17

Prayer Services Are Held at West Hill Temple for a Departed Soul

A Coffin Is Prepared in the Kaifeng Yamen for a Living Criminal

As the poem says,

The three religions—each has its approach;

Each holds its own place in the universe.

But similarities in the trappings

Obscure their features and mix them with the worldly.

As for Daoism, it originated when Laozi crossed Hangu Pass on the back of a water buffalo, and the border official, later to be known as Sage Wenshi, asked him to leave behind the five-thousand-character Classic of the Way and Virtue [Daode jing] that is still in circulation even to this day.

In Daoist practices, the most accomplished reach the state of the Void and live in quiescence and nonaction. Able to move freely between the mortal and spirit realms, they rise above the defilements of the world and deliver themselves from mortality. Those who are less accomplished cultivate their spirit, engage in breathing exercises, mix elixirs for prolonging life, and perform alchemic transmutations for the benefit of the populace. The least accomplished use charms and magic figures to summon ghosts and spirits, hold prayer services to communicate with the Upper Realms, and make magic signs to get through to the netherworld. Now, Zhang Jiao of the Eastern Han dynasty [25–220] belonged to the last category.1 He was able to conjure up a fog that stretched for five li. Those who wanted to be his disciples were told to pay five piculs of rice by way of an induction fee, hence the name, the Five Piculs of Rice Sect. Later on, this school gained popularity. Those who used their skills to subdue demons and rid the people of scourges were orthodox, whereas those who used their skills to do evil were nothing more than sorcerers. Even though the orthodox practitioners and the sorcerers were of quite different orders, they were very effective in their own ways and very hard to come by. With the passage of time, we in our day cannot find Daoists of the first two categories anywhere on earth anymore, but the third kind remains popular, with legions of disciples learning the arts, and some among them are quite impressive. However, there is one peculiarity about the arts: Those who have acquired such skills are no longer at liberty to behave as they please. There is no lack of practitioners who bring calamity on themselves as a consequence of their indiscretions. (MC: Beware!)

In the Qiandao reign period [1165–73] of the Song dynasty, there lived in Fuzhou, Fujian, a young man named Ren Daoyuan. He was the oldest son of Ren Wenjian, vice minister of imperial ceremonials. A Daoist devotee from an early age, he learned the orthodox method of the Five Heavenly Thunderbolts from his teacher, Ouyang Wenbin. He built an altar at home, and his services for people were quite efficacious. His wife’s nephew, Liang Kun, shared his enthusiasm for Daoist magic arts.

One day, a patient with a heart ailment went to him seeking a divination. He was from the Ke clan of Yongfu County [present-day Yongtai County, Fujian]. Before the patient arrived, Ren Daoyuan and Liang Kun, who had retired for the night at the altar, saw a celestial general approaching them. The divine being announced, “When the next divination seeker arrives, write the character 香 and give it to him, and tell him to go home quickly.”

On hearing this, Ren Daoyuan immediately rose, lit a candle, wrote the character on a piece of paper, sealed it, and went back to sleep. The next morning, when the patient arrived, Daoyuan gave him the sealed envelope and told him to return home quickly. After returning home, the patient died on the eighteenth day of the lunar month because the upper part of the character contained the radical 木, which consists of 十 (ten) plus 八 (eight) and 日 (day). This event brought him fame far and wide, and he came to be called “the Master” by all and sundry.

Later, after his father’s death, Daoyuan inherited his father’s title and left his hometown to take up his post. His official duties kept him so busy that his devotion to the Daoist arts began to cool. Every morning when passing the altar, he just saluted it briefly and told a young acolyte to make offerings of incense. That was all there was to it. He never even stepped inside the hall. His servants commented, “Master is not as devoted to the Dao as before. The gods may get angry.”

Complacent in his exalted position, Daoyuan did not take these comments to heart. Ignoring their gossip, he maintained this routine day after day.

On the fifteenth night of the first month of the thirteenth year of the Chunxi reign period [1174–89], residents of the northern section of the city gathered by previous agreement in front of the temple of Daoist Zhang and invited Ren Daoyuan to preside over the ceremony at the massive altar bearing Daoist charms. Amid the heaving mass of humanity attending the ceremony were two beautiful young women with tall coiffures. Standing shoulder to shoulder, they looked like twin lotus flowers on the same stalk. As Ren Daoyuan raised his head, his eyes happened to rest on them. The sight threw him into such raptures that all thoughts of the prayer service and the Daoist commandments took flight from his mind. (IC: Mara hindrances are upon him [in the form of earthly temptations].) “Young ladies,” he addressed them, “come and take a look inside, if you please.”

“Thank you, Master,” said the two women.

As they stepped over the threshold gracefully with their dainty feet, Daoyuan kept looking them up and down. Then he said, “Young ladies, lift your halters.” By adopting a line that local men used when making advances to women, he meant that he wanted to touch their breasts.

One of the women shot back sternly, “How can a Daoist master holding a prayer service say such a thing?” She grabbed her companion and turned around to leave the hall.

With another grin, Daoyuan said, “Since you’re here for a prayer service, why don’t you try to fulfill your bond with a great master?”

Blushing to the roots of their ears, the two women departed, cursing him under their breath.

After the ceremony was over, Daoyuan began to feel an itch and a sting in a spot behind his left ear. He asked a servant to check what it was, and the servant saw a tiny red lump the size of a grain of millet. When it was pressed with a finger, the pain was intolerable. The next day, Daoyuan returned home in dejection. After several days, he said to Liang Kun, his wife’s nephew, “Last night, I had a nightmare in which a celestial general reproached me. My number is up. The date of my death is written secretly on a piece of paper. It’s to be revealed by Master Shang Rixuan.”

Master Shang Rixuan, when he arrived, looked at the red lump and said, “This is beyond me. Only a child can reveal the secret.”

Soon a village boy came in. He leaped onto the rafter and announced in the tone of a deity, “Ren Daoyuan! The gods have been protecting you for a long time now, but instead of faithfully tending to the altar, you fell prey to avarice, lust, and moral turpitude. Your trespasses are unforgivable.”

In deep repentance, Daoyuan kowtowed and begged for forgiveness.

The celestial being continued, “And a fine thing you said on the fifteenth night of the month!”

Over and over again, Daoyuan begged for his life to be spared, and stated his readiness to turn over a new leaf.

“What’s the use of saying all this when things have come to this pass?” said the celestial being. “I don’t mind losing one disciple. You should serve as a warning to all Daoist disciples. (MC: Fierce.) However, considering your past merit, I give you twenty days.” With that, the child fell to the floor and woke up, but he knew nothing about what had just transpired. Liang Kun opened the envelope that Daoyuan had sealed and showed it to Shang Rixuan. It contained the same words: “twenty days.”

That very night, Daoyuan saw in his dream a celestial general running after him with an iron whip. Panic-stricken, Daoyuan ran around the foot of Nine-Fairies Mountain, where he resided, but the celestial general caught up with him and hit the back of his head with the whip. Daoyuan woke with a start. The lump behind his ear grew larger, and his head swelled until it was as big as a bamboo basket. When the drum sounded the second watch each night, he would cry out in pain as if he were being whipped.

When the twenty-day grace period was about to expire, Liang Kun was sleeping in his own house when he had a dream in which a celestial general said to him, “Go to the Ren residence as soon as the fifth watch strikes, to watch me finish off Daoyuan.”

Kun rose in alarm and rushed to the Ren residence. On seeing him, Daoyuan said tearfully, “This is the last time we meet!” He threw some clothes over his shoulders and was about to get out of bed when he suddenly fell onto the floor. Seven or eight servants tried to raise him, but he was picked up and thrown onto the floor again as if by an invisible huge hand. Upon close inspection, the servants realized that he had stopped breathing. Liang Kun saw to his burial. Awed by divine power, Liang Kun dared not practice his arts anymore.

Gentle reader, consider how Ren Daoyuan practiced orthodox Daoist arts half his lifetime. His only offense was saying those vile words in an unguarded moment, and yet he was punished so severely even though he was not guilty of any actions that brought disgrace to the religion. Imagine how much more unforgiving Heaven will be toward those Daoists of our day who engage in nothing but debauchery and felony! Indeed, in the netherworld, there is divine censure; in the mortal world, there are the laws of the land. There is just no getting away with crime. Yet it just so happens that it is easier for Daoists to engage in evil doings because Buddhist monks, with their distinctive shaved heads and robes, are easily recognized and therefore hardly at liberty to do evil. (IC: Not necessarily so.) But Daoist priests, once their Daoist hats and robes are replaced by everyday hats and clothes, look no different from laypeople, so they may not be easily seen through. And those Daoist priests with wives and children are all the more undistinguishable from ordinary men in the street. As a consequence, they find themselves less hampered than Buddhist monks when it comes to debauchery.

