IBGSW Chapter 150
The Ghost's Life
Gou Laosi, recalling the past, let his feelings pour out.
His sudden wail startled Zhang Chuanshi, already strung tight, so badly that he nearly tumbled off the carriage, and he began to curse.
Zhao Fusheng's heart rose along with Gou Laosi's heartbroken cry. She had warned him again and again not to give anything away, but emotions were hard to control, especially when he was reminiscing with Zhuang Laoqi about their childhood. At first Gou Laosi had been terrified to learn Zhuang Laoqi was dead, but as the memories came, grief swept over him.
People have joys and sorrows, and when emotion reaches its peak, no one can hold it in.
"Sigh."
She sighed silently and had already gripped the half-ruined ghost arm, mentally prepared that if Zhuang Laoqi revived as a malignant ghost, she would kick him off the carriage first, and perhaps face a tough fight.
Everyone in the carriage was on edge, barely daring to breathe.
Even Gou Laosi regretted his outburst the moment he'd finished, tears still hanging at the corners of his eyes.
But to everyone's surprise, Zhuang Laoqi did not revive as a ghost.
Whether his emotional awareness of humans had dulled after death, or for some other reason, he sat still for a long while without moving.
That brief silence felt especially long.
Yet with his silence, the big hole at his back seemed to receive some mysterious repair.
The black water that had been gushing down his spine like an opened sluice was suddenly blocked. It shrank to half its size and became a slow, thin drip—drop.
"Cousin's memory is better after all."
After a long while, Zhuang Laoqi broke the silence.
His tone carried an indescribable lightness. Though no one could see his face, they could feel that his mood was no longer as bad as before, and most of the chilling resentment that had hung around him had dissolved.
"Yes, that year we were eight, and my elder cousin, my elder cousin, how old was she? Ten? Eleven? I can't remember—"
He shook his head and seemed to fall back into distress.
"Zhuang Laoqi, the year you were eight, when your great-aunt married off her daughter, what happened?" Seeing Zhuang Laoqi about to lose control again, Zhao Fusheng raised her voice and called to him.
"Oh, oh, oh, Great-Aunt married off her daughter, Great-Aunt married off her daughter—"
At Zhao Fusheng's call, Zhuang Laoqi quickly came back to himself. This time, after thinking a while without being interrupted, he began to tell of events from more than a decade ago:
"My great-aunt's daughter married a rich family in Fengmen Village1. His forefathers had been traveling peddlers and had carried goods for people in Huanggang Village many times, so the family was very well off, and it was said that even after paying taxes each year they could save a little silver."
"Huanggang Village?"
Hearing this, Wu Shaochun exclaimed.
Zhao Fusheng, Fan Wujiu and Wu Shaochun exchanged a look, and a strange expression crossed their eyes.
Before Zhuang Laoqi and Gou Laosi had made their scene earlier that day, the bureau's people had been chatting in the bureau hall, and the conversation had touched on Wu Shaochun's past, and he had mentioned running goods for Huanggang Village.
They had never imagined fate would bring both of them into contact with the same village.
Still, Wu Shaochun had said the goods-running business in Huanggang Village wasn't legitimate but a shady one, and might involve some dishonorable dealings.
She steadied herself and heard Zhuang Laoqi continue:
"The betrothal gifts alone were two taels of silver."
In this era most families were poor, and being able to produce some decent gifts plus a few hundred coins was already considered generous.
Zhao Fusheng was stunned too.
"That's a huge sum, Your Honor," Zhuang Laoqi said.
"I know!" Zhao Fusheng nodded gravely:
"My parents sold me for just five copper coins."
"..."
Fan Wujiu felt as if he'd been struck on the head with a club.
He'd been frightened and anxious about this trip to Kuailiang Village and uneasy sharing a carriage with Zhuang Laoqi.
He'd listened to their chatter in dread, never expecting that, bit by bit, the topic would land on him.
When she brought up the sale of Zhao Fusheng back then, he didn't dare say a word. He drew his shoulders in and tried to make himself invisible, eyes flicking about, looking thoroughly awkward.
Gou Laosi, eyes bulging in their sockets, didn't know whether to be afraid or embarrassed, and sensed that Fan Wujiu beside him looked a little off after what Zhao Fusheng said.
Zhuang Laoqi didn't think much of it. He no longer seemed to care about the twists and turns of human affairs and was immersed in his memories:
"My great-aunt was overjoyed to get so much money. Her sons' betrothal gifts were taken care of, and she felt it was a great honor, so she invited the neighbors to the wedding feast."
