Chapter 14

At the gate of the ancestral shrine in Quanhou Village, Madam Qiao held a tangled ball of cotton thread, hunting for the loose end of it, and a crowd of women with nothing to do gathered round her to help.

Today Madam Qiao wore a black narrow-sleeved undergarment, and over it a bamboo-green cotton-lined jacket, neither new nor old. She was a brisk, neat sort — pretty and winsome by nature, one thing; and her cleverness at taking the whole household, indoors and out, in hand, that anyone could see too.

Whenever she went out to face people, everything about her was edge to edge and corner to corner; even her black hair she'd smooth down straight and proper, a stickler who'd not let half a stray strand stand up.

Coming and going, this woman was always smiling and pleasant of speech, courteous to people, knowing when to press and when to yield, with manners and measure — which never failed to set off Old Madam Chen as sour and mean by contrast.

When the old woman had gone off on her own last night, Madam Qiao's heart had begun to be uneasy. She was one who thought too much to begin with, and her instinct told her that young wife was no good sort — though the girl hadn't exchanged half a sentence with her, the old woman had been so easily gathered up and led away by her?

What the old woman was like — was there anyone who knew it better than she did?

Were her good days over from here on? Then what of her livelihood, and her old mother and brother back home besides — how they'd scrape through this month there was no telling.

Tossing and turning through the night, Madam Qiao got up at the crack of dawn, dug out some tangled cotton thread she'd put away long ago, gathered a crowd of chatterboxes besides, and set to work at the gate of the ancestral shrine.

Those women, idle enough to grow mold, all came together at a single call.

Madam Guo-Yang, chewing salted beans, hunted for a thread-end and asked Madam Qiao: "Lanxiang, where'd you scare up this good stuff? And — you're really giving it to us?"

From the day Madam Qiao took up with the fourth son, she'd never once been this generous.

Madam Qiao smiled all virtue and grace; she first jogged the sleeping Xique'er in the sling on her back, then turned round with a "what's-to-be-done-with-you" air and said: "It's yours, it's yours! I'll have you sisters know, I was cheated on this. Only yesterday, at the crossroads, I saw those poor refugees — you didn't see them — those little children, ai! We're all mothers; who could bear it?"

She sighed with a pained look: "Ai! A whole bowl of beans I traded them for half a cartload of cotton thread — and wouldn't you know, only the top few skeins were any good; look at the state of the rest, all snarled together! I can't sort it all out by myself, but to throw it away would be to waste it... never mind! You sisters do a good deed — whoever winds a ball takes it home, and count it as helping me out."

Everyone laughed together.

A bargain to be had, and a bit of work to pass the time besides — these few had done well out of Madam Qiao, and their words turned to flattering her.

Busy as they were over here, the excitement at the infirmary-camp gate could hardly be hidden from them.

Catching sight of it, that ever-unwelcome Madam Gao spoke up: "Eh? So this is the sort of thread it is? And here I thought it was something! You wouldn't know — back in our prefectural city the yamen used to buy by the season, top cotton at a hundred and twenty cash the tael, and thread like this is spun from the low grade, fifteen cash the tael. You're generous indeed — a whole bowl of beans traded for this?"

Always "our prefectural city" this and "you wouldn't know" that — such was Madam Gao's usual grating way of talking: given a thing for free, she'd still pick holes in it. A thoroughly tiresome person.

Before, Madam Qiao wouldn't give Madam Gao the time of day, but today she'd invited her along. Madam Gao had always envied Madam Qiao's crowd: on the move with the army they helped one another out, and once they'd settled somewhere they liked to stay together for company.

A pity that the more she showed off what she knew, the less anyone would have to do with her.

No one having any use for Madam Gao's routine, she grew put out inside, and her tongue turned nastier still; she jerked her chin at Madam Qiao: "That's your family's old woman over there, isn't it?"

Madam Qiao stopped her hands, looked over with a smile, and answered as forbearingly as if nothing were the matter: "That's our old woman, all right! First thing this morning off she went with a few lengths of cloth bundled up, saying she'd fit out Scabby's wife with new clothes — just like a child! It used to be me who waited on her hand and foot; now she's seen the young one, it's the young one she waits on hand and foot, and won't let me say a word about it! Heh — tell me, sisters, isn't our old woman just like the doddering old child of the house?"

The women laughed, faces twitching, all thinking: how could Madam Qiao be such a simple, put-upon soul? And that old woman really did lord it over the honest ones.

