| MISER Shen muttered to himself as we walked down the passageway. He had a sour look on his face, as though he had eaten a green persimmon, and his eyes peered warily into the shadows. |
1 |
| "Those monks cannot possibly be real." he snarled. "If they really wanted to divide seventeen jars of wine why didn't they pour the stuff into a vat and start from there?" |
2 |
| "Too simple," I said. |
3 |
| "Li Kao, they were acting like players in a farce," said Miser Shen. "During the years when I lived only to make money I often played the fool. The best way to cheat people is to convince them that you are a half-witted fool and that they are very clever. After practically begging you to demonstrate how clever you were they stole our boat. They practically forced us to run away from them, and that meant going down this dark tunnel, and I don't like this one bit." |
4 |
| "Miser Shen, you are imagining things. Those monks were just as stupid as they looked," I said. |
5 |
| That reminded me that I still had the jar of wine I had purchased from the little monk, but no sooner did I open it than Miser Shen snatched it from my hand. |
6 |
| "Listen! Do you hear a soft slapping sound?" |
7 |
| I faintly heard it, and I told him so. |
8 |
| "That little monk is wearing slippers, and that is the sound we are hearing. But he is back by the painting, nearly two hundred feet away!" hissed Miser Shen. |
9 |
| "Meaning?" |
10 |
| "Meaning that the painting could have been a trap. That place is some kind of echo chamber, and every word we said there could have been overheard! I would not trust any of those monks, Li Kao, and I most certainly would not drink their wine." |
11 |
| "Miser Shen, I tell you that you are imagining things, and I am thirsty enough to drink paint remover!" I said angrily. |
12 |
| Miser Shen looked at me steadily. Then he raised the wine jar to his own lips. "Forgive my insufferable insolence," he said softly. "You have been chosen by the great Chang Heng, and I am only Miser Shen. But perhaps Chang Heng has a purpose for me too, and if we are to go down this tunnel I believe that I should go first, and I believe that I should taste this wine first." |
13 |
| Then he tilted the jar and drank deeply. I examined him with interest. |
14 |
| "Stomach cramps?" I said. "Ringing in ears? A deathly chill creeping across the extremities? The world spinning round and round before your rapidly glazing eyes?" |
15 |
| Miser Shen suffered none of those terrible symptoms so I grabbed the wine jar and took a swig. "Mei Kuei-lu," I said when I stopped coughing. "Not too bad, if you care for a wine which is eighty-eight percent alcohol and smells strongly of fish." I handed the jar back to Miser Shen, and we passed it back and forth as we proceeded down the tunnel. Miser Shen insisted upon walking in front of me, which made normal conversation a bit awkward, but conversation became unimportant when the music began. |
16 |
| It was the most magnificent thing that I had ever heard. Deep down inside the passageways that sloped from the main tunnel the rising water slapped the bell stones that rose from the floor, and they began to ring with exquisite delicacy. A phenomenon which Cut Off Their Balls Wang has since explained as "sympathetic resonance" caused the stones that pointed down from the ceiling to respond with softer and lower bell sounds of their own. More and more bells chimed in, and then the rising water began to rush through the tiny holes in the black boulders, and it was as though the bell music was accompanied by a thousand strumming lutes and a million murmuring bees. |
17 |
| "How beautiful!" I cried. |
18 |
| "I do not trust it," Miser Shen said gloomily. |
19 |
| We passed countless passageways, and after an hour we came to one larger than the others, and down in the blackness the bells were playing as never before, with sounds almost like silver bells and sibilant gongs. |
20 |
| "I have never heard anything like it!" I gasped. "Miser Shen, we must go down this passageway and see what could cause such music. It is irresistible!" |
21 |
| "Yes, it is irresistible and that is what worries me. I cannot explain it, but I know that there is danger here," said Miser Shen. |
22 |
| "Perhaps it is the effect of the wine," I said. "Do you feel up to forty-four dead stone lions?" |
23 |
| "Forty-four dead stone lions," said Miser Shen. |
24 |
| "Sober as a Confucian!" I cried, and indeed it was indisputable because we were speaking Mandarin, and in Mandarin forty-four dead stone lions comes out as ssu shih ssu ssu shih shih, if it comes out at all. |
25 |
| I started down the passageway, but Miser Shen jumped in front of me. "A thousand pardons, but if you insist on going down here this humble one must go first," he said firmly. "Lead on!" I laughed. |
26 |
| The flickering torches cast grotesque shadows upon the walls as Miser Shen took four steps forward. The fifth time his loot touched a stone on the floor the stone tilted, and from the blackness came a harsh metallic whang! Miser Shen coughed. He fell back into my arms. Blood trickled over my fingers, and I stared stupidly at the iron bolt of a crossbow that protruded from his chest. |
27 |
| I reacted without thinking; diving to the floor of the passageway and whipping out my dagger; listening for the slightest sound and searching for the tiniest movement in the shadows. I heard nothing and saw nothing, and finally my brain registered the stone that had tilted beneath Miser Shen's foot. I lifted my torch and swung it around until I found what I was looking for: a permanently fixed crossbow mounted on the wall, aimed straight at the center of the passageway. |
28 |
| Permanently fixed crossbows must be oiled and loaded; the triggers must be reset. That little monk in black and his brothers in crimson must keep very busy servicing the death traps in the passageways, I thought. They would be waiting if I tr1ed to go back. All I could do was go forward and trust to luck. |
29 |
| "Miser Shen, if only I had listened to you!" I sobbed. "Forgive the foolish friend whose life you have saved." |
