Warm Wine, Easy Company
Early the next morning, while the mist still clung to the lake and had yet to clear, a figure was already crouched beside the two wine jars in the yard.
It was neither Wang Afu nor Wang Shun.
It was Old Daoist Xuan.
He had drunk with deep satisfaction the night before, and even half asleep he had still been thinking about those two jars of the Wang family's wine. So at first gray light, he had already thrown on his wrinkled old gray Daoist robe, tucked his wine gourd under one arm, and taken up position beneath the eaves. The sealing clay over the jar mouths had not yet been fully removed. He did not hurry to open them. Instead, he tapped one jar lightly with his knuckles, cocked his head to listen, then bent close and sniffed.
At once, his brows drew together.
"The seal isn't bad," he muttered. "But this jar's set too close to the wall. Damp creeps back in at night. It's pressing the wine down a little."
Outside the gate came the soft slap of water and the faint creak of a boat, as though a skiff had just returned from hauling in nets from a nearby inlet. Sure enough, a moment later Wang Shun came into the yard carrying two dripping fish baskets. His trouser legs were rolled high, and lake mud still clung to the edges of his shoes. Fish scales flashed faintly inside the baskets, and live tails still flicked and beat. It was plain he had gone out at dawn to pull in the night nets before heading home.
Madam Qian took the baskets from him and picked out the two freshest fish, laying them in a wooden basin.
"The fish were biting well this morning," she said. "One of these will make a fine soup."
Only then did Wang Afu come in behind him, a half-wet old net slung over his shoulder. He hung it beneath the eaves before turning with a grin toward Old Daoist Xuan.
"Daoist Master, you rise early indeed. We've only just come back from the nets, and you're already eyeing my wine jars."
Old Daoist Xuan did not even turn his head. He only rubbed a finger lightly over the sealing clay at the mouth of the jar, pinched away a bit of powder, lifted it to his nose, and went on criticizing as before.
"Early or late means nothing. Better ask whether your wine woke early."
"Your clay seal is sound, and your hand isn't clumsy. The starter's fragrance hasn't leaked away. But I'd wager the bottom of the jar is still a touch too damp."
At first Wang Afu had thought the old man was merely craving a drink at daybreak. But when he heard those two lines, something in his eyes truly brightened. He set his bucket aside at once and crouched down beside the jar himself.
"Daoist Master, you can really tell?"
"Last night I already felt this jar wasn't as open as the other one. I thought perhaps I was only being impatient. But hearing you say it now… it does seem the damp from the wall has gotten into it."
This time Old Daoist Xuan finally looked at him. Some of the loose, drunken haze in his manner faded a little.
"Wine is the least willing thing in the world to lie," he said. "Rice, starter, water, fire, jar—if one part is off by a hair, then it's off by a hair. That fresh jar last night was clean enough on the tongue. But the autumn-rice batch was rich with a drag in it. The rice wasn't spoiled, and the starter hadn't turned. Most likely the jar took on damp while it was resting."
"If you don't believe me, then once the sun comes up high this afternoon, move the jar half a foot away from the wall. Taste it again after a few days. The flavor will loosen on its own."
Wang Afu nodded again and again. In that honest, simple smile on his face, there was suddenly the unmistakable delight of a man who had found someone who truly understood him. For years he had made his living by the lake—casting nets, hauling fish, patching boats, all the ordinary skills of a fisherman—but what he treasured most, oddly enough, were the few jars of wine in his home. Yet in the village there were very few who truly understood wine. Most only thought it smooth enough to drink, praised it with a simple "Afu, your wine is good," and let the matter end there. Someone like Old Daoist Xuan, who could smell one jar and immediately tell the difference in its sealing and the weight of the damp it had taken on—this was the first time he had ever met such a man.
"Since Daoist Master can truly read it," Wang Afu said, slapping his thigh on the spot, "then you mustn't leave today. We're steaming a basket of rice this morning. Help me take a look, will you? Tell me if I'm spreading it right, if I'm using too much starter or too little."
Old Daoist Xuan clicked his tongue at once. His whole face plainly declared: I had no intention of leaving so soon anyway. But he still had to put on a bit of restraint.
"It isn't as though I'm staying just for your little jars of wine."
"But since you're asking with such sincerity, if I refuse outright, that would hardly be gracious."
With that, he tucked his wine gourd behind his waist, folded his sleeves together, and settled himself in a squat as though he had every right in the world to be there.
At the other end of the yard, Madam Qian was already washing the rice.
The big wooden basin was full of swollen white grains, and the rinse water clouded faintly as she worked. Thin rivulets of starchy water ran down her wrists. She moved with quick, practiced hands, laying out basin, sieve, steaming basket, and cloth in neat order, without the least confusion. Wang Shun carried out the wooden steamer, set it firmly beside the stove, then fed in the firewood he had split the night before, one stick after another. Once the fire caught, warmth slowly began to gather beneath the pot. Steaming rice was most easily ruined by uneven heat, but Wang Shun handled the fire with steady hands—one stick close, one stick loose—and the flames, for that very reason, burned red and even, never flaring too hard.
By then Fang Yingjie was awake as well.
He had slept more deeply the night before than he ever had in the ruined hall or the old boat shed. After rising, he first followed the method Old Daoist Xuan had taught him, slowly sinking the breath in his chest, guiding it down once through his body. Only after the faint, floating pressure between his ribs had eased a little did he take up his wooden staff and make his way outside.
The first thing he saw was Old Daoist Xuan crouched beneath the eaves, sniffing at the sealing clay on the jars. The next was the smoke by the stove, the rice in the basin, the starter jars beside the crocks, and the voices in the yard as the household gradually came alive. The morning wind off the lake was still cool, but it no longer stung the skin. It carried only a trace of water-damp and the warmth of wood fire, enough that for a moment he could hardly tell whether he was a guest here, or whether he had long since grown used to this yard.
He had meant to take advantage of the fact that Old Daoist Xuan was clear-headed for once and ask what time they would set out today to look for people. But one glance at the old Daoist, now wholly absorbed in the wine jars, and the words stalled on his tongue.
Wang Yan came out of the house carrying a winnowing tray. Seeing him standing there with his staff, staring blankly, she smiled at once, her eyes curving.
