The sun had only just passed noon, yet the wharf outside the West Water Gate of Pingjiang Prefecture was already so crowded there was scarcely room to turn around.
Grain boats, transport barges, and merchant ships from Tai Lake lay packed together in four or five rings, their masts a forest, their furled sails like rows of gray butterflies with upright wings.
Bare-armed boatmen chanted as they hauled the towlines. The coarse hemp ropes stretched taut, squeezing droplets from between their strands, which flashed once in the winter sunlight before falling into the water.
A ship carrying seafood from Ming Prefecture had just docked, its deck still steeped in the salty, fishy scent of the sea breeze. Basket after basket of oysters and shellfish was being carried ashore, their silvery flesh trembling faintly inside the bamboo baskets, drawing passersby over to admire the fresh catch, point, and discuss the prices.
Pine Crane Tower stood at the corner of the stone-paved street directly opposite the water gate, a two-story wooden building with three successive sections and upturned eaves. Beneath them hung a black-lacquered plaque, its gilded words, "Pine Crane Tower," gleaming faintly in the sunlight.
Outside stood an eighteen-foot pole bearing an apricot-yellow banner emblazoned with "Tai Lake Three Whites." It snapped and billowed in the north wind, its corner striking the bronze bell at the eaves with a bright jingling.
The twenty-odd square elm tables in the downstairs hall were packed. Waiters carrying trays threaded through gaps between the diners, endlessly calling, "Coming through, coming through!"
At a square table near the middle of the hall, a long-faced, lean old man in a gray cloth robe slapped the table and rose, his goatee bobbing as he declared, "Those fiends from Unknown Island lurk everywhere, seizing every chance to whip up