The meeting with Geng De takes place next day.  For propriety’s sake, Madam Lei and Qing are sitting behind a muslin curtain.  Yao Lin’s also present.  A servant serves the usual tea.

The discussion’s fruitful.  My father deals in rare animal pelts, which he obtains from Zhao Zhan’s tribe, and silver and ivory luxury goods from the countries beyond the border.  His business in the capital exports sugar and salt.  By combining the Lei business, the Yao business and the Zhao business, we have the beginnings of quite a nice little trading empire.  Geng De’s delighted and promises to teach me all the ins and outs of the sugar and salt trade over the winter.  I realize that I’m going to be very busy over the next few months.  We draw up a contract and sign it.  I undertake the task of writing to my father to tell him what’s going on.  I mention that I’ve got a plan to form a small private force to accompany our wagons north-westwards and bring them back.  I’m hoping that Hao Meng will agree to be the leader.  We can charge other merchants a fee for joining us and sharing our protection.  Everyone blinks a little at first, but the idea rapidly takes hold.  After the meeting, Geng De invites Yao Lin and me to a tavern for a drink and we seal the bargain in wine.  He goes home happy. 

Yao Lin says, “They told you I want to go back with the wagons in the spring, didn’t they?”

“Yes.  If that’s what you want, go for it.  You could visit your parents’ grave on the way, so they know we haven't forgotten them.”

“Yes, I was planning to.  This whole trading thing – it’s a lot bigger than I could have imagined.  Do you think we can do it?”

“Definitely.  By joining forces, we’ll spread the risk and make economies of scale.  As long as I can learn everything there is to know about tea, spices, sugar and salt by the end of the winter, we should be all right.”

He laughs.  “You can do it.  And I don’t know anything about those things either, so we can learn together.  Should I tell Mo Jiang that I can’t go on working at the Liangs anymore?” 

“I’d keep working part-time, if Liang Zhou agrees.  See how it goes.”

“Right,” he says.

 “I’m going to the Pavilion tonight.  I’ve got some plans to discuss with Yuan Song.”

“You’ve got an idea about how to help Sir Zhan and the Third Prince?”

“Yes, I do.  Ah-Lin, I’m going to move out of the Lei house.  What I’m going to do might be dangerous and I don’t want to involve Madam Lei and Ah-Qing.”

He stares at me.  “Move out?  Where to?”

“I don’t know yet.”

“Can I come with you?”

“I said it was going to be dangerous.”

His face is eager.  “Don’t care about that.  I want to help.  And it would be great living together, just like it was in the caravan.”

“I promised your father I’d keep you safe.”

“Dad would be the first to say you should help your friends if they need it.  Go on, say Yes, Ah-Jing, please.”

He’s just like an eager puppy and I can’t help smiling.  “All right, all right.  But if anything dangerous happens, you’ll have to cut and run back to the Lei house.”

“Oh great!  When can we move?”

“As soon as we find somewhere.”

“So I’ll tell the Leis that you’re at the Liang house tonight?”

“No.  I’m going to confess to Madam Lei.  I don’t like lying to her.  But we’ll keep up the fiction for the servants.”

This is the first thing I do when we get back.  It involves telling her everything about what’s been going on, but I discover that, of course, she already knows or has guessed most of it.  “Yes, I know about the Cherry Blossom Pavilion.  All the merchants do because it’s a major customer for us.  The new Master already has a reputation for being a clever man and a shrewd bargainer.  I’m glad you’ve confided in me.  And I agree that we should conceal your visits from the household.”

“Well, you can tell Ah-Qing.  Yao Lin already knows.  I don’t want the Lei house to get a bad reputation.”

“Especially not now we’re expanding,” she says with a smile.

“As for my other affair, I want to make sure that it doesn’t affect any of you.  So I think it would be best if I moved out of here and found myself a small house nearby.  Yao Lin says he’d like to come with me.  Would you know of anywhere?”

“I’ll ask around.  But are you sure it’s necessary?”

“Yes, just in case.  Anyway, I can’t go on trespassing on your hospitality forever, comfortable as it is here.  People will start to talk, since you have a daughter of marriageable age.”

“Unfortunately, you’re right.  I’ll ask my friends if there’s anywhere local for rent.  You’ll need a servant or two.  And I can get good rates on furniture for you.”

I reflect that there are many advantages to having merchants as friends.

