Among the Sheng household’s servants, a considerable number had been purchased locally. Those servants who were reluctant to leave their native land and family connections were released by the Sheng household, each given a parting sum of money. People on all sides praised the benevolence and kindness of Administrator Sheng. Sheng Hong selected an auspicious moving day by the almanac, and early on that morning set out with the entire household. The Sheng household — several dozen people along with all their baggage and freight — was loaded onto seven or eight boats in all. Sheng Hong, concerned about attracting too much attention, sent trusted household managers ahead to escort several of the cargo boats north in advance, and to make preparatory arrangements at the residence.

Yao Yiyi traveled together with Wang Shi on the starboard side of the vessel. The maids and serving women around her had changed over again, presenting several new faces she could not be bothered to memorize. She continued as before — eating and sleeping and sleeping and eating — eating very little, yet sleeping far more than was usual. Aside from a few days of mild seasickness at the outset, Sheng Rulan, who traveled alongside her, was in extremely good spirits and watched the river scenery eagerly, bouncing about as she came to tell Yao Yiyi — her “sixth little sister who has fallen ill and cannot speak” — all about everything she observed.

Little Rulan had apparently not been out much in her life. Even a large crow taking flight could keep her excited for half a day — waving her chubby fingers and making a great fuss. When Wang Shi could stand it no longer, she would scold her briefly, and the subdued little Rulan, unable to keep hanging over the cabin window, would come to talk with Yao Yiyi instead. Each time, little Rulan would chatter away for half a while, and Yao Yiyi would respond with a listless “mm” or a nod of her head.

“Mother — I think Sixth Sister really has turned simple. She can’t even speak.” Six-year-old little Rulan expressed dissatisfaction with her new companion.

“Fourth younger sister, please do not say such things. Minglan is ill. Just yesterday I heard her speak — and she is more than a year younger than you, and has just lost Wei Yiniang. You must not bully her.” Sheng Changbai, twelve years old, sat by the window reading, his features clear and delicate, his bearing upright and composed.

“Yesterday she only said four words — ‘I need to relieve myself.’ Elder sister, you heard it too.” Little Rulan tugged at one of Yao Yiyi’s braids. Yao Yiyi stayed perfectly motionless against the soft cushions, as though she had fallen asleep again.

“Enough, Rulan.” Sheng Hualan, just past ten and a half, was at the age where a young girl first begins to bloom — as fresh and delicate as a white magnolia just unfurling its petals. She sat leaning against the low table, leafing through embroidery patterns. “There’s nothing to make a commotion about. From the moment we boarded, it has been nothing but your chatter and noise — not an ounce of proper family decorum. Keep on like this, and I’ll go tell Father to have you copy out texts as punishment. Then let’s see if you still have so much idle energy to go poking at other people. Go and play by yourself.”

Little Rulan pouted, clearly somewhat in awe of her eldest sister, and reluctantly hopped down from Yao Yiyi’s cushion platform to go play with a string game with one of the maids. As she passed behind Sheng Hualan, she stuck her tongue out and made a face.

Before long, the senior maid in attendance on Hualan came in. Hualan set down the embroidery patterns and asked: “Well? What happened?”

The maid stifled a smile. “Just as young miss predicted — it’s quite the scene over there. Since we’re on the boat, there’s no way to make a real commotion, and now she’s just sitting there wiping her tears. I was hoping to hear a little more, but Nanny Liu came and shooed me out.”

Hualan smiled to herself, quietly pleased. Changbai put down his book, frowned, and said: “You’ve been eavesdropping again. Father has already given strict instructions that no one is to ask questions or pry — why do you never listen? Always snooping around — is that how a young miss of a proper family conducts herself?”

Hualan glanced sideways at her brother. “What’s it to you? Mind your own business and read your books.” Then she murmured to herself, quietly: “… So she really has angered Father — but what exactly was the reason? I absolutely must ask Mother tonight… Serves her right!”

Yao Yiyi lay there with her eyes narrowed in feigned sleep. As the only person in the room who actually knew the full story, she thought to herself that the view from inside the cabin had been far more interesting than anything outside it. In just the ten days since the boats set out, Sheng Hong had already dismissed two household managers at a port stop where they resupplied — and notably, both of them shared the surname Lin.

