Near noon on the twenty-fifth day of the fourth month, two oxcarts stopped outside the main gate of Chen Family Cove Fortress. Two maidservants climbed down, greeted the Chen Clan's tenant farmers outside the Fortified Manor with easy familiarity, and headed straight for the West Tower once they entered.
At the sight of them, Lai Fu said delightedly, "Xiao Chan, Qingzhi, you're here! Hurry and see the mistress. Everyone's been looking forward to your arrival." He then had Zeng Yuhuan take Xiao Chan and Qingzhi upstairs.
Xiao Chan and Qingzhi were Ding Youwei's two maidservants. They had accompanied her to Chen Family Cove when she married and had lived here for six years, so everything here was thoroughly familiar to them. Chen Caozhi's mother, Mother Chen Lady Li, was also kind and gentle, so the two maids were deeply attached to the Chens of the West Tower and felt even greater tenderness for Zongzhi and Run'er.
Upon seeing Mother Chen Lady Li, the two maidservants knelt together and bowed to the ground, paying their respects to their mistress.
Mother Chen Lady Li told Yinggu to summon Caozhi and the others while she asked how Youwei had been lately.
Chen Caozhi came in with Zongzhi and Run'er. Sweet-tongued Run'er immediately called out, "You're Sister Xiao Chan, and you're Sister Qingzhi. I haven't got it wrong, have I?"
Xiao Chan and Qingzhi beamed. They bent their knees and crouched down, taking Run'er's and Zongzhi's hands and looking them up and down, their affection coming straight from the heart.
Mother Chen Lady Li knew they could not linger, with nearly forty li to travel on their return journey. She immediately told Zeng Yuhuan to prepare lunch for the two tenant farmers from the Ding household who had driven the carts, as well as Xiao Chan and Qingzhi, so they could set off as soon as they had eaten their fill.
Xiao Chan had been only twelve when she first came to Chen Family Cove, and Chen Caozhi had been six. She had often taken him out to play and had been very fond of the handsome child. Now he changed with every passing year, growing ever more handsome as he grew older. When she had come last year, he had still been shorter than her; now, at a glance, he stood a good bit taller.
Xiao Chan was delighted to learn that Chen Caozhi would be going with them this time. "Young Master Caozhi, that's more like it," she told him. "My lady often thinks of you. When you didn't come last year, she was terribly upset. She even cried."
During the Wei-Jin period, servants addressed the daughters of their households as "my lady," "young lady," or "maiden." The form of address "miss" did not yet exist.
Three quarters of an hour past noon, three oxcarts left Chen Family Cove and headed north. Lai Fu drove one of them. Mother Chen Lady Li had ordered him to make a trip to the county town as well. The Chens of the West Tower had plenty of farmland but not enough tenant farmers, and Lai Fu was going to hire two more tenant households.
Lai De went along too. Unaccustomed to riding in a cart, he walked beside the oxcarts.
Though the two Ding household tenants had worked hard driving the oxcarts such a long way, they were in good spirits. Mother Chen Lady Li had never been stingy, and this time she had again rewarded each of them with a bolt of silk worth five hundred Wuzhu coins.
Chen Caozhi walked at first too, repeatedly looking back as he went. His white-haired mother stood leaning against the doorway, watching, determined not to stop until the oxcarts were out of sight.
Qingzhi took Zongzhi in one oxcart, and Xiao Chan took Run'er in another. The wheels rumbled, the narrow road wound on, and gradually they drew farther from Chen Family Cove and farther from Nine Luminaries Mountain.
The cart compartments had no windows on either side. Above them were awnings woven from thin bamboo and coated with tung oil to keep out the rain. At the front of each compartment was a yan, and at the back a shao, both partitions resembling carriage doors, with cloth curtains hung over them as well. Xiao Chan kept the rear curtain lifted, smiling as she watched Chen Caozhi walking behind. "Let's see when your Uncle Chou starts complaining that he's tired," she said to Run'er beside her. "It should be very soon. Your Uncle Chou is terribly frail."
"Uncle Chou is really strong now," Run'er said. "He climbs Nine Luminaries Mountain every day, and he eats three big bowls of wheat at every meal."
