The Golden Lotus, Volume 1

by Lanling Xiaoxiaosheng

  “You may have it for a few days,” Ximen Qing said, “but I must have it back again. She thinks a great deal of it, and I only borrowed it to look at. I must return it to her.”

  “You shouldn’t have given it to me, then,” Jinlian said. “I didn’t steal it from her. You will find it loves me so much it won’t leave me.”

  “Little slave,” Ximen cried, “don’t be such a tease.” He tried to take back the roll.

  “If you try to snatch it,” Jinlian said, “we will have a snatching match. I’ll tear it into shreds and then it will be lost to all of us forever.”

  Ximen Qing laughed. “Have it your own way. I can’t help myself, but I beg you to give it back to her when you’ve done with it. She has something else that is very interesting and, if you let her have this back, I’ll ask her to let me show you the other.”

  “I wonder who trained you in artfulness, young man,” Jinlian said. “You shall have this back when you bring me the other.”

  They talked for a long time, and that night Ximen stayed with Jinlian. She perfumed the bed and lighted the silver lamp. She dressed herself with all the skill at her command, performing her most intimate toilet, and they looked at the roll so that they might emulate the lovers who were painted upon it.

  Readers, the wonders of witchcraft have been known to us since the most remote periods of antiquity. Very soon after the blind Liu had made a spell for Jinlian, her shame was turned to happiness and Ximen’s displeasure to favor. He dared refuse her nothing. Though he had all the cunning of a ghost, he was compelled to drink the water in which she washed her feet.

  CHAPTER 14

  The Cuckold

  One day, Wu Yueniang was not feeling well, and her brother’s wife came to see her. Yueniang pressed her to stay a few days, and they were sitting together in her room when Ping’an came to announce his master’s return. Mistress Wu went to Li Jiao’er’s room.

  Ximen Qing came in, took off his cloak, and sat down. Xiaoyu brought tea, but he did not drink it, and his wife noticed that he was very pale.

  “Why have you come back so early?” she said.

  “It was Brother Chang’s turn today,” he replied, “but his house is not very large, and he asked us to go to the Temple of Eternal Felicity outside the city. Brother Hua and Brother Ying—there were four or five of us in all—went to the Zhengs’ bawdy house for some wine. We were enjoying ourselves when several constables appeared. Without a word they seized Hua and took him off with them. This scared us all. I went to Guijie’s house, and hid there for a long time. I was so worried that I sent a man to find out what had happened. It seems that Hua’s brothers have some grievance about the disposal of the family property. They made complaint at the Eastern Capital, and the courts have sent an order for Hua’s arrest. When I had heard this, I didn’t worry so much, and the rest of us came back.”

  “The best thing you could do,” Yueniang said. “You have been going with those scamps day after day, gadding about and neglecting your home. Now, you see, there has been trouble. After this, I trust you will break with them completely. If you don’t, you will find yourself involved in squabbles and disasters, and you will end by being beaten till you look like a rotten sheep’s head. You will never believe what I tell you and stop this unbecoming manner of life, but the whores in the bawdy house can tell you any old story and you’ll listen to them with your donkey’s ears. You are the kind of man who lets the advice of his own people go in at one ear and out at the other, and treats everything outsiders tell him as if it were written in the golden characters of a sacred book.”

  “Who do you imagine would have courage enough to strike me?” Ximen said, laughing.

  “Oh, you are a splendid braggart by your own fireside,” Yueniang said.

  Daian came in. “Our neighbor, Mistress Hua, has sent her boy to ask Father to go and talk to her.”

  Ximen Qing tried to escape as quietly as he could.

  “Aren’t you afraid people will talk about you?” Yueniang said.

  “We are only neighbors. There’s nothing in it. I must go and see what she has to say.” He went to Hua’s house.

  Li Ping’er had given instructions that he was to be taken at once to the inner part of the house, and there Ximen Qing found her, wearing a silken gown. She looked disheveled and weary, and her face was as pale as wax. She came and knelt down before him.