This leads me to my next story, one about a Daoist priest who used prayer services to seduce a woman and ended up dying a violent death. This story is a warning to all Daoist devotees. There is a poem in testimony:

A fetus is formed by the forces of nature;

It finds in its mother’s womb the best of nurture.

But the womb may turn out to be your tomb;

Stay free of offenses against womanhood!

The story goes that in the Song dynasty, there lived in Kaifeng Prefecture, Henan, a woman, Wu-shi, who married into a Liu family of this prefecture when she was fifteen years old and gave birth to a son, Li Dasheng. When Dasheng was twelve years old, Mr. Liu died of illness, leaving the beautiful Wu-shi a young widow, not yet thirty years old. With no parents-in-law or other clan members, she became head of the household (MC: This is unseemly.) and looked after her son. Recalling her deceased husband’s kindness, she planned to hold a prayer service for the salvation of his soul. (IC: She will not be so inclined in the future.)

There was a West Hill Temple nearby, where Daoists cultivated their spirits. One of the priests, Huang Miaoxiu, had been chosen abbot of the temple thanks to his skill at drawing charms and his elegant and graceful bearing. One day, he was in the temple drawing up a document for a patron when he suddenly saw a young woman in mourning white walking into the temple with an eleven- or twelve-year-old boy. As the saying puts it so well, “A woman in mourning white is a pleasure for the eye.” That woman, already quite a beauty, was doubly charming in her white clothes and white head scarf. If she had been not in a Daoist temple but in a Buddhist monastery, she would have been taken as the white-robed fertility goddess Bodhisattva Guanyin. (MC: Idle but good comments.) She approached Abbot Huang and bowed twice as if offering votive candles. The abbot looked her over and felt as if his soul had taken leave of his body. Eagerly, he bowed in response and asked, “Which family are you from? What brought you here?”

“I’m Wu-shi of the Liu family. My husband passed away recently, and I’m here, with my son, Liu Dasheng (IC: Her little nemesis.), to request a prayer service for the departed. We, mother and son, plead in all sincerity that Your Reverence apply your divine power to ensure his well-being in the netherworld.”

Feeling the stirrings of less than honorable desires, Abbot Huang said, “Since your worthy husband died only recently and you want the salvation of his soul, you need to set up a mourning hall for him at home. I say this because a prayer service must be held in a mourning hall in order to be efficacious. A perfunctory service in this temple with other activities going on at the same time may not do much good. Would this idea be agreeable to you, madam?”

Wu-shi replied, “Your Reverence’s visit to my humble home will be my greatest honor. My son and I will be ever so grateful. After returning home, I’ll get the mourning hall ready for the prayer service in anticipation of your coming.”

“When may I come to your house?”

“The one-hundredth-day commemoration of my husband’s passing is coming up in eight days. I’d like to have a seven-day service. If it starts tomorrow, the last day of the service will coincide with the commemoration. So it will be best if Your Reverence could grace my humble home with your presence early tomorrow morning.”

“You have my word. I won’t be late. Tomorrow, then!”

Wu-shi retrieved a tael of silver from her sleeve and offered it as advance payment for paper and other materials required for the service. Then she took leave of the abbot and returned home to make preparations for the service.

The truth of the matter is that Wu-shi’s wish to hold a prayer service for her husband was sincere and unmixed with improper motives. As it turned out, however, Abbot Huang was a rapaciously lecherous man. Impressed by Wu-shi’s beauty at first sight, he burned with amorous desires even as he talked with her. Wu-shi did not entertain lascivious thoughts, but inwardly she marveled at the abbot’s prepossessing exterior and his straightforwardness. “What a handsome man!” she said to herself. “Why did he take up a religious vocation? I’m glad he didn’t put on airs but was so good as to offer to come to my home for the service. He’s one of those men who go out of their way to help others.” And she felt quite well disposed toward the man. (IC: Herein lies her karma.)

Early the next morning, Abbot Huang went straight to Wu-shi’s house, followed by two young acolytes and a custodian carrying scrolls of Daoist scriptures. As her son, Dasheng, was still too young, Wu-shi managed the household herself, so she greeted the visitors and led them into the mourning hall. The abbot, the two acolytes, and the custodian hung up portraits of multiple Daoist deities and laid out an altar. Then the abbot began to put the ritual implements to use. He announced the purpose of the service, invoked the deities, conjured up spirits, proclaimed amnesty, and summoned the soul of the deceased. As this was noisily going on, Wu-shi entered the room to offer incense. Eyeing the woman, the abbot put on an even greater show of enthusiasm. After he finished intoning the scriptures in unison with the two acolytes, he rose and, holding the celestial instructions, knelt down on the carpet in front of the portraits of the deities to read them out loud. He also bade Wu-shi to get down on her knees to offer her prayers. Kneeling, as she was told, at a spot only a few inches from him, Wu-shi smelled the incense that he had scented his clothes with and instinctively stole glances at him. Sensing her interest, the abbot returned her glances while intoning the sutra. As they shot looks back and forth, both were overcome with the desire for an embrace. After the prayers were duly said, they rose to their feet, and Wu-shi began to offer incense and kowtow to the portraits of the deities, all the while stealing glances at the altar. When her eyes fell on the two young acolytes, each with shoulder-length black hair topped by a small hat, she marveled at their ruby lips, white teeth, delicate complexions, and fresh looks and said to herself, “Those Daoists do know how to enjoy life! What heartthrobs those two boys will grow up to be!” She was seized with uncontrollable desire as she continued to throw surreptitious glances from behind the mourning-white curtain.

The frightening truth is that lovers’ eyes see what they want to see. Once you have fallen in love, everything about the object of your affection fascinates you. Indeed, no matter whether he or she is tall, short, well built, or thin, you find each attribute adorable. (MC: How true!) What’s more, women tend to be more constant in love. Once a woman is enamored of a man, she won’t be able to dismiss him from her mind. The more Wu-shi looked at the abbot, the more she found him dashing and delightful. Being a young widow, she was at the height of passion. With her desire stirring, she blushed and grew pale by turns, and she kept pacing to and fro behind the curtain, sometimes showing half her face, sometimes stepping out from behind the curtain, as if to make her wish known to the abbot. But since Abbot Huang had already taken a fancy to her, how could he not be aware of it? However, lest he make the wrong move on the very first day of his stay, he limited himself to darting amorous glances at her without attempting to have his way. As for her son, Liu Dasheng, he was too young to understand the ways of the world. Thrilled at the chance to look at the images of deities and play with the bells and drums, he knew nothing about his mother’s inner thoughts.

Soon, lamps were lit, and they had supper. Then Wu-shi assigned a clean side room to the abbot and his acolytes. The abbot told the custodian to return to their temple, whereas he and the two boys spent the night in the same bed. The next morning, they rose and made preparations for the continuation of the service. So much for the abbot for now.

Let us retrace our steps and come back to the moment when Wu-shi and her son, Dasheng, retired for the night. Once in her bed, she thought, “That priest must be doing that thing with the two pretty boys at this very moment while I have to sleep all alone.” Aroused by these thoughts, she found herself overwhelmed by her desires. With a shudder, she gnashed her teeth and broke into a sweat. She had just drifted off to sleep when she heard footsteps nearing her bed. She raised her head and saw a man lift her bed curtain and jump into bed. Then she heard the voice of the abbot saying softly, “Thank you for sending me signals with your tender glances. They were by no means lost on my watchful eyes. Now that the night is deep and all is quiet, let’s enjoy the moment!” With that, he inserted his cucumber-like member into her. Without demur, Wu-shi joyfully accepted his advances.

At the height of her enjoyment, she saw one of the two boys lift the curtain to look for his master. (MC: The dream will be borne out.) At the sight of the abbot quite carried away with what he was doing, the boy cried out, “Lady! A fine thing you’re doing, seducing a priest! I’ll keep my mouth shut only if you let me join you.” So saying, he shot out a hand to grope Wu-shi’s waist.

Sharply, the abbot said, “I forbid you to misbehave in my presence!”

Wu-shi was about to go into raptures when that harsh demand wakened her, and she realized that it had been but a dream. Finding her thighs and even the mat wet, she quickly wiped them dry with a handkerchief and said to herself with a sigh, “What a nice dream! Will such happiness be mine for real?” Peaceful sleep continued to elude her the rest of the night.

On rising at daybreak and hearing the bells and drums in the hall, Wu-shi told her maids to carry water to the abbot and tend to his needs. The two young acolytes, secure in the knowledge that they could get away with misbehavior on account of their age, entered the mourning hall to ask for what they needed, and a familiarity sprang up between them and members of the household.