She spent several hundred coins buying pigs and vegetables, and made it very lively, with a flowing banquet of dozens of tables.
"What does this have to do with Fourth Madam Zhuang's family?"
Pretending not to have seen Fan Wujiu's expression, Zhao Fusheng asked Zhuang Laoqi at this point.
"My uncle was going too."
He said:
"It was a lively day. My aunt got up at dawn to comb my little cousin's hair, and rushed my other cousins to get ready, telling them to dress properly and not to embarrass the family."
The two families were next-door neighbors, and Zhuang Laoqi heard everything next door.
His aunt barked at her fourth daughter to hurry and fetch her brother's trousers and shoes, the youngest sister seemed to have fallen and was crying, and his aunt angrily ordered her daughter to pick her sister up quickly.
When everyone was ready, it wasn't early anymore, and the sound of the wedding procession's suona2 carried from afar.
The people of Zhuang Family Village were hurrying out. His aunt carried her son and called her daughters, while his uncle stood with his hands clasped behind his back, and the two families met at the door.
Just then Fourth Madam Zhuang, who had been busy with the housework and looking after her siblings, finally ran out of the house in a rush:
"Coming, coming."
She braided her hair with one hand and hopped on one shoe.
Everyone in the family was ready except her.
His body was dead and his memory long muddled, but for some reason, as Zhuang Laoqi recalled that old incident, an image of Fourth Madam Zhuang from that day rose clearly in his mind.
She wore her two older sisters' hand-me-downs, which had been his aunt's originally and then altered smaller again and again before being passed to the daughters.
By the time it reached Fourth Madam Zhuang, it had been through many hands and was threadbare.
Compared with when her sisters got the clothes, she was younger and thinner, and the garment hung enormously on her, loose and patched all over, and with her hair still unbraided, she looked like a little beggar.
At that moment his uncle frowned in surprise and asked:
"You're going too?"
His casual remark froze young Fourth Madam Zhuang in place.
She stood there in her gray patched clothes, hands still working at her braids.
Next to her siblings she looked plain and unremarkable. Her shoulders were hunched inward and she seemed timid, and his uncle's eyes were like a knife for scraping bone, slicing away her pride piece by piece.
His aunt looked at her daughter impatiently, finding her an embarrassment:
"Fourth, you're not going."
She turned and looked about, and saw Zhuang Laoqi's family not far off.
His mother was holding young Zhuang Laoqi's hand. He was the beloved youngest son and would never be left out of an outing like this.
Zhuang Laoqi also had older sisters, and apart from the two married ones, two daughters were still at home, but his family brought only one daughter and two sons.
By comparison, his uncle's family had come out almost in full, with a few more people.
His aunt counted heads in her mind, felt awkward, and glared at her daughter again, finding her inconsiderate:
"You stay home. We have two chickens to look after. Someone has to watch them."
The light in Fourth Madam Zhuang's eyes dimmed quickly, and her lips lost their color nearly at once.
In Zhuang Laoqi's memory, all color faded with the passing years.
The pictures left in his mind were only black, white and gray, and under those tones the sight of his elder cousin's pitiful face seemed to take on an eerie, terrifying quality.
But in that dark background, the shimmering tears in young Fourth Madam Zhuang's eyes stood out strikingly, and in the end they turned to blood tears, then gradually darkened to black, and swallowed up the whole picture.
"I, I want to go—"
Facing his aunt's words, Fourth Madam Zhuang answered timidly.
"You child—"
His aunt impatiently raised her hand, meaning to slap her.
Fourth Madam Zhuang tilted her head and hunched her shoulders, wanting to duck but not daring to, and his uncle, irritated by the sight of his wife and daughter, said:
"Forget it. I'll give you a boiled egg. You don't go."
A boiled egg was a precious thing. Not only did the daughters not deserve one, even their father couldn't bear to eat one. They were saved up to be sold at market in town.
"I don't want it."
Fourth Madam Zhuang undid the braid she'd just made and burst into tears:
"Father, I want to go too."
"You—"
His uncle wanted to hit her, and Fourth Madam Zhuang, as if begging for help, turned her eyes toward Zhuang Laoqi's family.
Zhuang Laoqi, not knowing why, felt sorry for his elder cousin and shook his father's hand. His father, seeing this, hurried to speak up:
"Elder brother, elder sister-in-law, forget it, why hit a child? Fourth girl is usually well-behaved and obedient. If she wants to go, let her. She's a child. How much can she eat?"
