“Young lady, don’t worry. I won’t look at your feet.”
The man across from me spoke with utter seriousness.
He claimed to know a little medicine and wanted to set my bones.
I spat at him at once. “Bah! You lecher! Who needs you!”
A faint curve lifted the corner of his mouth. “Oh? So unyielding? Then just wait to become a limping beauty.”
As he spoke, he mimed hobbling along.
I was so angry I wanted to smash the steamed bun in my hand against his head.
But—
I couldn’t bear to.
Out here in the wilderness, Xiao Yin and I had not brought much dry rations.
I had already counted: four steamed buns and eight flatbreads left.
There was no one under heaven more unlucky than me. I had taken a boat to my husband’s family to complete the marriage, only to run into bandits on the way. After finally escaping, I injured my foot. Then I even ran into this lecher who, like me, had fled from the passenger boat. Wherever I went, he followed; I simply could not shake him off.
Dusk was deepening. The last wisp of sunset glow was like a little tail that could not be caught, slipping away.
Pain came in waves from my foot, and I endured it without making a sound. Xiao Yin cried, “Miss, at a time like this, what’s the use of some wretched reputation… Why not let this young master try…”
Xiao Yin was my personal maid.
She was also the only dowry my maiden family, the Zhu residence, had given me.
A sack of coarse dry rations, a bundle of old changes of clothes, and one maid—they had sent me out the door just like that.
As for a dowry, there was none at all.
My stepmother, the current madam of the Zhu residence, Lin Yue, had waved her hand and said, “Eldest Miss, have a safe journey.”
My father, Master Zhu, had perfunctorily exhorted me with a few words like “When you arrive at your husband’s family, do not disgrace our household,” and after speaking, he turned back into the residence with Lin Yue.
I smiled.
People all said: better a beggar for a mother than an official for a father.
A maiden family?
What was a maiden family?
For a girl whose birth mother was gone, what maiden family was there?
As I was thinking this, the man somehow hobbled over to my side.
Without warning, he grabbed my foot and gave it a sharp twist.
There was a crack.
The piercing pain made me suck in a breath of cold air.
He turned his back, lifted his head, and laughed heartily. “Young lady, I truly didn’t look at your feet.”
Xiao Yin crouched beside me and asked nervously, “Miss, how is it? Is it better?”
I moved my ankle.
This lecher did indeed have some skill.
After the bone was set, the burning, swollen sensation slowly receded.
Night fell.
The mountain wind swept through the verdant pine forest.
The man propped up his chin. “Young lady, I healed you. How should you repay me?”
I thought for a moment and said, “I’ll give you a piece of information as repayment.”
“What information?”
“On the boat, that servant boy who followed at your side was in league with the bandits.”
The smile on the man’s face vanished in an instant.
His eyes seemed steeped in ice.
“How do you know?”
“That night when we passed through Yanzhou, he got off the boat to fetch water and whispered with a scar-faced man on the bank. I happened to leave the cabin for some air and saw them. That scar-faced man was the leader among the bandits who robbed the boat today.”
“You’re certain you didn’t see wrong?”
“Absolutely not.”
During the Longqing reign, my maternal grandfather had served as a court painter, specializing in portraits. My mother had learned only the surface of his craft, yet she had already become famous throughout Dongchang Prefecture. I had grown up steeped in painting since childhood. By the age of nine, I could copy Gu Kaizhi’s Admonitions of the Instructress to the Court Ladies. My memory for human faces was meticulous in the extreme. How could I be mistaken?
I knew well that when one was away from home, the fewer troubles the better. I had not intended to tell him. But at this moment, I only wanted to settle accounts with him cleanly.
I was never used to accepting favors for nothing.
I did not wish to owe anyone.
Without a word, the man strode away.
I said to Xiao Yin, “Let’s hurry and go.”
“Miss, your foot…”
“It’s fine.”
I wanted to hurry to the Cheng family in Yangzhou Prefecture, take out the marriage contract, and complete the marriage as soon as possible.
This marriage had been arranged for me while my mother was still alive.
She said the Cheng family was a household of farming and study, diligent, plain, and indifferent to fame and fortune—a good place to belong.
My mother had left this world in the flower of her youth, yet she had worried over me for an entire lifetime.
A clear tear fell onto the back of my hand.
The moon swayed unsteadily within that tear.
“Wait!”
Behind us, the man was calling out.
“Just now, I went to a small market town by the official road and bought a carriage. Your foot is injured. You shouldn’t walk a long distance.”
There was sweat on his forehead. He must have hurried.
“Fifty li west is a ferry crossing. I asked around. Tomorrow at the hour of chen, a passenger boat heading south will pass through.”
I hesitated, unsure whether I should get into the carriage.
He said, “Many thanks to you, young lady, for informing me today. You have done me a great favor. External thieves are easy to recognize; household thieves are hard to guard against. That servant boy is only the beginning. There may be greater trouble to come. I need to turn north and handle some matters. We part here!”
After thinking it over, I thanked him and got into the carriage with Xiao Yin.
The man said from behind me, “I am Qin Mingxu. Might I ask the young lady’s esteemed name?”
