The Little Mute Can Talk?
The shopkeeper slid the beads of his abacus and replied unhurriedly:
"Listen carefully, miss! For unlined clothes, an adult's outfit takes seven chi of cloth, and a child's takes five.
For lined clothes, an adult needs one zhang, and a child needs seven chi.
Altogether, for one set each of unlined and lined clothes, that comes to exactly six zhang and two chi of cloth!"
"As for cotton, lined clothes need cotton stuffing to keep them warm.
An adult's lined outfit takes 2.5 jin of cotton, and a child's takes 1.2 jin. For four children and two adults, that's a total of 10.8 jin of cotton for the lined clothes!"
He paused, then added:
"Cloth comes at three prices: coarse cotton is 1.8 wen per chi, white cotton is 2.8 wen, and dyed cloth is 3.8 wen.
Going by the most commonly used cotton cloth, the cloth and cotton for the clothes come to 362 wen. The six cotton quilts need to be made thicker, so they come to 405 wen in total."
With that, he pushed the abacus forward and gave them the total. "The cloth and cotton for the clothes and quilts, plus labor, come to 837 wen altogether! To round it off, just give me 830 wen. I really haven't charged you a penny too much!"
Liu Su'e smiled and bargained:
"Shopkeeper, we're all neighbors around here. How about 820 wen?
We'll come back to your shop whenever we need clothes made!"
"All right. Just come back and pick them up in a little while. The tailors at our cloth shop will get them finished for you quickly, and the quilts are ready-made." After saying that, the shopkeeper arranged for someone to take their measurements.
Lin Shouyi then took them to a place that sold iron woks. Iron woks crowded the ground and the wooden racks. The largest could stew half a sheep, and their rims were thick enough to give a dull ring when struck.
The medium ones were just big enough to cook for five or six people, and their lids fit snugly.
The small ones held only enough to cook two bowls of congee. There were also frying pans with handles and shallow griddles.
The stallholder was a man with a bushy beard. When he saw someone approach, he picked up a medium-sized iron wok and struck it. "Have a look, customers. This is genuine wrought iron, hammered a thousand times at the smithy. One wok will last you more than ten years!"
Lin Shouyi pointed to the wok and asked, "How much does this one weigh? How much does it cost?"
"A full ten jin!"
The stallholder pounded his chest. "Iron's expensive these days. Wrought iron costs thirty wen a jin. Materials and labor together, this wok is three hundred wen."
Zhou Wanwan stared at the shiniest wok on the stall and asked, "How much is this one?"
The stallholder looked where she was pointing and grinned.
"The girl's got a good eye! This wok was hammered out at our smithy, sure and true. Feel the rim-see how thick it is!
It won't scorch on the bottom when you cook over a fire, and it makes a flavorful stew, too. Most importantly, it's sturdy. One family is still using a wok hammered out in my father's day. It's been passed down through two generations without breaking!
The price isn't cheap, though. It's five hundred wen. Don't complain about the price; this wok will last several generations. In the long run, it's a much better deal than replacing a thin wok every year.
An ordinary family could use one like this for both everyday cooking and entertaining guests. In a village, it would count as something respectable to own!"
He wasn't lying. Iron-smelting technology was limited in ancient times, and iron was precious, making iron woks major, durable household purchases.
An ordinary farming family often had only one wok. If it broke, they couldn't bear to throw it away, so they would have a blacksmith patch it again and again.
"Three hundred and fifty wen, and I'll buy it," Zhou Wanwan said, looking at the blacksmith.
The blacksmith stared for a moment. "Well! A girl so young already knows how to bargain. Fine, three hundred and fifty wen it is!"
Zhou Wanwan's heart was bleeding, but they would use the iron wok every day. It was very important, so they had to buy a good one.
After buying those things, Zhou Wanwan spent the remaining few hundred wen on grain, buying nothing but fine grain.
The corner of Liu Su'e's mouth twitched. "Daughter, why are you buying nothing but fine grain? I can eat coarse grain."
Zhou Wanwan looked at the coarse grain. Most of it was millet, sorghum, buckwheat, and oats that hadn't been fully hulled, along with coarsely ground corn grits, barley flour, and even mixed flour with beans in it.
The colors were mixed too: yellow, brown, and gray all jumbled together.
The grain often contained rice husks, chaff, and tiny bits of sand and stone. Occasionally, a few shriveled grains and grass seeds could even be picked out.
The coarse grain was hard to swallow. Zhou Wanwan coughed and said, "Mother, didn't I already say that everyone at home has to listen to me? Shopkeeper, please get me two hundred wen's worth of rice, two hundred wen's worth of white flour, and a hundred wen's worth of salt."
The stallholder slid the beads of his abacus, his voice booming:
"For fine grain, let's take rice. The going price is fifteen wen a jin. Two hundred wen buys a little over thirteen jin, enough to feed five or six people for three or four days.
White flour costs a little more, at twelve wen a jin. Two hundred wen buys sixteen and a half jin, enough to steam buns and make noodles for a while.
Salt is precious stuff! Government salt costs ten wen a jin, so a hundred wen only buys ten jin.
And that's coarse salt, with big grains and a bit of a bitter taste. If you want fine salt, it's another two wen per jin.
Don't complain about the price. Salt is the chief of all flavors; you can't pickle or cook vegetables without it. Ordinary families use it sparingly, just a little pinch in a dish."
Zhou Wanwan said directly, "I want fine salt."
Who could get used to eating that coarse salt?
The grains of coarse salt were uneven in size, grayish white, and a handful contained tiny bits of sand and stone, saltpeter, and even some dirt.
Besides being salty, it had a faint bitterness. It couldn't mask the fishy or gamey smells of ingredients and could only add a little flavor.
More importantly, the impurities were harmful. It contained a lot of magnesium chloride and calcium chloride, and eating too much could easily cause bloating and diarrhea.
Old people and children in particular had weak digestion. Eating coarse salt regularly would leave them without an appetite, sallow and thin.
Once they had bought everything, they put their things in the carrying baskets, sat on the ox cart, and quietly waited for the others.
When the people from Zhou Family Village saw all their packages, they couldn't help sneering. "Well! You've split from the family, and now you're living high on the hog! You actually bought so many things."
"Isn't that right? I'd say the spirit medium was really good to them, giving them so many good things when they split from the family."
Zhou Wanwan couldn't help sneering back. "Are you blind? When we left the Zhou family, we didn't take a single thing."
"The little mute can talk? You jinx, get out of our village! If you ruin our village's feng shui, we'll kill you."
"That's right, get out! Don't even think about setting foot in Zhou Family Village again. Zhou Family Village isn't a place for a bunch of calamity stars like you. If any of you dare come back, we'll break your legs."
Lin Shouyi couldn't hold back any longer.
"Do you really think Zhou Family Village is anything special?
I'd like to see what becomes of your Zhou Family Village in the future.
Don't worry! From now on, they're people of our Wild Field Village. I hope you won't regret this later."
Zhang Guilan snorted with laughter.
"I never thought anyone would be eager to take in garbage! I'd like to see what kind of end your Wild Field Village comes to.
My mother-in-law said that wretched girl is a calamity star. Your Wild Field Village won't come to a good end. Just wait and see!"
The people of Zhou Family Village joined in:
"Let's hurry and get away from that bunch of calamity stars. Stay with them too long, and it'll bring bad luck.
The spirit medium said that anyone who gets involved with them can only wait for death."
"Let's hurry back and wash ourselves, so they don't drag us down with them. Those Wild Field Village people just don't know whether they're courting life or death."