The Zhishui poetry gathering.
Kang Xian suddenly barked out a rebuke, and the hall went quiet at once. Yu Zixing had studied under Kang Xian for a short while, and seeing his always-severe teacher fly into such a rage for no reason he could guess, he was badly startled; he ducked his head and cupped his hands at once. "W-wise teacher..."
Kang Xian was a master of the School of Principle and his backing was solid; though he had few disciples, most of those present knew his reputation perfectly well. Now his gaze swept the whole garden and came to rest again on Yu Zixing, and he looked like nothing more than a teacher correcting a disciple. "Is that the sort of thing you can say as you please?!"
For a moment there was silence. Kang Xian set down his brush and looked over once more. "Let me ask you. Tonight there were hundreds of poems and ci. If this ci had been a muddle, an eyesore, with not one thing to recommend it — what would you have done?"
At those words Yu Zixing already understood what he meant. He gave a shudder and bowed, his voice dry. "Your disciple... your disciple would naturally have set it aside and paid it no mind."
"Then... had you ever met this Ning Liheng before? Did you know the man? Had you heard his name, seen his face? Had any bad report of him or of his character ever reached your ears before tonight?"
"Your disciple... your disciple accepts the lesson."
That was enough. Kang Xian smiled. "Since you understand the principle, sit down... Ladies and gentlemen, there are many fine works at tonight's gathering. Lord Qin and I were just now appraising them — this one by Mingyi, for example..." He raised his voice and began to comment on the best pieces one by one, drawing out the strength of each line. He was a learned man to begin with, and now he deliberately let himself go and offered no flattery; yet in truth these poems were excellent, and even Yu Zixing's two pieces drew praise generous enough.
This took a good deal of time. At the very last, Kang Xian set the slip of paper bearing the Shui Diao Ge Tou back on the table. "And now... what say you all appraise this Shui Diao Ge Tou once more?"
When he had finished, Cao Guan rose from his seat.
"Minggong's blow to the head has taught your disciple. I am ashamed to say it: this ci is indeed superb, brilliant in style, profound in mood. I am far beneath it.
A moment ago my own heart stirred with rivalry, and only Minggong's teaching brought me to my senses. That tonight's gathering should see such lines is a real piece of fortune. And yet, everyone — just now I came by a few lines of my own, and I would like to try them against yours.
Haha, pearls and jade have gone before us, but every man here is a great talent. Who will complete this poem for me? We must not let the fame of our Zhishui poetry gathering be dragged down."
When he had finished, Kang Xian laughed. "That is how a gentleman should be." Everyone laughed with him, and the mood in the garden came alive again. Someone called out with a laugh, "Zongchen, a few lines and you dare talk big? I've a whole poem already — the job of salvaging the gathering's face ought to fall to me."
Then came another fierce contest of verse; no one was willing to be outdone, and it burned even hotter than before. Kang Xian watched, smiling, and lifted his teacup to drink. Beside him, Old Qin smiled as well.
"Haha, what is Lord Qin laughing at?"
"Hah, Minggong, that was hardly honorable of you. Ordinarily young Liheng only beats you a few games, and here you go roasting him over the fire. A gentleman holding grudges — that won't do. When the two of you meet again, he'll be coming to settle accounts with you, I expect."
He said it as a joke, but Old Qin was laughing happily, looking for all the world like a man hoping for some entertainment. In letters there is no first place; there had never been a standard for judging poetry, and past a certain height it comes down largely to what people say.
Fine as this Shui Diao Ge Tou truly was, it could not really put everyone else "far beneath it," could not leave "every other ci worthless."
Yet with a few idle sentences Kang Xian had planted a suggestion as plain fact: that when you see a work you cannot match, your first thought is to slander its author's character — and that is not the way of a gentleman.
Of one night on the Qinhuai, it was not only poems that got out. Once word spread of how Kang Xian had rebuked the company at the gathering, the outcome was easy enough to imagine. Having been needled by Lord Qin, Kang Xian's smile did not falter; he stayed quite pleased with himself.
"Heh. This old man treasures his talent and helps him to fame. If he meets me, he ought to be thanking me. Lord Qin, thinking that way is a little petty of you. As the saying goes, the gentleman is calm and at ease, the petty man forever anxious — haha, one should be broad-minded."
Neither of them had ever seen with his own eyes how much talent Ning Yi had, but by all accounts he was no ordinary man; tonight they were rather struck by this ci, and yet also rather knowing about it. As the two of them joked, an old man nearby came over.
"This Ning Liheng, could he be...?"
He too had gone down to the riverside to play chess with Old Qin and had met Ning Yi on a single occasion; he knew the man's surname was Ning, and now he had guessed. Pan Guangyan came over smiling as well, and hearing this, laughed.
"This Ning Yi, could he be with Minggong...?"
Kang Xian laughed and lowered his voice. "He is a young friend to me, to Lord Qin, and to Lord Du. In the matter of poetry, I doubt there's any imposture. But the man keeps a low profile, and my friendship with him is the friendship of gentlemen, clear as water — we do not involve ourselves too deeply. I must ask you, Crane Elder, to keep this to yourself and not spread it about."
Pan Guangyan saw the light all at once and laughed.
"...So that's how it is."
