With the Yang brothers gone, the room’s earlier liveliness seemed as though a cold wind had torn a gash through it, and all at once it fell quiet.
Fang Xiaoqi idly poked at the leftovers in his bowl with the tip of his chopsticks, muttering, “What the hell was that? We were just getting into the drinking, and they took off without so much as a word. Next time, we’ve got to make Brother Qilang drink three big bowls as punishment.”
Sixth Brother Fang grabbed the jar of sorghum liquor, still less than half empty, and gave it a shake.
“Enough! They have elders to attend to; we have wine to drink!”
He pulled several large bowls over in front of him and filled them one by one. “Come on, fill them up! Today’s a good day—don’t ruin the mood!”
Fang Dazhuang threw back his head and laughed in his voice like a broken gong. Raising his bowl, he clinked it against Sixth Brother Fang’s. “Sixth Brother’s right! Drink!”
Fang Qiao'er leaned slightly to one side, and from the corner of her eye caught sight of something indigo-blue in the corner beneath the table.
She bent down and picked up the pouch embroidered with white plum blossoms.
After gently brushing it clean with her handkerchief, Qiao'er held it out to Fang Xiuniang.
Xiuniang had been looking down. At the sight of the pouch offered to her, her hand suddenly stiffened.
Slowly, she reached out and took it.
“It’s nothing.” Xiuniang forced her lips into a smile more painful than tears, her voice so soft that only Qiao'er could hear. “He left in such a hurry that he forgot to take it. I’ll give it to him myself another day.”
As though she understood at once, Qiao'er laid her hand over Xiuniang’s and gave it a gentle squeeze.
“Sixth Brother, let me lay it all out for you clearly!” Sixth Brother Fang had drunk himself into high spirits. Rolling up his sleeves, he casually pulled several chopsticks from the holder and arranged them haphazardly across the tabletop.
“This chopstick stands for our cloth shop in the east of the city, and the freight business at the Xiaguan docks.”
Pointing to the longest chopstick, he said, “Once the imperial inspectors from the Three Departments are gone, land prices in Jiangnan will shoot up, and our business will rise with the tide. I’ll keep my eye on this juicy piece of meat!”
Xiaoqi leaned forward and pointed at a shorter chopstick beside it. “What about me? What about me?”
“You little brat, what are you in such a hurry for?” Sixth Brother Fang smacked Xiaoqi on the forehead. “Didn’t your father say long ago that the rice shop in the east of the city would be yours to manage? From now on, you’re Manager Fang!”
“Dazhuang!” Sixth Brother placed two chopsticks side by side on the table and pushed them toward Fang Dazhuang. “You’re strong enough to keep people in line. I’m putting you in charge of dispatching supplies at those big grain warehouses south of the city! If any roughneck with more brawn than brains dares make trouble, kick his leg clean in two!”
Fang Dazhuang tossed back the last of the wine in his bowl, wiped his greasy mouth with the back of his hand, and laughed loudly. “Leave it to me! Whoever dares lay a finger on our Fang family’s grain, I’ll skin him alive!”
Sixth Brother turned to Qiao’er and Xiuniang, his tone softening considerably.
“Qiao’er, Xiuniang, you two are careful and deft with your hands. That silk shop we’ve just taken over on the city’s main street will depend entirely on you to run it.”
“Before long, the wives of Jiangnan officials and the young ladies of great families will be lining up to buy our designs!”
The more everyone talked, the more excited they became. The gloom that had hung over the room was swept away by the grand vision they were painting.
Fang Xiaoqi rested his chin on both hands, his eyes shining as brightly as lamps. Suddenly, an idea sprang into his mind.
“Hey! Sixth Brother! Dazhuang!” Xiaoqi shot to his feet excitedly. “Once our three families have this business firmly settled and we’ve got some money to spare, let’s pool our funds and buy a big plot of land by the Qinhuai River!”
Waving his arms, he enthusiastically laid out his vision. “We’ll open the biggest, grandest restaurant in all of Jiangning! I’ve even thought of a name—‘Three Brothers’ Tower’!”
