Chapter 34

Chen Dasheng ran off after his wife. His brothers went pouring after him.

The old lady shuffled furtively to the kang-cabinet and hid the silver cakes again. Well hidden, she thought. Only then did she sit back down. She wiped her face as if nothing had happened, and said to Doctor Cheng, sheepish but grave: "Ai! Like children, the pair of them. Sorry to trouble you! You see how it is, good or bad, a pair of wretches. They must think I've lived too long!"

Doctor Cheng looked at Wanquan. Wanquan looked at Doctor Cheng. The two of them bowed their heads together and laughed under their breath.

But in their hearts they were truly impressed. An old lady like this would sooner give up a piece of her own flesh than a copper. Today the little wife had found the soft spot. Meng Wanquan need never again fear the wretched days when the old lady stopped the grain-carts at the camp gate, or grabbed two fistfuls of the horses' fodder.

Doctor Cheng even meant well and counseled her: "Old lady, your house has changed its standing now. Those who come and go from here will be no common folk from now on. Your grandson's wife has just gone to great pains over you. You should think it over carefully. You truly can't go on as before."

But his good words were wasted. The old lady couldn't follow them, so she looked to Meng Wanquan.

Meng Wanquan had learned a new trick today. He hadn't followed it either, but he had the gist. So he put it to her plainly: "Dasheng, see, he's a proper official now. You could say he's risen sky-high in one step, a great man who eats from the bronze cauldron. From now on, when you go to a landlord's house for a feast, you'll be the one seated at the head table.

"Granny, from now on you've got to think of his face. And besides, you're an old lady the Emperor himself has recognized. So no more crowding in with the women to gossip! And best stop herding the sheep too. Tomorrow I'll have the lads come each day to take them out for you. There's no court sixth-rank lady who herds sheep all day."

Was the old lady herding sheep for a reason? She was just bored.

And now she was a great lady, she couldn't even herd sheep?

At that a loneliness came over the old lady. She spread her hands, rubbed at the old calluses on them, and sighed. "Ai. You tell me, then. This is a thing I'd not have dared dream of, chanting to the Buddha a hundred times. I'm just an old woman who scratches her food out of the dirt. I scratched away, and the Emperor got to hear of it, and gave me that. But how would I know how to be a great lady, an old madam? Now I mayn't go out, mayn't herd sheep. What am I to do?"

She looked at Doctor Cheng and Meng Wanquan. "In ten lifetimes I've never seen what a great lady is like. Even if I'm to pretend, you have to find granny a mold to press the cake from, so I've got a shape to copy!"

True enough. Whom would she learn from?

The two of them sat and thought a good while. Then all at once Doctor Cheng clapped his hands and laughed. "I have it!"

Just then Meng Wanquan looked up and laughed too. "I have it as well!"

And so they said to her together: "Copy Madam Tao!"

At that the old lady leaned back, and said with deep disgust: "What? Copy her? Her? That skinflint? I copy her? That old thing so full of foul schemes, five hundred jin of well-stone couldn't cap the pus running out of her. I copy her?"

Meng Wanquan agreed with every word, but pressed on: "Granny, you needn't copy how she's harsh with her daughters-in-law and daughters. You needn't copy her scheming heart. Just watch how she deals with people, that's all. Truth is, I think she carries it off rather well."

Doctor Cheng nodded too. "That's the way of it. Old lady, from now on, when you watch a person, don't look at the bad parts, and don't go out talking of their faults. Just look at the good parts, and learn those. And they say Madam Tao's family once held office in the county yamen, so there's likely some family bearing to her, some breeding in how she carries herself."

"Rubbish! You believe her bragging? As if we don't all know each other!" The old lady lifted her face and cut in, scornful. "It was her eldest daughter-in-law who let it slip year before last. I caught an earful. Madam Tao's father, hmph! He was a jailer in the old days, a keeper of the lockup! Pah! Dressing up every day like some official's young lady, born of the low trades, and looking down on us who farm."

The old lady wasn't wrong, at bottom. The common world ranks people high, middle, and low. The farmer, in every sage's mouth, is of the high sort. But the yamen clerk, the runner, the go-between, the matchmaker, the whore, the actor, the thief, the shaman, the shopkeeper, these were the nine low trades, that never in generations climbed out.

Doctor Cheng didn't care to hear ill of people, and didn't take in idle talk. He turned his head and looked out the window. But he thought, you've forgotten, have you? Not long ago every man in your own house was a bond-slave, lower than the low, not even counted as a person. And now you look down on others?