Madam Gao blinked, reached out and gathered a big ball of cotton thread into her bosom, and, scraping it together, said with a knowing air: "Don't take it wrong, but you're a fool! What do you know next to me? That side's gone and latched onto rich folk — if I were you, I'd go over there; is the old woman going to drive me off?"

Madam Qiao went on working, still smiling: "Go over there and do what? There's a heap to do at home, and I mean to make the old woman a set of winter clothes besides — isn't that what I'm sorting this thread for?"

Big-voiced Madam Guo-Yang genuinely couldn't stand it, and said with a huff: "Right you are — indoors and out, you wait on the old woman, you drag the child about, never resting your hands at home or abroad; isn't waiting on her hand and foot enough? The other one's been here a single day — just look! That old hag simply bullies you for being honest! I'm fit to burst with anger on your behalf, and still you'd make her winter clothes — if it were me she'd not get a single hair off me, never mind winter clothes!"

Madam Qiao shook her head with an easy laugh, letting it pass: "Our old woman hasn't had it easy — these five years, how many of our family have we lost, would you say? Now there's only the old woman left, near seventy-something, and mustn't she be well looked after? One thing amiss, and when the fourth comes home tomorrow he'll beat me again..."

"Hmph — best not to mention that man of yours; and say what you like, he's one with a hard fate on him!"

---

The old woman had no idea she'd been talked about by Madam Qiao again; she was calling out to Hua'er, so worked up her hands and feet were trembling.

Chang Lianfang smiled at the old woman with a flash of big white teeth; she hurried over, meaning to be affectionate — but then, seeing Chang Lianfang's suit of fine armor and all the grand, resounding array of him, her nerve failed.

She took a step back, smiled awkwardly, and, not knowing what to say, waved both palms back and forth before her as if shooing chicks.

The person was still the child who'd once cried in her arms, but so lofty and exalted now — what was she to do? What if this child no longer owned her for his old granny?

But Chang Lianfang had a good heart: seeing the old woman, he was moved too, and reached back to take down the several-dozen-jin gilt tang slung across his back, leaning it against the camp's palisade.

The gilt tang was very heavy, and not set down steady it slid down along the edge. Chang Lianfang, caught up in the moment, took no notice.

Qi Qian'er, her back to the shrine, happened to be standing not far from the gilt tang; seeing it topple, without much thought she put out a hand to steady it — and the thing pressed on her palm about as much as a two- or three-jin old radish would, and the gilt tang was caught and held fast.

Then, feeling it wasn't right, she let go at once and clasped her hand behind her back.

There came a clang, and the gilt tang fell heavily to the ground, gouging a small pit in the earth on the spot.

At the sound everyone looked over, and seeing Qi Qian'er standing there blankly with one hand behind her back, the old woman asked in alarm: "Girl? What is it? You weren't frightened, were you?"

Mm — she was frightened, all right! Face white, Qi Qian'er looked at the old woman and shook her head.

The old woman explained anxiously to Chang Lianfang: "The girl's seen nothing of the world; she didn't knock it over on purpose — you mustn't hold it against her."

Chang Lianfang shook his head with a smile: "My fault, my fault! I didn't set it down steady and gave the little sister a fright."

At his words the old woman's heart lightened; laughing aloud, her awe forgotten, she went up and gave the lad a slap: "'Little sister,' nothing! This is your Brother Scabby's wife, your sister-in-law! You little Hua'er, still the same scatterbrained way about you — you only ever remembered your food, didn't you? Still fond of a good bawl?"

Some people are simply born unable to get along with others. Even with no malice in her, only wanting to show she cared, the things that came out of the old woman's mouth put people badly out of sorts — whatever it was folk wanted to hear, she'd be sure to say the opposite.

Luckily Chang Lianfang was big-hearted, and knew the old woman's lifelong temperament well. He shot a surprised glance at Qi Qian'er, then swept up the hem of his battle-robe, dropped to his knees before the old woman with a thud, and kowtowed three ringing times in earnest, saying: "Granny! I kowtow to you. I'm a heartless one — gone these four years and more... and never once came back to see you. Don't hold it against me!"

At that the old woman's tears came pouring down; she hurried to raise Chang Lianfang up, and, chiding, even gave him a slap or two: "What talk is this! What talk! I don't hold it against you, I don't! Child, there's no need for such words — to be alive now is the whole sky of bodhisattvas watching over you; I see you're not short an arm or a leg, and I can't be glad enough..."

