Fang Wan knelt before the mourning hall and cast the last stack of spirit money into the brazier.
The flames licked at the yellow paper. Ash drifted upward and settled on her plain white mourning clothes. She had been kneeling there for several days, and her knees were so swollen she could barely pull her trouser legs down over them, yet not the slightest trace of exhaustion showed on her face. Her back remained ramrod straight.
“Mother, go and rest.” She rose and went to help Mother Fang, who was kneeling beside her and swaying as though she might collapse at any moment.
Mother Fang’s eyes were swollen from crying until they looked like walnuts. Her entire body leaned against her daughter, limp as a puddle of mud. She had been sheltered by Scholar Fang all her life, and she had never learned to do anything for herself. Now that her husband was dead, it was as though the sky had fallen in. All she knew to do was cry.
“Wan’er, your father’s gone. How are the three of us supposed to live now…” Mother Fang began crying again.
Fang Wan said nothing. She simply helped her mother into the inner room, poured her a bowl of warm water, watched her drink it, then helped her remove her shoes and tucked her in. Finally, she patted her gently as though soothing a child.
“Mother, get some sleep. I’ll take care of things outside.”
Sobbing, Mother Fang closed her eyes. Before long, she had fallen asleep.
Fang Wan quietly pulled the door shut and returned to the mourning hall, where she began tidying the incense, candles, and paper offerings that had piled up over the past several days. Tomorrow was the seventh-day memorial rite, and the offerings had to be prepared in advance. Her father had loved the osmanthus cakes she made, so she would have to stay up all night and make them.
Several aunts from the village had come to help and were putting up a canopy in the courtyard. Fang Wan walked over and said in an even, courteous tone, “Aunt Zhou, Aunt Li, thank you for your hard work. Tomorrow is the seventh-day memorial, so I’m afraid I’ll have to trouble you for another half-day. The canopy doesn’t need to be too large—just big enough for a few tables. Only close relatives will be coming, so there won’t be many people.”
Aunt Zhou looked up at her, marveling inwardly. Scholar Fang’s daughter was only sixteen or seventeen, yet with her father dead and her mother unable to cope, she had taken care of the funeral arrangements. From reporting the death and setting up the mourning hall to preparing the offerings for the seventh-day memorial and arranging the coffin for the burial, she had handled every matter properly, without the slightest mistake.
“Wan, you should get some rest. You haven’t closed your eyes in days,” Aunt Zhou said sympathetically.
“It’s all right.” Fang Wan gave a faint smile. Her smile was faint as the mist of early morning and gone almost as soon as it appeared.
She turned and went to the kitchen to prepare the dough for the osmanthus cakes. As she passed the water jar, she happened to catch sight of her reflection—a small, pale face, dark circles beneath her eyes, cracked lips, and hair hastily twisted up with a single silver hairpin.
She did indeed look somewhat haggard.
She touched her face, then remembered the words her father had always repeated while he was alive: “Wan’er is blessed with good looks. She shouldn’t show her face too freely, lest she attract the wrong sort of men.”
And so she had been raised in the inner chambers from childhood, rarely allowed outside. Even in the village, few people had ever gotten a proper look at her. Her father was a scholar, old-fashioned to the bone, and he had always treated this as a proper rule. Fang Wan had never argued with him. She knew he loved her.
Now that he was gone, those rules had gone with him.
She sighed and lowered her head to knead the dough.
======
Beneath the old locust tree at the eastern end of the village, Old Man Wang was chatting with several others. When he spotted the old village head, Old Master Song, walking toward them with his hands clasped behind his back, he quickly shifted aside to make room.
“Village Head, your son hasn’t come home in quite some time, has he?”
Old Master Song packed his pipe, then took a leisurely puff. “The shop’s busy. He can’t get away.”
“I heard Scholar Fang passed away. That poor girl—just a widowed mother and orphaned children left behind.”
Old Master Song exhaled a mouthful of smoke and did not respond.
He had known for a long time that Scholar Fang had a daughter who was exceptionally beautiful. He admired Scholar Fang’s learning, and the two of them would occasionally discuss the classics over wine. Once Scholar Fang got drunk, he could not go three sentences without mentioning his daughter, praising the girl as though there were none like her in all the world. Yet he had never allowed Old Master Song to see her, always saying, “A young lady should not be seen by unrelated men.”
Old Master Song had simply put it down to a scholar’s old-fashioned ways and thought nothing more of it.
What truly put the idea in his head was what he had seen over the past few days.
