On the pleasure boat, eating fresh fish, holding a brush to paint the mountain colors and lake light—Xu Hexue had been separated from the mortal world for so long that it seemed only on this day did he truly dwell among the living.
At night, the room was bright with lamp candles. He recalled some of his own past.
Nothing to do with his teacher, nothing to do with his elder brother and sister-in-law—these were fragmented memories from when he was most carefree in his youth, playing and making merry with classmates of similar age.
Xu Hexue remained lost in thought for a long while before slowly unfolding the painting paper before him.
Green willows, white egrets, rippling water, mountain contours, and that red-lacquered Xiechun Pavilion—only, it lacked the person Ni Su had asked him to paint.
Under the lamplight, Xu Hexue gazed at the painting paper for a long moment before putting it away again.
Whether it was his teacher or Ni Su, in the end he dared not put brush to paper.
“Xu Ziling.”
A slender shadow appeared on the gauze window.
Xu Hexue had just propped himself up from the desk with one hand when he turned to see that shadow. He responded with an “Mm.”
“I’ve chosen a piece of white fabric with pale gold brocade patterns. Would it be good to use it to make clothes for you?” Ni Su stood outside the door; through the gauze window she couldn’t see the scene inside.
Xu Hexue hadn’t expected that after mentioning making clothes for him that night, she would have already selected the fabric so quickly. He always felt somewhat weak and feeble at night, afraid she wouldn’t hear his voice clearly, so he walked to the gauze window and said, “Good.”
“Won’t you look at it?”
Ni Su’s voice came from outside.
When Xu Hexue opened the door, he saw a piece of soft, snow-white fabric unfold before his eyes. The lantern in the corridor illuminated the pale gold brocade patterns on it, which flickered with subtle luster from time to time.
The snow-white fabric shifted downward, revealing the young woman’s pair of bright eyes curved in a shallow smile.
“Does it look good?”
She asked.
“It looks good.”
Xu Hexue looked at the fabric in her hands again. Seeing that after hearing his response she was about to go to the adjacent room, he immediately called out to her: “Ni Su, working with needle and thread at night strains the mind and harms the eyes.”
“I know.”
Ni Su nodded and carried the fabric into the room.
For several days in a row, Ni Su either worked on making clothes or tidied and organized the shop front. She bought some medicinal herbs to dry in the courtyard, simply to smell their fragrance.
South Huai Street was never short of shops selling medicinal herbs. Moreover, she had opened a medical clinic, not a medicine shop. Although the door had been open for several days, it wasn’t that no one came, but they would turn and leave as soon as they saw that the attending physician was a woman.
These past days, only Zhou Ting had come once, bringing a Night Watch Bureau subordinate officer with an external leg injury. Then there was a young man named A’Zhou who worked at Xiangfeng Tower. Every mealtime, he would come to South Huai Street hawking food. Ni Su would always call out to him, asking him to deliver meals from Xiangfeng Tower.
After some back and forth, they became somewhat familiar. Yesterday A’Zhou mentioned that his mother at home was pregnant again, but recently for some unknown reason kept experiencing abdominal pain. Ni Su went to his home to examine his mother, then prepared medicine for her from her own medicine chest. Considering A’Zhou’s family was poor, Ni Su didn’t charge him a single coin.
Today Cai Chunxu invited Ni Su to listen to music at a teahouse. Below the railing, a light gauze screen half-concealed the graceful figure of a woman, her hair thick and black as clouds, her head full of jeweled ornaments and tassels.
Delicate hands plucked the zither strings, music pouring forth, melodious and flowing.
“If you ask me, Sister A’Xi, if you made some fragrant pills and medicinal ointments and opened a medicine shop, claiming they were ancestral family recipes, why would you worry about no one coming?” Cai Chunxu fanned herself with a round fan. “Only in this way would they care less about your status.”
“I opened the medical clinic not just for profit.”
Ni Su said.
“Then what is it for?” Cai Chunxu no longer looked at the woman playing the zither below, shifting her gaze to Ni Su beside her.
