The two little servants ran around outside all day.
Fu Jingxuan hadn’t been idle either, bringing Fang Zesheng along to Pingxi Village near the outskirts of the city.
There were not many households in Pingxi Village, only twelve or thirteen in total.
At the entrance of the village there was a tea shed. Beneath it sat a thin, withered old woman tending a stall; she sold small handmade trinkets to the travelers passing by on the official road, earning a few copper coins a day.
In front of the village lay ten thousand acres of tea fields planted with lush, sturdy tea trees. This was the land the Fang family leased out.
The field paths were difficult to traverse, so Fu Jingxuan left Fang Zesheng near the tea shed and stepped onto the ridges alone to look around.
The Feng family relatives were indeed not very attentive to the care of the tea trees. Now that the season for frost and freeze damage had arrived, no one had prepared materials like cotton batting or rice straw to protect the trees from frost and increase their temperature. The leaves of these few tea trees before him had grown dark brown spots; if they weren’t treated in time, they would inevitably all freeze to death. One or two trees wouldn’t matter much, but if things continued this way and caused a large-scale freezing disease among the trees, the harvest of spring buds would surely be greatly reduced by next spring.
In previous years, when Lady Wang encountered such a situation, she would simply arrange for the tenant farmers to replant tea seedlings. If they couldn’t make the first batch of spring bud picking, she would just muddle through, which gradually caused the ingredients for the “Carved Lotus” cakes to shift from the earliest spring tea to pre-Mingqian tea, pre-Yuqian tea, or even autumn tea.
It wasn’t that autumn tea was bad.
Rather, due to the different production techniques, the process for “Carved Lotus” cakes could not extract the flavor of autumn tea to its greatest extent. Just as a sword does not fit the wrong sheath or a horse with the wrong saddle, it was only natural that the pressed tea cakes tasted poor.
If the Fang family wanted to sell tea again, they had to raise the quality of “Auspicious Carved Lotus,” perhaps even making it better than it was during Fang Changru’s time.
Wearing a jade-white robe dyed with the colors of maple-red autumn, Fu Jingxuan walked a few circles in the tea fields before returning to Fang Zesheng’s side.
“I hope Prefect Feng takes the initiative to visit before winter begins. If he waits until winter is over, I’m afraid next year’s business will be difficult to manage.”
Draped in a dark cloak and sitting in his wheelchair, Fang Zesheng noticed a withered leaf stuck to Fu Jingxuan’s clothes and reached out to brush it off. “He is likely still watching and waiting. He won’t visit until the imperial rewards are announced.”
Fu Jingxuan asked, “What if His Majesty doesn’t grant a reward this time?”
“Then he will maintain a loftier posture.”
“And if there is a reward?”
“Then his posture will be humbler.”
Fang Zesheng continued, “My father never had any formal dealings with Prefect Feng. Not long after he took office, trouble broke out at home. Over the years, he only dealt with Lady Wang. Now that she is gone, those accounts in his hands are becoming a hot potato; he won’t be able to wait much longer.”
Fu Jingxuan nodded. Just as he was about to move behind Fang Zesheng to push the wheelchair forward, his wrist was caught, and he was pulled to crouch down.
Slightly puzzled, Fu Jingxuan leaned down as requested and asked with a smile, “What are you doing?”
Fang Zesheng remained silent. He had Fu Jingxuan turn his head to the side, then removed his original silver hairpin and replaced it with a hand-carved peachwood one.
Fu Jingxuan didn’t get a clear look at what the pin looked like. He reached up to touch it. “What is this?”
Fang Zesheng didn’t look at him, instead glancing toward the old woman tending her stall at the village entrance. “Supporting that old woman’s business. I bought it on a whim.”
Fu Jingxuan could roughly feel that the pin was carved with a small Jade Rabbit embracing the moon; given the date, wearing it was quite fitting for the occasion. Since it was still early, Fu Jingxuan pushed Fang Zesheng back into the city and visited a newly opened flower and bird market. Along the way, he chatted about nothing in particular, doing everything he could to stall for time, only turning back toward the Fang residence once the moon had climbed the branches.
