At the hour of the Rabbit, Jin Si entered the school with his cloth satchel slung over his shoulder. Clear voices reciting filled the room.
His classmates held their books and did their morning reading. No one looked up to ask why he had been absent yesterday. Occasionally, someone raised their head, but only gave him a casual glance before continuing to read. That made sense. Being held up for a day or two by family matters was perfectly ordinary, and he was the least noticeable of them all anyway.
He took the letter out of his satchel and placed it on the teacher's desk, then returned to his seat at the very back and opened the Thousand Character Classic for his morning reading.
At the hour of the Dragon, the teacher strolled into the room as usual. He picked up the letter on his desk and read it, then nodded slightly and put it down without saying anything more. As always, he quizzed them on their previous lessons before guiding each of them through new material.
Jin Si looked at the empty desk ahead. The child who had shown signs of deep mourning was still absent today. He remembered that some families made their funerals exceedingly complicated, fussing for days before finally burying the dead and hiding them away in the earth.
They took a break at noon.
Bored, he squatted beside the wall watching sparrows, while several twelve- or thirteen-year-old pupils hid behind a tree and discussed strange tales of ghosts and monsters.
They spoke of a precious radiance appearing somewhere, drawing countless people to kneel and pray for blessings, and of someone or other who had seen a nine-colored jeweled pagoda out in the wilderness. Their descriptions were so vivid it was as though they had been