Chapter 83 — A Marriage
Purple Streets of Chang'an · Page 1 of 4
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?