Chapter 2

Pei Shuyuan and Shen Zhiyan went to call on the great scholar.

My husband accompanied them during the day.

At night, he invariably drew me into some earnest studying by lamplight.

He had almost worn that book to pieces.

We never got through more than a few pages before he pulled me into putting them into practice.

One day, in a moment of passion, he suddenly raised his head and said,

“Are you pleased, Sister-in-law?”

Then he leaned over me again, murmuring “Sister-in-law” against my ear as he took my earlobe between his lips.

Shame, nervousness, and the sense of doing something forbidden overwhelmed me all at once…

Afterward, my husband said he was simply helping me get used to it.

The scholar opened a class and accepted several pupils. His cousin and the friend both got in.

They studied during the day and came back to stay at night.

My husband said that when they had a day off in a couple of days, he would go and throw a sack over his cousin’s head.

Thinking of Pei Shuyuan gave me a feeling I couldn’t quite describe.

He was so handsome. Surely his child would be good-looking too?

In our countryside, having no children was a miserable fate. People called yours a dying household.

Once you were old, being bullied by outsiders might be the least of your worries. Even the servants might beat you.

My husband had considered adoption, but after much thought, he still felt it would be better if I bore the child myself.

After all, trusting an adopted child to treat us well in our old age was a gamble.

And in real life, very few people won that gamble.

Traditional women like me followed the husbands they married, whatever those husbands were like. A husband was his wife’s whole world.

I would do whatever mine said.

The night soon came.

My husband carried his hooded cousin in over his shoulder and dumped him onto the bed.

He gave me a meaningful look, then left.

I stood nervously beside the bed.

I climbed onto it so awkwardly that my hands and feet seemed to have forgotten how to work together, then had no idea what to do next.

This was too much to ask. I had no experience at all.

After a while, his cousin slowly came around.

Somehow, as he struggled, the hood came off.

Realizing he was in bed with me, he froze.

“Sister-in-law? Why are you here? Why are you dressed like that?”

For convenience, I was wearing only a bellyband and underdrawers.

His voice rose. “How could you do this to my cousin?”

“No, listen. It isn’t what you think…”

“You’re about to take my trousers off! What else could it be? No. I won’t betray him.”

Pei Shuyuan grew louder and louder. I hurried to cover his mouth, but he deftly dodged my hand.

He sprang off the bed and made for the door.

In a panic, I started calling for my husband. I had barely got a word out when he came wriggling out from under the bed with astonishing speed and agility.

He caught Pei Shuyuan around the waist and hauled him back onto the bed.

Pei Shuyuan gaped. “Wait—what were you doing under there?”

His eyes shifted, and the corner of his mouth twitched. “What sort of tastes do you two have?”

I stood to one side with my head down, embarrassed and ashamed.

My husband patiently explained his condition to Pei Shuyuan.

“We only want you to father a child for us. We’re close family. Couldn’t you do us this favor? I promise, once Yunniang is expecting, we won’t trouble you again. Apart from heaven and earth, only the three of us will know. What do you say?”

Pei Shuyuan looked utterly incredulous.

For a long moment, his face went blank.

Taking his silence for consent, my husband started pulling down his trousers.

The sudden chill seemed to jolt Pei Shuyuan’s mind back into working order. He struggled violently.

“No! No, I won’t! This is absurd! She’s your wife!”

He refused to cooperate and fought so fiercely that we had to abandon the whole business.

After seeing him out, my husband sighed and comforted me. “Don’t worry, my darling. I’ll try to talk him around.”

“Why don’t we forget it?” I said. “This isn’t the sort of thing you can force someone into…”

We might as well find someone else.

But my husband interrupted before I could say that last part.

“I know I’m the only man in your heart. But for our future, for the happy life the three of us will have, I’m asking so much of you. I’m sorry you have to endure this.”

Holding up my handkerchief, I hastily changed what I was going to say. “It isn’t too much. If it’s what you want, a little hardship is nothing.”

My husband was deeply moved.