As Wu-shi was sitting in the mourning hall, one of the acolytes came in to ask for tea. Wu-shi detained him and asked, “What’s your name?”

“Taiqing.”

“And the name of the older one?”

“Taisu.”

“Which one of you slept head to head with His Reverence last night?”

“What’s wrong with sleeping head to head?”

“I’m only afraid that His Reverence may be a little wanting in discretion.”

With a grin, the boy said, “Madam, you’re a funny one.” With that, he left the room and quietly reported the conversation to the abbot.

His heart aflutter, the abbot thought, “Only a flirt is capable of such comments. But even though that mourning hall is only a couple of feet away, the interior section of the house is off limits to outsiders. What am I going to do to lead her on?” He gave himself up to thought, putting himself in her position. Suddenly he said, “I’ve got an idea!” A moment later, when Wu-shi emerged from the interior of the house to offer incense, the abbot immediately went to stand shoulder to shoulder with her. Holding a bell in one hand and a tablet in the other, he began to chant a lyric poem to the tune of “Ripples Sifting Sand”:

I kowtow to the Top Layer of Heaven,

Sharing a bond with a fellow worshipper.

In the flower of her youth,

She suffers in her lonely bed.

She holds a prayer service

In pious memory of the deceased.

To Lovers’ Lane we come to quench our thirst

And to enjoy celestial bliss.

This poem was all too clearly meant to lead her on. Well aware of its meaning, Wu-shi commented with a slight smile, “That was a lot of mumbo jumbo, Your Reverence.”

The abbot rejoined, “No. Nothing I said was against Daoist teachings. Those lovely words were passed on to us by our forefathers, who enjoyed celestial bliss, so that we can follow their examples.”

By now, there was no doubt left in Wu-shi’s mind about the abbot’s intentions. She went inside, filled half a bowl with shelled nuts, brewed a pot of high-grade green tea, and told a maidservant to take them to the abbot, saying, “Tell him that these are from Madam, to quench his thirst.” This covert echo of the abbot’s poem was just as good as saying “Yes.” The abbot was beside himself with joy. Gesticulating wildly with both hands and feet, he cast all thoughts of the Treasured Canons and the Purple Cloud Secret Talismans to the winds. The pleasures of the pillow had taken full possession of his mind. Surreptitiously, he had one of the boys find out about Wu-shi’s sleeping arrangements. On learning that she shared a room with her son and a maid, he thought better of recklessly barging in.

That evening, he went to bed with the two boys as before. His mind was filled with images of Wu-shi as she had appeared to him during the day, and he found release in Taiqing. As the bed creaked under them, he caressed Taiqing’s back and said to both acolytes, “My dear boys, I have something to talk over with you. The mistress of the house seems to have taken a fancy to me. If I have my way with her, you two may also have something to gain. But the private section of the house is strictly off limits to outsiders, and she shares her bedchamber with her son and her maid. And, here, your presence also makes things awkward. What’s to be done?”

Taiqing said, “But don’t mind us!”

The abbot said, “At the beginning, she may not like being watched.”

Taisu suggested, “There’s a bed meant for the soul of the deceased in the mourning hall, and it’s furnished with a bed curtain and nice bedding. And that hall is between the private section and the outer section of the house, a perfect spot for a secret affair.” (MC: This is why Taisu will also suffer retribution from the netherworld.)

“Good idea, my dear boy!” exclaimed the abbot. “Now I know what to do tomorrow!”

Whispering into their ears, he told them of his plan. Both boys said, clapping their hands, “Wonderful!” Aroused by all this talk, the abbot finished what he had been doing with Taiqing. The two boys found release in self-amusement. Nothing further happened that night.

The next morning, the abbot greeted Wu-shi and said to her, “Today is the third day of the prayer service. I know the magic formula for summoning the spirits of the dead. Shall I go ahead and summon the spirit of your deceased husband, so that he can meet you? What do you say, madam?”

“That would be wonderful!” said Wu-shi. “But how are you going to do it?”

“I’ll first build a bridge with white silk in the mourning hall. Then I’ll make his spirit cross the bridge for a meeting with you, but only one family member can stay here, because with another person in the room, the yang element will be too strong for the spirit. And the door of the mourning hall must be kept closed so as to prevent any prying eyes from detecting the cosmic secret.”

“There are only two family members: my son and I. My son is too young to know anything. Seeing his father won’t mean much to him. But I do want to see my husband. Let me stay in the mourning hall and watch you apply your magic formula.”

“That would be best,” said the abbot.

Wu-shi went back to the interior of the house and brought out two bolts of white silk. The abbot took one bolt, held one end of it and, with Wu-shi holding the other end, began to measure its length. Each time they folded the fabric, they exchanged meaningful glances. When their hands met, he gently touched her wrist, and she kept silent. The abbot then had the tables stacked up to make his “bridge,” which, placed squarely at the entrance to the mourning hall, blocked the view from outside.

The abbot then emerged from the mourning hall to give these instructions to the two young acolytes: “I’ll close the door of the mourning hall and summon the spirit of the deceased. You two must keep watch at the door and prevent anyone from looking inside, so as not to ruin my magic.”

With their tacit understanding of the situation, the two acolytes said, “Yes, Master.”

Wu-shi, on her part, told her son and the maid, “The abbot is going to summon the spirit of the deceased for a meeting with me. It’s to be done in absolute silence. You stay inside. Don’t come out and make noise.”

On hearing that his father’s spirit was to be invoked, Dasheng cried out, “I want to see Daddy, too!” (MC: Plea of an innocent child.)

“My son, the abbot says that the more people there are in the room, the stronger the yang element will be, and the spirit will refuse to show up. So only I can be there to keep vigil. If you want to join, the whole attempt may fail. If the abbot makes a success of it this time, you can join the session next time.” In fact, Wu-shi knew that the abbot must have been using this as an excuse to hide something he had up his sleeve. So she talked her son out of the idea with nice words, bribed him with a liberal supply of goodies, and locked him and the maid in her bedchamber. That done, she went into the mourning hall and sat down.

With a click, the abbot bolted the double-leaf door. Then, feigning gravity, he hit the table twice with a tablet. After mumbling goodness only knows what words of incantation, he said smilingly to Wu-shi, “Please sit on the bed for the spirit. But there’s one thing I need to warn you about: when the spirit comes, it will be nothing more than an indistinct image, as in a dream, and it can’t do anything for you.”

“I just want to meet his soul and pour out my sorrows to him. I don’t mind if he can’t do anything for me.”

“I say that because you’ll only be seeing him face-to-face but won’t be able to resume your pleasures of the bed.”

“There you go again, Your Reverence! I’ll be quite content with just seeing his soul. Why did you have to bring that up?”

“But I’ll be able to bring about your union of delight with him.”

Startled, Wu-shi exclaimed, “That can’t be true!”

The abbot explained, “A soul is devoid of body. Once I summon his soul and attach it to my body, he can be united with you.”

“But a soul is a soul, and a priest is a priest. How can you substitute a soul?”

“We’ve always had this magic formula through which numerous souls have been able to attach themselves to live bodies in order to meet their loved ones.”

“How can this possibly be done?”

“If you find me different from your worthy husband in any way, just don’t believe me in the future.” (IC: Very clever.)

Wu-shi said reproachfully, “What a clever tongue you have, wicked priest! You do know how to fool people!”

At this point, the abbot walked up to her, gathered her in his arms, and put her on the bed meant for the soul of her husband. With a grin, he said, “Let me be your husband for now.” Wu-shi was aroused by this time, and the two of them began to cavort with each other.

He, a shrewd and handsome Daoist,

Had seldom tasted respectable women.

She, a beauty newly widowed,

Had forgone the nuptial pleasures.

With wind and thunder roaring,

They conjured up a storm in bed.

Her spotless chastity is ruined,

Like flowers trampled underfoot.

The images of deities that filled the hall

Never had any substance to them.

The soul of the departed

Remained in the netherworld.

One drew in the spermatic essence;

The other plowed the fertile field.

When honoring the gods,

A lone bird slipped on the path;

When servicing the Dao,

A priest plunged into the depths of the flowers.

The taste was wonderful and mysterious;

The bodies were exhausted and spent.

Their joy complete after their amorous sport was over, the abbot asked Wu-shi, “How do I compare to your husband?”

With a snort, Wu-shi replied, “You filthy rascal! This is so embarrassing! Don’t bring this up!” (IC: What does she know about “embarrassing”?)

The abbot said gratefully, “I’m much obliged to you, madam, for not finding me inadequate. I can never repay you enough, not even if I die.”

“Now that you’ve tricked me into this, you’d better make this a long-lasting relationship.”

