Chapter 13: Mending the Kite and Exchanging Cloth Scraps
No one understands the bitterness that Boatman felt on that day.
He originally thought that there were plenty of tailors in Sangqing Town, and that mending a silk kite was something any woman on the roadside could do.
To his surprise, the woman who mended clothes said she couldn't mend it, only linen, and told him to go somewhere else. There were ready-made clothing shops, Zhang's old tailor shop, and Chen's embroidery shop by the roadside, so he went into each one.
The clothing shops don't repair this at all. The old tailor wants to charge 300 coins, plus 200 coins for the fabric. The embroiderer says it will take two days to embroider, 300 coins for the silk thread, and 500 coins for the embroidery work.
Boatman was startled; the silk kite had only cost him five hundred coins.
If all else fails, he will go to find a kite maker. In the spring, many people fly kites, and kite makers can be found everywhere in the streets and alleys.
When the person heard this, they said they would take apart the thin bamboo frame and re-paste the paper, and it would only cost a hundred coins. How could Boatman agree to that? Otherwise, he would have bought the silk kite for nothing!
After going around in circles and exhausting himself trying to persuade her, he still had to sheepishly return to find Lin Xiushui.
Lin Xiushui had long known that he would give up after hearing the price, because in the entire Sangqing Town, there was no one who could repair clothes better than her at a lower price, and no one who asked for a lower price could repair clothes as well as her.
One day she'll show everyone that cheap things can be good too!
She picked up the kite, and Chuanbulang sighed, "I should have just had it repaired here. I didn't even make a sale all day."
“You’re sure to have business today,” Lin Xiushui, a potential customer, said honestly. “There’s no rush to mend the kite. It can be mended by tomorrow at the latest. Let me take a look at the fabric first.”
Fortunately, the boatman was a cloth seller, so he had no shortage of cloth. The most common types were linen and white ramie, followed by kudzu cloth and silk, as well as large quilt covers.
There aren't many colors; the most common ones on the market are red, blue, green, and cyan, only the shades of each color are different.
Lin Xiushui entered the cabin and saw the piles of cloth. Her eyes lit up, but when she asked about the price, her light went out like a blown-out candle.
Forget it, I can't afford it.
She first gathered all the silk fabric she needed, then said, "Let's look at the scraps of fabric again. I'll see if I can find any that we can use."
Boatman picked up a burlap sack, placed it at the bow of the boat, and untied the rope. "This is full of scraps of cloth. Take your pick. These are all scraps of cloth I got from Lin'an Prefecture. Don't be fooled by their small size; there's plenty of material, including damask, silk, and even satin, in many different patterns."
Lin Xiushui was initially uneasy, thinking it was just scraps of fabric left over from cutting cloth, and that it would be difficult to bargain when buying fabric scraps.
She took out the pieces of fabric; they were indeed made of damask, silk, and cotton, and the colors were quite nice: light red, maroon, and pale green. But something felt off. She touched the fabric pieces several more times, took a few steps, and examined them closely against the light. Then she knew what was wrong.
She first asked, "How much is this bag of fabric scraps?"
“You want to buy it?” Boatman held up one finger. “I’ll give you this price; I’ll double it if someone else buys it.”
Lin Xiushui deliberately said, "Ten coins."
“Young lady, you must be joking,” Chuanbulang shook his head repeatedly, “There’s no such low price.”
“This isn’t even worth a hundred coins,” Lin Xiushui pointed to a palm-sized piece of cotton cloth, stained with oil and with haphazardly cut edges. She was certain, “It was probably taken from someone else’s old clothes. It’s worth at most thirty.”
Chuan Bulang was immediately stunned, his face showing undisguised astonishment. This piece of cloth was not from Lin'an Prefecture at all; it was old clothes bought from the secondhand clothing market. It contained a lot of silk and satin because more than half of it was unredeemed pawned items from pawnshops, as well as clothes that had been ruined by tailors and stolen and sold after his family was raided.
