Kai Lung’s Golden Hours - Ernest Bramah (the reading strategies book .TXT) 📗

bury it secretly there, remembering his impetuous words and well knowing the net of entangling circumstances which must otherwise close around him. At that moment you will appear before him, searching for your husband, and suspecting his burden raise an outcry that may draw the neighbours to your side if necessary. On this point, however, be discreetly observant, for if the tumult calls down the official watch it will go evilly with Heng-cho, but we shall profit little. The greater likelihood is that as soon as you lift up your voice the baker will implore you to accompany him back to his house so that he may make a full and honourable compensation. This you will do, and hastening the negotiation as much as is consistent with a seemly regard for your overwhelming grief, you will accept not less than five hundred taels and an undertaking that a suitable funeral will be provided.”

“O thrice-versatile Chou-hu!” exclaimed Tsae-che, whose eyes had reflected an ever-increasing sparkle of admiration as Yan unfolded the details of his scheme, “how insignificant are the minds of others compared with yours! Assuredly you have been drinking at some magic well in this one’s absence, for never before was your intellect so keen and lustreful. Let us at once carry your noble stratagem into effect, for this person’s toes vibrate to bear her on a project of such remunerative ingenuity.”

Accordingly they descended into the cave beneath and taking up Chou-hu they again dressed him in his own robes. In his inner sleeve Yan placed some parchments of slight importance; he returned the jade bracelet to his wrist and by other signs he made his identity unmistakable; then lifting him between them, when the night was well advanced, they carried him through unfrequented ways and left him unperceived within Heng-cho’s gate.

“There is yet another precaution which will ensure to you the sympathetic voices of all if it should become necessary to appeal openly,” said Yuen Yan when they had returned. “I will make out a deed of final intention conferring all I possess upon Yuen Yan as a mark of esteem for his conscientious services, and this you can produce if necessary in order to crush the niggard baker in the winepress of your necessitous destitution.” Thereupon Yan drew up such a document as he had described, signing it with Chou-hu’s name and sealing it with his ring, while Tsae-che also added her sign and attestation. He then sent her to lurk upon the roof, strictly commanding her to keep an undeviating watch upon Heng-cho’s movements.

It was about the hour before dawn when Heng-cho appeared, bearing across his back a well-filled sack and carrying in his right hand a spade. His steps were turned towards the fig orchard of which Yan had spoken, so that he must pass Chou-hu’s house, but before he reached it Tsae-che had glided out and with loosened hair and trailing robes she sped along the street. Presently there came to Yuen Yan’s waiting ear a long-drawn cry and the sounds of many shutters being flung open and the tread of hurrying feet. The moments hung about him like the wings of a dragon-dream, but a prudent restraint chained him to the inner chamber.

It was fully light when Tsae-che returned, accompanied by one whom she dismissed before she entered. “Felicity,” she explained, placing before Yan a heavy bag of silver. “Your word has been accomplished.”

“It is sufficient,” replied Yan in a tone from which every tender modulation was absent, as he laid the silver by the side of the parchment which he had drawn up. “For what reason is the outer door now barred and they who drink tea with us prevented from entering to wish Yuen Yan prosperity?”

“Strange are my lord’s words, and the touch of his breath is cold to his menial one,” said the woman in doubting reproach.

“It will scarcely warm even the roots of Heng-cho’s fig-trees,” replied Yuen Yan with unveiled contempt. “Stretch across your hand.”

In trembling wonder Tsae-che laid her hand upon the ebony table which stood between them and slowly advanced it until Yan seized it and held it firmly in his own. For a moment he held it, compelling the woman to gaze with a soul-crushing dread into his face, then his features relaxed somewhat from the effort by which he had controlled them, and at the sight Tsae-che tore away her hand and with a scream which caused those outside to forget the memory of every other cry they had ever heard, she cast herself from the house and was seen in the city no more.

These are the pages of the forgotten incident in the life of Yuen Yan which this narrator has sought out and discovered. Elsewhere, in the lesser Classics, it may be read that the person in question afterwards lived to a venerable age and finally Passed Above surrounded by every luxury, after leading an existence consistently benevolent and marked by an even exceptional adherence to the principles and requirements of The Virtues.

X The Incredible Obtuseness of Those Who Had Opposed the Virtuous Kai Lung

It was later than the appointed hour that same day when Kai Lung and Hwa-mei met about the shutter, for the Mandarin’s importunity had disturbed the harmonious balance of their fixed arrangement. As the storyteller left the inner chamber a message of understanding, veiled from those who stood around, had passed between their eyes, and so complete was the sympathy that now directed them that without a spoken word their plans were understood. Li-loe’s acquiescence had been secured by the bestowal of a flask of wine (provided already by Hwa-mei against such an emergency), and though the doorkeeper had indicated reproach by a variety of sounds, he forbore from speaking openly of any vaster store.

“Let the bitterness of this one’s message be that which is first spoken, so that the later and more enduring words of our remembrance may be devoid of sting. A