They had originally been down-and-out kinsmen who had come to attach themselves to Lin Yiniang. Over the past several years, they had served as her right and left hands — managing her shops and estates on the outside, monopolizing the purchasing duties on the inside. Both of them cut impressive figures wherever they went. Now that Sheng Hong was moving to dismiss them, they naturally refused to leave willingly and went to plead with Lin Yiniang. Lin Yiniang was startled and alarmed. Her mind was swift and perceptive — she immediately sensed that something was wrong and went straight to Sheng Hong to intercede on their behalf. But this time, no matter what she said or how she pleaded, Sheng Hong kept his face cold and paid her no mind at all. And since they were on the boat — with passengers and crew virtually on top of one another — she could not very well produce her full repertoire of playing the zither, blowing the flute, weeping like the legendary beauty Xi Shi — that entire elaborate performance. She could only watch helplessly as her own right and left arms were stripped away.

Wang Shi was inwardly overjoyed, yet did not dare to let a single trace of it show on her face — she had to maintain a carefully neutral expression in public, which cost her considerable effort. But her mood was buoyant, and this showed in how generously she began to treat Yao Yiyi. Everything provided for Yao Yiyi was now arranged at the same standard as Wang Shi’s own daughters. Every time the boat put in at a port, a physician was fetched aboard to examine Yao Yiyi’s pulse, to determine whether her faculties were truly diminished. Unfortunately, Yao Yiyi did not cooperate — she continued to seem chronically unwell, eating very little, sleeping in a heavy fog day after day.

Sheng Hong came frequently to look in on Yao Yiyi. Each time he visited, his worry deepened a little more. Each time he held his daughter and weighed her in his arms, his brow furrowed a little tighter — and he urged the boatmen to make greater speed, thinking that once they arrived in Dengzhou and settled in, he could give his daughter’s health a proper and thorough examination.

With the early summer south wind blowing strong and favorable, the journey north by water was smooth and rapid. By the time they reached the Jing-Jin region, Sheng Hong disembarked with several of his advisors and went overland to the capital to attend to the formal procedures for his promotion at the Ministry of Personnel — to express reverence and gratitude for imperial favor, and to pay respects to a series of teachers and colleagues. The rest of the family and household, led by the eldest daughter, continued north by boat toward Shandong.

With Sheng Hong gone, Lin Yiniang became even more restrained — she stopped making appearances altogether and remained inside her own cabin educating her children. From the boats passing alongside and from those at harbor stops, people could often hear the sound of clear, earnest reading coming from Lin Yiniang’s cabin, and they remarked admiringly that the Sheng household was truly a family steeped in poetry and scholarship — a household of deep tradition. Wang Shi, hearing this, grew vexed and pressured Changbai to also read aloud so that the people outside could hear. Changbai, by nature a person of few words and quiet composure, was so startled by this demand from his mother that his usually fair complexion turned the color of an eggplant struggling to get the words out.

Yao Yiyi remarked inwardly: an eggplant is even less likely to read books.

Yao Yiyi slept in such a muddled daze that she had no idea how long they had been traveling. In any case — by the time little Rulan had grown thoroughly tired of sitting on the boat, and Changbai had finished a full scroll of his reading, and eldest young miss Hualan had embroidered four handkerchiefs — they finally docked. On the dock, household managers had already brought a company of servants to receive the party. The dusty, disheveled figures from shore and the dizzy, disoriented passengers from the boat had little to say to each other. They transferred directly into carriages and continued along a rattling, jolting journey for several more days. Fortunately, Dengzhou was also situated near water, and by the time the Old Madam felt she might be shaken to pieces, they arrived at last.

Yao Yiyi was a southerner — she did not suffer much from seasickness. But she suffered terribly from carriage sickness, and vomited yellow water for days on end, nearly retching up her bile. This was no longer a performance of pretend sleep — she was genuinely collapsed into unconsciousness in the arms of a powerfully built serving woman, who carried her through the gate of the new home. She had no idea what the Dengzhou residence looked like. By the time she recovered some slight awareness of her surroundings, she was already lying on a heated bed-platform, and every time she managed to open her eyes, there was a physician sitting nearby shaking his head thoughtfully. The first time, he was a gentleman of around forty. The second time, he was an elderly man with white-streaked hair. The third time, he was an old man with entirely white hair and beard. Following the rule of traditional medicine that a physician’s age correlates with his skill, this represented successive improvement in the caliber of the physicians attending her.

Three physicians had been brought in consecutively, and all of them said that the young miss of the Sheng household’s illness was a matter of serious concern — not for want of good medicine, but because the problem lay with Yao Yiyi herself: she had absolutely no will to live. Wang Shi watched the small girl thin down to skin and bone, and her heart grew uneasy. Relations between her and Sheng Hong had just recently begun to thaw. And since Sheng Minglan had been personally carried to her by Sheng Hong for her to raise, if Sheng Hong returned to find his young daughter had fallen ill and died — Wang Shi would have earned not credit but additional trouble.

