“That is good.” Eleventh Young Miss smiled. “The new year is nearly here — you should recover soon. My lord will be pleased to see you well.”
Qiao Lianfang smiled faintly, her face like the peach blossoms of March.
The two walked along together, and Eleventh Young Miss smiled. “Shall we try a different Imperial Physician for a look?”
*Try a different Imperial Physician, get some new medicine, and take the opportunity to recover and be done with it.*
But Qiao Lianfang shook her head and smiled. “No need. Physician Zhang is quite good.”
Eleventh Young Miss sighed inwardly.
She had already given her the opening…
She smiled lightly. “It has been a long while since Madam Qiao came to see you. Why not send someone to invite Madam Qiao to visit? Having her company would lift your spirits. Your illness might even improve.”
A flash of surprised wonder crossed Qiao Yiniang’s eyes, but Eleventh Young Miss’s words had struck squarely at the longing for her mother that she carried day and night. She smiled and thanked Eleventh Young Miss.
Eleventh Young Miss turned to the Hupo at her side: “Make the arrangements — have Madam Qiao invited to the household tomorrow for a visit.”
Hupo respectfully acknowledged.
The group returned to the courtyard.
Eleventh Young Miss had barely returned to her own main room when Wen Yiniang came to request an audience.
She considered a moment, then had a young maidservant bring Wen Yiniang in.
Wen Yiniang came in wearing a face full of smiles, heaping elaborate flattery on Eleventh Young Miss as soon as she crossed the threshold — things such as how it was unprecedented generosity for the household to have all the concubines see the Marquis off together, things she had never witnessed in all her life, and so on.
Thinking of how she herself had once smiled and flattered everyone she met when first building up her clientele, Eleventh Young Miss simply came out with it directly: “Yiniang, it would not be appropriate for me to receive the Third Young Madam of the Wen family.”
The smile on Wen Yiniang’s face froze. “At least see her for my sake.”
Eleventh Young Miss had someone set a small stool beside the kang and said, “Yiniang, I am a daughter-in-law of the Xu family, and also a daughter of the Luo family. I am well aware of your situation. I am a simple person with simple thoughts. I believe that being a daughter-in-law is much the same as being a court official. The imperial court is like your husband’s family, and your clan is like your natal family. Only by serving the court with undivided loyalty and working for the welfare of the realm can one receive high office and generous emolument, earn the veneration of all ages, bring glory to one’s family, and have one’s wife ennobled and one’s children rewarded. By the same reasoning, a daughter-in-law who devotes herself wholeheartedly to her husband’s household, knows how to show filial respect to her parents-in-law, treat her brothers-in-law and sisters-in-law well, and raise and guide the children, will earn the respect of her husband’s family. When they dare not disrespect the daughter-in-law, they naturally dare not disrespect the daughter-in-law’s natal family either. Yiniang, does what I say hold true?”
Wen Yiniang listened in a daze. She said, “But I am… not anyone’s daughter-in-law…”
“All the more reason, then, to be strict with yourself and to abide by the proper rules,” Eleventh Young Miss smiled. “Rice of the same variety nurtures people of a thousand different kinds. Even among maidservants, there are ranks of all sorts; even among daughters-in-law, a mother-in-law treats them with varying degrees of closeness. This does not fall from the sky — it is entirely a matter of one’s own fortune and conduct.”
Wen Yiniang lowered her eyes and said nothing for a long while.
One cannot grow fat on a single bite.
Eleventh Young Miss saw the wife of Nan Yong come in and knew the hour of Mao had arrived. She sent Wen Yiniang away: “Yiniang, go home and think carefully on what I have said.”
Wen Yiniang rose and took her leave, her eyes somewhat downcast.
Back in her own room, Qiu Hong said under her breath, “What does Madam mean by this? Instead of taking Qiao Yiniang to task, she’s lecturing us?”
Wen Yiniang had been greatly struck by Eleventh Young Miss’s words. She had no interest at all in what Eleventh Young Miss intended for Qiao Lianfang. Would it matter if Qiao Lianfang fell out of favor — could she simply step in and take her place? Regardless, pressing down one Qiao Lianfang would only mean who knew how many more Qiao Lianfangs waiting up ahead. Besides, the more high-profile Qiao Lianfang was, the more advantageous it was for her — Eleventh Young Miss was bound to draw close to the concubines who had borne children. Their days would only get better.
