Chapter 7 - A Girl Named Xiaowan

 

Ma Rulong was drunk. When one was drinking with the people he could trust, it was quite easy to get drunk, and he trusted Dawan and Yu Five.

When one was heavy-hearted, suffering from injustice, it was also easy to get drunk. Although he believed that this wrong would one day be righted, he couldn't help feeling gloomy.

If one drank wine using big bowls, and if he drank bowl after bowl relentlessly, he would always get drunk.

He had been drinking for two, three days, and so he was hammered. And when one was in this state, whatever he said or did, he wouldn't remember very clearly. Even if he did remember, it would be fuzzy like a dream, or like somebody else said it, or did it, rather than himself.

He seemed to remember himself saying something that made him jump out of his skin when thinking about it right now. At that time, everybody had been boozed up. He'd grabbed Dawan's hand and said, "Will you marry me?"

Dawan had laughed. She'd laughed non-stop, until running out of breath. Then she'd asked, "Why do you want me to marry you?"

"Because I know you are very good to me. Because while other people all suspect me, treat me like I'm the worst of all the murderers, and try to kill me, you trust me. You are the only one who's willing to help me."

Ma Rulong had spoken his heart. When one was drunk like this, he always spoke what he truly felt.

But Dawan hadn't believed him. "You only want to marry me because you are drunk. Wait until you sober up, you'll regret it."

She'd laughed, but not without a twinge of pain in her voice. "Wait until you see a girl prettier than me, you'll want to kill yourself out of regret."

She'd said, "I'm all ugly, and strange, and wicked. There are countless girls who are prettier than me."

Now that he was sober, he couldn't remember if Dawan had agreed to his proposal. He couldn't help asking himself, "If she said yes, am I or am I not already regretting it? Right now, do I still want to marry her?"

But he had no answers to these questions.

Then he saw a girl, a girl who was far prettier than Dawan.

When he woke up, he was not in that kitchen, and Yu Five and Da Wan were suddenly nowhere in sight. He found himself lying in a quite small but soft bed, which was also perfumed and very comfortable. This bed was placed in a small but very clean, very cosy, and very sweet-scented room.

In this room, one could see a few flower trees outside a window. Beneath the window was a tiny dressing table. On the dressing table was a tiny bronze mirror. By the mirror was a vase of plum blossoms. And standing by the plum blossoms was this girl.

The plum blossoms were elegant and magnificent, and so was this girl. And like the flowers, she was delicately beautiful. But although she was dressed in red, her face was actually bluish pale. While her eyes were bright and beautiful, they looked unspeakably melancholy.

She was looking at Ma Rulong. She was looking at him with very strange lights in her eyes, as if she was half-curious and half-afraid. Ma Rulong was having a hangover. He couldn't recognize the girl, nor did he know how he himself got here.

Suddenly the girl asked, "Are you Young Master Ma, the ‘White Horse Master' Ma Rulong?"

Ma Rulong replied, "Yes, I am."

"Did you go to the Winter Plum Valley a few days ago?" The girl asked.

"I did," said Ma Rulong.

The girl asked, "Did you see Qiu Fengcheng?"

But Ma Rulong said, "Do you know him too?"

The girl nodded. Her brows creased with sorrow. She softly said, "My last name is Su, my given name Xiaowan. You wanted to see me."

"What is this place here?" Then he finally asked, "How did I get here?"

"A certain ‘Master Five' brought you here." She chose to answer his second question first.

Then, to explain why she sheltered a drunk, male stranger, she said, "Master Five said that you were Qiu Fengcheng's friend and that only you knew where he was."

Ma Rulong forced a smile. Yu Five was still able to deliver him here. A drunk man certainly couldn't do such thing. He had never thought that anyone could drink him under the table. He suddenly discovered that he'd been overestimating himself.

He politely asked, "This is your home?"

Xiaowan replied, "I don't have a home. This place can't be called home."

Ma Rulong understood what she meant.

Of course a home was not just a house. No matter how beautiful a house was, a house and a home still were not the same thing.

Xiaowan said, "I used to work at the Garden of Joy in town as a.. ..a prostitute. Since I was young I've never had a father or a mother. Fengcheng got me out of that place and bought this house for me."

She let out a smile, a smile that revealed her unspeakable pains. Then she continued, "But if he's not here, how will this place ever be home again?"

Ma Rulong let out a sigh and said, "I didn't know he was such a passionate person!"