“Then we can have Xiaowu be our chief manager! He’s steady and can handle a big operation!” Xiaoqi turned toward Xiuniang, grinning broadly. “And Xiuniang can manage the accounts! The Fang and Yang families will be one family—making money for both!”
The room erupted in laughter.
Fang Dazhuang slapped the table, roaring with laughter and repeatedly crying, “Good lad! Your brain works far better than mine! Xiaowu as manager, Xiuniang handling the accounts—damn, that’s a perfect match!”
The blunt remark made Fang Xiuniang flush crimson. She lowered her head so far it nearly disappeared beneath the table, protesting coyly, “Xiaoqi, say another word of nonsense and I’ll tear that mouth of yours apart!”
Though she scolded him aloud, the disappointment Yang Xiaowu had stirred in her heart earlier was, in the end, softened somewhat by the lively merriment around her.
That was right. Once this turbulent time had passed and the two families were joined by marriage, wouldn’t their days be peaceful and happy?
Fang Dazhuang’s face was flushed from drink, the liquor surging in waves toward his head.
He shoved aside the bench and seized Fang Xiaoqi by the arm, his grip crushingly tight.
“Xiaoqi! You’ve said exactly what’s been in my heart!” Dazhuang bellowed, his eyes wide as oxen. “Once the three families have fully secured this enormous deal and the situation has settled down, I’m going to drag all of you to the Yang family ancestral hall and throw another grand feast!”
He swept a large hand toward the gray, hazy sky outside the window. “We’ll summon every one of the younger generation from our three families! We’ll set up ten tables—twenty, even—right beneath the tablets of our ancestors!”
“I want everyone in Jiangning to see that the Fang, Chen, and Yang families are bound together like flesh and bone! I want every lord and notable along the Jiangnan circuit to know that when it comes to Jiangnan’s land, the three of our families have the final say!”
Sixth Brother Fang nodded repeatedly, rising with his bowl of wine to echo him. “What a rousing idea! When the time comes, we’ll send invitations to every gentleman, merchant, and notable in the city and have them all join us! Anyone who doesn’t come will be showing disrespect to our three families!”
The men’s fervor seemed to raise the temperature of the room by several degrees.
Fang Xiuniang held a teacup and took a small sip of warm water. Yet, for some reason, the faint anticipation that had just begun to stir within her sank strangely once more.
As she watched her brothers brimming with excitement, all she could hear was the heavy, uneven sound of Yang Xiaowu’s footsteps as he had left.
The smile slowly faded from Xiuniang’s face.
Fang Qiao’er was sitting right beside her and saw everything.
“Sixth Brother, Dazhuang.” Qiao’er finally spoke up.
The clamor in the room paused.
Qiao’er lifted her head and looked from one person to the next. “You truly didn’t notice that something was wrong with Qilang and Xiaowu today?”
Her brows drew together, and she could not suppress her doubts. “Qilang is usually as explosive as a firecracker, yet today he could barely string a sentence together after walking through the door. And Xiaowu didn’t even have the presence of mind to take the dagger Dazhuang gave him or the sachet Xiuniang embroidered for him. He looked as though something—or someone—were chasing him.”
“I watched them carefully from the side. This definitely isn’t the sort of urgency one shows when an elder falls ill. It looked more like…”
Qiao’er bit her lip and swallowed the harshest words.
“It looked more like guilt—as if they were afraid to face us.”
“Could Old Master Yang’s illness truly have reached the critical stage, with his life nearly spent? Or has something gone wrong within the Yang family?”
At this, Sixth Brother Fang waved his hand dismissively.
“Qiao’er, you’re just too softhearted. You spend all day scaring yourself.”
Sixth Brother belched after a drink of wine. “Old Master Yang only fell ill because he worked himself to the bone for the sake of our alliance. The whole matter of those six thousand mu of land rests on the shoulders of one old man. Who wouldn’t be worn down by that?”
“Once the imperial envoys from the Three Judicial Offices come ashore and deal with that old cur Xu Youde, this storm will pass. Then the old master’s illness will naturally clear up.”
