Chapter 364: Two Bunches of White Chrysanthemums

At 8:40 on April 4th, by the row of flower stalls at the cemetery gate, Zhi'an squatted beside a blue plastic bucket counting money.

"Thirty-five?" He looked up. "It was twenty-five last year."

"Wholesale's thirty this year." The vendor pulled a bunch of white chrysanthemums out of the bucket, water dripping from the stems onto the newspaper underneath. "White chrysanthemums thirty-five, yellow thirty. How many bunches?"

"Three stems per bunch?" She crouched down to sort through them. "The other stall's got five."

"Lady, five stems is forty." The vendor pointed down the row. "I've got five-stem bunches too if you want them."

Most of the white chrysanthemums in the bucket were still wrapped in their sleeves. She pulled out two bunches and compared the blooms, pushed the sleeves down to check whether the centers had yellowed. After comparing two, she went back to the first one in her hand. "This one." She handed over the money. "Leave the water on it—don't shake it dry. It'll be in the sun on the way up."

Zhi'an stood up, shoved the change into his pocket, and jogged toward the small shop. "I'll get water and wet wipes."

"Two packs of wipes. There's moss on the headstone."

He paid with his own money. Coming back, he counted the change in his palm, then tucked it into the side pocket of his backpack.

The road up the mountain was concrete steps, pines on both sides shedding needles across the ground. Second day of the Qingming holiday, and there were plenty of people: an elderly couple ahead carried a big armful of yellow chrysanthemums, walking slowly; a little boy sat on his father's shoulders, holding a white chrysanthemum handed out by the cemetery; halfway up, a loudspeaker looped, "Open burning of paper offerings is prohibited in the cemetery. Fresh flowers may be exchanged for paper offerings at the service point." The wind scattered the second half of the sentence.

Zhi'an took the steps two at a time, then stopped and turned back to wait for her.

"Slow down."

"I'm waiting." He raised the water in his hand. "I've got the water."

"Day after tomorrow, I'm taking the day off." Two steps higher up, he suddenly said it.

"No."

"Half a day."

"The hearing runs into the afternoon."

He kicked at a pile of pine needles at the edge of the step. "Then I'll run over at noon."

"Even if you run over, the guard won't let you in." She said, "Go to class. When the ruling comes down, I'll be the first to tell you."

Zhi'an hugged the water to his chest, climbed two more steps, then turned back suddenly. "What if you win?"

"Winning still means class."

Shen Qian's headstone stood in the row just west of the slope mouth, its face toward the southeast, gray stone. She set the white chrysanthemums at her feet and crouched down, first pulling the plastic flowers from the porcelain vase in front of the stone—last year's, their petals bleached white by the sun, a crack split along one edge. The plastic flowers went into the bag she'd brought. She worked her way down the stone with the wet wipes, starting from the top.

"Sis, water."

She poured the water over the stone, wrung the wipe out twice. The moss in the carved characters was stubborn. She scraped at it with a fingernail; when that didn't work, she pressed the corner of the wipe against it and rubbed. There was a fine crack in the lower right corner of the base, opened up by last winter's freeze, a little wider than the last time she'd come. She reached out and touched it, then picked the pine needles out of it.

"Next time I'll bring a porcelain vase," she said quietly. "Plastic splits after one year in the sun."

Zhi'an crouched nearby, wiping the layer of pine needles and dirt off the stone slab in front of the grave. When he finished, he brushed his knee with the back of his hand.

Two graves over, a family had set out disposable bowls and chopsticks—stir-fried noodles in a plastic container and a dish of peanuts—and a middle-aged woman crouched in front of the stone saying, "Eat up. I brought you wine today." Zhi'an glanced over, then lowered his head again.

"Dad," she said.

Wind came up from behind the mountain, rattling the flower sleeves.

[Thud. Words spoken outside a courtroom do not count as submission.]

"The day after tomorrow, the hearing. Qingshi Village." She went on. "One village, six children. The youngest is eight. The lead in their blood's over the limit. The ditch runs down from the mountain, past the village entrance, around the primary school playground, all the way east."

"The appraisal opinion came in—forty-two pages. Not a single word on it is ours. Sampling, sealing, transport for testing, signatures—all other people's hands. You said evidence would speak for itself. This time it has."

"Restoration costs are in the schedule: 3.12 million. If he actually restores that land, that ditch, back to what it was, that money never enters the account. What enters the account is the ditch. Director Cai from Qinghe said she doesn't want the money. She wants that ditch back the way it was, wants the playground back the way it was."

"The night before the hearing, someone got in through the village committee's back window and swapped out the other sample set. The name on the seal tag was traced over to match the daytime one—traced badly. Who went in through the back window, the police are still investigating. That's a separate case."

She laid the bouquet in front of the stone, blooms facing up, the outer layer of newspaper spread beneath it on the stone platform.

"Those nine notebooks of yours—I've read through Volume Six. The remaining three, they'll wait until this fight is done."

One sentence rose to her lips and she swallowed it back: someone owed her father a piece of testimony, and she'd said she would read it aloud on the day it could be laid out on paper. Today was not that day.

Zhi'an put the wipes back into the bag but stayed crouched, his voice lower than usual. "Dad, I'm in school, you know."

After a pause, he added, "My sister stays up late every night."

"Zhi'an."

"I'm telling the truth."

There was the sound of footsteps on pine needles on the steps, coming down from the row above, unhurried. She looked up.

