In a room in the western annex of the Inspector’s residence (刺史府) at Xiangyang (襄陽), Cai Mao (蔡瑁) sat long into the night.

Two letters lay unfolded upon the desk. To the left, a letter from a kinsman at Xudu (許都). To the right, a secret dispatch from the governor of a commandery on the northern frontier of Jingzhou. Their contents differed, but their conclusions were the same.

Cao Cao (曹操) will not let next spring pass.

Cai Mao was forty-five. Through his elder sister Lady Cai (蔡氏), Liu Biao’s (劉表) second wife, he had risen to the post of Commander of the Jingzhou Navy (水軍都督). Yet he did not think of that post as gained through his sister’s favor. With his own hand, across twenty years, he had woven together the ships, oars, and banners of Jingzhou’s navy, one by one.

Beside the two letters on his desk lay one more sheet, a register (名簿) of the adult males of Jingzhou. Among the names, his fingertip rested many times that night upon one name.

新野 劉備.

Cai Mao rose from the desk. He walked slowly twice around the room. His steps were quiet. Almost no sound touched the wooden floor.

What Jingzhou would look like after Liu Biao’s death—this was the largest scene on Cai Mao’s mind tonight. The succession struggle between Liu Biao’s eldest son Liu Qi (劉琦) and his second son Liu Cong (劉琮) had, over the past two years, shifted the temperature of every seat within Jingzhou. Liu Qi’s mother had died early. Liu Cong’s mother was Cai Mao’s elder sister.

That Liu Cong would become the next Inspector was, for Cai Mao, a settled picture. Within that picture, his own hand held the seat at the southern window of Jingzhou, where he could quietly lower the last stroke of his brush.

But if the name of Liu Bei entered that picture even once, the picture broke. Liu Bei’s surname was Liu (劉)—that single character alone was the most dangerous character for the young head of Liu Cong. So long as Liu Qi lived, Liu Bei could stand at his side. And once Liu Biao died, the moment Liu Qi and Liu Bei stood at the same seat, the picture of Liu Cong could vanish.

Cai Mao took his seat again. He took up the brush. Upon the dispatch at his right he added a single line.

Watch (監視). Send a man to Xinye, for the next month, to observe Liu Bei once each day.

Having written that line, he added another.

Receive from afar (遠接). At the next banquet, move Liu Bei’s seat to a side chamber outside the great hall. Set him one step farther from the official seat.

After the two lines, Cai Mao set down the brush. He drew an even breath. His own plan felt heavy to him. But he checked inwardly that the weight was still one his shoulders could bear.

Footsteps outside. It was his adjutant (副官), Zhang Yun (張允).

“Commander. Is your lamp still lit?”

“Come in.”

Zhang Yun stepped inside and stopped a pace away. Cai Mao lightly closed the register on the desk.

“Zhang Yun. Have we two men inside Xinye?”

“Yes, Commander. One is planted as a rice-seller in the Xinye market; the other as a stable-hand outside the magistrate’s office.”

“From today, add one more. There is a rumor that Liu Bei walks a round of his back yard each morning. Have that round counted from a distance.”

Zhang Yun clasped his hands. Even the sound of his hands coming together was quiet.

Late that night, Cai Mao spread out one more sheet. In the right corner he wrote a single small character.

疑 (Suspicion).

Suspicion was the deepest emotion in him this night. Liu Bei’s reply letter had been too courteous. At the banquet, his body upon the chair with the short leg had been too upright. The angle of his waist as he rose from the lowest seat and went before Liu Biao for the cup had been too composed. When the chair with the short leg was made to wobble, the face Liu Bei had shown was too clear.

A clear face was the kind of face Cai Mao found hardest to handle. Harder than anger, than sorrow, than even fear. For from the outside, one could not know what was held behind a clear face.

“Xuande (玄德)… what is held behind that clear face of yours?”

Cai Mao murmured the words softly. No answer came. The dark of the room lay still and long behind his question.

That same night, at the back yard of the magistrate’s office in Xinye, Liu Bei had just finished his round of the yard and was on his way back into his room.

His step was half a beat faster than yesterday. Since looking at the flesh on the inner side of his thigh, his stride had grown, little by little, shorter and firmer. Liu Bei himself was not conscious of the change. Only Guan Yu (關羽), from one corner of the back yard, measured that change each morning.

While Cai Mao’s suspicion of the clear face deepened in the western annex at Xiangyang, in the back yard at Xinye the owner of that clear face walked his round tonight with a slightly shorter stride. The distance between the two rooms was half a day’s ride. The distance between the suspicion and the resolve within them was far closer than half a day.

—

WIA Code 스캐너로 비추면 인터넷 없이 발행 사실과 위·변조 여부를 확인할 수 있습니다.
휴대폰 기본 카메라로 찍으면 스캐너 안내 페이지가 열립니다 — 기사 바로 열기

움직이는 코드(스트림) 한 장에 기사 전문(사진 포함)이 담겨 있습니다 — WIA Code 스캐너로 약 39초 비추면 폰에 저장되어 인터넷 없이도 읽을 수 있습니다. Stream.mp4 도 여기서 받습니다.