Some time later the bridge stilled. The Butler stood up and came to the place where Van had fallen off. For a while he watched how the stream was carrying away the basket, which already looked like leaf fallen from a tree. He could not find any sign of Van. So, he took the piece of red ribbon and headed back to the house. There, he showed the piece to his Mistress, and she understood everything.
Of course the parents could not let their son to have a relationship with a servant, but they did not have another way out, such as sending the girl away. It was the time of unrest. For security reasons, no one who served in the Northern House was allowed to leave if he knew the Lord and his children by sight. That was why it had been impossible to send Van back to her home village to her parents, and her staying in the house after the morning incident near the pond was out of the question.
That made me sad. But the trip to the low world that followed made me worried. Van’s body was the incarnation of one of the cruellest rulers of a clan that was feuding with the Shi Nan Song family who had to suffer humiliation in his subsequent incarnation as a girl. The fact that his soul might find a more ‘suitable’ body was a matter for concern, as then it would be a more serious threat for the Nan Song family. And this would be likely to happen during the lifetime of my child.
In the evening guests arrived. They were the heads of the noble families and their wives who had been invited to the Northern House of the Nan Song to bring their registries of days of conceptions and births, so that the most favourable marriage could be chosen for Shi. The astrologists were sitting in a separate room, where the heads of the families were invited in turn. After all the dates had been copied and verified, the astrologists started their calculations. They had a lot to do.
Following a long walk in the garden, where the visitors could admire the fish in the pond, and wondrous trees and flowers, the guests headed for the dining hall, where they could see a huge revolving disk which served as a table. There were, actually, three concentric disks that made up the table, the largest was the lowest, the smaller ones were placed one above the other. In the centre of the top disk, there were four big gilded statues of the Buddha and four smaller ones, thus, in total, eight; they were surrounded by plenty of flowers in special flat vases and cassolettes with incense. The candles were placed in lotus shaped gilded candle holders which reflected their light and made its structure fine, which, in turn, made the silk glitter as if alive.