“When I was young learning medicine from my elder brother, I already had this aspiration,” Ni Su lifted her tea bowl and took a sip, then continued, “Because my father told me that daughters cannot inherit the family profession, and under heaven there was no woman who could stand properly and with dignity in a medical clinic.”
“I want to establish myself here. If people come, I’ll examine them myself. If no one comes, I’ll show my father and brothers, show those people who refuse to believe that women can also be good physicians.”
From a very young age, Ni Su understood that because of the saying “marrying off a daughter is like spilling water,” so much family business inheritance had nothing to do with women. Just as medical skills depend heavily on family lineage, while the knowledge of lower-class herb women mostly came from improper sources with many cases of treating people to death—these layers upon layers of shackles created the current world’s distrust and contempt for women who practice medicine.
“This isn’t the first time I’ve heard you mention your elder brother.”
Cai Chunxu propped her elbow on the tea table. “These days the Night Watch Bureau’s investigation of the winter examination case has caused quite a stir. I heard that the policy essay your brother wrote about new governance while alive has also been printed by bookshops. Even Madam Cao from my Ruqing Poetry Society said that her husband, who is the magistrate of Guangning Prefecture, has also seen that essay and apparently praised it enthusiastically…”
As she spoke, she couldn’t help but sigh. “If your brother were still alive, he would surely have achieved scholarly honors by now. My husband has taken leave and won’t leave the residence these past few days, which has prevented me from going out either. I don’t know how the Night Watch Bureau’s investigation is progressing? Are there any leads?”
Ni Su shook her head. “The Night Watch Bureau doesn’t leak information about their cases. I’ve met that Young Master Zhou, and he only told me there has been some progress. Beyond that, I know nothing.”
These days, she had been waiting anxiously.
“Sister A’Xi, please rest easy. Perhaps the truth will come to light very soon.” Cai Chunxu comforted her with a few words, then noticed the brocade kerchief still wrapped around her neck and said, “But the injury on your neck cannot be taken lightly. It’s best to use some ointment that can remove marks. I accidentally injured the back of my hand before and used an ointment from the medicine shop at the entrance of South Huai Street. It was very effective.”
“Thank you, Sister Cai. I’ve made note of it.”
Ni Su nodded.
Recently there had been much rain. In just the time it took to listen to a few songs with Cai Chunxu at the teahouse, rain began falling outside again. Ni Su bought a paper umbrella from a nearby street vendor. Passersby on the street hurried along, while only she and the person beside her walked slowly through the misty rain.
“Ni Su, buy medicine.”
Seeing she was about to walk past the medicine shop, Xu Hexue stopped in his tracks.
Ni Su turned back. She saw him outside the umbrella, his figure like mist, fine water droplets clinging to his slender lashes, his eyes looking toward the medicine shop on the street.
“If I’m left with marks, will you still feel uncomfortable?” Ni Su walked closer to him with the umbrella, instinctively tilting it toward him, but this gesture appeared unspeakably strange in the eyes of passing pedestrians.
“Let’s first go to A’Zhou’s home to check on his mother. We can buy it on the way back.”
Ni Su had promised the young A’Zhou she would visit his home again today. If A’Zhou’s mother’s abdominal pain still hadn’t eased, she would need to change the prescription.
A’Zhou’s family lived in the old alley of the western district—hidden in the cracks of prosperous Yun Jing, a place of desolation. Today with the rain, the low, old alley had an even heavier damp smell, with thick green moss clinging to the brick walls, chaotic and filthy.
Some commotion came from deep in the alley. Having just entered the alley entrance with the rain sounds masking everything, Ni Su naturally couldn’t hear clearly, but Xu Hexue was more perceptive.
Drawing closer, Ni Su finally saw bailiffs dressed in identical clothing with blades at their waists, and at their front, there seemed to be someone wearing green official robes.
Many common people had gathered in the rain before the peeling door at the end of the alley, peering inside.
That was A’Zhou’s home.
“Everyone move aside!”
The person in green official robes led the bailiffs forward, speaking sternly.