Anyway, he was full of lies when he sold cloth. He would buy clothes for a hundred coins, cut up and repair the burnt or not-so-good clothes, cut them into scraps of cloth, and resell them for several hundred coins.
He wasn't annoyed at being seen through this time, but just puzzled and asked, "How did you figure that out? I've sold to so many people, and none of them have ever said anything."
Lin Xiushui chose to reply to "My eyesight is too good" instead of "They all have terrible eyesight" and "I'm too lazy to call you out on it".
"One hundred coins won't do, thirty coins at most."
Chuanbulang hurriedly said, "Grandma, this isn't how you bargain. Give me a little more money up."
"Thirty-five Wen at most."
After repeatedly backing down, Chuanbulang finally said helplessly, "Fifty coins, that's the lowest I can offer. Consider it payment for repairing the kite."
This was exactly what Lin Xiushui wanted.
She returned the fifty coins that the boatman had given her, untouched, saying, "I told you you had business today."
Chuanbulang's lips trembled; he had nothing to say.
He looked at Lin Xiushui, who was holding a sack of cloth in her left hand and a kite in her right, and touching a string of copper coins in her hand, and muttered to herself, "Why do I feel like I'm losing out?"
What a huge loss!
Lin Xiushui felt she had made a profit, and turned around with a smile on her face. In fact, it was worth the price of three hundred coins. No matter where the old clothes came from, the feel of good fabric would not lie.
Lin Xiushui took the sack back. There was no one in the house. She first found a bamboo tray and placed it on the bench. She poured out the cloth scraps, which smelled damp and stuffy.
I only glanced at the top of the boat from the bow; it was mostly small pieces of brightly colored cotton, silk, and fine brocade with many patterns. But when you poured it out from the bottom, it was mostly large, wrinkled pieces of white ramie, fine white linen, or plain coarse silk, mixed with some blue, green, and red fabrics.
It can only be said that the buyer is not as shrewd as the seller.
Lin Xiushui was still happy. Plain colors were fine too, as she could dye them herself. She could make quite a few things with these scraps of cloth.
After picking and choosing for a while, she finally decided to call upstairs: "Xiaohe, come and help me choose fabrics, put the same colors together."
Xiaohe poked her head out of the wooden window and ran down, exclaiming, "Wow, where did all this come from? Ah, rags?"
“What rags?” Lin Xiushui had already chosen the silk fabric. She sat down at the table and began to mend the holes in the kite. “Now that you’ve chosen, I’ll make you a pair of cat-head shoes.”
Xiaohe ran to get a stool, jumping up and down as she said, "I'll pick one, I'll pick one."
Unable to sit still for long, Xiaohe leaned her head on Lin Xiushui's shoulder again and asked curiously, "Sister, how did your kite get broken?"
“Others need to fix it if it’s broken, so they can make money,” Lin Xiushui replied, taking advantage of the remaining light to begin mending the kite.
This kite has three large holes and four small ones. The kite frame is made of bamboo and wood and is fixed with thread, unlike paper kites which are glued together.
She cut the thread with scissors, set up the bamboo and wooden frame, and removed the kite cover. Mending isn't just random patching; it has to be done according to the pattern. This butterfly-shaped kite has a yellow background with persimmon calyx patterns on both sides. This pattern, resembling the calyx of a persimmon flower, was very popular in Lin'an Prefecture.
Because the persimmon in the persimmon calyx pattern symbolizes the hope that everything will go smoothly, and the persimmon root is the strongest of all wood roots, it also implies that it will last forever.
Lin Xiushui had seen it on window frames, bricks and tiles, pottery jars, and wood carvings, especially on fabrics, where the patterns on children's clothes were mostly persimmon calyx patterns.
But the persimmon calyx pattern on this kite has many layers. The bottom is a blue-green rhombus, with a circle of yellowish-brown stripes inside, followed by orange four-petaled sepals, and dark red pointed leaves at the corners.
She needed at least four similar colors of silk fabric, which she cut and pasted according to the shape, striving to achieve a similar appearance. As for the other small holes, she would cut and paste petals from mixed-color fabric to decorate them.
