Chapter 110

As autumn came on, after no end of fuss, Prince Rui'an at last moved in leisurely state from the Great Liang palace back to his own mansion.

He brought home his own set of attendants with him, of course, and poor Qi Qian'er was freed in a moment from the endless household toil.

In the old days, by her temper, she'd surely have found all this a trial, stood up, and walked off. But as, nail by nail and stone by stone, coin by coin and brick by brick, the Prince Rui'an mansion was built up anew, through trial upon trial she found she had grown.

The young ladies of other great houses, who from birth had learned at their mothers' knees by eye and ear, couldn't match the experience she'd gained in a few months of managing the household affairs with her own hands.

Luckiest of all, she was allowed to make mistakes, allowed to go back on them, and when she learned a hard lesson there was someone to clean up after her. That was happiness enough.

And she wasn't the only one to grow through all that repeated toil. Ge Sansu, sheltering in the house, the future wife of their Seventh, had grown too.

Only, that growing came to an end at last when autumn came.

The books of rites say: the cool wind comes, the white dew falls, the cold cicadas cry, the hawk offers up the birds, and the killing begins. This year Great Liang had seen fair winds and timely rain, and once the grain was in the granaries, after the autumn wind, at the third mark of the noon hour, the autumn officers carried out the executions, and who knew how many heads fell to the ground.

Ge Sansu's family's lawsuit came at last to its end.

The Ge family's case, evil to the dregs and against all nature, cast off every human bond, and it stirred not only the Board of Punishments in Yanjing but moved the Son of Heaven to anger and shook the whole realm.

The case touched on morals and the bonds of kin, past the bearing of every class of people, and might be called the first great case since Great Liang opened its pot.

Cracking it was like unwinding a cocoon, and layer after layer peeled away, until the hundred-year-old Wu ink-trade house of Yanjing was dragged in, top to bottom.

The case fell under the fourth of the ten unpardonable crimes, the crime of monstrous unnaturalness, and so the chief offenders were every one cut in two at the waist and left three days in the marketplace, and the rest of the Wu family who had a hand in it were exiled ten thousand li to the frontier, never to return.

In a moment, the two great ink-houses of Ge and Wu, that had nourished so many generations of Yanjing's scholars, vanished into the dust.

And Ge Sansu, the wronged party in the case, had no easy time of it either.

You can imagine that if this girl kept her surname and walked the world as the orphan of the Ge house, she'd never be free of the world's gossip her whole life, and there'd always be someone who, under a kind name, gave her that needless pity, and little by little pushed the girl, who'd struggled so hard to climb out, back down into the abyss.

Luckily the boy Guan Si'er was thoughtful, and after keeping her company and comforting her often, he even used his own connections to arrange a Daoist nunnery a thousand li off, and sent Ge Sansu there to keep her mourning and take shelter.

And so the two of them were, in name, as good as settled on.

Early that day, Ge Sansu set out at last, and because her standing was a delicate matter, no one else of the house saw her off, though the Doctor sent a man with a card to give the girl courage.

The girl left today by water, and the boat was to be boarded at the Laixian dock, sixty li from Yanjing.

A line of unremarkable covered carts carried the sorrow-laden Ge Sansu out of the capital, and it was two hours before they reached Laixian.

Ge Sansu was to travel on the official boat of a fourth-rank officer posted south. A fourth-rank man was no small official of the court, and so, when they came, the great dock was put under a brief curfew to make it easy for the official's womenfolk to board.

Few came to see Ge Sansu off, only Chen Dasheng and his wife and Guan Si'er.

Chen Dasheng dismounted and fell to exchanging courtesies with the officer, while Qi Qian'er directed the maids and pages moving Ge Sansu's baggage, and over and over gave her instructions about this small thing and that.

A true elder sister and brother-in-law could have done no more.

Ge Sansu had said little all the while, and only when two steady, mature serving-women helped her onto the gangplank did her whole face show its grief. The wind was high at the water's edge, and the older woman quickly raised her sleeve to shield her and soothe her. "Don't cry whatever you do, miss, the wind's high here, mind it doesn't chap your face."

The other urged her too. "It's getting late now, and there's a good wind, so let's get aboard early."

Ge Sansu did not stir, but pushed aside the sleeve before her and gazed hard off toward the imperial city, while some deep, bitter memories wandered through her heart. Who knew where her thoughts went, but she let go the serving-woman's hand, came back down the gangplank, walked up before Qi Qian'er, slowly knelt, and knocked her head to the ground, straight and proper.

