Chapter 87

On the fifth of the first month of Yong'an the third year, the lords of Guard Lane received their edicts at home. Chen Dasheng rose straight from sixth-grade Commander's Recorder of the imperial guard to junior-fifth-grade Vice-Director of the Board of War. The other six old sabers each rose a grade, to junior-sixth-grade Secretary of the Board of War.

This year the Emperor raised the rank of a hundred and thirty-six officers, great and small, to reward their good service over the past year. Of those above the third grade he raised only three. And he granted not one minister a noble title for his merit.

The Great Liang Emperor had learned from the fallen dynasty's mistakes. When it came to titles and fiefs, he was stingier than any ruler before him.

Chen Dasheng and the rest edged up quietly from the imperial guard into the Board of War, in among a crowd of civil officials. The officers of the boards took no notice. It was no concern of theirs, and the posts were small and cut across no one's interests.

The seven held office in the Board of War now, but they took no post of real power there. They had nothing in the Carriage Bureau, the Storehouse Bureau, or the Bureau of Operations. They still walked before the throne among the twenty-eight imperial-guard garrisons. The Long Saber Garrison had always been the most independent of the twenty-eight, and this year the Emperor even meant to enlarge it to a hundred men. Ever since the mad nun came the year before, the Emperor let no one move the Long Saber Garrison over his head without his leave.

The guard-commanders who could once give Chen Dasheng and the rest their orders could no longer give them any.

And it did no harm, for it made everyone glad. Chen Dasheng and the rest had come into the imperial guard holding real posts. The seven rising to the Board of War left real vacancies behind in the twenty-eight offices, one Recorder's post and six Secretaries'.

Sun Shouyi, Minister of the Board of War, took two of them. Chen Dasheng arranged two more. The last three were seized by able men of every quarter showing their strength.

So after the New Year, Chen Dazhong and Chen Dayi were moved from the Five Armies Command into the twenty-eight offices, under Liu Daya, as Secretaries of the Jinwu Guard. Chen Dayong stayed at the Five Armies Command. He needn't queue for an empty title, but took a real Secretary's post at once.

He had charge of the odds and ends of the garrison-farming round Qingfeng. But where was there land round Yanjing for a garrison to farm? So he became the house's greatest idler, loafing about the Command every day.

And the Long Saber Garrison grew quietly special. Its officers had won the right to attend court, which the officers of the twenty-eight offices had not.

Not to stand within the hall in honor, of course. When there was nothing doing, if they wished to attend, they stood outside the hall.

So attending court was out of the question for now. But once the Lantern Festival was past and each man was back in his place, the Long Saber Garrison would move its office, and from then be a second imperial bodyguard, beyond the palace guard.

She Qingling always worked his statecraft without a ripple. He had been drawing the threads all along. Quietly he turned the old four branches of military power into five, the Board of War, the Five Armies Command, the imperial guard, the Jiusi Hall, and the smallest of them, the Long Saber Garrison. This, he felt, made the most balanced military order for Great Liang.

He couldn't have said himself why it had to be so. He did it by the nose for politics that his years had honed.

Guard Lane had come into sudden good fortune. From the chessboard court to the Six-Board lanes, everyone slyly waited for the Chen house to lay on wine and celebrate, and every house had readied seven gifts to bring and offer their good wishes.

But no one came. Rise in office or not, Chen Dasheng was numb to it, and his brothers were numb with him. The whole household drank a little wine and talked over how much more pay-silver each had gained and how much more grain he could draw. The next day they rose and went on just as before.

There was no help for it. Walking the palace and meeting the high officers of the Six Boards, a fifth or sixth grade was a rank they could haul out and cane at will. It truly counted for little.

At noon on the eighth of the New Year, Tong Jintai came home from the little drill-yard of Hu Yougui next door. His own house had once had a place to drill too, and a fair-sized corner garden. But his wife would have a flower-house there, and he was too lazy to fight it, so he went to Hu Yougui's to drill.