Fang Dazhuang joined in to reassure her. He sat back down, grabbed a piece of cold meat, and stuffed it into his mouth, chewing noisily.
“Sis, you know what Brother Wu is like. He’s been a man of few words since he was a boy.”
Dazhuang mumbled around the meat.
“His family has just suffered such a major upheaval. What could he possibly say that would sound reassuring? He must be worried sick too. Let’s not sit here making baseless suspicions about our own brother.”
Fang Xiaoqi lifted the large bowl in his hands and shouted toward the window, “To Old Master Yang! To our alliance! May everything go smoothly!”
“To the alliance!”
Sixth Brother and Dazhuang echoed him in unison. The three men raised their bowls and tipped their heads back, draining them.
One bowl of wine followed another. The men drank from the afternoon until the sky outside began to darken.
…
In the corner of the room, the copper brazier that had once burned bright red held only a pile of pale gray ashes. The fire had weakened, and wisps of cold air seeped in through the cracks around the window.
Sixth Brother Fang let out a long belch, rubbed his throbbing temples, and glanced out the window.
“It’s getting late.” Sixth Brother braced himself against the table and stood, swaying slightly. “Let’s call it a day. Time to break up.”
The five members of the Fang family chatted and laughed as they left the private room and made their way down the wooden stairs.
The blast of cold wind hit them, and they shivered in unison, sobering up by a few degrees.
The five Fang family members each wrapped their heavy cloaks tighter around themselves, hunched their shoulders, and followed the flagstone road toward the Fang residence in the southern part of the city.
When they passed the familiar tofu shop at the crossroads, they saw Shopkeeper Wang, who usually loved to shout and gossip with the neighbors, hunched over as he hurriedly slotted wooden boards into the doorway.
Hearing their footsteps, Shopkeeper Wang raised his head. The moment he recognized the Fang siblings, the half-length board in his hands nearly slipped and struck his foot.
A strange mixture of fear and sympathy flashed across the old shopkeeper’s face. His eyes darted away as though they had touched a red-hot iron.
He hurriedly lowered his head and mumbled indistinctly, “G-Good evening, gentlemen of the Fang family.”
Before the words had even left his mouth, he turned and darted into the pitch-black shop as though fleeing from the plague.
“Hey? Old Wang!” Sixth Brother Fang called out in confusion, taking half a step forward. “Why are you closing up so early tonight? My father was just talking about your white jade tofu yesterday!”
Bang!
The only reply was the sound of the two door panels slamming shut.
Sixth Brother Fang’s outstretched hand froze in midair, and much of the drunken haze left his face.
Frowning, he turned to Dazhuang. “What’s with that old fool? Did he take the wrong medicine?”
“Who cares? Maybe the cold froze his brains,” Dazhuang said, rubbing his hands together. “Come on, the wind’s too strong.”
The group continued onward, full of doubt.
But the farther they went, the stranger the atmosphere became.
As they rounded the corner by Willow Tree Alley, they came upon several neighbors gathered by a wall, chatting among themselves.
They had been talking animatedly, but the instant they saw the Fang family approaching, every smile on their faces vanished.
One man in blue tugged urgently at his companion’s sleeve and muttered something under his breath. The others looked horrified. Without even bothering to greet them, they hastily turned sideways and slipped away along the wall, heads bowed as they hurried off.
Fang Dazhuang stopped short. “What the hell is going on? Have they seen a ghost?”
Fang Qiao'er clutched the collar of her cloak tightly, her face turning pale. “Something’s wrong! Dazhuang, Sixth Brother, look over there.”
Following the direction of Qiao'er’s finger, they saw an old man selling charcoal by the roadside, crouched down as he packed up his baskets.
The old man glanced up at them and shuddered all over. He did not even bother to pick up the two chunks of charcoal that had fallen to the ground; he grabbed his basket and left at once.
As he passed them, he kept shaking his head, muttering vaguely, “What a sin… what a terrible sin…”
Fang Xiuniang’s heart leapt straight into her throat, pounding violently.