She knew well that if the Chen family hadn't had eyes and hands reaching to the heavens, able to shield her, then once the case was closed, with so great a fortune sitting there, whether she'd have lived at all would have been another matter.

Qi Qian'er hurried to stop her, but Ge Sansu was looking toward the young man not far off.

The young man was handsome of face, tall and straight. He wore a plain blue cloth robe, his cloak flying in the wind, and seeing Ge Sansu look at him at last, he dragged out a smile.

Qi Qian'er took hold of Ge Sansu and urged her quickly, "Get up, sister, what are you doing?"

Ge Sansu wept. "Sister, brother-in-law, your great kindness, I, I'll be going now."

Qi Qian'er quickly raised her up, stroked the girl's shoulders, worn thin as a bundle of kindling, and comforted her. "Go on. Go and rest and mend yourself. All the burdens of yesterday we can't undo, but a person has a whole life to live, so set your heart at ease. You have a home, you have me, and you have our Seventh. The Seventh says the hill over there is a fine, elegant place, and the master who keeps the mountain is an amusing sort. Three years will go quickly."

Ge Sansu nodded, meant to smile, but had forgotten how to.

She sniffed, and turned at last to speak to Guan Si'er. "Then, then I'll be going."

Guan Si'er nodded, stepped forward, and walked at her side to see her aboard, saying as they went, "Once you're there, stay with your mind at ease. Don't be afraid of anything, I'll see to it all. Those with you are people the sister-in-law trusts. If, if you're ever idle, send them down often to the posting-station at the foot of the hill to look, and I, I'll write to you."

Ge Sansu stared at him, trying hard to fix his face in her memory. She was no smooth talker, and of a thousand words to say, in the end she said only, "I understand."

Guan Si'er had said these things more than once, but she wanted to hear them still, and only hearing them did she feel she had something to lean on.

Guan Si'er was loath to let her go, and shy as well, and at the moment of the gangplank he plucked up his courage and put out a hand to steady her, and Ge Sansu, gathering the greatest courage of her life, caught his hand tight and let him hand her aboard.

With a cat's-claw ache in his heart, Guan Si'er said, his face flushed, "The card, the card I gave you, keep it safe whatever you do. If, if there's ever trouble on the mountain, take my card down and ask the county magistrate for shelter."

Ge Sansu had thought she wouldn't cry, that she'd be weak no longer, but at the instant the boat raised its sail and left the shore she suddenly clung to the rail and said out loud, "Then you... you must write often."

In all this world, if this one too forgot her, there'd be no one left to remember her.

Guan Si'er nodded hard and waved to her in earnest. "Aye! I understand, go on in! The wind's high... I'll write the moment I'm back..."

The boat drew farther and farther off, and Guan Si'er and Ge Sansu gazed at each other, lovesick. They both knew one thing: once they'd been poor wanderers at the world's edge, lonely, adrift, with no tie to anyone, and now, the life that was theirs had grown a little more full at last.

The boats drew farther off, and faintly he heard the serving-woman say again, "Good girl, don't cry whatever you do, let's go in now, the wind's high here, and if you take a chill and sicken, the young master will worry..."

Guan Si'er stood there, and after a good while suddenly shook his head with a laugh. "Young, young master? Tss!"

Once the official boat left the shore, the merchant boats, passenger boats, and fast boats that had long been waiting crowded in to the dock, and the laborers touting for work on the bank and the families come to meet their kin all surged forward.

In a moment the dock was a bustle.

Seeing his brother so loath to leave, Chen Dasheng went over and clapped his shoulder. "Come away, you can't see her anymore. Take it slow. Look at me, didn't I wait near three years myself?"

Qi Qian'er snorted a laugh and gave Chen Dasheng a sidelong look.

Guan Si'er still wouldn't leave, and Chen Dasheng could only go on, "She's really out of sight now. Aiyo, son-in-law, best you get home early too, don't catch a chill and set our little Seventh's lady worrying?"

The first time the boy had ever been teased so, his face flushed red at once and he said low, "Brother! What are you saying? All these people, listen to what you're saying?"

Qi Qian'er, hearing Chen Dasheng carry on so, raised a hand and gave him a swat, and said to Guan Si'er with a smile, "Your big brother's been so spoiled by your teacher he's turning boyish. Look at him, where's the big brother in him now? A few days back he was fighting Qingguan's Youtian over a cat to play with, and went and teased the child to tears."

