Chapter Ninety-Two: Moonlight Like Eyes

Zhang Ji left Wei Renshi’s house with a contented belch.

By then he was already a little tipsy, yet he had not forgotten to ask Wei Renshi to set aside a set of the coal stoves he would make in the future, to be given to Fang Xuezheng of the county school. Fang would naturally find a way to send it along to him; the two of them were distantly related.

Not long after, Jiao Haiqing also took his leave. He, too, was in high spirits, having seen for himself the advantages of the coal stove and already planning to go home and discuss with his family how they might work with Wei Renshi in this coal business.

Wei Renshi himself, having also drunk some wine, fell back onto his bed. When he woke, the moon had already risen at the edge of the sky.

The Grand Matriarch had already gone to sleep.

Xi'er had not. She was sitting on the steps in the courtyard, staring blankly into the night.

When she heard Wei Renshi come out, she tore her gaze away from the moon, stood up, and asked, “Has the young master sobered up? Are you hungry? Thirsty?”

“Why are you still awake?” Wei Renshi asked with a smile.

“I wasn’t sleepy,” Xi'er said. “I thought the young master hadn’t woken up in the evening to eat, so you would surely wake up hungry, and after the wine wore off you’d be thirsty too.”

Silver moonlight fell into her eyes, clear as a mountain spring, bright as the moon above.

“I’ve been warming some thin porridge in the pot for you,” Xi'er said again. “Would the young master like some now?”

Touched for a moment, Wei Renshi smiled and said, “That would be wonderful.”

Xi'er was delighted. She ran off to the hearth like a gust of wind, and before long came back carrying a wooden tray with a bowl of thin porridge, several steamed buns, and a dish of pickled vegetables.

“A bowl of porridge will be enough,” Wei Renshi said, taking the bowl and drinking a mouthful. The warm, slightly cool taste was wonderfully soothing from mouth to stomach.

Xi'er was a careful girl; she knew that Wei Renshi liked his congee a little on the cool side.

Imagining how this girl must have tended the fire from time to time, adding or subtracting charcoal just to keep the porridge at exactly this temperature, Wei Renshi felt his heart go soft.

After he finished the porridge, the moonlight grew even stronger.

Bathed in silver glow, the countryside was quiet and chill, yet it carried with it a kind of calm and peace.

“Xi'er, you grew up with me, didn’t you?” Wei Renshi asked.

Xi'er nodded. “Ever since I can remember, I’ve been running after the young master. You were such a troublemaker when you were little, always running around everywhere and climbing up and down all over the place!”

“My mother told me we’re about the same age?” Wei Renshi asked.

“Yes, yes!” Xi'er nodded vigorously.

“Then why are you so foolish?” Wei Renshi laughed, rubbing her hair. “You could have just kept the fire going and left the porridge warm. When I was ready to drink it, you could have taken a couple of small lumps of ice from the ice cellar and thrown them in. Wouldn’t it have cooled down at once? Why go through all that trouble to keep adding fuel and maintain it at exactly this temperature?”

Xi'er thought about it, then tilted her head. “Oh! It can be done that way too!”

Wei Renshi laughed again. “I say you’re foolish, and you don’t even argue?”

“Compared with the young master, Xi'er really is foolish!” she said pitifully.

He rubbed her head once more. This girl really was thoughtful. Even his students in later generations, some of whom were older than she was, might not have been as sensible as she was.

The treatment of girls in ancient times was truly harsh. Just the previous month, the eldest daughter of Old Dai Seventh Family in the same village had turned thirteen and was already married off. She was still only a child herself.

How pitiable.

“You should have a steamed bun, young master,” Xi'er said, trying to persuade him. “Just drinking porridge won’t fill you up.”

“All right!” Wei Renshi nodded and picked up a bun to eat.

Seeing that he obediently ate it, Xi'er smiled again in delight.

On that warm and intimate night, Wei Renshi felt that it was precisely these unnoticed little kindnesses that gave him the faintest sense of belonging in this strange time and place.

At dawn, rain began to fall. It was not heavy, but it came and went in a steady drizzle, lasting through the entire day. Only when the sky was nearly dark again did it finally taper off.

With that fine rain came the sudden chill of early autumn.

Then there came the sound of hoofbeats and wheels outside the gate. When Wei Renshi went out to look, sure enough it was Ma Weilong and Gou Er returning.

“Greetings, Young Master,” Ma Weilong and Gou Er said as they jumped down from the carriage and came before Wei Renshi to bow. “We were fortunate not to fail in our task. The letter has been personally delivered to Clerk Liu. He also had us bring back a reply.”

Then they took out a letter and handed it over.

“You’ve both worked hard. Go and rest,” Wei Renshi said as he accepted the letter. “I’ve already had the masons build houses for you, right beside the distillery. Since they’ve only just started, if you have any requests, go tell them tomorrow. Uncle Shi and Uncle Changgui have already gone to instruct them.”

The two were stunned to hear that Wei Renshi had even arranged houses for them, and hurriedly bowed again. “Thank you, Young Master!”

“We’re family; there’s no need for all that,” Wei Renshi said with a smile, waving them off. “Go eat something and get some rest.”

Behind the rear house in the courtyard stood a dilapidated horse shed.

According to the Grand Matriarch, when Wei Renshi’s father was young, the family had also kept horses, but later they could no longer afford to maintain them and had been forced to sell them.

Still, the shed remained, though the ground beneath it was piled high with junk. A few days earlier, Old Shi and Changgui had cleaned it out and brought in some fodder, so for now it could at least serve as a place to tether a horse.

The main entrance had steps and the carriage could not pass through, but the side gate was wide enough. Wei Renshi sighed. Fortunately, this ancestral home had not been sold off by his bookish, useless father.

Though everything was worn and ramshackle, at least it still served its purpose.

In his previous life, Wei Renshi had never ridden a horse, but he had driven a carriage.

In the village where he had taught, there had been an old man who still kept a horse and carriage, using it to go to the market town and bring things home. Wei Renshi often rode along for the pleasure of it, and the effect when he traveled down the street was not unlike that of an expensive car attracting every eye. He had learned how to drive a carriage from that old man.

The old man’s wife had died early, and his children had gone off to work elsewhere without once returning. He had once said that when he was old, he would give the horse to Wei Renshi. In the end, Wei Renshi himself transmigrated first.

After unhitching the carriage, settling the horse in the shed, and feeding it fodder, Ma Weilong and Gou Er finally took their leave.

Wei Renshi returned to his study and opened the reply that Liu Yuxi had sent back with them.

“To Wei Renshi, with respect: since my return to Weinan...” Liu Yuxi’s handwriting was neat and clear, telling in detail of how, after returning to Weinan, he had built embankments to trap silt and improve the fields, and manage the barren land. The hardships involved, and how he had solved them, were all explained to Wei Renshi in full.

He also told Wei Renshi that he had already submitted a memorial detailing the embankment-and-silt method and the plan for improving wasteland, and that the court’s response had been very favorable. Now he only awaited the results of putting the two methods into practice. Once tangible results were seen, that would be the time for the court to reward Wei Renshi for his contributions.

He also said that the scraper was a good thing, and that the coal stove and the making of honeycomb coal from coal would be tested as well.

Wei Renshi folded the letter and set it on the desk, while in his mind he weighed the news he had learned from Zhang Ji. The memorial that had delighted the emperor beyond measure was probably this very embankment-and-silt method, along with the improvement of barren fields.

Judging from this, if Liu Yuxi succeeded in producing results in Weinan with these two measures, then Wei Renshi would certainly not be short of imperial rewards. The only question was how great that merit would prove to be, and what degree of favor it would bring.