Chapter 4

At last he laughed, lifting a hand to rub his brow.

“Because I want to visit the workshop, but I'm afraid you'll think I come too often.”

The students' laughter drifted up from a distance. Lantern light warmed his profile. I tucked the brass token into my sachet and smiled.

“Then remember to bring money next time. The workshop doesn't give credit.”

“All right,” he answered at once. “I can mend doors, move flowerpots, teach A-Ya to read. Could some of that count toward the bill?”

I deliberately made things difficult.

“We'll have to see how well you work, Master Lu. Then I'll discuss it with A-Ya.”

He nodded with the gravity of someone accepting an important commission.

I closed my hand around the token. Listening to the distant footsteps of students chasing one another, I suddenly felt that life could be very pleasant with someone beside me who knew how to speak and act with consideration.

13.

In the third month, the Hengwu Fragrance Workshop opened its third shop.

On opening day, Lu Guanlan brought his students with a new signboard. They hadn't commissioned a famous calligrapher. A-Ya had written the two characters for Hengwu. Her brushwork was still a little unpracticed, and the students had squeezed a trail of little flowers beside it.

I stood at the door looking at it for a long time.

“Aren't you afraid people will laugh?” I asked Lu Guanlan.

“They worked hard on it. What's there to laugh at?”

I had the assistant hang it up and invited the students inside for sweet soup.

Qin Zhaoye arrived just then.

He stood across the street with a card in his hand. A-Ya spotted him first and quietly asked whether she should send him away.

“It's opening day. We don't turn away customers. If he buys incense, charge the usual price.”

He approached and handed me the card.

It was his wedding invitation.

The bride wasn't Liu Hanyan, but a colleague's daughter from an ordinary family, said to have a quiet disposition.

“I shouldn't have come,” he said. “But I thought I ought to tell you in person.”

I accepted the invitation, glanced at the date, and said, “Congratulations, Lord Qin.”

He looked around the crowded shop, then saw Lu Guanlan beside me.

“Are you getting married too?”

Lu Guanlan was helping a student wipe spilled sweet soup off her sleeve. He looked up.

“Not yet,” I said with a smile.

Something complicated passed through Qin Zhaoye's eyes. He seemed both relieved and more deeply hurt.

“Ah Heng, I often think now, if only I hadn't—”

I raised a hand to stop him before he could return to the past.

“I've received your invitation, Lord Qin. We're busy today. I won't keep you for tea.”

He stood there holding the card, his feet rooted to the spot.

I passed the wedding invitation to A-Ya, told her to put it in the gift box, and turned back to my customers.

Lu Guanlan handed me warm tea with two fresh banksia rose petals floating on it.

“You like this,” he said.

I took the cup. “When did you notice?”

“Last time you stayed up late checking the accounts. You drank three cups.”

I lowered my head and sipped. The floral scent was delicate, without bitterness.

Gongs and drums sounded in the street. The students ran out to light firecrackers, and the passing crowd gradually hid Qin Zhaoye from view.

I asked Lu Guanlan to move the flower baskets a little farther inside so the children wouldn't trample them. I didn't look across the street again.

14.

Not long after Qin Zhaoye's wedding, my mother came to the workshop again.

This time, she didn't sit under the pomegranate tree waiting for me to serve tea. She bought two boxes of scented balm as soon as she arrived, then spent a long time praising the shop's decorated paper with A-Ya.

Recognizing who she was, A-Ya slipped over to ask whether she should invite her into the back courtyard.

“Please show my mother into the courtyard.”

My mother sat on the long bench there. She looked a little older than she had the year before.

She held her tea without speaking for a long time. I went on writing in the accounts, giving her time to decide what she wanted to say.

“Ah Heng,” she began at last, “did you arrange for your cousin to teach music at the girls' school?”

“She went herself. I only passed on a letter.”

My mother nodded and ran her fingers twice around the rim of her cup.

“She sent me a box of pastries a few days ago. She said she bought them with her first month's wages. She also said she owed you something she should have said long ago.”

“Then let her keep it. If she truly feels she owes me, living her own life well will be enough.”

My mother looked at me, her eyes a little red.

“I always thought Hanyan couldn't live without someone to depend on. She's beautiful and softhearted. Without protection, I was sure she'd suffer. You were strong, so I thought a little more for you to carry wouldn't matter.”

“Mother,” I said softly, “however strong I am, there are times when I can't carry any more.”

