The old madam kicked the door drum, but the drum stood firm, unmoved.

Qiqian’er’s mouth twitched. “Even if you knock this door drum right off, there’s still the lintel. Where would you find someone to tear down the house and change the doorway right now? Look at these three steps under your feet, and the four door-stops above the gate—under the former dynasty, this marked the residence of a fourth-rank official. Does your grandson, your Dasheng, hold a fourth rank?”

Naturally, he did not.

The old madam shook her head helplessly, and, both irritated and exasperated, reached out to jab Qiqian’er hard. “You strange girl, why are you so odd? How do you dare say anything and everything? It’s strange too—why aren’t you shy around strangers?”

Shy around strangers? In her past life she’d bickered with this woman every single day, sleeping on the edge of the same kang for three years, emptying her chamber pot more times than she could count. Shy around her? She didn’t have the leisure for that. She needed to secure her position in this household first, and quickly.

Qiqian’er rolled her eyes at the old madam. “And you’re still angry! Didn’t you see the seal notice at the gate? An ordinary house, you occupy it and that’s that—but at least your grandson holds an official position, and he has his own standing to maintain. Tomorrow I’ll write out a notice to hang at the gate—if we don’t go too far, others will show us that much respect too.

“But if you overstep the bounds of ritual propriety and touch things you shouldn’t, you’ll only cause trouble for your own children. It won’t do for your grandson Dasheng to be up front risking his neck with a blade in hand while you pull the planks out from under the bridge behind him, will it? A residence like this—whichever official first came to post the seal has probably already recorded it in the official books. How could you get away with taking advantage of it? What good could possibly come of that?”

The old madam, still somewhat unconvinced, patted the door drum and muttered: “You’ve got such an unpleasant way of putting things. If you don’t think about some good fortune while you’re alive, what’s the point of living…”

The old madam had only gotten halfway through this sentence when she caught sight of a head peeking furtively from the mouth of the alley.

Qiao Shi, an embroidery hoop in hand, Xi Que sleeping soundly on her back, was leaning over the top of a wall, peering into the alley.

Her mood was bad, truly bad—she felt her good days were now over for good.

Someone friendly with her had brought word earlier that the old madam had spent fifty catties of grain and ten strings of cash to bring home a young bride, and that the girl could even read and write—which made things even worse.

Whatever the Chen family valued, she knew perfectly well.

In the past, it was just her and that dead old hag in the household. Whatever that old hag hoarded away and hid, she was blind to real value—she only recognized grain. Even fine old lacquer boxes from the capital’s established shops, she’d toss aside without a second glance, let alone paintings, calligraphy, or fine porcelain. With such shallow, countryfied understanding, fooling her was a sure thing every time.

Even if the old madam wanted to find fault, she wouldn’t know how.

The whole Chen family had no discernment—whatever they got their hands on, they didn’t know its worth, only knew to hide away a bit of surface jewelry and grain.

Who was Qiao Shi? Her father used to run a needle shop. Though a modest household, she was still a county-town girl raised on fine polished rice. Later she married the son of a tooth-medicine shop family in the same street—her husband’s family at one end of the street, her own family at the other. Qiao Shi had been steeped in honey her whole life growing up.

Growing up along a whole commercial street had trained Qiao Shi’s eye for value from a young age. She never trusted Chen Old Four, so she stole and pilfered ruthlessly, secretly hiding things away, waiting for a chance to send them back to her own family’s home. She always felt she was only drifting through beneath the Chen family’s roof, that she would leave sooner or later—always leaving eventually—so why not take whatever she could grab.

But now that wouldn’t work. With this good-for-nothing new arrival in the house, there was bound to be a reckoning to come.

Qiao Shi lay sprawled on the wall, watching that old woman and the young one kicking the door drum, chatting and laughing together—she couldn’t make sense of it.

How had they gotten so friendly in such a short time?

Qiao Shi seethed with resentment, her teeth grinding audibly, wanting nothing more than to jab her needle into both of those swine and take a body full of holes out of them.

While she seethed silently, three or five aunties returning from tending their sheep suddenly came up beside her. The women who followed the army camp all liked to raise a few sheep—in their spare time they’d let them graze wherever there was grass, and once the grass ran out in winter, they could sell them to the camp for a good deal of army grain.

