Chapter 103 — He Yu

"What nonsense!" Dou Huaide leaned weakly back against the great bolster behind him. "That's the story we tell the elders. He's the fellow who put on that grand opera performance in the middle of the night at Dafang Temple, and the one who later lost five hundred taels of silver to me at cockfighting—all for the sake of those five hundred taels, he sent word to both the honest folk and the underworld. If I hadn't spent those months at home with my books, he'd have caught me long ago. So the moment I stepped out the door I was being watched; otherwise he'd never have set off on the journey with us."

Dou Yan thought back to her first encounter with him. It came as no great surprise.

Only this account sat poorly with what she had surmised. She had assumed it was Fifth Uncle who wished to curry favor with the He family, and that He Yu and Dou Huaide and the rest had simply joined company for the road.

She could not help asking, "Why is he after you? Surely not over those five hundred taels? He doesn't strike me as so petty a man."

"He doesn't care a fig about the five hundred taels, but he can't swallow the loss of face!" Dou Huaide said irritably. "He felt humiliated at being bested by me and wants to win it back and wipe out the shame. But I've given up cockfighting... I mean to sit the provincial examination next year! At first he wouldn't believe it. Later he reluctantly came round, but then he insisted I sell him the Iron General, the bird I used to fight with. I gave it away long ago—what am I supposed to sell him? So he badgers me without letup, demanding I raise him a bird every bit as fierce as the old Iron General... And the worst of it is, this can't reach Father's or Mother's ears—if they knew I'd been cockfighting for wagers, they'd have me kneeling in the North Tower before the ancestral tablets fast enough!"

"That's true enough," Dou Yan said. "So what do you mean to do?"

Dou Huaide sighed. "A pity Wu Shan isn't here. If he were, I could pin the whole business on him, and would Father and Mother have any cause to blame me then?"

Wu Shan, ah!

The two of them had always been close.

He surely wouldn't mind taking the blame for Dou Huaide.

She wondered how he was faring now.

Only a few months since last she saw him, and yet the man already seemed a distant memory.

Dou Yan quietly took a sip of tea.

Dou Huaide said awkwardly, "I... I didn't mean to bring him up..."

"It's nothing," Dou Yan said. "A match may fall through, but that's no reason to turn into enemies. Wu Shan is a good man, and he was good to you..." In her last life he had even helped you take a wife, and owned up to every misdeed along the way. She could not help urging, "Twelfth Brother shouldn't let a thing like this drive a wedge between you and Fourth Brother Wu."

"No wonder Wu Shan thought so highly of you," Dou Huaide said, visibly moved. "Fourth Sister, your heart is open and aboveboard. A woman every bit the equal of any man."

Dou Yan laughed heartily. "Flattery is my favorite thing to hear. Whether Twelfth Brother means it or not, I'll take it gladly." She was utterly unaffected.

At once Dou Huaide's spirits lifted. He rose to his feet. "Come on. I'll go help them write the spring couplets too—I can't leave Song Yan out there facing Ji Jianming all alone. His constitution's rather frail as it is."

More likely Song Yan found it a pleasure rather than an ordeal.

Dou Zhiwei rose as well. "Then I'll go have a word with Sixth Aunt. It's been some days since I've seen her."

Dou Huaide shook his head. "You girls—didn't you send Mother several pots of wintersweet only yesterday? Have you forgotten?"

"I didn't come myself!" Dou Yan treasured every moment she could spend close to the Ji family.

The two of them chatted and laughed their way out of the room.

That evening Dou Yan discussed the matter with Chen Yanzhou. "...I'm afraid we may have misjudged. It's quite possible that He Wendao has no wish at this time to involve himself so early in the struggle over the Grand Secretariat."

"That's possible too," Chen Yanzhou said, attaching no small importance to the news. "Though He Wendao entered the Grand Secretariat on Zeng Yifen's recommendation, the He family has always stood as a faction unto itself, taking no part in anyone else's affairs. That is precisely why the He family has stood unshaken for so many years."

Dou Yan nodded. "It would be best to look into the He family's affairs as well—He Yu is the youngest son, so why would He Wendao send him back to the ancestral home for the rites?"

"I understand," Chen Yanzhou said, and went off to set men to investigate the He family.

Once the Laba Festival had passed, word came from the capital: "He Wendao passed the examinations at a young age, and took as his wife the daughter of his examination patron. He holds this lady in the greatest respect. Together they have borne six sons and three daughters, with no children by any other woman. He Yu was a pearl born to an old oyster, twenty-two years younger than the He family's eldest son, and the He lord and his lady cherish him as the apple of their eye. For this journey home to the ancestral rites, the eldest son had originally been chosen; only because He Yu clamored to come was the plan changed at the last moment to send him."

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To the sisters and brothers reading this book, someone in the comments asked about the publication of *The Concubine's Daughter's Stratagem*. There are seven volumes in all; the first five are out now, available on Dangdang and at the major bookstores. The sixth and seventh volumes have already been through proofreading, and since the first five have sold rather well, I expect the sixth and seventh to go to press within the next two months.

Thank you all for your support all along!

o(n_n)o~

Still begging for pink votes...

Tonight's update will be a little late.

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