Chapter 83 — A Marriage

The boy's heart was like crystal, pure and transparent, laid bare before Dou Zhiwei with fearless sincerity and courage.

Dou Yan was deeply moved, and suddenly found himself unable to meet that gaze.

She rose and half turned to block that look, then said to Wu Ya with a bright smile, "We are sisters of one house; there is no need for such courtesy." Then, kindly, she asked, "Do you prefer weiqi or shuanglu? Why don't we play a game?"

Wu Ya let out a long breath.

She had been terribly rude just now, and everyone present was her brother's close friend. Even setting aside how his words had moved her, if he had said nothing at all, she still ought to apologize to Dou Yan to salvage her brother's dignity. Yet in her heart Dou Yan had always been the sort who, once in the right, would never let another off easily. She had steeled herself to be ridiculed or mocked and to hold her tongue no matter what—only to find that Dou Yan had handed her a way down.

"I like shuanglu," she said with a smiling nod. Dou Pinshu at once bustled over eagerly and had the maids set up the board, then propped her elbow on her hand and her chin in her palm to watch from the side.

Wu Shan breathed a sigh of relief—only for a heavy hand to land on his shoulder: "Well, well! I underestimated you before."

He turned and saw Dou Yan standing behind him.

"I told you I would see it done," Wu Shan said with a smile, a smile that grew ever more dazzling.

They did not return to the Dou residence until lamp-lighting time.

The great red lanterns hung from bamboo poles outside the gate lit the whole surroundings bright as day. The troupe on the stage had changed to another, but the singing went on, and the crowd of opera-goers packed the Dou family's main gate so tightly that not a drop could have seeped through.

Dou Yan and the others entered the residence through a side door.

Wu Shan escorted his sister to the guest quarters.

Old Madam Wu sat waiting for them in the hall on a luohan bed spread with a cool bamboo mat.

Seeing her son and daughter return, she asked with a smile, "Did you have fun today?"

Wu Ya nodded happily. "I played chess in the pavilion on the back hill, and Twelfth Brother even painted a portrait of me." She had a maid bring the painting for Old Madam Wu to see.

"Isn't it lifelike?" She clung coyly to her mother's arm.

The woman in the painting wore a summer gown of tender yellow, a snow-white magnolia pin in her hair, standing graceful as jade beside the Taihu stone.

Wu Ya pointed at the stone. "That's the Taihu stone behind Sixth Aunt's house."

"Mm!" Old Madam Wu nodded in admiration. "It is beautifully painted."

"Twelfth Brother says once he has some free time in a few days, he'll paint me a spring scene, an autumn scene, and a winter scene too, so together they'll make up all four seasons…" Wu Ya chattered on and on. Wu Shan, until he left the guest quarters, never got a chance to exchange a private word with his mother.

He was thoroughly vexed.

Old Madam Wu, meanwhile, knitted her brows. "All for the sake of the Dou family's Fourth Miss, you even scolded your own sister?"

Nanny Bi hurried to smooth things over. "Several of the Dou young masters and young ladies were present at the time, and Seventh Miss's voice truly was a little loud. Fourth Young Master was only considering the larger picture…"

She got no further than that sentence.

Nanny Bi dared not say more, and slipped quietly away.

Old Madam Wu tossed and turned, unable to sleep.

To be sure, this marriage was by parents' command and matchmaker's word—but which parent under heaven did not wish happiness and fulfillment for their children?

She thought of how her son had loved to hover around Dou Yan since he was small, yet had said nothing of it to her until he took first place in the examination. All that endurance and self-restraint had been for this one day—his heart was set on marrying Dou Yan! And then she thought of her own youth… and could not help heaving a long sigh.

Dou Yan of course knew nothing of all that Wu Shan had done for her.

Back home, she washed the dust from herself and went to pay her respects to her grandmother.

Her grandmother had long since had mung bean soup made and steeped in buckets down the well. She at once told Hong Gu to ladle out a bowl for Dou Yan, saying, "That ice is too cold, and too much of it is bad for you. Well water is gentler." Then she sat behind Dou Zhiwei fanning her, and asked, "The Wu family's Seventh Miss went too—did the two of you play shuanglu together?"

Dou Yan understood her grandmother's intent, but she had resolved never to marry.

The greater the hope, the greater the disappointment.

She did not want to wound her grandmother, so she smiled and said, "We don't quite take to each other. She gets on better with Yi-jie."

Her grandmother gave a sigh of "Ai," her disappointment plain to see.

Wu Shan's face rose in Dou Yan's mind.

She shook her head, and the fleeting image soon scattered.

Dou Yan lay down on the cool bed that breathed the fragrance of green bamboo, and was soon asleep.

Early the next morning, Old Madam Wu emerged from her inner chamber with two dark circles under her eyes.

Wu Shan and Wu Ya, come to pay their respects, were badly startled, and called out "Mother" in uneasy voices.

"It's nothing," Old Madam Wu said, rubbing her temples. "It's just too noisy outside."

The opera had already been sung for three days and three nights straight.

Wu Shan obediently massaged his mother's temples.

But his mother said, "There's no need. If you have matters to attend to, go and see to them! A-Qi here is enough to keep me company."

Wu Shan knew well that haste makes waste. With a smile he murmured his assent, shot Granny Bi a look, and stepped out of the hall.

Wu Ya flung herself into her mother's arms, all giggles.

Old Mrs. Wu stroked her hair and smiled. "Go find your little friends to play with. Mother wants to nap a while longer."

Wu Ya went off with her maids to look for Dou Pinyi.

Old Mrs. Wu rose to her feet and said to Granny Bi, "Come, let us go sit with the Sixth Madam."

Granny Bi started in alarm. "You—what business have you with the Sixth Madam?"

Old Mrs. Wu looked at her with a mix of exasperation and amusement. "What are you so afraid of? My own son has set his heart on the girl—am I to go and argue the matter with her family? You all conspired to keep me in the dark, so surely you can let me sound out the Sixth Madam? If the Dou family's Fourth Miss is already betrothed, and we go sending a matchmaker to their door, we would be laughed out of town!" She added, "If only the Dowager could decide the Fourth Miss's marriage—then I would not have to deal with that Wang woman at all."

Granny Bi was aghast at this and thought of nothing else, only hastening to flatter Old Mrs. Wu. "That is just it—our Fourth Young Master knows that in all the world the one who loves him most is our madam, and that is why he dared carry on so. With anyone else, our Fourth Young Master would never have stooped so humbly..."

"Enough. Enough." Old Mrs. Wu waved her hand to cut Granny Bi off, and laughed. "You needn't speak for him. He is my son—do you think I don't know him? How much did he give you?"

"What an accusation, madam!" Granny Bi could tell well enough that Old Mrs. Wu was not truly angry, and she answered with a grin, playing along. "How would this old servant dare? Harmony in the household brings prosperity in all things—I only wished that madam and the young master would not fall out, but live together in peace and goodwill..."

Talking all the while, the two of them made their way to Ji Shi's quarters.

The maids and old serving women attending Ji Shi filled half the courtyard.

Old Mrs. Wu gave a little "Ai yo," muttered that she had come at an awkward time, and turned to leave—only to be spotted by Caisu, who lifted the door curtain and stepped out.