Cook Qiao had originally planned to find an embroiderer to cover it up with embroidery, but Granny Qiao insisted that embroidery was too expensive. She knew a tailor who did excellent, inexpensive mending, so she dragged her off to the Banyan Tree Market. Unbeknownst to them, the tailor had gone to the market, so they waited in vain for half a day. When he finally showed up, he turned out to be a young gentleman—he didn’t look the least bit like a tailor.

Cook Qiao thought to herself that she’d still have to find an embroiderer. Although it would cost a bit more, she’d only worn this dress a few times—it was practically new. She’d spent several hundred wen on it, so even if she spent a hundred wen to have it embroidered, it would still be better than throwing it away. She made up her mind and stood silently to the side.

Ye Tao took the garment and unfolded it to examine it. The hole gnawed by the mouse wasn’t too bad, but the urine stain was a real problem—it certainly wouldn’t come out in the wash, so he’d have to treat it as a hole. However, the stain was quite large, so unpicking the stitches to patch it wouldn’t be very practical.

He still remembered the dress Granny Qiao had worn the day before and asked, “Do you have any fabric in the same color?”

Cook Qiao shook her head. “This is a ready-made garment I bought from a tailor’s shop.”

Ye Tao asked again, “Can the hem be shortened?”

This was also a jacket, much longer than the one Granny Qiao had worn the day before. Even if shortened a bit, it would still be a standard length. Cook Qiao was reluctant—in the past two years, the longer the jacket, the better, and she’d bought this one specifically because of its length. 

Ye Tao had a plan in mind. After examining the garment for a moment, he pointed to the front placket and said, “Then we’ll have to take it apart right here at the front placket and alter it to include a wide-collared decorative collar strip .”

A decorative collar strip is a decorative strip found on areas such as the collar, front placket, and cuffs. It comes in a wide variety of styles—including matching and contrasting colors, as well as wide and narrow trims—and as long as it’s paired well, swapping it out won’t look out of place.

The decorative collar strip on this garment was only a little over a finger’s width wide. Since wide decorative collar strips were currently in fashion, Cook Qiao thought it would work and asked him, “How much would it cost to mend it this way?”

Ye Tao took a quick count: six holes plus one urine stain. The small holes could be mended using the same weaving technique as on Granny Qiao’s clothes yesterday, but the urine stain would need to be cut out and patched—a slightly more complicated process than the small holes.

“Not counting the decorative collar strip, it’ll be 18 wen.”

“I’ll get the decorative collar strip myself.” Cook Qiao already had an idea; tailor shops sold decorative collar strips separately, so she could go pick out a wide one, and once she replaced it, the garment would be as good as new.

Unlike Granny Qiao, she didn’t have the luxury of leisure; she had a banquet to host tomorrow and needed to go shopping. After paying, she left. Granny Qiao, on the other hand, didn’t even go to the market; instead, she borrowed a chair from a neighbor to sit and watch Ye Tao, and even pulled out a handful of roasted beans to chew on slowly. 

Ye Tao planned to patch up a few small holes first. Just like yesterday, after removing the decorative collar strip, he cut strips a little over a finger’s width from the edges of both sides of the front of the garment, then took out a few strands of thread to mend the small holes.

Today was the market day at Xinqiao, so there were few people under the banyan tree. Neither the regular fortune-teller nor Old Man Hong was there; only a few people had come to cool off and rest in the afternoon.

Ye Tao secured the garment on the embroidery hoop so that it was neither too tight nor too loose. Mending isn’t embroidery, so an embroidery hoop isn’t strictly necessary, but since silk threads are much finer than those used in linen, he was afraid the fabric would stretch out of shape if not secured properly—yet stretching it too tight wouldn’t work either, as that would make the mended area feel stiff.

His grandmother only sewed clothes and never did mending; Ye Tao wasn’t a professional mender either—he’d just taught himself a few techniques for after-sales service, and much of his expertise came from learning through trial and error.

At some point, Granny Qiao’s munching on beans had stopped; she was leaning back in her chair, a rush-leaf fan in her hand, dozing off.

Sunlight filtered through the dense foliage, casting patches of light large and small. The sporadic chirping of cicadas drifted down from above. After mending three holes, Ye Tao looked up for a moment. Granny Qiao had woken up at some point; seeing his movements, she assumed he was craving a snack: “There aren’t many cicadas now, but when it gets hotter, you young lads should go into the mountains, catch some cicadas, and bring them home. Have your mother fry them up for you—my boys all love them.”

Ye Tao didn’t like them—he’d never eaten insects in his life—but he didn’t want to spoil the mood. He simply nodded in agreement to whatever the old woman said, his hands never stopping their work.

