Chapter 2

When we got home, Zhao Deqian hurried into the room and asked his mother in a deliberately low voice, “Mother, what is going on?”

His mother was puzzled. “What do you mean, what’s going on?”

“What’s going on with that woman?”

“Hey, she’s the wife Mother found for you. Have you forgotten? The day you left to repair the bridge, didn’t I ask whether you wanted a wife? You laughed and said yes. Well, there she is—brought home for you! She cost a tael of silver, too. Listen to Mother: don’t let this wife run away. She’s pretty, and the rare thing is that she can cook—”

“Where did our family get silver?”

“We borrowed it from the Chen family.”

“…”

Their voices drifted now and then through holes in the paper window. I pretended not to hear. After fetching water to wash my face, I began making supper.

Monkey Third had caused such a commotion that most of the fish I caught that afternoon had been spoiled. Luckily the old hens had laid two extra eggs that day, or even the cleverest housewife could not have cooked without rice.

As smoke rose from village chimneys, Deguan came home following the smell of food. “Second Sister-in-law, did you make all these good things because Second Brother came back today?”

On the kang table were clear-braised river catch, mountain greens fried with eggs, pickled vegetables mixed with assorted beans, egg-drop soup, and a stack of millet cakes. Deguan’s saliva nearly ran down to his toes.

My face warmed. I shot him a look. “Don’t talk nonsense. Eat.”

Pitying her son, Mother felt out two millet cakes and set them in Zhao Deqian’s bowl. “Second, eat more. You must have worn yourself out repairing that bridge.”

“Worn out? That work was light as feathers.”

“Good if you aren’t tired. Later, Second Wife will move the bedding from my room into the side room.”

“Cough, cough, cough—”

Zhao Deqian got a fish bone caught in his throat. After coughing hard for a while, he recovered enough to say, “Mother, what are you talking about?”

She curled her lip. “Only good things. You’re twenty-one and still haven’t given me a child!”

Zhao Deqian’s face went black and red, like evening storm clouds unable to hide the sunset’s glow. His eyes skittered first toward me, then toward Deguan. “Why say such things in front of the little one?”

Deguan was busily sucking tiny fish clean. “I’m deaf. I can’t hear a thing!”

Me: “…”

The Zhao family was easy to be around, all right. They truly did not treat me as an outsider.

A crescent moon hung over the branches. When I pushed open the window, the sweet scent of crops made me light-headed. After I spread the bedding on the kang in the side room, Zhao Deqian came in from washing, holding a damp cloth cooled in well water.

“Put this on your face.”

He turned his head aside as he handed it to me. I took it and pressed it to my cheek with a grimace.

Ow, that hurt. That damned Monkey Third deserved to be beaten into a dead dog!

I knew I was pretty, but no matter how pretty a woman might be, half her face red and swollen could not look good.

Zhao Deqian, though, was good-looking. Not in a delicate, refined way, but in the way of a strong frame, clear muscles, and rugged features.

Otherwise, how could he have knocked Monkey Third down with one punch?

After I removed the cloth, the two of us—man and woman meeting for the first time—sat facing each other on the edge of the kang in a silence that made my heart pound like a drum.

After a long while, Zhao Deqian suddenly blew out the lamp.

I jumped. “Why did you put out the light?”

In the darkness, he said slowly, “Lamp oil is expensive. We should save it.”

“Oh, right. We should. Strictly speaking, we are husband and wife with a marriage contract, but—”

“I’m sorry. I was injured repairing the bridge. I’m afraid I may neglect you from now on.”

My mind did not turn fast enough. “Huh? You were injured?”

Zhao Deqian fell silent again. “…Go to sleep.”

He took off his shoes, climbed onto the kang, moved his bedding to the foot, and lay down fully clothed without another word.

I slept awkwardly at the head of the kang. My face was burning, but I had been frightened that day and had little energy left. After some idle thoughts, I fell asleep too.

At first light the next day, Zhao Deqian went out to cut wheat.

Farmers’ meals were simple. Mung-bean congee with little pickles made a fine meal. After serving Mother breakfast, I reheated several millet cakes left from the night before, put on my bamboo hat, and carried food to the fields.

The Zhao family had three mu of wheat. It was scarcely enough work for Zhao Deqian alone. By the time I arrived, he had already cut nearly one mu.

“Second Brother, time to eat!”

