Perhaps because Lin Yuchan’s body had been accustomed to hard labor since childhood, after working in the tea house doing intensive cleaning for three to five days in the dark, she finally stopped falling asleep with aches all over her body every night. When hungry, she could also endure it better and wouldn’t feel like dying.

Shopkeeper Wang Quan finally stopped chasing her away, but never looked at her directly. The other clerks in the tea house treated her like a joke, ordering her around at will, each acting like a master.

Lin Yuchan realized that the cleaning and sweeping work in the tea house was originally done by lower apprentices and laborers in rotation. With responsibility dispersed, there was inevitably shirking and complaining, and the clerks would quarrel every few days.

Now it was perfect—all the dirty and tiring work was pushed onto her. The five or six clerks in the tea house worked together to order her around, harmoniously enjoying themselves with unprecedentedly good atmosphere.

While Lin Yuchan worked, her eyes and ears weren’t idle, silently observing her surroundings.

Local dialect, women’s hairstyles, types of food, prices, the movement patterns of street thugs…

In this world, with her status, blending into the crowd was safest. Any display of personality would bring unnecessary risks.

The clerks in the tea house had various divisions of labor. Below the shopkeeper were the accountant managing books, the clerk handling documents, the liaison running errands, apprentices doing odd jobs, and so on. There were also middlemen stationed in tea-producing areas responsible for tea purchasing and transport, called “long legs” in trade jargon.

Additionally, there were translators for various languages. Such talent was numerous, but mostly incompetent. Some people completely improvised when translating for foreign masters, since both sides couldn’t understand each other’s languages, it was hard to verify anyway. It was said that when Lin Zexu came to Guangdong to ban opium, being unfamiliar with local conditions, he suffered greatly from treacherous translators who secretly collaborated with foreigners, but he had no choice.

Reliable translators commanded high prices. Defeng Trading House only kept two or three, who rushed between various branches and docks daily, going wherever foreign merchants visited to help.

When Su Minguan visited that day, the translator happened to be away, reportedly serving at a banquet between Master Qi and Qichang Trading House.

Also, before closing the shop each day, Wang Quan would go into the small tea room with Accountant Zhan to carefully review the books. Sometimes when Lin Yuchan pushed the door open to clean, they didn’t avoid her, treating her like a stray dog.

…

“Hey, time to eat!”

Lin Yuchan was wiping the shelves when she was roughly shoved and nearly fell from the ladder.

The clerk who pushed her was named Kou Laicai, in his twenties, a low-level apprentice. Previously, others had ordered him around, but now fortune had turned, and finally, there was a more humble laborer for him to bully.

Kou Laicai was unattractive with big hands and extremely long fingernails, covered with a lifetime’s dirt. He’d probably never spoken to any woman except his mother. Usually, when a girl passed on the street, he could shamelessly stare for ages, but never dared to approach. Now that Lin Yuchan had come to the tea house, his favorite thing was finding fault to hit her.

This gave him an excuse for blatant “physical contact,” which counted as a great pleasure in his mundane life.

Lin Yuchan naturally avoided when she could. This time, she couldn’t dodge; her body was weak from hunger.

Dizzy and disoriented, when she opened her eyes, she saw Kou Laicai grinning but not daring to speak to her anymore.

Man is iron, rice is steel. Lin Yuchan dropped her clothes and rushed to the back kitchen.

The porridge wasn’t ready yet, bubbling with steam. Several clerks on rotation break were all slouching on stools, waiting.

“Hey, you serve the porridge.”

With an extra servant girl in the tea house, naturally, they had to make full use of her.

Lin Yuchan asked calmly: “How did you eat before I came?”

“Served ourselves.” The answer was matter-of-fact.

Lin Yuchan nodded, bent down to pick up bowls, and served porridge to each master. She neatly arranged pickled vegetables on top of each bowl.

Everyone couldn’t find fault, took their bowls, and began slurping porridge. Some held out empty bowls for refills.

Having a young girl serve their meals for the first time in their lives, they had to thoroughly enjoy it.

The pot of porridge quickly emptied, everyone ate until their bellies were round, then “suddenly” discovered: “Oops, didn’t save any for you. Sorry about that.”

