The Priest Kept a Ghost in His Gourd and Let Him Out Every Night novel · Chapter 24 of 24
Chapter 24: The Open Gourd
The new ferry boat went down the slip at noon with a bottle of rice wine smashed on her bow.
Auntie Xu did the smashing.
She had never smashed anything so gently in her life.
The whole village stood on the landing in its best clothes.
The east bank had been empty for a hundred years, and now ferrymen walked on it who were not afraid any more.
Zhuoran stood at the bow with a boat hook in his hands.
He wore a plain blue ferryman's coat that Auntie had sewn for him.
His black hair was tied up in a short knot with a peach-wood pin.
Pingan had given him the pin that morning, and had told him it was only a spare.
"All aboard," called the old ferryman, who still would not say he forgave anyone.
The little girl with the rice bowl went up the gangplank first, and Zhuoran lifted her over the gap.
"Mind the rail," he said.
"I know."
"Hold it."
"I know! You told me!"
"Good."
Pingan watched them go out onto the brown water with his hands tucked into his sleeves.
The ferry crossed.
It came back.
Nobody drowned, or froze, or turned into a monster, and the river lay smooth and unbothered under the sun.
Afterward, there was the matter of the stone.
The stonecutter had come on the morning boat.
He had worked since dawn, tapping.
By afternoon a new line was cut at the very foot of the memorial, below the last of the three hundred names.
The rest of this chapter is part of the paid portion of the series. Chapters 1–12 of The Priest Kept a Ghost in His Gourd and Let Him Out Every Night are free to read — start from the beginning, then unlock the rest with coins in the app.
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