Resolution
Jin Lang had also taken part in the palace examination, so when this disaster broke out, Bai Jinxiu could not simply sit still. She issued strict orders that the entire Jin household was forbidden to breathe a word of the matter, then boarded her carriage and headed straight for the Bai Manor.
Madame Liu and Lady Dong were both beside themselves with worry, fretting that Jin Lang and Dong Zhangyuan might be dragged into the affair.
When word came that Bai Jinxiu had returned, Madame Liu hurried out to meet her.
Bai Jinxiu took her mother's hand and spoke as she walked through the wisteria gate.
"The capital is in chaos right now. Just a little while ago, the wife of Jin Lang's cousin on his grandmother's side came secretly to ask about Jin Lang—afraid we might have sent gifts. Every family that sat for the spring examination is either begging at Wude Gate for their exam results to be returned, or trembling in terror that the gifts they sent will come to light! Before I came here, Chancellor Yu had already entered the palace to see His Majesty, and his eldest and third sons have gone to the Court of Judicial Review."
Madame Liu, a lady who knew little of the world outside her gates, felt her heart drop at the news.
"Then... does that mean Jin Lang could be affected as well?"
"We didn't send any gifts. But if there truly was fraud in the examination, it seems the spring results will be annulled entirely. That would mean Jin Lang has to sit for the exam all over again!"
Having said her piece, Bai Jinxiu quickly added, "Mother, please go inside for now. I'll go speak with Eldest Sister and discuss what to do. Don't be too anxious."
"Yes, yes! Go discuss it with A'yan! A'yan will have a plan!"
Madame Liu nodded.
When Bai Jinxiu entered the garden, supported by Cuibì, Bai Jingyan was drilling with her silver spear, endlessly repeating the same unadorned, elementary thrusts and feints, sweat pouring down her face.
"Sister."
"Second Sister!"
Chun Tao greeted her with a smile.
At the sound of Bai Jinxiu's voice, Bai Jingyan drew in her frost-cold spear and planted it once more. She wiped her face and hands with the handkerchief Chun Tao handed her, then spoke first.
"Did you come because of the examination fraud?"
Bai Jinxiu lifted her skirts and stepped into the courtyard, nodding.
"They say Yu Zhen, the Chief Minister of Judicial Review, went to Wude Gate to console the examinees. Wen Zhenkang and his men can't even leave the palace—they've been seized by the Imperial Guard! Once the bribery is confirmed, not only will the examiners who took and gave the bribes lose their heads, but the results of everyone who passed will be annulled."
"Tell Jin Lang that this is precisely the moment to keep his head and prepare properly. He'll have to retake the exam—make sure he sets his mind straight."
"Sister? Could it be that this affair..."
Studying Bai Jingyan's unnaturally calm expression, Bai Jinxiu felt a sudden, unsettling suspicion that her sister might be the one behind the whole affair, and lowered her voice.
"Does it have something to do with our family?"
"Hanlin Academician Wen Zhenkang is Li Mu's man. You knew that much. But did you know that Minister of Revenue Cao Chongxing is his man as well?"
Bai Jingyan gestured for Bai Jinxiu to take a seat on the stone chair.
"Li Mu has reached his hand out toward even me. So he's going to learn what it means to hurt—to find out exactly what fear is when I break one of his arms."
Bai Jingyan set the damp handkerchief down on the tray Chun Tao held out for her and continued.
"This is something they did of their own doing. I merely stirred up a bit of wind against a boat already drifting with the current."
"Minister Cao Chongxing is Li Mu's man?"
Bai Jinxiu looked utterly astonished.
"After Prince Liang died plotting his rebellion, everyone who had followed him defected to Prince Yang. Jinxiu—never lose your judgment to a weak appearance and pretense."
Bai Jingyan poured a cup of tea and pushed it toward her sister.
"This was a decision I made after careful thought. When you set out to catch a rat, if you're too afraid of disturbing your own nest, you'll never sever Li Mu's arm. Yes, the affair may swell until the results are annulled—but the bigger it grows, the more good it does us too. Jin Lang and Zhangyuan are men of genuine talent. Retaking the exam will cost them nothing!"
