Read Chapter 13: — CIMO HALL

After the forgery case, Mufeng spent more time at Cimo Hall.

The house had survived wars, political campaigns, redevelopment plans and generations of Qiu family arguments. Its timber screens, carved beams and old furniture represented a history no single person could claim to own.

Qiu Zanchen wanted Mufeng to inherit responsibility for it because his grandson Qiu Bin had no interest in becoming a calligrapher.

"You love these things," the old man said. "That is more important than blood."

Mufeng refused the property.

"Love is exactly why I cannot take it as private wealth."

The argument remained unresolved.

Meanwhile the other members of the Yongfeng Gang were changing.

Song Dacheng had left for Germany after a bitter fight with his father over investment in a heat-treatment workshop. The older Song believed the project would ruin them. Dacheng believed without it their factory would remain permanently second-rate.

Qian Duoduo was expanding his family's restaurant to the new district while quietly courting He Jiaxuan, a fashion designer from a wealthy family. Her European boyfriend complicated matters, but Duoduo insisted that no foreign champion could compete with a man capable of making perfect crystal shrimp dumplings.

Daidi had become subdued since Yifeng closed.

Qiu Bin still loved her and still failed to say it.

One evening the five friends returned to the old neighbourhood and broke into the abandoned garden where they had hidden as children after stealing pears from Daidi's grandfather.

For a few hours they were ridiculous again.

Then morning came.

"We thought growing up meant freedom," Dacheng said.

"It means invoices," Duoduo replied.

"And mortgages," Mufeng added.

Daidi looked at him. "And choosing people who don't choose you back."

Nobody laughed.

Later, Qiu Bin finally told her the sentence he should have spoken years earlier.

"I like the smell of pear candy."

Daidi stared at him.

"That is the worst confession in Chinese history."

"I wasn't confessing."

"Then it's even worse."

She walked away smiling.

Mufeng watched them and understood that love did not always arrive like lightning.

Sometimes it waited in the same lane for twenty years.