"You little blockhead, what are you standing there for?"
"Waiting for the rice to cook itself? Or your leg to heal itself?"
Fang Yingjie flushed slightly at that and said in a low voice, "I wanted to help."
"Help?" Wang Yan stuffed the tray into his arms, mischief dancing in her eyes. "Then start by holding this steady. Don't take two steps and spill the whole family into it."
She was teasing him, but the task she had chosen for him was the lightest one there was.
Fang Yingjie lowered his head and looked at the tray. It was lined only with a clean cloth, waiting for the rice to be spread out on it later. It was neither heavy nor difficult to carry. Something stirred faintly in his chest. He held it carefully, then walked slowly over to the stove and set it down.
Madam Qian saw him and said, "Your injuries aren't healed yet. Don't force yourself. Passing things over and tending the fire will do. Wang Shun can handle the heavy work."
Wang Shun, bent over the stove and stirring the fire, only grunted once in acknowledgment.
In the fish basket by the corner of the yard, the live fish were still flopping now and then. Beneath the eaves, water kept dripping from the wet net. Fish smell, lake damp, and the white steam of cooking rice mingled together in the air. Only then did it truly feel like morning in a lakeside fisher household.
Before long, the rice was done.
A steaming basketful of white rice was tipped out of the wooden steamer and spread over the large tray, and at once a great rush of steam rose through the whole yard. In that heat there was the clean sweetness of fresh rice, mixed with the faint damp scent of wood from the steamer itself. One whiff of it was enough to make an empty stomach feel even emptier. Madam Qian and Wang Yan used bamboo paddles to turn and loosen the rice so it would cool. One moved a little faster, the other a little slower, yet somehow their rhythm matched perfectly. Wang Afu pinched up a few grains, rubbed them between his fingertips, then handed them to Old Daoist Xuan to smell.
Old Daoist Xuan lifted them to his nose and frowned at once.
"The heat hasn't gone out yet."
"Spread it more. Turn it again. If you rush the starter in now because you're eager, it'll take too fiercely at the front and go hollow at the back."
Far from being annoyed, Wang Afu looked as if he had just been handed treasure. He immediately took the bamboo paddle and turned the rice several more times. One man spoke of exactly how cool the rice ought to be before the starter was added; the other argued over how different the brew became when the starter went in heavy or light. The more they talked, the better they got on, until at last they were even bickering over whether one ought to use well water left overnight or fresh water drawn that same morning from the edge of the lake.
Wang Afu insisted well water was steady.
Old Daoist Xuan, however, disliked it, saying well water had too dead a hold to it and could not compare with fresh-drawn water, which still had living spirit.
The two argued until their faces were red, and in the end each yielded half a step. Then they changed tack and began talking instead about the season, the nature of the rice, the temper of the fire. They argued back and forth and still convinced neither the other nor themselves, yet each secretly felt the other had a point.
While handing over cloths and basins from the side, Fang Yingjie listened without meaning to—and before long he found himself listening in earnest.
He had thought at first that the Wang family's wine was simply something fisherfolk brewed for themselves to drink and sold by the jug now and then to help with the household expenses. Who would have guessed that when it was truly made, there could be so much craft in it? From steaming one basket of rice to spreading it out, from adding the starter to letting the jars rest, every stage had its own delicate knowledge. Old Daoist Xuan, crouched beside the jars with his beard jutting and last night's wine not yet entirely out of him, became far more serious than usual the moment the talk turned to fire, timing, and starter. And Wang Afu, meanwhile, only grew more and more animated, as though all those half-seen, half-understood truths he had kept buried in his heart for years had suddenly found someone who could catch them.
So the work went on, and the talk with it, until half the day had slipped away.
Old Daoist Xuan naturally did not leave.
Not only did he fail to leave—when fish soup was served at noon, he even delivered a pronouncement on Wang Afu's wine before everyone present.
"If you keep this wine tucked away in the village and sell it only by the jug, that's a pity."
"I'm not saying it's unmatched beneath heaven. I'm saying it has roots. It has a line of its own. It wasn't made at random."
He ladled half a spoonful of fish soup into his mouth, swallowed it, and added slowly, "If you can get the next few jars right, then opening a small shop of your own may not be impossible."
The words sounded light enough when spoken.
But when they landed in Wang Afu's ears, it was as though something gave a quiet knock against the middle of his chest.
Holding his wine bowl, he went still for a moment before smiling.
"Daoist Master has struck right at one of my foolish dreams."
"All these years, with wind and waves in my face out on the lake, I've always thought that if one day I could truly set up a little place by Ping Wharf—nothing grand, just our own wine, fish soup, hot cakes, and a couple of small dishes—then the family might finally have somewhere steady to put its feet. But dreams are dreams. For now it's still only an empty notion in my belly."
Madam Qian, who was ladling soup for everyone, let out only a soft sigh at that.
"It isn't a bad dream."
"It's just that money won't let us hold it down."
Old Daoist Xuan had not yet answered when a voice from outside the courtyard gate laughed and cut in:
"If Afu-ge truly has that thought in mind, then perhaps money won't hold him down after all."
Everyone looked up.
A middle-aged man stood just beyond the gate, dressed in a blue jacket with a cloth belt tied at the waist. He looked to be around forty, broad-shouldered and sturdy, with a ready smile and the seasoned ease that comes from years spent doing business outside. He carried a small packet in one hand, as though it were some gift he had brought along the way. Stepping over the threshold, he first cupped his hands politely to Madam Qian, then turned with a grin toward Wang Afu.
"Afu-ge—what? Don't tell me you don't recognize me?"
Wang Afu stared for an instant, then delight burst across his face.
"Yacai?"
"You've become so well turned out these past few years I almost didn't dare recognize you myself!"
The man was Tang Yacai.
He and Wang Afu had known each other since childhood, both having grown up around the same dock. Later Tang Yacai went into the fish trade and small-goods business, and over the years he had indeed made something of himself. At New Year and on feast days he would sometimes send sweets or cloth back through others, and if he happened to pass through this area, he always stopped in to offer greetings. Madam Qian, Wang Shun, and Wang Yan all knew him. Seeing him now, not one of them found his appearance abrupt.
Tang Yacai smilingly handed the packet he carried to Madam Qian.
