Chapter 20: Only fearing the flowers would go to sleep in the deep night (III)
A Yin had already seen the matter on the young lady’s mind, but had not necessarily seen the resplendently blossoming spring flowers wilted by frost. Song Shijiu’s gaze was thoroughly perplexed, her face even whiter than wallpaste, her face numb as she said, “Tu, Tu Laoyao?” The image of Tu Laoyao’s beady eyes and large belly passed her mind, his sturdy hands and grinning appearance, unable to resist wiping his neck.
A Yin leaned her body to the side, her wrist supporting her head, and said with a smile, “If it’s not, is it possible that it’s me?” She raised her hand to touch Song Shijiu’s chin, and shook her head. “I won’t do; I’m a courtyard full of peaches and plums, and you’re just a small cape jasmine flower.”
Song Shijiu bit her lip, half her face hidden beneath the quilt, and paused a moment, before declaring in a small voice, “It’s not you either.”
A Yin narrowed her charming eyes and gazed at her for a bit, the corners of her lips seeming to rise a bit, and she laughed softly, and laid back down, unclear whether she was happy or unhappy, and said, “Ah, Shiyi…”
Song Shijiu’s face flushed, but her significant pause in speech hadn’t been missed, and she turned over to ask her, “What is it?”
A Yin gazed at the shadow cast by the wooden frame of the bed’s head, and said with a smile, “Since her shifu died, she’s always been by herself, coming and going alone; I’ve never seen her take a liking to anything, nor have I seen her take a disliking to something.” A Yin tilted her head to gaze at Song Shijiu, and said, “It’s that she treats you well, isn’t it?”
Song Shijiu nodded.
A Yin continued, “I don’t know what her heart is made of either; at a glance, it appears frigid, but in all matters it’s amiable, delicate and attentive. But other people’s friendliness is intimate, and Li Shiyi’s friendliness is just friendliness; her treatment of others naturally has three or four parts of leeway, and in the end, it’s still careless. Hanging your heart on her, aren’t you afraid?” If her heart was given to someone else, regardless of if it was a pool of water or muddy dirt, eventually the echo could be heard, but if it was placed on Li Shiyi, it would become an invisible, untouchable wandering spirit; if Li Shiyi didn’t speak, there wasn’t anyone who could see it. Killing but not bothering with a burial; A Yin let out a sigh.
“I’m not afraid,” Song Shijiu said, shaking her head, small lips pressed together, her eyes still gleaming.
A Yin patted her head, and laughed, and then heard Song Shijiu ask, “Then, according to you, does she like me or not?”
A Yin shot a glance at her, then turned over the tight quilt, and said, “What sort of business am I in? Liking, that act, how would I know about it? Go ask Tu Laoyao, he has a special affection.” A Yin carelessly said in a sleepy tone, and, in a daze, yawned.
The night passed dreamlessly. This place was out of the way, but luckily it was entirely peaceful, and the group slept alright, only Tu Laoyao waking up once in the night due to a full bladder, eyes squinted in narrow slits as he went towards the latrine, vaguely seeing light emitting from below, which was still well-lit, and mumbled to himself, “Is it really that they don’t care about finances?” and then returned to the room and began snoring.
A Yin’s sleep loosened her bones, and she only got up when the sun had risen to the height of three bamboo poles, and she used up the water washing her face, and then nudged awake a still sleepy Song Shijiu, the two of them lazily dressing and grooming, and only after another half a shichen went downstairs. In the broad daylight, downstairs wasn’t as desolate as it had been the night before, and several individual guests were gathered around the tables, eating and chatting idly, the scent of roasted meat and clear wine passing mouths in suspicious surroundings, increasingly attracting gluttonous insects. A Yin and Song Shijiu came over and sat down at Tu Laoyao’s side, where a tray with thin, delicate, paper-skinned baozi, delicious thickly-cut meat and the clear, rich scent of yams overlapped in a stunning, fragrant scent, and on the other side there were a few oily, flaky youxian pastries, and furthermore, two bowls of foamy porridge that didn’t appear like porridge.
Li Shiyi, herself nearby, brought over the vinegar, and sat down by the side as well; because Song Shijiu had let out the matter in her heart the night before, she was a bit uneasy, and lowered her eyelashes, engrossed in drinking her porridge; Li Shiyi, seeing she had picked up a baozi, asked her, “Do you want vinegar?”