The Tong and Hu houses were too close to bother with the front gate. At first the two lords climbed over the roofs of the back-court wings to reach each other. But Zhang Wanru thought roof-climbing beneath a lord's dignity, and had a bluestone stair built up to the roof for him. One house copied another, till every lord's house had its own stair, and they went visiting by the back stair now. They had turned Guard Lane into one great chessboard court, with people all over the rooftops.

Tong Jintai and the rest were all bitter-born, and none too clever, but they had one good quality, hard work. Whatever their days were like now, they rose quietly before daylight, and wherever they could, each found a spot and learned some new fighting-skill, a whole morning at a stretch. Over in Yanjing, when they were not on watch, they had two more sorts of lessons, one the classics and histories, one the books of war.

Down from the stair, Tong Jintai wrapped his head and took a hot bath. When he came out he asked the boy, and heard that again today no fire was lit in the house, his wife having gone back to her mother's first thing.

Mm. Since she'd gone back, he'd go sponge a meal at his father-in-law's too.

So Tong Jintai changed into everyday clothes, threw on a half-worn cloak, took a brass hand-stove in his arms, and strolled out.

Out the gate he saw Jixiang's wife coming his way behind a cart heaped with things.

One look and he knew what it was. His chief was subsidizing the brothers again.

Since Master She had quietly come to live at the house, the Emperor had learned how much he mattered now that he was out of the palace. So every morning a few carts came early from Yanjing, and whatever the Emperor thought good to eat or use, he sent his brother a share.

And what went to Master She went to the whole of Guard Lane.

Sure enough, Jixiang reached his door and had four baskets of fruit set down, all smiles.

Tong Jintai was curious and opened a basket. In the little five-jin baskets were two of fine-leaf pears, one of peaches, and one of linqin, that is, apples.

A year ago he'd not have eaten such fruit, nor even seen it. This year he ate it every few days, ate till he'd near lost the taste for it. He could sponge it off the Emperor, and off Master She when he went with the chief, and in the latter half of the year Ping Shen sent more of it than the palace did.

Sometimes on watch, when some consort of the back palace had a birthday or the like, there were rewards, and the guards' rewards were always special. The consort wouldn't slight them with a single dish or a few strings of cash, but gave a whole banquet table at the least, and for her own face she would set out every kind of fruit with it.

The fruit looked so fresh that Tong Jintai smiled at Jixiang's wife: "Oh, these went into the cellar last ninth month."

Jixiang laughed and came over and dropped his voice: "A good eye, Third Master. Just so, fine-leaf pears cellared in the ninth month. New tribute came up from the south yesterday, and the palace cellar couldn't hold it, so the Emperor thought, since there's a surplus, share out the old. Several hundred jin came before daylight, and the mistress had baskets found and a share sent to every house. This season they're a rarity, but once out of the cellar they won't keep many days. The Third Master and the Third Mistress had best eat them quick and let none go bad."

Tong Jintai thought of his big-bellied wife and nodded. He saw an empty basket on the cart and took it. He picked out a few of the biggest of each kind from the baskets on the ground, filled his basket, and put the lid on. Then he told the servants to set it by for their mistress, took up the basket, and went off out of the lane.

She Jixiang asked, curious: "Where's the Third Master off to?"

Someone answered, and Jixiang laughed and stuck up a thumb: "The Third Master's made a fine match. No need even to light a fire at home."

That was just what Tong Jintai prized, and he nodded firmly: "That's so!"

Then he went, his step light and proud.

Nor was he the only one. Guard Lane had a whole crowd of meal-spongers. The married were one thing, but when mealtime came, the unwed would go asking round whose house was eating what today, and if it pleased them, go and sponge a meal. Sometimes there was no need to ask. When Doctor Cheng's house made medicine-food, or Meng Wanquan's made a fragrant cauldron, they'd send word early, and the chief's house sent someone round nearly every meal to ask whether to cook for the brothers. Married or not, it went on, as though they'd never once parted.

And the greatest sponger of all was Tong Jintai. His father-in-law's house was only a lane over, in the Board of Rites lane, and they too kept whatever good thing there was in mind for him.

Being so near, his mother-in-law came strolling by his house now and then. At first Dong-shi kept some cover on it, but she grew used to him. This son-in-law's temper was so simple and winning. When he took to someone, he was truly good to them. And above all, he never called her mother-in-law, but called her Mother, just as Zhang Wanru did.

