Bamboo rafts shuttled back and forth on the Dongyang River. Now every rest day, many people came to ride the bamboo rafts. Drifting with the current on the crystal-clear little river, relaxing one’s body and thinking of nothing, head resting on the green bamboo, listening to the sound of the raft gliding across the water was itself the most beautiful melody. The white clouds overhead were like cotton and silk, constantly changing shape—one moment like galloping horses, the next moment like a crouching white rabbit.
No need for wine, no need for tea. Just bring an empty flask, and these mountains, this water, these clouds could fill your weary, empty heart.
The flow of people was like woven fabric. Women exchanged amorous glances, men sang loudly, and between waving sleeves, subtle fragrances drifted. What did any of it matter to me?
I only needed these mountains, this water, these white clouds.
Yun Ye was wrong. He still needed to pole the raft. Xiao Qiu was already hanging from the bamboo pole, clinging to it and crying as she watched the raft about to drift away. Xinyue frantically clutched Xiao Qiu’s clothes and wouldn’t let go—she was about to fall in too.
Two foolish women! Couldn’t they just let go of the pole? Yun Ye picked up the bamboo pole at the raft’s tail and poled back. With great effort, he finally rescued Xiao Qiu from the pole. Only someone brainless would jam the pole into a rock crevice—getting stuck on it served her right.
A perfectly good prose piece had been completely ruined by her. Xinyue always said she was clever—clever like this? Hanging herself on a bamboo pole kicking her legs wildly like a monkey.
The woman on the opposite raft was what you’d call clever—rolling up her sleeves to reveal snow-white arms, singing and dancing, causing the pack of wolves at the Academy to howl incessantly.
“Don’t look!” Xinyue forcibly twisted Yun Ye’s head back around. In her glossy black hair was a topaz hairpin studded with rhinestones that radiated brilliance in the sunlight. Seeing this object, Yun Ye suddenly remembered he’d been betrothed.
The story went back three days. After Xinyue had once again lingered long in Yun Ye’s room, he was forcibly dragged to the riverside by several old fellows for a conversation full of enticement yet laden with extremely heavy threats.
“Boy, you’ve struck it lucky! Old Xin’s beautiful granddaughter has taken a fancy to you. So, when are you getting betrothed?” Li Gang’s words sounded like a mafia boss forcing a marriage. Never mind that the seventy-year-old fellow didn’t have many days left—was there any way to force someone into betrothal like this?
“Young people just have no sense of propriety. A lone man and woman alone in a room together—Old Xin, how can you be so at ease? If it were me, I’d have brought out the family discipline long ago! And you still have the good fortune of marrying your granddaughter to him?” Master Yuanzhang beat the drum from the side.
Sun Simiao, who happened to be strolling by, chimed in: “This child Xinyue has a good figure—she has the look of one who will bear sons. You boy are blessed to marry her. Your Yun family won’t lack descendants to inherit the family business.” Old Sun was thinking long-term for the Yun family.
“Boy, the young lady’s reputation has been completely ruined by you. If you don’t give an answer now, are you looking down on us old men? Very well, tomorrow I’ll pack my bags and prepare to return to my old home in Hexi to spend my remaining years. I won’t roll around in this mortal world anymore.” Master Lishi looked weathered and careworn.
“How shameful! It’s fortunate only a few old friends are present, otherwise where would I have the face to live in this world!” Beating his chest and stamping his feet was Master Yuanzhang’s ultimate move.
Li Anlan’s familiar face flashed before his eyes, then immediately vanished into boundless darkness. Although he felt somewhat like he’d fallen for a honeytrap, Yun Ye still said with a smile, “Being able to marry Xinyue is this boy’s good fortune. How could I have other thoughts? The venerable elders worry too much.”
His heart ached a little, but Yun Ye’s face wore a smile.
Xinyue was an excellent girl, and marrying her was indeed good fortune. But why couldn’t he feel happy? Yun Ye asked himself.
The old gentlemen doing this was already the bottom line of their moral concepts. If he showed the slightest hesitation, it would brew into a major disaster, whether for the Academy or for himself.
Yun Ye felt the atmosphere on the scene relax and return to its usual peace.
“I told you! Such a good child as Yue’er—who would bear to push her away? We old brothers have really embarrassed ourselves today. Boy, you mustn’t speak of this, or we’ll break your legs.” Master Yuanzhang warned Yun Ye viciously.
No one paid him any more attention. The several men talked and laughed their way back to the Academy, with Master Yuanzhang apparently receiving their congratulations.
“You haven’t even mentioned the betrothal yet. Aren’t you leaving a bit early?” Yun Ye was very worried they’d make him get married tomorrow—that would be even more embarrassing than Huang Shu.
Li Gang never had anything nice to say: “As if you’re somebody important! We’re only telling you as a courtesy. Otherwise, with the parents’ command and the matchmaker’s words, where would you have any say? We old fellows will naturally discuss this matter with the old lady. You just shut your mouth and do your work properly. Don’t worry about other things.”
He knew his own family too well. Grandmother, aunt, his father’s sister, his older sister—a whole group of women who, when they had nothing else to do, would chatter about what the future mistress of the Yun household would be like. Now that they’d been given a topic, wouldn’t the house be turned upside down?
Grandmother indeed used the fastest speed to betroth Yun Ye, and even gave his topaz hairpin to Xinyue as the Yun family’s heirloom treasure. This immediately made Master Yuanzhang, who had been somewhat dissatisfied, feel completely gratified. Looking at the brilliantly shining hairpin in his granddaughter’s hair, he drained three cups of wine in succession, very satisfied with Yun Ye’s tact.