Chen Dasheng scratched his head, his eyes full of contentment, and turning he saw good river fish for sale at the dock, so he took out money and had a page go buy some to bring home, to give Father something fresh tonight.

Seeing Ge Sansu off was like sending off a new life, and though Guan Si'er, standing on the bank, was loath to part, his mood slowly brightened. Watching his big brother and sister-in-law buy fish to eat, he didn't go over to join the fun, but thought: the water before him joined to that person, and while he stood here it was not quite parting.

Having bought a heap of river-fish, Chen Dasheng handed Qi Qian'er up into the carriage, and seeing his brother unwilling to go, he unfastened a long whip from his own waist, went over, and coiled it round Guan Si'er's.

Yanjing's rules grew stricter by the day, and a long saber, once drawn, took a life. So of necessity these years they'd trained in a few other arts of self-defense, and for an ordinary fight the whip was the lightest of them, and spared you leaving no one alive.

Having coiled it on for his brother, Chen Dasheng charged him, "Stay if you want to stay, but have a care. This Laixian dock is the ground of the old Canal Gang and the old merchant guild, and it's full of loafers and idlers and no end of petty thieves. Don't go the way of your brother Jintai, who walked his wife round the six-markets crossing once, a grand old saber, and let someone lift his wife's purse clean off her."

Guan Si'er nodded with a smile, saw his brother and sister-in-law off into the carriage, and when they were out of sight he found a quiet height near the dock and, hands clasped behind him, looked out at the water in the distance.

The dock was a bustle, and the most of what came and went was a kind of small covered fast boat. The big brother said that now the waterways were clear, one man working a boat like this, carrying goods between two nearby docks, could keep a whole family, old and young.

He reckoned the time: Sister Su should have reached the next dock by now? Their official boat was so big, and there was a good wind today... no, no, the river-fish here was good, and those serving-women were steady and knew how to care for a person, so at noon would they make Sister Su something to whet her appetite too, to ease the ache of longing?

It was a strange thing to think of, too. He'd never thought he'd lose his heart to a woman like Sister Su, and he couldn't fathom why so much tenderness had risen in him for the Ge Sansu caught in that hopeless corner, nor why, that day, he'd told that woman his whole history, that he'd never spoken aloud to anyone, and hidden not a scrap of it.

And afterward, watching her master her grief and grow stronger day by day, he was lost.

It made sense, too. The seven of them, brothers, were low-born, but strong of spirit, and out of their unwillingness to yield grew a will to wrestle with Heaven itself.

If they loved, it was bound to be their own kind: like the sister-in-law Qian'er, who gave way to no man; the sister-in-law Yuniang, tough of spirit, who could carry a whole family on her back; the sister-in-law Wanru, cheerful through all slander and unafraid of gossip...

In private, Brother Yougui had joked too that for wretches like them, come to such a dead end, so black you couldn't see the bottom, perhaps even the gods and Buddhas couldn't bear it, and had sent down a troop of women bodhisattvas to save them.

Guan Si'er, lost in his thoughts, didn't know that standing on the bank he'd become a sight himself.

The handsome young man, with his air of rank, stood on the height looking into the distance, his eyes full of feeling, and as the river wind blew and his cloak flew up, he laughed.

Guan Si'er wasn't one to smile much out of doors, having borne and endured and suffered year in and year out, so when he did smile it had the glory of the third month's spring in bloom.

No end of boat-women, poling their craft, went back and forth before him on purpose, and some laughed sweetly on purpose to draw his notice, but a pity, this one's heart was given, and his whole heart and eyes held only his Sister Su.

Before he knew it the time slipped by, boats came and boats went, and another merchant boat drew in. With a clatter the gangplank joined boat to shore, and a crowd of young men in square scholars' kerchiefs, not old, bright-faced and lively, pressed together at the bow in a merry throng.

One of the younger students pointed off into the distance, excited, and cried, "Teacher, look! Such high city walls! This must be Yanjing!"

The crowd below the boat roared with laughter at once, and a rough fellow standing on a sack joked at him, "That's Laixian, not Yanjing! Yanjing's walls reach to the sky, ever so high. The little scholar's seen wrong!"