I could not decide how else to address him, so I called him Second Brother. It did not sound distant, nor too intimate—and most importantly, I could make myself say it.

At the call, Zhao Deqian rose bare-chested from the golden wheat. He walked over from a distance with something in his hand.

“For you.”

With one hand he took the millet cakes; with the other he offered me a small bird’s nest.

My eyes lit up. “Bird eggs? Where did you get them?”

“Found them while cutting wheat.”

I gladly took the nest, which held four or five little eggs. “There are things like this in a wheat field?”

Sitting on the ridge between the fields, he chewed a cake and nodded. “There are. Big green caterpillars, rabbits, sometimes snakes.”

I set the nest aside with delight, untied my bundle, and poured him a bowl of mung-bean congee from a small jar. I had cooled it in the well water early that morning; it was sweet and cold, just right under the sun.

“You eat. I’ll cut wheat for you.”

At the Qian household I had been a kitchen maid and had never cut wheat. The field before me was gold, wave after wave of grain. It looked new and fascinating, so I picked up a sickle and went to work.

But he caught my wrist. “Rest. I can do it myself.”

His grip was so strong that my fair wrist reddened at once. I cried, “Ow,” and loosened my hand. Guilt flickered across his face.

“If you can’t sit still, pick up the fallen ears.”

He had tied the cut wheat into solid sheaves, but it was a pity to leave the scattered ears behind. So I took a basket and began collecting them.

At noon, he pushed a great cart of wheat sheaves while I carried my basket and a rabbit that had fainted dead away. Together, we went happily home.

At the house, a fine-featured youth who looked like a scholar was cooking. Seeing me, he bowed respectfully. “Second Sister-in-law.”

I smiled. “You must be Dewan. Why are you home today?”

“The academy gave us two days off for the wheat harvest.”

“Then you’re in for a treat. Your second brother found several bird eggs in the field today and caught a rabbit too.” I held up the rabbit excitedly.

“Second Sister-in-law has worked hard.”

I could hardly stand this scholar brother-in-law’s excessive politeness. I hurried into the kitchen. “Your second brother is the one who worked hard.”

Water boiled in the great pot. Zhao Deqian swiftly dressed the rabbit, and I made a fragrant pot of red-braised rabbit with assorted-bean flatbreads stuck to the side of the wok.

At the table, the Zhao family attacked the food like a whirlwind again. Once everyone was full, Mother asked Dewan, “Third, is your academy fee due next month?”

Dewan nodded. “Don’t worry, Mother. The county gave out some aid a few days ago. If I copy a few more books, I’ll have enough.”

“How can that do? You’ll copy until your eyes go blind. Tomorrow I’ll borrow some more from the Chen family.”

I was curious. “Is the Chen family very rich?”

Zhao Deqian nodded. “They’re the wealthy household of Taoshui Village. They used to be poorer than we were, but over the past years they made their fortune selling sesame cakes and opening a wonton shop. They even built a three-courtyard residence, grander than the rich homes in town.”

I could not bear the words wealthy household. The moment I heard them, my skin prickled. “Rich people all have black hearts. If we borrow from them, won’t they charge ruinous interest?”

Mother gave me a cloudy-eyed glare. “Don’t talk nonsense, Second Wife. The Chens are good people. During the plague year, I’d have been in my coffin without them. And your husband—Second Girl from the Chen family brought him around with needles. Besides, they’ve never charged interest on a loan.”

I smiled. “There are families like that in the world? But Mother, people say help in an emergency, not in permanent poverty. We can’t live on borrowed money forever.”

“That’s true,” Mother said anxiously. “Who doesn’t want to make a proper life? We just have no way in.”

That night, under a thin moon, Zhao Deqian and I spoke again of what had come up at lunch.

The Zhao family had not always been poor. They once had five mu of land. My father-in-law had been a learned man; during busy seasons he farmed, and in slack seasons he taught village children to read. Around the holidays he wrote spring couplets. The family had managed well enough.

But several years earlier Father had fallen ill. To treat him, they spent their savings, sold two mu of land, and piled up debts.

To repay them, Mother stitched shoe soles day and night until her eyes were half ruined.

After Father died, Dewan entered the academy, and life became harder still. As a xiucai, he received a little county stipend each month, but a scholar’s expenses were considerable: brush, ink, paper, and inkstones were costly, and travel and social calls cost money as well. Mother often needed medicine. Now the whole household depended on those three mu and the labor Zhao Deqian sold in town.