I set off for the Pavilion well before curfew, having sent a message to Yuan Song that I need to talk to him.  I find him lounging on his couch reading, informally-dressed, his hair loose.

“Before you ask,” he says, putting the book aside, “There’s no news.  Come and have some tea.”

I know it’s too early for news, but I still feel a tug of disappointment.  I quell it as best I can.

“So,” he says, handing me the tea-cup, “What have you come up with?”

I pass on the information that Bai Ping’s given me.  He nods.  “That tallies with what I’ve heard.  Because the Emperor executed the senior generals, the current officers in charge of the army are less experienced and less sure of themselves.  There’s one who might take the lead but he’s being very quiet.  His name’s Tao Yahui and he’s another protégé of General Chen’s.  He’s young, but good things are said about him.”

“They won’t be doing anything till the epidemic’s under control and that might take weeks.  But I think the longer it takes, the more the unrest will increase.”

“I agree.  So what’s this idea of yours?”

“We heard that Xu Yating was furious with her son because he didn’t listen to the messages about the jail-break.  Suppose we try to drive a wedge between them?”

“How?”

“I thought we could produce caricatures ridiculing the Emperor, for example depicting him as a naughty child with a scolding mother.  We could put them up in public places and get the whole city laughing at him.  Or we could find some means of putting him in a humiliating situation and making it public.  If he becomes a liability, his mother might be tempted to find a way of putting him aside and making herself regent.  According to Bai Ping, that would get the army to move.”

He drinks his tea slowly, thinking.  I wait.

“If you’re caught,” he says finally, “The punishment will be terrible.”

“I know.  But otherwise, there might be deadlock for years.  I’m planning to move out of the Lei house into a place of my own.  We can produce the drawings there.  I can’t ask anyone else to run the risk, so I’ll put them up myself.  But what I need is someone to do the drawings.”

He puts the tea-cup down, gets up, and with his usual languid grace, moves to a side-table and picks up a book that’s lying there.  He hands it to me and sits down again.  I flip it open and gasp.  Then I feel my face get burning hot.  It’s a book of erotic drawings, beautifully done but very lewd.  I slam the book shut.  Yuan Song looks amused.  “Those drawings were done by a young artist I know.  He painted the picture of cranes there on the wall.  But he can’t make a living painting birds, so he earns extra cash by producing these books which, as I’m sure you know, are popular in pleasure-houses. I think he’d be able to help.”

I’ve already noticed the painting he’s referring to.  It’s outstandingly beautiful.  The birds seem to be quivering with life, ready to fly away.

“He wouldn’t give us away, would he?”

“I doubt it.  The punishment for producing pornography is a public flogging, so he won’t want to call attention to himself.”

“So you think my idea might work?”

“I think it’s definitely worth a try.”

A thought occurs to me.  I pick up the book of drawings and open it again. 

Yuan Song’s eyebrows rise.  “Tempted?” he asks teasingly.

“I was just thinking about the rumours going round – the ones about Xu Yating and Du Xun being lovers.”

He catches on instantly.  “Spread pornographic drawings of the Dowager Empress and her eunuch?  That would be spicy.”

“We could do that as a follow-up, if she does try and grab power.  And we need a high-level contact in the army.  General Chen perhaps?  Though he’s more or less under house arrest.”

“I think that could be managed.”  Yuan Song pours more tea.   “Let’s do it,” he says.

I’m suddenly overtaken by a huge yawn.  ‘Sorry.  It’s been a busy day.”

He laughs.  “I hear you’re going into trade now.  A new departure?”

“It just sounds like an interesting thing to do.  I want to make lots of money.”

“You can always come here and play the zither again.  In the meanwhile, it’s a while since I had a good game of chess.  Will you indulge me?  Then we can have dinner.”

I can barely keep my eyes open by the time dinner’s over.  Yuan Song sends me off to bed, while he himself prepares for the night’s business, still far below normal levels because of the curfew.  I fall asleep thinking of that final kiss and whisper in the dark before Shan disappeared out of my life.

When I get back to the Lei house the next morning, to my surprise, Madam Lei tells me she’s found me somewhere to live.  “You remember Fan Wang, the man whose loan was secured on my house?  He has a place for sale.  It seems that he needs to sell it to make up his daughter’s dowry.  It’s not far from here.  If we send a message now, you could go and see it this afternoon.”

