Father Nie fell silent. Mother Nie gestured for the children to stop provoking him. He wouldn’t lose his temper, but the guilt would only deepen, and she couldn’t bear to see him suffer.
After the meal, Nie Qinghe took the initiative to wash the dishes, while her cousin led Honghua to Mother Nie to learn some embroidery techniques.
Father Nie sat on a small stool in the courtyard, lost in thought.
Now that the children were growing, there were expenses everywhere. They had lived in Jintai City for years, but they had never owned a home—only rented. Even their current small courtyard, with its three main rooms, was barely more than a shanty. They had built it themselves with bricks and stones, and it didn’t even have a proper latrine. The main rooms were low and cramped; as the sun dipped west in the afternoon, the interior grew dark and gloomy. In the summer, when it rained heavily outside, it leaked inside.
He had hoped to save enough money to rent a better place.
His eldest son was sixteen now. In two years, it would be time to arrange a marriage. He couldn’t just rely on the boy’s luck—his master had chosen him as a disciple and married his daughter to him, but he couldn’t expect his son to be as fortunate. Getting married meant saving for furniture and a betrothal gift.
And then there was Qingqing. She was fourteen. In another two years, she would likely be entering the Song family’s home. They would need to prepare her dowry: four seasons’ worth of clothes, shoes, socks, bedding, and a sum of money tucked away at the bottom of her chest. Even if the Song family didn’t demand it, they couldn’t be too shabby. Otherwise, how could their daughter hold her head high?
He looked at his home. His wife had followed him for all these years, yet he had only ever given her a single pair of silver hairpins. Over the years, they had always been short on money, and she had pawned or sold off her silver jewelry piece by piece. Now, only the betrothal gifts he’d given her remained untouched; she had nothing else.
How long had it been since the family had eaten fine grain, a stir-fry, eggs, or meat?
The children never blamed him for being a useless father, but he couldn’t keep letting them suffer.
If we send him to school, how much tighter will our budget have to be?
He really can’t study.
Education was a bottomless pit, a money-swallowing hole. Fourth Brother was living proof of that.
When Fourth Brother first started learning, the costs were relatively low. But after he turned ten and began studying the Four Books and Five Classics to write essays, the tuition started at two taels of silver per year and increased annually. When he reached the age to take the exams, they had to hire famous scholars for guidance and pay for him to network with other students. It felt like no amount of money would ever be enough.
Even without those expenses, the brushes, ink, paper, and inkstones were all incredibly expensive. The books were even worse—a single volume could cost a hundred or even several hundred coins, and that was supposedly the cheap ones. To support his education, the family spent over ten taels of silver a year on tuition and materials alone, not counting food and clothing. That was already the absolute limit of what his older brothers could earn. If they made more, they would have poured it all in, and it still wouldn’t have been enough.
He couldn’t do what his own parents had done—sacrifice his other children for the sake of the youngest.
But his youngest son, Xiaoli, was truly gifted. If he went to school, he might actually forge a bright future and bring honor to the family. It would be a waste of a natural talent to keep him from learning.
If all else fails, I’ll just let Xiaoli try it out. The early stages of learning don’t cost much anyway. If he has the talent, we’ll see results within a year. If not, we can just give up on the idea.
Father Nie was naturally taciturn, not one to wear his heart on his sleeve. He kept these thoughts to himself, unable to voice them, especially since he could never bring himself to criticize his own mother or younger brother.
Nie Qinghe watched him drift off into a daze, figuring he was still drunk and a bit dazed from his children’s sharp words.
But Father Nie was genuinely bewildered. He’d never expected his eldest daughter to develop such a prickly temperament after her illness. And while his second daughter had always been a little firecracker, she’d never been this defiant before. At least she’d never dared to talk back so bluntly. Tonight was just too strange.
Nie Qinghe caught the eye of Xiaoli, who was helping Mother Nie split hemp fibers, and gave him a subtle sign. Understanding immediately, Nie Xiaoli ran over and clung to his father.
“Dad, teach me to read!”
Seeing his son so eager, Father Nie was more than happy to draw on his own limited knowledge. Every father craved a sense of accomplishment through his children; their admiration and success made him feel taller and prouder.
But in the time it took to crack a few melon seeds, Nie Xiaoli had already drained his father’s reservoir of knowledge.
“Dad, that’s it? You’re out of stuff to teach me.”
Nie Qinghe chuckled softly from the side. She had noticed that the writing system of this era was a mix of traditional and simplified characters, not entirely one or the other.
She knew this.
She stepped forward. “Dad, I practiced a bit while I was washing the dishes.” Picking up a stick, she wrote out every single character Nie Erzhuang had taught Xiaoli, scratching them into the dirt.
Nie Erzhuang stared, speechless.
His children were far more brilliant than his fourth brother. When the fourth brother had started learning, it had taken him forever to memorize just a few pages of the primer, and he’d always written the characters in the wrong order.
