Mrs. Zhao's health had never been very good, and this time, perhaps because her heart was heavy with worry, her illness lingered even longer.
She was sick from the middle of August and didn't fully recover until the beginning of September.
By then, the harvest had already begun for some of the earlier crops.
The group barely managed to set out on the tenth of September.
As they left the county seat, they happened upon Wo Laicai being paraded through the streets, on his way to be beheaded at the Vegetable Market.
After some interrogation regarding the bones found in his latrine pit, Wo Laicai confessed. The skeleton belonged to an old beggar.
While scavenging, the old beggar had found a ceramic jar full of copper coins by the river.
Nervously clutching the jar, the old beggar headed for the county seat, where he ran into Wo Laicai at the gate.
