Chapter 18: Only fearing the flowers would go to sleep in the deep night (I)
The second day, Lian Ma no longer waited for A Chun.
Li Shiyi steeped a pot of the Taiping houkui that she had bought yesterday, tidying things up in preparation for leaving on the journey back. A Yin had long since arranged her suitcase, and sat at the table, prodding the stove. “This winter day is getting longer and longer,” A Yin said with a yawn. Li Shiyi gave her a cup of tea, listening to the sound of Lian Ma moving outside, picking greens. A Yin glanced at her, and said, “Next month, have you thought of what it is?”
Li Shiyi sat at her side, and asked, “What do you mean?”
A Yin put her hands over the warm stove, and said, “Next month is the anniversary of my shifu’s death; since interring him, it’s unexpectedly been a great number of years since I’ve gone to see his family; this time, it’s to loosen my old bones, so if you have the time, come accompany me.” Seeing Li Shiyi properly considering it, she added, “Your shifu is buried there, too; let’s go see both at once; it’ll count as fulfilling filial piety.” A Yin’s voice was a little husky as she said, “In this twelfth, frigid winter month, one can’t know whether or not one’s bones will freeze.”
Just as Li Shiyi nodded, before she had even spoken, she heard the sound of crashing metal against the door, and Tu Laoyao stepped through the door, swinging his hand, numb with cold, and said, “I just went to look at that Shijiu; take a guess how it is—she was, in fact, sleeping just like…” He was dazed in place, half the white breath not yet having left his mouth, the breath like gossamer threads at the sides of his mouth, rising in ridges like the head of a wax gourd, indistinctly asking, “Who’re you?” He gazed at the still undisguised Li Shiyi, spottlessly white inner garments wrapped around her tall, long form, a thick coat simply thrown over her shoulder, her half-length hair just reaching her chin, gently sweeping against the distinct angle of her jaw, her features clear and graceful, perched upon fair and glossy skin, as if having been carved out of ice.
Li Shiyi tilted her face, her drooping eyelids fluttering as she cast a look askance at him. This expression was entirely familiar. Tu Laoyao sucked in a breath, his calves shivering a bit without reason. “Oh no, oh no,” A Yin rolled her eyes, as if having been given a burden she couldn’t throw away, “This time, he’s really become one of our own.”
Li Shiyi turned her right hand, which was tending the fire, over, and said, “Firstly, next time, remember to knock.”
Tu Laoyao blinked two beady eyes, brain frozen in a paste, as if his right leg had been removed, and returned to the outside of the threshold, reaching out an arm to close the door, and stood out in the wind for a few seconds, and only then raised a hand to knock on the door. A Yin called out for him to enter, and shook her head at Li Shiyi. “It's this that’s really a buffoon.”
Tu Laoyao returned inside the house, as careful as the first time he’d ridden the train, having forgotten the words from just then entirely, just scratching at the tabletop with his nails, not knowing whether or not he should sit down. He didn’t dare to look at Li Shiyi, only furtively spying half glances at her, as attractive as a television star, attractive enough to make the inside of his heart scratched up; this young lady covered up this much, he didn’t know when all was said and done which Bodhisattva she was.
Li Shiyi, seeing that he was preoccupied clearing his throat and not speaking, opened her mouth to ask, “When you just went to Shijiu’s room, did you knock?”
“I knocked, I knocked,” Tu Laoyao said hastily, only thinking it over carefully after speaking, and, for the life of him, couldn’t remember whether he’d knocked or not.
Li Shiyi lifted her wrist, which had been steeping a cup of tea, and reached her hand out to set it on the table before him, secretly tapping against the bottom of the cup, as if using Tu Laoyao to beckon a hun spirit back, and said, “Just now, what were you going to say?”
“I was saying…” Tu Laoyao hissed through his teeth, all of his unawareness having run off to who knew where, and looked for the start of a subject, saying, “Just now, listening to what you two were muttering about, it seemed like you weren’t returning to Beiping anymore?”
Li Shiyi nodded, and said, “We’re going to Shandong, to see our shifus.”
Tu Laoyao let out an “en”, and, seeing that she appeared as before, his heart relaxed quite a bit, and he mulled it over for a bit, before saying, “On the matter of shifus, I won’t be going with you; it’s just that, going to distant places, you few young ladies always make one unable to set their heart down—Yin-da-gunainai, don’t get angry. Shiyi-jie, I travelled together with you until Jiaodongdao;[1] I’ll go back to Sijiucheng myself, and look for my wife, is that acceptable?”