The young man's face flushed red, and he wanted to push out of the crowd, but he heard someone behind him say, "It was right to bring you out, sure enough. Up on the mountain you read hard every day, but it was all blind men feeling the elephant, guessing by fancy. That over there is the county town of Laixian, and the walls were finished with silver the new dynasty laid out.

"And this here is the largest dock on this canal. I read in the county yamen's gazette coming down the mountain that this dock was, after our Emperor took the throne, one of the first water-and-land works built with money from Great Liang's treasury, under the direction of Master Qingling.

"Under the old dynasty the realm fell into such ruin that the people couldn't make a living, and then Heaven appointed an enlightened sovereign to settle the world. Since our Emperor took the throne he has toiled and striven, and through much hardship there are at last signs of Great Liang coming into its prime. Watching the court's measures these two years, I think: the realm has gone two hundred years without bringing forth a famous minister, and if one is to come, it must be in this reign!"

From of old, for fear the people would band together, there was that thing called the travel-permit, and those who could range all over the realm at will were all special people. Such as this boatload of foolish students from out of town, who were traveling scholars, allowed the privilege.

The sight of a teacher taking his beloved disciples to lecture through all the south and north had not been seen for many years.

But as Great Liang grew steady, and two rounds of examinations including the grace exam had passed, these traveling scholars began again to range the realm in bands.

On the merchant boat the students parted to left and right, and the teacher, making the most of the time to lecture, paced slowly to the bow with his hands behind him, and, gazing at this new realm with feeling too, began to hold forth to his students:

"In every dynasty and age, whatever emperor took the throne, the traffic north and south and the carrying of goods were things the ruler cared for. As they say, if the grain-boats fail to come for three months, the sovereign and his ministers worry; if for six, the people of the capital weep... Our academy has stood through three dynasties, and holds seventy scrolls surveying the water and land routes of every age, and now there are new canal docks too. Beyond your books, you must set down these new things for those who come after to consult. That, beyond rank and fame, is the duty a scholar must bear."

The students all bowed together and said yes, and the sound and the sight of it were a particular pleasure to hear and see, like a scene in its glory.

The teacher had perhaps spent half his life teaching, and was used to speaking out clear before all eyes, so his lecturing voice carried a long way.

Guan Si'er, standing on the bank, heard it too, but did not turn his head, only thought with quiet gladness: "So the teacher at home stands this high in the hearts of scholars."

He listened with his eyes narrowed, but did not look.

This band of frail scholars traveled with plenty of baggage, of course, and the teacher, warming to his lecture, came down off the boat hands behind him, leading his troop of little fools.

Those who could afford to study were young lords of well-off houses, naturally, and as they came off the boat, the great heap of chests and cases was carried and lugged and stacked on the dockside, and caught the eye.

The house-guards and servants were busy and paid no heed to what was around them, and the young lords, young and fond of finery, with the teachers not watching for a moment, had hung all sorts of gold and jade trinkets on themselves before coming ashore.

Traveling the realm to study, one must needs learn a bit of everything, of course.

The moment their feet touched the bank, the teacher led the students round the dock asking: what goods are these? Where from? Where bound?... And what tool is this, what's it worth, and how much labor does it save?

The Martial Emperor loved talent, but in the end a practical kind, and for poetry and verse he had no interest at all, even some dislike.

For the realm's scholars sitting the examinations, the academies everywhere had always had their ways and methods, and would shape the students' interests to the ruler's tastes and widen what they knew.

The teacher taught well and the students loved to learn, and the whole band went to and fro, a fine sight to begin with, the speaker warming to it and the hearers glad.

But all at once Guan Si'er heard a shrill, high scream, "Help, someone! They're robbing us... help!"

He whipped his head round to look, and saw, not far off at the edge of a winch, four or five mean-faced petty thieves, no good men by their looks, come off a fast boat and in a moment ring the band of students.

These few didn't hurt anyone, but swarmed in, picked their targets, shoved over a few of the more delicate students, snatched the things at their waists, and ran.

They did such business often and were all quick about it, and in a moment they'd robbed their men and turned and leapt onto the fast boat waiting in the water.

The fast boat's man set a long pole against the bank, gave one push, and in a moment was cleanly off from the shore.

The people around thought nothing of it, ashamed perhaps in their hearts, but not daring to cross these few rogues.

The teacher, seeing his students robbed, was furious of course, and pointed at the rogues on the fast boat and cursed them loudly, "In the bright light of day, at the Son of Heaven's own feet! Do you not fear the officers will chain you up?"