The abbot said, “We’d better call each other cousins, so that we can continue to see each other without arousing suspicions.”

“Good idea,” acknowledged Wu-shi.

“How old are you, madam?”

“I’m twenty-six.”

“I’m one year older than you are. So let me be your older cousin. I know what to do.” So saying, he got out of bed, struck the altar table twice with a tablet, opened the door, and said to the two acolytes, “The dead man’s soul that I just summoned revealed that his widow is in fact a cousin of mine. I never knew this. The soul volunteered the information. I questioned him in detail and found what he said to be true. So she and I are in fact very close relatives.”

The acolytes said, grinning, “Yes, very close indeed!” (MC: A double entendre.)

Wu-shi called her son to her and repeated the abbot’s barefaced lies to him, adding, “It was your father who said this. Now come and greet your uncle.”

What did a little boy know? Henceforth, he called the abbot “Uncle,” as he was told.

From then on, the abbot and Wu-shi met daily for their unions of delight, ostensibly to call back the spirit of the deceased. Every evening, Wu-shi emerged from the interior section of the house, the abbot entered the mourning hall, and they cavorted in bed with growing intimacy. The son asked to see his father every time he heard about a session to call up his father’s spirit, but each time he was told, “You’re a mortal being. You can’t see him.”

The son had to give up on the idea, but inevitably a suspicion began to creep into his mind. “Why am I always told no?”

On the seventh day, the prayer service came to an end, and the one-hundred-day mourning period expired. Wu-shi thanked the abbot, and the two acolytes cleared away the altar. Furtively, she and the abbot agreed on their next assignation. In order not to attract prying eyes, the abbot returned to the temple. Wu-shi sent her son back to his tuition-free school, so that he left home early in the morning and returned after dark. During daytime, the two acolytes often came to bring messages to Wu-shi, and sometimes the abbot came himself. At night, after the son went to bed, the abbot was let in for their games of fornication. The maidservant knew what was afoot, but her mistress had bought her silence. Three years went by with nothing standing in their way, but we shall say no more of this for the moment.

In the meantime, Liu Dasheng the son grew up and reached puberty. He began to gain some idea of what was going on. He had a quick mind and was well read and sensible. The thought that his mother was involved in something dishonorable bothered him, but he dared not confront her. One day, a schoolmate in the classroom jestingly called him “the little priest.” His face aflame, he returned home and said to his mother, “I have something to say to you, Mother. Could you tell that uncle to stop coming here? Someone called me ‘the little priest.’ I’ve become a laughingstock.”

On hearing this, Wu-shi reddened from the roots of her ears to her cheeks. Giving him a couple of sharp raps on the head with her knuckles, she said, “What does a child like you know? Your uncle is your mother’s cousin. Who’s to stop us from seeing each other? Who told you this? Once I find that goddamned swine, I’ll give him hell!”

But Dasheng continued, “I’d never heard of such an uncle before the prayer service started. (MC: Meticulous.) If he’s really my uncle, it’s only right for cousins to visit each other, so why do I hear gossip about this?”

That charge hit home. Seized with rage, Wu-shi cried, “A fine son you are! Think of all the hardships I’ve gone through in raising you! And now you believe some outsiders and come to humiliate your mother. Oh, why did I bring up such an ungrateful son?” And she began to slap the table and chairs while wailing at the top of her voice.

In consternation, Dasheng dropped to his knees in front of her and pleaded, “Please forgive me! It’s all my fault!”

Mollified by his plea for forgiveness, Wu-shi stopped crying and said, “Do not ever listen to baseless gossip again!”

Dasheng stifled his anger and did not venture another word, but he said to himself, “She was so brazen in her denial. I must catch them in the act in order to put a stop to it. Let me keep a watchful eye on them first.”

One evening, after all became quiet, Dasheng went to sleep in his mother’s room. On waking at midnight, he heard the door creak, as if someone had just gone out. On the alert, he threw some clothes on and got out of bed to look. When he found the door open, he knew that his mother must have gone to her illicit rendezvous again. So he turned back and felt around his mother’s bed in the dark. Sure enough, she was not there. Instead of leaving the room to track her down, he hit on a plan and bolted the door. Then he put a bench against the door before going back to his own bed to sleep.

What had happened was that Wu-shi and the abbot had agreed to meet after dusk. The spiritual tablet in the mourning hall had already been taken down, but the bed was still there, neatly made, for their convenience during their filthy trysts. There were more screens than before standing tightly around the bed. The abbot lay down in bed before Wu-shi entered the mourning hall to join him. After spending the whole night indulging in sexual pleasures, they rose a little before daybreak so that the abbot could leave the hall, after which she returned to her bedroom. They had been following this routine for so long without having to be on their guard that they thought nothing of it. But that night, on reaching her bedroom door, Wu-shi found it closed, and it did not yield to her hand. Realizing that her son must be in the know, she felt very much put out and sat down to wait for daybreak. Her teeth clenched, she remained immobile, silently suppressing her angry words.

Dasheng did not open the door until it was broad daylight. On seeing his mother, he feigned surprise and said, “Why are you sitting outside, Mother?”

Wu-shi had to resort to lying. “Last night, I heard footsteps outside. I was afraid there might have been a burglar around, so I opened the door to take a look. Why did you bolt the door?”

“When I saw the door open, I was also afraid that there might have been a burglar around, so I closed the door and put a bench against it. I thought you were asleep in bed. Why were you outside? And why didn’t you call me so that I could let you in? What’s the meaning of sitting here all night?” (MC: The questions touch her to the quick.)

Listening to her son, Wu-shi racked her brains for an answer but failed to come up with any. She gave up the attempt and said to herself, “I can’t keep this wayward son of mine in my room any longer.”

One day, out of the blue, she said to him, “Now that you’ve grown up, it’s unseemly for you to share a bedroom with your mother. That bed in the mourning hall is quite nicely made. Why don’t you sleep there tonight?”

Wu-shi meant to turn him out of her room so that she could entertain the abbot in her own room with greater ease and enjoyment in the future. Little did she know that her son, with his sharp mind, had caught on to her intentions. He nodded in agreement. That day, he went to school as usual and returned home in the evening to sleep in the hall, but he kept an even sharper lookout.

When one of the acolytes came later that day, Wu-shi told him to go back and tell the abbot that her son had locked her out the night before, adding, “So I told my son to sleep in another room. Tonight, your master can use the back gate and come straight to my bedroom.”

That night, when the abbot came, Dasheng, in the hall, had not gone to sleep. Instead, he was walking about, on the lookout for signs of anything astir. On hearing a sound from the back gate, he ducked into a shadowed spot and clearly saw the abbot enter. As the maid closed the gate, the abbot went straight to Wu-shi’s room, closed the door, and went to bed.

Dasheng thought, “A son can’t very well catch his mother in the very act of adultery. Instead, I’ll just go and spoil their fun.” After a while, hearing no more sounds from his mother’s room, he quickly found a thick rope and used it to fasten the door knockers together, one on each leaf of the door. He thought, “That scoundrel won’t be able to open the door and slip out. He’ll have to jump out the window. Let me do something to make him feel sorry for himself !” He went to the outhouse and brought back a urine bucket and a broken night-soil bucket. He then put them in the spot under the window where the abbot would land when he jumped out. Having done that, Dasheng went back to the hall to sleep.

After spending the whole night wallowing in debauchery, the abbot heard roosters crow twice. Afraid that daybreak was near, he put on his clothes and headed for the door. He pushed and pushed but could not get it open. He had to call Wu-shi’s attention to it. Wu-shi came to offer him help, but she could not get the door open either. The door creaked, as if it was being blocked from the other side.

“How very strange!” said Wu-shi. “Could it be that the little brat is up to some trick? Since the door won’t open, you’ll have to take the window. (IC: Just as he expected.) I’ll take care of the door tomorrow morning, but the sky will be turning light soon. There’s no time to lose!”

Peering through sleep-deprived eyes, the abbot opened the window and leaped. With a splash, his right foot landed in the urine bucket. Thus thrown off balance, he lurched, and his left foot ended up in the night-soil bucket. In haste, he pulled his right foot out of the urine bucket, but the bucket was deep, and he was in a panic. He fell, knocking the bucket over. (MC: Marvelous!) He was covered to the waist with urine and feces, and his lips were bleeding (IC: Did he get a taste of the filth?), but he dared not let out a peep. In spite of the pain, he scurried away through the back gate, covering his nose with a hand.

Wu-shi was already quite upset because the door would not open, and now, hearing the racket that followed the abbot’s departure through the window, she began to worry. She went to the window. In the darkness, she could make out nothing, but she was hit with a wave of foul stench. Wondering what could have happened, she went broodingly back to bed.

