Yongning seventeenth year, late autumn.
"She's dead?"
"He died a long time ago. But no one found him."
What he sang was a one-fold opera. An old play in Nan Opera tells the story of a brothel girl and a down-and-out scholar. The woman sold all her jewelry and even her most beloved pair of phalaenopsis hostas in order to provide for the scholar's exams. The scholar came back as the top scholar in high school, but the woman had died of illness in the brothel, still clutching the pair of hosta tickets. That opera is called "Crazy Dream".
He sang:
"Butterflies cannot fly across the sea, and the slave family cannot wait for you to come. An infatuated love is wasted in water, and a half-life name is nothing but dust..."
Finished singing. He stopped his posture, lowered his hands, and stood quietly at the entrance of the alley. Then he turned around and disappeared deep into the alley. The hem of the old opera robe dragged a faint trace on the ground, which was smoothed away by the night breeze in the blink of an eye. Like he never showed up.
Only the Phalaenopsis handkerchief is still flying. It flew over the most prosperous Flower Street outside Changmen, over the corridors with red lights on, over the closed teahouses and taverns, and over one courtyard after another with blue bricks and black tiles. Finally, the wind died down. The handkerchief fluttered down and landed in an abandoned courtyard.
"It's you again." She said to the handkerchief, her voice was as soft as talking to herself.
She folded the handkerchief and put it into Bijia's pocket. Then she raised her head and looked outside the courtyard wall. In the distance, in the direction of Wan'an Lane, the shouts of government officials and the dim light of torches could be heard faintly.
"It's begun." She said.
Only the Phalaenopsis handkerchief is real. It lay quietly in Zanlan's pocket, close to her heartbeat. One moment, one moment, one moment. Like some kind of countdown. Like the beginning of a story.
Purpose: Women's Awakening