"Oh!" The slightly slanting afternoon sunlight was dazzling. Xiao Chan narrowed her eyes as she studied Chen Caozhi, who wore a small fine-gauze cap and a wide-sleeved kudzu-cloth robe. He walked at an easy pace, showing no sign of breathlessness. His complexion no longer had that bluish cast beneath its pallor, but a faint rosy glow instead. His figure was tall and graceful, his bearing gentle and refined. The greatest change was in his eyes, though it was hard to describe. In short, they were captivating.
"Young Master Caozhi, come on, get in the cart and ride with us," Xiao Chan called.
"Is there room, Sister Xiao Chan?" Chen Caozhi asked. "When I get tired, I'll ride in Lai Fu's cart."
Run'er giggled. "Uncle Chou calls her Sister Xiao Chan too. How funny!"
Xiao Chan wrinkled her nose. "When your Uncle Chou was your age, I was the one who took him out to play. Why shouldn't he call me sister? Come on up. There's room. Run'er is such a tiny little thing." As she spoke, she ordered the tenant farmer to stop the cart.
Chen Caozhi climbed in and sat down beside Xiao Chan. Holding Run'er in her arms, Xiao Chan fixed her bright eyes on him without blinking, neither speaking nor moving. After a while, she suddenly burst out laughing and pointed at him. "Hahaha! The young master is blushing! Young Master Caozhi actually knows how to blush now! Hahaha!" Still laughing, she reached over and pinched his cheek. It was an old habit of hers. As a child, Chen Caozhi had been pink and tender, and she had loved pinching his little face. Even Ding Youwei's scoldings had repeatedly failed to make her stop.
The cart compartment was cramped, and Chen Caozhi failed to dodge the pinch. He felt thoroughly embarrassed, yet it also felt very affectionate. Of his sister-in-law Ding Youwei's four maidservants, Sister Xiao Chan had treated him best. But by his age in his previous life, he was twenty-seven, and twenty-one-year-old Xiao Chan was only a little sister to him. Having her pinch his face and tease him was truly laughable.
Little imp Run'er egged her on. "Uncle Chou often pinches my face too. Sister Xiao Chan, pinch him back for me!"
Xiao Chan pinched him only once and did not do it again. The depth of Chen Caozhi's gaze made her feel that the youth before her was no longer a child. He already had something of a grown man's air, and she needed to mind her words and actions.
Xiao Chan was petite, with a round face and lively eyes. Though she no longer pinched Chen Caozhi's cheek, her eyes would not leave him. Leaning very close, she looked him up and down and nodded. "Young Master Caozhi really has grown a great deal. My lady is sure to be astonished when she sees you later. It's been two years since she last saw you."
"Sister Xiao Chan, is my sister-in-law well?" Chen Caozhi asked.
The smile swiftly faded from Xiao Chan's face. She glanced at Run'er and shook her head. "Not very well. My lady misses Zongzhi and Run'er terribly. When she wakes in the morning, a large patch of her pillow towel is wet. She sheds tears even in her dreams."
Those words alone made Run'er cry. Little tears pattered down as she called, "Mother-"
Xiao Chan quickly hugged and soothed her. "Don't cry, Run'er. If my lady finds out I made you cry, she'll punish me. You don't want Sister Xiao Chan to be punished, do you? Don't cry."
Run'er struggled to stop sobbing, but she could not hold back her little teardrops. The sight of her sniffling and choking back sobs would have wrung even a heart of stone.
Chen Caozhi took Run'er's little hand. "Run'er, your mother doesn't like to see you crying. She likes a well-behaved Run'er, a Run'er who can recite the Analects and write out the Declaration Memorial. Oh, that's right-when you went to see your mother last year, could you recite the Analects?"
Distracted, Run'er finally stopped her sorrowful cries. "I was only five last year. I couldn't recite a single line of the Analects-"
"Then when you see your mother later, if you recite the Analects for her, won't she be very surprised and very happy?" Chen Caozhi asked.
Run'er's eyes curved into a smile. "She certainly will!" she said brightly.
While Chen Caozhi talked with Run'er, Xiao Chan leaned against the wall of the cart and watched him quietly. She felt that this youth was truly very different from before. He had once had an endearing air of dullness. Now he was still endearing, but the dullness was gone, replaced by a handsome, untrammeled grace that Xiao Chan could not put into words.
Xiao Chan could not help thinking, Judging by his speech and bearing alone, even his elder brother Chen Qingzhi back then seemed no match for him, did he?
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