Chapter 6 — The Mask Isn't Real

Cao Nha Uyen's small gallery is located in a quiet alley near Truc Bach lake, the ground floor displays lacquer paintings and ceramics, the second floor is where she receives regular customers. Uyen Nhi walked up the creaking wooden stairs, still holding the paper bag containing the mask Ms. Hang bought from Doan The Vinh's store.

"You brought evidence with you?" Nha Uyen looked at the bag in Uyen Nhi's hand, trying to keep her voice gentle, but her eyes were somewhat cautious right from the first greeting.

"I want you to see this." Uyen Nhi placed the mask on the tea table, without beating around the bush, turned it straight into her mouth to reveal the old-fashioned crescent moon mark. "I bought it at a souvenir shop on Hang Nan Street yesterday, priced at eight and a half million, with a fake certificate of origin. The owner said the goods were delivered from a mysterious factory, late at night, the delivery person was unknown."

Nha Uyen picked up the mask and looked under the living room light. Her face didn't change much, but her hand holding the mask was a little tighter than necessary.

"Can you fully tell me what happened between my teacher and Phan Khac Tuyen?" Uyen Nhi asked directly, her eyes never leaving Nha Uyen's face. "I found his name in old books, the same year that you changed the way you engraved the secret seal. And I found a page of notes about a batch of damaged goods, losing a big contract, that same year."

Nha Uyen put the mask down on the table, slowly, as if she was trying to buy time to rearrange something in her mind. She stood up, went to the window, and looked out at the small yard below for a long moment before turning back.

"Are you sure you want to know?" Her voice was lower, no longer her usual warmth. "Because once I say it, you won't be able to treat your teacher the same way again."

Uyen Nhi felt her heart skip a beat. "What do you mean by that?"

"Twenty-two years ago, the factory received a large order — two hundred masks for an international delegation, using herself as a bridge, because at that time she had just begun to expand her network of foreign customers." Nha Uyen sat down again, her hands clasped together on her knees. "The order was urgent, only three weeks to complete, but the normal paper making process requires drying each layer in the shade for many days. Tuyen was the best student at that time, his teacher trusted him to be in charge of mixing the paste for the whole large batch."

"Then the batch went bad." Uyen Nhi spoke softly, almost like a question.

"Nearly half of the masks had peeling paper or cracked paint after delivery, because the glue used to make the paste was mixed with cheap preservatives instead of glutinous rice paste cooked according to the traditional recipe - that substance helped the glue dry much faster, on schedule, but caused the paper layers to not adhere firmly to each other over time. Customers returned nearly half of the batch, demanded compensation, and never came back to order again. It was a big shock to the factory at that time, both in terms of money and reputation."

"And who is to blame?"

Nha Uyen looked down at her hands and was silent for so long that Uyen Nhi thought she wouldn't answer. "Tuyen. Because he is the last person to mix the paste, the one who checks the batch before serving. My teacher, in anger at losing a big contract, fired him that very week, without giving him much of a chance to explain."

"But you said it in a tone like it wasn't his fault."

Nha Uyen looked up, her eyes for the first time in the conversation reflected a real torment, no longer the cautiousness from before. "I'm not completely sure, dear. I only know that at that time, in the workshop there was another apprentice, a few years younger than Tuyen, in charge of preparing ingredients. That person once arbitrarily experimented with adding preservatives to the paste to shorten the drying time, saying he wanted to help keep up the schedule, but did not inform anyone, including Tuyen."

"Who is that person?"

A long silence enveloped the room, with only the steady sound of the ceiling fan spinning and the sound of traffic in the distance in the alley. Nha Uyen took a deep breath, as if she had to muster up all her courage to say the next sentence.

"It's your cousin. Cao Xuan Tung."

Uyen Nhi sat still, letting that name settle in her mind, trying to fit it into the picture that had just been drawn in front of her. "So why didn't you tell the truth at that time, to save Tuyen from being unfairly fired?"

