Chapter 86 — The Country Estate

Dou Yan stared at Ji Yong in astonishment.

She had not expected such attentiveness from him.

Ji Yong grinned with a teasing glint in his eye. "Rest easy. I will keep your secret—I certainly won't tell my aunt."

Dou Yan laughed.

She considered her words. "Aunt Cui was always in excellent health. But two years ago, when she went out to the vegetable plot to pick melons, she suddenly collapsed there. If not for someone attending her, I fear she would have..."

Ji Yong listened, then said thoughtfully, "Show me the prescription the doctor wrote at the time."

Dou Yan replied apologetically, "Aunt Cui was living at the country estate then. By the time we heard and brought her back to the county, the prescription was long since lost."

Ji Yong clasped his hands behind his back and paced a few turns around the side room. "I vaguely recall a medical text describing a robust peasant woman who dropped dead without warning, her symptoms much like Aunt Cui's. The final diagnosis was wind-heat pathogen invading the exterior..."

Dou Yan's spirits lifted. "Was any treatment given?"

"A calm mind and moderation in food and drink," Ji Yong said. "Nourishment must come first, with dietary therapy as support." He went on, "What does Aunt Cui usually like to eat? Heavy, greasy foods are bad for her, and do not provoke her temper—nothing is worse for her than sudden great joy or great anger."

Dou Chu answered each question in turn.

Ji Yong then went with Dou Yan to the kitchen, where they picked out everything their grandmother must not eat. The two spent half an hour there before returning to the room.

Ji Shi looked at their empty hands in surprise. "Where is the medicine you were brewing?"

Oh no—they had forgotten all about it.

The two exchanged a glance. But Dou Yan at once thought of some excuse about an overturned pot—before she could speak, however, Ji Yong said, "I read that brewing method in a book and never had occasion to try it. This time I finally found my chance to use it, and who would have guessed it would prove worse than the ordinary way? The whole batch burned in the pot."

Ji Shi and their grandmother burst out laughing.

Dou Yan muttered inwardly, A man like this—why did I have not the slightest impression of him in my former life? What exactly happened to him? Or did I simply overlook something?

For a moment, she grew curious as to why Ji Yong had not continued to sit the metropolitan examination.

Ji Shi quietly told her, "This nephew of mine could speak before he could walk, and could recite texts before he had the strength to hold a brush. Grandfather treasured him like a precious jewel and taught him to read and write himself, and he did not disappoint—by a young age he already had a literary reputation. Precisely because of this, he understood nothing of the ways of the world and could not manage daily life without the servants about him. 'To see clearly into worldly affairs is itself learning; to master human feeling is itself composition.' Grandfather said that with a temperament like his, he might do well at scholarship, but should he enter officialdom, he would likely fare worse than even a petty clerk. Moreover, our family has produced both an imperial tutor and a grand secretary, and already draws every eye; the title of top examinee is one we can well do without. Let him go out and gain experience, learn the ways of the world before returning to his studies—then his writing will have vigor, will have a knight's spirit, and will be truly good writing."

Dou Yan was half convinced. "I think Cousin Ji is perfectly fine!"

He was kind even to the maids and serving boys about him, and he had helped her take their grandmother's pulse.

Ji Shi was rather stumped by this remark.

She hemmed and hawed a while before murmuring, "You will understand in time," then turned the conversation to Cui's health and let the matter drop.

Dou Yan grew all the more interested in Ji Yong.

Just then, Gao Xing came in beaming with delight to report, "Du An says he is returning to the capital tomorrow."

Du An had been sent back by Wang Shuying to help the Wang family deal with the property they had left in Nanwa.

Gao Xing had been puzzled at the time. "His Excellency Wang is a frontier governor now—surely he has someone to manage his estates?"

"A strong dragon cannot crush a local snake," Dou Yan said drily. "Du An was born in Zhending and raised there. At eight he entered the household as a servant, and by the time he went to the capital he was already a steward of some standing, with wide connections and a broad web of contacts. With his help, they will surely sell for a couple of coppers more than anyone else could get."

Gao Xing trusted Dou Yan above all others, and a few days later sent a sharp young servant to inquire; the Wang family's fine fields had indeed fetched a very high price. Gao Xing clicked his tongue in admiration. "The Fourth Miss is truly formidable!" Yet he also guarded against Du An playing him false on Du Ning's behalf, and went about in daily fear of some trouble breaking out. Fortunately Du An was kept busy, and only occasionally offered Du Ning a pointer or two; with Dou Yan at his back, no one dared oppose him openly, and those pointers came to nothing. Every matter of the West Dou household remained firmly and orderly in his grasp.

Dou Yan reckoned it was time Du An went back.

Linger any longer, and he might find no place left to stand in the capital.

Gao Xing said, "Eldest Miss, shall I see Steward Du off?"

"See him off? Whatever for?" Dou Yan said coolly. "Did he give us any greeting when he came? Since he had no need of your welcome, he surely has no need of your farewell."

Gao Xing nodded again and again.

Dou Yan instructed him, "Have a carriage prepared for me. I am going to the country estate tomorrow."

Gao Xing smiled. "Old Chen is back?"

Chen Yanzhou's public identity was that of the newly hired accountant at Dou Yan's stationery shop. He lodged at the country estate and went to the capital once a month to reconcile the accounts with Fan Wenshu; Dou Yan therefore often went to the estate to learn from Chen Yanzhou how the capital shop was faring—though in truth it was to seek his tutelage in her studies and to ask after the news of the capital.

"Yes!" Dou Yan said, and thought of the capital shop.

Fan Wenshu had no experience running a stationery shop, but he had ability. Within a month of reaching the capital he had used the Dou family connections to smooth over every obstacle, and three months after opening, the shop had turned its losses around to break even.

Dou Yan had not opened the shop to make money in the first place, and now that business had picked up, she was not a stingy sort. She had agreed with Fan Wenshu that if the year ended in profit, he might take a tenth of it.

Fan Wenshu was overjoyed and threw himself into the shop's affairs with even greater zeal. Whenever Chen Yanzhou came to reconcile the accounts, he entertained him warmly, telling him all he knew of whatever interested him and holding nothing back—a great help to Chen Yanzhou.

She wondered what news Old Chen had brought this time.

Dou Yan mused on it, reported the plan to her grandmother, and early the next morning set out for the country estate with Sujuan, the Bie sisters, and several guards.

Chen Yanzhou had already brewed a pot of Biluochun and was waiting for her.

Dou Yan cradled the cup of clear, emerald-green tea and could not help praising it. "Excellent tea."

Chen Yanzhou listened, smiled, and refilled her cup with tea. "I have more good news for you, young mistress."

Dou Yan raised an eyebrow.

"At the start of the month," Chen Yanzhou said, "your honored father was summoned before the throne by imperial decree and received commendation."

Whatever sort of man her father might be, his scholarship was sound enough.

Dou Chi took it as a matter of course.