  “My lord,” she said, “the priest may be nothing to you, but I pray you consider the glory of Buddha. There is an old maxim that when disaster overtakes a household, neighbors should do what they can to help. My husband has never paid any attention to me; he has never troubled in the least about domestic affairs, but has always gone elsewhere and played the fool. Now he has got into serious trouble and is in a difficulty, he sends one of the servants to say that I must get him out of it. I am a woman, and no more use than a crab without feet. How am I to find anybody who will take the trouble to do anything for him? When I realize how he has always refused to listen to me, I can’t help thinking that it serves him right even if he is sent to the Eastern Capital and beaten till he rots. But my father-in-law’s memory must be considered, and this would bring disgrace upon him. I feel bound to ask you to help me to persuade the officials not to send him there. Think of my poor face, and plead for him. I should not like him to suffer hardship.”

  Ximen Qing saw her kneeling before him and asked her to get up. “It can’t be anything very serious,” he said, “but so far I don’t know what the trouble is.”

  “It will take some explanation,” Li Ping’er said.

  “My late father-in-law had four nephews. Ziyu was the eldest, Ziguang the third, and Zihua the fourth. My husband was the second. They are all blood relations. My father-in-law was very wealthy, but he knew that my husband was a fool and, when he came back from Guangnan, gave everything into my charge. The other three had all annoyed him in some way, and never dared to visit the old man. Last year, my father-in-law died. The other brothers divided between them a good deal of the furniture and some of the beds and curtains, but they got none of the money. I told my husband several times that he should give them something, but he would do nothing at all in the matter. Now, he has got himself into a hopeless situation, and the others have the whip hand.” She burst into tears.

  “Sister,” Ximen Qing said, “don’t distress yourself about it any more. I was under the impression that the matter was really serious, but it is only a family squabble. You have told me what you wish, and I will give my brother’s business as much attention as if it were my own. Tell me what you wish me to do and I will do it.”

  “My lord,” Li Ping’er said, “if you are really willing to undertake this, I could wish for nothing better. Tell me how much you will need for presents, and I will get it ready for you at once.”

  “Not very much,” Ximen said. “I believe the Governor of Kaifengfu is a ward of the Imperial Tutor Cai. Both Cai and my relative, Marshal Yang, have a certain influence with his Majesty. If we send two presents and get those gentlemen to speak to Governor Yang, I don’t think he will refuse anything they ask, no matter how serious the case may be. We must send a present to the Imperial Tutor, but, as Marshal Yang is a relative of mine, he can hardly accept a present from me.”

  Li Ping’er went to her room and took from a chest sixty large bars of silver each worth fifty taels. She gave them to Ximen Qing. The total value was three thousand taels of silver.

  “Half of this will be enough,” Ximen said. “Why do you give me so much?”

  “Keep anything that is left for me,” Li Ping’er said. “There are four chests behind my bed, full of the finest embroidered ceremonial clothes, jade girdles, and so on, without mentioning cap buttons, jewelry, and things of that sort. They are worth a great deal of money. Will you look after them for me and keep them in your house, so that when I want anything I can ask you for it? I feel very unsafe with all this stuff here. If anybody should come and take it away from me, I s
hould be in a desperate fix.”

  “But what will you say when Brother Hua comes back and asks questions?” Ximen said.

  “My father-in-law gave me all these things secretly,” Li Ping’er said. “My husband knows nothing about them. You can take them without hesitation.”

  “I must go and see what my wife says,” Ximen Qing said. “When I get home, I will send somebody for them.” He went home to discuss the matter with Yueniang.

  “We can tell the boys to take food boxes for the silver,” she said, “but the chests and big things we must bring over the wall when it is dark. Then we shall be sure that the matter is kept secret; for, if we bring the stuff around by the gate, everybody in the neighborhood will know what is happening.”

  Ximen Qing thought this an excellent plan. He told Daian, Laiwang, Laixing and Ping’an to take two food boxes and bring the three thousand taels of silver. That evening, when the moon had risen, Li Ping’er and her two maids, Yingchun and Xiuchun, brought benches to the wall and lifted up the chests. On Ximen’s side, Yueniang, Jinlian, and Chunmei set up a ladder and put a blanket on the top of the wall to receive the various articles one by one. Everything was taken to Yueniang’s room.