Xinyue wore the hairpin and showed off around the entire Academy, winning the admiration of all the womenfolk. She herself acted nonchalant, putting on a shy appearance. Back in her chamber, she sat before the bronze mirror looking left and right. An hour later, she reluctantly removed the hairpin, wrapped it in silk and placed it in her vanity case, storing it in the most hidden place. Her face wore a smile, and as she smiled, she suddenly covered her blushing face—who knows what she was thinking about.
The two people on the Dongyang River each had their own concerns. One blushed every time she glanced at the other, while the other was like a dazed goose with his spirit wandering beyond the heavens. Only poor Xiao Qiu suffered, bending her waist and struggling hard to control the raft so it wouldn’t crash into the shore.
The river water was very shallow, only reaching people’s waists, crystal clear to the bottom. There were no big fish, only finger-length small fish playing in the water. Xinyue let down a strand of her long hair and lay on the raft teasing the small fish, from time to time breaking into peals of laughter.
A sixteen-year-old Tang Dynasty woman developed beautifully. Looking at Xinyue’s perfect curves, Yun Ye felt somewhat parched, forcibly suppressing the evil fire in his heart. Suddenly feeling playful, he lay side by side with Xinyue on the bamboo raft, sharing a strand of hair to tease the small fish.
No one knew when it started, but Yushan Academy had become a new recreation destination for the nobility of Chang’an. The ten-li stretch of the Dongyang River was filled with bamboo rafts—bearded old men, young women wearing conical hats and veiled in light gauze, and naturally dissolute young men chasing butterflies. Some poor students of humble birth who considered themselves somewhat talented also appeared on the riverbank, clutching scrolls and reciting incomprehensible jumbled verses, hoping to attract the attention of the nobility on the river.
Yun Ye and Xinyue were very eye-catching, not because the two were a golden couple, but because they were having the most fun, with the most childlike joy. Their loud laughter and banter drew disdain from proper gentlemen and longing from youthful maidens.
Xinyue told Yun Ye that in her old home in Jiannan, there was also a small river. Every time it got hot, she liked to sit in front of her house and watch those boys swim—it was very interesting.
Yun Ye muttered under his breath. Xinyue listened for a long time before making out what he was constantly mumbling: “What a loss, what a loss, such a huge loss.”
“What huge loss? Did you lose money?” Xinyue was very puzzled.
“You watched those boys swim. I feel I’ve suffered a huge loss.”
“Why? What loss?” Xinyue didn’t understand.
“When I was little swimming in the river, I didn’t wear pants. My whole body was bare. Thinking about it now, there must have been bored women like you peeking. That’s why it’s such a huge loss.” Yun Ye said this with a face full of sorrow.
“You terrible person, making fun of me!” A crazed Xinyue pinched Yun Ye’s arm hard. Yun Ye’s screams and Xinyue’s scolding laughter spread across the river surface.
Lishi, who had moved a reclining chair onto a bamboo raft, said to Yuanzhang who was reading beside him: “Old Xin, that’s your granddaughter calling out so loudly. Aren’t you going to do something about it?”
“Why should I? Her husband is right there screaming—he has no objections, so why should I interfere? Just young people’s playful banter. Anyway, that girl is surnamed Yun now, not Xin. If she’s raised well, it’s that boy’s good fortune. If she’s raised badly, he can just endure it.” Master Yuanzhang adopted an attitude of letting things take their course.
After playing around for half the day, their stomachs were hungry. Seeing others all had food, eating happily on their rafts, drinking delightfully, only the three of them hadn’t brought food. Xiao Qiu’s stomach was already starting to growl. Xinyue had never been this happy before. She’d rather starve than leave the bamboo raft—she planned to just live on the raft from now on.
Yun Ye was helpless. He could only raise his voice and shout to Huang Shu on the other side, who was cruising the river with his wife and child.
Today was the Academy’s rest day—everyone was off. Huang Shu had always envied the refined habit of nobility cruising the river for no reason. He ran to the steward to request a bamboo raft, only to have a big gob of spit spat in his face, with words saying the Academy’s rafts were prepared for nobility. What did a tomb robber want with a raft? Hadn’t he seen how many Academy students were waiting for rafts? If he wanted one, wait until midnight!
Wiping the spittle from his face, Huang Shu got ruthless. It’s just a broken raft—was it necessary to spit in his face? And midnight? Midnight was precisely tomb-robbing time. Who cruised rivers at midnight?
Huang Shu was also a famous man in the jianghu. Having made a promise to his wife and child, he’d complete it even if it meant beheading. There was plenty of bamboo at the foot of the mountain. He picked the large ones, cut down over a dozen, and worked through the night to lash together a big raft. Today the most conspicuous raft on the river was his family’s.
Hearing the Marquis call, he quickly poled over. The family of three greeted the Marquis.
“Do you have food? I’m starving to death.”
As it happened, Huang Shu had prepared thoroughly. There was chicken and meat, and little fish fried until crispy. Fermented glutinous rice wasn’t lacking either, and the flatbread made by Ying Niang was fragrant and crispy with the best chewiness.
“My lord, why exactly is our Academy taking a whole month’s holiday?” Huang Shu took advantage of the Marquis catching his breath to ask.
“Every year there are two months of holiday—once in summer, once in winter. But this year it came a few days early.” Yun Ye said to Huang Shu.
“Why release early? I haven’t finished selling my fermented glutinous rice yet.” Ying Niang interjected.
“Because a jinx is coming. To prevent the Academy from being ruined, we had to take a holiday. Take your fermented glutinous rice to sell at the kiln—it’ll definitely sell faster.”
The usually bustling Academy entrance was cold and deserted today. Xu Jingzong looked at the empty Academy, then at the large cart of luggage behind him, and shook his head with a bitter smile.