Seeing Qiao Shi peering about so furtively, one loud-voiced auntie crept up with a grin and suddenly bellowed right in Qiao Shi’s ear: “Hey! Si Niu’s wife! What are you doing crouched here!”

Having shouted this, the auntie leaned over to look too, but after just a glance Qiao Shi yanked her back, pleading: “Auntie, please keep your voice down. If our old madam hears, she’ll come after me again.”

These aunties had just come from grazing their sheep by the creek and had no idea the old madam had taken in a grandson’s bride. Hearing this only made them more curious, and they all craned their necks together to sneak a look, then turned to ask Qiao Shi in curiosity.

“Oh, isn’t that the old granny? Who’s that standing at the gate with her? Never seen her before—could the old madam have bought herself a servant girl?”

Qiqian’er wasn’t tall, had sparse hair atop her head, wore a shabby jacket and a pair of shoes with holes in them—her appearance was nothing much to look at.

Qiao Shi curled her lip and put on a wronged expression. “You wouldn’t know, Aunties. Just now the old madam came trotting back and locked the gate as if guarding against thieves. Then not long after… she carried out a huge sack of things. And now—ten strings of cash and fifty catties of grain, all to buy a child bride for our Third Brother’s son Choutou…”

“Ah! That’s—that’s absurd. In times like these, with chaos everywhere, what good could come of someone whose background you know nothing about… wait, how much did she pay for her?!”

“Ten strings!!”

“Oh my! Your old granny must have a fat purse then.”

Qiqian’er had spotted the people too. Keeping her expression neutral, she tipped her chin toward the old madam, gesturing at the house behind them and then glancing left and right.

The old madam, with her own calculations in mind, was afraid people finding out would cost her some advantage. Seeing Qiao Shi over there gathering people and running her mouth, she flared up with fury at once.

She grabbed Qiqian’er’s hand and trotted over. Before she’d even arrived, she could already hear Qiao Shi, in her usual pitiful, saintly-sounding voice, spinning more lies.

“…Aiya, Old Four’s to be pitied too—not only does he have a pile of nephews to look after, he has to support us as well. He’s out there risking his neck every day, and I spend every day on edge, tossing and turning all night unable to sleep. We’d only just managed to save up a little, and now the old madam’s gone senile… that’s ten whole strings of cash…”

Qiao Shi, absorbed in her complaints, didn’t notice the sheep-herding aunties quietly stepping backward, or the loud-voiced one making increasingly urgent faces at her.

Whatever wits Qiao Shi had, she suddenly felt a chill gust at the back of her neck, her legs went weak, and she gave an awkward laugh, raising her voice: “Well, it’s true! Choutou and the others aren’t so young anymore. I’ve been worried about it too—last time his Fourth Uncle came home he said he’d keep an eye out for a good match. There just wasn’t a chance, so I was worrying about it, thinking once things settled down I’d go looking myself. Ah well, it’s still our old madam who’s the clever one. Our… our old madam cares for her children and grandchildren more than anyone. She scrimps and saves every single day, and for whom? For her children—ahh!!”

There came the dull, hard crack of a pipe striking a skull. Startled, Xi Que began to wail groggily.

Qiao Shi let out a cry of shock, and though her skull throbbed with pain, she didn’t dare flee. She immediately crouched down, covering her head, exposing Xi Que on her back, and pleaded: “Old madam, please, hit me lighter, not on the head. I have plenty of flesh on my back—I still have to get up at night for Xi Que, feed the sheep, cook your meals and boil your water…”

Here it was again, here it was again! Nothing had really been done to her, and yet every single time, outsiders would think she’d been terribly mistreated.

Chen Wu Shi was so furious she saw stars, choking with a frustration she could hardly bear. Unable to counter this twisting talk with words, she really did strike out with her hands.

“You black-hearted thing! Smearing filth all over with that mouth of yours! Look at all the scheming rattling around in that belly of yours, scheming day in and day out! You, you just wait—tomorrow when Si Niu gets back I’ll drive you out… ‘Bought a bride,’ indeed, and… and spent your money?”

