He hovered above the ground for a moment.

'Where is he going?' asked Wang.

'To Zhangqiu.'

Now Zhangqiu was right next to his own native town in Shandong, and Wang immediately got down from his seat and put in a plea for his neighbours, that they might be spared a violent hail-storm.

'Unfortunately this decree emanates from the Supreme Deity,' said the Patriarch. 'The quantity of hail to be dropped has been exactly predetermined and cannot be altered for personal reasons.'

The Patriarch could see, however, that Wang was deeply distressed, and after pondering the matter for a long while, he turned and instructed the God of Hail to discharge most of his hailstones on the hills and valleys, so as to spare the crops.

'And as you can see,' he went on, 'I have a guest, so would you mind making your departure a little more civilized than normal?'

The God left the hall and went out into the courtyard, where seconds later a cloud of mist could be seen billowing out from beneath his feet. He hovered above the ground for a moment, then lifted off with massive force, reaching first tree-top, then roof-top level. Finally there was an almighty crash of thunder, and as he soared up into the sky and northwards, plates rattled on the tables and the whole building quaked.

'You mean to say that every time he goes, it thunders like that!' gasped the awestruck Wang.

'Just now I asked him to tone it down,' said the Heavenly Patriarch, 'so he made it a leisurely take-off. Otherwise he would have zoomed straight up into the air bang!'

When Wang eventually took his leave, he made a note of the date. Later he sent a man to Zhangqiu to make inquiries, and it transpired that on that exact day there had been a particularly heavy storm, with rain and hail filling the watercourses to overflowing. But strangely, only a few lumps of hail had landed on the fields.

20.

THE GOLDEN GOBLET.

Yin Shidan, who rose to be President of the Board of Civil Office, was a native of Licheng who grew up in circumstances of great poverty and had shown himself to be a young man of courage and resourcefulness.

In his home town there was a large estate that had once belonged to a long-established family, a rambling property consisting of a series of pavilions and other buildings that extended over several acres. Strange apparitions had often been witnessed on the estate, with the result that it had been abandoned and allowed to go to ruin. No one was willing to live there. With time the place grew so overgrown and desolate that no one would so much as enter it even in broad daylight.

One day, Yin was drinking with some young friends of his when one of them had a bright idea.

'If one of us dares to spend a night in that haunted place,' he proposed jokingly, 'let's all stand him a dinner!'

Yin leaped up at once. 'Why, what could be easier!'

And so saying he took his sleeping mat with him and went to the place, the others accompanying him as far as the entrance.

'We will wait here outside,' they said, smiling nervously. 'If you see anything out of the ordinary, be sure to raise the alarm.'

Yin laughed. 'If I find any ghosts or foxes, I'll catch one to show you.' And in he went.

The paths were overgrown with long grass and tangled weeds. It was the first quarter of the month, and the crescent moon gave off just enough light for him to make out the gateways and doors. He groped his way forwards until he found himself standing before the building that stood at the rear of the main compound. He climbed on to the terrace and thought it seemed a delightful place to take a little nap. The slender arc of the moon shining in the western sky seemed to hold the hills in its mouth. He sat there a long while without observing anything unusual, and began to smile to himself at the foolish rumours about the place being haunted. Spreading his mat, and choosing a stone for a pillow, he lay there gazing up at the constellations of the Cowherd and the Spinning Maid in the night sky.

By the end of the first watch, he was just beginning to doze off when he heard the patter of footsteps from below, and a servant-girl appeared, carrying a lotus-shaped lantern. The sight of Yin seemed to startle her and she made as if to flee, calling out to someone behind her, 'There's a strange-looking man here!'

'Who is it?' replied a voice.

'I don't know.'

Presently an old gentleman appeared and, approaching Yin, scrutinized him.

'Why, that is the future President Yin! He is fast asleep. We can carry on as planned. He is a broad-minded fellow and will not take offence.'

The old man led the maid on into the building, where they threw open all the doors. After a while a great many guests started arriving, and the upper rooms were as brightly lit as if it had been broad daylight.

Yin tossed and turned on the terrace where he lay. Then he sneezed. The old man, hearing that he was awake, came out and knelt down by his side.

'My daughter, sir, is being given in marriage tonight. I had no idea that Your Excellency would be here, and crave your indulgence.'

Yin rose to his feet and made the old man do likewise. 'I was not aware that a wedding was taking place tonight. I regret I have brought no gift with me.'

