Lurking behind covered windows after curfew, all three of them are well on their way to passably drunk when Nie Huaisang lays his current volume down on the table, scattering peanut shells, and sighs. “I wonder what it would be like,” he muses, and Jiang Cheng obligingly makes an inquisitive sound and looks over. The book is open to a woodcut image of a man with a woman bent over his lap, her mouth around him, both of them looking as if they’re enjoying themselves immensely.