However often she came to her son-in-law's, he was all smiles. Now and then he'd bring her a flower to wear, and when he saw some good thing in Yanjing he'd carry it home and have his wife send a share to her father and mother.

It couldn't have been warmer, or fonder.

Tong Jintai came strolling with his fruit-basket to his father-in-law's, and the gatemen saw him from far off before he reached the gate.

The few gatemen rose and smiled, for they knew the son-in-law was here to sponge a meal.

The Zhang were old ministers of the fallen dynasty. Long ago the several branches had lived together in the old Yanjing mansion. But once the new dynasty rose, the surrendered old ministers had a hard time of it, and dared not stand out. So they sold the Yanjing mansion, hid away all their old splendor, and moved quietly to Quanhou Street in Qingfeng.

Their old lady was living yet, so the household could not be split, and crowded as they were, four branches lived in the one courtyard.

Then hadn't Zhang Wanru struck great luck and found a gold son-in-law? With the Zhang now backed, the other three branches dared, at the end of last year, each buy land on Quanqian Street, and come spring each meant to build a house.

The eldest branch's gateman saw the son-in-law from far off. He sprang down the steps, trotted up to take the basket, and bowed: "Oh, the son-in-law's come."

Tong Jintai asked with a smile: "Where's your young mistress?"

Best find out where his wife was, so they could sponge together.

The gateman smiled: "Reporting to the son-in-law, the young mistress went first thing to the Tang tea-party with the eldest madam."

Tong Jintai stopped and looked at him: "Not here?"

The gateman nodded, but said with a smile: "The old lady's ordered the kitchen to make the sheep-tripe stew today. It's a fine dish, and nothing goes down with wine like it."

And the whole house knew he loved it.

The Zhang had been officials for generations, and their cook always had his best dishes. That one Tong Jintai loved above all. He smiled and asked again: "And my dad?"

It struck the gateman every time he heard it. In all Quanhou Street's six lanes there was no other son-in-law like this. The eldest branch had three sons, two true-born and one base-born, and every one of them called their father "Father." Not one of them ever called him "Dad," the warm way this son-in-law did.

The gateman said with a smile: "The elder master's in the west wing of the front court, giving the young masters their lessons."

The Zhang schooled their children and grandchildren strictly. They dared not run a family school now, so the four brothers took turns teaching the young at home.

Tong Jintai chatted with the gateman as he went in the Zhang gate. He didn't head for the back court, but walked straight to the west wing, and from far off heard the sound of reading.

A few steps more and he came to the three-bay west wing. He put his head in, and in the inner room saw four or five desks, the bigger brothers-in-law hard at their books and quiet.

In the middle room a knot of little brothers-in-law wagged their heads reciting, and his father-in-law sat in the seat of honor with his head bent over a stone-rubbing, now and then tracing it with a hand.

Before the New Year Zhang Zhengci had been much pushed about at the Board of Personnel. He thought he'd not last there, so he'd pleaded illness and stayed home. But in the twelfth month the old lords of his board sent word to have him report to the document office after the Lantern Festival, which meant they had a mind to use him.

So Zhang Zhengci thought to give the young a great deal more teaching before the New Year. He and his three brothers, as ministers of the fallen dynasty, could look for no future. But the young of the house could sit the new dynasty's examinations.

For a while the Zhang were all one wail. True-born or base-born, the young suffered no end, and even on New Year's Eve the Zhang held lessons.

Tong Jintai was a shameless one. He looked a moment, then reached out and pushed the window open and smiled in: "Dad! It's this hour and still you've the brothers at their books?"

The Zhang were strict in their teaching, and his two true-born brothers-in-law were fathers themselves, yet dared not slack. They heard the sister's husband come, lifted their heads, and smiled at him, sweet all over.

Tong Jintai smiled too, a tiger-tooth showing. He lifted the basket to his father-in-law, who put on a show of anger, and said: "By luck I came by some good fruit to share out to the brothers."