Meng Wanquan found it hard work talking to the old lady, so he raised his voice: "What's the use of all this? Madam Tao's son is at the thousand-household post over in the four commanderies. That's a face worth something. He's been an officer a good while.

"And don't go running her down. Whatever Madam Tao's house is like, that's her own family's business. In all my coming and going, I've never once heard Madam Tao say a bad word of a neighbor, never heard her run anyone down. Just for that, I think she's all right. Granny, why not just copy that much?"

The old lady sat blank a while. She thought hard, dredging up the past, then let out a long, helpless breath: "Oh. Copy that old Tao woman. Hmph!"

---

In the borrowed courtyard the Tao family lodged in at the mouth of the alley, a dozen women's hands were busy. Spindle-rods, whorls, spinning-wheels, reeling-frames, back and forth without rest.

The tread of the loom mixed with the bubbling of the iron pot under the reeling-frame. Now and then a woman would lift her head and glance warily past the curtain. Seeing it safe, she'd reach a reddened hand into the hot pot, fish out a boiled cocoon, break it open, quickly pick out the pupa, and, without turning round, pop it into the mouth of the seven- or eight-year-old girl winding thread behind her.

The little girl bit down, looked at her mother's back, narrowed her eyes, and smiled to herself.

On the other side of the curtain, Madam Tao was devoutly worshipping the Buddha.

A stone slab lay across an old vat, and on the slab stood a roughly carved wooden bodhisattva.

Madam Tao couldn't chant the sutras. So she knelt devoutly and said one "Amitabha." She bowed down and said one "Amitabha." She rose and said one "Amitabha."

Three motions, nine times over. Then Madam Tao braced her sore, aching waist and stood. She looked first past the curtain at her daughters-in-law, her granddaughters, her daughter, all busy and quiet at their work. She nodded. Then she bent, untied the cloth pad from her knees, said one more "Amitabha," and laid the pad beside the bodhisattva.

She walked without a sound to the doorway, lifted the curtain without a sound, and passed without a sound from the back court of this great house that wasn't hers to the front court.

Only when her foot was on the threshold of the front court did she let out a slow breath. She looked back once at the rear court, then turned, smoothing her hair, and walked toward the main hall.

There was nothing at all in the main hall. Zhou Jizong leaned against a bare pillar, watching the early-winter weather outside. Thinking over what had befallen him lately, his mood soured, and a dull weariness came over him.

Madam Tao came slowly round to the door. She looked at the youngest son she hadn't seen in years, and, after who knew how long, snorted a laugh.

Zhou Jizong saw his mother, and at once went from sitting to kneeling. He lay down on the ground and called to her: "Mother."

Madam Tao didn't go in. She stood in the doorway in the sun, picking a loose thread off her sleeve, and mocked: "What's this, you can bear to seek out your beggar of a mother now?"

Zhou Jizong lay still a moment, then lifted his head to explain: "A son does not speak of his father's faults. When Father meant to take us away, he wanted to change our surname. We didn't dare not go, didn't dare not obey."

Madam Tao went on jeering: "Don't push it onto him! Your second brother didn't run. That's how it is. All the reasons are in your mouths, I can never out-argue you, you're always in the right.

"And what am I? Cast off, and cast off I stay.

"But if that Zhou Xingfa had any backbone, he shouldn't have taken our Tao family's money and married into my house to begin with! Oh, the realm fell into chaos, the home was gone, the Tao family was no use to lean on, and he up and ran.

"You ran off with him, so don't come back. I counted you dead too! Well and good. Living easy elsewhere, of course you never thought of me. Now you've hit hard times, and I'm your beggar mother again. Zhou Jizong, a man can't behave like this. Even a trader deals by both sides being willing! Go find your father, you and your third brother!"

Zhou Jizong lay there a good while. At last he lifted his head: "My father, he said he can't help."

Madam Tao gave a cold laugh: "He's been a company-officer in the four southern commanderies all this while, and you two have served the general as his guard three, five years. A hundred taels of loss you can't make up? I don't believe it."

Zhou Jizong: "It truly isn't a matter of a hundred taels. Third Brother's locked up now, and we've all been suspended from our posts. Old friends did think out a few ways for us, and they'd work. Only, Mother!" He kowtowed hard. "We've no brick to knock at the door with, no decent bribe to offer. I beg you, Mother, for the sake of once being mother and son, save me and Third Brother."

