[Republican-era couple + married first, fall in love later + prodigal returns + patriotism and national pride + love in troubled times]
Help! This young lady from the Republican era is really something!
Born into an aristocratic family in Jiangnan, Lin Suyun marries industrialist Shen Huaijin in a family-arranged match to bring in money. As it turns out, she is obsessed with shopping and parties, thinks her husband's constant talk about "saving the nation through industry" is unbearably lame, and even secretly takes a lover for some excitement!
Then comes the day it all goes wrong. Her domineering husband gives her an ultimatum: "Come with me to the cholera front in Tianjin, or marry him off to you."
Excitedly, she goes to elope with her lover, only to watch him lose his nerve and flee in an instant. Forced to the epidemic zone, a living hell, she thinks her husband is taking revenge on her. Instead, she sees him kneeling among the refugees, cleaning up filth with his bare hands.
"What are you doing this for?" she asks, baffled.
"So I can live with a clear conscience." He looks up, his eyes filled with the weariness of a lifetime.
When she takes off her designer clothes and puts on coarse cotton, and that man coughs up blood as he tells her, "I'm sorry..."
Lin Suyun finally understands: in these troubled times, the deepest love has never been candlelit dinners and sweet nothings.
Full of hope, she goes to elope with her lover, only to watch him flee in a panic. Forced to cholera-ravaged Tianjin, she thinks her husband is taking revenge on her. Then she sees him take off his suit and kneel among the refugees, cleaning up filth with his own hands.
"What are you doing this for?" she asks.
He looks up, exhaustion in his eyes. "So I can live with a clear conscience."
When she finally takes off her finery, changes into coarse cotton, and enters the refugee camp; when Shen Huaijin collapses in front of her, coughing blood as he says, "I'm sorry I couldn't protect you"...
Lin Suyun finally understands that the deepest love in these troubled times has never been romance and flowers.