Qiao Shi lay sprawled, sobbing: “I—I never said that…”

Chen Wu Shi spat at her. “Ptooey! You’re the one who was bought, a family-ruining thief! I bought you from your own husband through my Si Niu—I’ve been giving you face by holding my tongue, and now you’re slandering Choutou’s wife! What grudge does Choutou’s wife have with you? She doesn’t even know you! How dare you slander her like this? Is she anything like you? She’s a clean, respectable, unmarried girl from a good family, matched through proper matchmaking by Teacher Zhuang, with a marriage contract, a dowry, and betrothal gifts all in order. What are you compared to her? What have you ever done for our Chen family?”

The old madam hated Qiao Shi with her whole being.

Qiao Shi had been wailing pitifully, but upon hearing something off in the old madam’s words, she suddenly fell silent, lying there quietly and taking the blows.

The loud-voiced auntie quietly went over to Qiqian’er and tugged at her sleeve, signaling for her to go break up the fight.

Qiqian’er had a blood feud with Qiao Shi and her husband. Having returned by the grace of Heaven, she didn’t dare seek revenge and lose her own virtue for it—but she had no intention of intervening in this business between the two of them either.

In her past life there had been no such scene as this. When Qiao Shi said “bought,” the old madam had simply accepted it—after all, who could blame her when Madam had been the one to deceive her.

Oh, so after all this fuss, everyone here had been bought, one way or another.

Qiqian’er lowered her head and tugged at the hem of her jacket.

Over there, one of the aunties came up and murmured to the loud-voiced one: “Why bother pulling her in? She’s only just arrived here—how curious.”

With that, several aunties went up together and, hands flying every which way, pulled the old madam away.

Being restrained only made the old madam more furiously determined, her two legs kicking wildly.

Qiao Shi quickly dodged into a corner by the wall. The old madam’s foot went straight into the wall instead, and with a cry of pain she clutched her foot, rubbing it.

Even as she rubbed it, she kept cursing at Qiao Shi: “You gossiping shrew, it’s only because the rules have gone slack now, with no clan elder watching over you! In the old days, if you dared run your mouth like this, they’d have beaten your face swollen right in the ancestral hall, you ill-bred, thunder-struck thing…”

No matter how much good the old madam did, her mouth undid it all—the aunties who’d pulled her away all wore awkward, embarrassed expressions.

True enough, back in the old days, the village wives could work together well enough—with many people around, you could talk about anything, farm work, household chores, new clothes, all of that was fine. But in a village with strict rules, gossiping about others was absolutely forbidden.

Loose talk was grounds for one of the “seven reasons for divorce” under the old rules—it was only now, with no one enforcing anything, that such things went unchecked.

Seeing the old madam so furiously worked up, Qiqian’er went over, crouched down, patted her chest, tugged at her sleeve, and glanced toward the house at the end of the alley.

The old madam had things on her mind, and felt for Xi Que too, so she spat once more, stood up, and pulled Qiqian’er away with her.

Tears streamed down Qiao Shi’s face, her teeth biting the corner of her mouth until it bled. When someone nearby tried to help her up, she wrenched free and ran off covering her face.

Xi Que’s crying was heart-wrenching.

She’d run a good distance away before one of the aunties gave a light laugh: “And here I thought she was a proper wife—turns out she was bought too.”

By old custom, once a woman married, she took her husband’s surname, and outside the home others would address her using her husband’s surname combined with her own maiden surname.

As for what a woman’s own given name actually was, this generally wasn’t known to outsiders—only family and close intimates used it between themselves. The loud-voiced auntie’s husband’s surname was Guo, and her own maiden surname was Yang, so people in the village called her “Guo’s Yang-family wife” or simply “Yang Shi.”

Her temper was naturally short, and taking hold of her sheep, she spat: “Yu Wan’s wife, less of your nonsense. Which one of us here is really from her original household? Whose life hasn’t just muddled along one way or another? Do you think I don’t know how you came to be here in the first place? Talk about the crow laughing at the pig for being black—and that old madam is no good either, don’t tell me you haven’t seen how she used to bully poor Lan Xiang?”

Yu Wan’s wife, rather petty by nature, released her grip at this, pulled her own sheep along, and walked off muttering as she went: “Big fool!”

