Chapter 115: The whole ship is surprisingly quiet during sailing
As the boat approached the Third Gate at midday, Changsun Qingjing overheard the conversation between the boat owner and the head of the music troupe, and the incessant sounds of the pipa and konghou, which had been playing day and night, suddenly ceased.
The monks' previously scattered and spontaneous midday prayers suddenly became a unified chanting of scriptures, just like in the mornings and evenings.
The boat slowed down noticeably, and a boatman called out to the guests that the sacrificial ceremony was about to begin. He advised them to stay in their rooms and wait quietly, and not to drink alcohol or engage in entertainment, so as not to offend King Yu.
The young boatmen carried incense tables, incense burners, wine, salt, dried meat, and paper horses onto the bow of the boat one after another.
The helmsman and the ship owner personally presided over the sacrificial ceremony. Everyone knelt and worshipped devoutly before the clay statue of Yu the Great on the altar, loudly reciting simple prayers into the air: "May King Yu grant us grace and protect our ship; may we pass through the three gates and enjoy calm seas."
Then, the boatmen began burning paper horses and throwing copper coins and millet into the river.
Passengers who had never been to Zhizhu Mountain before curiously leaned out to secretly observe this ancient blessing ceremony, finding it both comical and vulgar.
As the boat slowly approached the entrance, the passengers, seeing Zhizhu Mountain for the first time, could no longer smile.
The mountains are rugged and towering like swords pointing to the sky; looking up, the layers of peaks block out the sun; looking down, the raging waves swallow boats.
The passengers' comments began to echo those of the "uncouth" boatmen.
"King Yu has blessed me."
"Amitabha."
The ship slowly sailed between two rock walls, which were no more than twenty paces wide at their widest point.
The rocks on both sides are rugged and craggy, their color a deep ochre like rusted iron; the stone edges are fierce and jagged, covered with moss like dragon scales.
The boatmen slowly lowered the tow rope from the mast base towards the side of the ship. The trackers on both banks used long poles to hook the tow rope and connect it to the main tow rope. The main tow rope then split into more than a dozen tow ropes about six or seven steps from the ship, which were then pulled by more than a dozen trackers on each side.
With the sound of a gong, the boatmen on the two banks slowly towed the ship between the reefs and treacherous shoals.
As the plank road ascended, the boatmen walked almost along the cliff edge, which was ten steps above the ground. Under the guidance of the tow leader's horns and flag signals, the boatmen squeezed along the cliff face to survive in this four-mile-long predicament.
The whole ship was eerily quiet.
A three- or four-year-old unfamiliar girl skipped and hopped up to the upper floor of the pavilion, seemingly oblivious to the perilous situation of the ship's gunwale clinging to the cliff face outside.
Compared to other girls of the same age from noble families, such as the eldest grandson Renpei, this girl was shorter and thinner, and her skin and hair were yellowish due to excessive exposure to the outdoors.
What's remarkable is that hardship didn't rob her of her curious eyes or her courage to explore. When she fell on the unstable deck, she would brush off the dust, get up, and then look around at each cabin on the three-story upper deck.
Just as A Cai was about to send the girl downstairs, Changsun Qingjing noticed the child's scars and felt pity for her, so he invited her into his cabin.
The little girl wasn't shy at all. She thanked the woman and took the plate of dried fruit she was given, chewing it heartily. When the woman asked her what her parents' names were, she looked confused and answered vaguely.
“Guo Niang, don’t make things difficult for the child. She’s dressed in mourning clothes, and she doesn’t seem to have recovered from the loss of her loved one. The boat is rocking so much it’s making us nauseous.” Changsun Qingjing sighed, recalling the time when she lost her father at the age of eight. “She probably doesn’t know what she’s been through. Go downstairs and ask her family. Be careful on the way there and back.”
Ah Cai noticed that the little girl's fingers were dark and couldn't help but wipe them clean for her.
"Eat slowly, be careful not to choke." Ah Cai smiled and stroked the child's messy head, then took out a silver comb from her own hair to comb the frizzy, tangled hair.
"Use my perfume and face cream." Changsun Qingjing thought of the starving people on Mangban Road who were eager to sell their babies to noblewomen, and of the mother and child who had hung up a funeral banner for him before they died. His guilt turned into an urgent desire to make amends, so he took the girl to his side.
A-Cai understood and filled the fish basin with warm water. Changsun Qingjing personally washed and combed the child's hair, applied fragrance to her dry hair, and used face cream to fill in the chapped areas of her skin.
This child possesses a quality that pampered aristocratic girls lack: the ability to read people's expressions or to deliberately flatter them.
After Changsun Qingjing and her servant Acai cleaned the child, she was eager to pour a drink for her unfamiliar, kind mistress as a token of her gratitude.
In the child's mind, there was probably no difference between being given a bowl of porridge and a few pieces of dried fruit; she had become accustomed to it.
But no one had ever dressed her up as neatly and respectably as her mother. A glimmer of light occasionally pierced through her difficult life, and her frail soul desperately grasped at it.
The sound of the grasshopper's crisp, clean footsteps came from behind.
"My name is Sui'er." The little girl dipped her brush in water and drew an object resembling a wheat ear on the floor. "My lady, Sui'er wants to stay here..."
"Okay!" Changsun Qingjing readily agreed, instructing Guoniang to let the cook go back first, and that Guoniang would take the child back later.
