Chapter 2

Today was the fifth day since An Xin came to her mother’s house. Since early in the morning, a drizzle had started. This has been the trend for the past few days. Every day has been cloudy, and An Xin was stuck at home. The holidays were still not over yet, and there was no need for her to go to school. It was extremely boring to be sitting idly at home. Hence, she carried out a few explorations at this old house.

There were four floors in the house, with an attic on the topmost floor. An Xin could only go up till the third floor because the staircase leading to the fourth floor was blocked by an iron door, which was firmly locked. Both hers and her mother’s rooms were on the second floor, and the third floor had been almost vacant for a long time. When she arrived at the third floor for the first time, everything was covered in a thick layer of dust. She took every single step carefully as she was not willing to dirty her clothes. She had only explored the two lower floors for these past few days and had not yet stepped onto the third floor.

The first floor had a very spacious living room, and a similarly spacious kitchen and dining room, furnished with antique solid wood furniture. There was also a small activity room with an old piano in it. Most of the rooms on the second floor were locked. Apart from two bedrooms, two other bedrooms could be accessed. One of the two rooms was a cluttered utility room, and the other was her mother’s study. Mother usually goes out early and comes back late every day. Even when she was at home, she kept herself in her Study for the majority of the time and only returned to her bedroom late at night.

It was nearly noon, the pitter-patter sound of the rain was getting louder. An Xin put the cold food in the microwave and had lunch alone. Mother’s cooking was very ordinary, far less delicious than Dad’s. After dinner, she went back to her bedroom and turned on her laptop to browse the web. Holding the mouse to move the cursor, her eyes quickly swept through the colourful pages. Then she suddenly discovered the latest and most popular way of divination, it was novel and simple, and she wanted to try it at least once.

This kind of divination only needed a dictionary. Then one has to close their eyes, turn over the pages of the dictionary, and point to a word at random. Repeat it four times. These four words indicate your fortune for the upcoming year.

She jumped out of her chair and found a dictionary from her luggage. With a thick book in her hand, she closed her eyes, turned the pages and pointed her finger at a word, then opened her eyes and looked. It was “known to every family” (家喻户晓). Well, would I be famous next year? This was not a reliable result.

Again, this time, it is an “embezzling public funds”(中饱私囊). This was even more impossible, even if I have the intention, there is no such condition.

Seeing these words, she lost the will to play any more. But since she had already started, she thought that she should see this through whatever the result may be. Anyway, it was not something hard. In this manner, she continued to point out two more words. The next one was “have a beginning, have an ending(有始有终)”, the one after was “being possessed by ghosts”(鬼迷心窍). What was all this? It was bullshit. Then she looked at all of them together:

known to every household(家喻户晓)

Embezzling public funds(中饱私囊)

have a beginning and an end(有始有终)

be possessed by ghosts (鬼迷心窍)

Except for the third word, everything else was totally unreasonable, OK!

An Xin listlessly closed the dictionary and put it back. After playing on the computer for a while and reading books, she felt bored. There was still some time left until my mother came back home. What should I do next?

Just as she was pondering about this, she heard a faint sound of the piano playing. Mother was back already?

She opened the bedroom door and walked out. The rain was still pouring with a loud sound. The sound of the piano was not really audible in the sound of rain, if not closely listened to. As she reached downstairs, she discovered that the main door was still tightly shut, and her mother’s shoes were not there. Mother was not back yet! Had she misheard things?

An Xin went downstairs and came in front of the door of the activity room. When she opened the door, there was no one inside, but the cover of the piano had been lifted. She seemed to recall that the cover had been closed earlier.

Maybe it was Mother who lifted it. She thought to herself. She closed the keyboard casing of the piano and went out of the room without paying much attention to it. Any other teenage girl like her, if alone in such a big old house in the remote mountains, would have been a little scared, but An Xin only felt a little lonely and bored. She has been brave since she was young. She dared to catch insects, frogs and snakes. She used to live in a small house with her father. When her father went on business trips, she often stayed alone at home and gradually got used to this feeling of being alone.

An Xin was really flustered when she had nothing to do. Then she recalled that there were many strange things piled up in the utility room. So she went back to the second floor, opened the door of the utility room and went in. The most conspicuous thing in the room was the Duobaoge shelves (1) which occupied a whole wall. In fact, the furniture and furnishings in this house were mostly European style, but only this room had a typical Chinese style furnishing. The shelf was badly damaged and the dark red paint fell off many at places. Many boards were damaged by insects. It looked as if it could be broken by a touch. The Duobaoge shelf was full of objects of different sizes, and some were old and some were new. In the dim yellow light, it seemed as if every object had a story of itself to tell, just waiting for someone to discover it.

She picked up a square carved silver box with a missing corner. She clicked open the box. Suddenly, Ding Ding Dong Dong, a piece of monotonous music resounded throughout the room. Inside the box, on the faded red velvet, stood a graceful crystal ballerina on one foot, spinning slowly with the music. Her elegantly curved foot was only left till her calf. She had no idea where the rest of the broken sole was.

She closed the music box, put it back in place, and continued checking out other items. The exquisite model boat, which lacked spare parts, a cracked antique vase, few specimens suspected of being made from real animal corpses, and a complete set of small wax statues of twelve beauties of Jinling (2) Although some of these things are old and broken, they are worth seeing.

