Chapter 163 — The Third Place Scholar

"Who would say otherwise?" Dou Xin rose and headed for the study. "I will write him a reply—I daresay everyone under heaven believes he must be riding high at this moment, swelling with ambition. Only he, I suspect, regards this title of tanhua as a humiliation, too ashamed even to mention it!"

Suxin thought it over and concluded that Ji Yong was exactly the sort of person who would do such a thing.

She could not help smiling to herself as she stood to one side and helped Dou Yan grind the ink.

When Ji Yong received Dou Yan's reply, he was still wavering over whether to take up his post at the Hanlin Academy.

Ji Yong's uncle Ji Song and his father Ji Qi were frantic with worry. Ji Qi complained outright, "Why has Grandfather still sent no word? How are we to settle Jianming's affair? If the old gentleman will not make a decision, we can hardly act on our own!"

Ji Song gave a bitter smile.

Zixi came seeking an audience.

Both men were impatient to have Zixi come in and report.

"The young master bade me tell the people at the sedan-chair hall," said Zixi, panting—clearly he had come at a run, "that he will need a sedan chair first thing tomorrow morning, to go to the Ministry of Personnel and register his posting."

Ji Song breathed a sigh of relief.

But Ji Qi sprang to his feet with a cry of "Ah!" and hurriedly asked, "Why has Jianming suddenly changed his mind?"

Zixi caught his breath and only then said, "The young master had just received a letter from the Fourth Miss of the Dou family. What she wrote in it, I do not know, but the young master read it and burst out laughing, and then he told me to go and speak to the people at the sedan-chair hall."

Ji Song and Ji Qi exchanged glances.

After a moment's hesitation, Ji Qi lowered his voice and asked Zixi, "What exactly did the Fourth Miss of the Dou family write in that letter?"

Zixi shook his head.

Ji Song stroked his beard and said softly, "Then find some way to see what the Fourth Miss of the Dou family wrote in that letter."

Zixi was taken aback and could not help glancing up at Ji Qi.

But Ji Qi gave a light cough, lowered his head, and took a sip of tea, as though he had not heard a word of it.

Zixi smiled bitterly to himself, yet he had no choice but to agree. The next day, seizing the chance while Ji Yong was out, he found the letter Dou Yan had written to Ji Yong and gave it a hurried glance, then hurried off to report to Ji Song and Ji Qi. "...She spoke of nothing else. The Fourth Miss Dou merely set down a few thoughts on the cultivation of flowers."

"Thoughts on the cultivation of flowers?" Ji Song was astonished.

"Yes!" Zixi stood with his hands at his sides and answered respectfully. "The Fourth Miss Dou wrote in her letter that in laying out a courtyard garden, besides planting evergreens such as boxwood and holly, one should also intersperse flowering trees and plants that bloom in all four seasons, so that the garden's scenery may be pleasing. Among those that bloom in spring are narcissus, Fujian cymbidium, camellia, azalea, and winter jasmine... The narcissus is pure and elegant, the cymbidium quietly fragrant, the camellia graceful and surpassing in beauty, the azalea as brilliant as the morning sun; only the winter jasmine is the most ordinary of all, yet by the edges of trees and the corners of pavilions, as soon as the weather turns warm, it blooms in a glory like brocade clouds, the most unforgettable of sights. Whoever it is, when spring is mentioned, must speak of this herald of spring. What matters in such a flower is not how rare or precious it is, but when it blooms... Even a thing of the streets and back alleys, if it claims the first touch of color in early spring, is the finest flower in the world. Why then cling to what kind of flower it is?"

Ji Song frowned and said nothing.

Ji Qi pondered with a pained expression. "If only we could know what Jianming wrote in his letter to the Fourth Miss Dou!"

Zixi was drenched in sweat.

Surely the two masters would not send him to sound out the young master's thoughts?

If he aroused the young master's suspicions, that would be trouble indeed!

Just as he was growing anxious and uneasy, Ji Song waved a hand at him and said, "You may go. Do not mention this matter to anyone else."

Zixi hastily assented with respect and withdrew.

Ji Song said to Ji Qi with some concern, "Do not guess at random. What the Fourth Miss Dou wrote in her letter is plainly a metaphor, encouraging Jianming to strive and advance. By rights, after ten years of bitter study, a man like Jianming has already achieved complete success—what could he still find unsatisfactory? Why would he rather speak to the Fourth Miss Dou than to his own family? And how would the Fourth Miss Dou know that such counsel would prove effective?"

They too had often urged Ji Yong to study hard and better himself, but the more they urged him, the more he deviated from convention, until at last they dared not urge him at all.

"Indeed!" said Ji Qi. "If we could learn why the Fourth Miss of the Dou family can move Jianming, we would not be so helpless before him!"

Ji Song sighed, and once back in his room he at once wrote a letter to his grandfather, the Old Master Ji.

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Today I went out with my colleagues to foster goodwill, so Buggy will have to be caught after I get back.

o(n_n)o~

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