She lowered her head to the tea leaves drifting in her cup.

I put down my brush, my voice softening too.

“I know you love my cousin. I know you think I can manage everything. But if she needs money or help in the future, you should discuss it with her first. My life is mine to decide. Don't make promises for me again.”

My mother sniffed, then suddenly took an old wooden box from her sleeve.

It was the dowry box from my wedding day. Inside lay a deed to a flower garden my father had left behind. When I had been short of money for the Qin family's birthday banquet, I had thought my mother had sold it.

“I've kept this all along,” she said. “I meant to sell it then, but I couldn't bear to. It's yours now.”

I didn't take it at once.

“If you feel you've wronged me, you needn't use this to make amends.”

“It isn't compensation.” She pushed the box toward me. “When I was young, I wanted to open a flower shop too. After I married, it was never mentioned again. Your father knew, so he bought this land for me. You've done so well on the path I never took. I'm glad to see it.”

The courtyard grew quiet. Only the bamboo sieves on the drying racks stirred softly in the wind.

I accepted the box and poured her more tea.

“I'll take the garden. From now on, the workshop will give you a tenth of its profits and send the accounts each quarter. If you'd like, you can come and see the flowers bloom.”

She wiped the corner of her eye and nodded.

After she left, A-Ya came over.

“Mistress, will your mother still force you to go back to the Qin family?”

I put the deed in the account box.

“If she brings it up again, I'll ask her to sit down and work through every account with me. As for what she'll do from now on, we'll see.”

A-Ya nodded thoughtfully, then went to teach a new apprentice how to read the scales. Her words and actions were already those of a shop manager. Even Lu Guanlan praised how quickly she was improving.

15.

Once the flower garden was settled, Lu Guanlan began coming more often.

At first, he said he was helping check the boundaries on the deed. Then rain left water standing on the land, and he said two drainage ditches needed digging. Once those were done, he noticed the little house had a loose door and spent an entire morning repairing it.

Watching him bustle about, A-Ya whispered to me, “Master Lu works so hard. If you marry him, at least you won't have to wash his clothes.”

I tapped her forehead with a bamboo ruler.

“Stop talking nonsense about him.”

She ran off clutching her forehead and nearly collided with Lu Guanlan, who was coming through the gate carrying a basket of wood. He hadn't heard what she had said before. He only asked why her forehead was red.

Her eyes darted.

“Mistress says if I won't study properly, no one will marry me!”

I nearly dropped my flower shears into the basin.

Lu Guanlan looked from A-Ya to me, perfectly serious.

“A-Ya is doing very well. Once she has a fragrance shop of her own, she needn't marry at all.”

She suppressed a laugh, snatched up the wood basket, and vanished from the courtyard.

I bent over my banksia rose branches, my ears warm. Lu Guanlan put down the wood. He seemed to want to explain himself but had no idea where to begin, so he picked up the hammer and went back to the door.

After a while, he suddenly said, “Ah Heng, there's something I'd like to discuss.”

I looked up. “Go on.”

“The head of the academy wanted to buy me a little courtyard house in the north of the city. He said I lived too far away, and getting to lessons in winter was inconvenient. I refused.”

“The north of the city is close to the academy. Why refuse?”

He held the hammer handle, his voice very quiet.

“It's too far from the workshop.”

I stood still and didn't answer at once.

“I know you're content with your life now and don't want anyone restricting you again. I don't have any great ambitions either. I'll go on teaching at the academy. You'll make your own decisions about the workshop. If you think I'd suit you, I'd like a room set aside as a study in the courtyard at Banksia Rose Slope. Then I could teach, mend things, and share meals with you.”

He spoke slowly, every word clear. Wind slipped through the half-open doorway and set the sachets beneath the eaves brushing against one another.

I looked at the thin new calluses on his hands and suddenly remembered all those years before. I had always had to guess Qin Zhaoye's thoughts: why he hadn't come home, whether the things he gave away should have been meant for me.

Those days had been like a room with every door and window shut, so stifling I could scarcely breathe.

Lu Guanlan had told me plainly what he wanted. He was willing to let me take my time.

I placed the banksia rose branch in my hand into a white porcelain vase and looked up.

“We can set aside a study. Only, the window must be made a little wider. I don't like dark rooms.”

He froze for a moment, then laughed.

His smile was more carefree than the spring breeze. Even the hammer slipped in his hand, nearly landing on his foot.

