“It was my fault for startling you, Miss. I hope Second Miss Yu will forgive me a little,” Cui Zixu admitted the fault readily, without the least evasion.
The young man suddenly bent down. The long silk cord hanging at his waist swept across the dance mat, and the edge of his hanging wide sleeve brushed by accident over the upper of Yu Nanzhi’s embroidered shoe.
The pearl-studded toe of the shoe drew back slightly. Yu Nanzhi covered the back of her neck and watched Cui Zixu’s movements with a wary face.
This fellow was certainly up to no good [1]bottling up bad water (biē zhe huài shuǐ, 憋着壞水) (Slang), quietly brewing some piece of mischief jQuery('#footnote_plugin_tooltip_3253956_1_1').tooltip({ tip: '#footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_3253956_1_1', tipClass: 'footnote_tooltip', effect: 'fade', predelay: 0, fadeInSpeed: 200, delay: 400, fadeOutSpeed: 200, position: 'top center', relative: true, offset: [-7, 0], });.
Cui Zixu lowered his eyes and searched about as if nothing were the matter, his fingers passing over the pattern of the gold-woven carpet. Suddenly he stopped at the place where Yu Nanzhi had been standing. The eyes that had been lowered lifted at once, and waves finally rose in those calm depths.
Found it.
He picked up a gold bead that had rolled loose and held it out to Yu Nanzhi on his fingertips.
Cui Zixu’s hands were very good to look at, the joints long as jade and evenly shaped. The gold bead lay in his palm, its golden light turning, bright and dazzling.
Yu Nanzhi’s gaze focused. When she saw clearly the familiar treasure-lotus pattern on it, her heart gave a jump. She instinctively reached back for the long necklace-chain behind her, and when she touched the empty end of the chain her heart stalled—
This gold bead in Cui Zixu’s hand was clearly the end bead lost from the tip of her long chain.
Yu Nanzhi was surprised that Cui Zixu would go to this extra trouble.
After all, if a gold bead was lost it was lost, she could go back and find another exactly like it to replace it.
Cui Zixu did not know how Yu Nanzhi’s thoughts were circling. He only said, “The lost pearl is here. I return the original to you.”
“The lost pearl?” Yu Nanzhi snorted coldly and stopped pretending to agree with every word. After all, after those two occasions in the corridor of the princess’s residence and the book pavilion of the Duke of Zhenguo’s household, each of them had a faint sense of what sort of piece of work the other was. “Those two words, no one, neither anyone in the Duke’s household nor any host or guest of any house, dares mention them in front of me.”
Identities swapped by mistake for fifteen years, the real and fake heiress known to everyone, this was the Duke of Zhenguo household’s sore point.
In outsiders’ eyes it was also the sore point in Yu Nanzhi’s heart.
To have someone take your place and enjoy wealth and honor and every luxury for decades, and still hold neither resentment nor hatred, that would be a saint.
Yu Nanzhi was no saint, but there was no great resentment or hatred in her either. This present display was mostly put on for Cui Zixu to see.
Cui Zixu was neither hurried nor annoyed. He told it slowly. “In the South Sea there is a village called Hepu, which lives by raising oysters and gathering pearls. One day while collecting the oysters they carelessly dropped one, and only decades later was it found again. When the shell was opened, a pearl appeared and filled the room with light. Its glow turned and turned, far surpassing the pearls opened from the other oysters in those years. So people say, ‘A lost pearl may be worth a thousand gold.'”
When the story was finished, his gaze fell thoughtfully on Yu Nanzhi, as if asking silently, “Real and fake heiress, the lost pearl recovered, do you really care about these things?”
He praised her as worth a thousand gold, and asked in order to knock at her heart.
