Chapter 5 — Chinh The Muu

Tiet Uyen did not raise her head to look at him. After being punished by kneeling, Princess Truong ordered her to be detained, and sent the most powerful mother Ton to her side, every day to teach Tiet Uyen the rules, then gave the key to me: "The affairs in the palace will be managed by you from now on." From then on, more than half a month later, Bui Chieu almost always stayed in Tiet Uyen's room. It's not clear whether it was guilt or something else, that time she knelt for a whole day and a night, her knees were bruised for many days. Every time he saw her limping slightly, her throat felt like it was choking on a block of cotton. Tiet Uyen released the detention, when she came to the main courtyard to ask for peace, wearing a shirt with a very low collar, the side of her neck revealing a few red and blue purple marks, even though covered with a layer of powder, it was still vaguely visible. She smiled brightly and raised her hand to stroke her neck, proudly saying that every day before going to court, the duke was 'ready' to have breakfast at her courtyard. Footsteps were heard in the courtyard. Bui Chieu walked in carrying a flower waffle and a white jade hairpin. Tiet Uyen welcomed her and softly called out "husband". He said "yeah", brushed past her outstretched hand, walked straight in front of me, placed the flower waffle on the table, and stuck the white jade hairpin into my bun.

“Please come in.”

The old doctor placed his hand on my pulse, closed his eyes for a long time, then stood up, bowed deeply: "Congratulations, your madam, you are happy." He paused for a moment, "The statue's veins are smooth but powerful, as far as I can see—it's a statue of twins." Tiet Uyen stood in the corner, her proud expression not yet extinguished. As soon as she heard those words, the smile on her lips immediately disappeared without a trace. From then on, I felt secure in raising the baby, but later Bui Chieu's heart still softened. Bui Chieu went to ask Princess Truong to let Tiet Uyen meet the child once. After the wedding night, Tiet Uyen had not seen Niem An for a long time. Princess Truong was silent for a long time, the tea cup in her hand raised and put down, and finally said only one word: "Okay." The day they met, Tiet Uyen waited in Princess Truong's yard. When Niem An was led in by her mother, she immediately squatted down, her arms outstretched, her lips trembling. Niem An stood at the door stunned for a moment, then ran over, Tiet Uyen picked her up, burying her face in her small shoulder, her shoulders shaking violently, Niem An hugged her neck, smiling forever. That day, Niem An was very happy. When she ate, she ate half a bowl. When she read poetry, her voice was even louder than usual. When Tiet Uyen left, she chased her to the courtyard gate, but was stopped by her mother. She clung to the door frame, stood on tiptoe, and watched until Tiet Uyen's back disappeared down the hallway before letting her hand fall. But after returning from the Princess Hospital, Niem An immediately withered away. He didn't laugh anymore, didn't like to talk anymore, the rice was served, he picked up the chopsticks and picked it up and down, for half a day, the grain of rice didn't reduce much, asked him what happened, he shook his head, taught him how to write, he picked up the pen, the ink dripped onto the paper and spread out a patch, he looked at that patch of ink and was stunned, called out a few times before he regained consciousness, at night the mama watched next to him, heard him turn around in the blanket, turn over and over, turn it over until midnight. I feel bad. I sent someone to find out what my mother had said when she followed Niem An out that day. At first, she refused to say anything. When I asked her, she only replied, "The young master is fine," "Maybe he was exposed to the wind." Later, I ordered a close maid to invite her to drink wine. After a few drinks, there was a lot of talking. go up.

"The young master met Miss Tiet at the princess's yard and was fine. On the way home, he passed through the garden and suddenly stopped, saying he wanted to go under the old eucalyptus tree to take a look. The old slave said there was something to see. He still insisted on going. When he got there, he squatted down, stuck his hand into the hole under the tree root and hooked it for a long time, pulled out something and hid it in his chest. The old slave asked what it was, but he didn't say, and after returning, it became like that."

Old tree. I led the two of us to the foot of that eucalyptus tree. As soon as the iron shovel was lowered, the soil was very loose, as if it had just been dug up recently. Digging three meters deep, I touched something. A cloth doll was sewn together, with my eight-character birthday written on it, right where three needles stuck in my heart. I turned the cloth doll over, the needle and thread were crooked, the handwriting was also crooked, it wasn't Niem An's handwriting, she was only six or seven years old, she couldn't write down such well-formed strokes, someone wrote a model for her, so she could trace it based on it. I took the rag doll back to my room, closed the door, spread out the paper, sharpened the ink, from a young age I learned to write with my grandfather, my grandfather said, first I have to draw the bone, then I must draw the spirit, the force when writing, the place to stop the pen, the habit of collecting a pen, are more difficult to imitate than the shape of the letter, but also easier to recognize. I once saw Tiet Uyen's writing, she once copied a book of "Thi Kinh" for Niem An, a page fell to me, I found that page, placed it next to it, compared line by line, line by line, book by book, following it. Imitating the handwriting of a six- or seven-year-old child by following the model is even more difficult than imitating an adult's handwriting. You can't be too similar. If you're too similar, it won't look like a child's handwriting. You can't be completely unlike it. If it's completely different, it can't be blamed on her. I wrote several pages in a row, each page intentionally leaving a slight loophole in a certain stroke, the horizontal folds too heavily, the vertical hooks fall too sharply, these loopholes, along with Tiet Uyen's pen usage habits when teaching Niem An to write, are almost identical. After that, I sewed a new cloth doll, using the same rough cotton fabric as the original one, the needle density was the same, only the eight-character birth god on it was changed to that of Princess Chu Tri Doanh. The name is also hers.