In August of 1912, Violet attends her first dinner party. It’s meant to attract potential bidders for her defloration six months later. Li instructs her to remain a pretty ornament and not call attention to herself. Despite this warning, Loyalty Fang, the party host, singles Violet out for attention. He asks her to sing a song, which she mangles badly, much to the delight of the other guests. Loyalty asks her to sit beside him and confesses that he knows her real identity. As a boy, Violet’s cat scratched him severely. Violet always assumed he died from infection as a result.

Loyalty’s father brought him to Lulu’s house when he was 17 to get a taste of the good life. He tells her:

He said that when I became a success, I would be able to visit however often I wanted. Just being there caused excruciating yearning for romance, and I was angry my father had shown me the delights and then denied them to me (288).

Loyalty vowed to become richer and more successful than his father and succeeded. He’s since grown complacent and needs a spark of yearning to restore his drive. He believes that Violet can bring that inspiration back into his life.