Bai Jinxiu bowed her head and considered it carefully.
"You're right, Sister."
"And where is Jin Lang?"
"When he heard that failed examinees were stirring up trouble at Wude Gate, a friend of his came to fetch him, and they went together."
Bai Jinxiu rose and gave Bai Jingyan a courteous bow.
"I should send someone to bring him home. He must make the most of this chance—so that when he sits for the exam again, he can show his true ability."
Bai Jingyan nodded.
After Bai Jinxiu left, Nuo Ping came in with news. Several of the people he had dispatched returned bearing fresh reports: Chancellor Yu had emerged from the palace looking far less harried than when he'd gone in. Both of the chancellor's sons had also left the Court of Judicial Review and returned to their residence. Hearing this, the Grand Tutor had hurried into the palace himself.
Chancellor Yu was, as ever, the man best able to protect himself at court. Like a loach, he had slipped clean away—the moment he heard the news, he went straight into the palace and offered up his own guilt. The Grand Tutor, watching the chancellor's every move, must have divined what he was about to do and rushed to the Emperor to confess as well.
Once those two men had both declared their faults before the throne, the Emperor would understand just how grave this examination bribery scandal truly was. And the angrier His Majesty grew, the more perilous Wen Zhenkang's position would become.
The Left Chancellor must be pacing his halls in an agony of uncertainty right about now.
Bai Jingyan narrowed her eyes and tapped a finger lightly against the stone table. The fraud had thrown the whole capital into an uproar; Wen Zhenkang's family must be clutching their hearts in dread.
For Wen Zhenkang, presiding over an examination as chief examiner for the first time, to brazenly accept bribes like this—was it because Li Mu was quietly covering his back?
If Li Mu were entangled in this affair—or if someone were to coach Wen Zhenkang's family to go begging the Left Chancellor for help—the chancellor would certainly be thrown into a panic. He might even be genuinely afraid. Even if Li Mu had nothing to do with the matter, it would still be a monstrous headache for him.
Having thought this far, Bai Jingyan called for Chun Tao and sent her to summon Nanny Dong.
Her plan was to light the fire at home first. Wen Zhenkang's wife would be in a panic by now, her judgment clouded. That was precisely where the blade had to be inserted.
Nanny Dong understood the instruction at once.
"Leave it to me, Eldest Miss. I'll see it handled properly."
The Golden Board was customarily posted on the third day of the fourth month, once the palace examination had concluded. But with nearly a hundred examinees camped outside Wude Gate, striking the Dengwen Drum and begging the Emperor to return their results, the list could not be published on schedule.
An imperial edict came down: the examination fraud case was to be tried jointly by the Chief Minister of Judicial Review and the Crown Prince, with a resolution ordered within three days.
The Crown Prince had a splitting headache. No matter what he did, someone would end up resenting him. Among the meritorious families whose sons had sat for the spring examination, which household had not sent gifts?
And of all things, his imperial father had ordered him to punish the offenders strictly. The two grandsons of Chancellor Yu's household and the grandson of the Grand Tutor had unquestionably earned their places on true merit, so they were set aside—but everyone else who had offered bribes was to be punished severely and barred from official appointment for life.
People came knocking on Yu Zhen's door. He closed it to all visitors and refused every gift brought to him—and understandably so. With a scandal of this gravity erupting, unless an official intended to lay down his post altogether, refusing was the only proper course.
The Crown Prince, who lacked Yu Zhen's iron resolve, did receive the meritorious families at first. Before long, however, he could bear it no longer and summoned his advisors to deliberate—seeking some way to resolve the affair without making enemies of everyone.
Zhen Xiangzhi proposed that just as a state is governed by its laws and a family by its house rules, the Crown Prince—as heir to the realm—must stand before the nation's law with unimpeachable integrity, severing private sentiment from public duty. Only then, he argued, would the Emperor come to acknowledge and trust in such conduct.