"I passed through Pingsha Market," he said, "and remembered that sister-in-law likes the sugar crisps from there, so I brought a little."
Then he turned to Wang Shun and gave his shoulder a hearty pat.
"Good lad. You've grown this tall already."
And when he saw Wang Yan, he smiled even wider.
"Yan'er really has grown into a young lady now. She's no longer that little girl with a runny nose who used to trail after us."
Wang Yan curled her lip. "Uncle Yacai always has to start by bringing up old stories."
Madam Qian and Wang Afu both laughed.
With that kind of familiarity, that kind of tone, that way of asking after all the small details of the household as clearly as though he had them memorized—how could he have seemed like an outsider? He looked, in every possible way, like an old acquaintance who knew the family inside and out.
Tang Yacai turned his eyes and noticed Old Daoist Xuan crouched by the wine jars and Fang Yingjie seated beneath the eaves with his staff. He smiled.
"You've got guests in the house?"
Wang Afu then gave him a rough account of how he had met Old Daoist Xuan and Fang Yingjie by the water dock a few days earlier, how the talk had turned to wine, and how they had eventually stayed the night with the family.
After hearing it, Tang Yacai first cupped his hands toward Old Daoist Xuan.
"Since Daoist Master understands wine, he truly came at just the right time."
"Afu-ge's wine tastes ordinary enough to those of us in the family who've long been used to it. It's rare to have someone with a genuine nose for it say a fair word on his behalf."
Old Daoist Xuan glanced at him sidelong and let out a soft snort through his nose, but did not respond.
He had never liked talking too much with men who made their living running trade outside. In his eyes, they all had sweet mouths and cluttered hearts, as though every sentence they spoke had first been weighed on a merchant's scale. But Tang Yacai had pitched these few words just right, and they were not enough to annoy him.
Tang Yacai smiled and went on.
"It's not as though I only learned of Afu-ge's little dream today."
"All these years, hasn't he always been thinking that if someday he could take over a little shop by Ping Wharf, the family might be spared at least some of the wind and waves?"
"As it happens, a couple of days ago I was sitting there idly talking with a friend near Ping Wharf, and I heard him mention that he was helping someone transfer a small shop. The frontage isn't large, and the place is old, yes—but the location is quite suitable. Selling wine, fish soup, hot cakes—any of that would do."
He paused, then added, "Normally a shop like that wouldn't be in such a hurry to change hands. But something happened in that household all of a sudden, and they can't keep it going. That's why they're trying to let it go quickly. And because of that, the price is even a little below the market."
At that, he looked at Wang Afu, though his tone remained casual.
"The moment I heard it, I thought of you first. It struck me as one of those chances that comes along by luck. If you truly mean to do it, I can put in a word for you. If you don't, then just take it as something I happened to mention in passing. That's all."
When he finished, the yard fell quiet for a moment.
Not because the words had been too abrupt.
Quite the opposite.
It was because they had come so perfectly, so neatly, that it felt as though fortune itself had simply happened to knock at the gate.
Wang Afu stared for a heartbeat. Then that spark which Old Daoist Xuan's words—may not be impossible—had already kindled in him seemed to leap a little higher. But he was an honest man by nature and did not dare show too much too soon. So he only smiled and said,
"No harm in hearing more. If one truly means to take over a shop, it isn't something to be done with a single move of the mouth."
Tang Yacai smiled as well.
"I'm only passing on the word."
"If you've no mind for it, then let it pass. But if you truly do, then a tidy little place like that isn't something that appears every day. Wine like yours, Afu-ge—kept here in the village and sold loose by the jug—that truly is a pity."
He spoke neither hurriedly nor heavily. It did not sound like hard persuasion, nor like a man pressing another with his words. It genuinely seemed as though an old acquaintance had happened upon an opportunity that suited a friend, and had simply reached out to draw a line between the two. Madam Qian, who had been cleaning fish with lowered head all this while, slowed her hands despite herself. Wang Shun said nothing. He only set the oar-handle in his hand quietly aside and lifted his eyes toward his father.
The yard remained silent for a moment longer. Beneath the eaves the wet net still dripped. Beside the wine jars, the broken edge of the sealing clay still carried the faint fragrance of starter.
And that little shop, not yet seen, not yet touched, seemed with those few easy words to flare into life in every heart there, each in its own way.
A Small Dream Begins to Take Shape
Tang Yacai did not say everything outright.
That day, he sat in the Wang family's yard for the better part of half an hour, drank two bowls of wine, and put in a few good words for a friend of his who helped people arrange storefronts near Ping Wharf. Then he rose with a smile and said only that if Wang Afu truly had a mind to it, he would come again in a couple of days and take him over to have a look.
He left, but the matter did not leave with him.
The wine jars beneath the eaves were still sealed with clay. The fish soup by the stove still simmered with the same rising steam. Water still dripped from the drying nets beneath the wooden poles. At a glance, everything looked exactly as it had before. And yet that little shop—still unseen, still somewhere beyond Ping Wharf—seemed to have been lightly kindled by an invisible hand. Though it remained far away, its shadow had already fallen into the hearts of everyone in the household.
Over the next two days, no one kept bringing it up aloud. Even so, each of them seemed to be holding something quietly inside. Life went on as it always had. At dawn, the nets were hauled in; the fish were sold as before. Wang Shun still pushed the boat out before first light and worked the nearby channels, collecting the nets they had set the night before one by one. Sometimes Wang Afu went with him; sometimes he stayed home to watch the wine, the rice, the fire, and the timing. Only now, unlike before, father and son no longer took the boat deep out into the water. Most mornings they worked only the near inlets, lifting half a morning's worth of nets before turning back as soon as the catch was enough. Their hands were still busy with the same old labor, but some hidden corner of their thoughts had already begun to lean elsewhere.
Madam Qian said nothing, but she saw it clearly enough.
Once, Wang Afu came back before noon with a fish basket in hand. The catch was not small, but the man himself was plainly distracted. As she sorted the fish, she said in an even tone, "These past two days, your mind hasn't been on the fish at all."
At first Wang Afu laughed it off, but after he set the basket down, even he could not help glancing in the direction of Ping Wharf. For a long while, he said nothing.
Old Daoist Xuan, naturally, remained much the same as ever.