Lu Jibai stood two steps up, a bunch of white chrysanthemums in his hand, wrapped in newspaper. No tie, shirtsleeves rolled to just below the elbow. That cut on his left forearm had scabbed over, one edge lifting slightly to show pink new skin beneath. He didn't step closer to the grave—just stood there waiting on that step where fewer needles had fallen, switching the flowers from his right hand to his left. Once he was still, he didn't move.

She recognized that spot: when she crouched talking to her father, a small lift of her eyes would find him there. It didn't block the light, and it didn't block the stone.

"You came," she said.

"Mm."

Zhi'an tightened his grip on the bag, looked back once, then looked back again. Between the two glances, he pulled his phone out of his pocket, slid it back in. The empty water bottle crackled in his fist.

She straightened the bouquet in front of the stone, stood up, and stepped back half a pace. "Come up."

Only then did he approach. When he passed her, she handed him the plastic bag at her feet, and he took it, carrying it in the hand without the flowers. He crouched down, unwrapped the newspaper, folded it sheet by sheet and tucked it into his pocket. He set his flowers beside hers, pushed the two bunches together, then touched them lightly with the back of his hand so they leaned into each other.

He stood and stepped back half a pace. His hands hung at his sides. A pine needle landed on his shoulder; he didn't brush it off. His shoes were muddied, and the mud had pressed a small damp patch onto the stone platform. When he backed away, his toes avoided it.

Zhi'an leaned close to her ear, his voice very low: "How long was he standing there?"

"I don't know."

Someone below the slope called a child's name, the voice carried up in pieces by the wind. She had said what she came to say. From him, not a single word.

At five to ten, she glanced at her phone. "Let's go. I still have to go over the paperwork this afternoon."

"Mm." He bent down, picked up the plastic bag, and tied the mouth once.

Going down, Zhi'an took the lead, two steps at a time. About ten steps ahead, he stopped to wait for them.

"The hearing's the day after tomorrow."

"I know."

"8:20 at the courthouse."

"Eight." He said, "Security check at the entrance. First Courtroom's inside—it's a walk."

"Eight's too early."

"Eight." He paused. "Director Cai comes up tomorrow afternoon. I've got her staying at the small hotel next to the courthouse. Sixth morning, we go through security together."

"She's staying two nights?"

"One. She said there aren't many buses from the village. She'll catch the six o'clock shuttle."

She filed that away: pick her up tomorrow afternoon, move the paperwork review forward half an hour.

"The expert assistant—how many questions are you planning to ask."

"Three." He said, "If he says isotope ratios can overlap, I ask how wide that overlap window is, and whether he has sediment data from this side of the mountain. If he says this side has no data, I ask whether he has any third-party data."

"And if he answers 'in theory'—"

"Then I'll call the appraiser back once more and have him answer exactly one question: has he personally ever run this kind of comparison."

"The appraiser's outline is up to page seven."

"Page seven," he said. "Seventeen more pages behind it. Tomorrow we go through it twice. First pass, I read. Second pass, you read, and I'll catch where you trip."

"You think you can catch me?"

"I can."

"How did you know we'd be here."

"Qingming," he said. "You only ever come in the morning."

"What time did you get here."

"Eight."

"You stood at the base of the mountain for forty minutes?"

"About that."

"Why didn't you come up."

"You were talking first."

Ahead, Zhi'an turned back and shouted, "Hurry up, you two. The stalls by the gate sell soda. I'm getting a bottle." Standing on the steps, he shouted at Lu Jibai again, "Next time, stand closer."

"All right," Lu Jibai answered.

She walked on two more steps, her heel knocking against a wet stone slab.

Her phone vibrated in her pocket. She pulled it out: a voice message in the group chat. Ma Jianjun's voice rolled out of the speaker: "Attorney Shen, what time's the hearing day after tomorrow? I can spare two hours in the morning."

She held the record button: "Nine o'clock, First Courtroom, Intermediate Court. Don't let it cut into your deliveries."

The reply came fast: "Won't cut into anything. Helmet's in my hand. Won't even take a seat."

He Xiufen's text followed right on its heels: "After you finish at the grave, there's noodles in the pot. Don't eat out."

She put the phone back in her pocket and looked up at the stone memorial arch at the mountain gate. Under the arch sat a sorted trash bin. Lu Jibai walked over, tipped the plastic flowers from the bag into "Other Waste," and folded the bag into his pocket.

Zhi'an stood in front of the shop picking out a soda and called back, "Sis, which one do you want?"

"Just water."

"I looked back at him twice." Zhi'an twisted the cap off his soda, his voice dropping. "He didn't move a muscle. Standing next to him, I felt too awkward to even talk."

She didn't answer. She took the water he handed her, opened it, drank. The mouth of the bottle was ice-cold, the chill running all the way to her chest.

Last time was the death anniversary. She'd come alone, stood for ten minutes, then gone back down the mountain. Those plastic flowers in front of the stone were the ones she'd stuck in that day. Today she'd stayed here a full hour.

She walked to the stone arch, stopped, and looked back up the slope.

In the row at the mouth of the slope, by the last grave, a spot of white showed among the gray stones: two bunches of white chrysanthemums leaning together, blooms pressed close. When the wind passed, they tilted together, came back together. From here, no one could tell which bunch belonged to whom.

She stood beneath the arch, still. She thought: the time he had stood up there was longer than the time she'd spent talking with her father.