Chapter 323: The Master Register

The girl on the mask looked exactly like the girl in the photograph.

A faint old scar marked the space between her brows, and a tiny mole remained beneath her left eye. Lu Yuan had never seen that face before, yet it felt as though he had known it for a long time.

The person outside raised a hand, and the lips on the paper mask moved with it.

“A-Yuan.”

The voice drifted through the crack in the door, gentle as an echo from years past.

“Open the box.”

Xu Erxiao stepped in front of Lu Yuan, holding his iron shovel across his side.

“Weren’t you just telling him to hand someone over? Now you’re calling him A-Yuan.”

The person outside ignored him and looked only at Lu Yuan.

“Don’t you want to know who she is?”

“I do.”

“Then tell me your name. Admit who you are, and I’ll tell you who she is.”

Lu Yuan did not answer.

Song Qinghe raised the green lamp, shining it toward the paper mask.

The light fell on it, but the face cast no shadow.

She moved the lamp to the left. The face on the mask brightened with the light, yet its shading did not change at all. It looked as if it had been cut out of an old photograph and pasted onto the paper.

“That isn’t her,” Song Qinghe said.

The voice outside gave a soft laugh.

“What makes you so sure?”

“Because she’s inside the box.”

A dull thud came from the wooden box.

Once.

A pause.

Twice.

The girl on the mask opened her mouth and made the same knocks.

Lu Yuan lowered his gaze to the box. There were no gaps for air around the lid, only a seam so fine it was almost invisible. The green lamp’s flame leaned toward it, flickering faintly.

“There’s someone inside,” he said.

“Or the boat is learning to knock like a person,” Zhou Heng warned.

Shen Qiushuang crouched beside the box and listened carefully for a while.

“The secret signal my father left was two knocks, a pause, then four.”

There was no further sound from the box.

Shen Qiushuang’s face turned pale.

“Those three knocks just now weren’t the signal. She was trying to warn us.”

“Warn us about what?” Xu Erxiao asked.

She ran her fingers along the edge of the box, stopping at a mark that had been worn smooth.

“Not to open it.”

“To distrust the person outside.”

The voice beyond the door remained gentle.

“Miss Shen, after all these years, you still refuse to listen to your father?”

Shen Qiushuang’s hand stopped.

“My father’s words are written on the lid.”

“Do not open the box.”

“And yet you know those words.”

The person outside fell silent for a moment.

The smile on the mask slowly disappeared.

“Your father hid her here not to keep her alive, but to make her keep serving as a witness. As long as she stays on the boat, she can prove the old records weren’t wrong.”

“You’re lying,” Shen Qiushuang said.

“Your father locked her inside with his own hands.”

“My father left a warning.”

“A warning for whom?”

Shen Qiushuang did not answer.

Lu Yuan walked over to the door, his eyes settling on the old photograph. There was a crease on its back, as if something had folded it over and over. He turned it around and, by the green lamp’s light, slowly felt along the paper.

Faint writing appeared beneath the light.

“Do not open the box. Stop the fish first.”

Zhou Heng looked at the closed-eyed fish relief on the bronze plate.

“Stop the name-verification plate?”

“If the plate is still verifying names, whoever opens the box will be entered into its records,” Song Qinghe said. “And the person inside will be recognized by it again.”

The person outside suddenly raised a hand and pointed at the bronze plate.

“You don’t have much time. The boat has passed the middle of the river. Once the name-verification plate matches the master register, all the names being held in safekeeping will be taken away. Opening the box won’t save her.”

“So we stop the fish first,” Wang Cheng’an’s voice came from beyond the cabin wall.

The ink line passed through the crack in the door and trembled lightly. Wang Cheng’an was still on shore, but his voice carried clearly along the line.

“There are three grooves on the plate. You put on two pieces of the lock just now, and they have five petals between them. The sixth petal isn’t on the lock. It should be on the back of the plate.”

Shen Qiushuang raised her ring of keys and felt carefully around the edge of the bronze plate.

“The back of the plate is against the side of the boat.”

“Then look from the other side,” Wang Cheng’an said. “Don’t ask whether it recognizes you. First find out where it came from.”

Lu Yuan handed the lamp to Song Qinghe, then went with Zhou Heng around to the other side of the cabin wall.

Several old navigation charts, blackened with ink, hung there. Beneath them was a rectangular wooden panel. It had no nails, yet sat more tightly in place than the boards around it.

Zhou Heng rapped on it with his knuckles.

“It’s hollow.”

