Chapter 255 — Status

Song Han had not expected to be allowed to accompany his brother to offer incense to their mother. A faint flush of color showed through his pale cheeks, and he called out timidly, "Brother." The delight in his eyes was hard to conceal.

Song Yan's heart ached. He patted him gently on the shoulder.

Song Han grimaced in pain.

A chill came into Song Yan's eyes. "What is it?" he demanded sharply.

Song Han hung his head and muttered, "Nothing."

Song Sui gave a cold laugh and yanked down his collar.

Two livid purple welts lay savagely across Song Han's shoulder.

"He beat you!" Veins stood out on Song Yan's forehead, and his bright eyes glinted with a cold light.

"No, no," Song Han murmured. "I bumped into something myself." A look of panic crossed his face. "Truly, I did it myself." As though afraid Song Yan and their father would come to blows, he clutched tightly at Song Yan's hand, his eyes pleading.

A glimmer of tears flashed at the corner of Song Yan's eye.

He was silent for a long while before he said in a low voice, "If he beats you again, run—and beg for mercy at the top of your lungs. He cares about his face above all things; he would never want anyone to know. Don't just stand there like a fool and let him do as he pleases."

He seemed once more to feel the searing pain of their father's whip falling across his own back that day... He threw his arm tightly around his brother's shoulders.

"I understand!" Song Han turned to Song Yan with a pale, weak smile. Dou Yan could not help doubting whether, if Song Han really were beaten again, he would have the courage to resist as Song Yan had told him to.

Song Yan told Chen He to fetch two bottles of the finest wound medicine, then pointed to Dou Yan and said, "Your sister-in-law!"—gesturing for him to pay his respects.

Song Han stepped forward shyly, bowed respectfully, and called her "Sister-in-law."

Dou Yan rewarded him with a pouch containing a banknote for twenty taels, and said with a smile, "For you to buy snacks."

Song Han realized at once that the pouch held a banknote and hastily declined. "I don't want it!"

Song Yan said, "She gave it to you, so take it. In future, if you can't find me about anything, go and tell your sister-in-law."

Song Han murmured an "mm," accepted the pouch, and gazed at Dou Yan with open curiosity.

Dou Yan smiled at him kindly, and, supported by Song Yan, climbed into the carriage.

Song Han and Song Yan mounted their horses and rode one to the right, one to the left of Dou Yan's carriage, out of the Ying Zhenguo mansion's lane.

The Song family's ancestral graves lay in a propitious site in Daxing County, backed by hills and facing water. Loyal servants who had once followed Song Chixiao in his campaigns north and south served there as tomb keepers; over a century of breeding, what had been two or three households had grown into a small village known as Song Family Village.

When Dou Yan and the others arrived, the village head of Song Family Village, having received word long before, had already led the old and young of the whole village to welcome them at the entrance.

Song Yan and Song Han dismounted, exchanged a few words warmly with the village head, and then, accompanied by several village elders, carried the offerings—whole pigs and whole sheep—up the hill.

Dou Yan, wearing a veiled hat and supported by Su Lan and Su Xin, followed behind Song Yan.

The white marble tomb was clean and tidy, clearly well tended the year round.

Song Yan and the others offered incense to Lady Jiang, and Song Yan stood alone at her graveside muttering in a low voice for some time; only then did they come down the hill.

The village head urged them to stay for the midday meal.

Song Yan declined politely. "I must be at court this afternoon. At the winter solstice I will come again to offer incense to my mother."

The village head repeatedly praised Song Yan's filial piety, was exceedingly attentive, and saw them out of Song Family Village.

Song Yan asked Song Han with a smile, "Is there anywhere in particular you'd like to go? I'm giving you half a day off today—I'll have Chen He take you out to enjoy yourself."

Song Han's eyes lit up, but he hesitated for a long while, and at last said, "I'll stay with you, brother!"

Song Yan laughed. "There's plenty of time to come. But this chance won't come again. Think it over—do you want to stay with me, or go and look around East Street, the White Cloud Temple, or the Puji Temple?" Then, before Song Han could speak, he said with a smile, "Go on, let Chen He take you out. Whatever you see that you like, brother will pay for it." He tempted him further: "Didn't you want to buy a cloisonné paperweight like Gu Yu's? Take this chance to see whether the Jade Treasure Pavilion has a suitable one." Then he joked, "Mind you, I'd wager the Jifen Pavilion is sure to have one—but I'm afraid people would say that no sooner had your sister-in-law come into the house than we brothers went to the Dou family to sponge off them. So the Jifen Pavilion—never mind."

Song Han was about to decline again.

Song Yan sighed. "This is all I can do for you now. We'll wait for you at the Drunken Immortal Tavern; once you've chosen your things, come straight there."

Seeing that Song Yan spoke sincerely, Song Han's eyes reddened, and he asked Dou Yan shyly, with a touch of eagerness to please, "Is there anything you'd like me to buy, sister-in-law? I'll bring it back for you."

"Before I married I already squeezed a good sum out of my father," Dou Yan said teasingly. "Just now I really can't think of anything I want. But once I do, you mustn't back out on me!"

"I won't, I won't!" Song Han hastened to promise, his expression very solemn, so that Dou Yan could think of nothing more to say.

Song Yan gave his horse to Chen He and got into Dou Yan's carriage himself.

The party parted ways on the official road.

Song Han, accompanied by Chen He, went into the city, while the others went to the estate the Emperor had bestowed upon Song Yan.

Yan Che had arrived long since and was waiting in the courtyard with a group of people.

Besides familiar faces like Lu Ming and Xia Lian, Dou Yan also saw a tall, thin man like a heron, said to be another of Song Yan's retainers, Zi Aifeng; and a handsome middle-aged man named Zhong Bingxiang, who had just hurried over from Guangdong—he was Song Yan's chief steward at the Thirteen Factories there...

The company performed the rites of master and servant, and Song Yan kept Zhong Bingxiang behind. He instructed him: "From now on, the profits from the Quanzhou shop are to be handed directly to my wife."

The Quanzhou shop was the most profitable of all of them.

Zhong Bingxiang answered with a respectful "Yes, sir," and could not resist stealing two more glances at Dou Yan before withdrawing.

Now that the marriage was made, the expenses of the inner and outer quarters ought to be kept as distinct as two streams that never mingle.

Dou Yan accepted this gladly.

Song Yan took her to the rear courtyard.

A young man of slight build, fair and clean-featured, with an altogether ordinary face, stepped out from among the trees.

"This is Du Wei," Song Yan said, introducing him to Dou Yan with a certain reserve. "He was formerly of the Dingzhen State Duke's household; when my uncle handed him over to me, he took charge of several of my shops in the capital."

Dou Yan understood at once.

This man gathered intelligence for Song Yan; he was one of Song Yan's hidden cards, one of the forces operating in the shadows at Song Yan's command.

"Young Master!" Her eyes stung, her chest swelled tight, as though she were a dam brimming with water, ready to spill over at the slightest misstep.

Song Yan made a gesture that said no more need be spoken, and said, "Since you and I are husband and wife, there are some things I ought not to keep from you."

Fearing her tears would fall, Dou Yan turned her face away.