For a youngster from a famous, aristocratic family like Qiu Fengcheng to be crazily in love with such a worn woman like her, it was really extremely touching.

Xiaowan said, "Even though he's hard and unyielding, he's actually a good person, and he's never allowed wrongs to go unrighted."

Speaking of Qiu Fengcheng, her eyes were filled with soft emotions. She continued, "He's been so good. He's done everything for me. And he's never been reckless with me, a woman like this..

I've got a chance to be with a man like him, I.. I can die content."

Ma Rulong said, "You two are still young, how can you die?"

Xiaowan let out a bitter smile, "Had you come a little later, you wouldn't have seen me."

Ma Rulong suddenly recalled how Qiu Fengcheng had dug that hole in the ground.

Xiaowan said, "Before leaving, he promised me he'd come back last night at the latest."

Ma Rulong asked, "What if he never comes back?"

Downhearted, Xiaowan said, "That means he's already left this world. I will certainly accompany him in death."

Even though her voice was soft, it was filled with an irreversible determination to die. They had sworn an oath to be together in life and in death.

Ma Rulong kept his mouth shut. He didn't know where Qiu Fengcheng was either. At the time Peng Tianba, Feng Chaofan, and the merciless monk were pursuing him, Qiu Fengcheng certainly wasn't with them.

Although he didn't die from Jin Zhenlin's spear, his injury was surely not light. Where could a severely wounded man have gone to?"

On that day they all went to the Winter Plum Valley because of Madame Jasper's appointment. Did she show up there afterwards? Did she take Qiu Fengcheng with her to the Jasper mountain village?

Ma Rulong was not sure.

Xiaowan stared at him, waiting for him to reply. He actually couldn't speak his mind, not wanting to hurt this passionate girl even more.

Xiaowan let out a soft sigh. She said, "I know if he's still alive, he'll return. Why are you deceiving me?"

Ma Rulong said, "I.. .."

Xiaowan didn't let him speak. She interrupted, "You actually can't fool me. I know this – he and I have been in love. That's good enough for me."

Her manner suddenly became cold. She said, "It's going to be dark very soon. Familiarity between a man and a woman is frowned upon. I don't dare to delay Master Ma."

As soon as she said this, there was no way one could prolong the conversation.

Ma Rulong could only leave. But just before departing, he actually said, "I understand your determination and I won't force you. But I do hope you can wait for three days. Within these three days, I can definitely tell you more about Qiu Fengcheng."

Xiaowan hesitated. Then she finally complied, "Good. I'll wait for three days."

The sky had turned dark. Xiaowan's house stood at the mouth of a long, narrow alley. Ma Rulong pulled up the collar of his gown before stepping out into the wind.

He had wanted to find Xiaowan because he needed to confirm if Qiu Fengcheng was telling the truth on that day. He didn't really doubt Qiu Fengcheng but he really had no other clue. Just like a drowning person, he had to hold on tight to whatever he saw at hand.

Now that he had confirmed that Qiu Fengcheng was really a sentimental person, their love actually moved him. He wanted to help them. He hoped that he could find out the whereabouts of Qiu Fengcheng within three days.

He hoped he could help reunite this pair of lovers.

Still, he felt as if something was not right but he couldn't quite put his finger on it. He always thought there was something too little and too much about that house of Xiaowan. But what was missing? What was too much? He really couldn't say.

Had Dawan woken up by now? Was she having a hangover headache like he was? He suddenly realized that he was missing her. This unbelievably strange, ugly, irrational girl appeared to have some loveable traits.

What a pity that he didn't know where she was from, nor did he know where she had gone to. They met by accident. Naturally, they would go their own separate ways. Maybe he would never see her again. Ma Rulong let out a sigh, deciding that he would no longer think about her.

It was late winter. As the end of the year was drawing near, each and every family had to buy New Year's clothes and other items. At this time, everybody had money in his pocket and was busy making transactions. Just outside the alley, there was also a tiny flower market. Daffodils and wintersweets were just blooming for the occasion.

A petty merchant's wife and her young maid had just come back from shopping for New Year's items – needle mushrooms, wooden ear mushrooms, red jujubes, white fruits, maidenhair ferns, and bamboo shoots – which were all packed in a basket. That girl was holding the basket in her hand but her eyes were actually fixed on a branch of plum blossoms. Would there be any girl of fifteen, sixteen who didn't like pretty things? How could one not like the bright and fragrant plum blossoms?

The girl couldn't bear it. She asked, "Mistress, should we buy a few branches of plum blossoms?"

