Chapter 55: The Undocumented Resident

Back in Pear Blossom Lane, An Chunfeng summoned Little Lin for a talk.

She wanted to see his household registration book.

During his time in Pear Blossom Lane, Little Lin had never progressed to signing a contract. He had only been introduced through the broker’s house and was still on trial.

The moment he heard about the registration book, his face fell and his shoulders slumped. Stammering awkwardly, he said, “Madam An, I don’t have one.”

He was unregistered.

An Chunfeng immediately understood why the brokerage paid him only two hundred copper coins a month, and why he had dared ask only two hundred from her as well. It was because he had no registered household.

The capital of the Great Liang Dynasty had a population of a million. Apart from those officially registered with the authorities, there were still countless people without household records—some fleeing head taxes and other levies, some refugees, some orphans. In places hidden from the bustling avenues, many lived without identities recognized by the government.

They existed in silence, like layers of moss spreading along the corners of walls. Dependent on a thread of sunlight and a little rain, they multiplied and survived from one generation to the next, generation after generation remaining unregistered.

In a great city, survival was easy enough. One could always find odd jobs, earn three or five copper coins to fill one’s belly, and take shelter beneath another family’s eaves for a while against the wind and rain.

But changing the fate of one’s family and living a better life was difficult.

Without household registration, one could not freely enter or leave the city. Even with money, one had no right to purchase a house. One could not sign legal contracts through the authorities, and one’s wages were lower than those of ordinary registered citizens. In life or death, no government office would trouble itself to intervene.

Without someone to make arrangements, even after death one could not receive a proper funeral. One could only be hauled away by the night-soil cart to the cremation grounds outside the city, where a few pieces of wood and a jar of oil would reduce one to a handful of ash.

The unregistered were not criminals. It could only be said that an unjust household-registration system had always existed.

Little Lin had no household registration, but An Chunfeng was merely surprised and did not take it to heart.

She had not the slightest doubt about his character.

She had dealt with him before at the brokerage, and he had now worked for her diligently for ten days. He was an honest boy.

Still, for the sake of caution—and to satisfy her curiosity about the peck of white rice that had been offered to her—she decided to visit his home.

“Madam, are you going to see my home?” Little Lin asked. He did not refuse, but his eyes were filled with confusion and unease.

No one was willing to set foot inside the homes of children like them, children without registered identities.

“Yes. Let’s go see your home now.” An Chunfeng seized the moment and immediately set off with him.

Little Lin’s home was also in the northern part of the city, not far from Chessboard Street.

Knowing that he had younger brothers and sisters, An Chunfeng bought some pastries and candies to bring along.

After crossing the main street and passing through several alleys, the road grew narrower and narrower, while the houses on either side pressed closer together.

An Chunfeng stepped across pavement blackened by years of standing water, skirted children playing with ants in foul water, and ducked beneath garments hanging haphazardly overhead. At last, she reached a crowded compound.

More than a dozen households shared the courtyard. Between the makeshift sheds stood a patch of open ground littered with firewood split from old furniture.

Three exhausted-looking women were drawing water from a well. Several large wooden tubs stood beside it, piled with clothes waiting to be washed.

As the women beat and scrubbed the garments, dirty water spilled over the rims of the tubs, ran across the mud, and flowed into an earthen ditch nearby. Some of it gushed straight back into the well.

They were washerwomen who earned their living washing clothes for others.

And that well water—An Chunfeng could only call it well water for the moment—was being recycled in this manner.

Exhaustion had stripped the women of all curiosity. Even when they saw strangers enter, they merely raised their heads a little, used their dripping hands to push disordered hair away from their foreheads, and cast a few sidelong glances in this direction.

The men of the compound were away. Only two children of three or four were rummaging through the pile of old furniture for pieces of wood to play with. When they saw An Chunfeng and the others, they shrank back in fear.

Little Lin led An Chunfeng through the heaps of miscellaneous belongings, winding toward a corner where a small door stood.

Only then did An Chunfeng learn that Little Lin’s family actually consisted of three brothers and a younger sister who was bedridden with illness.