Something heaved and broke inside Yu Nanzhi’s chest [2]startled breakers beating the shore (jīng tāo pāi àn, 驚濤拍岸) (Metaphor), violent turmoil rising inside one jQuery('#footnote_plugin_tooltip_3253956_1_2').tooltip({ tip: '#footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_3253956_1_2', tipClass: 'footnote_tooltip', effect: 'fade', predelay: 0, fadeInSpeed: 200, delay: 400, fadeOutSpeed: 200, position: 'top center', relative: true, offset: [-7, 0], });. Her skin crawled faintly, and she had the feeling of being seen through.
She did not like it at all.
“What does Second Miss Yu think?” Cui Zixu’s voice was warm and smooth, but every word was like a blade.
Cui Zixu’s attitude just now was truly strange, and Yu Nanzhi did not understand it. She only raised her eyes and smiled faintly, and came at it from a wholly different direction. “If you ask me, the most pitiable one in this is that old oyster. It got clear of death by a hair [3]escaped out into the living heavens (táo chū shēng tiān, 逃出生天) (Idiom), to come out alive from certain destruction jQuery('#footnote_plugin_tooltip_3253956_1_3').tooltip({ tip: '#footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_3253956_1_3', tipClass: 'footnote_tooltip', effect: 'fade', predelay: 0, fadeInSpeed: 200, delay: 400, fadeOutSpeed: 200, position: 'top center', relative: true, offset: [-7, 0], }); and lived safely for decades, and still one day it was cut open and gutted, only so someone could take the pearl in its belly.”
Cui Zixu keenly sensed a thread of displeasure in Yu Nanzhi’s mood, especially after what he had just said. He knew he had probably been too clever by half [4]worked cleverness and produced clumsiness (nòng qiǎo chéng zhuō, 弄巧成拙) (Idiom), to spoil a thing by handling it too cleverly jQuery('#footnote_plugin_tooltip_3253956_1_4').tooltip({ tip: '#footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_3253956_1_4', tipClass: 'footnote_tooltip', effect: 'fade', predelay: 0, fadeInSpeed: 200, delay: 400, fadeOutSpeed: 200, position: 'top center', relative: true, offset: [-7, 0], });, and tried to make it good. “The old oyster lives by eating the fine dust in the water, and the pearl gatherers live by the oyster. Each has its reason. It all depends on how a person’s heart sees it.”
Yu Nanzhi had known he would argue like that. There was not much point in talking further, so why waste more words.
She snorted coldly, snatched the gold bead from Cui Zixu’s palm and walked off unhurriedly.
Cui Zixu rubbed his fingertips together lightly and watched her pale green figure go further and further away and disappear in the surging crowd. Only then did he finally draw back his gaze.
The girl’s faint jasmine scent lingered where she had stood, like the mist that rises when the rain has just cleared, rising suddenly, then carried off by the wind before one was ready.
The sound of strings and pipes was still there, and the beaded blinds drifted and cast their shadows on nothing.
Cui Zixu put his hands behind his back, passed through the noisy crowd and told the servant waiting outside the warm chamber, “We are going back to the residence. There is no need to wait for Third Master Xie.”
On the other side, Yu Nanzhi had barely got back to her original seat. There was a little sanlejiang left in the pot, just enough for one cup. She held the cup and swept her eyes carelessly around the dance mat.
Yu Qiuchi and the young lady of the Reminder of the Left’s household were tangled up together, arms linked, dancing the tage dance that had come from the southern tribes, quite carried away. And Yu Shuhuai and Feng Congrong…
…they were gone!
There was no trace of them among the guests’ seats or on the jade steps.
Yu Nanzhi rose, pushed aside the light gauze partition, sat down against the felt mat by the window and pushed the shutter open a crack.
【Heavens! The camellia just passed word over, saying a man and a woman are meeting over where she is.】
Yu Nanzhi raised an eyebrow slightly. The voices she had not heard for a while were back in her ears.
In that case, that nuisance the Prince of Qinghe must have left already.
So she considered.