I do indeed remember Fan Wang and when we meet that afternoon, he remembers me.  The house is small compared to the Lei mansion:  three bedrooms and a reception room arranged around a small garden.  There’s stabling for a few horses and a porter’s hut, complete with porter.

“He’s an army veteran,” Fan Wang explains, wiping his face with his handkerchief, for even the thin autumn sun seems to make him sweat.  “Lost an arm somewhere on the borders.  I hope you’ll keep him on.  I was renting the rooms to scholars preparing for the civil examinations, but now, since there doesn’t seem to be much chance of the Zhongs paying me back just yet, I need some ready cash.”

The place is shabby, but somehow homelike as well.  Since the rooms were being rented out, they’re furnished, albeit with odds and ends.  I’ve made my mind up before we finish going round it.  The price is reasonable.  Wan Fang’s delighted.  We arrange to meet the following day to sign the contract and I go back to the Lei house elated.  That evening, Yao Lin and I carefully count out our money.  I have a good amount left of Bamboo Hat’s fee for killing me and the reward I got for killing the bandit, plus what I earned from Hao Meng.  I also kept back a little of the gold I earned from Yuan Song.  Yao Lin has a portion of the money received for the pearls, which Madam Lei suggested he keep for personal use.  It’s more than enough.

“You keep your money,” I say to Yao Lin, “It’s better if the house-deed’s in my name only, for security reasons.  You can pay rent.”

“Sounds good.  I can’t wait to see the place.”

The deal’s clinched next day and Yao Lin and I take triumphant possession of our new home.  The porter’s a silent leathery veteran with a mop of grey hair and a stump where his left arm should be.  He brightens up when I mention we have horses to stable.  Enquiries elicit the fact that he was in a cavalry regiment.  I mention my own time with the cavalry and he brightens up even more.   I hand over a sufficient sum of money for him to buy straw for the stable floor and forage for the horses, and add a bit for him to get himself a drink and a meal.

Most of the furniture’s usable, but we throw out the quilts, which smell of dead mice.  We find a couple of straggly brooms and sweep the place clean.  There’s a well, a privy and a tiny kitchen, mostly taken up with a big stove, now cold.  There are large copper cauldrons for heating water and a minimum of cooking utensils.  Neither of us are cooks, but we’ve learned enough camp cooking to keep us going, and food can always be bought in.

I suppose every young man feels like this when he leaves home and moves into his first independent lodgings, but this is a new experience for both of us and we’re feeling like kids who’ve been given a huge present.

“We’ll bring everything over tomorrow,” I say, “Then we’ll invite everyone.  We’ll have a party.” 

Yao Lin’s face is glowing.

Moving in turns out to be simple.  Yao Lin and I don’t have many possessions, apart from the horses.  Our clothes, our quilts, Yao Lin’s few items of furniture: all are loaded onto the horses and transported to the new house, the name of which is the Cloud House.  We bring Blaze and Arrow, leaving my one remaining spare horse at the Lei house for Qing’s use.  The grey dog trots alongside the procession.  The porter, whose name is Ah-Bo, has lit the stove for us, so the place is warm and hot water’s ready.  There’s no separate bathing room, but each bedroom has a smallish tub behind a screen.  The servants at the Lei House have given us an emotional farewell and, more importantly, loaded us with food, so we don’t go hungry on our first night.  But it’s a long time before I sleep and I suspect the same goes for Yao Lin, who’s been wildly over-excited all day.

He has to go to work in the morning, while I have time to take a look round the neighbourhood.  It’s a much more popular area than the street the Leis live in.  There are shops, a tavern or two, plenty of food stalls and a lot of bustle.  It’s the ideal place for two young men living on their own.  Also, the fact that there have been students living in the Cloud House for some time means that we’ll pass unremarked.  The neighbours will assume that we’re studying for the exams too.  It couldn’t be better.

I can’t wait to let everyone know and invite them round, so I do the rounds of the Liang house, Hao Meng, Shao Su and the Cherry Blossom Pavilion to give everyone my new address.  I can’t invite my women friends to the house, so I’ve decided to treat them all to tea and cakes one afternoon.  When Yao Lin gets back from work, we plan our party.