"So inconsiderate," his aunt said with disgust:
"Everyone else is going and she wants to go too."
"Go, go. What a bad-luck brat3. Eat till you burst!"
His uncle cursed.
The family set out grumbling and scolding, and Fourth Madam Zhuang's excitement at going out with the family turned to grievance, and her mood was low the whole way.
"You're the one who wanted to come, and we brought you, and you make a face like a funeral," his aunt scolded all the way.
Fourth Madam Zhuang carried her little brother on her back, not daring to talk back, tears brimming on her lashes.
When the two families arrived at Zhuang Laoqi's great-aunt's house, the people there looked at them with scorn at how many had come.
The tables were lavish, with meat dishes rarely seen in the village.
People who normally had little oil in their bellies ate until their mouths glistened. Only his uncle's family sat there fuming.
At the table his aunt complained about her daughter to everyone she met, and Fourth Madam Zhuang stared blankly. Her excitement at the start had given way to silence.
She held a bowl and fed her little brother, and with all the food on the table, she couldn't swallow, and hardly touched her chopsticks.
When the family left, people pointed at them and sneered at his uncle's family: "Poor as dirt, coming to scrounge a free meal4."
His uncle lost face, and when they got home he blamed his aunt for not teaching the children properly, and the couple fought.
His aunt, angry and resentful that her daughter had embarrassed them, blamed her: it was all because she'd insisted on coming that people had mocked the family for having too many mouths and being greedy.
That time, Fourth Madam Zhuang was beaten badly.
After that lesson she grew even more obedient and reserved, and her fame spread afterward, until she became known as a virtuous woman in the villages for miles around, and everyone wanted to ask for her hand, and in the end Kuai Wu of Kuailiang Village took her home.
...
Zhao Fusheng was lost in thought.
This was a trivial glimpse of childhood from Fourth Madam Zhuang's short life, but through Zhuang Laoqi's few words she seemed able to picture the woman as she'd been in life, the malignant ghost who was now stirring Kuailiang Village into turmoil.
Suddenly she wanted to sigh.
"Sigh—" She did more than want to. Zhao Fusheng actually sighed aloud.
"What's wrong, Your Honor?"
Hearing her sigh, Wu Shaochun asked quickly.
"I was only feeling sorry for her."
Zhao Fusheng said lightly.
Her words were full of pity.
Fan Wujiu was taken aback. Zhao Fusheng's pity was pure, without calculation or any air of condescension. She seemed truly to lament such a woman's death and to feel sorry for Fourth Madam Zhuang.
"Your Honor, she's a ghost," he reminded her discreetly.
"I know that very well," Zhao Fusheng said.
"I feel sorry for her, but that doesn't change that I'll have to subdue her or dismember her."
What she said in that moment was in fact split in two, mingling compassion and cruelty.
Fan Wujiu was lost for words for a moment. He found it hard to understand Zhao Fusheng's emotions, but that didn't stop something from stirring inside him.
"To tell the truth, I didn't believe in heaven's justice and the cycle of rebirth at all," Zhao Fusheng said, shaking her head:
"I thought those were just words to comfort oneself. But Goutou Village and Kuailiang Village have given me a different insight."
"What insight, Your Honor?" At the mention of Goutou Village, Wu Shaochun couldn't hide his curiosity.
To this day Goutou Village was a wound in his heart. He'd nearly died in that case and lost his mother in it.
Many villagers he'd known had died, and only a few had survived.
"Shaochun, do you hate the substitute ghost of Goutou Village?" Zhao Fusheng asked.
"Of course!"
Wu Shaochun answered without hesitation.
Zhang Chuanshi, who'd been cursing and grumbling while driving, heard this and remembered what they'd gone through at Goutou Village, and cursed through clenched teeth:
"I hate it too."
"After that case finished and you came to the bureau, Eldest Brother Fan and the others would have told you the whole story of the Goutou Village case and the ghost's origins," Zhao Fusheng said, looking at Wu Shaochun.
He nodded without hesitation:
"Yes."
Though Wu Shaochun had been through the Goutou Village ghost case, he was a pure newcomer, and for him that case had begun without rhyme or reason and ended like waking from a nightmare. He had learned only the gist of it, and had understood the whole story only after reaching the bureau, when the Fan brothers told him.
