by Rose Lerner
Gao’s eyes were dark as he looked down at me. His jaw tensed with what I could only guess was anger. Heat rose up the back of my neck.
“I-I meant no offense.” Mortified, I slipped the silver back into the pocket of my robe. “You had mentioned that you and Huang had an arrangement—”
“Why don’t you go to Wu Kaifeng to help you?”
I looked over to the little street urchin, who was still watching us curiously. Gao followed my gaze.
“Boy, watch the horse,” he commanded.
The boy scrambled over to stand dutifully beside my mount, staying clear of biting range. The horse tossed his head.
“Will it be safe?” I asked as Gao directed me away.
“There are patrols and onlookers, and your very appearance insures that the animal won’t be touched,” he said with impatience. “You’re a lady. A gentleman,” he amended after looking at my clothing. “Of obvious status. It protects you—somewhat.”
“Scholar Chen wasn’t protected.”
“I only said somewhat. Men find plenty of reasons to kill another man. Now tell me why you’re not going to Wu Kaifeng.”
We had cleared the main area of the night market, and the lanterns hanging from the doorways were fewer in number. I hurried to keep up with Gao’s long stride, fearing the dark corners a little more now that I knew a man’s life was in some ways easier to forfeit than a horse’s.
“I came to you because you’re not hand in hand with the magistrate’s office,” I explained, nearly out of breath.
Gao slowed down a bit, allowing me to fall in step beside him.
“You’re the one who has Wu scouring the entire ward for information,” he said.
“Wu Kaifeng was asked by the magistrate’s office to investigate this crime. Chen Xi Hao was an important man.”
“More important than every other pitiful soul who meets his end on the street.”
His shoulders were thrown back, with tension riding all along his spine. His back was tall and straight enough to form a wall between us.
He was still angry about my earlier slip.
“I do apologize,” I said softly. “I didn’t mean to imply that you were a servant or a hireling.”
“You have a lot of words, don’t you?”
How was it that I was the one raised with lessons in etiquette, yet here I was, making every misstep?
I might as well speak plainly. “You admitted to accepting payment from my brother as a simple business transaction. Yet from me, you’re obviously affronted. Is it because I’m a woman?”
He exhaled slowly. “You’re not your brother, Lady Bai.”
I wished I could have seen his face when he said that. It could mean so many things. It could mean nothing.
“What trouble do you think Bai Huang in?” he asked.
We had ventured into unfamiliar territory, but Gao seemed comfortable enough. He walked the streets with a sort of loose-limbed confidence. I tried to mimic it, but I’m certain I failed.
“I’m afraid he’s fallen into gambling again.”
“Gambling,” Gao echoed, unimpressed.
“It’s a weakness of his. He can’t drag himself away once he’s caught in it. It…it nearly ruined him.”
“I do understand. More than you know. But all in all, gambling’s a pretty mild vice in the magistrate’s eyes. The constables turn a blind eye to it. Most indulge in some game or another.”
How could I tell him that I suspected there was more? That it wasn’t coincidence that kept bringing Huang back to the same area where Scholar Chen was killed? I was certain Huang must have known the scholar better than he admitted.
Gao was not a friend, not a servant, not an associate—yet he seemed to know things about my brother that no one else did.
“I need to find my brother,” I insisted. “You know where Huang goes around here. Will you take me?”
I needed to see for myself what he was doing. I prayed it was nothing more than a few nights carousing in some drinking house.
Gao paused and I wondered how loyal he was to my brother. Maybe one didn’t have to be a close friend. Maybe it was simply a pact of one man to another to keep each other’s secrets. Women certainly did so, even among strangers.
He came to some quiet decision, because he turned abruptly and started heading through the lane with purpose. “Stay close to me,” he instructed.
I quickened my step, colliding unexpectedly against his side.
“Not here.” I thought I saw a glint of amusement in his eyes. “When we get there. And do everything I say.”
I nodded, my face burning with embarrassment. One of these days, I would learn how to act as a man without feeling like a fool. If that was ever possible.
* * *
I would never have found the place if Gao hadn’t directed me. There was no lantern, no signboard. Not even a sliver of light through a crack in the doorway. It was just a plain building in the middle of a street like any other.
Gao knocked four times and the door opened. Whoever was behind it took one look at Gao, then over his shoulder at me. I tried to look back at him as if I always went to secret doors in the middle of the night.
It must have worked, or the man didn’t care. He stepped aside and I followed Gao through.
The interior was dimly lit. The hanging lanterns were of dull, serviceable paper and there were about five wooden tables arranged close together. Three at the back and two at the front. Around each table stood a cluster of patrons.
The first sound that came to me was the rattle of dice inside a porcelain bowl. Fascinating how such a sound could cut through the murmur of voices so effectively. Then again, the people didn’t come here to converse. At each table, all eyes watched the dice as if in worship.
A sinking feeling came to me. “When was the last time Huang came here?” I asked Gao.
“Not often lately. Months ago.”
But it had been often once. And the last time was after he’d already earned his imperial degree. Long after he’d promised that he was done with gambling.