In the morning he inspected the jars. At noon he tasted the newest wine. In the afternoon he hovered over the starter vats. By evening he would still drag Wang Afu over to the fermenting mash and launch once more into a lecture on the difference between rice and water. He drank by day and drank again by night, and every word out of his mouth was a complaint.
"This starter hasn't been kept long enough."
"That jar still needs moving."
"The fish soup is fresh enough, but if you held the fire down just a little more, the edges of those cakes would come out crispier."
He complained without end, yet with each passing day he settled himself more firmly in the yard.
By the third day, Wang Yan had already learned that one glance at the way he crouched beside the wine jars was enough to tell her that the old Daoist had no intention of budging that day.
"Father," she said, turning the dried fish with a bamboo sieve and unable to hold back a laugh, "if you let him keep watching the wine like this, before long he'll be finding fault with our rice jar too."
Old Daoist Xuan glared at her at once. "What does a girl like you know?"
"Wine is the root. Rice is the root too. If the root isn't right, what is there to drink?"
Wang Yan was not the least bit afraid. If anything, she laughed harder.
"Listen to him. Yesterday he said he knew only a little. Today he's talking about roots."
Madam Qian was washing vegetables nearby, and even she could not help the faint curve of a smile.
Little by little, the whole yard began to warm with the ease of people growing used to one another.
Fang Yingjie had not been idle these past few days either.
His leg had not fully healed, so he could not help pole the boat or cast the nets, and neither Madam Qian nor Wang Shun would let him touch anything too heavy. So he took on whatever lighter tasks he could—hauling water, tending the fire, handing over the net weights, gathering up the dried little fish, smoothing out the freshly washed cloths to cover the mouths of the wine jars one by one. Wang Shun was not a man of many words, yet whenever Fang Yingjie put too much strain into a movement, he would quietly take the thing from his hands. At mealtimes, Madam Qian would always nudge the hot soup and cakes a little closer to him, as though afraid he was holding himself back. Wang Yan, meanwhile, never stopped teasing him. One moment she would laugh that he carried a fish basket as if it were a spirit tablet; the next she would say that if he stood any longer he looked like a thin bamboo stalk ready to snap. Her mouth never spared him, but whenever he truly tried to lift something heavy, she was always the first to step in and stop him.
Wang Afu treated him with no distance at all.
Sometimes, while mending nets beneath the eaves, he would notice Fang Yingjie watching and casually show him which knots were less likely to slip. At other times, after tasting the wine and finding that the fermentation had risen more smoothly than it had the day before, he would call him over to smell it too and ask, "Does it smell sour to you?"
So the days passed, one after another, and without realizing it, the restraint Fang Yingjie had once carried in his heart—the feeling that he was only borrowing a bed for a few nights and ought not to take too much kindness—began to ease.
Yet the more that happened, the tighter the thread in his heart drew—the thread tied to Xuanyuan Xi, Feng Feiyun, and the others.
The hot fish soup, the warm meals, the drying nets, the wine jars in this house—all of it was real. The comfort was real too. But he was not one of the Wang family. In the end, he would have to return to his own road.
And so, nearly every day, he urged Old Daoist Xuan once more.
Sometimes it was after a meal, when the old Daoist was still squatting by the wine jars.
Sometimes it was early in the morning, before the old man had begun drinking and while his wits were somewhat clearer.
Sometimes they were only walking together to the landing to fetch a fish basket, and Fang Yingjie would lower his voice and ask:
"Senior, when will we go look for them again?"
The first time or two, Old Daoist Xuan merely waved him off.
"What's the hurry?"
"If those acquaintances of yours are really looking for you, they won't vanish today and drop dead tomorrow."
But after being asked too many times, he truly grew irritated.
"We came up empty twice already. What the hell is there left to look for?"
"Those acquaintances of yours have legs. I'm not their father. Am I supposed to scour all of Taihu and fetch them back one by one in my teeth for you?"
"You little block of wood—keep pestering me, and I'll seal you in a wine jar and let you ferment."
Fang Yingjie was clumsy with words and did not know how to argue with him. He could only lower his head and swallow the question again.
Yet each time he swallowed it, that smothered urgency still remained in his eyes.
Two days passed. The next morning, Wang Shun and Wang Afu went out on the water as usual. But neither of them dared go far. They worked only the waters near the landing, gathered a half morning's nets, delivered the fish, and hurried back. Wang Shun had just propped the empty fish basket beneath the eaves and begun rinsing the oar with clean water when a voice called cheerfully from outside the yard.
The visitor was Tang Yacai.
This time he was not alone. Beside him stood a lean man of about forty, dressed in a long blue cloth gown. His black boots were old, but carefully brushed clean. He spoke with unfailing courtesy, introduced himself as surnamed Lu, and said he helped broker the leasing of several storefronts over by Ping Wharf. Every other sentence out of him was "Brother Afu" or "Brother Shun," and in passing he casually mentioned the names of a few old shops by the wharf, so that he seemed very much like a man who truly moved about in these parts.
Tang Yacai came in, drank a mouthful of wine, and—as before—praised Wang Afu's brew, saying it was a waste to sell it loose in the village. Then he got to the point.
"That shop I mentioned the other day—I went and looked again for you today. As it happens, the owner has softened his stance as well. If you father and son have the time, why not come with me and have a look first? Whether it suits you or not, you can decide after you've seen it."
The moment those words were spoken, the hope Wang Afu had been trying to tuck away at last could no longer be hidden.
Madam Qian's hands paused briefly over the vegetables. She looked first at her husband, then at Tang Yacai. No doubt she had her concerns, but in front of guests she would not throw cold water on it. She only asked softly,
"Could such a thing really come together so neatly?"
Tang Yacai smiled.
"If it weren't such a good fit, how would I dare trouble Brother Afu with it?"
"Don't worry, sister-in-law. I wouldn't lead one of our own into a pit, would I?"
That one phrase—one of our own—filled the matter out to the brim.
Wang Shun had been sitting by the door repairing the oar, saying nothing until then. Only now did he lift his head and ask the most practical question of all.
"Which landing is the shop near?"
"Is it on the main street at Ping Wharf, or a little off?"
Broker Lu answered at once, his reply smooth and precise.