First, take a small piece of blue cloth and cut it into a diamond shape larger than the hole. Then, carefully sew along the edge using silk thread taken from silk fabric. This thread is extremely fine. This cloth cannot be coated with paste, otherwise the cloth will stiffen when the paste dries.
First, she embroidered the yellow stripes along the edges. Then, she cut out the persimmon calyx pattern and sewed it on. The needle had to be inserted at an angle, and she had to lift the needle and pick up the thread so that the thread wouldn't be too noticeable. Although this wasn't her first time doing embroidery, she was still a little nervous.
The silk fabric was very thin. Of course, the thinner the better for a kite, but for the person who was mending it, it was a real test of skill. She had to think carefully before each stitch and couldn't pull the needle back and forth.
As darkness fell, the large hole that had been broken gradually transformed back into the original pattern of the kite. Apart from the difference in color and slight protrusion, the pattern looked exactly like it had always been there.
After patching the large hole, Lin Xiushui prepared to patch the small one. When she looked up, she was surprised to find that it was already dark. There were two sesame oil lamps and a bowl of noodles that had long since gone cold beside her.
Then she remembered that when her aunt came back and called her to eat, she said she would eat, but she was busy with her hands and didn't eat at all.
She rubbed her sore shoulders. Wang Yuelan came over when she saw her move and said irritably, "What important work is it? Can't you eat first and then do it? Don't eat this cold rice. There's still rice simmering in the stove."
Wang Yuelan then brought over a few more plasters and placed them on the table. She said, "Put these on your hands. These plasters are effective. I asked someone for them."
Lin Xiushui was stunned; she had never told her aunt that her hand hurt.
"Go eat, what are you standing there for?" Wang Yuelan waved her hand in front of her eyes. "What's wrong, your eyes hurt?"
"No," Lin Xiushui rubbed her eyes and said softly, "the plasters are so expensive."
Wang Yuelan reached into her silk pouch and pretended not to hear.
"Let's go eat."
Lin Xiushui, carrying the hot plaster, went to the stove to get some food—bone broth noodles. She sat back down at the table. It was dark with stars, and a breeze was blowing in the courtyard. Two sesame oil lamps flickered.
Wang Yuelan took out a silk floss pouch next to her, which looked like half a bag. She had smeared lard on her hands beforehand, so they were still oily. She stretched out the silk floss, made a small hole in the middle, and turned the bag into a silk floss loop. This was used to make trousers and jackets. If you stretched it into long strips, you could make silk floss quilts.
To turn it into a single, thin, and warm piece of silk floss, two people need to pull it together, with equal force and a steady hand speed. The loop is pulled thinner and thinner into finer strands. If pulled well, the strands will be the same thickness; if not, some will be thinner than others, requiring further pulling and mending.
Lin Xiushui was about to put down the bowl and go help, but Xiaohe ran over instead, rolled up her sleeves, and said, "I can flip silk floss too." Lin Xiushui was surprised, "Really?"
“I did a really good job at it. I did it with my mom last year too.”
Wang Yuelan tugged at the silk floss ring and said, "There's no other way. If I ask someone else to help me turn the silk floss, I'll owe them a favor. Years ago, I asked someone to help me turn the silk floss once, and that year I turned it for them about ten times."
She never looked at it again. Last winter, when it was cold, she thought of bringing Lin Xiushui a cotton-padded jacket. She bought some waste cocoons and made them herself. She taught Xiaohe how to make cotton-padded pockets over and over again. After teaching her for a long time, she finally managed to make them look decent.
Actually, as long as someone holds her back, Wang Yuelan can pull the rope evenly by herself. Lin Xiushui wanted to lend a hand, after all, someone else had paid for it.
But after watching several sheets of paper, she was relieved to see that the torn cotton was very even, and that the cotton still needed to be sewn up and patched up where it was uneven.