"Because you're scared." Nha Uyen's voice choked. For the first time in many years of acquaintance, Uyen Nhi saw this always calm woman reveal a moment of true weakness. "Tung was only nineteen years old at that time. Her family had a lot of hope for him. His mother - her aunt - passed away early, leaving him as his grandfather's only comfort. She was afraid that if the truth came out, he would be kicked out and have a bad reputation for life, and Tuyen... she thought he was brave enough to stand up after that, good enough to find another place. She thought wrong."

Uyen Nhi felt a dull anger rising in her heart, not explosive anger, but a cold disappointment, slowly spreading like water soaking into paper. She remembered all the times Nha Uyen visited the workshop, brought cakes and fruits, asked kindly, sat with her for hours telling stories about her teacher's past - but never once, not even once, was the name Phan Khac Tuyen mentioned in full. "You remained silent for twenty-two years. And your teacher, until he died, did he ever know the truth?"

"I'm not sure." Nha Uyen shook her head, her eyes were red. "But I think later on he gradually suspected something, because of the way he changed the secret mark that year, because of the way he never mentioned Tuyen again even though he never really forgot in his heart. Maybe he was also tormented, just didn't have the courage to go back to Tuyen to apologize, just like she didn't have the courage to tell the truth."

The room fell into a heavy silence. Uyen Nhi looked at the fake mask lying on the table, Ms. Hang's eyes were evenly drawn looking straight at her as if waiting for an answer that she herself did not yet have. Outside the window, a small boat rowed slowly on the surface of Truc Bach lake, the sound of oars splashing water echoed steadily, strange to everything that had just been said in this room.

She thought of her teacher in the last years of his life, how he would sit quietly for a long time before starting to label a new mask, sometimes so long that she thought he was losing concentration. Now she wondered if in those silences, he was thinking about a former student's face, a name he never allowed himself to mention, but also never really let go.

"Where is Cao Xuan Tung now?" She asked, her voice calm again.

Nha Uyen closed her eyes for a second, then opened them, looking straight at Uyen Nhi. "He's gone, dear. Traffic accident, fifteen years ago, on the way home from work. He never knew what he did to Tuyen — nor did I ever have the courage to tell him before he died."

Uyen Nhi was silent for a long time, feeling that the story she had just heard was not as simple as she thought when she entered this room. There were no clear villains in the past, only a series of choices of fear, silence, and unforeseen consequences that continue to this day.

"I need to find Tuyen." She stood up and packed the fake mask back into the paper bag. "It's not to blame him. I need to hear from him himself, what pushed someone who was once my teacher's best student, to become the person behind these fake goods."

Nha Uyen nodded and quickly wiped the corners of her eyes. "I'll help you find him. I still have his family's old address, though I'm not sure if it's still correct now. But Uyen Nhi—" she took her hand, her voice pleading, "—no matter what happens, remember that Tuyen was not a bad guy from the beginning. He was once a good person, very good at best."

Uyen Nhi nodded, but in her heart, the biggest question was no longer whether Tuyen was good or bad, but how good a person could be, before twenty-two years of injustice and hardship turned them into a completely different person.

At the foot of the stairs, she stopped and turned her head to look up. Nha Uyen was still standing there, a lone figure in the middle of the gallery window, the yellow light illuminating her face with wrinkles that Uyen Nhi had never noticed so closely before. She suddenly realized that this woman had carried that secret with her for more than twenty years, alone, with no one to share it with, no one to ask for forgiveness. Perhaps that is also a form of punishment, even though no one announced the sentence.

On the way home, sitting in the back of Nhat Vu's car - who patiently waited for her all afternoon at the iced tea shop at the end of the alley - Uyen Nhi told the whole story, her voice monotonous as if she was narrating something that did not belong to her. Nhat Vu listened silently, did not interrupt, only when she finished talking did she speak, her voice was much lower than her usual vivacity.

"So no one is really completely at fault, but everyone has their share." He said, looking straight at the road ahead. "That's much harder to handle than finding an obvious bad guy."

"I know." Uyen Nhi leaned her head on Nhat Vu's shoulder, watching the streetlights pass by in the darkness. "But I still need to find Phan Khac Tuyen. No matter how complicated the story is, those fake goods are still being sold every day, bearing my teacher's name."