Madam Tao looked at her son, throwing his head at the ground like a dropped gourd-dipper. A long while passed before she said, with a bitter smile: "I knew it. I knew it! Coming to me with those eager eyes, it's our old Tao family's gilt Buddha you've got your mind on."

Zhou Jizong lifted his bloodied head and begged: "Mother! Save us, Mother!"

Madam Tao asked sharply: "Haven't you got a father? Aren't you the dutiful one? Where's your father? Where's Zhou Xingfa? Go to him!"

Better not to have said it. The moment it was said, Zhou Jizong's eyes filled with tears. His heart ached, and he said, trembling: "Father, he had a new family years ago. Two sons already. When I went, my father said, you're all grown, his burdens are heavy, we should manage on our own. And he said, he said you had a gilt Buddha. Mother! Save us!"

Something stabbed at Madam Tao's heart. She sniffed, walked slowly out to the steps, and sat down, murmuring: "That's fair enough. A man will want a home of his own, sooner or later. As for me, I lost the gilt Buddha long ago. What are you thinking? All these years, we've pretended not to know your second brother is dead, and stuck like leeches to the old camp to keep a place.

"Other families all have a husband, a son, a grandson sending back army pay to keep the women and children. You each threw down your wife and daughter, made new homes out there, lived easy, and left me, a poor old woman, a whole body of debt!

"Whom have we got? A whole house of widows and orphans. And we can't even count you dead. We have to pretend you're all alive, and now and then pretend you've sent something home, this, that!

"Ha. What a sin! Don't dream of it. That gilt Buddha I sold long ago. Bought beasts, bought a cart, bought looms and reeling-frames. All this road we've lived by weaving and spinning. Even now we barely get by. Go on. I can't help you. And I've no father to turn to either."

A soft rustling came from behind her. Madam Tao knew her son had got to his feet.

Just so. None of them stir early but for gain. No gilt Buddha, and this mother needn't be knelt to anymore.

Madam Tao was still turning it over when a knock came at the gate.

She lifted her head, coughed, cleared her throat, and asked: "Who is it?"

Outside the gate came Qi Qian'er's voice: "Madam Tao, it's me. Chen Dasheng's wife, née Huo."

Hearing his own name, Chen Dasheng couldn't hold back a smile, and looked at Qi Qian'er.

Qi Qian'er, cradling the brocade, didn't so much as turn her head. "What are you smiling at?"

Chen Dasheng shook his head. He'd only heard it was his wife, and, for no clear reason, was glad.

Hearing it was Qi Qian'er, Madam Tao paused. She glanced at the few sheep tied by the gate, and stood up at once: "Aiya, honored guests! Coming, coming!"

She peered at herself in the water of the half-vat in the yard, patted off the dust, tugged her clothes straight, then hurried to the gate. The last two steps she steadied. She opened the gate slowly, met them with a smiling face, and froze.

Outside stood Qi Qian'er and Chen Dasheng side by side. In Qi Qian'er's hands was a bolt of brocade, gorgeous in color, rich past telling.

The sun struck it, and it was as if she held a treasure of gold.

And behind the two came six attendants, all decently turned out.

Ah! So they'd come with a train of servants to show their swagger? Come to lord it over her poor little household, was that it?

What Madam Tao didn't know was that those six were seventh-grade lords too. She saw only the short jackets they wore, the sort worn by house-servants. New or not, fine or not, a person of standing does not wear a short jacket before others.

Grumbling inside, Madam Tao spoke with the greatest warmth: "Aiya, aiya! If it isn't his lordship the Recorder come to my door again! Quick, come in, sit inside, quick, quick!"

She said it, but her gut was twisting. She was terrified they'd say they wanted to come in and sit. This chit was not to be trifled with, her eyes were always sharp and cruel.

And besides, her house truly hadn't a single chair to seat a guest.

Luckily Qi Qian'er refused at once: "No need, Madam Tao. I'm still in mourning, so I shouldn't enter another's house."

Relieved, Madam Tao said: "Yes, yes, look at me, I'd forgotten. You're a dutiful, mannerly one!" She turned and praised Chen Dasheng: "Of all our lot, if you want someone who runs a house top to bottom, it's your wife! And for dutifulness, no bragging, it's your wife again! You're a lucky man, my lord Recorder!"