And she began to weep again — her own house had lost eight living souls; if only a few more had come back to her, even short an arm or a leg. She could still move about; even to wait on them hand and foot, kowtowing to the ground, she'd gladly have done it.

Seeing the old woman grieved, Chang Lianfang hurriedly stood and comforted her.

While the fond reunion went on over there, Meng Wanquan went over smiling to pick up the gilt tang — but reaching down with his one hand to grab it, once, twice, he found the gilt tang unexpectedly heavy.

Once he'd spent some effort righting the gilt tang, he turned and said in praise: "Good grief — our city-breaking general, right enough. This thing of yours is no light weight!"

Young as he was, Chang Lianfang said with a smile: "Year before last, in the Miyang campaign, I complained my weapon didn't sit right in the hand, and this was forged for me by the Armaments Directorate at His Majesty's own order — seventy-nine jin, four liang, three qian, made of the finest wrought steel."

Any man born has a natural love of blades and spears, cudgels and staves, and Meng Wanquan too had come down from the front; seeing so fine a weapon, he naturally took to fondling it.

But Qi Qian'er, off to the side, hearing the weight, worked the hand behind her back a little — the way it had come down heavy in her palm just now, it hadn't felt like seventy jin at all, had it?

It had been like catching a smallish old radish tossed from nearby — nothing to it at all.

Remembering last night's nightmare, she cast her mind carefully back over every last thing that had happened that day at the Plague God's temple — but hatefully, she'd been dead drunk, and could bring nothing of it back.

The old woman, unaware of Qi Qian'er's disquiet, was fondly stroking Chang Lianfang's red-tasseled gilt armor up and down — tsk, all this gleaming gold, could it be made of real gold? This little Hua'er had truly struck it rich.

Thinking it, she said it: "I say, little Hua'er, that helmet of yours isn't made of gold, is it?"

At that Chang Lianfang laughed: "Granny! Gold, nothing — it's copper plate! Gold is far heavier than this. Strong as I am, if this armor were gold I really couldn't bear it up — I likely couldn't even jump in it! You wouldn't know, but there's a siege-strongman in our camp called Guan Yimu, who trains in the hard external-qigong way — that lad eats fifteen half-jin steamed cakes at a sitting, and even he daren't wear gold armor. This suit of mine is only a few dozen jin, which is truly nothing at all."

The old woman had never seen gold, and naturally had no notion what gold was about. She just nodded, and, stroking Chang Lianfang's arm, sighed: "Anyone can see this was built up on good rice and good flour and good rich food — taller now, and stronger, solid and firm; you look — you look just grand, truly grand!"

The old woman forced a smile and was happy for him — and she truly did envy him.

It made Chang Lianfang quite embarrassed.

He'd entered the army camp at thirteen; small then, short and squat and timid, the first time he went into battle he was so frightened he bawled his head off and wet his pants.

It wasn't that the boy had no skill in his hands: with the old Chang house's ten-generations-and-more inheritance, his father had started training him at five, and in ordinary sparring at home the thirteen-year-old Chang Lianfang could go a dozen mock passes with his father on a pony and not come off the worse.

But going into real battle and sparring at home were two different things.

On top of which Chang Lianfang had a failing: he bawled — a bawling that split the very heavens, a dry bawl without half a tear falling.

And that was a disgrace to his ancestors.

Where had Chang Lianfang gotten this dry-bawling habit? For that we must start from his old home. Chang Lianfang's family were folk of Wenwang Mountain in Mianzhou, and his father, Chang Mianshen, was a locally famous idle wanderer.

What the martial world jokingly called an "idle wanderer" was the sort of great layabout who had nothing much to do ordinarily, yet could get himself mixed up in anything.

Such a man was neither bandit nor official, and had nothing to do with the martial world proper; yet if some neighbor or fellow-villager had a person seized by the mountain bandits, he could find the channels to broker between the two sides — money handed over with one hand, the person released with the other. And if someone fell foul of the law, the idle wanderer had ways to get him out too. In short, Chang Mianshen counted as a resounding, well-connected man of sky-high chivalry, with friends and sworn brothers everywhere.

But a figure like that was forever having odd and peculiar people come to throw themselves on him; any wandering fighter passing Wenwang Mountain, once he reached the Chang gate, could count on a roof over his head and a hot meal.

That the Chang household kept a great pot going all year round to feed them — slapping its own face swollen to look fat — was one thing; but the pity of it fell on children like Chang Lianfang. He was the youngest of the house, and hadn't yet the food-grabbing skills his elder brothers had honed from small; small besides, short in the leg and unable to leap and scramble — he went hungry!

