Page:Romance of the Three Kingdoms - tr. Brewitt-Taylor - Volume 1.djvu/44

 She sent for her brother, and said, “I and you are of lowly origin and we owe our good fortune to the eunuchs. The misguided Chien Shih is now dead and need you really put all the others to death as Yüan Shao advises?”

And Ho Chin obeyed her wish. He explained to his party that the real offender having met his fate they need not exterminate the whole party nor injure his colleagues.

“Slay them, root and branch,” cried Shao, “or they will ruin you.”

“I have decided;” said Ho, coldly, “say no more.”

Within a few days Ho became a President of a Board and his friends received offices.

Tung T‘ai-hou summoned the eunuch Chang Jang and his party to a council. Said she, “It was I who first brought forward the sister of Ho Chin. To-day her son is on the throne and all the officials are her friends and her influence is enormous. What can we do?”

Jang replied, “Madam should administer the state from ‘behind the veil’; create the Emperor’s son Hsieh a prince; give ‘Uncle’ Tung high rank and place him over the army and use us. That will do it.”

Tung T‘ai-hou approved. Next day she held a court and issued an edict in the sense proposed. When Ho T‘ai-hou saw this she prepared a banquet to which she invited her rival. In the middle of the feast, when all were well warmed with wine, she rose and offered a cup to her guest saying, “It is not fitting that we two women should meddle in state affairs. Of old when Lü T‘ai-hou laid hands upon the government all her clan were put to death. We ought to remain content, immured in our palaces, and leave state affairs to the statesmen. That would be well for the country and I trust you will act thus.”

But the Empress Tung only got angry. “You poisoned the lady Wang out of jealousy. Now, relying upon the fact that your son sits on the throne and that your brother is powerful, you speak these wild words. I will command that your brother be beheaded and that can be done as easily as I turn my hand.”

Then Empress Ho in her turn waxed wroth and said, “I tried to persuade you with fair words; why get so angry?”

“You low born daughter of a butcher, what do you know of offices?” cried her rival.

And the quarrel waxed hot.

The eunuchs persuaded the ladies to retire. But in the night Ho T‘ai-hou summoned her brother into the palace and told him what had occurred. He went out and took counsel with the principal officers of state. Next morn a court was held and a memorial was presented saying that Tung T‘ai-hou, being the consort of a “frontier” prince—only a collateral—could not properly occupy any part of the palace. She was