When Sheng Hong returned and saw how frail and diminished his daughter had become, his anger toward Lin Yiniang intensified further. During the day he handled official business; after returning from the office in the evening, he dealt with the household servants. The Sheng household had newly arrived in Dengzhou — whether buying or dismissing people, those on the outside had no knowledge of the internal situation and simply assumed it was a new official taking charge, with the customary adjustment of the household staff. Sheng Hong, with his temper running high, avoided seeing Lin Yiniang. Over the course of two consecutive days, he dismissed several of the capable maids and serving women from her quarters — demoting some, expelling others, or selling some off entirely. He also slept every night in Wang Shi’s rooms. Wang Shi was inwardly beside herself with elation. The ginseng roots she was having prepared to supplement Yao Yiyi’s constitution grew from one stalk to the next — each one as large as a radish — and the sight of it made Yao Yiyi’s heart pound with something approaching alarm.

While the sunshine was bright on one side, cold and bitter winds howled on the other. Lin Yiniang tried several times to see Sheng Hong and was turned away by the servants each time. But ultimately she was not an ordinary woman. On this particular evening, after dinner, Sheng Hong and Wang Shi were in the middle of discussing the matter of Sheng Minglan’s illness. All of the children had returned to their own rooms — only Yao Yiyi still lay in a semi-conscious haze on the bed platform by the window. Husband and wife sat on either side of the low table beside the platform as they talked. The conversation somehow drifted onto the topic of acquiring properties in Dengzhou — when suddenly an uproar broke out outside, followed by the sounds of maids calling out to restrain someone. Wang Shi was about to send Nanny Liu Kun to find out what was happening, when with a swift movement of wind, the light blue soft silk curtain was swept aside, and someone walked in. None other than Lin Yiniang herself.

She came wearing no ornaments, her jet-black hair coiled in a simple bun with not a single jewel or hairpin of pearl or kingfisher feather to be seen. Her face bore not the slightest trace of powder or rouge. She was naturally striking in appearance, and the effect of a plain dark indigo garment against her skin made it appear like white frost — radiant and cold. Her gently arching brows, slightly knitted, gave her the look of one holding back sorrow. Her waist was slender enough to be encircled by a single embrace. She seemed to have grown notably thinner of late — the very image of fragile, plaintive beauty.

From outside came the sounds of maids and serving women pushing and grappling with one another — clearly Lin Yiniang had brought a contingent of women with her to force her way in. Sheng Hong turned his head away from her. Wang Shi flew into a fury and slapped the low table. “Look at this spectacle you’re making of yourself — who is it for? You were told to stay in your own rooms. What are you doing barging in here? Stirring up a commotion so that the whole house can hear — do you think other people have no shame, the same as you? Come, someone — drag her out!”

Several maids moved to push Lin Yiniang away.

“Do not touch me!”

Lin Yiniang wrenched herself free and dropped to her knees directly before Sheng Hong with a thud. Her voice rang out like iron striking a cutting board — resolute and determined. “Master — I have made up my mind today. If you do not allow me to speak, I will dash my head against this wall and die here — better that than being ground down to nothing piece by piece!”

Sheng Hong said coldly and sharply: “You need not go looking for death. Do you think that because I have treated you well in the past, you can imitate common marketplace women and put on the whole act of weeping, wailing, and threatening to hang yourself — and for whose benefit is this performance!”

Lin Yiniang’s tears came flooding. In a voice full of grief she said: “These past many days, my heart has been simmering in agony — there have been so many words I needed to say, and yet you kept avoiding me and refusing to meet with me. I have died inside already, many times over. But Master — you are a magistrate appointed by the Emperor. Even when handling the most insignificant petty thief, you allow the accused to make a defense. Let alone that I have served Master all these years — and moreover have raised a son and a daughter for you. Even if you want me dead, you must at least let me die knowing why!”

Sheng Hong thought of Wei Yiniang’s manner of death and ignited with fury. He hurled a teacup to the floor. “You know very well what you have done!”

Lin Yiniang’s tears rolled freely. In a voice broken with sobs, she breathed: “…Hong-Lang!”

Wang Shi flew into a rage, leaping down from the platform. She turned to the maids and serving women and shouted: “Are any of you alive in there? Is everyone dead? Get her out of here!”

Lin Yiniang raised her head. “So unwilling to let me speak — is it because you fear what I might say?”

“What filth are you spouting? I have nothing to fear from you.”

“If you are not afraid, then today — one word of spit, one mark in the ground — let everything be laid out plainly. Right and wrong, black and white — Master is fully capable of making the judgment himself.”