Zhang Zhengci had once looked down on military men, and but for a realm-wrecking calamity would never have dreamed of matching his true-born daughter to a lout. But now his two true-born sons and one base-born together were not so dear to him as this one son-in-law.

Tong Jintai stood at the west-wing door and looked longingly at his father-in-law.

Zhang Zhengci was helpless. He put the rubbing away, pinched his beard, and said to the young: "Enough for today. Home with you, but don't dare slack, practice all the harder. Tomorrow I'll rise early and test you, and any who can't get through..."

A cough came from beyond the door. The life-saving son-in-law finished his cough and stood in the doorway grinning.

Zhang Zhengci gave up and waved as at flies: "Go, go, all of you!"

Tong Jintai knew the eldest sons of the other three branches, and as he saw them out he gave each two fruits to take home. Such fruit was not to be had this season, let alone enough to give each child one.

They each took two home. To have the servants cut them so each could have a taste was well enough. This house at least had a son-in-law who could get fruit. In a common house, you might have money to buy at the market, but there was nowhere to buy in the deep of winter.

To eat fresh fruit in winter, with the roads what they were, was a thing even an emperor could scarce manage. Hadn't one matter of a few lychees, long ago, dimmed the fame of a whole golden reign?

A rare luxury indeed.

The fruit shared out, Tong Jintai's two true-born brothers-in-law came slowly out to make their courtesy to the son-in-law.

The elder brother-in-law was called Zhang Ziwei, three-and-twenty this year, and the middle one Zhang Zicheng, twenty.

His father-in-law had two concubines besides, one He-shi and one Li-shi. He-shi's daughter Wanning had long since married in Yanjing, and though but one-and-twenty this year, was already the mother of three children.

Li-shi had been Dong-shi's dowry-maid, and was late to bear. In the war years the elder Zhang fretted over the affairs of state, and over his mother and second brother and daughter in the old home. In the thick of all that fretting, Li-shi found herself with child, and gave the elder Zhang a great fright. So Tong Jintai's youngest brother-in-law was four this year.

The elder Zhang told a friend after how it had felt. He said it was as if he'd been dozing sweetly by a lotus pond on a clear, idle autumn afternoon, when a frog leapt plop into the pond and startled him. It broke his dream, and he woke to find himself in the war again.

And so the milk-name of Tong Jintai's youngest brother-in-law was A-wa, Little Frog.

You could see the Zhang temper in Zhang Wanru, all bright and open and large. And the Zhang had loved old things for generations, so there was a playful streak in them besides.

Their lessons over, Zhang Ziwei said: "Brother-in-law, after the New Year I'm asking a few friends to drink. It's too crowded here, so I'd borrow your back court."

Tong Jintai waved a careless hand: "What do you tell me for? Over my way your sister keeps house, and one watch and I'm gone ten days or a fortnight. Turn it upside down as you please."

Zhang Ziwei was delighted. He was about to thank him when his father cuffed him hard up the back of the head: "Your sister's carrying a child. You're not to take a pack of good-for-nothing friends there to plague her."

At that Zhang Ziwei's face fell. He nodded, tucked his books under his arm, and walked off downcast.

He looked so pitiful that Tong Jintai smiled: "It's nothing. Guan Si'er's garden is big. I'll have a word with him, and you can go turn his yard upside down and not plague your sister."

The brother-in-law was overjoyed. He turned to look at his father, and his father found it fit and nodded.

The elder Zhang made to go off with his hands behind his back, but as he bent his head he saw the linqin in his son-in-law's basket, bright red and fine, and took one. He fancied himself a free and easy spirit who cared nothing for his name, so he stood on no ceremony. He wiped it a few times on his sleeve and went off to the back court gnawing it.

The Zhang's four branches and their old servants were crowded into the second courtyard, so the way was thick with people. The house had come up in the world at the end of last year, and all along the way they were smiling, with an ease of a degree or two in the bows they made.

Tong Jintai did not know more than half of them, and went smiling all the way after his father-in-law, easy and free. In the ordinary way, hmph, he'd have been stopped and greeted seven or eight times along that road at the least.

The party came into the back court and lifted their eyes to see A-wa with his trousers loosed, watering the two "snow mountains" the servants had heaped up.