He couldn't get to the pot's edge, and couldn't grab himself any food.

With no other recourse, little Chang Lianfang trained up a whole art of heaven-splitting dry-bawling.

In those days, the moment the food was served he'd dry-bawl; his voice was loud, and for one thing it would summon the grandmother who doted on him most to take his side, and for another, the others, seeing the master's household's little one crying, would be too abashed to grab, and let him get to the pot's edge to eat first.

And so Chang Lianfang bawled his way to thirteen; force of habit — scolded for it, beaten for it, still he couldn't break it. Pitiful, come to that: an ill-fated little sapling, before it had so much as put out a shoot, he'd gone off with his brothers and his father to seek his fortune.

His skill was good enough — it was only that he cut an ugly figure, having to bawl even as he fought, and wetting his pants every few days into the bargain.

In ten generations and more of the old Chang house, there'd never been one like him.

Once wouldn't do, twice wouldn't do; coming back bawling his head off every single time was too great a disgrace to the ancestors. Chang Lianfang's father was a hard man too: gritting his teeth, he changed the boy's name, hid who he was, and kicked him off to train with the rest in the new-recruits' camp.

Anyhow, that was how it went: Chang Lianfang, Chen Dasheng, and Meng Wanquan were assigned to one tent. Meng Wanquan was the eldest, Chen Dasheng second, Chang Lianfang the youngest.

These little fellows were all in their teens back then, the down on their lips still gosling-yellow, and they'd trained up but a few days' skill before being sent to the front.

The first time out of the recruits' camp onto the killing field, Chang Lianfang bawled as ever — but this time no one came to save him, and someone laid his shoulder open with a long gash of a blade; he lost half a basin of blood and all but his life.

With no gong sounded from the rear to call the retreat, this pack of half-grown boys had to hold the front; take one step back, and before you could even turn to run your own side would kill you first.

Want to live? Simple — grit your teeth and go forward.

Chang Lianfang charged in bawling his head off, and hadn't gone far before he met another one bawling his head off — only this one, besides wailing, was running with snot and eating it too.

This person was none other than Chen Dasheng — oh! back then he was called Chen Scabby.

Anyway the two of them bawled together, and somewhere along the way, battle after battle, the bawling habit cured itself.

But that came later.

To stick to the story: that time, when Chang Lianfang came off the field, there was no telling what strings his father had pulled, but he was sent straight to the infirmary camp — though to the Meng Wanquan of those earlier days, a little wound like his would heal on its own where he was, and wangling his way into the infirmary camp was a poor showing.

But poor showing or not, the thirteen-year-old Chang Lianfang, once at the infirmary camp, could at last catch his breath — though his belly was full of grievance too; he hadn't wanted to come, and his grandmother, had she known, would never have allowed it.

His father had stolen him away in the dead of night.

The day he'd just been settled in, it happened Old Madam Chen came to the camp to take in mending work; perhaps from too much lost blood, Chang Lianfang mistook her for someone else, and, dizzy and dazed, clung to the old woman and wouldn't let go, crying, Grandmother, save me.

And the old woman's heart, in that instant, broke clean apart with tenderness.

It wasn't that she'd necessarily doted on Chang Lianfang back then — only that, at that time, each of the two was willing to take the other for kin and lean on them.

And so, in the two months Chang Lianfang spent in the infirmary camp — stingy as the old woman was — in these five years he was the only one ever to have wangled goat's milk out of her hands to drink.

At any rate, when his wound had healed, while everyone else was sallow and gaunt, this lad alone went out plump and fair.

He had parents living, so he couldn't take a godmother over his own father's head, nor would he dare; but in his heart he took the old woman for a grandmother.

As for the name "little Hua'er" — that was the old woman mishearing, back in the day. Everyone called him Lianfang, Lianfang, and since it's flowers that are fragrant, the old woman's tongue slipped and out came the name.

Funnily enough, the name actually caught on: outsiders, seeing how fair and handsome he was, took to calling him General Hua — anyone who didn't know would have thought his surname was Hua.

Her fond greeting with Chang Lianfang done, the old woman, seeing how respectable and refined he was, and a general now besides, let her usual petty calculation show.

First she eyed Chang Lianfang's train of carts, then turned and pulled the blankly staring Qi Qian'er over: "Little Hua, this is your Brother Scabby's wife."

His upbringing telling, Chang Lianfang was too well-mannered to look straight at Qi Qian'er; he shifted his gaze a touch aside, and in all solemnity raised his hands to chest height and made the same-generation bow of greeting.