Scholar Fang had died suddenly, yet the funeral arrangements had proceeded without the slightest disorder. When Old Master Song went to pay his respects, he had personally seen Fang Wan calmly directing people as they set up the mourning hall, recorded the gifts in the ledger, and arranged the communal feast. Every one of the older women and daughters-in-law present did as she asked. Even the elders of the clan treated her with courtesy.
That day, she had worn coarse mourning clothes and a white flower in her hair. Among all the women wailing and crying to the heavens, she alone had kept her back straight and conducted herself with composure, arranging every matter clearly and properly.
As for her mother, all she had done from beginning to end was cry.
When Old Master Song returned home, he mentioned to his wife, “That daughter of Scholar Fang’s is no ordinary girl.”
His wife asked, “What does she look like?”
“I couldn’t see her clearly through the curtain. But judging by the way Scholar Fang praised her when he was alive, she can’t be bad-looking.”
His wife shot him a look. “You’re taking the word of a dead man bragging?”
Old Master Song said nothing more, but he had already made up his mind.
A beautiful and capable woman was a treasure in a farming household. His son, Song Shi, worked as a shop assistant in the city. If he was to make something of himself in the future, he would need a wife capable of holding the household together. Most pretty women were little more than vases; most capable women, on the other hand, were rough-looking. If Fang Wan had both beauty and capability, then she was the kind of woman you couldn’t find even with a lantern.
So he asked Granny Wang, the most silver-tongued woman in the village, to sound out the Fang family first.
The Fang household was now reduced to a widowed mother and her children, precisely the sort of time when they would be at a loss. His son was not a bad match, so the matter would most likely succeed.
Sure enough, Granny Wang returned that afternoon with a broad smile spread across her face.
“Village Head, it’s done, it’s done! Mrs. Fang agreed, and the girl didn’t object either. Let me tell you, I got a good look at that girl—and what a beauty she is—”
Old Master Song waved a hand and interrupted her. “Her looks aren’t the most important thing. What matters is her temperament. What do you think of the girl?”
Granny Wang gave him a thumbs-up. “Village Head, you really do have a good eye! That girl is so capable and efficient. She can handle everything inside and out. Her mother is as helpless as a lump of dough; the whole household depends on that girl to keep it standing. If your Son marries her, he’ll be bringing home a woman who knows how to run a household.. You won’t have to worry about anything at home or outside from then on.”
Old Master Song nodded in satisfaction, the wrinkles on his face relaxing.
“Then it’s settled. I’ll write a letter now and have Shi-ge’er come home to meet her.”
His wife muttered from the side, “Aren’t you afraid Shi-ge’er won’t like her?”
Old Master Song snorted. “He wouldn’t dare, besides, if the girl is truly as beautiful as Granny Wang says, what could he possibly find to complain about?”
He spread out the paper and picked up his brush. After thinking for a moment, he did not write about how capable Fang Wan was. He only said that his father had arranged a match for him and ordered him to come home at once.
He knew what his son was like. The boy had lived in the city too long and had developed lofty tastes without the ability to match them, dreaming only of marrying a city girl. If he praised Fang Wan directly in the letter, Song Shi would surely pay no attention. Once he returned and saw her with his own eyes, he would naturally understand what was what.
Old Master Song sealed the letter and gave it to a young man from next door who was heading to the city. Then he paced twice around the courtyard with his hands behind his back, unable to keep the smile from his face.
Scholar Fang, oh, Scholar Fang. While you were alive, you hid your daughter like a precious nugget of gold. Now that you’re gone, you’ve let me pick up such a bargain.
Rest assured. My Shi-ge’er won’t mistreat her.
======
Fang Wan knew about all of this.
After Granny Wang’s visit, her mother’s spirits improved somewhat, probably because she felt reassured now that her daughter’s marriage had been arranged.
She was neither pleased nor displeased. To her, marriage was like planting crops when the fields needed planting or putting on extra layers when the weather turned cold: it was simply something that had to be done. What difference did it make whom she married? As long as the man was upright, could give her mother a peaceful life in her remaining years, and could help support her younger brother, that would be enough.
She placed the osmanthus cakes she had made on the offering table before the spirit tablet, then lit a stick of incense.
“Father, tomorrow will be your seventh-day memorial.” Kneeling on the prayer mat, she spoke softly. “If you can hear me, Father, then tell me—is this match a good one or not?”
The ash fell soundlessly from the incense onto the back of her hand, warm to the touch.
She closed her eyes and took it as her father’s answer.
Outside the window, the moon was round and bright, casting a silvery glow over the entire courtyard, as though someone had spread a layer of frost across it.
And in the city dozens of miles away, Song Shi frowned as he read the letter over and over.
He did not want to go home.
The shop was at its busiest, and as the assistant shopkeeper, how could he simply leave whenever he pleased?