'Your very presence is gift enough,' replied the old man graciously, 'and will help to ward off noxious influences. Would you be so kind as to honour us further with your company now?'

Yin assented. Entering the building, he looked around him at the splendid feast that had been prepared. A woman of about forty, whom the old gentleman introduced as his wife, came out to welcome him, and Yin made her a bow. Then the sound of festive pipes was heard, and someone came rushing in, crying, 'He has arrived!'

The old man hurried out to receive his future son-in-law, and Yin remained standing where he was in expectation. After a little while, a bevy of servants bearing gauze lanterns ushered in the groom, a handsome young man of seventeen or eighteen, of a most distinguished appearance and prepossessing bearing. The old gentleman bade him pay his respects to the guest of honour, and the young man turned to Yin, whom he took to be some sort of Master of Ceremonies, and bowed to him in the appropriate fashion. Then the old man and the groom exchanged formal courtesies, and when these were completed, they took their seats. Presently a throng of finely attired serving-maids came forward, with choice wines and steaming dishes of meat. Jade bowls and golden goblets glistened on the tables. When the wine had been round several times, the old gentleman dispatched one of the maids to summon the bride. The maid departed on her errand, but when she had been gone a long while and still there was no sign of his daughter, the old man himself eventually rose from his seat and, lifting the portiere, went into the inner apartments to chivvy her along. At last several maids and serving-women ushered in the bride, to the sound of tinkling jade pendants, and the scent of musk and orchid wafted through the room. Obedient to her father's instructions, she curtseyed to the senior guests and then took her seat by her mother's side. Yin could see from a glance that beneath the kingfisher-feather ornaments she was a young woman of extraordinary beauty.

They were drinking from large goblets of solid gold, each of which held well over a pint, and Yin thought to himself that one of these would be an ideal proof of his adventure that night. So he hid one in his sleeve, to show his friends on his return, then slumped across the table, pretending to have been overpowered by the wine.

'His Excellency is drunk,' they remarked.

A little later, Yin heard the groom take his leave, and as the pipes started up again, all the guests began trooping downstairs.

The old gentleman came to gather up his golden goblets, and noticed that one of them was missing. He searched for it to no avail. Someone suggested their sleeping guest as the culprit, but the old gentleman promptly bid him be silent, for fear that Yin might hear.

After a while, when all was still within and without, Yin rose from the table. The lamps had all been extinguished and it was dark, but the aroma of the food and the fumes of wine still lingered in the hall. As he made his way slowly out of the building, and felt inside his sleeve for the golden goblet, which was still safely hidden, the first light of dawn glimmered in the eastern sky.

He reached the entrance of the estate to find his friends still waiting outside. They had stayed there all night, in case he should try to trick them by coming out and going back in again early in the morning. He took the goblet from his sleeve and showed it to them. In utter amazement they asked him how he had come by it, whereupon he told them the whole story. They knew how poor he was, and that he was most unlikely to have owned such a valuable object himself, and so were obliged to believe him.

Some years later, Yin passed his final examination and obtained the degree of Doctor or jinshi, after which he was appointed to a post in Feiqiu. A wealthy gentleman of the district by the name of Zhu gave a banquet in his honour, and ordered his large golden goblets to be brought out for the occasion. They were a long time coming, and as the company waited a young servant came up and whispered something to the master of the household, who instantly flew into a rage. Presently the goblets were brought in, and Zhu urged his guests to drink. To his astonishment, Yin at once recognized the shape and pattern of the goblets as being identical with the one he had 'kept' from the fox wedding. He asked his host where they had been made.

'I had eight of them,' was the reply. 'An ancestor of mine was Caption

Someone suggested their sleeping guest as the culprit.

a high-ranking mandarin in Peking and had them made by a master goldsmith of the time. They have been in my family for generations, but it is a long while since I last had them taken out of storage. When I knew we would have the honour of your company today, I told my man to open the box, and it turns out there are only seven left! I would have suspected one of my household of stealing it, but apparently there was ten years' dust on the seals and the box was untampered with. It baffles me how this can have happened.'

'The thing must have grown wings and flown away of its own accord!' quipped Yin with a laugh. 'But seeing that you have lost an heirloom, I feel I must help you replace it. I myself have a goblet, sir, very similar to this set of yours. Allow me to make you a present of it.'