"No." The mistress in silk replied firmly, with a stern face.

The young maid was not discouraged. She asked, "These flowers aren't expensive. Why don't we buy some so we can look at them at home?"

"Because I'm not in the mood."

With a sigh that young maid muttered, "Mistress is really too much. Master has only been away for a few days and she isn't in the mood to look at flowers."

Although the maid didn't get what she wanted, she could still backtalk before following that moody mistress home. This was a trivial matter, and nobody paid attention to them.

But Ma Rulong actually did.

The wife of a petty merchant had a young maid by her side. Considering Qiu Fengcheng's family background and how he'd treated her, how come Xiaowan didn't have any servant in her house?

And there was a vase of plum blossoms on that small dressing table. The flowers were freshly cut.

If Ma Rulong hadn't shown up, she would have killed herself for love. How come she'd been in the mood to cut flowers?

Now he knew what was wrong with that room. It lacked a young maid. And that vase of flowers shouldn't be there.

So he turned around. Most people who lived in this alley were petty merchant families. Xiaowan's house was larger than theirs, with higher walls. The gate was made of hard and thick wooden planks, with a lock on the inside.

But if Ma Rulong wanted to go in, it really was not difficult.

He could have jumped over this kind of walls in his teens. In Jianghu, the Hall of Celestial Horse ranked extremely high for its lightness kungfu and sword techniques. He suspected Xiaowan hiding something from him, he should have just jumped over the wall to investigate her secrets. He also knew that if he wanted to see someone's true colors, he had to look when that person didn't realize he was there.

Too bad he couldn't do it. He'd never done it before, and never would.

He decided to knock on the door. But just when he was about to knock, he suddenly heard a strange sound.

He'd heard someone laughing. A laugh itself was certainly not strange. Although bad things did often happen in the world, people would still hear someone laugh, everywhere.

The strange thing here was that this was a man's laugh. Besides, it came from inside this house, which Qiu Fengcheng bought for Xiaowan. There was only one person – Xiaowan – in there, how could there be a man laughing?

The night was quiet, and so was the alley. Although it was a short laugh, he heard it very clearly.

Everybody, who had been involved in this matter, died a violent death, one by one.

Some people laughed before killing.

Right now, was it someone trying to kill Xiaowan to silence her?

Ma Rulong was no longer worried about scruples. He jumped over the wall.

Inside that room, a big fire was blazing, and a window was left open. Hiding in a pine tree outside, he could see through the window that Xiaowan was standing in the room.

Ma Rulong jumped in from the other side of the wall. It so happened that he fell onto this pine tree. He didn't want to violate people's privacy. But.. .. he had already seen them. He saw Xiaowan, and a man.

He could not see the man's face.

This man had

She'd said, "I'm all ugly, and strange, and wicked. There are countless girls who are prettier than me."

Now that he was sober, he couldn't remember if Dawan had agreed to his proposal. He couldn't help asking himself, "If she said yes, am I or am I not already regretting it? Right now, do I still want to marry her?"

But he had no answers to these questions.

Then he saw a girl, a girl who was far prettier than Dawan.

When he woke up, he was not in that kitchen, and Yu Five and Da Wan were suddenly nowhere in sight. He found himself lying in a quite small but soft bed, which was also perfumed and very comfortable. This bed was placed in a small but very clean, very cosy, and very sweet-scented room.

In this room, one could see a few flower trees outside a window. Beneath the window was a tiny dressing table. On the dressing table was a tiny bronze mirror. By the mirror was a vase of plum blossoms. And standing by the plum blossoms was this girl.

The plum blossoms were elegant and magnificent, and so was this girl. And like the flowers, she was delicately beautiful. But although she was dressed in red, her face was actually bluish pale. While her eyes were bright and beautiful, they looked unspeakably melancholy.

She was looking at Ma Rulong. She was looking at him with very strange lights in her eyes, as if she was half-curious and half-afraid. Ma Rulong was having a hangover. He couldn't recognize the girl, nor did he know how he himself got here.

Suddenly the girl asked, "Are you Young Master Ma, the ‘White Horse Master' Ma Rulong?"

Ma Rulong replied, "Yes, I am."

"Did you go to the Winter Plum Valley a few days ago?" The girl asked.

"I did," said Ma Rulong.

The girl asked, "Did you see Qiu Fengcheng?"

But Ma Rulong said, "Do you know him too?"