A seed of doubt planted itself in his mind. Could his children actually be cut out for scholarship?
At the time, girls weren’t sent away to school, but a son could learn and then return home to teach the rest. One person’s tuition could benefit a niece and two daughters—what a bargain!
The thought thrilled him.
There were no electric lights, and even the kerosene lamps and candles of later eras were absent. Only the wealthy could afford tallow or paraffin candles; ordinary families wouldn’t dare spend such money. Instead, they used vegetable oil lamps, which gave off a dim light and thick black smoke. Not only did it make work difficult, but it also strained the eyes. Besides, vegetable oil was needed for cooking; why waste it on light? Many times, they simply worked by the glowing embers of the stove.
Following the principle of saving oil and sparing their eyes, the family would all climb into their respective beds after the second watch clapper struck.
Early to bed, early to rise. It saved oil and left more time for work in the morning.
The couple slept in the east room, while Nie Yunduo shared the west room with her younger siblings. Because the room was small, the kang bed was equally cramped.
Once they settled in, Mother Nie couldn’t help but ask, “Dear, what are you thinking?”
“It’s late,” Nie Erzhuang replied. “Go to sleep.”
Mother Nie bristled and gave him a sharp shove. “All you ever care about is sleep! I kept my mouth shut for the sake of the children, but now that we’re alone, I won’t hold back. Look at what my life has become since I married you! We work ourselves to death just to give our children a decent life, so they can eat two mouthfuls of meat.”
“And yet,” she continued, “whenever we make a little extra, your mother takes it all. What’s the point of working so hard? Of course, we should honor our parents, but why do we have to support your fourth brother, too? Didn’t we agree to split the household and live our own lives? I’ll work myself to death for my own sake—that’s one thing. But now, no matter how hard I work, we never get ahead, and the children are the ones who suffer for it. Hmph!”
She rolled over, clutched her pillow, and turned her back to him.
Lying there, Mother Nie’s resentment festered. Old Madam Nie always played the victim and wailed about being poor, but in truth, her own family lived worse than the rural peasants.
Those peasants had grain in the fields and vegetable gardens behind their houses. They kept ducks and chickens in the yard for eggs, and the well-off ones even raised a pig in the pen. During the holidays, they had plenty of eggs to eat and could even slaughter a chicken for a feast.
What did they have to show for it?
Ever since Old Madam Nie had started demanding one tael and one hundred coppers a month, they hadn’t bought meat once. They relied solely on the single piece of pork Dali brought home during the New Year to treat themselves. They couldn’t even afford black flour, let alone white flour, and had to mix it with a lot of coarse grains. At first, Nie Xiaoli couldn’t keep the food down, stretching his neck to force it down. Nie Qinghe, sick for several days, only got a few bowls of egg custard—not even a single mouthful of fine noodles.
The family’s single jar of oil had to last them more than half a year! How could she cook a decent meal without any fat or oil?
Yet Old Madam Nie still pretended to be generous.
“I’m not some tyrannical mother-in-law,” she would say. “I only take one tael, and I leave you one tael as well. Doesn’t the children’s mother do embroidery and weave shoes? And Yunduo can also do embroidery to earn money. You uncles and aunts are the ones who keep it all. I see you earn at least four or five taels a month, yet you still cry poor to me.”
Is that how a person speaks? Mother Nie wondered.
What could they do with the remaining nine hundred coppers?
Including their niece, they were a family of seven. They had to pay the poll tax, and food and clothing were their biggest expenses. They also had to buy firewood and well water, and cover the costs of social obligations. Then there was the money for medicine if someone came down with a fever or headache. If it were a bad year, the government would still levy various taxes, and they would be left to starve.
It was a blessing that Dali was working as an apprentice. He didn’t eat or live at home, and his master even covered his poll tax.
Mother Nie worked tirelessly every day, earning six hundred or seven hundred coppers a month. Without her, the family would have been reduced to eating the wind from the north.
And yet, Father Nie still felt his parents were suffering at home and his younger brother was struggling with his studies.
Pah! Mother Nie thought. Xiaoli is clearly smarter than that pretentious, bloodsucking brother-in-law of mine!
If Old Madam Nie could let her own son study, why shouldn’t she let her son do the same? Did her mother-in-law have to die before a daughter-in-law could even breathe?
Father Nie called out twice, “Hey, hey.” When Mother Nie ignored him, he lowered his voice. “Look at you, already angry. I never said Xiaoli couldn’t study.”
His conciliatory tone softened her anger. “Rest assured,” she said, “I won’t make things difficult for you. I’ll never withhold the filial money you send to your mother. I’ll take on more embroidery work each month. That should be enough.”
If he refused to take the boy to an apprenticeship, she was powerless. But now that he had agreed, she was willing to work harder to earn the tuition.
She was terrified of Old Madam Nie causing trouble. She couldn’t afford to provoke her.