Beyond the little door were two narrow, dim compartments. His crippled sister lived in one; the three brothers lived in the other, which also held every household possession they owned—pots, bowls, basins, and all the rest.

Little Lin carried the candies into his sister’s room first. An Chunfeng could not squeeze inside and had to wait by the doorway.

Through the gray-black curtain, she first heard a startled cry, followed by a rustle of hurried movement.

A moment later, Little Lin invited her in.

The room was dim and damp. A rickety wooden table was piled high with clothes. In the corner by the wall, a little girl in pale gray clothes sat cross-legged on a small wooden bed.

At first glance, An Chunfeng was stunned.

What a lovely little Snow White.

Having seen no sunlight for years, the child’s skin was unnaturally pale. She had a lotus-petal face, two graceful willow-leaf brows, and large, moist eyes, black, bright, and clear as a limpid lake.

She must have rarely seen strangers. Her face flushed crimson as she clutched Little Lin’s sleeve and said nothing.

Embarrassed, Little Lin asked An Chunfeng to sit down. There was no chair in the room, so she could only sit on the edge of the bed.

There was no mattress, only an old woven mat, though it had been scrubbed spotlessly clean.

“Madam An, this is my younger sister. Her name is Rongxue, and she is eleven this year. Her legs… aren’t well, so she can’t easily get up and walk around.” Little Lin explained.

An Chunfeng gazed at the timid girl, as though through time and space she were seeing someone and something familiar from a previous life.

Among the little girls who had served as flower girls alongside her, there had been one just like this—pretty, sweet, quiet. But in the end…

An Chunfeng shook her head, forcing from her mind the image of the girl’s body, pale and swollen from the water, being dragged out by others.

“Rongxue, did you mend all these clothes?”

An Chunfeng turned away, struggling to suppress the sudden spasm in her heart, and looked toward the pile of garments on the wooden table.

“Yes. After the aunties in the compound wash their clothes, they bring them to me to mend.” Though shy, the girl answered in a soft voice.

“Oh? Besides mending clothes, what else can you do?”

An Chunfeng picked up a long black robe and examined it. The stitches were close and even, just like those on Little Lin’s clothes.

When asked what else she could do, Rongxue hesitated, then shook her head. No one had taught her anything. Apart from mending clothes and sewing purses for her brothers, she knew nothing else.

She had once wanted to cook for her brothers, but the room was so cramped that there was barely space to turn around. One time she nearly set the place on fire, so her brothers forbade her from lighting a stove. Now she spent every day sitting on the bed and mending clothes. She could not even cook.

“Rongxue mends clothes every day,” Little Lin said. “She earns one copper coin for every five pieces. I told her not to work because it’s too dark in here, but she wouldn’t listen.”

Hearing her eldest brother’s reproach, Rongxue did not grow angry. She tugged at his sleeve, took five copper coins from the purse at her waist, and spread them across her palm with a sweet smile.

“Big Brother, this is what I earned mending clothes. It’s enough to buy two pounds of sorghum rice!”

An Chunfeng let out a long breath. “How many days did it take you to earn five coins? Keep them and buy yourself some candy. From now on, your elder brother will earn eight hundred copper coins a month. That will buy plenty of rice and flour.”

This confirmed that she intended to keep him, and at such generous wages. Little Lin was overjoyed. He dropped to his knees and began knocking his head against the floor.

“Thank you, Madam An! Thank you, Madam An!”

On the wooden bed, Rongxue finally realized that this lady was her brother’s new employer.

She bowed down as well, tears of joy spilling from her eyes.

For an unregistered person, earning a silver coin was possible only for a strong adult doing backbreaking labor. Ordinary people could earn no more than three or five hundred copper coins at most.

For Little Lin to receive eight hundred copper coins in wages was something he would never before have dared even imagine.

The siblings were so happy that they hardly knew what to do with themselves. An Chunfeng had seen what she needed to see and did not wish to disturb the poor children’s rare moment of happiness. She left behind the pastries and candies, then departed.

Little Lin did not dare ask her to stay. For Madam An to come to such a lowly, filthy place had already been an honor beyond anything he could imagine.