"Just off the main street. Not so close that the rent is outrageously high, but not so far that the place turns dead and empty."
"In front, it sits near the road the porters and boatmen use. In the back, there's room enough to set up a stove. For fish soup and hot cakes, it's exactly the right sort of place."
By the time he finished, even the faint doubt on Wang Shun's face seemed to have shifted by half a measure.
He looked at his father and, in the end, did not object.
So that very afternoon, Wang Afu and Wang Shun followed Tang Yacai and Broker Lu to Ping Wharf to look at the shop.
The shop truly was not large.
The storefront was old, and half the paint had peeled away, but the location was genuinely good. It faced the outer street by Ping Wharf. Porters carrying loads, boatmen coming ashore, and sellers of fish and vegetables all had to pass its door. It had once housed a small food business, so the stove was still there, the smoke flue still worked, and along the inner wall there was just enough room to set two wine jars side by side. If they put a wooden table by the entrance, there would be room enough for hot cakes, fish soup, and two small dishes besides. The rear was narrow, but it would serve well enough for storing wine vessels and fermentation materials.
The moment Wang Afu stepped inside, his expression changed.
It was not greed. Nor was it the unseemly loss of composure that comes with sudden joy. It was the look of a man who had spent years turning something over and over in his own heart, never daring to believe it might truly stand before him one day.
He went to the stove and brushed a hand through the dust. Then he walked back to the doorway and looked out. On the road beyond, shoulder-poles, fish baskets, and grain sacks moved ceaselessly past. His lips twitched. For a long while, he could not manage a whole sentence.
Wang Shun was steadier. He examined the height of the threshold, crouched to test whether the floor sat level, and at last asked,
"If there's a heavy rain, will water gather at the door?"
"Which side do the boatmen usually come ashore from in the morning?"
"If the stove is set here, will it block people coming in?"
Broker Lu answered each question clearly.
Tang Yacai only stood to one side, neither rushing them nor pressing them, smiling as he watched father and son move about the place. At last he said lightly,
"Brother Afu, I've looked this place over several times now. The more I look, the more I think it suits you."
"With your wine and your fish soup—and your good wife's hot cakes—how could it be any worse than the places nearby?"
It was only a single sentence, and not a heavy one, but it landed squarely in Wang Afu's heart.
On the way home, father and son were quieter than they had been on the way there.
It was not that they had nothing to say. It was that each of them was busy reckoning things over in his own mind.
That night, as the family sat around the table for supper, the matter finally came fully out into the open.
Madam Qian spoke first. "If we really take the shop, we'll have to touch that money we've been keeping."
She said it very softly—so softly it was almost as if she feared startling something away.
Wang Afu lowered his head, took a drink of wine, and only after a long moment said, "It was never meant to sit in the chest for a lifetime."
"A person has to move forward sooner or later."
Wang Shun was silent for a while. Then, as ever, he asked the most practical question.
"If we really take the shop, who will deliver the fish every day? And will we have enough wine jars?"
After a pause, he added in a lower voice, "The boat will still have to go out. The nets will still have to be cast. Even if the shop opens, we can't just throw aside the work that feeds us now."
"There will always be fish," Wang Afu said. "As for the jars and the wine vessels, we can add to them little by little."
He did not overstate it, but it was plain this was no longer only a dream.
Old Daoist Xuan sat to one side with his bowl of wine in his hands, listening without interruption at first. But when he heard the words we can add to them little by little, he gave a quiet snort through his nose.
"The jars and vessels can indeed be added little by little. The wine cannot."
"If you truly take the shop, then first steady those few jars of yours. If the wine turns flighty, it won't matter how fragrant the cakes are or how fresh the fish is. You won't keep customers coming back."
Wang Yan had only half understood the discussion before, but now her eyes lit up as well.
"If we really open it, does that mean we can sell our fried little fish too?"
"I've seen the people at Ping Wharf. Every one of them is willing to spend a few coins on something to nibble."
Madam Qian shot her a look. "All you ever think about is eating."
Wang Yan only laughed. "Isn't that because Father's wine is so good and Mother's cakes smell so wonderful?"
At that, even Madam Qian could no longer keep a straight face. In the end, she smiled a little too.
The lamplight over the table was dim and yellow. Steam curled up from the fish soup. Outside, the lake wind stirred the drying nets with a soft rustle.
Fang Yingjie sat at the edge of the lamplight and said little. But as he listened to Madam Qian counting silver, listened to Wang Shun counting fish, listened to Wang Yan already imagining fried little fish on the menu, he too began to see, dimly, the outline of that little shop. The front would not be large, but the stove-fire would be warm. The fragrance of wine and the scent of fish soup would mingle in the air, enough, perhaps, to hold up the life of an entire family little by little.
Yet the more vividly that image took shape, the tighter something drew inside him.
For however good this table of lamplight was, it was never a place where he could sit for long.
That night, the little wineshop that had begun as no more than a passing remark seemed, before the eyes of the whole family, to acquire a frontage, a stove-fire, and the fragrance of wine, bit by bit.
The Thumbprint by Lamplight
The next day, Tang Yacai did not come again.
Yet the Wang household was quieter that day than it had been in several days past.
Whenever Wang Afu mended the nets, his eyes would stray now and then toward Ping Wharf. After noon, Madam Qian took out the little cloth bundles in which they kept their silver savings and counted the coins one by one. When she was done, she did not say how much there was, only tied the bundles shut again and pressed them back to the bottom of the chest. Wang Shun sorted through the oars, the fish baskets, and the net-ropes all over again, as though silently reckoning whether, if they truly opened a shop, these things could still be managed alongside it. Wang Yan, meanwhile, kept asking whether they could sell candied pastries in the shop, and whether, if they truly had a store of their own, she might learn to keep the accounts.
Even Fang Yingjie could see that all their hearts had already been gently caught by that little shop.
And the more plainly he saw it, the more keenly he felt like an outsider—not because they treated him as one, but because the Wang family was about to take a step forward, and that step had never been meant for him.
Yet he could not keep from urging Old Daoist Xuan.
Another night passed. At first light the next morning, Fang Yingjie steadied his breathing once through before he finally spoke in a low voice.
"Senior… when are we going to look for them again?"