Lin Yuchan smiled: “Thanks for the concern.”

She brought out a bowl of thick porridge from under the stove and began drinking it slowly.

The clerks were indignant, shouting:

“You saved yourself a bowl from the start!”

“What right do you have to serve yourself first?”

Lin Yuchan smiled: “I’m the one serving porridge, naturally, I serve according to my habits.”

After the meal, she naturally washed the bowls. With food in her belly, Lin Yuchan wasn’t tired from working.

As shopkeeper, Wang Quan ate lunch separately at a restaurant. When he returned after eating, he vaguely heard the clerks whispering complaints, probably about how this girl didn’t know the rules.

Wang Quan snorted: “Whoever holds the ladle makes the rules. Useless things.”

Merchants don’t rise early without profit—he was too lazy to care about anything unrelated to making money.

This went on for several days. One day, Lin Yuchan was so hungry her front touched her back, but she still hadn’t heard anyone call for mealtime.

She tentatively pushed open the kitchen door and only smelled the aroma of rice.

Several clerks on rotation break were all slouching on stools patting their bellies, their faces shining with sweat mixed with grease, contentedly burping.

Kou Laicai had a piece of vegetable hanging from his teeth, spat on the ground, and smeared it with his shoe sole.

Someone pointed to the dregs left in the pot: “Hey, eat!”

While picking their teeth and getting up, they said very considerately, “This was saved for you. You don’t need to serve meals anymore from now on.”

Lin Yuchan looked at the porridge—it was already mixed with who knows how much of their leftover saliva, stirred into a thin paste with a strange, muddy yellow color. It looked somewhat like a puddle of long-stagnant vomit.

A fly perched on the ladle, dancing as its feet slipped.

This “beating from society” exceeded her bottom line. She steeled herself to scrape out half a bowl, but felt nauseous before it even reached her mouth.

Lin Yuchan came out with an empty stomach and worked all afternoon, dizzy several times, and nearly fell from the ladder.

Several clerks all watched her with gloating smiles, whispering to each other.

“Hey, women are just stupid. Can’t even do such small things properly, and they’re lazy too.”

There are people in this world who hate you to the bone despite having no grievance with you, simply because oppressing the weak is their only pleasure.

In the evening when the tea house closed, some clerks went to rest in the warehouse dormitory behind, while those with families went home.

Wang Quan called Lin Yuchan: “Hey, girl.”

He’d been busy all day, receiving two or three foreign compradors, exploiting four or five poor farmers, and going to the mansion to urge the young master to come learn business, as usual, hitting a wall—tired with his face oily and his glasses flashing with grease spots.

Looking up, he saw the shelves had been organized clean and tidy, and the several rows of sample tea on the display case were actually arranged by grade level—exported tea was uniformly divided into grades A, B, C, and D. Recently Master Qi had followed fashion, ordering the grade labels on tin foil changed from Chinese characters to ABCD to make it convenient for foreign merchant customers to identify.

The clerks didn’t know English and saw the letters like ghost drawings, often placing them randomly. Wang Quan had corrected this countless times with little effect.

Fortunately, foreign merchants weren’t blind either—they could pick and see for themselves, so it didn’t matter if goods were messy.

But today Wang Quan discovered the sample teas had automatically returned to their places, arranged in several rows by high and low value, very pleasing to the eye.

Lin Yuchan was casually putting a misplaced “A” bag back in its proper position when she turned and asked: “Shopkeeper, what’s the matter?”

Wang Quan was somewhat surprised by her proficiency, then thought she was just being careful.

He coughed: “You’ve done well these past days.”

With Wang Quan’s opening line, Lin Yuchan was stunned.

He wasn’t chasing her away?

Wang Quan: “There’s a young man who pulls a rickshaw. I often ride his cart—a very honest person. He’s saved thirty taels for a wife. I only take seventy percent, the rest goes to you. If you’re willing, you don’t need to come to work tomorrow.”

Lin Yuchan remained stunned for a while before somewhat understanding.

“You still want to chase me away?”

