My fifth brother Zhisheng took first place on the provincial list in the year guimao. In the year dingwei he went north with the other candidates for the metropolitan examination, and one night put up at the posting-inn at Fuzhuangyi. It was full, so he borrowed lodging in the village.
The moon soaked through the torn curtain and the wind rattled the broken paper, and he could not sleep for lying there. He got up and walked into the front court, and turned through into the building behind, where he found a waste garden three mu across. Under a tree, a woman with bald temples was hobbling about, saying in a loud voice:
“The wind and moon are fine tonight. Among the travellers there are surely boys wanting a green-tower dream. Call them in!”
Presently a flock of beauties gathered. The old woman put on a show of anger.
“You sit in your rooms all day gambling at dice and cracking melon seeds — so spoilt and idle. Is your mother to live the long day on morning dew?”
They murmured and obeyed. She whispered in their ears for a long while, and then they all beckoned with their hands toward the south-east corner.
Before long the guests arrived — merchants’ dress, scholars’ caps, of every sort. A five-coloured felt was spread and they sat in a ring on the ground; the woman bustled to and fro laying out dishes and provisions, as though she had them stored ready. Then the wine wound down and the talk and laughter grew tired too. The old woman clapped her hands, laughing:
“The window candle is ash! The magpie bridge over the Silver River is built. Silly bull, fool girl — still sitting facing one another?”
They all rose. She led the way with a candle, and the beauties swept the guests off with them into a mat-shed.
Zhisheng, who had always prided himself on his nerve, stole over to look.
Inside, some dozens of bamboo couches were set out, and on each a guest lay with a yaksha in his arms. Snoring rose on every side; red hair lay against shoulders, blood-dark lips passed to mouths; here and there a man had pillowed a ghost-face on his arm and was murmuring endearments in his sleep.
Even as he stood appalled, an old yaksha came with a copper tube some seven inches long and thrust it into the back of a guest’s skull, making a low humming, breathing sound. She worked her way along several couches, and came at last to one, and said:
“This one has no brain. And his whole body gives off a sour stink. He quite makes me want to vomit.”
She rubbed his eyes and dragged him down off the couch.
Zhisheng slapped the railing and shouted: “There is a burly fellow outside this door — how dare you carry on so, old she-demon?”
There was an outcry: “The new honoured gentleman has arrived!” — and in the turning of an eye they were all gone.
He waited for daylight, mounted, and went on his way. At the posting-inn every guest was crying out with pain in the head. Among them was one whose eyes were swollen like peaches. Asked about him, they said he was a licentiate who had bought a place in the College and was going up to the capital to angle for a post in the copying office. Zhisheng smiled quietly to himself, and in that session he passed in the south palace.
The Duo comment: A rouge-knife that cuts to the bone, a flower-arrow gathered at the heart — one stretch of pleasure-ground is a bath in the soup of the fierce raksasas! If you do not turn your head early, I fear the one who bores into your skull will come to you.
