Jade Guanyin Statuette

The Jade Guanyin Statuette is the valuable object Mr Auslander leaves for the old man to pass to the child he raised. Unwrapped from a bulky parcel, the palm-sized figure carries both the physical impress of exceptional craftsmanship and the emotional weight of a bequest whose intended recipient refuses it. The old man sees a treasure; the child sees something he cannot accept as his own.

Appearance and Material

The statuette first appears beneath the bed, wrapped in several layers of brown paper. Its parcel looks large, an impression the unwrapping corrects: inside is a figure small enough to hold in the palm. That shift from apparent bulk to compact object slows the scene around the act of revelation, making the statuette’s actual scale part of its introduction.

The figure is carved from mutton-fat jade, with a single dark sapphire set between the eyes as the urna, or Buddhist Third Eye. The old man handles it delicately and examines it closely. He senses an icy, pure aura spreading from his palm through his body, which he takes as evidence of the jade’s high quality. The workmanship, together with the material, suggests to him that the statuette has a long and complex history. Its value is not merely decorative: he judges that such a remarkable treasure must be worth a great deal of money.

A Bequest Passed Between Generations

The statuette enters the scene through an act of entrusted delivery. As the old man prepares to leave for the garden, the child calls him back and says that Mr Auslander left something for him. The child retrieves the parcel from beneath the bed and explains that Mr Auslander had told him to give it to the old man when he came. The object thus arrives with instructions linking three people: Mr Auslander, the child who calls him Daddy, and the old man who receives the parcel.

The old man pauses over the child’s use of Daddy, checking that he means Mr Auslander. Once the child confirms it, the relationship behind the bequest becomes explicit. Mr Auslander had taken the child in when he was only a baby and loved him as if he were his own son. The statuette is therefore not simply an unexplained gift from one man to another. It has reached the old man through the person Mr Auslander raised, and the exchange makes that parental bond newly visible.

The old man is unsure why Mr Auslander would leave him a bequest when, as he says, he hardly knew him. His uncertainty sets the object’s considerable market worth against the question of why it has been entrusted to him. The parcel’s message is carried not by an account of Mr Auslander’s motives, but by the child’s delivery of it and the old man’s recognition of the care that connected the giver to the child.

Refusal and Meaning

After appraising the statuette, the old man tells the child that it is worth a lot of money and that he should keep it. The child answers no. The old man then appeals to the history of his relationship with Mr Auslander: because Mr Auslander took the child in as a baby and loved him as a son, the child ought to accept the bequest. The answer is again no. The refusal persists even when the old man turns from price to the child’s place in Mr Auslander's life.

The old man finally says that the child needs the statuette more than he does. That appeal reframes the disagreement as a question of need rather than entitlement: the old man recognizes the child’s claim through Mr Auslander's love, while the child still refuses the object. The passage leaves the refusal unresolved. It does not say that the child accepts the figure, that it is sold, or who ultimately keeps it.

The statuette’s significance rests in this separation between material value and successful transfer. Its jade, sapphire, workmanship, and apparent history make it an exceptional possession; its passage through the child gives it the character of a family legacy. Yet the hand-to-hand exchange does not settle ownership. The old man’s delicate scrutiny and the child’s repeated refusal make the object conspicuous as both treasure and burden: the bequest can identify a bond, but it cannot compel its recipient to take possession.