I raised the horsewhip.
“A chance meeting like duckweed on water. Why need we know each other’s names?”
“Until we meet again!”
He waved his hand.
The carriage began to run.
He seemed to mutter something else.
The wind brushed past my ears, and I did not hear clearly.
Xiao Yin said, “Miss, this servant seemed to hear Young Master Qin say just now that the Cheng residence is terribly dangerous, and that Miss should take care…”
“Nonsense. He doesn’t even know my name, so how would he know I’m going to the Cheng residence?”
Xiao Yin said in confusion, “Then perhaps this servant misheard…”
By the time we reached the ferry crossing, night was already deep.
The ripples on the river reflected the moonlight, especially gentle.
Xiao Yin and I sat at the ferry crossing and waited all night. When the hour of chen came the next day, sure enough, a boat arrived.
We sold the carriage on the bank, exchanged it for a little travel money, and boarded the boat.
All the way south.
By dusk, we heard someone outside the boat call, “Yangzhou Prefecture has arrived—”
Southern Zhili.
Yangzhou Prefecture.
On both banks of the canal, taverns, eateries, and shops hung all sorts of signboards. They crowded densely along the streets paved with bluestone, like beads on an abacus, plumply jostling together, clicking out the weights and measures of the world.
What a scene of prosperity.
Xiao Yin and I walked as we asked for directions, and in the time it took to drink a cup of tea, we found the Cheng residence.
A grand Guangliang gate.
Red lanterns hung on both sides.
Two tall stone lions stood to the east and west.
More than ten officers in canal-army uniforms stood at the entrance with sabers at their waists.
I was astonished: Mother had said the Cheng family was a household of farming and study. Why were there so many officers outside the residence?
Xiao Yin smoothed the wrinkled corner of my clothes, her face timid.
I walked forward slowly. Those officers seemed not to see me at all. Instead, a gatekeeper swaggered over arrogantly, looked me up and down, and said, “Who are you? What are you here for?”
I pondered briefly and said, “Please report to the Old Madam that the Zhu family of Dongchang Prefecture has arrived.”
Father had written a letter to the Cheng family.
The Old Madam should know I had come.
When the gatekeeper heard the words “Zhu family of Dongchang Prefecture,” he understood at once, as though someone above had already given him instructions.
With a smile that did not reach his eyes, he said, “This way, please—”
He did not welcome me through the main gate. Instead, he descended the stone steps and led me around more than half the residence. After a while, we arrived at a narrow, pitch-black side door, and only then did he say, “Please enter—”
Xiao Yin tugged at the corner of my clothes and whispered, “Miss, what does this mean…”
What did it mean?
The side gate was where concubines entered the residence.
The Cheng family was treating me as a concubine.
I said to the gatekeeper, “I want to see your Old Madam.”
“The Old Madam has taken the Eldest Young Madam to the temple to offer incense. She likely won’t be back today.” The gatekeeper cupped his hands. “Miss Zhu has had a tiring journey. Please enter the residence and rest.”
At this moment, if I entered through this door, I would have muddleheadedly accepted the status of “concubine.”
I smiled faintly and said to the gatekeeper, “Since the Old Madam has gone to offer incense, then please trouble yourself to pass on a message: I will not enter the residence today. I shall first go to the yamen and discuss matters there.”
“What are you going to the yamen for?”
“According to the Great Ming Code, taking a wife as a concubine is punishable by one hundred strokes of the rod. My maternal grandfather and the Cheng family’s old master were old friends. In the sixth year of Longqing, Madam Cheng and my mother arranged the marriage, sent the betrothal gifts, and exchanged the marriage contract. Now the marriage contract is in my hands, yet the Cheng family is receiving a wife with the rites of a concubine. Naturally, we should ask the magistrate to judge the matter.”
The gatekeeper’s expression changed.
He went inside the residence.
Only after quite some time did he come out and, most unwillingly, lead me through the main gate.
We passed through winding corridors, pavilions, terraces, and towers.
He brought me to a courtyard, said “please,” and then left.
“The Cheng residence truly treats people coldly,” Xiao Yin said, aggrieved.
Holding my luggage, I pushed open the door to a bedroom and said, “Since we have come, let us be at peace.”
Xiao Yin did not know that even now, my heart was still trembling.
There was no one left in this world to fight for me.
I could only fight for myself.
My fiancé—the Cheng residence’s second young master, Cheng Huaishi—what kind of person was he, in the end?
Was this journey to Yangzhou Prefecture right or wrong?
With many doubts in my heart and the fatigue of the jolting journey upon me, I fell asleep.
In my dream, lingering thoughts circled the canal.
“Miss, Miss, wake up!”
Xiao Yin was pushing me.
I opened my eyes and saw that dawn had only just begun to break.
“What is it?”
Xiao Yin’s voice carried a sob. “Miss! Just now, this servant accidentally overheard a few maids and servant boys of the Cheng residence talking. The second young master—your fiancé—has already died in Huizhou! They said the Old Madam has given orders, saying it was the calamity you brought with you that cursed the second young master to death, and that she wants to have us master and servant beaten to death and be done with it. Miss! What are we to do…”