Xu Erxiao helped him untie the paper cord around the edge of the panel. Behind it was a sheet of bronze, cast with the back of the closed-eyed fish.

A small piece of silver was set into the fish’s tail.

It had only one petal, shaped exactly like the missing sixth petal of the plum-blossom lock.

Lu Yuan took out the two lock pieces. As they neared the bronze plate, the silver along their edges drew toward one another, making the faintest ringing sound.

He did not press the lock into place right away.

“Stop the fish first.”

They all looked around the name-verification plate.

A narrow groove ran beneath it, originally meant for name slips. Now it was empty, with only a layer of dried black ink inside. Shen Qiushuang took out the bronze piece her father had left and placed it beside the groove.

“My father carved this name.”

She did not put the bronze piece into the groove. Instead, she pressed it against the opening, blocking the direction in which the black ink was flowing.

Song Qinghe moved the green lamp closer.

Its light shone on the bronze piece and reflected a streak of cold light directly onto the closed-eyed fish’s eye.

The fish’s eye slowly shut.

The vibration in the cabin stopped abruptly.

The names drifting across the walls all went still at once.

“It stopped,” Zhou Heng said.

“Not completely,” Wang Cheng’an replied. “That’s only the front of the name-verification plate. The master register is still pulling on the back.”

Lu Yuan placed the six-petaled plum-blossom lock into the groove in the bronze plate.

Five petals lined up with the old marks, and the sixth fitted into the space where the silver piece had been.

Click.

With a faint sound, a narrow horizontal panel sprang open on the back of the bronze plate.

All the sheets of white paper in the cabin drooped at once.

The girl on the mask suddenly turned her head and looked straight at Lu Yuan.

“You promised you wouldn’t let them open the box.”

Her words no longer sounded like the coaxing from before.

There was anger in them, weariness, and the reproach only someone close to him could make.

Lu Yuan still did not answer.

He looked at the wooden box.

“The person inside wanted us to stop the fish first. Now it’s stopped.”

“We still need to verify her origin,” Wang Cheng’an said. “First, find the evidence she left behind.”

Xu Erxiao immediately went to look for markings on the lid. The box was as large as an old cargo chest, with an iron ring at each corner. Beneath each ring lay a yellowed paper slip. None bore a name, only an image of an object.

The first showed a copper bell.

The second showed a length of red cord.

The third showed a herbal prescription.

The fourth showed a winding stretch of river.

“These are all things in the old records,” Shen Qiushuang said. “Back then, the carriage brought more than half a lock onto the boat.”

She took the yellowed grain depot record from her hidden pocket and compared it with the marks on the slips.

“The copper bell isn’t in this cabin.”

“Neither is the red cord.”

“The prescription and the river map... they hid both in the charts.”

Song Qinghe looked around. Her gaze landed on the navigation charts blackened with ink.

“They’re not hidden behind the charts. They’re hidden in the places that were erased.”

She brought the green lamp close to the maps.

The black ink did not fade where the lamp shone, but the ink lines on the paper showed varying shades. In several sections of river that had been blacked out, another color faintly emerged, as though old writing lay beneath the ink.

Lu Yuan took down the charts and spread them out on the floor one by one.

The first marked North Mountain Pass, the second the old ferry crossing, and the third the waterways near Yongji Grain Depot. When the three maps were put together, the sections hidden beneath the black ink formed a broken line that eventually pointed to the bottom of the cabin.

“The river map is here,” he said.

Xu Erxiao crouched down and traced the line, then suddenly felt a raised round spot on the floorboard.

He tapped it lightly with the handle of his iron shovel.

A clear ring sounded from inside the cabin wall.

Everyone stopped.

At the same time, a light knock came from inside the wooden box.

Shen Qiushuang pressed her hand against the lid and whispered, “We found the copper bell.”

She took her ring of keys and felt along the wall in the direction of the knocking. At the bottom of the wall, she found a loose wooden strip. After removing it, she discovered a tiny copper bell stuffed inside.

The bell had no clapper. It could not make a sound when shaken.

“How could it ring?” Xu Erxiao asked.

“The bell didn’t ring,” Lu Yuan said, looking at the box. “The person inside heard it.”

Shen Qiushuang placed the clapperless copper bell on the first paper slip.

The slip warmed slightly, and the image turned a real copper color.

But no matter how they searched, they could not find the red cord shown on the second slip.

Lu Yuan looked at the wooden box.

“Is the red cord inside?”

No one answered.

He placed the two silver lock pieces in his palm on the lid.