  In this manner Ximen Qing got into possession of many fine and delicate things, both gold and silver, while his neighbors had not the faintest inkling of what was afoot. He quickly prepared several loads of presents, and, after getting someone to write a letter to go with them, sent Laibao to the Eastern Capital. He was to ask Marshal Yang to send the presents to the Imperial Tutor, asking him to communicate with Governor Yang of Kaifengfu.

  The Governor’s name was Yang Shi, and he was also known as Guishan. Born at Hongnong in Shaanxi, he had obtained the third literary degree in the period of Guiwei. He had formerly been an official at Dalisi, and had been promoted to his present position at the Eastern Capital. He was an honest and fair-dealing official, but the Imperial Tutor had been his guardian, and Marshal Yang was in high favor at the palace, so he could not but fall in with their wishes.

  When the presents arrived, the Governor went into his hall and, bringing Hua Zixu and the others from prison, questioned them about their property. Hua Zixu had received a message from Ximen Qing, so he knew how matters stood.

  “When my worthy ancestor departed this life,” he said to the Governor, “I spent what money there was upon his funeral expenses and the reading of the Buddhist sutras. There was nothing else beyond a parcel of land and a couple of houses. The furniture has already been distributed among the members of the family.”

  “It is never possible,” the Governor said, “to be quite certain about the amount of a chamberlain’s wealth. It comes easily, but it goes easily too. If you have spent all you had, I will send instructions to the magistrate at Qinghe to put up for sale your two houses and the parcel of land, and to share the proceeds between Ziyu and the others.”

  Hua Ziyu pleaded that his brother should be made to hand over to them all his property, but the request irritated the Governor. “You seem to be asking for trouble,” he said. “When the chamberlain died, you made no complaint. Why are you trying to rake up matters that are over and done with?”

  Hua Zixu escaped without the chastisement he had anticipated. The Governor sent a document to Qinghe, ordering the officials there to make a valuation of the houses and land, and dispose of them.

  As soon as Laibao had heard the decision, he traveled posthaste to give the news to Ximen Qing, who was delighted to hear that Hua Zixu was free and on his way back. Li Ping’er sent for him to talk over the situation, and suggested that he should take some of her money and buy the house. “I shall be yours entirely then,” she said. Ximen again went home to discuss the matter with Yueniang.

  “I don’t see how her husband can fail to have his suspicions,” Yueniang said, “if he finds that you intend to buy his house. How do you propose to manage it?”

  Ximen Qing considered what she said, but he did not answer.

  In a few days Hua Zixu returned, and the magistrate of Qinghe appointed his deputy to make an inventory of the old chamberlain’s estate. One house in the Street of Peace and Good Fortune was sold to the princely family of Wang for seven hundred taels, and the land by the South Gate to Major Zhou for six hundred and fifty-five taels. The house in which Hua Zixu had been living was valued at five hundred and forty taels, but nobody made an offer for it, because it was so near to Ximen Qing’s house. More than once, Hua Zixu sent a messenger to ask Ximen to buy it, but he always said he had no money and didn’t care to pass the transaction through his accounts. Meanwhile, seeing that the local authorities seemed anxious to get the matter over and done with, Li Ping’er grew more and more anxious, and secretly sent old woman Feng to Ximen to beg him to take five hundred and forty taels from the money that she had left in his care. Finally Ximen consented, and paid the money to the officials. Hua Zixu hurriedly signed all the documents, and his three brothers divided the eighteen hundred and ninety-five taels between them.

  Hua Zixu was at last clear of the law, but he had not a penny to bless himself with, and both houses and land had been taken from him. The large bars of silver, amounting to three thousand taels, which he had had in his two chests, seemed to have completely vanished, a circumstance that he found exceedingly annoying and disturbing. He wished Li Ping’er to ask Ximen how much had been spent on his behalf and what was left, so that he could buy a house with the remainder, but the only reply he got from his wife was ill humor for several days.

