Before dinner, Yu Shu strolls to the East Courtyard alone. She avoids people all the way and observes the topography around the pond that caught her attention. She also appreciates a group of live carps swimming happily in the pond. Satisfied, she returns to the yard when it gets dark.
After eating wonton on the street, Yu Shu only drinks half a bowl of porridge for dinner. Watching Yu Xiaoxiu, whose face has turned yellow, gulps the soup, gnaws the flatbread, and eats a small plate of pickled vegetables, she feels upset. She really wishes that the bowl of wonton she ate in the evening goes into Yu Xiaoxiu's stomach.
She has no money to let Yu Xiaoxiu eat well now, and she doesn't want him to make do with it when he is growing up, so she can only think of a crooked idea.
Yu Xiaoxiu doesn't know what Yu Shu is thinking about. After dinner, he cleans up the bowls and chopsticks and goes out to wash his face and sleep. The ancient times are not like the modern times. There are fewer entertainment activities. At night, the poor can only turn off the lights and sleep.
Yu Shu washes her face behind Yu Xiaoxiu's head and brushes her teeth carefully with a willow branch. She goes back to bed, disheveled her hair and combed it over and over again with a broken comb. She always feels that this long hair is troublesome, but it feels quite comfortable when she washes it and dries it. The long hair drapes over her shoulders and hangs over her chest. When she shakes it, her beautiful hair is like a waterfall, very elegant. She feels good about herself and satisfies Yu Shu's maiden feelings that have been forgotten in some corner.
"Are you done? I'm going to blow out the light." Yu Xiaoxiu closes the door and unbolts it from the inside. He turns his head and sees Yu Shu showing off. He curls his lips and goes over to turn off the light.
"Hmm." Yu Shu is not afraid of the dark. She squeaks and throws away the comb. She pulls the quilt and lies in it. Then she pulls down the curtain.
With a whoosh, the light went out. Yu Shu closed her eyes. She heard Yu Xiaoxiu lie down with a thud and turn over. After a while, she said,
"Xiaoxiu, let's go out to play in a few days, okay?"
"Going out to play?"
"That's right. I'm either cooped up at home or in private schools. I want to go somewhere else. Why don't you come with me?"
After a moment of silence, she said, "I have to go to the private school in the morning, and you have to work in the afternoon."
"It doesn't matter. I'll talk to the shopkeeper. It's fine to rest for a day. Are you going?"
"… Yes."
"Hehe, then I'll find a day when I'm free. Let's go out and play. Let's sleep."
"Oh."
Yu Xiaoxiu turned over and lay on his side. Across half of the room, he looked at the blurry figure on the opposite bed. He closed his eyes, opened them again, closed them again, and opened them again. After confirming that there is indeed a person lying on the bed and not just him in this small room, he closed his eyes again after a while.
His sister has really changed. It's really good like this. It doesn't matter if life is a little hard, at least there is someone willing to accompany me.
***
Yu Shu almost woke up late. Hearing the rooster crowing at the back of the room, she turned over and almost fell asleep again. She pinched her thigh hard, gritted her teeth, and sat up on the bed. She looked at the window and saw that the sky outside was dark. It was just past midnight.
She quietly put on her clothes and tied her hair into a ponytail. She tucked the pillow under the quilt and felt around for something under the bed. She tiptoed over to the door and saw that Yu Xiaoxiu was quiet. She gently moved the stool that was blocking the door and opened the door to leave.
There is still no light, and it is very cold outside. Fortunately, she had the foresight to wear an extra layer of clothes.
The door of the kitchen in the corner of the courtyard is open. After Yu Shu went in, she rummaged on the stove for a long time before she found the flour and wheat bran. She wrapped a little with paper, took a bucket and a shoulder pole, went around the back of the house, and picked up a few chicken feathers from the place where the chickens often walked.
At this time, even the servants in the main kitchen who make breakfast are asleep. It is quiet inside and outside the courtyard. Yu Shu walked alone on the road to the East Courtyard. It is dark, but she is not afraid. She just feels cold on her neck because of the breeze. She shrunk her head and trotted for a while before her body warms up.
Avoiding the main road, Yu Shu did not meet the patrolling servants. When she reached the edge of the small pond in the garden, there is a faint white light in the sky. She climbed the long corridor, stepped on the lawn, and walked to the edge of the pond. She squatted down, put down the bucket, and took out something to make bait.
The fish in the pond have just woken up, and they are swimming slowly. The water is clear, and some images can be seen at the bottom of the pond.
Fish in spring love the smell of fish, especially carps and crucian carps. A little sticky shrimp skin, and a layer of wheat bran, is ready-made bait. Yu Shu had a friend who studied finance in the past who liked fishing very much. Occasionally, he would take a few people to the wild pond in the countryside to fish. Yu Shu followed them and was bitten by many insects, so she learned something.
After making the bait, she takes out the rope hook she prepared yesterday, wraps the rope on one end of the shoulder pole, and ties it to the hole. She also ties half a chicken feather on the red rope as a float. Fortunately, it is the spring time for fish to spawn, and fish like to swim near the water. She can catch it without a long pole.
It is the best time to fish at this time. Domestic fish need to be fed by people, and they are the hungriest when it is almost dawn. Domestic fish are much more stupid than wild fish, and they will come to fish as long as you give them fragrant bait. It is the best time to fish here at this time.