“He’d risk everything,” I murmured sadly. “For this.”
“It’s not so bad as that.”
I regarded him sullenly.
“This is just a bit of entertainment. One of many. Wine, women.”
I flushed at his mention of women. Would it be any better if Huang preferred courtesans to gambling? “Gambling is against the code of law. It leads to the decay of society.”
Gao raised his eyebrows. “Is that something you read in some old book, young lord?”
I scowled at him. “Gambling almost ruined my brother, and our family with it.”
Maybe it had led to Scholar Chen’s death.
“Let’s face this loathsome thing then.” Gao started toward one of the tables.
I hurried after him. “What are we going to do?”
“Ask about your brother, but you’ll need that money of yours to make it happen. The dice men are not keen to talk without it.”
Gao shouldered open a spot and deposited me at the edge of one table, with him in beside me. My arm pressed tight against his. My pulse quickened as we were jostled even closer.
Before us, the dealer placed three ivory dice onto a plate before clapping the bowl over them.
“Place your bet, Bai.”
I stared down at the table. Some sort of intricate game board had been painted onto the surface, with characters detailing different bets. The table was so well-used that much of the board had rubbed away.
The gambler beside me gave an impatient snort. I sensed this was not the time to ask for an explanation of rules, but as I prepared to bet, there was another problem. Everyone was playing with copper zhu cash. I didn’t have anything that small.
“I only have liang,” I tried to whisper to Gao, which in this place was more of a shout.
“You’ve learned your first lesson.” Gao grinned as he indicated the dealer. “Dice men are always happy to se
e young lords like yourself.”
Glowering, I put the heavy coin onto the table. It had the weight of ten cash coins, easily double what anyone else at the table was betting.
The dealer held the bowl in both hands, shaking vigorously while calling, “Bet now, bet now, bet big, win big.”
I watched, feeling a small rise of anticipation as the bowl was plunked down onto the table. With a small pause for drama, the dealer lifted the bowl to a chorus of groans. I was still trying to figure out whether the three dots showing was a good or bad result when a bony hand swept forward and took my money.
I blinked at the empty spot. “I don’t see the appeal.”
As the game started up again, Gao leaned forward to speak to the dealer before straightening.
“He hasn’t seen your brother,” Gao reported.
I stared back at him, incredulous. “That’s it?”
“All bets, bet now!” the dealer crowed. I thought I saw a smirk on the man’s lips before a wayward elbow knocked me away from the table.
I rubbed at the sore spot on my shoulder, feeling bruised in more ways than one. “What now?”
“We go to the next place.”
He tugged on my arm as if we were comrades, and just like that we were back out in the street. The noise and bluster of the dice tables disappeared behind the closed door.
“Funny how the scholar class looks down upon the study of numbers, and here they are in force.” Gao sounded genuinely cheerful.
“I know my numbers,” I muttered. What he’d said was true, after a fashion. The imperial exams overwhelmingly favored rhetoric and commentary. Sums and calculation were for the merchant class.
“Why in such a bad mood, Bai? You’re rich.”
There was something in how he made the declaration that raised my ire. He was right. My family was wealthy and I was in a bad mood.
Money wasn’t easy to come by for me. I had a modest allowance for donations to the temple and small purchases in the local market area. It had taken months of planning to collect a reserve for these excursions. I tried not to think of how money that should have gone to the Temple of Knowledge had just been thrown away at a dice table.
“Here we are,” Gao said, stopping in the middle of another dark, quiet street. Only a single lantern on each corner provided illumination.
Before going to the door, he reached into his pocket to fish out a single cash coin, holding it before me with two fingers. What did my brother see in this man? Gao was a scoundrel.
Begrudgingly, I took the coin, our fingers inadvertently brushing as I did so.
This place was smaller. Two tables crammed into a room, but they were just as good at taking my money.
We went to other places, all along the outskirts of the neighborhood. Gao took pity on me and stopped making me place bets. It seemed like the locals would speak to him quite easily if I stayed out of the way.
At each of the dens, there were workmen and laborers at the tables, but no one who was dressed as I was.
“No luck,” Gao reported at our sixth stop. It didn’t matter. I knew exactly what was happening.
He started toward yet another place that my brother supposedly frequented.
“It won’t be necessary,” I said to his back. “We don’t need to find someone to tell me about my brother. You’re the one he goes to. You’re the one he trusts.”
Gao halted. Slowly he turned to face me. “Bai Huang doesn’t trust me. And he shouldn’t.”
“My brother doesn’t go to any of these places, does he?”
He had been trying to distract me all along, leading me around aimlessly. I had to wonder if Huang had told him to do so.
“When I came here, I expected that all I had to do was find you and I would find him,” I said, stepping closer.
Gao’s face was unreadable in the dim light of the street lanterns. “Your brother comes to me because people here don’t take kindly to outsiders asking questions.”
I didn’t miss the warning in his words.
“It saddens me to learn that my brother has been living a second life. One that he keeps secret from his family, even his wife.”