30 |
| He was unconscious, but still breathing. I carefully pulled out the iron bolt and bandaged him as best I could, and then I managed to get him on my back. I used our belts to tie his arms around my neck and his legs around my waist, and then I crawled back to the tunnel and got to my feet and started down it once more, with my torch in one hand and my dagger in the other. The tunnel sloped gradually upward, and from the passageways on both sides the seductive music of the stone bells sweetly beckoned the traveler. After an hour the music faded away, and as I trudged up the sloping tunnel there was no sound but the scuffle of the sandals and my harsh breathing. Miser Shen was not heavy, but finally I had to stop and rest. I untied his hands and feet and propped him against the wall. I peered back into the blackness, but I could sense no pursuit. I stuck the flickering torch into a crack in the stone floor, and when I looked up I saw that Miser Shen's eyes were open. They were strangely bright. I touched his hand and found that he was burning with fever. Miser Shen looked at me in a puzzled fashion, as though he was trying to remember who I was and why he was there. Then his eyes cleared, and he said: |
31 |
| "You are the priest? I am looking for the priest, and they said he would be here." |
32 |
| It seemed to be important no him, so I said: "Yes, I am the priest." |
33 |
| "My little girl has been murdered by the Duke of Ch'in," said Miser Shen. "They say that I will feel better if I send a prayer to her, but I do not know how to write." |
34 |
| For Miser Shen it was fifty years ago, just before his grief had driven him mad. |
35 |
| "I shall write down your prayer for you, my son," I said. |
36 |
| Miser Shen's lips moved silently in the torchlight, as though he were rehearsing something, and then he said in a high nervous voice: |
37 |
| "Alas, great is my sorrow! Your name is Ah Chen, and you have been taken from me, and now I will never see you again. When you were born I was not truly pleased because you were a girl and I am a farmer, and a farmer needs strong sons to help with his work, but before a year had passed you had stolen my heart. You grew more teeth, and you grew daily in wisdom. You said 'Mommy' and 'Daddy', and your pronunciation was perfect. When you were three you would knock at the door and then run back and ask: 'Who is it?' When you were four you played the host when your uncle came for a visit. Lifting your cup you said 'Ching!', and when the wine was poured you said 'Kan pei!' We roared with laughter, and you blushed and covered your face with your hands, but I know that you thought yourself very clever. |
38 |
| "Ah Chen, they tell me that I must try to forget you, but it is very hard to forget you. You carried a toy basket, and sat at a low stool to eat porridge. You repeated the Great Learning, and you bowed to Buddha. You played at guessing games, and romped around the house. You were very brave and when you fell and cut your knee you did not cry, because you did not think it was right. Whenever you picked up a piece of fruit or some rice you first looked at peoples' faces to see if it was all right before putting it in your mouth, and you were very careful not to tear your clothes. But then one day the Duke of Ch'in raised our taxes, and your foolish father was sent to plead with him. Do you remember how worried we all were when the flood broke our dikes and the sickness killed our pigs? I told the duke of these things, and many more, and the duke believed that we really were too poor to pay our taxes. Peasants who cannot pay taxes are useless to the Duke of Ch'in, so he destroyed our village as an example to others, and it was the foolishness of your father that led to your death. |
39 |
| "Ah Chen, now you are all alone in Hell waiting to be judged and I know that you must be very frightened, but you must try not to cry or make loud noises. By some evil fate neither your mother nor myself was killed, but do you remember Auntie Yang, the midwife? She was also killed, and she was very fond of you and she has no little girls of her own to look after, so it is all right to try to find her and to offer her your hand and ask her to take care of you. When you come before the Yama Kings you should clasp your hands together and plead to them: 'I am young and I am innocent. I was born in a poor family and I was content with scanty meals. I never wasted a single grain of rice, and |
40 |
| I was never willfully careless of my clothing and shoes. If evil spirits bully me, may thou protect me!' You should put it just that way, and I am sure that evil spirits will not harm you. |
41 |
| "Ah Chen, I have soup here for you! I am burning paper money for you to use! Now the priest is setting down my prayer because I cannot write, and I will burn it and send it to you although you cannot read, for that is the custom. If you hear my prayer will you come to see me in my dreams? If fate so wills that you must yet lead an earthly life I pray that you will come again to your mother's womb. Meanwhile I can only cry, 'Ah Chen, your father is here!' It is very hard to forget you, and I can but weep for you and call your name." |
42 |
| Miser Shen fell silent for a long time. Then he looked up at me with fevered eyes and said: |
43 |
| "Did I say it right? I seem to be confused in my mind, and something seems to be wrong, but I practiced my prayer for a long time and I wanted to say it right." |
44 |
| "You said it perfectly!" I told him, and he seemed greatly relieved.* |
45 |
| Miser Shen spoke no more. His eyes closed and his breathing grew faint, and in a few minutes he gave a little sigh, and the spirit of Miser Shen passed from the red dust of earth. |
46 |
* The priest kept a copy of Miser Shen's original prayer, and those interested in the textual changes that a lapse of fifty years can bring are referred to "Sacrificial Prayer to Ah Chen" in Lin Yutang's The Importance of Understanding, World Publishing Co., 1960, pp 134-7.
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