When Dasheng rose in the morning and went to his mother’s door to take down the rope, he saw the buckets toppled over and the ground beneath the window covered with urine and feces. His anger mingled with amusement, he cleared away the buckets in spite of the foul smell, taking care not to wake his mother.

After a while, Wu-shi rose and was surprised that the door yielded easily to her. Wondering if she had been too hasty last night, she walked to the window and saw urine and feces covering the ground and wet footprints stretching all the way to the back gate. She called her son to her and asked, “Where did all that filth come from?”

“I have no idea,” replied Dasheng. “But judging by the footprints, I think a man was here, someone who couldn’t hold it any longer and made the mess.” (MC: Very funny.)

Reduced to silence, Wu-shi blushed and turned pale by turns and seethed with rage, but she could not come up with a retort. Henceforth, hatred for her son began to burn in her, and she came to regard him as a thorn in her flesh, to be removed at the first opportunity.

As for the abbot, his scented clothes were wet through with filth the night he suffered the humiliation. Gloomily, he washed himself clean in the temple. His lips badly bruised, he stayed away from the Liu residence for several days in a row. With her bellyful of grievances, Wu-shi was looking forward to pouring out her woes to him and taking his counsel. His prolonged absence made her long for him and added to her anger.

One day, the abbot dispatched the acolyte Taisu to call on Wu-shi.

“Your master’s absence means he must be angry,” said Wu-shi.

“He’s terrified of your son and is trying to stay out of his way for a few days.”

“My son is in school during the daytime. You can ask your master to come over during the day. I have something to say to him.”

Well aware of Wu-shi’s exploits, the eighteen- or nineteen-year-old Taisu threw a significant glance at her and said flirtatiously, “While my master is otherwise occupied, can his disciple take his place, just once?”

“You little rascal!” snapped Wu-shi. “How dare you take liberties with me? I’ll tell your master about it and have you beaten in your lower part!”

Taisu rejoined, grinning, “My lower part is just as good as yours. My master has a use for it. He won’t have the heart to beat it.” (MC: Lovely! No wonder Taisu stirs her desires.)

“You shameless little rascal! The way you put it!”

Wu-shi had always been attracted to that pretty boy but had found him still too young. Now that he had grown up and was trying to lead her on, her desires stirred. She pulled him close with one arm and planted a kiss on his mouth. Reaching out a hand, she found that member of his hard and erect. She was about to haul him to bed when, all too unexpectedly, Taiqing came to the hall and called out for Taisu. Abbot Huang had sent Taiqing because he had been waiting in vain for Taisu to return. On hearing Taiqing’s voice, Taisu immediately stopped what he had been doing, afraid that his master would reproach him. And so, their high expectations of fun were thus abruptly brought to an end. (MC: Fun will have to wait.) The two acolytes returned to the temple to report to their master.

The next day, the abbot went, as expected, to the Liu residence. Wu-shi closed the front gate and ushered him into the hall. She asked, “I didn’t hear from you after that night until yesterday when you sent one of the boys. Why?”

The abbot replied, “You son is extremely crafty. He’s a grownup now and is quite a holy terror. It will be difficult for us to meet. I’m afraid we’ll have to call it quits.”

Wu-shi had been hoping to include the two boys in her continued liaisons with the abbot, and these words displeased her. She said, “There’s no one above me to tell me how to behave. That little scoundrel is the only obstacle. I’m going to go all the way and finish him off, so that I can enjoy some freedom. (IC: Heartless!) He went too far these last few times!”

The abbot said, “He’s your birth son, your flesh and blood. How can you have the heart to kill him?”

“A good son should care about his mother’s happiness. That’s what flesh and blood is about. (IC: Exactly.) But he’s made life so hard for me. I’d rather do without him!”

“This is entirely up to you,” admonished the abbot. “Others can have no say in the matter, but I’m afraid you may regret it later.”

“I’ll put up with him for another couple of days. In the meantime, you can relax and come tonight for some fun. Even if he suspects something, let’s just ignore him and let him be. There’s precious little he can do.”

The conversation went on for a considerable while before the abbot departed, to come back after nightfall.

That day, Dasheng’s teacher was eager to return home and dismissed the class earlier than usual. On his way home, Dasheng ran into the abbot. Feeling sure that the abbot had just left his mother, Dasheng grew vigilant, but now that he was face-to-face with the abbot, he forced himself to call out “Uncle” and bowed with joined hands. Startled, the abbot returned the greeting and walked on without saying a word. Dasheng thought, “It’s been quiet these past few days since that night, but he obviously went to my home again just now, which means he’ll be back tonight. I can’t very well catch him again this time. I’ll just do something to keep him away.”

When he got home, his mother asked, “Why are you home so early today?”

“The teacher went home. I get to stay at home for a few days.”

Wu-shi kept her displeasure to herself and asked grudgingly, “Do you want a snack?”

“Yes, I’d like to eat something before I go to bed. These past few days, the teacher accelerated our lessons because he had to be away for some days. I’m so tired. I need to go to sleep early.”

Her spirits lifting a little at this remark, Wu-shi gave him a snack, and after he ate, he went to the hall to sleep, as he had said. Much relieved, Wu-shi ate supper by herself, tidied up the room, and took a rest. Then she told the maid to leave the back gate ajar in anticipation of the abbot’s arrival.

Little did she know that Dasheng had been feigning sleepiness. When all was quiet, he noiselessly got up and went to check the gates. The front gate was locked, and the inner gate was closed from the other side. He pried it open and went to check the back gate. Finding it ajar, he quietly bolted it, put a stool next to it, and sat down. At the first watch of the night, he heard the gate being pushed from the other side, but only gently. Then, on hearing tapping at the gate, Dasheng remained silent, meaning to watch for the man’s next move. Suddenly, a voice came through the chink in the gate, saying, “It’s me! Why is the gate closed? Open it!”

Dasheng said, disguising his voice, “It’s not going to work out tonight! Go back! Don’t cause trouble!”

All became quiet again. (MC: Wonderful!) In the meantime, in her room, Wu-shi was aflame with desire for the rendezvous. With still no sign of the abbot after the first watch was struck, she saw no option but to tell her maid to go to the back gate to see if anything was wrong. The maid went there in the darkness and gave a start when her groping hand touched Dasheng.

Dasheng said, his voice loud and harsh, “You slut! What are you up to, sneaking to the gate at this time of night?”

A scream escaped the maid’s lips as she took flight. Back in her mistress’s bedroom, she reported to Wu-shi, “I didn’t see the abbot, but Young Master was sitting there. I was almost frightened to death!”

Wu-shi said, “That little rascal is getting more and more hateful, going to such lengths to get in my way.” Rubbing her hands in irritation, she was about to let herself go and throw a fit when she checked herself, for she was in the wrong after all. Also, worried that the abbot might go back and fail to keep the appointment, she could not sleep in her agitated state.

After he had heard no sound for quite a while, Dasheng surmised that the abbot must have gone quite a distance. Only then did he turn in for the night. (MC: Meticulous.) Wu-shi again told the maid to check things out, saying that the young master must have left his position by the gate. The maid quietly opened the gate and stepped into the street, but she saw no sign of a human figure anywhere. Her report put an even greater damper on Wu-shi’s spirits. Seething with rage, she stayed awake without getting a wink of sleep until daybreak. On seeing Dasheng, she snapped, “What were you doing—a child like you—sitting by the back gate instead of sleeping in bed?”

“I didn’t do anything bad. What was the harm in sitting there?”

Her cheeks blazing red, Wu-shi cursed, “You little scoundrel! Are you implying that I did something bad?”

“Who said so? It’s just that I had nothing to do after nightfall, so I closed the gate and sat there to look out. There’s nothing wrong with that.”

Unable to argue him down, Wu-shi swallowed her anger and said in brazen defense of herself, “Your mother isn’t going to escape. No need for you to stand guard!” With tears in her eyes, she went back to her room, to wait for one of the acolytes so that she could ask about what had happened the night before.

As it turned out, instead of going to school that day, Dasheng spent his time reading in the hall and taking a stroll around the house now and then. At the sight of Taiqing, he blocked the acolyte’s way and said, “What’s up?”

Taiqing said, “I’d like to see the mistress of the house.”

“I can relay your message to her,” said Dasheng.

Hearing the acolyte’s voice from her room, Wu-shi immediately told her maid to usher him in. To her annoyance, Dasheng followed on his heels and never took so much as a step from his side. Unable to steal a private moment with Wu-shi, the acolyte could do no more than give a hollow greeting: “His Reverence sends Madam and Young Master his regards.”