Again, this is a simple pleasure that neither Yao Lin nor I have ever had, so we enjoy it enormously.  Everyone accepts except Yuan Song, who seems flattered to be asked, but declines on the grounds that his presence might make things awkward, which is unfortunately true.  Even Lai Xue turns up.  Qin Feng's accompanied by his young friend.  Mo Jiang and Wu Shun arrive together and Hao Meng brings a large jug of wine to add to the store we’ve already laid in.  He immediately gets on good terms with Ah-Bo.  It turns out that they’ve seen service in much the same places and in any case, old army lags can always find something to talk about.  We’ve bought in trays of snacks which disappear at an alarming rate.  But luckily the wine doesn’t run out.

It’s a tremendous satisfaction to see my friends enjoying themselves, though I can’t help thinking of the ones who are absent and possibly in danger.  Suddenly feeling a little emotional, I go out into the garden and find Qin Feng’s young friend sitting on the veranda looking lost.  Qin Feng, as usual, is well on the way to getting drunk.  The boy gets up hastily as I approach, and bows.

“No, it’s all right, sit down.  It’s so pleasant out here.”

“Your house is really nice,” he says shyly.  “It’s got a cosy feel.  I wish…”  He stops, shoots me a guilty look and falls silent.

“Ah-Feng’s found you somewhere nice, hasn’t he?”

“Well, it’s much bigger.  But….” He stops again and bites his lip.

“But?” I say gently. 

“The servants despise me.  And Ah-Feng’s away all day, so it’s really lonely.  At least when I was working, there was always somebody to talk to.”

“What’s your name?”

“My professional name’s Lingling.  But my mother called me Xinyi.”

“Then I’ll call you Xinyi too.  Listen, if you get bored during the day, you can always come and hang out here.  Even if we’re not here, I’ll tell Ah-Bo to let you in.  It’s a lively neighbourhood.  Plenty of shops.”

His face lights up.  “Can I really?  That would be…  I’d really like that.  I could – I could take care of the garden for you.”

“The garden?”  I’m a little taken aback.

“It needs attention.  I could do it.  My father and brothers are farmers, but my mother and I grew flowers, so I know about gardens.”

“Where do your mother and father live?  Do you see much of them?”

The small face falls.  “No.  My mother died when I was eleven.  And then my father sold me.”

There’s not much I can say to that. 

“Well, anything you can do for the garden will be very welcome.”

“I can cook too,” he says, brightening up again, “If you like.”

“You’ll have to teach us.  Neither Ah-Lin nor I can really cook, apart from roasting chicken on a spit or boiling it in a pot.”

He laughs, a pleasant little ripple of sound. 

Yao Lin comes outside and sees us.  “Qin Feng’s passed out.  Mo Jiang’s offering to take him home.”

Xinyi leaps to his feet.  “I’ll come."  He turns to me and bows.  “Thank you very much,” he says.

Inside, the party’s breaking up as curfew approaches.  Mo Jiang heaves a comatose Qin Feng to his feet and pulls one of his arms round his neck.  Xinyi takes the other side, diminutive compared to Mo Jiang’s solid figure.  Everyone leaves together, rather loudly.  Ah-Bo retires to his hut.  Yao Lin and I clear up.

“That went well,” Yao Lin says happily.  “What were you and that boy talking about?”

“He’s bored and lonely and Qin Feng’s servants despise him.  So I said he could come here during the day if he wanted.  He offered to do the garden and cook for us.”

Yao Lin blinks. “That sounds like a bargain.  But I hope Qin Feng doesn’t get the wrong idea.”

“I’ll put it right with him,” I say, yawning.

Yao Lin uncovers some snacks that have miraculously survived and we finish them off between us.  “How did that kid end up in a brothel in the first place?” he asks, munching.

“His father sold him.”

“His father sold him?” says Yao Lin incredulously. “How old was he?”

“Eleven.  He’s not much more than sixteen now.”

“I can’t imagine what it must have been like.”

I can, though I’m not going to ruin Yao Lin’s day by enlightening him.  And I remember what the girl in the Lotus Garden said, back there in Border Town.  “Sometimes life in a brothel’s better than life as a poor peasant.”

“How can it be?”

“You get fed every day and there’s always someone to talk to.”

He thinks about this for a while.  “I never realized,” he says at last, “How much it matters who you are.  Where you’re born.  Who your family is.  If I were Emperor, I’d do something about it.”

“That’s why we need to get my Third Brother onto the throne.  Eat up.  Can’t let it go to waste.”