Song Shijiu shook her head, then paused and said, “Yes.”
A Yin bit the back of her hand and laughed quietly; Li Shiyi frowned, and picked up a saucer and pouring vinegar for Song Shijiu. “Thanks,” Song Shijiu said to the vinegar. Li Shiyi’s hand paused, and then she took back the bottle of vinegar, tilting her head slightly as she gazed at Song Shijiu. Song Shijiu lowered her head and bit a couple bites of the meat baozi, and only then raised her head, and seeing Li Shiyi was staring blankly, gently asked her, “You didn’t stick one up today?” Her finger touched her own right cheek.
Li Shiyi shook her head, and said, “There’s few people, I didn’t feel like disguising myself.” Li Shiyi lazily dragged out the final syllable, eyes falling to gaze at the table, index finger supporting her temple, slowly moving upwards, matching the face that completely lacked any affectation, entirely casual and languid.
Song Shijiu’s heart jumped, her gaze following the slide of her finger, as if it had drawn a line across her own heart, saying: here, here, here, give it all to me, alright?
Alright.
Song Shijiu put down her chopsticks, and picked up a paper napkin to wipe her mouth, then pinched it into a ball, holding it her hand and poking at the corner of her mouth.
Those eating were upright and lively, and the lady proprietor, A Tang, came over, asking with a smile, “You’re still able to eat? Did you rest well last night? Do you still need to stay another night tonight?”
Tu Laoyao replied, “The food and drink is good, and the beds are warm; it’s just, da-jie, these candle flames of yours are very bright; last night when I got up in the night, I wasn’t careful, and thought the sky was bright.” He looked around, and added, “In this bright daylight, why are you still holding a lamp?”
With no issues around, A Tang sat down, casting a glance at the oil lamps all about dripping with oil, which in the light of day, didn’t seem very eyecatching, the tongues of flame swaying, moved by the wind outside, which just made the flames lay crooked, before coming to stand uptight again and again. A Tang folded her hands across each other on the table, sitting with her figure askew, and raised her chin towards the oil lamps, then turned her head back, and said, “There’s some things all of you guests don’t know; these aren’t by any means ordinary oil lamps, but mermaid ointment.”
“Mermaid ointment?” A Yin frowned.
Tu Laoyao knew that it had come to a time when he himself wouldn’t be able to understand again; he may as well not make any sound, so he only cooly and calmly grabbed a youxian pastry.
“It seems like I’ve heard of mermaid ointment,” Song Shijiu said, thinking.
“Emperor Qin’s tomb,” Li Shiyi said.
Song Shijiu shot her a glance, and thought of it, saying, “The past few days, I’ve been reading the Shiji;[1] in it, it said, ‘When the First Empror took the throne, excavations and building started at Mount Li, where after he united the world beneath the heavens, seven-hundred-thousand soldiers from across the world worked, digging through three subterranean streams, pouring copper for the outer coffin, the tomb being filled with models of all places, pavilions and offices, as well as fine vessels, precious stones, and rarities. Artisans were ordered to make crossbows so as any thief breaking in would be shot. All of the country’s streams, the Yellow River, and the Yangtze were reproduced in quicksilver and by some mechanical means made to flow into a miniature ocea, and the heavenly constellations were shown above and the regions of the Earth below. The candles were made of mermaid ointment to ensure they burned for the longest possible time.”[2] She shook her head, the back of her head swaying for a long moment, and then soon after shot a furtive glance at Li Shiyi; Li Shiyi, at that moment, happened to tilt her head to glance at her, and came in contact with her gaze, and she curved her lips to smile faintly.
“A Yin,” Tu Laoyao said, rapping upon the table, “translate it, will you?”
Rather than getting angry, A Yin smiled, and with a tender voice said, “It means that, under the heavens, there’s plenty of extraordinary things, and yet some old outer cabbage leaf[3] dares to order about this lady here.”
Tu Laoyao had originally had his ears perked to listen, but when the burst of cudgel-like mockery came, in a flash, his shoulders trembled, and he said with a disclaiming smile, “What ordering about? Isn’t it just that you’re experienced and knowledgeable? I’m just trying to learn and gain knowledge and experience, aren’t I?”