The girl nodded. Her brows creased with sorrow. She softly said, "My last name is Su, my given name Xiaowan. You wanted to see me."

"What is this place here?" Then he finally asked, "How did I get here?"

"A certain ‘Master Five' brought you here." She chose to answer his second question first.

Then, to explain why she sheltered a drunk, male stranger, she said, "Master Five said that you were Qiu Fengcheng's friend and that only you knew where he was."

Ma Rulong forced a smile. Yu Five was still able to deliver him here. A drunk man certainly couldn't do such thing. He had never thought that anyone could drink him under the table. He suddenly discovered that he'd been overestimating himself.

He politely asked, "This is your home?"

Xiaowan replied, "I don't have a home. This place can't be called home."

Ma Rulong understood what she meant.

Of course a home was not just a house. No matter how beautiful a house was, a house and a home still were not the same thing.

Xiaowan said, "I used to work at the Garden of Joy in town as a.. ..a prostitute. Since I was young I've never had a father or a mother. Fengcheng got me out of that place and bought this house for me."

She let out a smile, a smile that revealed her unspeakable pains. Then she continued, "But if he's not here, how will this place ever be home again?"

Ma Rulong let out a sigh and said, "I didn't know he was such a passionate person!"

For a youngster from a famous, aristocratic family like Qiu Fengcheng to be crazily in love with such a worn woman like her, it was really extremely touching.

Xiaowan said, "Even though he's hard and unyielding, he's actually a good person, and he's never allowed wrongs to go unrighted."

Speaking of Qiu Fengcheng, her eyes were filled with soft emotions. She continued, "He's been so good. He's done everything for me. And he's never been reckless with me, a woman like this..

I've got a chance to be with a man like him, I.. I can die content."

Ma Rulong said, "You two are still young, how can you die?"

Xiaowan let out a bitter smile, "Had you come a little later, you wouldn't have seen me."

Ma Rulong suddenly recalled how Qiu Fengcheng had dug that hole in the ground.

Xiaowan said, "Before leaving, he promised me he'd come back last night at the latest."

Ma Rulong asked, "What if he never comes back?"

Downhearted, Xiaowan said, "That means he's already left this world. I will certainly accompany him in death."

Even though her voice was soft, it was filled with an irreversible determination to die. They had sworn an oath to be together in life and in death.

Ma Rulong kept his mouth shut. He didn't know where Qiu Fengcheng was either. At the time Peng Tianba, Feng Chaofan, and the merciless monk were pursuing him, Qiu Fengcheng certainly wasn't with them.

Although he didn't die from Jin Zhenlin's spear, his injury was surely not light. Where could a severely wounded man have gone to?"

On that day they all went to the Winter Plum Valley because of Madame Jasper's appointment. Did she show up there afterwards? Did she take Qiu Fengcheng with her to the Jasper mountain village?

Ma Rulong was not sure.

Xiaowan stared at him, waiting for him to reply. He actually couldn't speak his mind, not wanting to hurt this passionate girl even more.

Xiaowan let out a soft sigh. She said, "I know if he's still alive, he'll return. Why are you deceiving me?"

Ma Rulong said, "I.. .."

Xiaowan didn't let him speak. She interrupted, "You actually can't fool me. I know this – he and I have been in love. That's good enough for me."

Her manner suddenly became cold. She said, "It's going to be dark very soon. Familiarity between a man and a woman is frowned upon. I don't dare to delay Master Ma."

As soon as she said this, there was no way one could prolong the conversation.

Ma Rulong could only leave. But just before departing, he actually said, "I understand your determination and I won't force you. But I do hope you can wait for three days. Within these three days, I can definitely tell you more about Qiu Fengcheng."

Xiaowan hesitated. Then she finally complied, "Good. I'll wait for three days."

The sky had turned dark. Xiaowan's house stood at the mouth of a long, narrow alley. Ma Rulong pulled up the collar of his gown before stepping out into the wind.

He had wanted to find Xiaowan because he needed to confirm if Qiu Fengcheng was telling the truth on that day. He didn't really doubt Qiu Fengcheng but he really had no other clue. Just like a drowning person, he had to hold on tight to whatever he saw at hand.

Now that he had confirmed that Qiu Fengcheng was really a sentimental person, their love actually moved him. He wanted to help them. He hoped that he could find out the whereabouts of Qiu Fengcheng within three days.

He hoped he could help reunite this pair of lovers.

Still, he felt as if something was not right but he couldn't quite put his finger on it. He always thought there was something too little and too much about that house of Xiaowan. But what was missing? What was too much? He really couldn't say.