A faint scraping sound came from within the box.

After a while, an extremely fine red thread slowly emerged from the seam in the lid.

Xu Erxiao hurried to reach for it, but Song Qinghe stopped him.

The red thread did not immediately reach for anyone. It swayed gently three times in the air, as if searching for a direction.

Song Qinghe moved the green lamp to the left.

The thread shifted in response.

She moved the lamp to the right.

The thread did not move.

“It isn’t reaching for the lamp,” Song Qinghe said. “It’s reaching for the lock.”

Lu Yuan moved the two lock pieces half an inch toward the center of the lid. The red thread immediately drew closer, as if a breeze from inside the box were pulling it in.

“She recognizes the lock.”

Shen Qiushuang placed the copper bell, the navigation charts, and her father’s bronze piece around the lid. She set the corresponding paper slip beside each item.

The fourth piece of evidence was still missing.

The herbal prescription.

There were no prescriptions in the cabin, only a fragment of an old grain depot ledger. Wang Cheng’an asked Lin Zhaoxuan to send over the information written in the records along the ink line. Shen Qiushuang checked it against the names of the herbs in the prescription and read them aloud.

“Three qian of angelica, one qian of angelica root, one qian of Sichuan lovage... The last ingredient says white reed growing beside the old river.”

“That isn’t a common prescription,” Shen Qiushuang said. “The herbs weren’t meant to cure an illness. They were meant to cover up a smell.”

“What smell?”

She looked at the wooden box.

“If a living person is trapped in a box for a long time, the wood gets damp. White reed can mask the smell.”

Lu Yuan’s gaze fell on the edge of the lid.

There was a small patch darker than the wood around it, as though it had been soaked for a long time. He traced the darkened area with his finger and finally found a narrow groove that had been sealed shut.

A paper folded for many years was wedged inside.

When he pulled it out, it was so thin it nearly crumbled. There was no name on it, only a few hurriedly written lines:

“I am inside.”

“Do not call me by my name.”

“If someone asks, first ask what he saw.”

Wang Cheng’an’s voice came from the other end of the ink line. “This is the evidence.”

The girl on the mask spoke again from outside the door.

“Lu Yuan, what do you see?”

Lu Yuan did not look at her.

“I see a face copied from an old photograph.”

“What makes you say it isn’t me?”

“The girl in the photograph has a tiny mole beneath her left eye. The face outside the door has one too, but its mole casts no shadow.”

The figure outside the door paused.

“What else do you see?”

“You say you know who she is, but you won’t say what she did. You tell us to give our names, but you won’t tell us where this boat came from.”

The girl’s face on the paper mask suddenly wavered like rippling water.

Lu Yuan continued, “You’re imitating the way she speaks, and you’re imitating her past. But you don’t have the copper bell, the red cord, the prescription, or this note.”

“So you aren’t her.”

A sigh came from beyond the door.

The face on the mask grew blurry, like a paper shadow being scattered by the wind. Then the pale face of the black-cloaked man appeared.

“Evidence can only prove the past.”

“It can’t prove the present.”

“You’re right,” Lu Yuan said. “So now we have to hear it from her.”

He did not call her by name.

He placed his palm against the wooden box and asked only one question.

“Can you hear me?”

Silence stretched on inside the box.

Everyone held their breath.

A very faint knock came from within.

Once.

Lu Yuan continued, “Are you willing to come out?”

This time, there were two knocks from inside.

Shen Qiushuang closed her eyes, and tears silently rolled down her cheeks.

“She’s alive.”

“We still can’t open it,” Song Qinghe said.

Everyone turned to look at her.

Song Qinghe pointed to the iron rings at the four corners of the box. “The fish is stopped, and we have all the evidence, but the four iron rings on the lid are still connected to the master register. If we open it rashly, the person inside will be entered into the ship’s ledger first.”

Zhou Heng touched one of the iron rings.

“Each ring has a thin chain running through the floor.”

Lu Yuan crouched down and saw that Zhou Heng was right. A thin chain extended from the inside of each ring. The four chains led in different directions: to the name-verification plate, the bow, the stern cabin, and the bottom of the wooden box.

“First, find out where the chains lead,” he said.

“Don’t cut them,” Wang Cheng’an said from the other end. “Find out what accounts each one is connected to.”

They split up to investigate.

The chain leading toward the bow connected to the horizontal panel behind the name-verification plate. Once the fish design had closed, the panel no longer pulled on it.