Wen Yiniang related Eleventh Young Miss’s words to Qiu Hong word for word: “…She is the legitimate wife — easy for her to speak so calmly. If I were sitting in her position, equally clear-headed — after all, this household is mine, and gains and losses are like running a business. Lose today, earn it back tomorrow. So long as the ledger shows more profit than loss in the end, it comes out ahead. To think of the old days — without Luo Yuanniang, could our business have run so smoothly? When my lord found out, what did he do? He sheltered Luo Yuanniang all the same, and made me the thorn in his eye, the splinter in his flesh — as though I were the one who had stirred the household into unrest. As if he never considered that even if I were the one who slipped the enchanting draught, Luo Yuanniang still had to drink it willingly for it to work. When things went wrong, I was the one who took the blame. In the end it was nothing more than this: Luo Yuanniang was a wife, and I was a concubine. Had I devoted myself entirely to the Xu family’s interests, I would have long since been left with nothing.”
Qiu Hong listened with hesitation. “Then… what do we do? Before, we had Luo Yuanniang to prop things up. Now that Luo Yuanniang is gone… My lord has made it clear — no relatives of the Xu family are to conduct business. Anyone who claims to be a Xu family relative and approaches the Imperial Household Department will be taken as an impostor of a court consort’s kin and sent directly to prison, with no need for further discussion. With snow this heavy this year, the cotton trade would certainly be enormously profitable — at the very least, one could earn seventeen or eighteen thousand taels. The Third Madam is petty and small-minded — she has the desire but not the courage. The Fifth Madam is too sharp-fingered — she hasn’t invested a single coin and yet demands a forty-sixty split… Without that connection to Luo Yuanniang, we can only watch the cooked duck fly away.”
“Isn’t that the truth!” Wen Yiniang gazed at the drifting snowflakes. “Looking at what’s falling from the sky, I don’t see snow — I see nothing but silver. And yet we haven’t the means to gather it into our own hands. You don’t know — just thinking about it, I feel such aching regret I can’t sleep.”
As they spoke, Qiu Hong had already poured hot tea for Wen Yiniang. “By the sound of you, our newly arrived Fourth Madam is set on playing the part of the virtuous and exemplary wife?”
“Whether she plays the good person or not is no concern of mine,” Wen Yiniang said with a furrowed brow. “What matters is this: if the Third Young Madam of the Wen family comes all the way to the capital and still cannot see her, the twenty thousand taels of silver the Wen family sends me every year may not arrive so smoothly. That is the real problem.”
“Surely not!” Qiu Hong said doubtfully. “After all, you have done no small amount for the Wen family. If it weren’t for you, how could the Wen family’s rice have been converted into salt licenses so smoothly? And a one-to-one exchange at that — across the whole of Great Zhou, the Wen family was the first to achieve that. Think how much money you have made for them!”
“That is precisely why they pay me twenty thousand taels of annual dividends!” Wen Yiniang said with a helpless sigh. “Did you think there was truly such a thing as silver falling from the sky?” She pressed her hand to her forehead. “This is truly a headache.”
“If the worst comes to worst, just forget the twenty thousand taels,” said Qiu Hong. “I don’t believe there won’t come a day when they need us.”
“What do you know.” Wen Yiniang gave a bitter smile. “The matter they entrusted to me — I failed to deliver. Do you know what that says? It says that I no longer have the same voice in the Xu household as I once did. A person who has lost their voice is no different from a discarded piece in the Wen family’s eyes. Your father was my milk-brother, and you grew up at my side — I have never treated you as an outsider, and have never concealed anything from you. Let me speak plainly. The Third Young Madam of the Wen family has been selecting two or three girls from among the family’s daughters for some years now, raising them by her side in preparation for exactly this day — when I grow old and lose my appeal before my lord and have no more standing. She has girls ready to send in. Do you still think the Wen family cannot do without me? This is also why I absolutely must find a way to have the Third Young Madam meet with Eleventh Young Miss. I am afraid she will suspect that I am the one blocking her path and preventing her from sending another girl in. If something then happens to the Wen family, I will be the sinner of the ages. That reputation, I cannot afford to bear.”
Qiu Hong was struck dumb.