Old Daoist Xuan was cradling a bowl of wine. At once he rolled his eyes.
"You little blockhead. Truly born to hound a man to death."
"Find them, find them, find them—you talk as though Taihu were your own back garden."
"The last two times we chased rumors all over the place and came up empty every time. Today they say someone was seen in the northern channel; tomorrow it turns out they've moved to the southern bay. The whole lake is riddled with inlets like holes in a sieve. What are you supposed to use to plug them?"
By the time he reached that point, his irritation had plainly mounted. He thumped the wine bowl down on his knee, and even his beard seemed to bristle.
"Besides, I'm dragging along an injured little burden like you. Go too fast and you start gasping; go too slow and the trail's already cold. This poor Daoist isn't some boat-running water rat. Am I supposed to grope through every last channel with you till dark?"
Fang Yingjie lowered his head. His fingers tightened slowly around his wooden staff.
He had meant to say, We still have to try—but when the words reached his lips and he saw the look on Old Daoist Xuan's face, the one that plainly declared that no one alive was going to drag him away from the wine jar today, he swallowed them back down.
For a moment, the courtyard went still.
Wang Afu was working on the nets beneath the eaves. Madam Qian was tending the fire by the stove. By the wine jar there still lingered the faint fragrance of ferment from the lid that had been lifted the night before.
Fang Yingjie pressed his lips together. After a pause, as though something had only just come back to him, he said softly,
"Then… what about Juyi Isle?"
Old Daoist Xuan stared.
"Juyi Isle?"
Fang Yingjie nodded. His voice remained quiet.
"I stayed there for a few days before."
"The people of the Four Seas Gang… they've all seen me."
"If Brother Xi and the others can't find us, and we can't find them either, then maybe… maybe we could ask there."
"Even if it's only to have someone carry a message, that would still be better than wandering the whole lake like this."
By the end, there was a note of caution in his voice, as if even he did not know whether the idea would amount to anything at all. It was only because he had been driven so utterly out of options that he had clawed up this one thread from the places he remembered.
When Old Daoist Xuan heard that, the last trace of the expression that said I can still shirk this for another day finally wore away.
The truth was, the little blockhead had already nagged him raw, and he had no desire at all to keep dragging an injured boy all over Taihu, splashing uselessly through one channel after another. It was only that these past few days the wine had gone down well, the ferment had looked promising, and the Wang family had treated him kindly and without complaint, so that by instinct he had wanted to put things off a little longer. But now that he had heard the words Juyi Isle, his thoughts turned, and the plan did indeed seem a tolerably economical one. Besides, however good the Wang family had been to the boy, this was not where Fang Yingjie belonged. Sooner or later, he would have to find the lad a path back to the people from whom he had been separated.
He set the wine bowl down on the table with a thud and said crossly,
"That's enough."
"Let today pass. Tomorrow at dawn, this poor Daoist will go to Juyi Isle."
"I'll deliver the message. Whoever comes to take you away can do the rest. And don't pester me after that. Nag me one more time and I'll throw you into the wine jar myself."
At the words tomorrow at dawn, the tight knot that had sat in Fang Yingjie's chest for days finally loosened, if only a little.
"All right," he answered softly.
And on that very same day, Tang Yacai came to the door for the third time, with Lu Zhongren beside him.
This time there was no more talk of "having another look" or "thinking it over slowly."
The moment he stepped through the gate, Tang Yacai smiled at Wang Afu and said, "Brother Afu, I held that shop for you as long as I could, but it can't be delayed any further. The owner has already nodded his approval. Put down a small earnest deposit and press your thumbprint, and the place is yours. After that, the wine jars, the ferment, the stove—those can all be settled step by step."
Lu Zhongren chimed in from the side.
"It's an honest business."
"No one's forcing you to empty out all your silver in one stroke. Just make a gentleman's agreement first, so the shop doesn't get snatched away by someone else."
The look on Wang Afu's face changed more than once.
It was not that he felt no hesitation.
That silver at the bottom of the chest had been saved little by little over generations. It had not fallen from trees, nor been scooped out of the river. Once it went out of his hands, he would be staking the whole foundation of his family on the chance of a different future.
And yet he remembered that shop.
He remembered the stove, the frontage, the stream of people passing by Ping Wharf. He remembered what life might look like if he truly set up a table there, a cauldron of fish soup, and two vats of his family's own wine.
And with that, the moment he hesitated, he had already yielded half a step.
Madam Qian, seated nearby, did not speak at once. She wiped her hands on her apron and asked in a low voice, "It truly is only a small deposit to begin with?"
Lu Zhongren's smile never wavered.
"Rest easy, sister-in-law."
"It's only to hold the place. The silver, the jars, the ferment—those can all be settled gradually afterward. This isn't the sort of deal where you pay everything at one blow."
Wang Shun frowned. "Let me see the contract."
It was exactly the right question to ask, and yet Tang Yacai took the words over at once.
"Shunzi, we're old acquaintances. Are you really treating me like an outsider now?"
"This isn't some life-and-death bond. Brother Afu only needs to put down a thumbprint so the shop can be held for him. We can settle the fine details later. What, do you think I'd cheat your family?"
As he spoke, he wore the familiar warmth only an old friend could wear, and even mixed into his tone a trace of half-playful reproach.
Listening to him, even Madam Qian's expression eased a little.
After all, Tang Yacai was not some broker from outside, not a middleman they had met halfway. Nor was he merely a casual old acquaintance. The two families had known one another since their fathers' generation. They still exchanged greetings on feast days and holidays. If they met on the road, he would always stop and call her "sister-in-law." Words spoken by such a man were naturally easier to trust than those of anyone else.
Wang Shun still felt everything was moving half a beat too quickly. He asked again, "Shouldn't we wait a little longer?"
"At least let Mother think it over once more."
Tang Yacai laughed and waved a hand.
"This isn't a knife at your throat. It's only reserving the place."
"If you truly had no interest at all, I wouldn't even have brought it up. But you've already seen the shop, and you've already made up your mind. Drag it out any longer and someone else will take it. If that happens, Brother Afu, don't blame me for not having thought of you."
The words landed softly, like a hammer wrapped in cloth, but they struck exactly where Wang Afu was weakest.