Without missing a beat, Dasheng said, “We’re both fine. He has nothing to worry about. You may go now.”

Taiqing’s eyes locked with Wu-shi’s, but not knowing what to do, he departed sullenly. Wu-shi smoldered with mounting rage. For about ten days in a row thereafter, no communication took place between the abbot and Wu-shi.

One day, a classmate sent Dasheng word that the teacher was back at school. Dasheng took leave of his mother and returned to school. Wu-shi was as delighted as if she had received amnesty by the grace of the Lord on High. As a matter of fact, the two acolytes Taiqing and Taisu not only served as messengers for their master but were also eager to get something out of the liaison for themselves. So they had been running to and from Wu-shi’s house like shuttles on a loom. But after Taiqing suffered such an indignity at Dasheng’s hands the other day, the two acolytes would not enter the house if they learned that Dasheng was home.

On the day Dasheng resumed school attendance, Taiqing put in an appearance just when Wu-shi was about to send a message. After what her son had done to her the past few times, she should have learned her lesson and exercised caution. But she knew no caution in her pursuit of carnal pleasures. (MC: She is too carried away to see the picture clearly.) Believing that her son was too young to be taken seriously, she asked the abbot to come that very evening, and to the front gate, too, saying that her son would not be on his guard but that the abbot should still wait until the night was deep. And so the appointment was made.

It was late when Dasheng returned home. After eating supper with him, Wu-shi and the maid locked the front and back gates, torches in hand—all for Dasheng’s benefit—and told Dasheng to go to sleep, whereas Wu-shi retired to her own room.

Dasheng said apprehensively to himself, “Since I wasn’t at home during the day, they’ll surely be up to some monkey business tonight, but why did she lock the gates? So that I won’t get suspicious? I must stay awake. I’m sure something will happen.”

He sat around until the night was deep before he quietly went to check the gates. He found the inner gate closed but not bolted and the back gate properly locked. “So he’ll be using the front gate tonight,” Dasheng thought. He slipped back into the hall and hunkered down in the darkness.

There, by the dim light of the stars, he saw his mother emerge from her room with the maid. Then his mother positioned herself by the door, apparently to be on the alert for Dasheng, while the maid went to check the front gate. Soon there came a tapping at the gate. Gently, the maid opened the lock and drew one leaf of the gate ajar. In a trice, a man slipped in. The maid closed the gate, and all three of them headed noiselessly for the inner section of the house. Without a moment’s delay, Dasheng threw open the front gate, took down the burglar-alarm gong hanging by the gate, beat it with all the force he could muster, and yelled, “Stop, thief !” (MC: Dasheng has not only an agile mind but also agile limbs.)

Allow me to digress: Kaifeng, being the capital city with a large metropolitan area, had no shortage of thieves and burglars. Therefore, by government order, every family hung a burglar-alarm gong inside the front gate. When a gong was beaten, neighbors in the ten-household administrative unit would come to offer help, and the neighbors were to compensate for any loss suffered by that family. It was a stringent law indeed.

Back to the story: The abbot was about to enter Wu-shi’s bedchamber when the sound of the gong burst on his ears. Realizing he had been seen, he was shocked out of his senses. Without sparing a moment to say one word, he spun around and headed for the back gate. (IC: Through force of habit.) Finding it under lock and key, he made a dash for the front gate. Thrilled on seeing it open, he regretted that he didn’t have an extra pair of legs to carry him. In fact, Dasheng meant only to drive him away because catching him would put his mother in a bad light. On seeing the abbot running helter-skelter, he picked up a stone and hurled it with all his strength at the fleeing figure. (IC: Comical.) As the stone struck him in one leg, the abbot drew up the leg and his shoe fell off. He certainly had no time to stop and pick it up. So he got away, with nothing but a stocking on one foot. (MC: Beating gongs and throwing stones are but child’s play, but they are more than enough for Dasheng to deal with the adulterers.) When neighbors came and asked what had happened, Dasheng said only that the burglar had gotten away. He picked up the shoe, closed the gate, and went inside.

Wu-shi, who had been looking forward to a union of delight with the abbot, was badly shaken. She and the maid were trembling with fear when they noticed that the beating of the gong had stopped and the front gate had been closed. Guessing that the abbot had gotten away, Wu-shi breathed a little easier.

Dasheng came in and asked deliberately, “Did I frighten you, Mother, when I drove away a burglar?”

Wu-shi replied, “Where was the burglar? You made such a big fuss over it!”

Showing her the shoe, Dasheng continued, “I didn’t catch the burglar, but I did pick up one of his shoes. I should be able to track him down with the shoe tomorrow.”

Knowing all too well by now that she had been tricked by her son, Wu-shi became even more spiteful, but she was in no position to lash out at him. From then on, the abbot stopped coming. While feeling sorry for the abbot because he had sustained such a shock, Wu-shi burned with hatred against her son and wanted to consult the abbot about a plan to get at him, but she dared not ask the abbot over for fear that her son would find out.

The anniversary of Mr. Liu’s death rolled around a few days later. Wu-shi hit on an idea. She said to Dasheng, “Take some fake paper coins to your father’s grave, burn the money as an offering, and sweep the grave clean. You go first. I’ll prepare some food offerings and go there by sedan-chair.”

Dasheng said to himself, “Why is it necessary to visit the grave on an anniversary? What’s more, why make me go first? She must be planning to get rid of me so that she can sneak off to the temple. I’ll say yes for now instead of confronting her.” So he said to his mother, “All right, I’ll go first and wait for you there.”

Having assured her with those words, he went instead to West Hill Temple and walked straight in. On seeing him, Abbot Huang gave a violent start. You may ask why. Well, the memory of the events of that night still haunted him. He collected himself before saying, “What brought you here, my good nephew?”

“My mother will be arriving any moment now.”

The abbot, with his guilty conscience, said to himself, “When did he and his mother reconcile? And if she’s indeed coming, why would she tell her son to precede her? Something isn’t right.” While he was thus debating with himself, he saw a sedan-chair approaching. (IC: As expected.) When the sedan-chair was set down right in front of him, who should emerge from it but Wu-shi of the Liu family! She had just stepped out of the sedan-chair when she raised her eyes and saw none other than her son.

“Mother, so you’ve come,” said he.

Appalled, Wu-shi thought, “How on earth did this nemesis of mine get here first?” Aloud, she could do nothing else but lie. “It being your father’s anniversary today, I can hardly do without a prayer service. That’s why I came to the temple, to see your uncle.”

“I’ve been thinking along the same lines, Mother. Since it’s not necessary to visit the grave on an anniversary, I thought it would be a better idea to ask Uncle to do something. That’s why I came first.”

Wu-shi seethed with rage, but there was nothing she could do about him. (MC: Dasheng in his brilliance is scoring one victory after another, but he is also inviting trouble.) The abbot, as was only to be expected, served tea. False-heartedly, he drew two Daoist charms, said a prayer to the gods, and burned the charms. (IC: This is all hocus-pocus.) He had no chance to make any mischief.

After the commotion was over, Wu-shi told her son to leave first, but he refused. “I’ll follow your sedan-chair on foot,” said he.

Wu-shi saw nothing for it but to get into her sedan-chair. Having gone to all this trouble in vain without even managing to say a meaningful word to the abbot, Wu-shi felt her anger mount with each step of the sedan-chair carriers. She made up her mind to put her son out of the way.

The sedan-chair carriers went fast. Dasheng was still too young, after all, and found it hard to keep up, and he felt the need to relieve himself. He thought, “Nothing should happen on the way home. I don’t have to keep up.” And so he lagged behind.

As if something was destined to happen, Wu-shi saw Taisu coming toward her. She asked the sedan-chair carriers, “Is my son following behind?”

“No, he couldn’t keep up and is now out of sight.”

Immensely delighted, Wu-shi called Taisu to her and whispered to him, “I’ll send that little scoundrel away tonight by one means or another. Your master must come. I need to talk to him about an important matter.”

Taisu said, “My master has suffered so many shocks that he dares not enter your house again.”

“If so, he doesn’t have to enter my house tonight. He can just stay outside the gate and toss a brick over the wall as a signal. Then I’ll go to the gate to talk with him. He can come in when it’s safe. Nothing can go wrong.” So saying, she shot Taisu a significant glance. Taisu was so seized with desire that he would have his way with the woman right there on the grass if the sedan-chair carriers had not been there. Wu-shi whispered again into his ear, “Tonight, you come, too. I may also do something for you.” Having heard that, Taisu went off, wagging his head in delight.

On arriving at home, Wu-shi dismissed the sedan-chair carriers. After Dasheng also arrived and it began to grow dark, Wu-shi prepared wine and some fancy tidbits to go with supper and told Dasheng to eat supper with her in her room. Affably, she said, “My child, after your father’s passing, you’re the only one I have. Why do you make things so difficult for me?”