Ah Cai finally found a set of ball games in the box, and the four of them each took a short stick and played ball for fun.
As dusk fell, the ship finally sailed out of the "human gate." The boatmen and passengers, as if they had conspired together, breathed a sigh of relief at their miraculous escape.
Cheers, applause, and prayers erupted all at once. Sui'er threw down her short stick and ball and ran to the window to watch the boatmen reel in the rope and the stern of the boat emerge from the bulwark, letting out a surprised "Ah ah!"
Li Shimin, who had been admiring the scenery on both sides of the river from the deck, finally returned to his cabin.
"I was wondering why you didn't come down to find me. Turns out you were playing with a little dumpling." Li Shimin squatted down and carefully examined the little girl. "I thought Renpei was the most delicate girl I had ever seen, but I didn't expect there to be one even thinner... Did you buy her from the people from Hedong in the lower deck?"
Sui'er, A-Cai, and Guo Niang continued their less intense simulated polo match.
"I don't think this child misses her father very much," Li Shimin muttered softly. But he still tolerated a child who was neither a relative nor from an official family playing in his cabin.
“I saw too many unfortunate people on the Mangban Road.” Changsun Qingjing sighed as he looked out the window at the boatmen waving goodbye to their boatmen and returning on the cliffside walkway. “And Shangdongmen, Luoxingyu… If I can help Sui’er today, even if it’s just to make her happy for an hour or two, I’ll feel a huge weight lifted off my shoulders.”
Li Shimin nodded in agreement, expressing his empathy for Changsun Qingjing's earlier sense of powerlessness. He casually tossed the ball that Sui'er had hit off course back to the side of the short stick.
The little girl and A Cai were playing for the ball, and in their excitement, the short stick flew out of her hand and knocked over the cup containing drinks next to Li Shimin.
In an instant, the tea with the aroma of sandalwood splashed everywhere. Li Shimin raised his arm to block it and said, "Be careful!"
When he lowered his arm, Sui'er was no longer as cheerful and lively as before; her bright eyes had dimmed. She lay on the ground like a frightened fawn, wiping the water stains on the floor with her sleeve.
Sui'er trembled with unpredictable terror, not daring to look up or speak, only repeating the wiping motion.
"Has this child been frightened by something?" Li Shimin pulled Sui'er up, and A Cai took a towel to absorb the water stains.
Sui'er, however, turned away as if she had been burned and ran behind Changsun Qingjing.
"Am I that scary?" Li Shimin forced a smile. "Did she misunderstand and think I was going to hit her?"
The grasshopper offered the drink again. Changsun Qingjing instructed her to pack some candied fruit and rock sugar for Sui'er, and then send the child back to her father.
The little girl knelt before the couple and then left.
"This child must think he had a wonderful dream this afternoon, a dream with a kind-hearted fairy..." Li Shimin said with a smile. The evening glow shone through the west window, softening and brightening his face, which had been as hard and dark as a cliff face.
“I’m a big customer. Plus, I promised him I’d only look around and not bother him, and I even helped pass things, so the boatmen didn’t mind too much… This time, I really think it’s good that Sui’er is with you, so you won’t see the boatmen on the cliffside walkway or the wreckage of boats hanging between the dead trees on the cliff…”
"I'm not afraid."
“I know you’re not afraid, but it will make you feel bad…” Li Shimin sighed. “Never mind, let’s not talk about it.”
Changsun Qingjing lowered his eyes, then looked up in acquiescence.
"...Are you thinking about Zhang Liang and Duan Zhixuan?" She gazed at the sunset, recalling that eventful evening.
"I wonder if Zhang Liang has found Duan Zhixuan's father yet, and how Duan Zhixuan is recovering at the Cao family's villa in Xin'an?"
“You personally saw Zhang Liang off, and I personally stitched up Duan Zhixuan’s wounds. How could anything be wrong?” Changsun Qingjing picked up her fan and gently patted Li Shimin’s shoulder. “When we said goodbye to them, they were both full of energy. Could it be that they couldn’t even protect themselves after enduring the most difficult times? You belittle yourself, you belittle me, and you belittle the other two young heroes. What crime have you committed? Shimin, cheer up. When you get to Hedong, why don’t you go and find out their whereabouts yourself?”
"Madam, you flatter me. I was being too childish." He poured a drink for his easygoing wife as well.
Changsun Qingjing looked out the window and asked, "Is the ship heading north?"
"Yes." Li Shimin picked out a large piece of rock candy from the fruit platter presented by A Cai, and said while chewing, "The helmsman said that once we get past this dangerous section, we'll be sailing downstream. After passing the Three Gates, there won't be any major problems. It's still safe to sail in the spring."
"Tell me, where is the emperor now?" Although Changsun Qingjing disliked Yang Guang, he couldn't suppress his curiosity.
"The imperial procession will travel by land. In every place they arrive, they will be subjected to flattery and homage, with local officials taking turns presenting them with treasures and beauties to perform a show of loyalty. In the end, they may not even be as fast as we are."
"That's perfect. After you visit your father's old friends in Hedong City, it would be the best arrangement for you to go north to Jinyang and meet him."
When the topic of Jinyang came up, neither of them felt a sense of anticipation.
Author's Note: Crossing the Sanmenxia Gorge was both perilous and peaceful.
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