In the end, the contract was spread upon the table after all.
It was not thick, and there were not many lines on it. At the top were written the location of the shopfront, the amount of the deposit, and several items to be procured in advance—wine jars, ferment, and the like. At a glance, it all looked no different from the ordinary terms of a proper business arrangement.
Lu Zhongren sat at one side, tapping along the lines with a finger as he showed them to Wang Afu, repeating the same assurance as before: "We're only holding the place for you first. The finer accounts can be settled later."
Tang Yacai sat there even more steadily, topping up half a cup of tea for him with his own hand and smiling as he said, "Afu, you don't trust me?"
Wang Afu lowered his head and studied the sheet for a long while. At last, he wiped his hand on his robe and pressed down his thumbprint.
When that red mark fell upon the paper, Fang Yingjie, sitting beneath the eaves, said nothing.
He understood neither business nor shop contracts, and there was nothing he could have said in any case. But he could see this much: with that single press, the little wine shop that had only been turning on Wang Afu's tongue until now seemed, at last, to have taken one true step forward.
At dawn the following morning, Old Daoist Xuan truly meant to go.
Nine and a half times out of ten, nothing the man said could be taken at face value; and yet once he had finally been nagged past endurance, he often became the most decisive of all. Early that morning, after downing a bowl of wine, he heard Fang Yingjie ask softly, "Senior, when are we leaving?" At once his face darkened, and he snatched up the wine gourd and tucked it behind his waist.
"Now. We leave now."
"If I hear you chant at me one word longer, my ears are going to grow calluses."
Then he cupped his hands toward Wang Afu and said, "This poor Daoist is going to Juyi Isle for the little blockhead, to pass on a message."
"If someone comes to fetch him afterward, then I can count my merit complete and stop listening to him hound me to death every day."
Wang Afu hurriedly said, "Daoist Master, you've done us a great kindness."
Old Daoist Xuan waved that aside at once. "Don't be in such a rush to thank me."
"I'm doing this because I'm annoyed, not because I'm virtuous."
He spoke as though he resented the whole business, but he went nonetheless.
Before stepping out, he turned and glared at Fang Yingjie.
"You stay put here and behave yourself. If you go running around again and someone stuffs you into a sack and carries you off, this poor Daoist will not fish you out a second time."
Fang Yingjie nodded.
Only then did Old Daoist Xuan hitch his wine gourd more securely at his side, swing out the hem of his gray robe, and set off from the village toward Juyi Isle.
No one imagined that not even half an hour after he left, the courtyard gate would be kicked open with a crash.
There were more than a dozen men.
At their head stood none other than Lu Zhongren. Behind him came several hard-faced men in short jackets, carrying cudgels, iron rulers, and hooked ropes as they filed into the yard. Tang Yacai was there as well, only standing a little farther back. The smile he had worn over the last few days was gone without a trace. His lips were pressed together so tightly that he looked, in that instant, as though he had aged years.
At the sight of them, Wang Afu froze for a moment, then lurched to his feet.
"Yacai? What is the meaning of this?"
Tang Yacai's lips moved, but no answer came at once.
Lu Zhongren had already let out a cold laugh.
"What is the meaning of this?"
"Brother Afu has already put down his thumbprint, and now he asks what this means?"
"The place at the shop, the jars, the ferment, the wine vessels—we've held them and prepared them all for you. And now that the silver is short, are you planning to take the advantage for free?"
All the color drained from Wang Afu's face at once.
"Didn't you say the rest could be settled gradually—"
"Settled gradually?" Lu Zhongren cut him off with a savage sweep of the hand. "That was what we said when we were still willing to leave you a way out."
"If you can't produce the silver now, then you've broken the agreement."
"In three days, I want to see ready cash. In ten, the full balance. If you fail, we seize the boat, the nets, the house, and the people. Do you think the little scraps your family saved over generations are enough to cover it?"
Once those words fell, what "respectable business" remained? It had turned into a noose.
At the words the people, Madam Qian's face changed violently.
Lu Zhongren had already pulled the contract bearing that red thumbprint from his sleeve and slapped it down on the table.
Wang Shun's eyes went red. He lunged for it.
But before his hand even reached the edge of the table, two of the thugs were already on him. One wrenched his arm aside while the other swung a cudgel down across his shoulder and back. Wang Shun gave a muffled grunt, his body lurching sideways; his fingertips brushed the edge of the paper, but in the end he could not seize it.
At once Lu Zhongren snatched the contract back into his sleeve. His face darkened as well, and he let out another sneer.
"Well, now. The thumbprint's there in black and white, and you still dare to snatch at it?"
"Smash it."
"I want to see whether this Wang family's little business can still be opened at all."
Before the last word had finished leaving his mouth, a wine jar went over with a resounding crash.
It struck the flagstones of the courtyard and shattered into several great pieces. Wine burst out in a rush and ran along the seams between the bricks. Then a second jar and a third were smashed apart beneath swinging cudgels. Shards of pottery flew everywhere, and the smell of wine surged instantly into the air, thick enough to choke on.
"Don't smash them!"
The cry tore itself out of Wang Afu's chest as he threw himself forward to stop them.
No one paid him the slightest heed.
One man kicked over the ferment vat under the eaves. The seal cracked open, and the ferment cakes inside tumbled out across the ground. Their fragrance, not yet fully ripened, spilled into the mud and was crushed underfoot almost at once. Another swept his cudgel sideways and sent the white cloth used for straining wine tumbling into the dirt, where shattered pottery, splintered wood, and wine lees rolled together in a filthy mass.
Others rushed into the kitchen and overturned the fermentation crock with a kick. Half a vat of mash came surging out with its sweet-sour reek, pouring over the threshold, mixing with the mud, the blood, and the ruined ferment until in the blink of an eye the whole courtyard was drowned in wreckage.
They were not merely smashing things.
With every blow, they were killing the Wang family's little wine shop before it had even opened its doors.
Madam Qian lunged forward to protect the ferment vat and was struck across the shoulder and back by a horizontal sweep of a cudgel. A muffled cry escaped her, and she pitched sideways on the spot.
"Mother—!"
Wang Yan screamed and threw herself forward to catch her.