Advisor Fang, however, urged the Crown Prince to receive the families first and let them plead, to accept even those who came weeping and begging. Then, once Yu Zhen had handed down the stern punishments, the Crown Prince could later go to the Emperor and ask for mercy on their behalf—and the meritorious officials would follow him ever after.
Zhen Xiangzhi found the scheme utterly shameful. The Crown Prince was no longer merely a prince; he was the root of the state. Only when the root stood upright could the nation walk the proper path.
Yet after his deliberations, the Crown Prince pronounced Advisor Fang's method the better one, and in that instant Zhen Xiangzhi's fury rose so hot he nearly transcended to the next world on the spot.
Winning hearts and minds mattered for the heir of a nation—but never, never by such means. Bribery in the imperial examinations corrupted the very foundation of the state. It was a great evil, a great crime. How could the crown prince of a nation countenance it? If ministers this rotten were allowed to remain in the court, what future could the Kingdom of Jin even speak of?
Prince Liang had scheduled his polo tournament for the sixth day of the fourth month, but thanks to the examination scandal, far fewer of the meritorious families showed up than expected.
The households implicated in the fraud were in no mood to appear anywhere, and even the unimplicated official families—with examinees of their own at home—had to hurry back to prepare for a retake. His Majesty might well order one.
In truth, the whole reason Prince Liang held the tournament was to let his sons choose brides from distinguished houses. If a son had a young lady he favored, the prince intended to ask the Princess Consort to arrange the match. For Prince Liang's purposes, then, it was enough that only daughters of great families attend.
The chatter drifting among the little clusters gathered at the polo grounds was entirely about the examination fraud.
Bai Jinxiu had been seated only a short while when she caught word that Wen Zhenkang's wife had visited the Left Chancellor's residence in the dead of night—and stayed a very long time. The moment she heard it, she returned straight to the Bai Manor and reported to Bai Jingyan.
"Wen Zhenkang's wife was widowed before she remarried into her current position. All the ladies gather and trade whatever rumors are drifting about, and my guess is she went to the Left Chancellor to deliver a threat dressed up as something else. Who knows—she might even be holding something over Li Mu."
Bai Jinxiu drew closer to Bai Jingyan and lowered her voice.
"I'll use a few tricks of my own to pry that weakness out of Wen Zhenkang's wife."
"Whatever his wife is holding, Wen Zhenkang won't be keeping his head."
Bai Jingyan pressed her lips inward and smiled at her sister.
"It would certainly help if you could find it out—but don't push yourself too hard if you can't."
"Don't you worry."
Bai Jinxiu nodded. Just then, Nanny Dong lifted the hanging screen and entered.
"Eldest Miss, Second Miss."
Nanny Dong's face was far from calm. After paying her respects, she spoke.
"Steward Yu, whom we sent to Suyang to oversee the repairs of the ancestral residence, has returned. He is reporting on the state of the manor to the Madam now."
"What's gone wrong?"
Bai Jingyan set down her teacup.
"The clansmen of Suyang—they are truly without a shred of shame."
Even as she said it, Nanny Dong was so angry her temples throbbed.
"When Steward Yu arrived, he found the family of the eldest young master of the main branch living in the residence. He made inquiries all over and learned that back when the Bai family of Dadu returned to Suyang in its glory days, they sent word ahead before departing. So those people would move out just while we were in residence, and the moment we returned to Dadu, they would move right back into the ancestral house! And now they have the gall to come to the Madam, claiming they sacrificed themselves to protect the ancestral home of our Bai clan—demanding money for it!
Every time we returned, it seems, they had servants tidy everything up in advance. And all so the truth wouldn't come out—yet still they had the shamelessness to demand compensation."
Ever since the Bai family had held its funerals, Nanny Dong had been clucking her tongue at the brazen, contemptible behavior of the clansmen. Hearing Steward Yu's report on the Suyang kin, she was so enraged she felt her very insides would turn black with fury.