“Who are you calling that?”

“I’m talking about myself! I’m the big fool! I’m going home!”

“Go home then, go home—as if I don’t have my own house too… I’m not sharing a courtyard with you anymore!”

“Go wherever you like, as if I care so much about you.”

“Ptooey!”

“Hmph, ptooey right back!”

Well, it was only because of the war chaos everywhere these days that this group of women, with no proper households to tend, had grown so restless with idleness.

The old madam had no idea anyone had fallen out over her family’s business. Supported by Qiqian’er, she walked back inside, grumbling as she went: “Why wouldn’t you let me curse her out properly?”

Qiqian’er wore an expression that plainly said “you really are dense,” and said: “You certainly enjoyed yourself cursing her out, but now I’m stuck with bad blood between me and Fourth Aunt from here on.”

The old madam waved a hand dismissively. “Afraid of her? You’ve got me. What’s there to be afraid of?”

Qiqian’er couldn’t help a wry laugh. “Right! What’s there to be afraid of. I just wonder…” She stopped walking and looked at the old madam, trying to reason with her: “If a dead rat fell into your own family’s porridge pot, would you still eat the porridge?”

Eat it, of course—why wouldn’t she? Food wasn’t something to waste carelessly! So a rat fell in, so what? Might even count as an extra bit of meat.

Of course the old madam knew that wasn’t what Qiqian’er meant, but unable to work it out, she said in puzzlement: “Girl, can’t you just say things I can actually understand? Don’t twist your words around—I can’t tell truth from nonsense that way.”

For words coming out of the old madam’s mouth, this counted as rare softness.

That was good, that was good.

Qiqian’er laughed lightly. “All right! I’ll make it plain, Grandmother. From now on, whatever happens within our own household, it’s enough that we know about it ourselves. What good does it do for outsiders to know? Aside from laughing at you, can they actually decide anything for you?”

The old madam fell silent. After walking a good long stretch, she suddenly seemed to understand and said: “Hey! My own mother used to say something just like that back in the day—how could I have forgotten?”

Who could say.

Reluctantly passing by that grand two-courtyard estate, the grandmother and granddaughter arrived at the end of the alley, where the old madam, as before, picked up a brick to smash at the gate and kicked it with her foot.

Once inside the courtyard, the moment they looked up, they saw an exquisitely carved blue-brick spirit wall depicting deer and cranes, symbolizing longevity.

This blue-brick spirit wall was extremely finely made—the deer and cranes in the center were vividly lifelike, and above, carved within the heart of peony blossoms, were the characters for “Propriety, Righteousness, Benevolence, Wisdom, Trust, Filial Piety.”

The old madam looked around, stamping on the square bluestone paving underfoot, and said: “Girl, you really do have a good eye. I have to say, this place is solid inside, no worse than that other one. I, I didn’t see clearly last time I came—climbed over the wall at night to peek into their rooms. Ha! Too late, there was nothing left at all!”

Perhaps resigned to fate, and willing to trust Qiqian’er, the old madam truly began treating this house as her own, inspecting it all around, praising it as she went.

Wasn’t it fine indeed—she remembered how An’er, passing by here once before, had said to her: Mother, isn’t this house nice? If only our family had one like this. They have their own well—you wouldn’t have to fetch water and put up with Fourth Aunt’s moods anymore.

Qiqian’er’s eyes stung. Mm—she held it back again.

No more crying. What good would crying do?

Best to get on with practical matters. The old madam and the others were all scrambling now to claim the grand estates to live in, but once some time passed and the second, third batches… of family dependents were sent over, people like them would be driven out layer by layer, until eventually they ended up living in the earthen huts behind the village.

What reason would those people use then? Right—overstepping one’s station, that mere dependents of a low-ranking officer would dare live in the mansion of a fourth-rank official. Only later did people gain enough understanding to realize that the term “overstepping one’s station” mostly applied to the imperial family—what did it have to do with those bandits? They were simply bullying you with words, and you were foolish enough to actually be afraid of it.

The old madam’s wish to find someone literate really had made sense after all.

This group of ignorant women, with no one to protect them, couldn’t even properly state their own household name—of course they’d be left to be bullied by anyone who pleased.

