Zhang hesitated, leaning over a dainty pot of pale-pink peonies, keeping herself busy watering the flowers as an excuse for not responding to the question, and touching the petals with her nervous fingers.

Judge Dee lifted his gown and produced a tiny silver ingot from an inner pocket, weighing it in his hand.

‘It’s not a profitable business to publish poetry, but I’m a devoted fan, willing to go all out for the project because I believe, no matter what may happen to her, those poems of hers will live on for generations. For that, I need to know as much as possible about the background of the poems. The peonies are so lovely. Please send a bouquet of them to her on my behalf.’

‘It’s so kind of you, sir. Xuanji really loves peonies. She has even written a poem about them, but a bouquet does not take that much silver, sir.’

‘Don’t worry about it. You keep the change.’

‘You’re a very generous man,’ she said, accepting the silver ingot. ‘About your question regarding a “true-hearted lover” of hers, she once imagined she had a man who really cared for her, she told me.’

‘Who?’

‘Wei.’

‘Wei – I think I’ve heard of that name before, but what do you mean by “once”?’

‘Wei’s a musician, young, handsome, and talented in his way, and he set a couple of her poems to music. At first she was crazy about him, but he was as poor as a rat, with no social or literary status to speak of. What’s worse, it did not take too long for her to be devastated with the discovery that he’s good for nothing – except in her bed. And for that matter, possibly in other women’s beds, too.’

‘But she continued to see him?’

‘He denied those allegations, but she too was seeing other men. So theirs turned into a sort of open relationship. He was not the one for her, she realized, but she nonetheless kept him with a kind of tacit understanding between the two of them. Whenever she was not seeing other men, he would sneak over to her from the small hut she had bought for him – or, occasionally, for a change, she would scurry over to him under the cover of darkness. In short, she continued to see him, even though she no longer regarded him as a serious choice – definitely not as a “true-hearted lover.”’

‘Wei must have had some idea about the other man or men she was seeing before the murder?’

‘It’s possible. But why the question?’

‘For a better understanding of her works. The occasions for the composition of her poems. Reading her poems, the readers may have a vague impression about the other men she had been seeing, and they are curious for details. For instance, what do you know about Wen, and for that matter Zi’an, too?’