Chapter 4

A eunuch led Suyin into the Golden Hall.

She'd changed into clean clothes and raised the forged letters she'd stolen from the study in both hands.

"I am willing to put righteousness above family."

"Gu Yanxing hides stolen silver in his adopted daughter's banking houses and secretly colludes with the Northern Territories. This letter, in his own hand, is proof."

Father's old seal was on it. The handwriting had been imitated convincingly.

Officials across the hall changed expression.

Cao Jingxian immediately asked the Emperor to order imprisonment and seal the Gu residence for investigation.

Kneeling below the steps, Father said only,

"I ask Your Majesty to verify the correspondence and examine the accounts."

The Emperor stared at the letter, a hand resting on his desk.

An announcement sounded outside.

I entered carrying a black-lacquered wooden box.

Suyin turned and shouted,

"Is the imperial court a place a woman merchant can simply barge into?"

I knelt before the Emperor and kowtowed.

"I have come to present the other half of the accounts Lord Cao dares not place before Your Majesty."

The box was set on the imperial desk.

Inside were the master ledger recording river-repair funds diverted into Liang's faction's private coffers, bills of exchange returned by northern merchants, and thumbprinted statements from managers in various places.

The Emperor immediately ordered the Minister of Revenue to examine them.

He laid out the bills one by one. Seal numbers and exchange dates matched the river-repair disbursements reported by the prefectures.

The Deputy Chief of the Court of Judicial Review also unsealed the statements. Additional clay seals had been applied after the case documents were registered at the palace gates the previous night. No one could have switched them at the last minute.

Standing below the steps, I explained their source.

Fengtai exchanged silver across the country.

Liang's faction had used trading firms' names to break the embezzled funds into smaller sums. At first glance, the accounts seemed unrelated. In the end, all the money flowed into three shops selling northern goods, under one owner.

Manager Zhao had noticed repeated secret marks on the bills and reported them to me. By tracing the copies held at our banking houses, I'd finally pieced together the silver's entire route.

Every piece of evidence came from original banking records I'd personally checked.

None had anything to do with Father.

"I left the letter Suyin presented in the study and deliberately let her take it."

"The old seal was canceled long ago. But the paper came from Chengxin Studio, which the Liang family regularly uses."

"The names of those who truly colluded to transfer silver to the northerners are in this ledger."

Sweat beaded on Cao Jingxian's forehead. He still forced himself to shout,

"You want to save your adoptive father. What accounts wouldn't you forge?"

"Your name is on page seven, Lord Cao. Three years ago, during the river embankment reinforcement, you received two hundred and ten thousand taels."

"Page thirteen holds the contract for land purchased for your wife's younger brother."

"Shall we ask the Ministry of Revenue to compare the banking houses' exchange records here in the hall?"

The Emperor turned to page seven.

His face darkened little by little.

When he reached the entry for the frontier army's winter coats, he suddenly hurled the ledger down the imperial steps.

"I allocated cotton. You sent reed fluff!"

"Soldiers froze to death beyond the passes while you bought land and built houses with the money meant to save their lives!"

The genuine ledger landed at the Vice Minister of Justice's feet.

After one page, Cao Jingxian fell prostrate and begged for his life.

Several ministers who had supported him moments earlier also went weak at the knees.

Suyin stood rigid in the middle of the hall.

"Impossible!"

"I took that letter from the study myself!"

"Precisely because you took it yourself, they believed the Gus were finished. That's why they dared come forward together today."

I looked at her.

"You don't understand accounts and won't investigate people. Promise you a wealthy future, and you'll push your whole family onto the execution ground."

The Emperor ordered the Court of Judicial Review to arrest Cao Jingxian and the remaining members of Liang's faction on the spot, and reopen the old cases involving river works and military supplies.

Censor Liang's offenses were included in the same case. The assets of all those implicated were confiscated.

Before he was dragged away, Cao Jingxian lunged toward Suyin.

"You fool!"

"The letter you stole wasn't worth a copper, yet you swore it was flawless!"

She turned to Liang's men.

"You promised! If the Gus fell, you'd send me into the earl's household!"

"Say something!"

The officials who'd urged her to present the evidence avoided her eyes one after another.

She threw herself at Father's feet.

"Father, I was deceived!"

"I only wanted the place that should have been mine. They forced me to take the letter. I didn't know it would come to this!"

He looked down at her. The last trace of reluctance left his face.

"Did someone force you to tear Ah Qiu's clothes?"

"Did someone force you to steal the draft and make false accusations?"

"Did someone force you to put your own thumbprint on a loan for six hundred thousand taels?"

She wept and pulled at his robe.

He stepped back and kowtowed toward the Emperor.

"The Gu family cannot acknowledge a daughter who trades her kin's lives for wealth."

"Today, I ask to strike Gu Suyin from our family register. Let Your Majesty judge her offenses according to law."

She screamed.

"I'm the Gu family's true daughter!"

"Gu Yingqiu stole my name and parents. What right have you to drive me out?"

The Emperor spoke coldly.

"Your blood gave you a door home. You sold that door yourself."

"You falsely accused your own father and helped corrupt officials frame a servant of the court. Since you did not know the full circumstances, I spare your life and exile you to Nanling."

The guards dragged her from the hall. She was still screaming that the Gus owed her.

Once quiet returned, the Emperor personally helped Father rise.

Father didn't stand at once.

"Your Majesty, though Suyin committed grave crimes, she is still the child who grew up outside our family without my knowledge."