Only then did A Yin have the brief appearance of happiness, and turned her head to say, “It’s said that beyond the South Sea, there are jiaoren,[4] and I’ve also heard that they visit springs, their figure similar to a human, just that they live in the water. This mermaid ointment, then, is made from extracting the fat from the jiaoren’s corpse, and it’s said that a single drop can burn for countless days without going out. The Emperor Qin’s tomb that Li Shiyi speaks of has precisely this sort of scented mermaid ointment candles, guaranteeing endless light beneath the ground.”
Tu Laoyao clicked his tongue in wonder, gazing at the mermaid light before him, some delight seeping across his face, and said, “This Emperor Qin’s things, can we share and enjoy ourselves? In this small inn of yours, there unexpectedly are these sorts of treasures.” Tu Laoyao stuck out a thumb.
A Tang said, “This is also just chance; in this Linhai of ours, there are, in fact, no fisherman’s goods; two years ago, I went towards the coast, and at that time met a few fishermen who had a fish being dying in their nets, as if having been stranded in shallow water; seeing that it couldn’t live for much longer, I bought it then, and boiled the fat and made lamps; luckily, those fishermen didn’t know what was what, and were even afraid of incurring disaster, and I got it for less than a few hundred.”
“So then it’s that sort of explanation, no wonder,” A Yin murmured. No wonder it was brightly lit the entire night; no wonder the light had a rare fragrance; using a corpse to make lamps, no wonder it attracted wandering ghosts.”
“That jiaoren, what did it look like?” Tu Laoyao asked.
“Extremely grotesque, absolutely nothing like a human’s appearance; its skin was like a dragon’s, one of its fingers that thick, with a small hole in its neck, and its ears only two holes,” A Tang said.
“O,” Tu Laoyao chuckled, losing his curiosity.
The group was silent for a bit, and A Tang stood up to tidy up the bowls and chopsticks, saying as she cleared them up, “Just now when I was tidying up the rooms, I saw that the four corners had ripe glutinous rice, and at the beam in front of the door there was a black donkey’s hoof; if I dare to ask, are you few xiansheng?”
Li Shiyi raised her eyes, and said, “What about it?”
A Tang piled up the plates and bowls, and said, “I heard say, going towards the north, near to Mount Ma’er, there’s an ancient tomb, and it’s said that it was an emperor who fled and had it constructed, and in the tomb, there are some gold items, and many masters used their methods to enter into the tomb.”
“He!” Antiques are most valuable in times of peace, and gold in times of war; Tu Laoyao was provoked to speech, and said, “Did anyone manage to obtain it?”
A Tang shook her head. “Some died inside, and some, who returned, had become foolish and stupid, unable to say anything of it, and not knowing what was, in the end, inside of it.” When A Tang finished speaking, she put the last bowl atop, and carried them back into the kitchen.
Li Shiyi mulled it over for a while, enough to write half a chapter of a book about it, then rose and returned to the guest room. A Yin idly cracked melon seeds, listening to the gossip at the table nextdoor. Song Shijiu returned her gaze, which had been chasing after Li Shiyi’s retreating figure, and tugged at Tu Laoyao’s sleeve. Tu Laoyao paused the movement of his hands, shelling melon seeds, and said, “What is it?”
Song Shijiu said in a low voice, “Do you think Li Shiyi likes me?”
“She does,” Tu Laoyao said, chewing on a couple melon seeds.
“Really?” Song Shijiu’s ears twitched.
Tu Laoyao said cheerfully, “Among us, who doesn’t like you?”
Song Shijiu cast a horizontal glance at him, and, unwilling to give up, said, “Not like that. It’s…a special fondness, like you and your wife.”
Tu Laoyao was startled, and gazed at Song Shijiu, chewing on air for a few moments, then shook his head so his cheeks trembled, and said, “That’s not liking.”
“Why?” Song Shijiu’s heart constricted.
Tu Laoyao said earnestly, “She’s your mother.”
-
Translator's notes:
[1]: Records of a Grand Historian by Sima Qian, known in Chinese as 史记 (Shiji).
[2]: Translation from Sima Qian: The First Emperor of Qin, Chapter 39, The Imperial Tomb, as translated by David K. Jordan of UCSD. Slight changes were made, with the translation’s “whale oil” being altered to “mermaid ointment” for a more literal translation.
[3]: Basically a descriptor of someone without much worth.
[4]: Mythological being in Chinese folklore similar to a mermaid, whose tears turn into pearls.
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