Chapter 5 — Homecoming
Purple Streets of Chang'an · Page 1 of 4
Father's carriage stood just beyond the second gate, where a handful of young servants were busy hauling things inside. Father, in a straight-cut robe of deep blue Hangzhou silk woven with iris patterns, a gray squirrel-fur greatcoat thrown over his shoulders, stood by the carriage like a jade tree in the wind, deep in conversation with Gao Sheng.
At the sound of footsteps, he turned, a faint smile on his face — handsome and elegant as a clear breeze under a bright moon.
Dou Yan's heart caught for a moment.
She knew her father was good-looking.
But she had never seen this father before.
In her memory, Father was always faintly frowning; even when he laughed heartily, there lingered in his brow a gloom that would not dissolve. Especially when he gazed at her in silence — his eyes unmoving, like an ancient well a thousand years old, chilling her to the bone.
Not like this — young, handsome, radiant, like a carefree youth, warming the heart at a glance.
"Shouyuan," Father's beaming face appeared before her, "Papa's home, and you don't even call out to me!" He reached out to pinch Dou Zhiwei's nose.
Dou Yan instinctively turned her head away, dodging her father's hand.
Father paused, then laughed it off without taking offense. From the carriage behind him he drew out a pinwheel, blew on it until it whirred noisily, and held it up before her: "Papa bought this for you in the capital. Isn't it fun?"
If she were truly a child, she would have been overwhelmed by the pinwheel, but she was already the mother of three, the one who bought pinwheels to coax her own children — how could she possibly take any notice of it?
Dou Yan craned her neck to peer into the carriage.
Mother, however, flushed red, gazing at Father with tenderness, and said in a voice half coy, half reproachful: "As long as you've come home safe, why buy us anything at all? We have everything at home."
"That's different!" Father took Dou Yan from Mother's arms. "I bought these specially for you in the capital."
Mother's face grew redder still, as though she had drunk aged Shaoxing wine, her eyes growing misty.
Dou Yan twisted sideways, trying to pull back the carriage curtain, but with her small body and short arms she could not reach it.
Father noticed her intent, gave her bottom a gentle pat, and set her up on the carriage: "What are you looking for?"
Dou ignored him and burrowed straight into the carriage.
The carriage was laid with thick quilts, upon which several classics such as Annotated Four Books had been tossed carelessly. In the corner stood a tea warmer; lifting its lid revealed a purple-clay loop-handled pot.
Beyond that, there was nothing else.
Dou Yan stood inside the carriage, looking around in bewilderment.
Could her memory be wrong?
Or perhaps... what Tuoniang had said was not the truth at all!
※※※※※
Having just returned from a long journey, Father's first order of business was naturally to pay his respects to Grandfather.
Mother made the excuse of arranging a family banquet and returned to the main quarters, summoning every serving woman on duty there into the hall.
"Which one of you wretched creatures told the girl those filthy words? Step forward this instant!" She slammed the table in a fury. "If I have to point her out myself, it won't be a matter of being sent to the outer courtyard or docked a few months' wages! I'll report it to the Old Master, call in the broker, and sell her off to some backwater village where she'll never taste a steamed bun of fine flour again as long as she lives!"
A dead silence fell over the room.
The teacups on the table rattled from the force of her fury: "Fine! Not one of you will step forward. You think I can't find out? The girl is barely of age, can't even speak clearly, and you put her up to spouting nonsense before me. If she were a few years older, you'd have corrupted her entirely..."