”

”

When she got to the end of the Duobaoge shelf, she discovered a huge wooden box in the corner. I was unknown what kind of wood the box was made of. But it looked very old and still exuded a faint fragrance. She reached out and brushed the dust on the box cover and saw the fine patterns carved on it. This pattern looked very strange. It was not the commonly seen pattern of flowers, birds, dragons and phoenixes, but some type of writing. An Xin tried to identify them carefully. It felt like they were some ancient characters like oracle bone inscriptions.

What was in the box? She was very interested in it now. But, just as she looked inside, she saw that the box was locked with a rusty copper lock. She reached out and pulled it twice. The copper lock did not move. She had no choice but to give up.

An Xin turned around in a disappointed mood. But when she had just walked to the door, she heard a “Click” behind her. She turned back and discovered that it was the copper lock hanging on the big wooden box that had been opened on its own. At this moment, it was leaning on one side.

Why did the lock open by itself? Was it because I had pulled it loose just now, so it slipped and opened by itself?

She thought to herself in her mind. She walked back to the Duobaoge shelf, pulled out the box and removed the lock. She opened the lid with a little joy and little anticipation about what she was about to uncover.

What, what is this? As soon as the lid of the box is opened, a brilliant red appears in front of her. Inside the box was filled with a red cloth? She stretched out her hand and carefully took out the pile of red cloth. She unfolded it to take a look. It was actually a set of red wedding dress: Ingot collar or shanghai collar, with same coloured clasps, embroidered with green leaf and peony. In addition to the skirt, there was also a cover. It was a complete set of wedding dress, she looked very delicate.

Although the wedding dress was beautiful, she felt a little disappointed. These were just clothes. She had thought there would be something interesting. She folded back the now unfolded dress again, ready to put it back in the wooden box. At this time, she noticed that there were two articles at the bottom of the wooden box: a key and a photo.

An Xin put the wedding dress aside, took out the photo and the key, and took it to the front of her eyes to inspect it carefully. The key was made of copper. It was very old. She looked at it and was not interested in it. Then her eyes moved to the photo, which she looked at for a long time.

It was a yellowed black-and-white photo that looked very old. In the photo, was a bride in a wedding dress, with her head and face covered, sitting on an old-style armchair. Looking at the style and embroidery of the wedding dress. It was the one in the wooden box. This wooden box must have some effects on preserving clothes. Even after so many years, the colours of the dress were still as new as before.

After studying the photo for a long time, she put the key and the photo back to their original place, but the wedding dress inside and closed the box cover. After that, she put the lock on again and adjusted the position. In this way, at a glance, it seemed as if it had never been opened.

The things in the wooden box must belong to the ancestors or elders of her mother’s family. That must be why there was only the bride’s photo, but no bridegroom was seen.

This issue only passed once through her mind, and then she threw it to the wind. She stepped out of the utility room, closed the door and heard her mother opened the door and took off her shoes. An Xin bit her tongue and screamed in her mind. She was almost discovered by her mother that she was rummaging through the things in the house.

As usual, after dinner, the mother and daughter separated. Mother entered the study again and closed the door. An Xin did not go to the Study, because her mother clearly said that she was not allowed to enter the Study. So although she was curious, she had always followed her mother’s advice. But, in the end, she was still a young and rebellious teenager. The more adults stop them from doing something, the more they want to do it.

The next day, the rain had finally stopped, but the sun had not yet come out, the sky was still overcast.

It was very boring to be alone. It was quiet in the house. There was a mountain wind whistling outside the window.

She went to the door of her mother’s study, held the handle firmly and turned it gently. The door opened, it was not locked.

She stepped into the room and found the study larger than she had imagined. On the tall glass windows, there were thick, deep red velvet curtains. Several large mahogany bookshelves were arranged neatly, like a small library. The desks and chairs placed against the wall were of the same texture, exquisite and antique in style. On a high table beside the window, there was a vase full of unknown flowers, which looked delicate and light yellow, emitting a light fragrance.

When she approached the bookshelf, she saw that it was full of books. The books looked very old, and there are many thread-bound books printed with traditional Chinese characters. After a little pause, she went to her mother’s desk, climbed into the big, wide wooden chair and sat down. The desk was full of odd things, and in front of her was a notebook with a thick red cover.

The notebook seems to have been used for a long time. The cover was torn from several places. There were no words on the cover. It was cool and smooth to touch and made of leather. What was in it? An Xin pressed the button on the brownish-yellow cloth lamp on the table and turned it on gently.

DuoBaoGe(多宝格): is a very popular furniture variety that only emerged in the Qing Dynasty. The unique feature of Duobaoge is that it creates spaces that vary horizontally and vertically, unevenly, and randomly. People can display different furnishings according to the size and height of each grid. In terms of visual effects, it breaks the very regular style such as horizontal and vertical continuity, thus opening up a novel artistic conception. Duobaoge flourished in the Qing Dynasty. Together with the armchairs of the time, it is recognized as one of the richest Qing-style furniture.

Twelve beauties of Jinling are mentioned in a Chinese classic literature book “The dream of the Red chambers”