Chen Dasheng smiled till his eyes were slits.

Her praise done, Madam Tao hesitated: "Nephew's wife, is this that you've."

The moment she said it, Qi Qian'er's eyelids flicked up. She looked at Madam Tao with a not-quite-smile.

They held each other's gaze a good while.

"Pah!" Madam Tao slapped her own face at once, and smiled at Chen Dasheng, abashed: "See my memory. How could I dare go on as before now."

That said, she came properly down the steps, and, formal or not, braced her knees and made Qi Qian'er a bow, saying she paid her respects to the lord Recorder and the titled lady.

Chen Dasheng had never met such a thing, and, embarrassed, wanted to do something. But his fierce wife kicked him, then gave him two great glares, and he dared not move.

Qi Qian'er nodded to Madam Tao, smiling, and put out one hand from the brocade to help her up: "Quick, look at you! Don't do this! Too many manners! Too kind! We're no strangers. If our old lady heard, she'd scold us later. From now on, you mustn't do this."

They both knew it was only a courtesy.

But after today, whenever they met, this was how it would have to be.

Qi Qian'er would not own the old tie.

By what right? I never ate at your table, drank at your cup. The old lady said that on the flight from famine it was every soul for himself. Not once did a Tao youngster carry a load or lend a hand for the old lady. So spare me the talk of friendship. If there's friendship, it's between your house and Madam Qiao, always warm, always close, and you two even mean to make a marriage of it. So the accounts between us, from here on, I'll be reckoning up, slowly.

We've no bad blood yet. And I won't give you the chance to make any fresh mischief. But, Madam Tao, from today, before me there'll be no more of your swaggering.

So, one way or another, today Qi Qian'er meant to have this bow of Madam Tao's.

I gave your house face, she thought, took your business, pitied your women slaving day after day. And you had to drag that fool Chen Dasheng down for a footstool. Then don't blame me for hitting back!

You put your face forward. If I don't strike it, I do you wrong!

Madam Tao didn't care to look at that sour manner of hers. She smiled at Chen Dasheng instead: "But I don't know, my lord Recorder, you've come to my poor door again, is there some matter? If it's more sheep, aiya, just take the lot away! Count it my whole family's respects."

The words jeered, and the sourness under them wouldn't stay hidden.

Behind the gate came a faint sound. Qi Qian'er's ear twitched. But she didn't turn round. She smiled at Madam Tao: "Not that. It's that Dasheng can't manage things, and would go and lead an extra sheep of yours home. Our old lady saw it and got angry. She said, Madam Tao's got a whole household to carry, hard enough as it is, how could you bear to take her fat sheep? So, here."

She raised the brocade, all glow and color, and smiled: "This was granted from the palace the other day. It's colored brocade the consorts wear. We've come to make it up to you."

Madam Tao looked at the brocade, half stunned stupid.

This was brocade! Even if you wanted it, you'd never find it on the market. A hundred, two hundred taels wouldn't buy palace-made brocade. And this was a whole bolt, not a few feet. How could you reckon a thing like this in silver?

This was to make up for a sheep? The old lady had a bellyful of calculation. But someone who earns fifty taels won't have the sense of fifty-one. Add up all the world she'd seen in the first half of her life, and she still couldn't fathom why Qi Qian'er would give her a bolt of brocade.

Yet the old lady was shrewd too. If she couldn't grasp it, she wouldn't take it! However much her heart wanted it, she could bear to refuse. And that was no small thing.

She waved a hand: "I'd never dare. A thing so fine."

But before she finished, a man came rushing out of the courtyard, his whole forehead bloody.

He ran out and dropped to his knees before them. He kowtowed, stood up, and his eyes went straight to that bolt of brocade. Then he looked, piteous, at Madam Tao, and called out, wretched and low: "Mother."

Madam Tao didn't want it, so she said: "It's only a sheep, five taels of silver at the very most. Whatever you."

"Mother!!"

Zhou Jizong threw his arms around his mother's legs. With this one bolt of brocade, far more use than the gilt Buddha, this was palace-made stuff.

Qi Qian'er had no wish to meddle in their family's affairs. Seeing mother and son deadlocked, she reached out and put the brocade into Madam Tao's hands.

Madam Tao took it and made to kneel. But Qi Qian'er caught Chen Dasheng's arm and walked briskly away.

Madam Tao stood dumbstruck, watching until their shapes vanished at the mouth of the alley. She looked down again, and the brocade in her hands was gone.