Wang Shun's eyes were crimson now. He slammed one man aside, dragged Madam Qian backward first, then wheeled and seized for the cudgel coming down. The thug never let him close. With a flick of the staff, the blow crashed onto Wang Shun's wrist. His face turned white at once, but his teeth were clenched so hard the muscles stood out in his jaw. He did not give a single step. Instead, he drove forward with shoulder and back and forced the man away half a pace.
Fang Yingjie rushed in too.
But in the end he was only an injured child, with no skill in fists or feet and no real strength to speak of. The instant his right foot took weight, it felt as though a needle had been driven deep into the cracks of the bone, and the breath in his chest turned chaotic at once. He dared not throw himself straight into the arc of the cudgels. All he could do was grit his teeth, dart in close, and grab for Wang Yan, trying first to drag her away from danger. But a man at his side struck backhanded. The cudgel skimmed across the back of Fang Yingjie's hand, numbing half his arm at once, while the old wound beneath his ribs clenched sharply in answer.
And yet at such a moment, how could he have cared about any of that? The Wang family's hot meals these past days, the extra clothes, the fire, their laughter and lamplight—all of it still stood vividly before his eyes. This courtyard was no longer merely someone else's courtyard.
In the space of a few breaths, the whole place had been reduced to ruin.
The wine jars were shattered.
The wine vessels were shattered.
The ferment was spoiled.
The straining cloth was fouled.
Even the wet fishing net that had only just been brought back under the eaves was kicked over, half of it rolling into the wine lees and muddy water, tangling itself among the shards. The empty fish basket against the wall was kicked upside down, its rim splitting open. The dried small fish meant to be taken to the quay the next day, together with the bamboo trays they had been laid out on, were trampled out of shape.
Wine mash, muddy water, fish stink, and crushed ferment merged into one foul mess. Even the plainest implements of an ordinary fisherman's household were ground underfoot.
And the cruelest thing was not any of that.
The cruelest thing was that Tang Yacai stood there through it all.
At first, Wang Afu had not dared believe it.
But when the third wine jar burst on the stones and the ferment vat was overturned as well, he finally jerked around and stared at Tang Yacai as though trying to see through him. His voice shook.
"Yacai… say something!"
"Didn't you say it was only to hold the place? Didn't you say we were old friends, that everything could be settled slowly?"
The color seemed to drain out of Tang Yacai's face bit by bit.
He opened his mouth. Something worked in his throat. At last, after a long moment, he forced out only a single low sentence.
"Afu… there was nothing I could do."
He should almost have said nothing at all.
The moment the words left him, Wang Afu looked as though he had been struck by lightning. He stood rooted where he was, unable even to remember what step to take next.
So it was not an outsider.
Not some broker from the road.
Not some brute who had come from nowhere.
It was Tang Yacai who had opened the door and pushed their whole family up onto the block.
In that instant, the crashes of broken jars, Madam Qian's pained gasp, Wang Yan's crying, and the curse Wang Shun spat out through clenched teeth all seemed to recede, as though a layer of distance had fallen over them. Wang Afu heard only the roaring in his own ears. Darkness rushed in and out across his vision, and he scarcely knew whether he was still standing or had already fallen.
By the time the men finally stopped, the courtyard was nothing but wreckage.
Lu Zhongren rested his cudgel on one shoulder and said coldly,
"Ready cash in three days."
"The full account in ten."
"If you fail, the boat, the nets, the house, the people—you keep none of them."
Then he flicked a hand, turned, and left with the others.
Tang Yacai moved as well.
He had taken two steps before it became clear that, in the end, he did not dare look back.
When the courtyard gate closed once more, the silence that fell was terrible.
Only the wine still trickled little by little through the cracks between the bricks, and now and then a shard of pottery clicked softly under someone's shoe.
Half-supported in Wang Yan's arms, Madam Qian's face was white as paper. It was plain that the blow across her shoulder and back had not been light.
Wang Shun held her up, his wrist trembling. At some point his lip had split as well, and a thin thread of blood showed there now.
As for Wang Afu, it was as though everything inside him had been hollowed out. Slowly he sank into a crouch amid the broken jars and wine lees. When his fingers touched the pool of wine on the ground, he only stared at it blankly, as though he still had not understood. He stared for a very long time.
That wine was his family's wine.
Wine nurtured drop by drop over generations.
Wine he had meant to carry to Ping Wharf and use to prop up a little shop of his own.
Now it had all run into the mud.
No one was the first to speak.
The pot of fish soup still sat on the stove, but the fire beneath it was nearly dead. The broth gave a single low bubble, then sank quiet again.
Standing in the yard, Fang Yingjie felt the breath in his chest turn painful and ragged. Yet his hand moved of its own accord into his robe.
The first thing his fingers touched was something hard and cool.
Slowly, he drew out the jade token.
Moonlight over water. Fine-grained. Smoothly patterned. Its silk cord hung low.
It was the very token Madam Wen had placed in his hand that day at the side landing of Pingsha Market.
He lowered his eyes to it for a long moment. His throat worked once before he finally said softly,
"Uncle Afu…"
Wang Afu did not answer. It was as though his spirit had not yet returned.
Instead it was Madam Qian, leaning weakly against Wang Yan, her face pale to the color of ash, who forced herself to raise her eyes.
Fang Yingjie closed his fingers more tightly around the jade token and said in a low voice,
"That Madam Wen… she saved me before, in Pingsha Market."
"She gave me this as well."
One by one, the eyes in the courtyard slowly came to rest on the jade token in his hand.
The lamp had not yet gone out.
The wine had not yet dried. The fish basket still lay crooked in the mud.
But the dream had already shattered across the ground.
Standing amid the wreckage of broken wine and broken hopes, Fang Yingjie spoke at last. His voice was light, but he said it all the same.
"Uncle Afu…"
"Why don't we try Madam Wen?"
Poetic Coda
Fishing lights once shone upon the wine vats;
a small family dream had just begun to glow.
A familiar hand led them in, the doorway warm with trust;
with easy laughter as surety, the thumbprint was set below.
Then ferment was crushed and jars were overturned into mud;
the mother struck down, the son shielding her through blood and blows.
Yet somewhere on Taihu one last boat-line still remains;
cold jade, veined like moonlit water, now points the road ahead.
(End of Chapter Twenty-Three)