Looking at the chicken feather floating on the water, Yu Shu has begun to plan how to eat the first fish. Braised? Steamed? Barbecued?
A gust of wind blows, and she holds her breath to hold back a sneeze. Half a chicken feather on the water moves.
***
At dawn, Yu Shu hides the bucket with two carps in the weeds outside the courtyard. She doesn't know how the fish in the pond are carefully raised. They have red backs and silver waists, are very beautiful, big, fat, and silly. These two fish are squeezed in a wooden bucket, and they don't know that their good days are coming to an end. They are still chasing each other and flirting with each other.
Thinking that these silly fish are raised in Old Lady Ji's yard, Yu Shu's revenge is really satisfied.
"You hit me with 20 rattans, so I will eat 20 of your fish. One fish for each time. Just right."
After hiding the fish, Yu Shu hides at the gate of the yard. When no one passes by, she sneaks in and leaves the shoulder pole and the bucket by the well. She enters the house, takes off her dirty clothes and puts them under the bed. Then she sneaks into bed. As soon as she lies down, she hears Yu Xiaoxiu talking in a daze.
"Are you awake?"
Yu Shu doesn't say anything. After a while, she hears Yu Xiaoxiu get up. Before breakfast, Yu Shu goes back to sleep. When Yu Xiaoxiu wakes her up, it is already dawn.
"Eat first, then change the dressing. If you have to do heavy work in Jing Shang Tang, do it slowly. I will go and replace you after school." After leaving these words, Yu Xiaoxiu takes his schoolbag and leaves. The brother and sister are four years apart, and he seems to be the older one.
After breakfast, Yu Shu doesn't hurry to go out. Instead, she takes out the two books she seized in Vientiane Street the day before yesterday. One is Qimen and the other is Yi Suan. She prepares a brush and ink. While reading, she scribbles some words that she doesn't know. She is going to ask Cao Zixin in the afternoon.
When the sun comes out, she cleans up the table, puts the book Qimen, closes the door and goes to the West Courtyard.
Today, there are only three people keeping records in Jing Shang Tang. The old Taoist who was sleeping on the bamboo bed in the corner is gone. The bed is still there, but no one knows where he went.
Yesterday, she cleaned more than a thousand compasses, but today, she only needs to clean the floor. Yu Shu feels that the people here are just looking for something for her to do. They are not deliberately making things difficult for her. Otherwise, when Yu Xiaoxiu helped her yesterday, they would have said something.
The wound on her arm still hurts today. If it weren't for the medicine Yu Xiaoxiu got from Uncle Zhou Liu, it would be strange if she didn't get swollen after soaking in water yesterday.
The hall was too spacious, and the floor was made of solid wood. The only difference was the smoothness of the high-grade flooring she had seen before. She had to change six buckets of water before she could wipe the floor clean. She sat on the spotless floor, panting, and rested for a long time before she felt better.
It is still early, so she moves to the center of the hall and sits cross-legged next to the huge Bagua plate. She takes out the book in her arms and continues to read. She doesn't know the meaning of more than half of the words in the book, and the whole sentence is even more obscure. But she knows that haste makes waste, so she can only take it slowly.
"What book are you reading?"
The light above her head is blocked. Yu Shu looks up and sees that it is the old Taoist. She is not surprised. She directly holds the book up and shows him the two words "Qimen" on the cover.
Unexpectedly, the old Taoist takes the book from her hand. He tilts his eyebrows and flips a few pages. Then he closes the book and throws it into Yu Shu's arms. He turns around and sneers, walking towards his bamboo bed.
"You can't learn shit even if you read this in ten years."
Yu Shu picks up the book and says behind him: "You can't even understand this. You can't learn shit even if you study for a hundred years."
The old Taoist stops. It is hard to tell if he laughs or snorts. He steps back and squats down in front of her. He carefully observes her young and tender face under the sunlight. His eyes move around.
Yu Shu doesn't like being stared at like this, especially when the other person is an old man. She lowers her head and continues to flip through the book, ignoring him.
"Tsk tsk, you don't have the root of wisdom, your spirituality is too poor, and your foundation is not good. You are far worse than Xingxuan. Apart from fate, there is nothing comparable. Alas, alas, I am so unlucky. If I knew that one is worse than the other, I would rather …"
When Yu Shu heard him muttering and comparing her to others, she couldn't help but feel unhappy. Although she usually liked to joke around, she was actually a proud person. Only she looked down on others. How could a stranger judge her and look down on her in front of her?
The old Taoist is still muttering, but Yu Shu rolls up the book, glances at him, stands up and walks out.
"Eh? Little girl, stop. Why are you leaving? I haven't finished talking. "
Yu Shu walks to the door and turns her head back. She looks at the sloppy old Taoist and ridicules:
"Go back and learn shit."
After saying that, she turns around and walks away, leaving the old Taoist squatting next to the Bagua plate in shock. After a while, he laughs out loud. Under the probing eyes of the few people in the hall, he shakes his head and lies back on the bed.
Yu Shu rolled up the book in her hand as she walked on the path. She tried her best to recall the name 'Xing Xuan lass' that the disheveled old man had mentioned. She seemed to have heard this name somewhere before.
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