Of course, given her excellent performance of working hard without complaint these past days, Wang Quan was also “returning kindness for kindness,” revealing the buyer’s information in advance to let her prepare mentally, so it wouldn’t be like last time with chickens flying and dogs jumping throughout the courtyard.

For Wang Quan, this was already very virtuous.

This time, Lin Yuchan also had some confidence, patiently bargaining with him: “Shopkeeper, I still want to stay here and make money for you.”

She spoke with apparent loyalty, but just fancied the tea house as a place to stay.

Wang Quan was pained, telling her: “Don’t look down on him for being poor. I’ve seen his family’s ancestral graves—excellent feng shui. If you conscientiously bear him several sons, someone will become a top scholar in the future!”

This wasn’t idle talk. Lin Yuchan looked at his expression—it was indeed sincere, as if he felt this was for her benefit.

She sneered: “If that’s the case, you should quickly have a daughter to marry him. You could become a top scholar’s grandfather-in-law.”

Wang Quan hadn’t expected her to be so tactless. His expression turned cold as he spat.

“How did the leftovers taste?”

The clerks had probably already bragged to the shopkeeper about “leaving her the worst leftovers.” Hearing this, Lin Yuchan perked up.

“Shopkeeper, this isn’t fair.” She was sharp-tongued. “I work more than the other clerks. Today, Brother Laicai almost got the tea price wrong—I was the one who reminded and corrected him.”

Wang Quan was stunned, then spat: “Ridiculous! The other clerks are all men! A woman wanting to eat the same food as men—that’s asking for trouble! Eat it or starve!”

Lin Yuchan finished work on an empty stomach.

Even Xiao Feng knew to secretly bring midnight snacks. In this world, everyone was self-reliant and had to find their own ways to fill their stomachs.

Before leaving the tea house, she saw no one around, crouched down beside the counter, and stretched out an arm.

She had observed these past days that on the right side counter of Defeng Trading House’s shop front sat a brass jar with a cute little bird on top. The jar was usually locked and contained loose silver coins. After wealthy customers finished business, they would casually toss in some change. When the coins hit the mechanism, the bird in the jar would nod in thanks.

This was a gift from Qichang Trading House to Master Qi, originally an ingenious toy for amusement. Later Wang Quan heard foreigners had tipping habits and asked for this bird jar. Indeed, every few days, it could accumulate a jar of small money.

The small coins came in various styles—besides broken silver and copper coins, there were Spanish silver dollars popular in trading ports, American dollar coins, Mexican “eagle dollars,” and so on.

Tips were distributed under Wang Quan’s supervision. In principle it was more work, more pay, but actually it all depended on the shopkeeper’s mood and preferences.

That clerk named Kou Laicai was slow-witted and couldn’t curry favor, never receiving tips, but he was never seen being resentful or indignant.

Lin Yuchan had more than once seen through door cracks Kou Laicai sneakily lifting the jar, tilting it to a special angle, then squinting one eye and using his long-nailed pinky to reach into the bird’s mouth. Five or six times out of ten, he could fish something out.

Then he would quickly curl his finger, pretend to flick nose dirt, and wipe it into the cracks at the very bottom of the shelves. When he stood up, his hands were empty.

Lower apprentices also did heavy work daily and stripped to just shorts when working. Silver couldn’t stay on their bodies.

Lin Yuchan originally didn’t know this, but whenever she cleaned and cleared cockroaches near that corner, Kou Laicai would scold and swat at her, driving her away.

Lin Yuchan carefully explored with her fingertips and indeed felt a hard, round piece embedded in the crack at the bottom of the shelf. She carefully hooked it out.

It was a Spanish silver dollar with a king’s portrait. The king wore a wig and resembled Buddha, commonly called “Buddha head silver.”

Lin Yuchan was delighted. Buddha head silver had good purity and quality, superior to silver dollars issued by the Qing court, so it was beloved by business circles. One dollar was worth about seven qian of silver.

She hid the silver dollar in her bosom—a case of the pot calling the kettle black.

Then she left the tea house. She didn’t return to her dormitory at the Qi mansion. Instead, she looked at the road, followed the uneven stone steps straight down, and came to the waterfront dock.

“Aunt Hong,” she knocked lightly, “is Aunt Hong there?”