Gao held his ground as I came to stand before him. “Lord Bai is remarkably skilled at keeping secrets from everyone,” he said. “I didn’t even know he had a sister, for one.”
I had to angle my chin up to meet his eyes. We were almost touching. The distance was far from proper, but I couldn’t back down or step aside. I willed Gao to tell me the truth. Even though we weren’t friends and he owed me nothing.
“Was my brother coming to see you the other night?”
Some emotion flickered across Gao’s face, gone too fast to read. “Lord Bai did ask for me to meet him.”
“What did he want?”
He smiled slightly. “I don’t know. I had a much better night—I met you instead.”
Heat flooded my cheeks, but I wouldn’t let myself be distracted. “Did Huang know Scholar Chen?”
“Who is Scholar Chen?” Gao asked blandly.
“You know who I’m talking about.” I dreaded asking the next question, but I had to know. “Was Huang involved in the scholar’s death?”
Gao’s smile faded and my heart stopped. A lifetime passed before he answered. “I don’t know.”
That wasn’t an answer. “You hesitated,” I accused.
“I thought you might assume I was responsible.”
I frowned at him. “Why would I ever think that? We were together.”
Gao regarded me somberly as I sorted through my memories.
“It wasn’t you,” I concluded.
“Are you certain?”
Our gazes locked. He was intent on challenging me on this.
“You have no reason to do the scholar harm,” I insisted. “And he was killed immediately before we happened upon him.”
I waited for Gao to contradict me, but he didn’t say anything regarding his guilt or his innocence. In silence, he directed me down the lane.
“Did Huang tell you to distract me tonight?” I asked when the silence had become too oppressive.
“I did what I did tonight for my own sake.” He looked straight ahead while he spoke. His features in profile were strong, his jaw etched out in sharp lines. “To keep you out of trouble.”
“Wouldn’t that be for my sake, then?” I questioned.
He glanced downward. “For my sake,” he insisted.
Even though I’d learned little of my brother, I couldn’t deny how alive I felt at that moment. Every sight and sound had been new to me tonight. Perhaps Huang just came out here to feel like this, unhindered by boundaries and expectations.
Maybe the appeal for him at the dice table wasn’t the hope of winning, but the thrill of the unexpected.
That was what Gao was to me. Someone completely unexpected.
We had returned to the edges of the night market. The scent of grease and cooking meat filled the air, and Gao noticed the drag in my step.
“Do you want one?” He indicated the wooden stall, where a man was dropping rounds of dough into hot oil.
I hesitated before nodding. Gao stopped me with an irritated shake of his head when I started to reach for my pocket.
He returned from the stall with a cone of fried cakes wrapped in a banana leaf. “You would have bought the entire basket,” he complained.
We sat on crates, looking down the main thoroughfare of the night market. I tested the cakes with a fingertip to make sure they were cool enough before taking one. They were drizzled with honey and sprinkled with sesame seeds. I took a bite, which was crispy and sweet and delicious.
“You’ll never pass as a man,” Gao complained around a mouthful of food. “You’re dainty.”
“I’m not dainty,” I argued, stuffing the rest of the cake into my mouth. I licked honey off my fingers like I’d seen him do to make a point.
Gao still looked skeptical.
Disguise or none, manners still dictated I
finished chewing before speaking again. “I’m not trying to pass as a man. I just want to be able to move about without being questioned at every step.”
“An adventure,” Gao offered.
“Yes.”
“You wanted to experience a different sort of life.”
“Yes,” I said, slower this time. Where was this leading?
“Your brother thought the same, at first. He was seeking a little amusement. A diversion.”
“This isn’t a diversion—”
“This is,” Gao interrupted, indicating our surroundings. “I am. This is all very entertaining to you.”
My heart pounded. I wanted to insist that he was more, but I couldn’t find the words. Anything I said would have been too forward—more so than masquerading as a man and romping through gambling dens.
“Do you know the story of Liang and Zhu?” I asked him.
“I don’t.”
I felt ignorant for asking. I didn’t know what Gao’s exact profession was, but he certainly didn’t spend all day reading poems and stories as I did.
“Zhu was a young girl from a wealthy family,” I explained, unable to stop now that I’d brought it up. “She begged her father to let her dress as a man so she could take lessons. While in disguise, she meets a scholar named Liang and they form a strong bond immediately.”
I glanced at Gao to see if I was boring him, but he was listening intently.
“They take an oath of fraternity, with Liang never realizing his new friend is actually a woman. Over the next years while they study, Lady Zhu falls in love with Liang, without him knowing the entire time. When she’s summoned back home, Zhu is heartbroken, but unable to tell her true feelings. By the time Liang does find out the truth, it’s too late. Zhu has been promised to another man, so Liang kills himself out of grief.”
“You like this story?” Gao asked.
I blinked away, blushing. “It’s my favorite story. But it doesn’t end yet.”
“Go on then.”
Gao’s tone was far from unkind, but I was suddenly shy to recount the rest. It was more than my favorite story. I’d read over every line and word so many times, they were etched into by being.