The chain leading toward the stern cabin connected to the array of empty lamps. After the names vanished from the lamps, the chain went dark too.

But the chain at the bottom of the box still glowed. Silvery light flickered along it, as though something were still being fed through.

The last chain led to the old navigation charts on the cabin wall.

Shen Qiushuang recognized them as the grain depot’s route maps.

“This path connects to the auxiliary anchor on shore.”

“The auxiliary anchor is already broken,” Xu Erxiao said.

“The outer anchor chain is broken,” Zhou Heng said. “There’s still another one inside.”

Lu Yuan looked at the bottom of the wooden box.

“It isn’t locking her up.”

“It’s supplying the box with names.”

Shen Qiushuang followed the glowing chain to the edge of the floor and found a hatch. Beneath it was a very fine copper wire, wound with several strips of old paper. Each one bore a name that had never been settled.

Song Qinghe brought the green lamp closer.

“These are all names the boat has recognized as ‘witnesses.’”

“She’s holding all of them by herself?” Xu Erxiao asked.

“She isn’t holding them,” Shen Qiushuang said softly. “She’s been turned into a storehouse for evidence. As long as she remains in the box, the boat can register all the testimonies under her name.”

Lu Yuan gripped the copper wire.

“What will happen to the names on the boat if we untangle it?”

“They’ll scatter,” Shen Qiushuang said. “They might return to their respective pieces of evidence, or they might all become nameless slips of paper.”

“Is there a third option?”

Wang Cheng’an was silent for a moment.

“Transfer them from one person back to their respective origins.”

“Just saying it won’t be enough,” Lu Yuan said.

“Right,” Wang Cheng’an replied. “Each part of each name needs to come into contact with its own evidence. How many things are still in the grain depot?”

Lin Zhaoxuan replied from shore, “Most of the grain sacks we sent in have already reached the stern cabin. We should be able to find dozens of old objects.”

“Have Shen Qiushuang identify the objects, and Erxiao check the records. I’ll keep the accounts from here.”

Wang Cheng’an paused briefly, then said, “Brother Lu, don’t open the box yet. We’ll return the names on the chains to their respective origins one by one.”

Outside the cabin, the Name-Crossing Boat continued forward. The river narrowed in the distance, and fog pressed in from both banks, making it look as though the boat were entering an endless gray-white corridor.

The black-cloaked man stood outside the door and no longer urged them to give their names.

He simply pressed his palm against the cabin door.

A line of writing slowly appeared on the boards:

“Evidence can be transferred. Witnesses cannot be lost.”

A smaller line appeared beneath it:

“If she is released, the Name-Bearer must take her place.”

Xu Erxiao could not help cursing.

“It’s still got its eye on Brother Lu.”

Lu Yuan took out the paper Wang Cheng’an had written and read it over once more.

“What is seen on the boat, record its location first.”

“What is heard on the boat, do not treat as testimony.”

“When an old name appears, look for physical evidence first.”

He folded the paper and put it back in his breast pocket.

“It wants to replace someone, not because it needs a witness.”

“It’s because it can’t let the witness speak for herself.”

A thin voice came from inside the box.

“Don’t... speak for me...”

The three words came haltingly, as if muffled by many layers of damp wood.

Shen Qiushuang knelt beside the box, her fingers resting against the narrow seam.

“We won’t decide for you.”

“If you want to come out, we’ll find a way.”

“If you don’t, we won’t hand you over to the boat either.”

After a long while, a gentle knock came from inside the box.

Once.

She was willing.

Lu Yuan raised his eyes to the black-cloaked man outside the door.

“Did you hear that?”

“She chose for herself.”

“That doesn’t count as testimony,” the man said.

“Of course it doesn’t,” Song Qinghe said. “It’s only her answer.”

“The ship’s ledger won’t accept an answer without a name.”

“Then don’t write it in the ledger yet.”

She placed the nameless note on the lid. Beside it, she set the clapperless copper bell, the old navigation charts, Shen Bonian’s bronze piece, and the two pieces of the plum-blossom lock.

“Her evidence is here. So is her will.”

“We can look into her name later.”

“She can’t be kept here forever.”

The black-cloaked man slowly took a step back.

The black book in his hand opened in the darkness. Its pages fluttered rapidly even though there was no wind. The writing that had gone still on the cabin walls began to flicker again, as if the whole boat were searching for another way to enter them into its records.

All four iron chains tightened at once.

The wooden box trembled faintly.

