Shao Wudou, second steward of the Wanlong at Three Trees, kicked open the plank door of the mud hut. He waved a contract charging three years of compound interest and demanded Zhou Qiao repay three hundred shi of reclamation debt within three days. He said the house counted for eighty shi, the land for sixty, and the person for one hundred and sixty, forty of which was for her. When Zhou Jiansheng came back, he didn't argue over a single word. He only pointed out that the handprint his father had made was on a work slip for carrying salt, not a loan contract. He folded the contract neatly and handed it back, telling Shao to return in three days. From a broken chest, he took a piece of charcoal and drew alkali patterns on a thin board, explaining that the white blossoms slanted southeast and the heavy alkali sank, with sweet water trapped beneath. He stood the board up for everyone in and around the courtyard to see and announced that he would dig a well in Dongchang in three days. Old He, the Stubborn, said rabbits wouldn't even shit on that land. Zhou Jiansheng replied that he could taste the soil. It had five layers: salt, nitrate, alkali, gypsum, and sweet earth. They only had to taste each layer until the flavor changed, and then they'd find water. They would draw ten barrels from the well, each worth thirty shi, enough to repay the debt. But he hadn't memorized all of his copy of The Water Regulations. Had he ever tasted the flavor of the sweet earth at the very bottom?