The clematis clinging to the wall outside the window went on muttering, 【That young lady is all in Hu dress, so very full of spirit. As for that young master, his face seems to have no expression at all.】
There we are, she had found them at last.
With features that obvious, one hearing was enough to know it was Feng Congrong and Yu Shuhuai.
Yu Nanzhi pressed her ear close to the window lattice and listened to the clematis’s live account.
Out of the warm chamber and round one turn was a covered corridor. Only a wall separated it from the noise inside the warm chamber, yet it was excessively quiet.
A man and a woman were standing there facing each other.
Feng Congrong clasped her hands. “Congrong thanks Second Brother Yu here. If Second Brother Yu had not taken the floor to help just now, I would probably have disgraced myself in public.”
“Fifth Miss Feng says too much.” Yu Shuhuai spoke stiffly and precisely. “It is said that without dance there is no music and without music no dance, but the Fifth Miss’s dancing is superb. Even with no jiegu to accompany you, your turning skirt and sweeping sleeves are like flying snow, your thrusts left and right raise a whirlwind. What disgrace could there be?”①
Feng Congrong covered her lips with her sleeve and laughed twice, low.
Not seen for several years, and this fellow still could not read a romantic signal to save his life.
Still, he could actually appreciate the beauty of her dancing now.
And that line of poetry praising her sounded good too.
Yu Shuhuai could not make head or tail of it [5]could not get a hand on his own head (mō bù zháo tóu nǎo, 摸不着頭腦) (Idiom), completely at a loss to see what is going on jQuery('#footnote_plugin_tooltip_3253956_1_5').tooltip({ tip: '#footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_3253956_1_5', tipClass: 'footnote_tooltip', effect: 'fade', predelay: 0, fadeInSpeed: 200, delay: 400, fadeOutSpeed: 200, position: 'top center', relative: true, offset: [-7, 0], });. He did not seem to have done anything laughable.
Seeing him suddenly go blank, Feng Congrong felt helpless.
How on earth had someone like this passed the jinshi examination and become the promising newcomer her father and the officials of the Secretariat thought well of?
She sighed, took a letter from the small bag at her side and held it out in front of Yu Shuhuai. “All right. This is what my father had me bring you.”
Vice Director Feng had meant to have a servant take the letter to the Duke of Zhenguo’s household, but Feng Congrong heard that the Duke of Zhenguo’s household had accepted the Marquis of Pingyuan’s invitation, guessed that Yu Shuhuai was bound to attend, and specially asked to go [6]asked for the tassel (qǐng yīng, 請纓) (Idiom), to step forward and volunteer for a mission jQuery('#footnote_plugin_tooltip_3253956_1_6').tooltip({ tip: '#footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_3253956_1_6', tipClass: 'footnote_tooltip', effect: 'fade', predelay: 0, fadeInSpeed: 200, delay: 400, fadeOutSpeed: 200, position: 'top center', relative: true, offset: [-7, 0], });, offering to make the trip for her father herself.
A light breeze moved under the corridor, and a few grains of snow settled on the sleeves of them both. Feng Congrong’s fingertips still held that letter, and the two gold armlets that had slid down to her wrist knocked together and rang.
Yu Shuhuai happened to catch sight of the red-glow-colored phoenix flower embroidered at her cuff, and suddenly remembered Youle Plain in the early autumn four years ago. She had been galloping on horseback and had come upon a phoenix flower tree by chance. Looking up, the sky was full of bright red, and she had said then that she would have that flower embroidered on her clothes. Now it was done at last.
“Second Brother Yu.” Feng Congrong pushed the letter forward a few inches more. The snow-white envelope made her nails look a pale pearl-shell pink. “Aren’t you taking it?”
Yu Shuhuai looked away at once and quickly recovered his unhurried manner. He asked, “Does the Vice Director have anything else to instruct?”
Nothing but official business in his heart and eyes, sure enough.
Feng Congrong asked back, “Business of the Secretariat, do you think my father would tell me?”