  “You idiot,” she cried, “you have never paid the slightest attention to your own affairs; you have spent all your time chasing after women, and as a result you found yourself in a hole and were thrown into jail. You then condescended to ask me to find somebody to help you. I am not a woman given to gadding about. What do I know about matters of this sort? Whom do I know and where should I have found anybody to do anything for you? I am a creature of such insignificance that, if my body were made of iron, very few nails could be made out of me. All I could do was to go around like a baby, appealing for help, and, fortunately for you, Master Ximen remembered that you had once been his friend, and when things looked cold and bleak for you, sent his servant to the Eastern Capital to get everything settled for you. It was exceedingly kind and thoughtful of him. Now you are out of the mess and your feet are once more on dry land, you begin to think about money, though your life has only just been given back to you. As soon as your troubles are over, you forget all you have gone through, come back to rake up a business that has already been done with, and want to know whether there is any money left.

  “Here is a letter from you, written in your own hand. Without this authority I should never have dared to spend your money on getting assistance for you. I am not so bold that I would steal your money and give it away.”

  “Although I said so in my letter,” Hua Zixu said, “I did hope to keep a little something, sufficient, at least, to buy a house to live in.”

  “Pah, you dirty fool!” Li Ping’er cried, “you ought to have thought about that before. When you had money, you never gave it a thought; but it seems a very different matter now. You keep on saying that I have spent too much money. What was three thousand taels? Do you imagine that the Imperial Tutor Cai and Marshal Yang are so moderate in their desires? If I hadn’t sent them a handsome present, do you think they would have attended to the matter so effectively that you never even felt the weight of a straw on your turtle’s body, but got off scot-free? And you are proud of the fact! You have no influence with them. You are no relative of theirs that they should trouble to be kind to you. Unless it was for something worthwhile, why should they go tearing about to save your skin? Yet you come home, and instead of preparing a banquet and showing your gratitude by entertaining Ximen Qing, you brush everybody on one side and only think about reopening the whole business.”

  This was like a blow in the face to Hua Zixu. He said no more. Next day Ximen Qing sent Daian with a present
to console him in his distress. In return he prepared wine, and invited Ximen Qing, hoping that he might get an opportunity to ask him about the money. As a matter of fact, Ximen would gladly have sent him a few hundred taels to buy a house with, but Li Ping’er would not hear of it. She sent old woman Feng to tell him not to come, and to send her husband a falsified account, making it appear that all the money had been spent.

  Hua Zixu had not brains enough to see through the trick. He sent repeated invitations to Ximen Qing. But Ximen went off to the bawdy house, and told his servants to say that he was not at home whenever a message came for him. This so upset Hua Zixu that he almost fainted, yet he could do nothing but stamp his feet with impatience.

  Readers, if a woman once ceases to love her husband and becomes unfaithful to him, he will never be able to find out her secrets, though he have strength enough to bite through iron. It is traditionally a man’s duty to attend to matters outside the household and a woman’s to govern within it, but over and over again a man’s good repute has been brought to nothing by his wife. Why is this? It is because he has not treated his wife as the Sacred Principle requires. The relations between husband and wife should be based upon a generosity of spirit that gives rise to mutual understanding and brings their feelings into complete accord. When this is the case, the husband sets the tune and the wife follows; there is no reason to anticipate trouble. Hua Zixu lost his head and was blown hither and thither by every wind; he had no ideas at all about the management of a household. This being so, it could hardly be expected that he would exercise any control over his wife’s doings.

  Soon after this Hua Zixu succeeded in borrowing two hundred and fifty taels of silver and bought a house in Lion Street. But he was still smarting beneath a load of anger, and had not long been in his new house before he fell ill of a fever. At the beginning of the eleventh month he took to his bed, and never rose from it again. Early in his illness he was attended by a doctor, but he objected to the expense and allowed the illness to run its course till, on the twentieth, he breathed his last. He was only twenty-four. While he was ill, Tian Xi, one of his boys, stole five taels of silver and made off.