The rogue at their head didn't care a whit, and tossed the jade pendant up and down in his hand, laughing. "Serves you right, you stinking scholars fit to fall flat! Of the whole dock it's only you, old dog, with your loud voice, spoiling your grandfather's good dream, so who should I rob if not you? Pah! The Son of Heaven's feet, is it? The officers will chain us up, is it? Go ask around. Here at Laixian dock the officers are worth a ball's curse. I'm grandfather to that pack of dogs, you old dog, believe it or not..."

The words weren't out before, from the height at the water's edge, a man came leaping over like a white crane, and the moment he landed on the fast boat he gave the few rogues a fright.

The rogues, long used to facing down wronged folk and officers, had their own ways of getting clear, and seeing a man who could fly they knew he was not to be meddled with, so they each stuffed the things into their coats and made to bolt into the water.

Guan Si'er had just been listening, pleased, to a man praising the sage sovereign and worthy ministers. In all this world, besides his brothers, the ones he revered most were his teacher and the Emperor, and since the Emperor cared for them too, he liked them the better, and thought this teacher's lecturing the finest in all Great Liang.

Damn it, who'd have thought that these out-of-town scholars, their feet barely touching Yanjing's mud, would have its good name spoiled for them by these few turtle-spawn.

Guan Si'er leapt onto the boat, and seeing the few rogues making for the water, he reached out and took the whip at his waist, and with a crisp crack in the air, the students stamping and shouting on the bank stared open-mouthed to see this godlike man coil the whip round the damned thieves and fling them onto the shore.

These were living men of a hundred-odd jin each. How did he fling them as easily as weightless goods? It was a thing to open your eyes.

The rogues had meant to drop into the water, but as they sprang up the whip coiled them, and one by one they fell onto the bank and rolled.

These men were tough too, and after rolling a few times, seeing how things stood, they scrambled up to run, never thinking the flying man from the boat was one of great skill.

He leapt onto the bank again and plied the single whip with ease on every side, cracking it loud, and the few of them scurried with their heads covered, but he laid their faces all over with whip-marks, and gave each a few hard strokes about the body besides, so that they howled without stop.

They were only a few petty thieves, and Guan Si'er beat them easily, but his hand was heavy. Loathing them for the shame of it, he showed no mercy when they begged, and laid a good seventeen or eighteen hard strokes on each thief, and only when he saw them gone limp did he neatly draw in the whip and coil it up again.

The beating was done very quickly, by the time everyone took it in.

Before the great sacks on the dock they lay sprawled every which way, while the man who'd beaten them sat quite at his ease on a sack, looking coldly at the few of them. "Just now, I seem to have heard that dog bark that he was whose grandfather?"

Only now did the teacher, and the students' house-guards and pages, come to themselves and crowd round again.

A few of the quick ones went over, gave the rogues a few kicks, bent and took their masters' things out of their coats, and, afraid of being blamed and quaking inside, a page raised them in both hands before his master. "Young, young master, your jade pendant!"

But his young master paid him no mind at all, and pushed him aside.

The whole band of students had had a great shock, and stared open-mouthed, looking at that face so familiar, so nearly the very same, that was, that was flogging people with a great whip?

Only last month they'd wept their farewells to their senior schoolmate at the dock back home. How had he, in the turn of a moment, come to Laixian dock?

No, no! Their senior schoolmate was a bit older than this one, surely?

One student understood at last, and called out trembling, "Teach, teacher, I thought for a moment I saw our senior schoolmate?"

But his teacher too had long since been struck dumb. This man, the very image of his own second son, stood plying a great whip and flogging people on the dock. Could it, could it be him?

At one possibility, his breast churned like a sea of terrible waves.

But before he could say anything, from beyond the crowd came the officers, late in arriving, shouting all the way, "Make way, make way, don't hold up the lord's business, make way or mind the lord's chains..."

When they came up near with their iron chains, they saw a few wretched faces covered in whip-marks.

Guan Si'er, seeing the patrol come at last, crooked a finger at them a little impatiently. "Come here!"

The two officers looked at each other, and were just about to ask who Guan Si'er was.

But he wasted no words, hopped down off the sack, drew a token from behind his waist, and flashed it at them. "At the Son of Heaven's feet, a vital place joining north and south, how has it fallen into such disorder? Go and call your commanding officer here..."