The young woman leaned forward slightly, and the distance between them closed a little.
There seemed to be storax left on the front of her robe, like a blade hidden in honey, and yet warm and sweet.
After all the tossing about on the dance mat just now, the green feather stuck at a slant in her hair was already about to fall, and when she lowered her head it slid down from her temple.
Before his awareness came back, Yu Shuhuai had already spread his hand and caught the feather.
In his jade-like palm lay a green feather, like grass just coming up in spring.
Feng Congrong’s eyes flickered. She was somewhat surprised that he would go to this extra trouble.
Even Yu Shuhuai himself had not expected to do such a thing.
He had read the books of the sages closely since childhood and held to “in ritual do not overstep the measure, do not encroach or insult, do not be over-familiar.” Behavior like this really did go beyond the bounds and was somewhat presumptuous.②
But in any case, it was his fault.
Yu Shuhuai opened his mouth to say something, but Feng Congrong blocked all his words in his throat. “One thing for another.”
With that, Feng Congrong pushed the envelope into Yu Shuhuai’s hand, boldly snatched back the green feather and pinned it at the top of her head.
“I’m going now.” With her back to Yu Shuhuai she waved a hand and left without the least reluctance, as if she had no purpose other than completing the errand of delivering the letter.
Yu Shuhuai held the letter and looked at it for a good while. In the end he did not open it here but put it into his sleeve, to see what Vice Director Feng had to say when he got back to the household.
No one noticed the red camellia outside the corridor, poking its head out of the snow now and then.
【The camellia says that lady most likely likes that young master, and that young master hasn’t woken up to it yet [7]his aperture has not opened (kāi qiào, 開竅) (Idiom), to come alive at last to something one was blind to jQuery('#footnote_plugin_tooltip_3253956_1_7').tooltip({ tip: '#footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_3253956_1_7', tipClass: 'footnote_tooltip', effect: 'fade', predelay: 0, fadeInSpeed: 200, delay: 400, fadeOutSpeed: 200, position: 'top center', relative: true, offset: [-7, 0], });.】
The clematis chattered away.
Yu Nanzhi listened with relish, as if the scene in the corridor were right in front of her eyes.
Sweethearts from childhood, reunited after a long parting, a wooden dolt meeting a bright, dashing older sister.
Many words to describe it came easily to mind.
She propped her chin on one hand and analyzed the relationship between Feng Congrong and Yu Shuhuai.
First, that Sister Congrong had feelings for her own Second Brother could be affirmed completely.
A woman like her, if she did not like someone, would either look straight past him as though he were not there or give him a good beating as she had Eleventh Master He and Second Master Qi, and would not bother to spend the least thought on him.
It was only a pity that she had met Second Brother, who could not read a romantic signal at all.
In dealing with people and conducting himself in the world, Second Brother had no great problem. Sometimes he was rather stubborn, but always to uphold his principles. Only, his heart had not opened, and he did not understand feeling between men and women.
No, that was not right.
Yu Nanzhi went back over the details the clematis had relayed and overturned the conclusion she had just reached. The key was—
That green feather.
Second Brother’s action showed that it was not that he did not care about Sister Congrong. An instinctive reaction cannot deceive.
If that was so, then it was not only that the lady had an interest, the gentleman had feeling too.
It was only that the person concerned had not yet discovered this feeling.
There was something in this!
Having chosen Sister Congrong’s flower branch, she had to do the job flawlessly. Tomorrow she would have to add Second Brother’s name to the little newspaper.
Yu Nanzhi made a private note of it.
She should be able to collect that final twenty strings of cash soon.
Note: ① “Turning skirt and sweeping sleeves like flying snow, thrusts left and right raising a whirlwind” is from “Jiuquanzi” in the Dunhuang Manuscripts. ② “In ritual do not overstep the measure, do not encroach or insult, do not be over-familiar” is from “Qu Li, Part One” in the Book of Rites.
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