Page 76 of Silk and Sensibility

The pirates have been driven away from Hangzhou now. Are you safe in Suzhou? So much has changed since we last met. I’ve tried to prepare for the provincial exams, but with all the other work I’ve been doing, I don’t know if I’ve prepared enough. Perhaps it is a blessing that you won’t hear from me. If you knew of my impending failure, I fear it would disappoint you greatly.

—Unsent letter from Fan Enze to Duan Ailin

Chapter 31

Ailin

Captain Bai’s return signaled a return to regular life. While no one could predict when Wōkòu would attack again, Captain Bai said the situation was safe, at least in the environs around Suzhou, at least for now. This meant that life was to be lived to the fullest for as long as possible.

As Mid-Autumn Festival in the eighth month approached, Ailin wondered why Captain Bai and Meilin did not formalize their betrothal, despite obviously being in love. Meilin quietly smiled in Captain Bai’s presence almost as much as he did in hers.

Though Meilin used to speak openly of Wei Luobi, she never talked about Captain Bai with Ailin.

“Do you think Meilin is delaying her betrothal to Captain Bai because of me?” Ailin asked Mama as she helped set up her embroidery workspace. Since returning from Hangzhou, being with Mama was calming in a way it hadn’t been since before Father got sick. Ailin was still less skilled with the needle than her mother from lack of practice over the years, but she used her eye for color to organize threads in a smooth gradient.

“Why would you think it’s because of you?” Mama secured silk fabric in an embroidery hoop, the first step for their grandest collaboration yet: a thread-on-silk re-creation of one of Ailin’s shānshuǐ landscapes.

When Mama struggled to thread her needle, Ailin offered to help, working up her courage to speak her mind. Mama was stronger now, and so was she.

“I think Meilin is afraid of hurting my feelings if she marries before I do,” she replied. She and her sisters had grown up expecting to marry according to birth order. Ailin’s failed betrothal attempt with Enze gave her ample reason to suspect that Meilin was holding back out of sympathy.

The outline of mountain ridges took shape as Mama began stitching. “Madame Jiang recently received a letter from Madame Cai, the first news she’s gotten from Hangzhou since the roads reopened.”

Ailin’s heart suddenly leaped. A letter from Hangzhou meant potential news of Enze. “What did the letter say?”

Mama kept her eyes on her embroidery as she spoke, steady and sure. “She wrote that they’re all safe despite the Wōkòu disturbance. Pang Tai is managing the family businesses well, Xiatian is expecting their baby to be born any day now, and . . . Shen Lusi says she is delaying her marriage to Enze.”

“They’re not married yet?” Ailin asked, shocked. Enze had stood up to his stepmother and left his family, all because of Shen Lusi. There was nothing more he could give up. “What’s the reason for the delay?”

“He’s been having a hard time saving up enough to provide for them. She says she doesn’t want to add to his burden, especially since he’s been working so hard that he isn’t sitting for the provincial exam this year.”

“Enze is abandoning his studies?” Ailin couldn’t keep the disappointment out of her voice. She knew Enze would struggle after being driven from his family home, but the news of him giving up on the exams was a fresh blow that brought back all her worries about him.

“Does it bother you to know he’s struggling?” Mama’s gaze was alarmingly perceptive.

Ailin rearranged a pile of thread as she warred within herself. She wanted to tell Mama everything—how honorable Enze was and how much she still loved him despite ending their relationship. But it was a fear-laden thought. If she admitted that she still cared about him as more than a friend, Mama would feel burdened by the knowledge when she needed to arrange Ailin’s marriage to someone else. But Ailin couldn’t imagine herself marrying anyone besides Enze, even though she wanted to accept her fate like a stoic, sensible woman.

At Ailin’s silence, Mama spoke again. “Have you considered writing him some words of encouragement?”

“Me?” Ailin squeaked in surprise. Proper ladies did not write letters to men they weren’t related to. She had not entertained the possibility at all.

“You know, I’ve long thought of Enze as one of my own children. I want what’s best for him just like I want what’s best for Junyou, you, and your sisters.”

“Do you think it’s appropriate, given the circumstances?” Though she and Enze once hoped to marry each other, no one in the world knew it outside of Ailin’s family. Furthermore, Enze had expressed his intent to marry Shen Lusi by publicly contradicting his stepmother. For Ailin to write to him seemed inexcusably scandalous.

Mama set her embroidery hoop on her lap. “I’ve said this before, but it bears repeating. Among the five virtues, yì is just as important as lǐ. As long as you have integrity, following your heart cannot be wrong.”

Ailin could not stop thinking about her conversation with Mama. Could she really surrender to her heart’s desires even at the risk of creating a scandal?

Shen Lusi had delayed her marriage to Enze, but that didn’t mean she had given up on making him hers. If Ailin wrote to Enze, but he still ended up marrying Shen Lusi, Ailin would be known as a woman who loved someone else’s husband.

But if she didn’t write to him, would she always regret it? She had lied when she told him she wanted to forget about what happened at Nuolan Garden. The truth was that she never wanted to forget his gentleness. She had merely been afraid of the conflict that would arise from fighting for love.

Ailin slept terribly that night, tossing and turning as she thought of Enze and what she should do.

In the morning, she awoke to the sound of zither music coming from Meilin’s room. It was the first time she’d heard Meilin play since her arm injury, though the Jiangs had lent her an adult zither as soon as she had started giving lessons again.

Meilin’s notes started low and clear, and Ailin immediately recognized “Three Stanzas on Plum Blossoms.” As the song progressed, Ailin wondered how her sister would approach the middle stanza that required numerous left arm movements.