It took nearly half the afternoon to patch all six small holes. Ye Tao took a couple of sips of water, stood up, stretched his arms, and kicked his legs a few times. Only after he felt his body loosen up did he sit back down, ready to tackle the mouse urine stains.

The sun wasn’t as scorching anymore. Some of the people seeking shade under the trees had left, while others had arrived. Most of those who left were heading off to work, while those who came were people with a bit more free time who’d come out to get some exercise.

Before he knew it, a few people had gathered around Ye Tao to watch. He paid them no mind and carefully cut out the soiled section along the fabric’s warp and weft, creating a neat rectangle, then used the removed front panel as a template to cut a slightly larger piece of fabric to match the tear. 

The patch wasn’t very generous—it had pinholes and creases—and ideally should be ironed before use, but since there was no iron at hand, he’d have to make do for now. Once the patch was sewn on and the garment had been washed a couple of times, the stain would be virtually invisible.

When dealing with this kind of stain, you could actually just cover it up, but since it’s rat urine, covering it up would only hide it—the stain would still be there. The thought of wearing it like that made Ye Tao feel queasy, so he decided to cut out the hole and patch it instead.

He aligned the warp and weft threads of the patch with those of the garment and sewed the patch onto the inside of the garment. This time, he used a loose stitch. Although the vertical and horizontal threads matched up, the stitches were clearly visible. With such wide spacing, it obviously didn’t look secure—a stark contrast to the repair method he’d used earlier, where not a single stitch was visible.

Those who had been watching from the sidelines—curious to see his earlier craftsmanship—were instantly disappointed. A tall, slender woman with a silver hairpin in her hair and prominent cheekbones said, “Is that it? Anyone could do that. It’s not even as sturdy as a patch.”

Although the others didn’t say it outright, they were thinking the same thing. Only Granny Qiao had full confidence in Ye Tao: “What’s the rush? He hasn’t even finished sewing yet.”

Ye Tao looked up and smiled at her, then untangled a few more threads and set them aside. He pinched one between his fingers, threaded it through the needle’s eye, and, following the fabric’s original weave, carefully secured the interfacing bit by bit.

Ye Tao had honed his needlework skills as a child by helping his grandmother. Cheongsams come in both fully handmade and semi-handmade varieties, but regardless of the type, they all require hand-stitched edging to ensure the stitches remain invisible—something a sewing machine cannot achieve, and this is the true value of handcrafted work.

Unlike mending, which involves reweaving the fabric, patching essentially involves sewing two pieces of fabric together. Once you’re used to it, it’s not difficult. Ye Tao’s pace remained unhurried, but he seemed much more relaxed.

He was quite tall, with large hands; though he didn’t look as delicate as a woman, he showed not the slightest hint of clumsiness. Pinching such a fine embroidery needle between two fingers, shuttling it up and down, in no time at all, he had sewn a seam.

The skeptical murmurs around him had faded away without him even noticing.

If this had been in the past, Ye Tao would have definitely recorded a video and given it an exaggerated title: “Paid XX yuan for a seamless repair—is that all there is to it?”

After finishing the basting and before the actual mending, he’d switch to some high-energy background music and add subtitles: ‘Main Feature Begins.’

There must have been six or seven people gathered around, standing at just the right distance—close enough to see his movements clearly but not so close as to block the light. Ye Tao looked up, then looked down again to continue stitching. He didn’t need to edit a video this time—the audience was right there in person.

By the time Ye Tao had sewn the last stitch, tucked away the thread end, and begun to remove the initial basting stitches, the tall, slender woman with the silver hairpin was still staring at him without taking a single breath. When he finished and let out a long sigh, she hurriedly asked, “How much does it cost to mend a hole like this?”

Ye Tao replied, “It depends on the size.”

“Then how much for this one?” the tall, slender woman asked again.

“Eighteen wen,” Granny Qiao interjected on his behalf. “Didn’t you notice just now? There were a few other small holes as well—they’re mended so well you can’t see them at all.”

“How could I not have seen them? I did see them. And all of these together are only eighteen wen?” she asked Granny Qiao, though her eyes were fixed on Ye Tao. Seeing him nod, she immediately said: “I have a brocade quilt—part of the dowry my family prepared for me back then—with a big tear in it. Can you mend that, too?”

Ye Tao said it could be mended, so she immediately went home to fetch the quilt.

Ye Tao held up the mended garment to examine it in the sunlight. Because the edges of the patches couldn’t be trimmed perfectly clean and the fabric overlapped in some places—and since the garment wasn’t very thick—there was still a slight trace visible against the light. If this had been a padded jacket, it probably wouldn’t have been noticeable.

