She casually asked, “Fellow villager, what else is in your bag?”

Upon hearing this, the farmer casually replied, “A spool!”

Chu Wan asked, “A spool, you mean the one used on a spinning wheel?”

Seeing her interest, the farmer took it out and casually put it there for Chu Wan to see.

Dawn was just breaking, Chu Wan held it up to the light and examined it closely. She saw that it was a jade gui still with remnants of cotton thread spun by the villagers. She pushed the cotton thread aside and touched it. The jade gui was carved with a strangely shaped phoenix head and flowing feathers. It was hard and dense.

Based on her intuition, she knew that this was white jade from the Han Dynasty. It was probably a type of auspicious jade, which some Han Dynasty noble had worn at the waist to symbolize their status.

She then asked, “How much is this spool?”

The farmer glanced at it casually and held up two fingers.

Chu Wan raised an eyebrow, wondering what this meant—20 yuan or 200?

200 was actually a good price to buy, and she won’t lose money over it, but she definitely wouldn’t be willing to spend that much. Wouldn’t that mean throwing away all her savings?

However, 20 yuan was a bit cheap, after all, this was not ordinary jade. It was white jade from the Han Dynasty, which could still fetch a good price on the market today.

But this farmer in front of her didn’t look like he was selling his own stuff. He was probably a shovel, selling stuff which he probably bought in the countryside for a few yuan, bringing them to the city to sell. These kinds of people were shrewd. If she tried to bargain down from 200 yuan, the seller would realize its worth and the deal would be off.

Seeing Chu Wan hesitate, the farmer said, “There are a few more left, do you want them?”

As he spoke, he took out two more. At first glance, they were similar in style, but with different patterns.

She casually replied, “Just tell me how much these three cost.”

Farmer replied, “Let’s not waste time with small talk. 3 for 50 yuan each, take it or leave it!”

As he said this, several other customers nearby also looked over. Seeing this, Chu Wan slightly blocked their view with her body and said, “Older Brother, 40 yuan, please.”

She immediately pulled out four 10-yuan bills and waved them at the man. “Is this okay?”

This was a common tactic for finding bargains at antique markets in the suburbs. You took out your money and showed it to the seller; they may not have wanted to sell at first, but they would be tempted by the large sum of money.

Sure enough, the farmer’s eyes lit up when he saw the money. “Okay, deal!”

So Chu Wan gave the 40 yuan to the farmer, wrapped the three pieces of jade in old newspaper, put them inside her cotton-padded coat, and left quickly.

When she reached a secluded spot, she took them out and wiped off the fertilizer residue. She then noticed that the jade was smooth and delicate, and the carving was exquisite. It was top-grade white jade, and it was worth keeping.

She was satisfied with this and didn’t care about anything else. She just wandered around and came across a small tricolor Hetian jade carving of two badgers.

The character for ‘badger’ was a homophone of the character for ‘joy’ or ‘happiness’. Thus, ‘two badgers’ carried the auspicious meaning of “double happiness,” making it a suitable gift for young people getting married.

The key point was that this sculpture was very well-carved, with a thick layer of oil and a uniform patina. It was carved in the ‘round with openwork’ and ‘pierced carving’ techniques¹. The two badgers were facing each other head to tail, with their limbs and tails connected, chasing and playing in a lively manner.

Chu Wan caressed it for a while, liking it very much, but she had no use for it herself, and whether she got married or not was another matter. So she thought she might as well give it to Lu Shouyan.

He gave her 10 yuan, so naturally she had to repay this favor. If she offered him money back, he definitely wouldn’t accept it. She might as well give him a gift, since he’s getting old and would probably get married soon anyway.

After some haggling, she added a brush washer as an extra, and the two items ended up costing a total of 25 yuan.

She was thinking that she could give this brush washer to Grandpa Lu.

Although her great-grandfather told her to ask Grandpa Lu for anything and not to be shy, she wasn’t actually that shameless.

With these in hand, she headed straight for the Lu family.

… …

Grandpa Lu’s family lived in Yu’er Hutong in Nanluoguxiang. It was a very neat courtyard house. It was said that the house used to be the residence of the Minister of the Imperial Household Department of the Qing Dynasty. It had been built with great care. It had a gable roof with tiles over the ridge, a front porch, and three wings on each side. The wings were connected by covered corridors. Such a courtyard could house dozens of people in an ordinary family.

However, all of Old Master Lu’s sons lived separately. He has five sons and two daughters. Lu Shouyan was the youngest son, and he should be twenty-seven years old this year. Apart from Lu Shouyan, the youngest of the others was over thirty, and the oldest was almost fifty.

Most of Grandpa Lu’s sons, now that they’re this age, held important positions and their workplaces provided them with excellent accommodations; at the very least, some lived in the company compound.

So, in such a large house, only Old Master Lu lived there. However, his grandchildren often came over, and most of them also had their own rooms at Old Master Lu’s place.

Chu Wan walked along the alley to the door and was about to go in when she was stopped by the guard next to her.

The guard sized her up and asked her to show her identification.

Chu Wan was surprised.

The guard stood ramrod straight, his face serious, justly performing his duties.

Chu Wan said, “I don’t have any identification. I’m a relative, and I’m here to see Grandpa Lu. Please go in and tell him that Wanwan is here to see him. He’ll know as soon as he hears that.”

Just as the guard was about to speak, the door opened and a woman came out. She was wearing an apron, carrying a vegetable basket, and her hands were slightly rough; she looked like a nanny.

When the woman saw Chu Wan, she frowned and said, “Are you here to collect junk? We just cleared out our things yesterday, there’s not much left.”

She then instructed the guard, “Xiao Zhao, you need to keep a close eye on things. Don’t just let anyone into the house, or it will look bad.”

Upon hearing this, Chu Wan ignored the woman and said directly to the guard, “Comrade, you are Grandpa Lu’s guard, right? Please pass on a message to Grandpa Lu when you see him. Tell him that Wanwan came to see him, but time is tight and he was not home at the time, so let’s forget about it and talk about it again in a few days.”

After saying that, she walked away.

She wasn’t bothered at all by being looked down upon because of her clothes.

She once wandered the world in tattered clothes, and she also once amazed the world’s art forums with her luxurious dresses. After seeing all kinds of gazes, she could take everything lightly.

She did dress simply these days, but she was perfectly at ease with it, and she didn’t care what others thought.

She hadn’t wanted to come in the first place, but now that it was like this, she could fulfill her duty of ‘visiting Grandpa Lu’ without having to actually stay at the Lu family’s house for a few days.

She had walked to the entrance of the alley and happened to meet someone riding a bicycle.

The man was about twenty years old, with a youthful face, and he paused for a moment when he saw Chu Wan.

This was unexpected.

What a small world. Lu Jianshi, how did we end up running into each other?

Pearls and Jade Beside Me in the ’80s translated by Maela @ whitemoonlighttranslations.com

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T/N: The gui is a type of ancient Chinese ritual artifact.

… …

This carving of two badgers is from the prosperous Qianlong period (1736-1795) and is only 5cm wide. It’s currently housed in a museum in Zurich.

Just like the ‘5 bats and peach’ jade carving a couple of chapters ago, the carver deliberately made use of the jade’s natural color variations to create a white badger and a brownish badger.

… …

‘Brush Washer’. It’s a bowl where you wash the calligraphy brush.

T/N: KO-FI has unpublished my page. If you supported me in the last 30 days, please email me at maela.translations@gmail.com so I can give you access to the advance chapters.

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FOOTNOTE:

1. ‘round with openwork’ and ‘pierced carving’ are both carving techniques that result in a 3D carving.  ↩︎