“It’s precisely because Father is no longer with us that you need to work out a way to ensure the well-being of the family. I, as your son, would surely do as you say, but all that gossip floating around unsettles me.”

Her anger turning to joy, Wu-shi said, “I can tell you quite truthfully that I was indeed guilty of some youthful indiscretions, which gave rise to the gossip. But now, I’m a thirty-year-old woman. I’m deeply remorseful. I’ve decided to live a quiet life by your side.”

At this show of contrition, Dasheng put on a smile and said, “That would be enough luck to last me a lifetime!”

Wu-shi filled a cup with wine and said, handing it to Dasheng, “If you don’t think ill of me, drink it up.”

Startled, Dasheng thought, “Could she be up to some mischief ? Could there be poison in the wine?” He took the cup but dared not drink from it.

Judging from his hesitation that he was suspicious, Wu-shi said, “How can I, your mother, bear you any malice?” So saying, she took the cup from him and drained it in one gulp.

Feeling deeply apologetic for having misjudged her, Dasheng grabbed the flask and filled his cup, saying, “I’ll gladly drink this as a penalty.”

After he drank three cups in succession, Wu-shi said, “I’m repentant. That’s why I confessed to you. If you have sympathy for me and forgive my past indiscretions, you must drink with me until we’ve thoroughly enjoyed ourselves.”

These words from his mother gladdened Dasheng’s heart, and he finished every cup that his mother offered him without declining even once. Now the truth is that Wu-shi had a large capacity for wine, but Dasheng, at his young age, could get drunk on very little, which was why Wu-shi was so assiduously plying him with wine. With one yawn after another, Dasheng was seized by a longing for sleep. After a few more cups that his mother shoved his way, he felt that the ceiling and floor had changed places on him, and the effort to stay awake was too much. After ordering the maid to help him to Wu-shi’s own bed, Wu-shi went out with the maid and locked the door from the outside. As she did so, she muttered, “Good gracious! Imagine you falling into my trap!”

She was waiting for news from outside when she heard the thud of a brick landing on the roof. At this awaited signal, she promptly told the maid to open the back gate. In came Taisu, saying, “My master is outside the front gate, but he dares not come in. You’ll have to go let him in.”

Wu-shi told the maid to keep watch over her bedchamber door and went toward the front gate with Taisu in the darkness. As Taisu got his arms around her, she turned, held him, and said, “Little villain! I’ve long had my eye on you. We weren’t able to finish what we were doing the other day, so let’s pay the debt now!” So saying, she led him to her son’s unoccupied bed in the hall and made merry with him.

He was an untested virgin;

She was an old hand at illicit affairs.

The first-timer was hungry for more;

The one with experience was filled with lust.

The disciple tasted the first course;

The master was to enjoy later offerings. (MC: Old hands at this business.)

After they were done, they straightened their clothes, walked out together, and opened the front gate. Sure enough, the abbot was still standing there, waiting like an idiot. Wu-shi stepped out and asked him in, but he hesitated. Wu-shi said, “That little scoundrel is in my room, stinking drunk. I need to work out a plan with you to bump him off here and now. Follow me in. We need to talk!”

As he followed her, the abbot admonished, “You mustn’t do that! He’s your son, your own flesh and blood. How can you find it in your heart to do that?”

“Isn’t it all for your sake? And I can’t take it from him anymore.”

“But if you do go ahead with it and word gets out, you’ll be in for a lot of trouble.”

“I gave birth to him. So my taking his life away shouldn’t be a major crime.”

The abbot said, “What’s between you and me isn’t that much of a secret. If what you do to your son is found out, you’ll be accused only of killing your own son, but if some enemy of mine pursues this case and accuses me of complicity with you, I’ll be guilty of a capital crime!”

“If you’re so afraid of the consequences, how can we enjoy ourselves with him around?”

“Why don’t you find him a wife? Let’s teach him a thing or two and muddy the waters. (IC: He is greedy for more.) Once he loses his moral high ground, he’ll be in no position to maintain his hold on you.”

“No, that will only make things worse! Who knows what kind of woman my future daughter-in-law will be? If she’s not to my liking, I’ll only be bringing a spy into the house and further inconvenience myself. The only option is to make short work of him. With him out of the way, even though I won’t be able to marry a priest, who’s to stop us from seeing each other as cousins? Now, that’s what I call a long-term plan.”

The abbot said, “If so, I have an idea: Go to the government yamen for help.” (IC: This is Heaven’s will. If Wu-shi was to have her way, it would be all over with Dasheng.)

“What do you mean?”

“Our prefect of Kaifeng hates unfilial sons most. Those charged with the crime of filial impiety have been either beaten to death or given long prison sentences. (MC: A wise judge wouldn’t be so opinionated as to convict an innocent man. But based on his wrong assumption, the stupid man charges Dasheng with filial impiety, only to bring ruin on himself, by the will of Heaven.) So you need only charge him with filial impiety. He’ll find it difficult to defend himself. You’re his birth mother, not a stepmother, so naturally the yamen will go by what you say. No one will question you. Even if he’s not beaten to death, his prison term will be long enough to spare us from his prying eyes. But if you want him dead, the yamen will surely comply with the mother’s wishes.”

“What if that little scoundrel grows desperate and tells tales about us?”

“How can a son accuse his mother of adultery? If he does blab about it, you can charge him with willful slander. The prefect will be even more convinced that he’s an unfilial son. Who will believe him? (MC: He believes he has covered all the angles.) What’s more, to prove adultery, you must catch both parties in the act. And there’s no proof against you and me. Whatever he says, the prefect will take it as a lie that’s meant to cover his ass. No one will help a son investigate his mother’s adultery. You need not worry on that score.”

“Earlier today, I told him to go to his father’s grave, but he went to your temple instead. His refusal to pay respects to his father’s grave—that fact alone is enough to convict him of filial impiety. But we need to prepare the case against him in secret, behind his back.”

The abbot said, “You can’t do anything because he’s always by your side. I’m on good terms with some yamen employees. I’ll submit the accusation paper in secret and work out some way to have the yamen accept the case and dispatch lictors to arrest him. You can come out then to bear witness. That way, not a soul will know a thing about it.”

“Yes, that’s the right way to do it. There’s one thing, though: After my son dies, you must be good to me and humor me in everything. If you don’t, won’t I have finished off my son for nothing?”

“What can I do to please you?”

“I want you to sleep with me every night. I refuse to sleep alone.”

“But I have business to attend to in the temple. How can I manage to come every night?”

“If you don’t have time, just send one of your disciples to keep me company (IC: Her lewdness has reached the extreme! Her fall is inevitable.), or I won’t be able to stand the loneliness.”

“I can humor you in that. Both young men are my trusted disciples. They’re very eager to please. Even when I’m with you, all three or four of us can have fun together if you like them. Won’t that be wonderful?”

Aroused by these words, Wu-shi went to the bed in the hall with the abbot and enjoyed herself to the full. In a seductive tone, she said, “I’m giving up my son for your sake, my love. Don’t you ever forget me!”

The abbot took a solemn vow: “If I ever betray you, let me die without a coffin to lie in!” (MC: He will not be denied a coffin. He’s not that bad a traitor after all.)

The abbot was quite exhausted after his passion was over, but Wu-shi wanted more.

“Why don’t you summon Taisu right now to try it out?” she suggested.

“Wonderful idea!” exclaimed the abbot. He rose, went to Taisu, gently took his hand, and said, “Madam Wu wants you.”

When Taisu approached the bed, the abbot said, “Get in bed quickly and keep Madam company!”

Although Taisu had already done it once that night, a young man like him would have no trouble doing it a second time. He jumped into bed and started again. Sitting on the edge of the bed, the abbot said, “You should be grateful that I made this possible for you.” He could not have known that this was Taisu’s second time around that evening.

Wu-shi felt satiated only after she had contended with two men. She said to the abbot, “With the little scoundrel out of the way, we’ll be free to do this often in the future!” (IC: Don’t be so sure!)

After it was over, she told both men to leave before her son woke up from his wine-induced sleep. As she walked them to the gate, she repeatedly reminded the abbot, “I’ll be waiting for news from you tomorrow or the day after tomorrow. Don’t fail me!”

Behind the abbot’s back as he preceded Taisu, Wu-shi again pawed Taisu, furtively gathered him in her arms, and kissed him on his lips before letting him go. (MC: The root of his future demise.) She then closed the gate and went inside. The maid was still by the door of the bedroom, dozing off. Wu-shi then entered her bedroom but, seeing her son still in bed, went to sleep in the hall.