When the meal was over, he returned to his official residence, and taking out his own goblet, sent it round straightaway to Zhu's house. When he inspected it, Zhu was absolutely amazed. He went to thank Yin in person, and when he asked him where he had acquired the goblet, Yin told him the whole story.

Which all goes to show that although foxes may be capable of getting hold of objects from a very long way away, they do not hold on to them for ever.

21.

GRACE AND PINE.

Kong Xueli, a descendant of the great sage Confucius, was a man of generous spirit and great refinement of character, and an accomplished poet. A close friend of his, who had been appointed Magistrate at Tiantai, wrote inviting him to come and stay, and Kong set off for Tiantai, only to find on arrival that his friend had died. Stranded without lodgings, and without the means to travel home, he put up in the Putuo Temple, where the monks gave him work as a copyist.

A hundred yards or so west of the temple stood the mansion of a gentleman named Shan, a member of a distinguished local family, who, having become involved in a protracted and ruinously expensive lawsuit, had taken his dependants to live in the country, leaving the place deserted.

One day Kong was out in a driving blizzard, the sort of weather in which everyone else decides to stay indoors, and happened to pass by the Shan mansion, where he saw an elegantly attired and handsome-looking young man emerge from the main entrance. The man also caught sight of Kong and, hurrying over to him, greeted him courteously and invited him to step inside out of the snow. Kong took an instant liking to the stranger and gladly followed him inside, looking around him with curiosity as he went. The various rooms of the mansion, though not particularly large, were hung with numerous fine embroidered hangings, antique calligraphic scrolls and paintings. Kong spotted a slim volume lying on a table entitled Jottings from a Distant Realm and, leafing through it, was a trifle puzzled to find that it was a work completely unknown to him. He assumed that the young man must be a member of the Shan family, since he was living in the Shan residence, and did not bother to inquire into his family background and connections. The young man, for his part, asked Kong in some detail about his own predicament and seemed most sympathetic to his plight. He encouraged him to set himself up as a tutor and start a little school.

'Alas,' sighed Kong, 'I am stranded far from home and can think of no one to act as my patron in such an enterprise.'

'If you would not consider it beneath you,' said the young man, 'I myself would be glad to be your first pupil and sit at your feet.'

Kong was touched by this gesture of friendship but modestly declined to assume the role of the young man's teacher, insisting instead that they should remain simply friends.

'Tell me,' he asked, 'why has this splendid house been closed for so long?'

'It used to belong to the Shan family,' replied the young man, 'but the young master went to live in the country, and ever since then it has been allowed to go to ruin. My own name is Huangfu. My ancestors hail from Shaanxi Province, far to the west. Our own home was burned down in a big fire, so we are lodging here temporarily at present.'

Kong now knew at least that the young man was not a member of the Shan family. The two continued to spend a most convivial evening together and ended up sharing the same bed that night.

At daybreak, a young pageboy came in to light a fire in their room, and Huangfu rose and went off to the inner apartments, while Kong sat up in bed with a quilt wrapped round him. Presently the pageboy returned to announce that the Master was coming, and Kong hurriedly rose from the bed, just as a white-haired old man entered the room.

'I must thank you, sir,' said the old man, speaking most courteously, 'for deigning to take my son in hand. At present he writes very indifferent prose, and I trust you will not allow considerations of friendship to interfere with whatever discipline you may consider necessary for his progress.'

He then presented Kong with an embroidered gown, a sable hat, stockings and shoes. Kong washed himself and combed his hair, whereupon the old man called for wine and food to be served and a dazzling banquet was set before them. The food, the furniture, the clothes, were all of a rare quality, such as Kong had never witnessed in his life. After drinking several cups of wine with his guest the old man picked up his walking stick and went on his way in high spirits.

When the meal was over, young Huangfu came in to present some of his previous compositions, which were all written in an archaic style, quite unlike the elaborate Eight-Legged Essay required in the official examinations. When Kong questioned him about this, he smiled and replied, 'I have never had any particular ambition to sit for the examinations.'

That evening they drank again.

'Tonight let us enjoy ourselves to the full!' exclaimed Huangfu. 'Soon, alas, we must turn our minds to more serious matters.' He called for his pageboy. 'See if father is asleep yet. If he is, go quietly in to Fragrance and ask her to join us.'