That night, in the courtyard, by the light of the sesame oil lamp, Lin Xiushui was mending a kite. Her shadow was cast from time to time. Xiao He and Wang Yuelan were pulling silk floss, and the shadow of the floss covered Lin Xiushui. The floss sometimes drifted down like light snow.
Even without a stove, she always felt hot, probably because the plaster on her hands was very hot, something she would always remember.
The next morning, the repaired kite appeared in Chuanbulang's hands.
He was still half asleep. After glancing at it, he asked in surprise, "You didn't just buy a new one somewhere, did you?"
"Why don't you take another look?" Lin Xiushui yawned. "I have the money to buy a new one."
Chuanbulang squatted by the river and washed his face. It was bitterly cold. He hissed and blinked again to take a closer look. Wow, this kite is good. At first glance, it looks fancy, but upon closer inspection, isn't it exactly the same as the original?
It didn't look like it had a hole at all. He had to put his face close to his eye to see a tiny thread. Then he looked at it from the other side and saw that it had been sewn with new cloth, neat and tidy, without even a trace of a patch.
He will never believe in old women mending clothes again; the younger ones are the real experts.
Boatman looked at it again and again, poking it with his hand, before praising it with a mouthful of praise: "Young lady, with your skills, you'd be losing money even if you only paid fifty coins, let alone a hundred."
“Then how about,” Lin Xiushui suddenly perked up, “you give me another fifty coins.”
"Are you kidding? That's impossible," Chuanbulang chuckled. "In the future, it's no big deal. If there's another job like this, I'll come back to you."
Lin Xiushui knew it, so she snorted and waved goodbye.
Next time, she'll ask for 100 coins.
The kite was repaired, and there was also a cotton-padded coat.
This garment doesn't require much skill. Aside from quilting, Lin Xiushui selected the fabric, sandwiched the silk floss inside, and sewed diagonal lines one by one, then crossed the diagonal lines to finish.
Spending a few days in the oilcloth workshop, covered in the smell of tung oil, one inevitably becomes slick and oily. Yes, she had already learned to sew her own work during her midday break.
Yu Liu Niang was quite puzzled, "You brought your own needles too. Actually, it's not a big deal if you use needles made from oilcloth."
She lowered her voice, "How can you be so honest? Do you think everyone in the tung oil industry doesn't benefit from it?"
"How do you do it? Put it in a jar?" Lin Xiushui asked, puzzled as she sewed.
Yu Liuniang gave her a look that said, "You just don't understand," and quietly told her, "Of course, you change your shoes every day and have all the relatives wear them. The tung oil is used to coat the soles and the uppers of the shoes. After they dry, they become oil shoes that cost two or three strings of cash a pair."
Tung oil is strictly regulated; you have to be searched to make sure you don't take it out. However, if you get tung oil on your shoes, it's not a problem.
This led to many funny incidents. Men wore women's shoes, and women wore men's boots. One was too small, and the other was too big. They had to squeeze in and drag themselves. Every day, seeing what shoes everyone was wearing was enough to make people laugh.
Lin Xiushui never imagined that there really was a way to gain an advantage in this industry.
She laughed so hard she almost pricked her hand with a needle, then took out a few brightly colored scraps of fabric from her small bag. "Do you think these will be good for making tiger-head shoes for your daughter?"
“No, that won’t do. The color is too good,” Yu Liu Niang said hurriedly. She added, “You haven’t sewn the soles of your shoes yet, have you? Bring them over tomorrow and use the needles here to stitch them even deeper than those from Shuangxiong.”
"A needle costs 130 yuan, might as well use it."
Lin Xiushui chuckled, realizing that she still had to take advantage of the needle.
Yu Liu Niang then said, "Come wearing your shoes tomorrow."
"Then what am I wearing on my feet?"
"Wear a pair of sturdy shoes, wide-footed ones," Yu Liuniang beckoned to her and whispered in her ear, "You have to go help out at the tung oil workshop tomorrow; they're painting oilcloth umbrellas."
"You have to put some tung oil on your shoes to raise your social status."
A note from the author:
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