Chapter 35

Chapter 35: Up Close

“You said earlier you would dress yourself,” Chun Zhi said as she walked toward his room, “when your injury was at its worst, you kept talking about how men and women shouldn’t touch. Why are you asking me to help now?”

Huo Zheng said nothing.

“Arms up,” Chun Zhi said. She talked, but her hands moved quickly, loosening his outer robe and slipping the new clothes onto him.

The size and length were perfect. The bamboo-green color suited him very well.

Chun Zhi looked, quite pleased with herself, and said: “My skills are pretty good.”

“You’re praising yourself now?” Huo Zheng asked.

“If you won’t praise me, then I have to praise myself,” Chun Zhi said as she smoothed his lapels.

“What do you think of the clothes I made?” she asked Huo Qi.

Huo Zheng straightened his sleeves and said: “Not bad.”

“Again with ‘not bad’,” Chun Zhi said: “Do you not have the word ‘good’? You only ever say ‘not bad’.”

She did not know that for Prince Chang’an, being able to say “not bad” was already very high praise.

On the roof, Jiang He’s eyes went wide when he saw the woman get so close to the prince and even help him change. His Highness Prince Chang’an kept himself extremely proper and never let women near him. The only people who served him were a eunuch attendant and a manservant. And yet this commoner from a tiny tofu workshop…

Jiang He stared a few times more, but after a cold glance from Huo Zheng, he slipped away at once.

Unaware that someone had come and gone, Chun Zhi said to Huo Qi: “All right, keep the new clothes on. I’ll take the old ones to wash.”

Huo Zheng answered: “Mm.”

Chun Zhi went out to wash the clothes. Jiang He went out to carry out his orders.

The next day, after selling tofu, Chun Zhi went to the City God Temple. She prayed with a sincere heart and asked that her wish would come true.

Two days passed in a blink, and soon it was the day of the hearing.

Chun Zhi got up early and rode Old Master Wang’s donkey cart to the county seat.

Several cases were on the docket today, so it would be a while before they got to hers. She could only wait at the side.

Over at the Lu Clan, Lu Jing Yun had pushed off all social calls so he could go to the County Yamen and testify for Chun Zhi. Just as he was about to leave, a maid ran in and said: “Madam is unwell. Her head hurts badly.”

Lu Jing Yun sent someone to call a physician, then turned back to check on Ji Ru Zhen and said: “How did Madam’s head start hurting all of a sudden? Did you catch a chill last night?”

Playing the weak patient, Ji Ru Zhen leaned against the bed and said: “I don’t know what happened. My head just started to hurt so much. Husband, go take care of your business. Don’t worry about me.”

“How could I not worry about Madam?” Lu Jing Yun said as he sat at the bedside and massaged her temples.

After a while he asked: “Any better?”

“A little better,” Ji Ru Zhen said.

When he took his hands away, she frowned and said: “It started hurting again.”

“Then I will press some more,” he said.

As he kept massaging, Ji Ru Zhen watched him and said: “Husband, don’t let me make you delay important work.”

“It’s not urgent,” Lu Jing Yun said: “I won’t be at ease until the physician comes and treats you.”

After a long wait, the physician finally arrived. He took Ji Ru Zhen’s pulse and said Madam was weighed down by worry and upset feelings.

“How would Madam be worried and upset?” Lu Jing Yun asked with a frown.

Ji Ru Zhen said nothing.

The maid said: “Isn’t it because people in Qingshui Town are saying Madam is fighting a tofu seller for her husband, saying the chancellor’s daughter couldn’t find a match and had to steal someone else’s husband…”

“Enough,” Ji Ru Zhen cut in: “Do not speak nonsense.”

Lu Jing Yun told the physician to write a prescription, then prepared to go in person to get the medicine.

Ji Ru Zhen, thinking he meant to use the chance to go testify for Chun Zhi, grabbed his hand and said: “A servant can fetch the medicine. Husband, please go deal with your work.”

He had already pushed off every social matter today. The only thing left was to show up as Chun Zhi’s witness. But Ji Ru Zhen clearly did not want him to go.

So he sat by the window and coaxed her: “If your head hurts, stop worrying about these things. Sleep a little. When you’re asleep, it won’t hurt.”

Ji Ru Zhen looked at him with hopeful eyes and said: “Then, Husband…”

“I will stay here with you,” Lu Jing Yun said.

Time moved quickly, and soon it was afternoon.

Because the plaintiff and the witness still had not appeared, the case against Chun Zhi was pushed from third on the list to the very last.

All the earlier cases had been heard. When it was finally the last case’s turn, the hearing could not even start because the plaintiff still was not there.

They waited a long time, and Wu Xin still did not show up.

The magistrate could only declare the case void.

Just as he lifted the gavel over the gavel block to announce the dismissal, a few local thugs came in carrying a stretcher. The person on it was wrapped head to toe in white cloth, so no one could see who it was.

The court scribe took one look and shouted: “Who are you down there, and why are you dressed like that?”

“This… this commoner is Wu Xin,” came the reply.

Wu Xin spoke with a sob and lay limp on the stretcher, not even trying to get up.

Seeing this, Chun Zhi could not help thinking: [Could it be that my prayers worked? They all came true!]

“You are Wu Xin?” the magistrate asked in disbelief: “How did you end up like this?”

“This commoner was beaten… last night,” Wu Xin said.

“Who beat you?” the magistrate asked.

“I… I don’t know,” Wu Xin said: “Before he hit me, he threw a sack over my head. I didn’t see his face.”

The magistrate glanced at the scribe.

“Have you made any enemies lately?” the scribe asked.

“Her… her,” Wu Xin said, lifting his bandaged hand and pointing at Chun Zhi with a trembling finger.

Chun Zhi said at once: “This humble woman and my husband were at our home the whole day yesterday and did not go out. All the neighbors can testify.”

“Her husband looks like a cripple, but he can fight,” Wu Xin said: “A few days ago, when I brought some brothers to take back the tofu workshop my mother left me, her crippled husband beat us all to the ground. It was him. Last night he must have been the one who beat me.”

“You have no proof,” Chun Zhi said: “How can you slander us?”

“I haven’t quarreled with anyone else lately, only you,” Wu Xin said: “Who knows if you would secretly harm me for that tofu workshop. Lord Magistrate, please stand up for this commoner.”

Chun Zhi said: “To report to the Magistrate, my husband injured his leg days ago and can barely walk. He has hardly left the house these days, and we do not even know where Wu Xin lives. How could we beat him like this?”

The magistrate and the scribe whispered to each other and felt that what Chun Zhi said sounded true.

“The matter of Wu Xin being beaten will be set aside for now,” the magistrate said: “Today we are hearing the case of who owns the tofu workshop. You both say it is yours. Bring out your evidence.”