The common people blocking the doorway immediately retreated to both sides, clearing a path for the officials.
“Sir! Sir, please seek justice for me! Please immediately go to South Huai Street and arrest the murderer who harmed my mother!” A young man’s voice carried a sobbing tone, nearly hoarse.
Ni Su recognized this voice, and Xu Hexue beside her also recognized it. He immediately said, “Ni Su, can you manage here alone?”
Ni Su only heard the young man crying out the three words “South Huai Street” and knew something was amiss. She suddenly heard the person beside her speak thus and looked at him at once: “Xu Ziling, don’t you…”
However, before her words ended, his form had already dispersed into misty vapor.
At the same time, many people emerged from inside that door. The lead official didn’t hold an umbrella either. Looking up in the rain, his gaze collided with Ni Su’s from over ten paces away.
“Ni Su.”
The official accurately called out her name.
He was the same judge who had escorted her back to the Guangning Prefecture Bureau of Records for punishment on Mount Qingyuan—Tian Qizhong.
In an instant, all the bailiffs behind him ran forward pressing their blade hilts, blocking Ni Su’s retreat.
For a moment, everyone’s gazes in the rain curtain converged on Ni Su alone.
Ni Su threw aside her umbrella and walked through that door. In the narrow, shabby courtyard crowded with many people, and under the eaves, the young man wept mournfully—it was indeed the one who had recently delivered meals to her from Xiangfeng Tower.
Beside him on a straw mat lay a woman covered in blood, her face deathly pale. She lay with eyes closed, as if she no longer breathed, yet her abdomen was distended.
Ni Su had just seen her yesterday. She was the young A’Zhou’s mother.
“You murderous killer! You harmed my mother!” The young man’s tears flowed even more violently upon seeing her. He suddenly stood up and rushed toward her.
A bailiff quickly restrained him, while Tian Qizhong entered and questioned coldly, “Ni Su, you previously spoke nonsense in Guangning Prefecture and were punished for it. Now you swindle and cheat, and have even caused someone’s death!”
Many people gathered in the courtyard all looked at Ni Su. Terms like “herb woman,” “caused a death,” and “sinful” surged toward her.
“The medicine I prescribed absolutely could not have caused death.”
Ni Su met his gaze.
“Then you tell me, why did my mother die after taking your medicine?” The young man’s pair of red, swollen eyes stared fixedly at her. “You lowly herb woman, do you know you’ve killed two lives!”
Many pairs of eyes watched Ni Su. Much reproach and insult mingled with the sound of rain. Ni Su said nothing, crouching down to touch the woman who had already died.
Seeing this, the young man immediately rushed forward to push her away: “I won’t allow you to touch my mother!”
His strength was so great that Ni Su was pushed down onto the muddy ground. Her entire dress became stained with considerable dirt, and the back of her hand was scraped raw on the stone steps.
“Attending physicians all keep consultation records. What illness your mother had, how I prescribed medicine for your mother, the dosage—all are recorded,” Ni Su propped herself up on the steps with one hand to stand. Water droplets fell from her skirt hem as she looked at the young man. “A’Zhou, since you insist it was the medicine I prescribed that killed your mother, then where are the dregs? Where is the prescription? Where is your evidence?”
Blood ran down the back of Ni Su’s hand into the spaces between her fingers. The young man watched the blood drops fall from between her fingers and dilute in the muddy ground. When he looked up again, he seemed somewhat afraid to meet her eyes.
“The medicine dregs you speak of—he already sent them to Guangning Prefecture’s office. Our prefecture’s medical examiner has invited physicians to examine them,” Tian Qizhong said sternly. “You practice medicine, yet don’t know that fresh rehmannia root and Sichuan aconite are incompatible!”
What?
Ni Su was startled. Sichuan aconite?
The rainy weather made people irritable. Tian Qizhong was even more disgusted by this crowd of people gathering here. He immediately ordered the bailiffs behind him, “Come! Apprehend this woman! Escort her back to Guangning Prefecture’s office for trial!”