Wen Yiniang looked at her and gave a self-mocking smile. “Everyone knows that the Wen family of Yangzhou sent their legitimate daughter to the Marquis of Yongping’s household to serve as a concubine — who knows how many people envy them in secret, and how many others would like to follow the same path. Only my lord is the sort who will not associate with those he is not familiar with, never frequents pleasure quarters, and keeps no young and beautiful concubines at home — no one can read his temperament; and Luo Yuanniang, troubled over the matter of heirs and afraid that women from outside might prove ungovernable and bear sons to ruin her plans, found companions for my lord only from among her close personal maidservants, and whenever such a matter came up simply pretended not to understand. That is why no one has dared to freely cultivate connections. Otherwise, where would the Wen family have found it in their hearts to share twenty thousand taels a year with me?
“Come to think of it, the person I admire most is my grandfather. Without him, how could the Wen family have come to where they are today?
“In those days, the Xu family was nothing more than a prince’s maternal relatives. The current Emperor — forget the throne, he was even separated from the position of Crown Prince by a thousand miles. Who could have foreseen that it would be the Emperor who would inherit the succession? And who could have foreseen that the eldest daughter of the Xu family would one day become Empress, bearing the First Prince, the Third Prince, and the Fifth Prince? As for the Xu family — had the Second Master of the household not died in the first month of that year, had Luo Yuanniang not suffered a miscarriage that spring, the Old Marquis would not have been stricken with grief turning to internal fire and fallen ill. Had the Old Marquis not been on his deathbed, the Xu family would not have been in such haste to take concubines for my lord and allow the companions to resume taking medicine. Had time not been so pressing, even if the Wen family had managed to send me here, I would likely not have made it through the door in time. Sometimes when I think about it, it is all fate — not one bit of it is within our own hands.” Her voice carried a deep and settled melancholy.
Qiu Hong had grown up in the Xu household and had heard whispers of all this before. Now that Wen Yiniang laid it out plainly before her, she found herself at a loss for words. After a long moment she spoke haltingly: “Let us keep looking for an opportunity. Perhaps in a few days something will turn around.”
Wen Yiniang listened and fell into deep thought for some time, then asked Qiu Hong in a quiet voice: “I recall Eleventh Young Miss has a sister called Fifth Young Miss. I believe she opened a dried fruit shop on West Main Street, renting a storefront from Prince Shun’s estate — on the very day of the opening, my lord even went to have a cup of tea there… Think of a way for us to build a connection with her. I simply don’t believe that Luo Eleventh Young Miss — a mere concubine-born daughter — when given a chance to show off in front of her natal family, would not show off, and could truly see through such matters of fame and fortune with complete clarity.”
Qiu Hong’s eyes glinted. “Yiniang, that is a clever scheme. From what I have heard, that Fifth Young Miss married a poor scholar, and they live entirely off her dowry. Otherwise, why would a girl of official-family birth go rushing to open a shop and run a business? The winter this year is a long one — her dried fruit shop surely isn’t doing well…”
…
The wife of Nan Yong carefully pinned the gold hairpin depicting Chang’e Flying to the Moon into Eleventh Young Miss’s hair, then put away the dressing comb.
Eleventh Young Miss studied herself in the mirror.
A moon-white silk jacket, a plain brocade cape jacket in rose-purple, embroidered at the hem and cuffs with large blooming peonies in pink, a mixed-weave skirt in dark green edged with a border in rose-purple, jewelry glinting brilliantly at her head — the overall effect, though stately and splendid, made her look three or four years older than her actual age.
That, however, was precisely the effect she wanted.
She was appearing in the role of a mother, after all. Those softer, more girlish touches were better left for Zhen Jie’er.
Eleventh Young Miss brought Lvyun and Hongxiu to the Grand Dowager’s quarters.
Zhen Jie’er was dressed in a white silk jacket and a plain apricot-yellow cape jacket, its edges embroidered in a narrow band of gold-thread cloud motif. A white damask skirt with drawn-thread work, her jet-black hair bound in a neat coil, adorned with two pearl flower hairpins — and on her wrist, the pearl bracelet Eleventh Young Miss had given her.
The Grand Dowager was pulling her close and looking her up and down with evident satisfaction. Seeing Eleventh Young Miss come in, she quickly beckoned her over. “Come and see — what do you think?”
—