If he could have foreseen all that would unfold in Jiangning that night, it was hard to say whether Ning Yi would still have asked Xiao Chan to teach him to sing, just to find some trace of the modern world. As it was, the cold had left his thoughts muddled and his spirits slack, he had never attended any of those poetry gatherings, and naturally he could imagine none of it.
The hour was past midnight. Ning Yi was asleep, knowing nothing of any of it. The carriage rolled down a street where the revelry had thinned a little, still creeping along; the crowds outside were as thick and noisy as ever, and firelight flickered in from beyond the carriage. Su Tan'er looked at Xiao Chan before her, the sheet of paper with the Shui Diao Ge Tou written on it still in her hand. Xiao Chan kept her head down, blinking, not daring to speak, her lips pressed tight.
What had happened tonight seemed outlandish even to her; even now she felt at something of a loss. Just how much weight did this ci in her hand carry? Her appreciation of poetry was not of the first rank. At first sight she had been shaken and astonished, unable to believe it had come into her hands from Xiao Chan; but what followed proved that she had still underestimated it.
It had truly been a joy to see the shock and astonishment on that ill-willed Xue Jin's face afterward. And when Puyang Yu and the scholars invited to the gathering came over to talk to her, she had felt a certain sense of being taken seriously — and as a merchant's daughter she knew the weight of that.
Everyone said merchants chased profit and had always sat at the bottom of the social order. Money could solve a good many problems and lift one's standing somewhat, but every kind of contempt remained; year after year, in great disasters and small, they gave money and labor and often could not even win a good name for it.
Grandfather had spent great sums on the academy precisely so that the Su family might produce men of letters — even if it took throwing money at the problem, at least they could enter the ranks of the scholar-gentry. She had watched that urgency since she was small.
The Puyang family was the same, though they had something to show for it. Every year they spent great effort on this Puyuan poetry gathering, and by now it had borne fruit: one foot was through the door of the scholar-gentry class.
But the other foot still had ground to cover, and mention the Puyuan poetry gathering and people might think first of the reek of the nouveau riche. From the seriousness with which they had received this ci that came out of nowhere, one could more or less measure its worth.
And yet... several people had actually said it could stand against the likes of Cao Guan and Li Pin. How could that possibly be?
Her own level fell short; she merely liked and revered poetry, and since it stood so far above her it was like the feeling one has for an idol.
Before she married she had attended a few other poetry gatherings and a few times seen top scholars compose on the spot and sweep all before them; she had thought the poems fine, and the feeling itself was enchanting.
Cao Guan and Li Pin and their like were the representatives of Jiangning's scholars now; Grandfather had hoped a talent or two might appear in the family, but never one to match them.
And this ci in her hand... it had been brought out by Xiao Chan, and was said to have been written by that husband of hers who plainly had no learning at all. In the past he had plainly written baffling stuff like "Three lotuses float in the emerald pool, a raft may drift on thoughts of the fair."
This one, fine as it was — it surely could not be that good, could it? Or was there... something else behind it?
One part of her was unsettled, overawed as she was by the aura of letters, by men like Cao Guan and Li Pin; but the merchant in her stayed clear-headed, able to meet everything unexpected with composure and as though nothing had happened, and only once she had stepped down from the carriage could she begin to probe it all in her doubt. She looked at Xiao Chan, who seemed to have shrunk a size, and then smiled. "Did the son-in-law really write it?" Of Xiao Chan, of course, she could harbor no suspicion at all.
"Mm."
"Then... Xiao Chan, will you tell me everything that happened tonight when you were with the son-in-law?"
"Okay."
Xiao Chan nodded and began to tell all that had happened after they left. First the story — the details of Journey to the West she skimmed in a few sentences, saying only that it was about a demon monkey; then the singing and dancing, the magic trick, and the like.
"Look, look, it changes like this... first you hide the bead in your hand..." Xiao Chan said, and repeated the trick. She had meant to show it off before her two sisters in the carriage and had already failed once; now she failed again and was thoroughly cast down. But after a moment she got to the singing and the writing of the poem.
"...A different way of singing?" Su Tan'er asked, frowning.
"Mm, it's very pretty." Xiao Chan nodded, then said quietly, "The son-in-law told me not to go singing it around carelessly. Otherwise a little maid like me messing about with the tune and the way a ci is sung, and they'd say I don't know my place..."
In truth what people said might not be about not knowing her place, and this Xiao Chan understood; but before her young mistress there was naturally nothing to hide. Soon, at Su Tan'er's request, the little maid cleared her throat and began, word by word, to sing the Shui Diao Ge Tou in the "new" way. The melody rose in the carriage, winding and echoing.
When the song ended, Juan'er and Xing'er were still sitting there wooden and enchanted. "That was so pretty..." Su Tan'er, though, leaned back against the carriage and was silent for a long while before she asked, "Xiao Chan, you've been with the son-in-law the longest. What do you think... what sort of man is he, really..."
Xiao Chan thought for a good while. "The son-in-law, he... the son-in-law... Xiao Chan doesn't think he's a bookworm who does nothing but bury his head in books. He's... very funny. He likes to joke sometimes, but he feels very steady, as if nothing matters to him at all... and the way he talks isn't like those scholars — none of that 'zhi-hu-zhe-ye' classical talk. And then... uh, and then that's all. Anyway, he seems different from what I'd heard before..."
Su Tan'er listened and nodded slightly.
Past the street ahead, the Su residence would be in sight...