“Return the names on the chains to their respective origins, one by one!” Wang Cheng’an called from the other end. “I’ve left space for you on the stele. As soon as the evidence arrives, I’ll record it!”

The grain sacks delivered through the water channel had piled up in the stern cabin. Xu Erxiao immediately ran out and carried several sacks from the top of the stack. Each sack was tied with a marked wooden tablet recording the source of its evidence.

Shen Qiushuang took the old ledger and compared each entry in turn.

“Copper abacus, shop by the West Bridge.”

Xu Erxiao found a copper abacus and placed it beside the first paper chain.

One of the slips on the chain immediately went dark.

“Red cord, found near Little Stone Village in Liu family gully.”

Song Qinghe found the length of red cord and placed it beside the second paper slip.

Another slip went dark.

“Fragment of an old household register, North Mountain Pass.”

Zhou Heng dug a sheet of paper with curled edges out of a grain sack and pressed it against the third chain.

With each piece of evidence returned to its place, the silvery light at the bottom of the box weakened a little.

But there were too many names on the paper chains, and not enough old objects.

Some objects had rotted away. Others were reduced to a broken corner. And Shen Qiushuang had never even heard of some of the villages written on the paper chains.

Wang Cheng’an noticed the problem quickly.

“Don’t force a match. Mark anything that doesn’t correspond to the evidence as pending investigation.”

“But it won’t accept pending investigation,” Lu Yuan said.

“We aren’t asking it to accept anything,” Wang Cheng’an said. “We’re recording what happened and leaving a trail that can be followed.”

Shen Qiushuang took the safekeeping seal. Using the power carried along the ink line, she stamped a red seal onto a blank wooden tablet.

“Remains pending investigation. Origin unverified.”

She pressed the tablet against the paper chain that had no corresponding evidence.

The chain did not go dark immediately, but it slackened by an inch.

“It worked,” she said.

They continued registering the entries one by one.

Any record that could not be verified was no longer forced under someone’s name. Instead, they recorded exactly what was missing, where it should be investigated, and who would hold it temporarily.

Wang Cheng’an continued making copies from shore.

When the final paper chain was marked “pending investigation,” all four iron rings on the wooden box loosened at once.

There was no loud crash, no strange phenomenon.

The copper wire that had been glowing slowly went dark.

Shen Qiushuang did not open the box right away.

She placed her palm against the lid.

“We’re ready.”

Two knocks came from inside.

Lu Yuan and Zhou Heng lifted the iron rings at the same time. Xu Erxiao held the lid while Song Qinghe placed the green lamp nearby, its light steady inside the box.

The lid slowly opened.

There was no black book inside, nor any shadow locked away.

A young woman lay curled up in a thick old cotton quilt, her hair loose around her shoulders. Her face was pale, and a faded length of red cord was wound around her wrist. The small wooden tablet at the end of the cord was the very same one that had hung on Lu Yuan’s chest in the photograph.

Her eyes were closed, and her chest rose and fell almost imperceptibly.

Shen Qiushuang reached out, then stopped with her hand suspended in midair.

“Can you hear me?”

The woman did not move.

Song Qinghe held the back of her hand near the woman’s nostrils. After a moment, she nodded.

“She’s alive.”

Xu Erxiao let out a breath of relief, then hurried to pull the cotton quilt over her.

Lu Yuan stood to one side without calling her by name.

The woman’s eyelashes fluttered faintly.

“Don’t... let me go back in the ledger.”

“I won’t,” Lu Yuan said.

She opened her eyes. Her gaze passed over everyone and settled on the plum-blossom lock in Lu Yuan’s hand.

She seemed to recognize the lock, and perhaps Lu Yuan too, but she showed no sign of a long-awaited reunion.

“You still haven’t remembered.”

Lu Yuan did not press her.

“What do you want to tell me?”

The woman used the edge of the box to sit up, her gaze sweeping over the paper chains that had been taken apart in the cabin.

“This boat isn’t the master register.”

“Then where is the master register?” Shen Qiushuang asked.

The woman turned her gaze toward the bow.

“At the end of this river.”

“This boat is only the road that carries people there.”

A long, mournful whistle sounded outside the cabin.

The boat suddenly stopped.

Then a row of lights appeared in the distant fog. At the end of them stood an old ferry crossing without a signboard.

The woman’s expression changed abruptly. She struggled to get out of the box.

“We can’t dock.”

“Why?” Lu Yuan asked.

She clutched her red cord, her voice trembling.

“Because this boat was never meant to take people into the master register.”

“It was meant to bring the master register to you.”