"I dare not ask that she be pardoned. I ask only that her escort to Nanling follow the law, provide sufficient food and medicine, and permit no member of the Gu family to use our status to mistreat her secretly."

The Emperor granted it.

I looked at Father's back and didn't try to dissuade him.

He'd expelled his daughter from the register so she couldn't keep hurting the family.

He also asked that a prisoner be escorted lawfully.

That was the principle he'd upheld all his life.

If Suyin treated that kindness as another opening to demand more, that was her affair.

Liang's faction was punished. The old cases were retried.

Father received the rank of Grand Preceptor. I received an imperial merchant's plaque. Eldest Brother transferred to the Ministry of Personnel. With supplies replenished, Second Brother won distinction and sent news of victory from the frontier.

When the rewards arrived, Father's first thought was to donate them to river works.

Before the eunuch delivering the decree, I wrapped my arms around two chests of gold.

"If His Majesty truly means to reward our family, please issue another verbal decree forbidding my father from giving this money away."

"Our roof has leaked for four months. If we don't repair it, the Grand Preceptor may have to sleep with a basin on his head between court sessions."

The Emperor heard and indeed added an order: the roof must be repaired and winter clothing fully supplied before Gu Yanxing could touch the remaining funds.

That evening, a whole roast goose finally appeared on our table.

Wearing the new clothes I'd given her, Mother picked up a goose leg and put it into my bowl first.

"Ah Qiu, for years I've feared you'd despise our poverty."

"Only today did I understand. Every day, your mouth says you want to leave, but your hands keep patching one hole after another for us."

"Of course I'm afraid."

"You give the silver away. In the end, I'm the one who pays to fill the holes."

I divided the goose leg and returned half to her.

"From now on, if you want to save someone, come and calculate the cost with me first. Once we know we can afford it, then save them."

A commotion suddenly rose outside.

Missing one shoe, the old steward rushed straight into the reception hall.

"Master, Madam! A merchant couple from the south is outside. They say they're looking for their daughter!"

A southern merchant couple glittering with jewels entered, carrying the other half of a jade pendant.

The woman burst into tears at the sight of me and rushed to embrace me. Gold bracelets chimed against one another on her wrist.

The man introduced himself as Tang Wanguan, a seafood merchant from Jiangnan.

Sixteen years ago, they'd come to the capital during unrest. Two swaddled babies had accidentally been switched. For years, they'd followed the jade pendant's trail in search of their child.

The two halves fitted perfectly. They also brought testimony from the midwife of that year.

Madam Tang stroked my face and kept crying.

"My child, how much have you suffered all these years in the Chief Grand Secretary's residence?"

"I've brought three million taels in drafts. First, let that soothe you."

"If it isn't enough, the fleet docks next month. I'll have more."

Father and Mother stared at the thick stack of drafts on the table.

Neither could speak.

I, however, saw the nine jeweled rings on Tang Wanguan's hands.

And the heavy gold abacus dragging down his robe at the waist.

No wonder I'd had an affinity for money since childhood.

At last, I'd found the root.

The Tangs wanted to take me back to Jiangnan. Mother's eyes reddened again.

I linked one arm through hers and took Madam Tang's hand with the other.

Eldest Brother was first to ask them whether they'd still acknowledge me if I didn't want to leave the capital.

Madam Tang wiped her tears.

"We only wanted to find our daughter. We never thought of taking her from anyone."

"Wherever she's happy living, we'll come to see her."

Tang Wanguan nodded too. Then he couldn't help glancing at the Gu residence's newly repaired roof beam.

"It's only that this house is rather too economical."

"If our fellow parents don't mind, I'll have good timber sent tomorrow."

Father was about to say he couldn't accept an unearned gift.

Madam Tang and I pressed his hand down at the same time.

She took a little notebook from her sleeve.

I turned two pages.

"Mother, why isn't there a repayment date for the forty thousand taels spent repairing a bridge last year?"

"What repayment would bridge repairs need?"

"And the sixty thousand for grain relief the year before?"

Tang Wanguan rubbed his nose.

"The grain's already in the people's stomachs. We can hardly dig it back out."

I looked at the Gus.

Then at the Tangs.

At last, I understood where I'd inherited this habit of loving money and using it to fill holes.

"I want my honest parents. I want my money-scented birth parents too."

"Who says a daughter can acknowledge only one pair?"

Tang Wanguan was the first to slap the table in agreement.

"Join the two families! In future, if Lord Gu wants to relieve a disaster, come to us for capital first. If our daughter thinks we're spending recklessly, let her manage the master accounts."

Hearing "capital," Father still wanted to refuse.

I put the drafts before him.

"I'll manage this money. First, we'll repair roofs and improve meals for both sets of parents."

"Anyone who wants to donate after that must submit a written request to me."

Laughter filled the room.

As for Suyin, under escort to Nanling, I later learned from an official dispatch that she'd tried to steal a runner's purse on the road and been caught on the spot. Before her old injuries had healed, she'd received another beating with the rod.

After hearing it, I asked the messenger only,

"The runner kept his purse, didn't he?"

He nodded.

"Good."

"All her life, she used other people's possessions to purchase wealth for herself. In the end, she gambled away even her blood ties and chance to live."

"Each time, she chose the most expensive advantage—and the very thing she should never have taken."

I moved Fengtai's master accounts to the Gu residence and opened a separate ledger for the Tang fleet.

From now on, whether anyone wanted to give money away or do business, it would have to pass through my abacus first.

I'd long since become the wealthiest person in the capital.

But keeping both sets of parents well fed and willing to sit obediently through my account reports?

Now that was an investment with a ten-thousandfold return.

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