The Lucky Farmgirl

Old Zhou stood in line with a slip in his hand among a crowd of people. Some households sent their stewards to collect the goods, and of course there were officials’ family members who came in person.

For the past year or two, Manbao’s salary had always been collected by Old Zhou himself. By now he didn’t even need his grandsons and granddaughters at home to read the slip for him; he could practically recite in his sleep how much silver and stipend grain they got every month, so he always came alone with a helper to collect it.

And because he’d come so often, he’d gotten to know quite a few people here.

There were circles even among those who collected salaries; his circle was made up of officials’ family members.

In this group there were fathers like him, there were uncles and elder uncles, and plenty of younger brothers as well.

Their common trait was that family assets weren’t particularly abundant, and the ranks of their officials ranged from sixth grade up to fourth grade.

There was another thing they had in common: none of them were natives of the capital.

Because they weren’t locals, and because their family fortunes weren’t great while the cost of living in the capital was too high, they all kept few servants at home, so for things like collecting salaries, family members came in person.

It was also from frequent dealings with them that Old Zhou learned that many people, after taking office, would bring along brothers and nephews. That way they could help manage the household and run errands for them; there were some matters one simply didn’t feel easy entrusting to ordinary servants.

At the same time, it was also a way of training up family members.

Otherwise why would people say, "When one person ascends to the Way, even his chickens and dogs rise to heaven"?

Old Zhou had a servant pull up a cart with a mule, swept his gaze over the area, found the right line at a glance, and went over to queue up.

Everyone very consciously lined up in two rows: one row was all the stewards and servants from different households, and the other was the officials’ family members like Old Zhou.

As soon as they saw Old Zhou, someone greeted him enthusiastically, "Old Zhou, you’re here, come on, over here."

Old Zhou had the servant hold the mule cart in the line while he himself went forward and squeezed in with his friends to chat; you could just barely still call it a proper line.

"Lord Zhou has two portions of festival gifts, right?"

"More than that, isn’t it? Shouldn’t it be three? Lord Zhou even has a title now."

Old Zhou laughed and said, "My Manbao said that the festival gifts for the title are listed under the same slip as Chongwen Pavilion editor, counted as two shares under one slip. Only those with a title but no official post have a separate slip."

When everyone heard that, they suddenly understood and started praising Old Zhou for being well-informed and knowledgeable.

Old Zhou smiled smugly. Although this place wasn’t as carefree as the village, they sure spoke nicely to him, and that was exactly why he always rushed to come collect the salary himself.

"What’s on your slip?"

"Two bolts of cloth, and some wedding rice and wedding flour, that’s all. Those don’t matter as much; I mainly heard that this time the mooncakes are made in the palace. One for the eldest in the household. We got two, and when we’re done making offerings to the Lady of the Moon, we’ll share them out for the children to eat."

Old Zhou quietly glanced at his own slip and painstakingly tried to make it out. He could recognize a few numbers, but he didn’t know the characters for "mooncake." Right, how many mooncakes had Manbao said their family would get last night?

Old Zhou racked his brain and found his memory a bit fuzzy, which made him a little worried.

An old man beside him saw the slip in Old Zhou’s hand, craned his neck to take a look, and then exclaimed, "The young lord gets four mooncakes. Huh, why do you have three slips?"

Old Zhou snapped back to himself and laughed, "This one is my son-in-law’s. I’m collecting his for him as well. Here, read it for me, what’s all written on this slip?"

The old man was a bit envious and jealous, but he still took it and read out, "One bolt of fine hemp, one bolt of coarse cotton, a small bag each of wedding rice and wedding flour, one mooncake. Huh, your son-in-law doesn’t get much."

Old Zhou said, "He only just became an official, his post isn’t high. Look at the next part—he’s still a county viscount. See what’s listed below."

The old man choked for a moment, then unrolled it further and indeed saw two lines of small characters written underneath: "Two bolts of fine cotton, two bolts of silk, two bags each of wedding rice and wedding flour, four mooncakes..."

Old man: so jealous...

Everyone: so jealous...

Old Zhou quietly muttered it under his breath twice and temporarily memorized it, then quickly handed his daughter’s slip to the old man, looking at him expectantly.

The old man unrolled it and said, "I can read it for you, but when you get up there you still won’t remember. The person you brought from home doesn’t know how to read either?"

Old Zhou said, "I was too happy when I left this morning and forgot to call along someone literate."

The old man said, "Then forget it. I’ll just go in behind you later. We’ll go in together—I’ll watch you collect your things before I get mine."

"Oh, that’s really too much trouble for you." Old Zhou smiled so hard his eyes turned into slits and told him, "Then I’ll take you up on that. Next time we come to collect the salary, I’ll treat you to some beans."

Every now and then when Old Zhou felt peckish, he’d have Junior Ms.Qian fry some beans for him to bring along. Just fried beans, but they still tasted better than other people’s, and all the friends he’d made here really liked them.

"How many years have we known each other? What are you being polite for?"

Everyone chatted idly with Old Zhou. "Old Zhou, Lord Zhou and your son-in-law aren’t young anymore, are they? Are they about to get married?"

Old Zhou chuckled, "Of course they’re about to get married. The date’s already set—eighth of the tenth month."

"A fine day! Congratulations, congratulations. We’ll have to come drink a cup of your wedding wine then."

"And the same to you, the same to you." Old Zhou’s eyes were all but gone from smiling, and the words slipped right out, "Never mind just one cup, when the time comes you can drink as much as you like."

Some honest types took it as just polite words, but some people’s eyes flickered and they grabbed Old Zhou, laughing, "Then we’ll be sure to come impose on you. By the way, we’ll need an invitation to attend the feast, won’t we?"

Old Zhou froze. They really planned to come.

He himself didn’t mind, but attending a feast meant giving a cash gift. They weren’t exactly very close relatives or friends; how could he go chasing people down to collect gifts?

But the thought flashed by and was gone. Old Zhou just smiled and said, "I’ll bring the invitations next time we come collect the salary."

The old man who’d been reading the slips for him said nothing. As the line moved forward and more people went up to collect their things and left, there were fewer people around them. Only then did he tug Old Zhou and say quietly, "Old Zhou, there’s some rules about who you invite as home guests, isn’t there? Shouldn’t you ask the kids at home?"

Old Zhou got along quite well with him. He glanced around and lowered his voice. "Of course I have to ask. My wife’s long said so—we haven’t studied, we don’t know much; we can’t make decisions on matters outside on our own. Everything has to be discussed with the children."

"Then why did you agree so readily just now?"

Old Zhou said carelessly, "What’s there to be afraid of? I’ll ask my girl when I get back. If we can invite them, we will. If we can’t, then I just won’t come collect the salary next month and let our Wulang come instead. He doesn’t know anything about this."

The old man: ...Shameless.

But he didn’t say anything, just gave Old Zhou a look full of admiration. "It’s my turn. Come on, you go in first and collect; I’ll keep an eye on things for you."

Old Zhou cheered up at once. He immediately called their servant to drive the cart up and then went in together with the old man.

The clerks handing out the festival gifts were the same ones who handed out salaries. They were thoroughly familiar with these people by now. After all, the ones who came every month to collect the salary were basically the same, and they saw each other once a month—hard not to recognize them.

When they saw Old Zhou, the clerk also broke into a grin. This man’s daughter and son-in-law were favorites at His Majesty’s side, especially nowadays.

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