That night, after bathing, the palace attendants had retired to the servants quarters, and there in privacy, the new maidservant was told the whole story behind the cat incident, and the reason behind the Empress's palace being surrounded by extra watchers.
But before we hear ourselves of this story some other events took place.
Su Li stood before Ylang who knew the moment she saw her face that she'd be in trouble.
Su Li had her lips pressed together in a way that looked almost reptilian; and glaring at Ylang with her brows sloped back, she drew her hand and slapped the young girl across the face.
"We don't need another monkey!" she snarled.
Ylang clenched her teeth, her hands over her eyes. She knew that this slap garnered the anger from each and every one of the maids.
Irate at Ylang they truly were because the Empress ordered that all the maids in her retinue be denied serving of dried fish for eight weeks as punishment for the cat's intrusion.
Just then the maids heard a cracking noise from the floorboards in the direction of the doorway.
The Senior Palace Maid was watching them—the hair knotted tightly at the back of her head was mostly grey with only a few black peekaboo strands. And to sum up her appearance, one could say she did not look like anything special at all.
All the maids bowed to her in unison.
The Senior Palace Maid dried the tears from Ylang's face with a handkerchief she took from the sleeve of her plain blue robe.
Though her voice sounded as soft as honey, it wasn't dripping with sweetness.
"Now listen foolish girl, if you don't want to make an enemy of your colleagues, drilled this into your head: the curse is not real. Also, if you wish to be in my good books you'd better perform your duties diligently and not be causing anymore trouble. As punishment, for the next eight weeks you will assist the workers in cleaning the latrines of every department."
A girl, thirteen or perhaps fifteen, was standing at the threshold between the corridor and the dormitory. Well, one could say she did look like something special—with a slightly yellow plump and almost perfectly round face, she looked like a melon. Her small eyes resembled two spoiled sultanas, and her hair was crinkled and crisp as curly endives. She seemed more suited to work in the kitchen, thought some of the maids.
One could imagine that such a face might have been chiselled by a sculptor who had just observed a lengthy ceremonial fasting.
The girl had witnessed the whole bitter interaction between the maids and Ylang with quite a baffled expression—the tip of her tongue stuck out like a little melon stem. And the corners of her lips sank into little creases filled with unease.
"Why, it's a novice!" exclaimed one of the maids. "We really shouldn't speak of the curse because it might frightened the poor thing."
At that the Senior Palace Maid warned: "All of you listen carefully: I forbid you of ever mentioning again that curse, or else you will be cleaning the toilets with your tongue!"
Her brows knotted fiercely above her scowling eyes.
They nodded understandingly.
Then she placed the novice's luggage on the top of her designated bed, and after briefly introducing the girl to her new colleagues the old lady simply left.
The novice had completed her training in palace manners and etiquette and she had been selected as the Empress's new wardrobe attendant.
And gossips jumped in all directions across the room:
"So you are the new girl replacing Wugamata." … "I heard she has fled the palace with her boyfriend." … "The guy from the kitchen?" … "No, no, no, I heard it was one of the Empress's household guard. He went missing overnight at the same time as our Wugamata." … "Maybe she and the guard didn't flee at all…"
And all the maids turned towards the novice with a devilish grin.
"Their bodies were found dead in the Park of Eternal Spring." … "The park is one bridge away from the Empress's gardens." … "The rumour is that both of them had their hearts missing!" … "Missing, you said?" … "Hmm, ripped out of their chest!" … "It is the curse of the nekomata cat!"
The maids glanced at each other sideways, the sound of their giggles unexpectedly muffled by a terrible gust of wind, the sort that rattled the window-panels, and it almost startled them.
The novice was sitting on the edge of her bed. A strange weight was on her limbs.
The maids clearly observed they had piqued her curiosity and sparked dread.
"Of course everything was kept quiet with a cover up story." … "They said that Wugamata was in a forbidden love affair with a guard, became pregnant, and so they fled to avoid punishment." … "But it was the curse of the nekomata who killed them."
The girl eagerly asked, revealing rather prominent teeth previously covered by bulbous lips, "What is the curse of the nekomata?"
"Novice, do you not know that cats are banned from the inner palace because of the curse?"
Su Li rolled her eyes and slipped into her bed. "Girls, you really shouldn't tell her such stories unless you wish her to cause a rumpus like Ylang."
"But I really want to hear the story of the curse," whispered the novice.
The maid with matted lashes teased, asking around: "Girls, shall we?"
Someone answered, "And scare the poor novice who's just joined us?"
"Novice, I'll tell you only if you promise that you will go to the Park of Eternal Spring, remain there for one hour and manage to stay alive…" challenged the maid with matted lashes.
The novice kept as still as a stone and hardly seemed to be breathing at all. When at last the maids laughed as if they'd made a great joke.
"Let's see… Where should I begin the story?"
They were kneeling on cushions, wearing white cotton robes. The moonshine mingled in the ghostly hours of night with the dim flames of the candles, sending forth contorted shadows on their faces.
"It all started fifteen years ago.
"The breath of the person dying on the bed was thin and weak, the expression in the eyes awfully dim and frail, the skin vampire-white, however the resolution in her voice left no room for misinterpretation when she cursed Empress Yū Miko, saying—"
Heavy footsteps heard from the corridor interrupted the story. They quickly blew out the candles and slithered silently into their beds.
The footsteps approaching the doorway didn't slow down their pace but continued along the corridor.
Not long afterwards, when the sounds of boots could not reach their ears, the storyteller rubbed her matted lashes and began again:
"It all started fifteen years ago…"