Chapter 425 — Naming

If madam flew into a rage and vented it on her, whatever was she to do?

She was on the verge of tears.

But Dou Ming only waved a hand and dismissed her.

It was as though a great weight had rolled off her back.

She fled at a run.

From the inner room came a clatter and crash of smashing things.

The little maid shrank her shoulders; then, lifting her head, she saw Wei Fan come in.

She bobbed a hasty curtsy and retreated, all a-tremble, to the corner of the wall.

Wei Fan halted at the door.

Dou Ming was smashing things again.

He had long since lost count of how many times this made.

The first time, she had urged him to take money and bribe the Earl of Donglin, so that the Earl might find him a post in the Five Armies Commandery. He had refused her.

She had swept every teacup and covered bowl off the kang table onto the floor in one great clatter.

The second time, her elder sister had seen that all the maids serving in his rooms had been changed, and, fearing the new ones would not know their place, had sent over one of her own senior maids to him; Dou Ming promptly sent the girl straight back to the Jingzhenguo Ducal House. When he went to reason with her, she asked him, in that sour, sneering way of hers, whether he had taken a fancy to the maid and meant to keep her in his rooms to warm his bed. He had stormed off in a fury, and she had smashed up the room just as she was doing now.

The third time... he could not remember.

He only knew that when his mother learned she had smashed everything in the room, and, grieving over the loss of the curios, summoned her for a reprimand, she had answered coldly: "What I smash is my own dowry, not the property of the Jining Marquis's estate. If I am not grieved, why should you be? When things are broken, one buys more. The old must go before the new can come." His mother had gone white as frost with anger and pointed at her for a long while without being able to get out a single word.

Wei Fan had no wish to go in and be made to suffer. He turned and walked out.

But out of the corner of his eye he caught sight of the little maid cowering and shivering in the corner.

His heart softened in spite of himself.

The girl feared Dou Ming as she would a tiger—and was he himself any different?

A sense of shared misery rose in Wei Fan.

He stopped. In a gentle voice he asked the little maid, "What is your name?"

Stammering, the girl answered, "This slave—this slave is called Ah-Xuan."

"Ah-Xuan?" said Wei Fan. "Which 'xuan' is that?"

"The 'xuan' of the daylily," said the maid.

Wei Fan was rather surprised. "You can read?"

"When my younger brother studied, I sat beside him at my needlework, and he taught me the characters."

Wei Fan was astonished. "If your family could afford to send your brother to school, how did they come to sell you?"

The maid protested, "I signed a redeemable indenture. In ten years my brother will come to buy my freedom!"

Her eyes were wide, black and white so sharply divided that they were like clear spring water—one could see straight to the bottom of them.

Another simpleton!

Wei Fan shook his head and went out, then could not resist lowering his voice to instruct the page boy at his side: "Find an opportunity to move this little maid, Ah-Xuan, to the study in the outer court. With a temper like hers, serving at madam's side, she has only one road open to her—death."

The page murmured his assent.

Wei Fan went to Lady Tian's rooms.

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Song Yan lay prone at the edge of the bed, watching his sleeping son. The more he looked, the more adorable the child seemed; the more he looked, the more marvelous.

He lowered his voice and asked Dou Yan, "Tell me, what would be a good name for our son? Mingyi? Xixian? Fengyi?"

Dou Wu laughed. "There's no need to name him so soon, is there? Why not give him a childhood name first?"

"How could that do?" Song Yan muttered. "He is our eldest son. He must have a childhood name, and a formal name as well." Troubled, he went on, "I think both Mingyi and Xixian are fine, but Gu Yu favors Fengyi. And as for the childhood name, how about calling him 'Yuan-ge'?"

The child was the eldest son, and so was well worthy of the word "Yuan."

Dou Xin nodded and said, "That childhood name is well chosen!"

Song Yan grew smug. "Then his formal name shall be Mingyi."

"Song Mingyi," Dou Xin said. "It rolls off the tongue nicely."

Seeing that Dou Yan agreed, Song Yan began calling his son "Yuan-ge" over and over.

But his son gave him no face at all; he knitted his brows, opened his mouth wide, and burst into loud wailing.

Song Yan laughed in embarrassment.

Dou Qu consoled him: "Yuan-ge is probably hungry."

Song Yan said "Oh," and withdrew to one side, sheepish.

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Sisters and brothers, happy weekend!

o(n_n)o~