Father Nie hated to see her working even harder. Years of embroidery had strained her eyes, and now weaving silk shoes kept her hunched over all day. Her health was poor, and her body ached constantly.
Father Nie pondered his options. He couldn’t withhold the money sent to his parents in the village—he couldn’t bear the thought of his mother causing a scene. He couldn’t let his wife wear herself out, and he certainly couldn’t let his youngest son’s education come at the expense of Qinghe.
The only solution was for him to shoulder the burden.
Though registered as an artisan, the new regulations had abolished annual labor service. Now, he only had to serve one to three months every three years. The rest of the time, he was free to work.
He was employed by the Liu family, but he could also take on official government assignments they were tasked with. Merchants had quotas to meet, and they were willing to pay him to fulfill them.
He had previously refused extra work because he was exhausted, but now he realized he had to take on more. What’s an extra hour of work at night? he thought. What’s a little extra fatigue for a man? Compared to his older brother and younger brother toiling in the fields, face to the earth and back to the sky, he was sheltered from the sun and rain, never hungry or thirsty. He was far more comfortable than they were.
His mood lifted. He reached out to gently massage the acupoints around his wife’s eyes. “Physician Jing said you must keep massaging these.”
Mother Nie’s anger had vanished, replaced by a hopeful daydream.
“If Xiaoli passes the exam and becomes a Xiucai,” she mused, “will I be the mother of a scholar?”
Father Nie chuckled. “You should call her Madam, pay your respects to the Madam.”
“Flattery will get you nowhere,” Mother Nie said, playfully punching his arm before breaking into a soft giggle.
The social strata of the officialdom adhered to strict rules of address, but the common people were much more relaxed. Many wealthy merchant families with large households kept maids and servants who were all called Old Lady or Old Madame, and no one ever questioned it.
The couple began to whisper, debating the tuition costs for their son’s apprenticeship. They compared which teachers were cheaper and which ones were rumored to be the best. Having never been educated themselves and paying little attention to such matters, they quickly ran out of ideas and agreed to go ask around the next day.
Father Nie suggested asking Song Qingyuan, but Mother Nie shut him down immediately. When he pressed the issue, she reminded him of Song Qingyuan and his mother’s blatant neglect and disdain for their own daughter.
In the side room, Nie Qinghe lay on the kang, listening to Honghua’s soft snoring. The girl had fallen asleep the moment her head hit the mattress, while beside her, Nie Xiaoli remained as silent as a cat.
Nie Qinghe whispered, “Sister, are you still awake?”
“I am,” her cousin replied. “Can’t sleep?”
Nie Qinghe rolled over and smiled. “Sister, could you have someone send a letter home tomorrow? I’m so sick, we really ought to tell them.”
Being sick would cost a lot of money. It would be perfectly reasonable to send less back home. Besides, if Old Madam Nie started causing a fuss later, Nie Qinghe would simply say she had been deathly ill. When her grandparents received the letter and showed no concern, only asking for money, her father would see exactly what kind of people they were.
Old Madam Nie might have brainwashed him, but Nie Qinghe could slowly set things right.
“Alright,” her cousin agreed. “I’ll ask Teacher Xie to help me send it tomorrow. He only charges two coins.”
“Sister,” Nie Qinghe said, “do you think it’s better here or back home? Grandma won’t force you to return… will she?”
Her cousin was seventeen, the age when marriage talks usually began. Old Madam Nie wouldn’t miss the chance to secure a generous dowry, but in her greed, she probably wouldn’t care if the groom was a decent, hardworking man.
Her cousin fell silent for a moment, then sighed softly. “What choice do we girls have?”
“As long as you want it, Sister, there’s always a way,” Nie Qinghe insisted. “There are so many opportunities here in Jintai City. Why should we have to go back?”
“Is that really possible?” her cousin asked.
“Of course,” Nie Qinghe said. “We have Mother. If you’re interested, she’ll keep an eye out for you. You know how well-connected she is around here.”
Her cousin’s voice dropped to a whisper. “Okay.”
Nie Qinghe knew this was a sign of her cousin’s shyness. She trusted her to understand the unspoken agreement: keep Xiaoli’s schooling a secret from Old Madam Nie.
The original owner of this body and her younger siblings had always gotten along well with their cousin. Only during the first two years here, when Old Madam Nie had threatened her, did she feel the suffocating guilt of being a guest in someone else’s home. But after she stopped acting as the old woman’s spy, Mother Nie had treated her like one of her own, and she had finally found her freedom.
Two years ago, when Old Madam Nie had come to stir up trouble, the cousin had publicly defended the second branch. The old woman had been so furious she tried to drag her back to their hometown to be married off. It was Mother Nie who had intervened, arguing that Qinghe and Honghua weren’t married yet and needed their older sister’s companionship. How could she just be taken away?
Nie Qinghe hoped her cousin would forge her own path in life, rather than becoming a tool for Old Madam Nie to hoard wealth.