Having finished her circuit of the courtyard, the old madam climbed up to the well in the corner and peered inside. She dropped a stone in and heard a heavy splash, then looked up smiling: “The water source isn’t small—enough to last eight generations. Girl, you’ve got a good eye, this courtyard’s a real bargain.”

Qiqian’er smiled too, pushed open the door, and entered the main hall of the courtyard—she had no intention of ever going back to that earthen hut.

This courtyard at the end of the alley was in typical Yandu style: a main hall of three rooms, with three more rooms on each side. Just inside the entrance stood two flanking walls—roughly speaking, one side served as a spot for stacking firewood, the other as space for a livestock pen.

Most enviable of all, this courtyard even had a back garden of about three fen of land, where vegetables could be grown in the future.

Once inside the main hall, Qiqian’er looked around—just as the old madam had said, there truly was nothing left at all. Only a solid stone roller lay across the doorway of the east room, as if meant to block someone out, though in the end it had blocked no one—even the east room’s main door had been carried off by someone.

Without thinking much of it, Qiqian’er, following the old madam’s example, gave the stone roller a kick—without putting in much effort at all—and watched it go rumbling away, thudding straight into the east wall.

Qiqian’er gave a startled shudder, utterly stunned.

The old madam called out from the courtyard: “What happened?”

Qiqian’er stared at her own foot in astonishment, feeling that something was wrong—truly wrong. Something big was happening!

These past two days back at Huo family village, she’d already sensed something odd about her own body. In her old age before, her back and legs had ached constantly, and coming back had left her stunned, thinking it was only natural for a young person to have this much vigor, to be capable and forceful in everything she did. But no matter how much strength she’d had, even in her prime she could never have kicked something like this.

This oversized stone roller was the kind meant to be pulled by a sturdy donkey.

Hearing footsteps, Qiqian’er quickly steadied herself and called out: “Grandmother! It’s nothing!”

Having said this, she found herself walking, guided purely by instinct, back to stand before the stone roller, and gave it another kick.

The stone roller was absurdly light—she sent it flying like a piece of tofu straight from the east room into the west room, where it struck the west wall with a dull thud.

Thud!!

“What happened! What happened!”

The old madam came scurrying in, looking at Qiqian’er, who was staring blankly at the top of the west wall. She pointed at it, stammering: “That, that thing over there, the roller fell off the edge of the kang—it, it startled me!”

The old madam went over to look, and saw that a chunk of plaster had come off the wall. Fortunately this room was a proper blue-brick tiled house sealed with glutinous rice paste, so the wall only bore a white mark.

The old madam muttered: “Who’s so wicked as to do this—may they get what’s coming to them—putting a stone roller up on the kang for what reason… What’s there to be scared of? You stay here, I’ll go fetch your bedding.”

Having said this, the old madam turned to go, but then remembered that last time she’d come in, the stone roller had been by the doorway—so had that thunder-struck woman been here again too?

With that, the old madam went outside, leaving Qiqian’er standing there alone, her face pale, dazed for a good while. She couldn’t make sense of it—mm… so she stopped trying to.

Only now did she gather her wits and look around properly. The main hall was one large, empty room, with two stove pits on either side, their iron pots long gone, set against the heated walls of the east and west rooms.

This family had been particular—willing to afford two large stoves.

The hemp-paper ceilings of the east and west rooms sagged pitifully. Some wicked soul had even left two piles of excrement in the corner of the room—judging by their state, no longer fresh, sitting black and disgusting in the corner.

Whoever it was had truly been wicked—not content with ruining the house, they’d also burned a pile of ashes right in the middle of it. It seemed that once there was nothing left worth taking, they’d used the furniture that couldn’t be carried away as firewood instead.

Tsk. Truly, there was nothing left at all.

Qiqian’er searched all around and finally spotted, on the kang in the east room, one bamboo kang-mat treated with tung oil that had at least been left behind. Only then did a hint of a smile appear on her face.

This kang-mat was a rare thing indeed—the sort only a well-off, particular household would own.