He finished, and two maids came up without a sound. They swept the ground and drew up the little master's trousers, and when they saw the lords and young masters come, they made a soundless courtesy and withdrew, so quick and so hidden you couldn't find them.

The house's two maids, both named Mei, were of this stamp, able, deft, quick, and sharp-eyed.

And the rules of this back court were quite unlike the front's, with none of the crowd.

Zhang Wanru had once told Tong Jintai how it used to be. Our back court was once just so, she said. The fathers and uncles all had ambition, and thought the day long of entering the Grand Secretariat as chancellors. But it was the grandmother who kept the rule, and she alone held all the daughters-in-law down, so that at sight of the old lady none dared breathe loud. On the face of it there was all strict rule. In private there was strife enough between wives and concubines, and between brothers. And who'd have thought that a house like ours, meeting this calamity, would find the old days empty and mean beside it, and those strange complaints healed overnight? When I came back to Yanjing from the Daoist temple and put off my nun's robe, I hardly knew the house. Father was Father again, and Uncle was Uncle.

Tong Jintai didn't know how the Zhang had been before. He only found it very fine now, warm to whomever he saw.

Take the house's blind old lady. To draw him to eat with her a few times, she had the kitchen make the sheep-tripe stew every day.

Tong Jintai handed the half-basket of fruit to a brother-in-law, bent down, and picked up A-wa.

A-wa gave a cry, turned and saw it was the sister's husband, and sighed in glad surprise: "Ah! Brother-in-law, have you come to take me riding?"

Tong Jintai held back a laugh and nodded: "Aye. Only we must eat first."

Riding meant sitting him up on the horse, where the child would make a whole string of battle-noises and be content. Being near, Tong Jintai often took the little fellow off to play.

Hearing the son-in-law say yes, A-wa nodded like his father: "Splendid, splendid."

But the words weren't out when Li-shi came trotting up and took him off with a slap on his bottom: "Splendid, my eye. One turn of my back and you're off making mischief in the old lady's court again."

The old lady's table was not one just anyone might sit at. Li-shi was afraid A-wa would grow used to sitting there and lose all sense of measure, and had come to carry him off.

A-wa would have cried, but Tong Jintai pushed a pear into his hand.

Four years old, when all was said, and with a fruit the child cried no more. He held it with the tears still in his eyes and pleaded: "Brother-in-law, when you've eaten, mind you come and fetch me."

Tong Jintai promised in earnest, and stood watching him carried off by his aunt.

Zhang Zhengci had once loved He-shi, and cherished the base-born younger daughter Wanning more than his true-born daughter Zhang Wanru. For that favor the house was forever at inner war, though he saw none of it then. He thought his inner quarters harmonious, and himself no bad head of a house.

Who'd have thought that in the war He-shi could not share the hardship. She first asked the elder Zhang for a writ to loose her, and became a new noble's concubine. Then she egged her daughter Wanning on to marry a new-noble house of her own choosing.

Evil repaid with evil is a good thing seldom seen in this world. That the elder Zhang got out of Yanjing at all had much to do with that new noble's secret pressing-down.

Now, having been through it all, the elder Zhang had come to see clear. He dared not dote on A-wa, but only stood aside and watched him in secret, and loved him with care.

When A-wa was gone, the few lords stepped into the old lady's room.

Before he was in, Tong Jintai called out gaily: "Granny! Here I am!"

The words were scarce out when an aged voice broke the quiet, glad in it: "My boy, only you know how to time it. The sheep-tripe stew's but just made, and here you are."

In truth, so long as the old lady knew Tong Jintai was home, she had the dish made every meal.

Tong Jintai came in smiling and said as he walked: "That's fine. I'm good for nothing else, but at your place I always eat well."

"Just so, just so! Quick, come here, come here."

The blind, lame old lady was helped up, and groped a hand forward. Tong Jintai took a pear from the basket and set it in her hand.

The old lady was faintly startled. She felt at it, bent and smelled it, and laughed: "Oh, this season, where did you get such a fine pear?"