He wasn’t entirely satisfied. He thought to himself that embroidery was indeed the way to go, and that he needed to practice his embroidery skills more diligently.

He wasn’t satisfied, but the onlookers were thrilled—and when they compared the price, they were even more pleased. Right then, two more people asked for the price.

It wasn’t Ye Tao’s first day mending clothes, and though there weren’t many people at the Banyan Tree Market today, it turned out to be his best day yet. In addition to Cook Qiao’s clothes, he also took in a brocade quilt, a pleated skirt, and a scholar robe.

There was no way he could finish mending all of this before dark, so Ye Tao had no choice but to assess the damage and give quotes first, then take the items home to mend them. 

It’s hot now; Ye Tao hasn’t even been sleeping under a quilt these past couple of days. The quilts today are different from what he remembered—they aren’t a single, seamless cover, but two pieces of cloth. The top one is smaller and serves as a decorative quilt top, while the bottom one is larger and touches the body. When in use, the bottom piece is wrapped over the top one, secured with needle and thread, with the batting stuffed inside.

The tall, slender lady’s quilt cover was made of satin, which was more expensive than thin silk cloth and featured intricate patterns; Ye Tao quoted 10 wen for it.

The pleated skirt had a hole where the iron had burned through it, and the cuffs of the scholar robe were stained with ink; Ye Tao quoted 8 wen and 6 wen, respectively. His prices weren’t high, so everyone paid up right away. Ye Tao glanced at the sky and decided to mend the pleated skirt first.

This pleated skirt hadn’t been worn in quite some time, and the pleats had loosened somewhat; the tear likely occurred while ironing the pleats. The tear itself wasn’t very large, but the edges showed scorch marks and had become brittle and stiff, so they needed to be treated as well.

Ye Tao ran the tips of his index and middle fingers over the fabric inch by inch, cutting away the parts damaged by the iron.

It didn’t take much thread to mend it. He unpicked a small slit along the edge to pull out the threads, took two threads from each direction, and mended it along the warp and weft. By the time he was done, the sun was already setting.

Cook Qiao came by with her basket to pick up the clothes.

Ye Tao showed her the neatly folded clothes. Cook Qiao first noticed the unstitched front panel—there wasn’t a single tear, the loose threads had been neatly trimmed, the small hole gnawed by a mouse had been mended, and even the dark stain that had been giving her such a headache for so long had vanished without a trace. She let out a gasp and said, “Is this really my clothes? Could it be that you secretly swapped them out to trick me?”

Granny Qiao was so delighted she could hardly see straight: “How could that be a lie? I was watching the whole time!”

She looked at Ye Tao with pride: “I told you the young gentleman is very skilled with his hands—he’d definitely be able to mend it. Just look at him—so handsome and fair-skinned; you can tell at a glance he’s someone who’s good with his hands.”

Cook Qiao had also forgotten the displeasure she’d felt upon first seeing Ye Tao. She agreed repeatedly and even mentioned that she’d bought a decorative collar strip and wanted Ye Tao to come and sew it on. She’d just paid for it, so she immediately took two salted eggs from her basket and pressed them into Ye Tao’s hands: “Take these home to eat—they go well with rice.”

Salted duck eggs cost at least two wen each, so Ye Tao felt awkward accepting them, but Granny Qiao said, “As a female cook, she’s not short on money—just take them.”

Cook Qiao knew this was a playful jab at her plan to spend a hundred wen on an embroiderer, so she laughed and said, “Just take them. With your skills, who knows when you’ll get hired by a wealthy family; don’t forget about us neighbors.”

Ye Tao had already encountered feudal bureaucrats on his very first day here, so he dared not take a job at any of the wealthy households. He shook his head: “I won’t forget.”

After packing up his stall, he didn’t rush home. Carrying his basket, he headed toward the small river. Along the riverbank, many people had come in boats to sell their catch, and it had gradually turned into a small market. Since it was a major market day today, there weren’t many people here.

Ye Tao had originally intended to buy shrimp—the small river shrimp he’d bought last time were delicious and cheap, perfect for fried rice—but unfortunately, he didn’t see any. Instead, a thin, dark-skinned boy was selling assorted snails, claiming he’d just gathered them and that they were still alive. 

Ye Tao took a look. The largest ones were about half the size of her palm, while the smallest were as tiny as sunflower seeds. They were sold in small straw bags, with a whole bag costing just three wen. Since he’d spent all the money Chen Chuan gave him on grain, Ye Tao paid for them out of his own pocket.