From then on, wanting a mat like this would cost at least two or three taels of silver—one would have to order it from a bamboo craftsman in the city two months in advance. Once the bamboo mat was finished, it still had to be sent to a paper-and-fan shop, where several pieces of coarse cloth would be sewn on and glued, then coated repeatedly with tung oil on the cloth, and left to dry through an entire summer before it became a finished mat.

Qiqian’er walked over and wiped away a layer of thick dust, then lifted the mat to check underneath—finding no felt padding beneath it, she began thinking ahead.

Thinking of how children would someday roll and crawl about on the bed, and how the kang beneath was raw and cold, she resolved that she’d have to lay down some good felt padding… mm, it had to be the very finest. She had money now.

Once she’d finished inspecting the whole kang, she picked up a broken brick and began tapping all along its edge, tapping until a spot near the edge of the floor gave off a distinctly hollow sound. At that, a full smile finally broke out on Qiqian’er’s face.

By local tradition, whatever valuables a household possessed were always hidden somewhere near the main kang.

As Qiqian’er kept searching around, the old madam came dragging her big basket in from outside the courtyard, and seeing her absorbed in her foolish-looking search, said with a happy grin:

“Girl, this house, this spot’s a good one. Tomorrow you take me around too—wherever we find a nice bed, we’ll just move it back here. Don’t you worry about not being able to carry it—I’m the sworn foster-grandmother of Meng Wanquan over in the camp, your Choutou’s exchanged incense-altar vows with him, we’re proper relatives! We’ve got plenty of hands to help! You just help Grandmother figure out the right choices. Wherever your brothers might live, let’s claim a few more courtyards now—save us the trouble of building for them later.”

How wonderful—free houses for the taking. Now there’d be enough for betrothal gifts when the boys married, an ancestral estate secured, and even a dowry courtyard to make up for Ding Xiang.

Qiqian’er took the basket, hefting it, her expression turning rather odd.

Seeing something was off, the old madam asked: “What? You don’t want to?”

Qiqian’er helped her sit down and said: “Of course I do! I just don’t know where my brothers are currently serving, or what rank of official grain stipend they draw. Once I know, I can help choose properly for them.”

The old madam had no idea about such things. She thought it over for a long while before saying, uncertainly: “Seems like, seems like they’re commandant-generals or something.”

Rather unconvincingly said.

Qiqian’er blinked. “Commandant, is it? There are several ranks even within that title—Zhaowu? Zhenwu? Xuanjie? Renyong? Do you know which of these it might be? Think carefully, and also—which grade of commandant is our own… family member?”

This was men’s talk again, thoroughly men’s talk.

The old madam’s eyes lit up, and she took hold of Qiqian’er’s hand fondly, smiling: “Good child, how do you know so much? I didn’t understand a single word of what you just said.”

Qiqian’er’s very heart trembled inside her—unaccustomed as she was, she could hardly bear the old madam’s fawning affection.

The old madam spread her hands, frankly. “How would I know all that? I only heard them say it’s some kind of ‘kitchen-fruit’ thing. Right, ‘fruit’! Seems he became a ‘fruit’ last year already! I remember being puzzled at the time—if he’s a general, just say general, why call it a ‘fruit general’? A fruit sounds unlucky if you ask me, isn’t it something anyone can just take a bite of?”

As she spoke, the old madam stroked Qiqian’er’s hand—one who had suffered holding the hand of another who had suffered—and she didn’t find Qiqian’er’s rough hands unpleasant at all.

Qiqian’er had never experienced such tenderness before, and awkwardly withdrew her hand. Looking up and seeing the window paper still intact, she climbed over and propped the window open to let in some air.

As she did, she asked the old madam: “By what you’re describing, that sounds like it might be a ‘Resolute Commandant’—though that was the old dynasty’s title, and who knows if the new dynasty will keep calling it that. Mm, if it is Resolute Commandant, then, well, that’s at least seventh rank… but seventh rank, really, wouldn’t get us into the capital.”

The old madam’s face lit up with both shock and delight: “Oh my, so ‘fruit’ means seventh rank! Seventh rank!”

“Mm, seventh rank, at the very least seventh rank.”