"My respects to my sister-in-law."

Seeing this, Qi Qian'er too straightened her back, laid her right hand flat over her left, hooked her thumbs together, and bent forward from the waist to return the courtesy: "Greetings to you, uncle."

Both of them, smooth as flowing water, cut a truly handsome figure — leaving the women over there, and Meng Wanquan too, staring dumbstruck.

Of the two, the one had been schooled in it from small, and later moved in different places among different people; while for Qi Qian'er it was purely force of habit.

When they'd finished their courtesies, it took the old woman a good while to react; then, her face all pride, she said to Chang Lianfang, feeling him out: "These two children, such manners! Little Hua — you, you're really something now, a general and all?"

Chang Lianfang nodded, of course, and said, rather bashful: "It's a prestige rank granted yesterday — I've been made a Roving Cavalry General."

Hearing him say so, the old woman looked at once to Qi Qian'er.

Qi Qian'er thought a moment, then held up five fingers to the old woman, to signify fifth grade.

Fifth grade, no less.

The old woman's heart grew heavy, and envy rose in her again; looking at Chang Lianfang she sighed: "Tsk — yi! Little Hua'er, you really are something now — all that grain, and can you even eat it all?"

Qi Qian'er snorted a laugh out loud.

Chang Lianfang, for his part, was baffled by what the old woman said.

Seeing them puzzled, Qi Qian'er explained: "Our old lady only learned yesterday that a ninth-grade civil official gets a hundred and eighty-seven dou, four sheng of grain a year — and yours is junior fifth grade."

As the old woman saw it, Chang Lianfang was a rice-mouse living in the granary, who could eat his grain turning somersaults.

So that was it — Meng Wanquan and Chang Lianfang thought about it and burst out laughing together.

Chang Lianfang said modestly: "You mustn't read too much into it, Granny — it's not so grand as that! That's just paper officialese. Toward the end the old dynasty never once paid its officials their full salary — never mind ninth grade. After we entered the capital, we asked the old officials up front and only then learned that these past couple of years the treasury's been empty: the wars have left the country with nothing, and all that's left in the treasury is a few scraps of rotten cloth — less than what's at the bottom of your own trunk, Granny."

For no clear reason Qi Qian'er thought of the heap of things under the Plague God's temple, and muttered to herself: empty, where? You just got there too late.

Meng Wanquan chimed in for the fun of it: "Granny, this of his is nothing! Little Hua's father's been made a Founding Earl — the lad counts as a young lordling now, and his house draws a real fief, seven hundred households of it, no less."

The old woman couldn't make head or tail of this, and turned again to look at Qi Qian'er.

So Qi Qian'er told the old woman: "A fief is a reward the Emperor gives to a subject of merit — it means that from now on, generation after generation, uncle's house enjoys the labor of seven hundred households working for them for nothing; and on top of that, the Emperor takes no grain-tax from his family."

Oh — now the old woman understood. Ai, one life to each person, and seven hundred households? Even seventy she couldn't rise to envying him for.

This young wife's knowledge was out of the common run, and Meng Wanquan and Chang Lianfang were duly astonished; they looked at each other, and Meng Wanquan explained to Chang Lianfang with a smile: "Your young sister-in-law comes of a scholarly house — she's properly and truly read her books."

So that was it. Chang Lianfang, who knew the Chen family's old heartache well, was glad for the old woman at the news, and gladder still for that brother of his; and so he cupped his hands in congratulation: "A great joy to you, Granny — with a sister-in-law in the house now, you've got your heart's wish at last."

The old woman pressed her lips in a modest smile and swatted at him again: "What nonsense! Not a scholarly house! You heard wrong! Hua'er, your sister-in-law's people are tenant farmers who worked the land for the old dynasty! Heh — how'd we wander off onto that? Let's talk business! Hua'er, would you go to the trouble of running an errand for Granny, if it's no bother? This old woman wouldn't dare order you about — I'm only begging you a favor. You see how your Brother Meng here hasn't a thing to his name, and your Brother Scabby and the others aren't at hand..."

Meng Wanquan, hearing this, felt hard done by — spinning like a top all day at the old woman's beck and call, and this was "hasn't a thing to his name"?

Chang Lianfang, though — now that he held a real junior-fifth-grade post — what was running an errand for the old woman to him?

And so, once Meng Wanquan had arranged things on his side, Qi Qian'er climbed onto the cart behind Chang Lianfang's.