Wang Shi’s chest heaved with fury. Lin Yiniang kept her eyes brimming with tears. Silence fell over the room. Sheng Hong, having spent his career as an official, recognized that the clearest course today was to let everything be said aloud. He called for his personal attendant Laifu. Nanny Liu Kun — ever sharp-minded — promptly called all the maids and serving women from the room. Shortly, Laifu entered. Sheng Hong gave him brief, quiet instructions. Laifu acknowledged the order and returned with several of the rough-work serving women, who ushered all the servants out to beyond the main courtyard entrance.

In the room, only five people remained: Sheng Hong, Wang Shi, Lin Yiniang, Nanny Liu Kun, and Laifu. Oh — and Yao Yiyi on the bed platform in her perpetual semi-conscious state, whom everyone had doubtless forgotten by now. Yao Yiyi swore once again on the mudslide — she had absolutely no desire to remain here and listen to a hall hearing. But the best course available to her was quite clearly to continue pretending to be unconscious.

Lin Yiniang wiped her tears gently, her voice suffused with sorrow: “All these days, I do not know what wrong I have done — Master refuses to acknowledge me, and moreover has been dismissing the people around me one after another. First the two kinsmen who had come to depend on me, then two of my personal maids — and just the day before yesterday, even the wet nurse who has served me since I was small was to be expelled! In Master’s management of affairs, I would never dare to interfere. But you must at least tell me what the offense is — give me the reasoning behind it!”

Sheng Hong’s voice came out cold: “Very well. Today I will give you the reasoning. I ask you — exactly how did Wei Yiniang come to die?”

Lin Yiniang seemed not particularly surprised by the question. Instead, a look of sorrowful acceptance crossed her face. “From the day Wei younger sister passed away, I knew this day would come. Back in Quanzhou, all the maids and serving women were already whispering and insinuating — saying that I had caused Wei Yiniang’s death. I thought at first it was nothing more than groundless gossip from ignorant servants. And since Master’s promotion was at hand, I did not dare to trouble Master with trivial matters, and simply endured it quietly. I told myself — the innocent are innocent; in time, the rumors would fade away on their own. But I never imagined…never imagined that Master himself would begin to doubt me.”

As she spoke, tears poured freely — an unstoppable flood.

Sheng Hong said in anger: “And am I supposed to have wronged you? On the day Wei Yiniang went into labor — why did you delay so long in sending for the midwife? Why was there not a single person left to serve her in that courtyard? Why had all the serving women in the household who knew how to assist with childbirth been given days off? I and your mistress had both left the house that day. If not you — then who?”

Lin Yiniang’s white jade-like fingers passed over her cheeks. In a voice full of grief she said softly: “Master, do you still remember — a few years ago, when our little daughter passed away — what you said to me? You told me to stop involving myself in the affairs of the other concubines, to manage my own quarters and no more. After you and Madam left the house that day, I stayed quietly within my own courtyard, attending to my own business. Master must understand — with both masters of the house gone, the servants naturally took it as a chance to relax and have a rest at home. Those serving women who knew how to assist with childbirth slipped away — and there were only so many of them to begin with. They have been in this household for decades — old retainers of long standing. How was I in any position to command them?”

Sheng Hong gave a cold snort but said nothing. Wang Shi turned to look at Nanny Liu Kun, her eyes flickering with slight urgency.

Lin Yiniang continued: “Later a servant came to report that Wei younger sister was having labor pains and the birth was beginning. I immediately sent my maid to summon the gatekeepers and have them fetch a midwife. But it turned out the gate matrons and several of the gatekeepers were eating and drinking and gambling. My maid beseeched them again and again before they finally, slowly set out — and then they were gone for hours upon hours. I questioned those gatekeepers about it afterward, and they said only that the nearby midwives were not at home, and they had to run several li to find one in the western part of the city. That was what caused the delay in Wei younger sister’s labor. Master, Madam — Heaven above, Earth below — every word I have said is the truth. If I had deliberately meant to harm Wei Yiniang, may I be struck by lightning and die without a proper burial! Master, if you still do not believe me, you may go and ask whoever was present that day — what hour it was when I sent word to fetch the midwife. There are people who heard.”

With this, she fell to weeping once more.

Sheng Hong turned his head and looked long and steadily at Wang Shi. Wang Shi felt a jolt in her chest. She looked over at Nanny Liu Kun, who gave her a barely perceptible furrowing of the brow. It had to be said: most of the serving women who knew how to assist with childbirth were Wang Shi’s own wedding household attendants. And the gate matrons and gatekeepers were also among those Wang Shi had always overseen directly. Even if Sheng Hong did not become suspicious of her, she could not escape the charge of lax supervision and failure to keep her servants in order.