I hurriedly took it from him.

“Master Lu, finish the door first. We can discuss the study once you've learned to hold a hammer.”

He hastily agreed, his ears staying red for a long time.

16.

A light rain fell over the city on Qin Zhaoye's wedding day.

I didn't attend the feast. Early that morning, Lu Guanlan and I went out of the city to Banksia Rose Slope. The workshop wanted to lease a flower garden there. He knew the local headman and had offered to make the trip for me.

The mountain path was muddy. He walked ahead in old shoes, turning to warn me whenever we came to a puddle.

A-Ya followed with a basket of pastries, complaining all the way that his umbrella was too small.

Lu Guanlan tilted it farther toward me. Soon half his shoulder was soaked.

“Master Lu,” I asked, “how much does the workshop owe you for looking after me so well?”

He considered it seriously.

“Counting the wages for moving flowerpots, mending doors, and teaching students to read, I'll probably have to save for a long time.”

“If it will take so long, why are you still willing to do all this?”

He stopped in front of a banksia rose just putting out new shoots and lifted a branch out of my way.

Only after moving it aside did he answer.

“Because I want to save those wages little by little, and one day use them to bring betrothal gifts to your door.”

Rain pattered on the umbrella.

I looked at his wet shoulder and saw red slowly spreading behind his ears.

Behind us, A-Ya gave a little cough, hugged the pastry basket, and turned to study the clouds.

I took an osmanthus cake from her basket and gave it to Lu Guanlan, in no hurry to answer.

“Settle the garden lease first,” I said with a smile. “The workshop's owner has quite a temper. You can take your time getting to know it.”

He accepted the cake, smiling happily.

“I know. I'll learn.”

In time, we did secure the lease at Banksia Rose Slope. A-Ya became the workshop's chief manager, and Xiaoman came to help after lessons. Occasionally Liu Hanyan brought her girl pupils to pick flowers. She would nod to me through the crowd.

Another spring came, and a new house went up beside the flower garden. There was no Waterside Pavilion in its courtyard, nor any courtyard belonging to someone else's past. Only a row of bamboo drying racks and a broad wooden table.

Lu Guanlan moved his lessons to the afternoon. In the mornings, he helped me mend the fence and sometimes carved designs on fragrance boxes.

The first cat he carved still had one crooked ear. I stamped it onto our newly made decorative paper, and it sold faster than the other designs. Customers said the silly-looking cat was delightful and asked who had drawn it.

I told them it was the proud work of our very own Master Lu.

When the banksia roses were at their fullest, the wind came up from the foot of the slope and scattered white flowers over my skirt.

I stood at the newly fitted window, watching A-Ya check the accounts with the apprentices, watching students run through the fields with flower baskets, and watching Lu Guanlan return in the distance with a great armful of freshly cut banksia roses.

He came beneath the eaves and placed them in the white porcelain jar beside me. Their fresh scent filled the room. I bent to arrange the branches, my heart calm and clear, my fingertips dusted with fresh pollen.

Qin Zhaoye, Liu Hanyan, and the Qin family's main courtyard with its lingering kitchen smoke still rose in my memory from time to time. But I could set them down now and return to the work before me.

That afternoon, Lu Guanlan carried the sieves of dried flowers indoors one by one. Complaining that I had stood in the wind too long, he laid a slightly damp outer robe over my shoulders, then bent to gather the petals scattered on the stone steps.

A-Ya ran out with the account book. An apprentice at the eastern shop had miscalculated a payment, and she needed my decision.

I took the book and told her to bring the apprentice to the garden tomorrow. We would hear the accounts and check each sum together.

Listening beside us, Lu Guanlan suddenly asked, “When you're finished tomorrow, will you have time to see the students' new lanterns at the academy?”

I handed the book back to A-Ya.

“I'll come once my work is done.”

He set the last bamboo sieve firmly down and looked up at the darkening sky, as though a worry had finally left him.

Beyond the courtyard gate, the flower garden stretched to the foot of the hill. Clusters of white banksia roses glowed in the evening light.

The wind carried their scent through the newly built courtyard wall and over the floral water still drying on my palm.

I closed the account book and turned into the lamplit room.

Behind me, someone carried a sieve of flowers, someone held pastries, and someone called out that they wanted to learn a new fragrance recipe tomorrow. Footsteps mingled on the blue-gray flagstones, untidy and wonderfully cheerful.