Tong Jintai handed the rest in his hands to a woman at the side, and sat down not far from the old lady to chatter with her.

Zhang Zhengci saw his mother wearing a smile, coaxed to laughing on and on by his son-in-law, and grew glad himself.

There was no help for it. Kindly as his mother looked now, she'd been fierce indeed. She had offended all four daughters-in-law, and this one had been the hardest to get past. Before the war she insisted on going home to repair the ancestral house, and insisted on taking Wanru along, and held her there and forbade her the capital. That was not all. To bring them back safe, the second brother had to plead long leave and go the whole way with them.

Who'd have thought that in the one war the second brother, guarding mother and niece, took a rebel blade across the face, and lost his future from that day. And the old lady, in her fright, broke her leg besides.

Zhang Zhengci dared not to this day ask his daughter how she'd come through it. He knew only that the house's servants fled to the last, and his daughter drove the cart by night up a mountain with the old lady and the second uncle. She sought out a famed local Daoist temple for shelter, and took the nun's robe there to keep them safe.

In the years after, the old lady's grief gathered pent-up, and she slowly went blind.

And now in the old lady's back-court room, the second brother's wife never came in, and his own wife never came. The wives of the third and fourth branches came only to ask after her by the rule, their duty done and no more. Being base-born, they could not win the old lady's love, whether they came or not.

But his own daughter and the second brother had grown used through the war years to keeping each other company, and had come to see through it all.

The elder Zhang thought this was well too, and sat down.

Scarce seated, they heard the door-curtain drop, and his disfigured second brother came in with a fierce look on him and a jar of old wine in hand. He saw the son-in-law and smiled: "Jintai's come."

Tong Jintai saw his best-loved second uncle and stood and bowed: "Second Uncle! I thought you'd gone visiting friends."

Zhang Zhengjue sat down smiling, cracked the jar open, and said to Tong Jintai: "When the old mansion was sold, I dug up a few dozen jars of old wine from the old garden. There's no knowing how many generations back an ancestor buried this daughter's-red, and your father-in-law, sorry for me, gave it all to me to drink as I please. Come, taste and see is it good."

The old lady heard it and scolded, laughing: "What generations back? It was your great-grandfather buried it for your grand-aunt, and after, there's no telling how, but when your grand-aunt married they dug up only the half." Here her voice fell low.

The grand-aunt's whole house was gone.

Zhang Zhengjue was free-hearted now, and poured his niece's husband a bowl of the amber old wine: "Quick, taste. It's our Zhang house's own old wine-recipe."

Tong Jintai loved wine. He took it up and drank a mouthful, and sighed at once: "Fine wine! Second Uncle, give me two jars first. If the recipe's still to hand, then when Wanru bears me a little daughter tomorrow, I'll bury a hundred jars too, for her dowry."

At that the men of the house looked at him together, and the old lady, who could not see, "looked" too, her eyes clouded.

Seeing him drink it off, the brother-in-law stood and poured him another: "You like girls, brother-in-law?"

Tong Jintai nodded in earnest: "Of course I like them. Of the seven of us, the one I envy most is Brother Qingguan. You don't know, when he comes home now his two daughters circle round him, one pounding his back, one at her needlework for him, tss."

He lifted his chopsticks and invited his father-in-law to eat.

When his father-in-law had taken up his chopsticks, Tong Jintai picked up his own favorite and ate a mouthful, and swallowing said: "My wife and I have it settled, we'll have a good sweet one just like Niuzi, heh, and then I'll be in clover."

Zhang Zhengci's heart eased by half. He even laid a slice of magnolia-shoot his son-in-law loved in his bowl, and when the son-in-law had eaten it said: "A daughter's good! Tender-hearted."

He was about to sing a daughter's praises when a gateman said in the yard: "Master, the second young mistress Wanning is back, sitting at the gate crying."

Of late the second young mistress often came back, only she could no longer get into the house.

She had borne three daughters one after another, and her mother, loosed as a wife and made a concubine, could do nothing to help her. So she had no way but to come back and look to her mother's house to right things for her.

But now she could not come in the Zhang gate.

The old lady's word was that though the whole Zhang house should die, they'd not own this daughter.