She seized Sixth Brother Fang’s sleeve with both hands. “Sixth Brother! Something’s happened! Something must have happened!”
Fang Xiaoqi was walking at the very back, and he had sharp ears.
He suddenly stopped, spun around, and looked toward two neighbors who had not yet gone far.
The winter wind tore their whispered conversation apart and carried fragments of it to Xiaoqi’s ears.
“…the Yang family… betrayed the alliance…”
“…surrendered… sold them all out…”
“…the Fang family… how terrible…”
At the sound of those words, he blurted out in alarm, “What kind of nonsense are you spreading?!”
Fang Dazhuang’s hair stood on end. He roared, “Stop right there!”
The few neighbors let out terrified cries, scrambling away on all fours until they vanished at the end of the alley.
Sixth Brother Fang’s face had turned ashen. The last trace of drunkenness had been replaced by cold sweat.
He grabbed Dazhuang, who was about to chase after them, and his voice warped with fear. “Forget them! Get back to the residence first! Run!”
The five men could no longer care about appearances. They dashed toward the Fang family estate in the southern part of the city as though their lives depended on it.
Behind the half-closed doors lining both sides of the street, pairs of eyes watched their panicked retreat. Those eyes were filled with fear, sympathy, and the anticipation of a good show.
In front of the Fang residence.
Two red silk lanterns swung violently in the wind, their light scattering chaotically.
The main gate stood wide open. Servant Fang Shun came tumbling over the threshold, his hat gone and sweat pouring down his face, steaming white in the cold wind.
The moment he spotted Fang Jinhai and the other younger members of the family charging toward him, he seemed to have found a lifeline. He threw himself to his knees beneath the steps, his face as pale as paper, and wailed,
“Master! Sixth Master! Something terrible has happened! The sky is falling!”
Sixth Brother Fang took one stride up the steps and seized Fang Shun by the collar, lifting half his body off the ground. His eyes were bloodshot as he roared, “What happened? Speak clearly!”
Fang Shun trembled like a sieve, his teeth chattering violently as he sobbed between gasps, “The Yang—Yang family has rebelled!”
“Half an hour ago… that old bastard Yang Bonian wasn’t sick at all! He was pretending!”
“He personally took a carriage, carrying the deeds to the Yang family’s two thousand three hundred mu of ancestral land… along with a map detailing the secrets of the prominent families in the southern part of the city, and went to Xu Youde’s headquarters!”
Each of Fang Shun’s words was like a venom-coated steel blade, plunging viciously into the hearts of every Fang family member present. He continued screaming hysterically:
“They’ve broken the alliance! They said they’re going to offer their land to the imperial court! They’ve sold out the Chen family—and the vulnerability of our Fang family’s ancestral graves—to Xu Youde!”
Boom!
All Fang Dazhuang could hear was a roaring in his ears.
He stood frozen in place, his face stricken with horror, his eyes drained of all color.
All color drained from Fang Xiuniang’s face in an instant. The world spun before her eyes, and her body toppled stiffly to the side.
“Xiuniang!” Fang Qiao'er reacted quickly, throwing her arms around Xiuniang’s shoulders and holding her tight. Yet her own tears spilled uncontrollably from her eyes, and she was shaking so hard she could barely remain standing.
Fang Xiaoqi’s eyes went wide. He shook his head frantically and staggered back two steps, shouting in disbelief, “The Yang family has rebelled? Impossible! That can’t be true! Brother Qilang was drinking with us just moments ago! Xiaowu—he…”
His voice abruptly cut off. Xiaoqi suddenly recalled Yang Xiaowu’s evasive, deathly vacant gaze at the wine table, as well as his hurried excuse for leaving.
“It was all a lie... all of it...” Xiaoqi collapsed into a crouch, covering his face.
Sixth Brother Fang’s hand fell limply open, and Fang Shun dropped to the ground.
Sixth Brother Fang staggered back two steps and crashed into the stone lion by the gate. His eyes were terrifyingly hollow as he muttered to himself, “A blood oath... our ancestors... How could this be possible...?”
“How could they dare?!”