But how many copper coins could hard labor earn?

If you covered your head, your backside showed. It was never enough.

Dewan’s tuition was one tael a month. He copied books and wrote for people whenever he had time, but if that delayed his provincial examination, would that not be throwing away a watermelon to pick up a sesame seed?

“The Chens made their way in business. Maybe our family could try as well.”

I spoke across two meters of kang, from where I lay at the head to Zhao Deqian at the foot.

“I’ve thought about it often. But Chen Chunmei can make sesame cakes. All I know is how to sell my strength.”

I sat bolt upright, eyes shining at him. “You may not know how, but I do!”

“You do?”

“Yes. I know how to make tofu.”

In the night, Zhao Deqian sat up too, eagerness impossible to hide in his voice. “Does tofu take much capital?”

“A dou of soybeans in town is twenty cash now. Buying from farming households might be cheaper. One dou should make about fifty jin of tofu. If we sell it at two cash a jin—or trade it for soybeans—I figure we may not eat meat and drink wine all year, but at least Dewan can study in peace. The capital isn’t much. I have a silver bracelet. Pawn it in town tomorrow, and it may be enough.”

“How can we do that? Keep your bracelet.” He refused without hesitation.

But I was blunt by nature. “It’s nothing. Consider it my thanks for saving my life.”

Outside the window, crickets called over one another in noisy waves. Under the pale moon, Zhao Deqian lay back down and said nothing for a long while.

Just when I thought he had fallen asleep, he spoke again.

“I’ll find a way to get the capital.”

I never imagined Zhao Deqian’s way would still be to borrow money from the Chen family.

“Second Sister-in-law, farmers are like this. Turn around a few times and everyone is related somehow. Depending on each other only brings people closer. In past years, Second Brother helped Second Elder Uncle Chen’s family farm and build their house many times. When Sister Chunmei married, even I went to help tend the fire.”

Seeing my astonishment, Deguan squatted on the ground weaving a cricket cage and comforted me with a cheeky grin.

“All right. Second Brother, wait for me. I’m coming too.”

After breakfast, Zhao Deqian cleaned himself up and took a parcel of dried mushrooms to the Chen house. I caught up with him before he could leave.

His eyes smiled as he nodded. “Going together is fine.”

The Chen house stood at the western end of the village: blue brick, gray eaves, a high gate, and a grand courtyard.

But when we pushed open the gate, what met our eyes were neat plots of green scallions and trellises of cucumbers blooming with small yellow flowers.

An old woman in coarse gray cloth was squatting by a cucumber trellis, pulling weeds. At Zhao Deqian’s call of “Elder Great-Aunt,” she stood and beamed.

“Deqian’s here? Oh, is this your wife? Good heavens, she’s so lovely and fresh-looking. Did a fairy descend to earth?”

I liked the frank old woman at once. I gave her a sweet little curtsy. “Greetings, Elder Great-Aunt. My maiden surname is Pan. Please call me Xi’er.”

“Good, good, and such a bright tongue. Come inside and sit.”

Elder Great-Aunt Chen warmly brought us into the house and set out a big handful of dried fruit. Zhao Deqian did not beat around the bush. Soon he explained that he wished to borrow money to make tofu.

When she heard, she slapped her thigh in delight. “You should have done this long ago! If you’d looked for business years ago, would your mother have ruined her eyes stitching shoe soles?”

“It means coming here to lose face again.”

“What kind of distant talk is that? Your mother used to help my family mend clothes. When your father was alive, he wrote our spring couplets every year. Chunmei isn’t here, or she could tell you a thing or two about business.”

“Did Chunmei go to the capital again?”

“Mm. Her husband’s elder sister in the capital missed her twin nephews. Who knew Chunmei would get pregnant again as soon as she got there? That elder sister was afraid of tiring her out and won’t let her come back to the village.”

As she spoke, Elder Great-Aunt Chen took five strings of cash and a piece of brand-new floral cloth from a cupboard.

“Take this money first. If it isn’t enough, come back to Elder Great-Aunt. This cloth is for Xi’er—good for a padded jacket lining or an outer wrap. Call it my gift for meeting you.”

How could I accept it? I rose at once to refuse.

But Elder Great-Aunt Chen moved even faster than I did. She stuffed the things into my arms and pressed my hands down firmly.

“We’re family. We’ll be seeing each other all our lives. Don’t stand on ceremony with Elder Great-Aunt.”