Had Dawan woken up by now? Was she having a hangover headache like he was? He suddenly realized that he was missing her. This unbelievably strange, ugly, irrational girl appeared to have some loveable traits.

What a pity that he didn't know where she was from, nor did he know where she had gone to. They met by accident. Naturally, they would go their own separate ways. Maybe he would never see her again. Ma Rulong let out a sigh, deciding that he would no longer think about her.

It was late winter. As the end of the year was drawing near, each and every family had to buy New Year's clothes and other items. At this time, everybody had money in his pocket and was busy making transactions. Just outside the alley, there was also a tiny flower market. Daffodils and wintersweets were just blooming for the occasion.

A petty merchant's wife and her young maid had just come back from shopping for New Year's items – needle mushrooms, wooden ear mushrooms, red jujubes, white fruits, maidenhair ferns, and bamboo shoots – which were all packed in a basket. That girl was holding the basket in her hand but her eyes were actually fixed on a branch of plum blossoms. Would there be any girl of fifteen, sixteen who didn't like pretty things? How could one not like the bright and fragrant plum blossoms?

The girl couldn't bear it. She asked, "Mistress, should we buy a few branches of plum blossoms?"

"No." The mistress in silk replied firmly, with a stern face.

The young maid was not discouraged. She asked, "These flowers aren't expensive. Why don't we buy some so we can look at them at home?"

"Because I'm not in the mood."

With a sigh that young maid muttered, "Mistress is really too much. Master has only been away for a few days and she isn't in the mood to look at flowers."

Although the maid didn't get what she wanted, she could still backtalk before following that moody mistress home. This was a trivial matter, and nobody paid attention to them.

But Ma Rulong actually did.

The wife of a petty merchant had a young maid by her side. Considering Qiu Fengcheng's family background and how he'd treated her, how come Xiaowan didn't have any servant in her house?

And there was a vase of plum blossoms on that small dressing table. The flowers were freshly cut.

If Ma Rulong hadn't shown up, she would have killed herself for love. How come she'd been in the mood to cut flowers?

Now he knew what was wrong with that room. It lacked a young maid. And that vase of flowers shouldn't be there.

So he turned around. Most people who lived in this alley were petty merchant families. Xiaowan's house was larger than theirs, with higher walls. The gate was made of hard and thick wooden planks, with a lock on the inside.

But if Ma Rulong wanted to go in, it really was not difficult.

He could have jumped over this kind of walls in his teens. In Jianghu, the Hall of Celestial Horse ranked extremely high for its lightness kungfu and sword techniques. He suspected Xiaowan hiding something from him, he should have just jumped over the wall to investigate her secrets. He also knew that if he wanted to see someone's true colors, he had to look when that person didn't realize he was there.

Too bad he couldn't do it. He'd never done it before, and never would.

He decided to knock on the door. But just when he was about to knock, he suddenly heard a strange sound.

He'd heard someone laughing. A laugh itself was certainly not strange. Although bad things did often happen in the world, people would still hear someone laugh, everywhere.

The strange thing here was that this was a man's laugh. Besides, it came from inside this house, which Qiu Fengcheng bought for Xiaowan. There was only one person – Xiaowan – in there, how could there be a man laughing?

The night was quiet, and so was the alley. Although it was a short laugh, he heard it very clearly.

Everybody, who had been involved in this matter, died a violent death, one by one.

Some people laughed before killing.

Right now, was it someone trying to kill Xiaowan to silence her?

Ma Rulong was no longer worried about scruples. He jumped over the wall.

Inside that room, a big fire was blazing, and a window was left open. Hiding in a pine tree outside, he could see through the window that Xiaowan was standing in the room.

Ma Rulong jumped in from the other side of the wall. It so happened that he fell onto this pine tree. He didn't want to violate people's privacy. But.. .. he had already seen them. He saw Xiaowan, and a man.

He could not see the man's face.

This man had his back to the window. Facing Xiaowan, he was reclining on a soft chair.

Ma Rulong could only see a foot hanging from the chair. On this foot was a really very elegant boot, the kind that was worn only by distinguished, extravagant gentlemen.

Xiaowan was standing in front of that man. She gave him a very strange look. Suddenly, she coldly said, "Do you really want me to die?"

In the same tone the man replied, "Do you think I wouldn't dare? Do you think I'm afraid of you?"

Xiaowan said, "Good. You want me to die. I'll show you."