Fang Zesheng knew in his heart that Fu Jingxuan had prepared a surprise and did not expose him. He allowed himself to be led around on this day-long excursion while secretly guessing countless possibilities in his mind.
Might he give him a jade disc?
Perhaps a few calligraphy brushes?
Or maybe a brand-new set of tea-whisking tools?
Surely, he wouldn’t hand him two crates full of lowbrow street story books or some improper erotic illustrations, right?
Fang Zesheng remained expressionless, but his heart was already restless with the desire to see exactly what kind of surprise Fu Jingxuan had prepared after stalling for so long.
Even if it were erotic art, he would accept it; however, if such a gift were placed alongside that hand-copied volume of “The Classic of Tea,” it would be somewhat inappropriate. It seemed he would need to prepare an excellent chest to store it properly.
Fang Zesheng was fully intent on returning to the inner courtyard to see his gift, but Fu Jingxuan pushed him past the main gates and arrived at the garden behind the outer residence.
This garden was personally constructed by Fang Changru. In the spring and summer, it was filled with bluestone, green grass, bamboo shadows, and floral terraces. Though it was somewhat desolate now, one could still see the upright bamboo trees towering toward the clouds. Fang Changru was a man of refined taste who understood aesthetic pleasure; in addition to planting many flowers and trees in the garden, he had also used mountain rocks to pile up a high terrace. By walking up a narrow staircase with only one person wide, one could “reach up to scoop the moon” and “pluck the stars with one’s hand.”
When Fu Jingxuan came to the Fang residence as a child, he loved climbing to this spot most of all. During the day, he could sprawl flat on the stone slabs to sunbathe, and at night, he could sit side-by-side with Fang Zesheng, looking out at the lamplit homes within Chuzhou City.
However, since Fang Zesheng’s legs were crippled, this place has become inaccessible. Even with a wheelchair or someone carrying him on their back, it was very difficult to ascend the narrow stairs; not to mention several points along the way required bending over, making it even more challenging.
“The moon is full tonight; why don’t we go up and take a look?” Fu Jingxuan said to Fang Zesheng when looking toward the heights with a beaming smile.
Fang Zesheng was stunned for a long while. He never could have imagined that Fu Jingxuan had actually constructed a stable “cloud ramp” for him leading up to this high terrace. Though the ramp was high, it did not go straight up and down; even the elderly mute uncle would not find it particularly strenuous to push a wheelchair up it.
On the viewing platform, two boxes of mooncakes, two pots of sweet wine, and the two redundant portions of fried sesame balls had already been laid out.
Fu Jingxuan pushed Fang Zesheng up and helped him sit on a cattail hassock by the table. He then sat opposite him, and glancing at the items on the table. He realized one of the portions was prepared by Fang Zesheng. He poured him a cup of sweet wine and said with a smile, “I scoop the celestial moon into my cup to gift it to the one in my heart.”
Fang Zesheng took the cup and had a shallow sip.
Suddenly, a silver stream of light rose from the ground and burst with a “bang,” blooming into ten thousand sparks of fireworks against the early night sky.
Fu Jingxuan was startled. Gazing up at the full moon and the Milky Way, then down at the sea of lanterns in the mortal world below, he found himself encircled by the bursting fireworks from his high terrace perch. He stared, mesmerized, for a long while.
“This is…” He turned to look at Fang Zesheng only to see that Fang Zesheng had also poured him a cup of sweet wine. He reached out and took it.
Once he finished drinking, Fang Zesheng turned his gaze back to the night sky. Amidst the succession of thunderous booms, he spoke a sentence in a deep, heavy voice.
He thought Fu Jingxuan hadn’t heard him, but he didn’t realize that Fu Jingxuan had been watching him with his head tilted the whole time, reading his lips to recite that sentence word for word.
“On this night of the Mid-Autumn full moon, I wish to gather all the elegance of this moment and offer it entirely… to my wife.”