“So according to you, you bear not a single speck of responsibility? What a clever tongue!” Wang Shi could not say more than this — to demonstrate too thorough a knowledge of the internal details would not serve her well.

Lin Yiniang moved forward on her knees, crawling to the edge of the platform. Her beautiful face was streaked with tears, yet seemed all the more luminous for it — like a bright moon. In a voice full of grief and sorrow, she spoke slowly: “I won’t say I bear no fault at all — I don’t. I was timid and fearful, unwilling to take responsibility. Had I personally stayed at Wei younger sister’s side that day, directing the maids and serving women, perhaps Wei younger sister might not have… I simply did not want to shoulder the blame. I was afraid of becoming the target of gossip. I was at fault in that — yes. But to say that I deliberately intended to take her life — I would never accept such a charge, not even before the King of the Underworld! I was raised and educated with books — do I not understand that a human life is of the gravest weight?”

Sheng Hong’s heart moved, and he sat in quiet thought.

Wang Shi, filled with fury, was about to let loose a tirade — only to have Nanny Liu Kun’s gaze forcibly stop her. She had no choice but to swallow it down. Then Lin Yiniang drew a few more shallow sobs, and in a tone of quiet, plaintive sorrow said in a trembling voice: “Master, Madam — I am a woman with no one to depend upon in this world, and this entire life of mine rests upon Master. If Master no longer wants me — I would rather die here and now. I was born into a decent family, and Old Madam was willing to help arrange a proper marriage for me. It was my own decision — my own shameless choice — to cling to the Sheng household. I have been mocked and laughed at, looked down upon by the servants. I accepted all of it — it was what I chose for myself, of my own free will. I know that I have angered Madam, that Madam’s heart has been made heavy by my presence — Madam’s resentment and aversion toward me, I understand fully, and I do not dare to offer a single word of defense. I only beg that Madam, in consideration of my wholehearted devotion to Master, spare me even the status of a small cat or dog — allow me one small corner in this great Sheng household to curl up in, a mouthful of food to eat, and only the chance to see Master from time to time. For that, I would bear a thousand curses and ten thousand blows of contempt — without a single complaint or regret. Today, before Laifu the steward and Sister Liu, I kowtow to you — please, take pity on me!”

And with these words, she truly did begin to kowtow — one knock after another — the sound resonating through the room. Sheng Hong felt a pang shoot through his heart. He leapt down from the platform and took hold of Lin Yiniang’s arms to pull her up. “Enough of this — what are you doing?”

Lin Yiniang raised her head and looked up at Sheng Hong, her tearful eyes brimming with a thousand kinds of tender feeling and ten thousand kinds of grievance. She held his gaze for a moment — then said nothing at all. She turned and flung herself against Wang Shi’s knees, weeping and pleading: “Please, Madam, take pity on me. Whether you punish me or reprimand me — all of it is what I deserve. Just please don’t treat me as some wicked, scheming person. If I have been foolish or improper in my conduct, call me here to scold me — I will accept anything you say. My heart toward Master is entirely genuine…”

She wept until her voice grew hoarse and her breath ran out, her eyes swollen red, and in her exhaustion she sank sideways — coming to rest against Sheng Hong’s legs on the other side. Sheng Hong genuinely could not bear it. Visibly moved, he reached out and steadied her.

Astonishing.

Yao Yiyi finally could not help but open her eyes to the barest slit. Sheng Hong’s face was flooded with pity. Wang Shi was so angry she had gone green and white by turns — lips drained of all color — yet could not utter a single word, trembling all over as if with palsy. Laifu’s jaw had dropped open. Nanny Liu Kun regarded the scene with an inward sigh of defeat.

Lin Yiniang’s remarkable performance had somehow managed to awaken Yao Yiyi — who had been thoroughly committed to sleeping her way through everything — and rouse her back to life. She asked herself with complete sincerity: here was a young miss who had grown up in an official household — who, though that family had fallen, had spent more than ten years in refinement and comfort. And yet she had the courage to kneel and beg and weep and plead before the servants, all in plain sight. She gave herself over to it entirely — tears when tears were called for, defiance when defiance was needed. Why, then, was she herself so cowardly? Why did she keep refusing to face reality? So what if she had been born into a less than ideal situation?

On a cool summer evening, a concubine of consummate professional skill and extraordinary talent had somehow — against all expectation — kindled within Yao Yiyi the will to survive.