"Number Four!!!"

The dignity of Madam Tao's whole life was gone. She screamed it.

Zhou Jizong's running steps halted. He stood still, slowly turned, and kowtowed to his mother three times: "Mother! Your son knows. I've struck your face again, spent your dignity again! My own life is nothing to spare. But I have a wife and children, and Third Brother, he's still in the lockup!

"Mother! I'll take this to save Third Brother. Give it to me, and I'll have my mother again, my beggar of a mother. Mother! This thing can win us a future! Rest easy, Mother, if it goes smoothly back there, by next year, fourth or fifth month at the latest, we'll work our way to your side. And then Third Brother and I will come home! Both of us surnamed Tao again!"

Madam Tao watched, helpless, as her son ran off. A sharp pain took her heart. Clutching her chest, she staggered to the gate, braced herself on the wall, and sank slowly onto the step.

She didn't know how long she sat there. Then someone murmured: "Granny?"

Madam Tao wiped her eyes and turned. There stood the thin boy in the long gown, holding a bowl of water, watching her with worry.

She smiled, and said fondly: "It's you, Top-Scholar. Granny's all right. Come, sit by granny, good boy."

The boy was the orphan her second son had left behind. His name was Tao Wentong. Top-Scholar was his milk-name.

Tao Wentong gave his granny the water and sat down beside her.

She stroked his head, and said, aching inside: "I always thought, a new emperor takes the throne, there's sure to be a grace examination. Your late grandfather used to say the grace exam was the easiest to pass. Now our house has spent a sheep to buy a favor. Tomorrow I'll go to Yanjing, put my old face forward, and beg that new great family to find my good boy a school." She sighed.

Madam Tao lifted her face and looked at the lintel over the courtyard gate.

There were four brackets on it.

"In this world, there's always a mountain higher than your mountain."

Grandmother and grandson sat there who knew how long, till the sun sank low. Then the old lady said to Tao Wentong: "Good boy, tell your little aunt, tomorrow give Madam Qiao back the eggs she sent. From now on, our house has no more dealings with her."

Tao Wentong didn't understand. "Why? Auntie Qiao is very kind. Granny, our house has no other income. Auntie Qiao said she'd give a string of cash a month."

Madam Tao stood, patted his shoulder, and smiled: "She was only feeling us out. Your little aunt never said she could read. And besides, we've taken a noble's gift now, so we mustn't do anything to make that noble frown. Remember that?"

"Mm, I understand. I forget which book said it. Take a man's money, spare him his troubles. Granny, I'd still like to study."

"Ha. Your great-grandfather always said the same. And what a state our house was in then! Never mind, never mind. My boy shall study! My boy shall study! Later, we'll sell off all the cloth stored in the house for you. Whatever it takes, we'll have our books. After that, we're quick with our hands and feet, we'll not miss the odd string of cash. Isn't that a life too? Aiyo, my Top-Scholar."

The sun sank low. On the branches of the osmanthus tree in the yard hung two bloody sheep-heads, eyes staring, unclosed in death, and two sheepskins with the neck-hide gone.

The old lady's stream of grumbling echoed round the yard.

"Aiya! Mothers! Ancestors! Open your eyes and look. I'm truly afraid folk won't know you're headsmen! Who ever saw a sheep killed by hacking off its head with a great saber? You think you're executioners at the yamen!!

"Look at half a yard of blood, isn't this a waste? Grown men, every one of you, twenty years old and heads of your houses! And you can't even slaughter a sheep!!"

In the main hall, on the two fire-wall stoves, iron pots bubbled and steamed. One held sheep-bone and whole sheep offal. The other rolled full of chunks of mutton.

On the great kang in the east room they'd lit the yellow wax Chen Dasheng and the rest had brought home.

Today was extravagant. They lit a full six sticks, and every corner of the good-sized east room glowed bright.

Before Qi Qian'er sat a long low chest. The kang-table she'd smashed, so this chest had to serve.

On it were brush and ink, paper and stone, a heap of silver cakes and broken silver, and a few dozen coppers scattered loose, giving off a faint smell of bronze.

And at Qi Qian'er's feet, laid out golden-bright, were five strings of copper cash on hemp cord, and a great cloth sack.

Before the chest, Yu Qingguan and the rest knelt one beside another, reporting their accounts to Qi Qian'er.