“That’s not big at all!” The old madam threw her hands wide dramatically. “You girl talk too big for your own good—the official in town before wasn’t even that high up, and yet how imposing he was, riding out in a little sedan chair, his feet never even touching common dirt! I know for a fact he was only ninth rank, wearing that ridiculously tall hat. Your grandfather was scared witless every time he saw him… kowtowing every single time! Tsk, the men of the old Huo family were all like that—spineless things, kowtowing to others and then coming home to brag to me about it. Tsk… I can’t even be bothered to speak of them.”

Qiqian’er couldn’t quite respond to this, and only smiled: “Well, even ninth rank counts as an official rank, drawing government stipends—you shouldn’t underestimate that. A ninth-rank official draws three strings five hundred cash from the court each month, and beyond that, one hundred eighty-seven sheng and four dou of grain from the court every year.”

Hearing this, the old madam went nearly wild. “How much?!”

Qiqian’er had no choice but to repeat it.

The old madam’s lips twitched, and only then did she begin counting on her fingers: “Your grandfather used to say that back in our ancestors’ time, a single ox sold for three strings of cash. Later, once the court grew poor and oxen became dear, by the time it left our household it sold for fifteen strings.

“His eight generations of ancestors! Was that town official’s forebear a monk or something, chanting sutras across lifetimes to build up this much fortune for his descendant! The court just handing him the equivalent of three whole oxen a year, for nothing?!”

Seeing Qiqian’er nod, she grew even more envious, saying furiously: “Your Choutou wanted an oil cake once when he went to town, and it was only one big coin apiece, but his own father wouldn’t even spare that for him! And here that town official could eat three thousand of them a month and not fear bursting! No wonder the court’s gone poor—serves them right for squandering everything!”

Having said this, her eyes rolled with growing curiosity, and she crawled on her knees over to Qiqian’er, lowering her face close, and asked: “So, girl, your Choutou and his brothers and uncles are all ‘fruits’ now—how much does seventh rank get us?”

Qiqian’er stopped what she was doing and sat up, recalling: “Seventh rank, I heard something about it from them before. The old dynasty can’t really be compared to the new one now, but I’d think, with the new Emperor just having ascended the throne, this is exactly the time for winning over loyal servants—so they’d only give more, not less. The court wouldn’t dare stint now.”

The old madam pulled her to sit properly, eyes wide with anticipation, urging her to hurry up: “Just tell me about the old, poorer times—never mind the current, wealthier times.”

Qiqian’er sat and thought it over carefully. “The seventh rank in the army draws what’s called military pay, and since ancient times it’s never matched what civil officials receive.”

“Those wicked scoundrels—so the ones risking their necks in battle get less than the ones just shuffling papers? Well then, tell me what your army’s stipend is…”

“Mm, military pay generally has five grades—let’s put them all at the middle grade. A ‘fruit’ commandant ranks higher than an ordinary soldier, so at the very least, monthly income should be around twenty strings of cash, with grain of three shi or more. Beyond that, if the commanding general they’re serving under is generous, there’d also be pickled-vegetable money, spring and winter clothing money, armor-outfitting money. Over the course of a year, for festivals like Cold Food, Winter Solstice, and Dragon Boat, there should be special allowance money too—for upper-middle seventh rank, that could be another twenty or thirty strings in special allowances. Beyond that, come spring there should be fine silk given out, at least two bolts, and in winter, firewood allowance, which could also come to about eight strings or so…”

Qiqian’er sat there tallying the figures, and the more she talked, the paler the old madam’s face grew, until finally the old madam stopped listening altogether, scrambled down off the kang, jammed her feet into her shoes, and rushed straight outside.

Qiqian’er, stunned, leaned out the window and called: “Grandmother, where are you going?”

The old madam stood in the courtyard, trembling all over with fury, her face pale, her mouth quivering as she said: “I’m—I’m going to go have it out with that thunder-struck woman, to the death! I don’t want to live anymore! I don’t want to live one more day!! There’s no living like this! I’ve been wronged so bitterly!!”

As she spoke, the old madam began to cry, pointing with a trembling hand into the distance even as she wept: “Before, they said all of it—your Choutou’s pay, his brothers’, even Si Niu’s—it was all sent to her. All I ever saw was a bit of grain and a few strings of cash. Never mind the pickle money or the silk—I never even saw one extra stick of firewood…”