The boy went, and returned carrying a piba-mandolin in an embroidered case. Presently a handsome young woman joined them, dressed in an exquisite gown, and Huangfu told her to play for them the air known as 'Bamboo Tears'. She plucked the strings with an ivory plectrum, and played with a strange vigour and passion, to rhythms subtler than any Kong had ever heard. Huangfu poured wine into large goblets, and they drank together into the early hours.

The next day, they rose early to begin their studies. Huangfu proved to be a gifted pupil, able to memorize texts at a single glance, and in no more than a couple of months he had perfected the required prose style. They arranged to have their drinking sessions every five days, making a point of always inviting Fragrance along to join them. Once, when Kong was somewhat the worse for wine, Huangfu noticed that his friend could not take his eyes off the girl.

'Fragrance is just a serving-maid, brought up by my father,' he commented, continuing in a friendly tone, 'I understand how lonely you must feel, so far away from home. In fact I have been meaning for some time now to find you a good-looking wife.'

'Then let it be someone like Fragrance!' said Kong, to which Huangfu replied with a smile, 'As the saying goes, "Little experience makes a man marvel at little!" If Fragrance is your ideal of beauty, then you are easily pleased.'

One day, when he had already been with them for half a year, Kong felt the urge to go out into the countryside for a stroll. He walked to the entrance of the mansion and tried the door, only to find it firmly locked from the outside. When he inquired why this was so, Huangfu told him that his father was anxious to discourage contact with strangers, who might disrupt the progress of his studies. Kong seemed to accept this explanation.

The summer was hot and muggy, and they decided to hold their lessons outside, in one of the garden pavilions. It was at about this time that Kong began to develop a strange swelling on his chest, which was at first the size of a peach, then overnight grew to the size of a large bowl. It gave him great pain and caused him to groan constantly. Huangfu came to visit him morning and night, but Kong slept and ate little, and soon began to waste away, his condition gradually deteriorating to the point where he ceased eating and drinking altogether. Huangfu's father came to call on him, and both he and his son lamented their guest's critical state.

'Last night I was thinking about Mr Kong's illness,' said young Huangfu to his father, 'and I felt sure that my sister Grace would be able to cure him. Just now I sent someone to grandmother's to fetch her. I wonder why she is so long coming.'

Just at that moment the pageboy came in. 'Miss Grace is here,' he announced, 'with her aunt and her cousin Miss Pine.'

Father and son hurried out to greet them, and in a little while returned accompanied by Huangfu's younger sister Grace, a girl of thirteen or fourteen years, with a bright sparkle in her eyes, and a figure as supple and lithe as a young willow. When Kong set eyes on her beauty, his spirits suddenly lifted. He at once forgot his pain and ceased his groans.

'This is my dear friend Kong,' said Huangfu. 'He is as a brother to me. Care for him well.'

A little coyly, Grace rolled back her sleeves, approached his bed and began taking Kong's pulse. As she held his wrist, he became aware of a perfume more fragrant than that of the rarest orchid.

'No wonder!' she concluded with a gentle smile. 'The heart meridian has been affected. His is a very serious illness but still curable. The swelling is already hardening, so we will have to cut it away.'

She took a golden bracelet from her arm and placed it on the diseased part, pressing it down gently. The swollen flesh rose an inch or more above the bracelet, but the base of the swelling was somehow contracted and contained, becoming considerably less extended than before. With her free hand she untied her sash and took from within her gown a knife with a razor-sharp blade as fine as a sheet of paper. Pressing the bracelet with one hand and holding the knife in the other, she cut lightly and deftly along the base of the swelling. Dark blood gushed from the wound, staining the mat on the bed beneath him. But Kong, who now craved nothing but the proximity of this beautiful girl, not only was oblivious to the pain but dreaded more than anything else the completion of the operation, since it threatened to bring with it her departure and a premature end to their short-lived intimacy.

Soon the diseased flesh had been excised in one piece, like a chunk of rotten wood cut from a tree. The girl called for water with which to bathe the wound, then from her mouth she spat out a red bolus, a pill the size of a large bullet, pressing it into the wound and turning it round and round. At the first turn, he felt a burning sensation; at the second, an insistent tingling; at the third, a lightness that permeated his body to the very marrow of his bones.

The girl put the bolus back into her mouth and swallowed it.

'There! You are cured!' she said, and hurried out. Kong leaped up to thank her, as if he had never been ill at all.

But his sufferings were not at an end. Now he found himself yearning more and more for her beauty, abandoning his books and sitting for hours musing on nothing, listless and dead to the world.