“Jiaodongdao? Shandong?” A lovably soft voice arose, like the cold air that seeped through the cracks and took captive the silver-coloured wood charcoal’s dry heat, and Song Shijiu, wearing a lotus-root-coloured coat, rabbit-fur collar surrounding her full-moon face, stood at the doorway, filled with laughter.
Tu Laoyao let out an “ai”, gaze following her as she took a step into the room, sitting down with familiar ease, his heart really having second thoughts: this Song Shijiu didn’t knock on the door, and Li Shiyi didn’t have any words for her. Women’s hearts, like a needle in the sea. Tu Laoyao sipped a mouthful of tea, face creasing as he came to his conclusion. Suddenly, he remembered something important, and pointed at Li Shiyi, asking Song Shijiu, “Take a look at who this is, do you recognise her or not?”
Song Shijiu propped her face up with a yielding hand, big eyes glistening, carefully asking for confirmation, “Tu Laoyao, have you lost your memory?”
Tu Laoyao was startled, finger swinging in a circle, asking in terror, “You knew she looked like this? You all knew?”
Song Shijiu stared at him blankly, only then becoming aware of Li Shiyi’s undisguised face, and at this, tilted her head all of a sudden to appreciate it with pleasure, and suddenly, remembering Tu Laoyao ignorantly saying “like this”, felt a bit unhappy.
“Only I didn’t know?” Tu Laoyao, without reason, felt very wronged, and after remaining silent for a bit, rushed to say to Li Shiyi, “Since you were born pretty, what were you doing disguising yourself ugly? You weren’t afraid of…taking responsibility for people’s lives, were you?” His heart was anxious, and out of the corner of his eyes, he saw on Li Shiyi’s hands, precisely those hands arranged at the edge of the table, thoughtlessly tracing a circle, the mannerisms of a waterway robber without regard for human life.
With a rising scent of perfume, A Yin’s silk handkerchief flashed before his eyes, stopping the wild flight of his mind, and Li Shiyi said, then, “To walk through the jianghu, it’s more convenient.”
A Yin waved the silk back and forth, saying with a smile, “When she was in her teens, she entered a tomb, when her skills were still not high, and provoked a female ghost, and was pursued aboveground and bothered for a few months, insisting she make a meal for her. Two years ago, when she’d just arrived in Beiping, she was invited by a military official to enter a grave, and once she emerged from the tomb, she was unexpectedly surrounded by soldiers, saying she’d been seen by the military official, who wanted to take her as his concubine. The skin of this Shiyi-jie of ours, yah…” She let out a laughing sigh, eyes cutting crosswise as she bit her lip.
Tu Laoyao, understanding what was being said, said, “That makes sense. Putting yourself out in the public eye like this, and always begging for food in a mass of men. Today’s military officials, with a flat-topped haircut and proper faces…” He wanted to say more, but hesitated, his courage not quite great enough, and let out an “ai”.
They were all quiet for a bit, and only then did Tu Laoyao, stomach strong, ask, “Things are different now. The words I said when I went into a tomb for the first time with you themselves are valid; you have this xiongdi, Tu Sanping, and now that we have a residence, we nevertheless need to have some style; from now on, there’s no need to go negotiate business, just send me to do it. That smoking pipe of yours, I’ll replace it as well, you don’t need to come and go through the wind and rain, I’ll look for proper jobs, that your siblings will like too.”
“Look,” A Yin laughed, “it’s really the street food-eating, adaptable-minded, efficient, no reason for itself smoking pipe to replace Li Shiyi’s methods.”
These words were both sour and sweet, and it wasn’t clear whether they were praise or disparagement, and Tu Laoyao couldn’t understand them, but wasn’t angry, either, just pressed his face closer to Li Shiyi a bit, and, laughing mischievously, said, “I say, the best thing to do would be to buy a Western automobile, and from now on, leaving the house, you’ll get directly into the car, sitting in the back, and no one would bother you.”
Li Shiyi said, “Still not as good as inviting two chauffeurs, three managers, and twenty serving grannies.”
A Yin clapped the table, and said, “And how about summoning a party of guard soldiers.”
Tu Laoyao swallowed saliva, and gazed upon the expressions of the two, smiles that weren’t quite smiles, and drew his head back.
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