Hearing that Qi Qian'er would no longer press Chen Dasheng for money, and remembering that Madam Qiao and her fourth son had carried off her grandson's savings, the old lady felt her own guilt. So she took her little stool and fled out, saying she'd watch the meat-pot.

But this watching was no ordinary watching. She'd have pressed her ear to the wall if she could, to miss not a single figure.

Now and then, when no one was about, she'd slip into the west room, come out with a coarse bowl, fill it with mutton, take a turn round the yard, and come back empty-handed.

Everyone saw it. Everyone pretended not to.

The gate creaked, and Chen Dasheng came in with two weighing-scales, one large, one small.

The old lady shot to her feet, ran to bar the gate, and stood a while with her ear to it, listening hard. Only when she was sure it was safe did she tiptoe back inside with small steps.

Meng Wanquan came in, set his things on the chest, and drew a bulging silver-pouch from his own breast. He laid it on the kang and said: "Trouble you, sister-in-law, reckon mine up too. Heh, I've got to sort out how to live from here on."

Ever since he learned you could take a house for nothing, Meng Wanquan felt his luck had finally turned, heaven be praised. He didn't say he wasn't jealous of his sworn brother. But some things can't be had both ways. He'd given up an arm and kept his life at least. He'd lived.

Qi Qian'er smiled at his silver-pouch, and jerked her chin at the back of the line: "Fine. Brother Wanquan, get behind Guan Si'er. I'll do yours properly, last."

"Ai! Good, good! Trouble you, sister-in-law, show your brother the way, and I'll thank you well later, rest easy!"

Qi Qian'er glared at him: "None of that stranger's talk. Get over there!"

Meng Wanquan, all smiles and delight, went off to line up.

Chen Dasheng still said little. But like a page-boy, he followed his wife around, poured her tea, fetched her water, and now and then popped a piece of pastry into her mouth.

The old lady's cabinet was locked, of course, and Qi Qian'er hadn't given him the key.

But the fellow was sly. Now and then he'd lift a whole cabinet-door off its hinges, glance furtively at the outer room, and, with his hands behind his back, feel out some pastry to smuggle to his wife. Then, hands behind his back, he'd set the door back on.

Qi Qian'er didn't call him on it. She even nodded her approval.

Well done, really! Best keep it up!

So Chen Dasheng stole all the harder. His eyes, truly, were like that brocade now, all glow and color.

Reckoning up their livelihoods was the second thing Qi Qian'er had to see to. She had to take all these fools' money in hand and lay a firm ground under their days. She had to set them up with property, find them well-matched wives to carry on their lines. Only then would their descendants never drag her An'er down. More than that, they might even be a help to him.

Otherwise, with these few, and their wits, they'd go to a place like Yanjing, draw a sixth-grade lord's pay, with no one to mind them and no one to teach them. Ten thousand taels in hand wouldn't help. In a place like Yanjing there's a thing to spend on for every purse, however big. Their brains and their skills together couldn't guard their money. However much they had, it wouldn't be enough to fling around.

Still, for now they weren't doing badly. Mostly because they'd never had a chance to spend. Chen Dasheng had handed most of his savings up, so he was the poorest. The other six each had a few hundred taels to their name.

Qi Qian'er took up the large scale and the small, weighed out Yu Qingguan's share, then took up her bound ledger and wrote a "1," a heavy, black stroke, with another thick line added on.

She held up the ledger to Yu Qingguan: "Uncle, remember, this is one. This is your account. The heap on your table comes to five hundred thirty-two taels, plus forty coppers."

Yu Qingguan looked carefully at the single stroke and nodded, certain. He pretended to know it all, nodding as if he had ten thousand acres of good land in his belly: "That's right. Trouble you, little sister-in-law. That's the figure."

He knew nothing of the sort. Past thirty, he was hopeless at it.

Qi Qian'er smiled, took his hand, and had him press a thumbprint on the total. She gave him back the forty coppers, then opened the big cloth sack at her side and swept the heap of money into it.

At the clink and clatter, the dull thud of the solid silver blocks knocking together, the old lady outside couldn't bear it.

She braced herself on the wall, head down, drawing sharp breaths: "My heart!!"

But bowing her head was a mistake. Half a pot of mutton had been smuggled off by her, and now the surface showed only broth, no meat.

Never mind that, though. The old lady braced on the wall, clutched her chest, and cursed: "That wicked old Tao woman, black-hearted, this sheep's too thin!!"