The next morning, on realizing that he was in his mother’s bed, Dasheng said to himself, “I must have been dead drunk last night!” As he recalled what his mother had said to him the previous evening, he wondered whether she was being sincere or not. “Could she have done that again while I was drunk?”

Meaning to pick a quarrel with Dasheng, Wu-shi said as soon as she laid eyes on him, “You were so drunk that you lost your head and collapsed on my bed. I had nowhere to sleep the whole night!” (MC: Liar!)

Feeling deeply apologetic, Dasheng dared not make a peep.

Another day went by. Early the following morning, on hearing shouts and loud pounding at the gate, Dasheng grew apprehensive and went to open it. Two yamen lictors charged in and threw a noose around Dasheng’s neck. Dasheng asked, aghast, “What’s this about, gentlemen?”

“You goddamned villain! Your mother is accusing you of filial impiety. Once you’re in court, you’ll be beaten to death! And here you are, asking what it’s all about!”

In a panic, Dasheng burst out crying and said, “Please let me see my mother before I go with you.”

“Your mother will see you in court!” While saying this, the lictors marched him inside.

Having heard the pounding at the gate, the ensuing commotion, and her son’s cries, Wu-shi knew what was going on. As she rushed to the gate, Dasheng held her and said tearfully, “Mother, however bad I am, you gave birth to me. How can you do me such harm?”

“This is what you get for disobeying me in everything! Now get a taste of what I’m capable of !”

“When did I ever disobey you?”

“The other day when I told you to visit your father’s grave, why did you refuse to go?”

“You didn’t go either. How can you blame me?”

Knowing nothing of what had actually happened, one of the lictors butted in, “Of course you should pay respects to your father’s grave. How can you shift the blame onto your mother? We thought she was your stepmother or adoptive mother. But now that we know she is your birth mother, you’re unquestionably guilty! What do you have to say for yourself ? Now go with us this instant to the yamen!”

And so they took Dasheng, along with Wu-shi, to the Kaifeng prefectural yamen.

It just so happened that Prefect Li Jie had just opened his court session. Prefect Li was an incorrupt and honest official with a sharp intelligence. All his life, he looked on unfilial sons with the greatest aversion. Having read the complaint about an unfilial son, he glowered on hearing the announcement that the defendant had been brought in. But seeing that the defendant was just a fifteen- or sixteen-year-old boy, he began to have doubts. He thought, “What could this boy have done to make his mother accuse him of filial impiety?”

He struck the silencer against the table and said, “Your mother accuses you of filial impiety. What do you have to say to that?”2

Dasheng replied, “I may be young, but I’m not uneducated. I’d never dream of failing in my filial duties to my parents. But as bad luck would have it, my father passed away, and I’ve displeased my mother to such a degree that I now stand accused of a crime. This fact alone is enough to prove the atrocity of my crime. Your Honor, please have me beaten to death to please my mother. I have nothing else to say.” With that, he burst into a flood of tears. (MC: These words are enough to move any casual passerby to tears.)

The prefect felt saddened on hearing those words. He thought, “How can a son who says such things be unfilial? There must be more to this case than meets the eye. But then again,” he thought, “maybe he’s just a good talker, for all I know.” He called forth Wu-shi.

Wu-shi approached with her seductive way of walking and took the scarf off her head. The prefect ordered her to raise her head, and when he saw that she was a pretty young woman, a certain suspicion entered his mind. He asked, “What did your son do in his filial impiety?”

“After my husband passed away, he broke free from my control and did everything his own way. (IC: He needs no control.) Every time I offered him admonishment, he hurled curses at me. I thought I should take his young age into consideration, but he got worse by the day. Unable to discipline him, I had no alternative but to seek justice in a court of law.”

Turning to Dasheng, the prefect asked, “What’s your response to your mother’s accusation?”

“How could I dream of arguing with my mother? My mother speaks the truth.”

The prefect asked further, “Does your mother play favorites?”

“My mother is most loving, and I’m her only child. She doesn’t play favorites.”

The prefect told him to approach the bench and said to him in a subdued voice, “This case is not what it seems. You can tell me the truth. I’ll do right by you.”

Dasheng kowtowed and said, “Nothing is hidden from Your Honor. I’m totally at fault.”

“In that case, I’ll subject you to corporal punishment, since parents can’t be wrong, as they say.”

“I do deserve punishment.”

The prefect grew even more skeptical at this reaction, but in order not to contradict himself and lessen his dignity as the prefect, he ordered sharply, “Beat him!”

Dasheng was immediately thrown to the floor and given ten strokes with bamboo rods. (IC: Injustice!) The prefect observed Wu-shi with a watchful eye and was struck by the total lack of compassion in her face. Instead, she advanced toward the prefect on her knees and pleaded, “Your Honor, please make sure he’s beaten to death!”

The prefect lost his temper. “You evil woman!” he lashed out. “This young man must be the son of your husband’s former wife or concubine. You have no heart. How can you be so ruthless!”

Wu-shi said, “Your Honor, he’s my birth son. You can ask him.”

The prefect asked Dasheng, “Is she your birth mother?”

Sobbing violently, Dasheng replied, “Yes, she is indeed.”

“But why does she hate you so much?”

“I have no idea. Please grant my mother her wish and beat me to death!”

The prefect grew even more apprehensive. Feeling certain that this case was not what it appeared to be, he said to Dasheng with deliberate harshness, “You are indeed an unfilial son. Death is what you deserve!”

Encouraged by the prefect’s severity, Wu-shi kowtowed over and over again, saying, “Your Honor, please finish him off as soon as possible, so that I can enjoy some peace and quiet.”

“Do you have other sons or adopted sons?”

“No.”

“He’s your only son, so I’ll give him a lecture and spare his life so that he can support you the rest of your life. Won’t that be good?”

“I prefer living alone instead of having him around.”

The prefect warned, “The dead cannot return to life. Regrets will be too late.”

“I’ll have no regrets,” said Wu-shi through clenched teeth.

The prefect announced, “In that case, I order you to buy a coffin tomorrow and come to claim his corpse. The accused is to be sent to jail today.” So he sent Dasheng to jail and released Wu-shi.

Her face beaming with joy (IC: How can she have the heart to smile?), Wu-shi made straight for the gate. Following her with his eyes until she was out of the gate, the prefect thought, “This woman is no decent sort. They must be hiding something. The way that boy is keeping his lips sealed shows that he is in fact a filial son. I must get to the bottom of this case.” (MC: A benevolent man with divine wisdom.) He summoned a detective who was keen of eye and swift of movement and gave him these words of instruction: “That woman will surely talk to someone after she leaves the yamen. No matter how far she goes, follow her and report to me whatever you see—what kind of people she talks to, what she says, and so on. I’ll have a handsome reward for you if you do a thorough job, but if you give me false information or if you hide anything from me, you’ll be a dead man!” (IC: These instructions are indispensable.)

Prefect Li had always maintained such strict discipline that no yamen employee would dare to disobey him. So the detective cautiously tailed Wu-shi and saw a Daoist priest meet her only a few steps from the yamen gate. (IC: He’s too hasty and impatient. It’s all because of his wrong assumption about the prefect’s propensity to sentence unfilial sons to death.)

“How did it go?” asked the priest.

Grinning from ear to ear, Wu-shi replied, “It’s over. You need only buy me a coffin so that I can claim his dead body tomorrow.”

Clapping his hands, the priest exclaimed, “Wonderful! Buying a coffin is no problem. I’ll have the coffin carried to the yamen tomorrow.” After that exchange, the priest and Wu-shi went away, talking and laughing. (IC: Predictably, they are in for some enjoyment that night, but it will be their last night together.)

The detective recognized the man as a priest of West Hill Temple and reported to the prefect. “Just as I thought!” said Prefect Li. “That’s why she asked to have her son killed and has no qualms about it. How abominable!” Then and there, he wrote something on a piece of paper and said to the detective, “After that woman shows up at the yamen tomorrow, I’ll order that the coffin be carried in. You can open the envelope at that point and act according to my instructions.”

The next day, Wu-shi was the first one to enter the court. She said, “Upon Your Honor’s instructions, I’ve prepared the coffin, and I’m here to claim my wayward son’s corpse.”

The prefect said, “Your son was beaten to death last night.” (IC: Wonderful!)

Without the least hint of grief, Wu-shi kowtowed and said, “Your Honor, I’m deeply grateful to you for having done right by me.”

“Carry the coffin in, and be quick about it!” ordered the prefect.

The detective promptly opened the seal and saw that it was an arrest order written in vermilion [a mark of the urgency and the severity of the case]. On it was written: “Immediately arrest Wu-shi’s adulterer, the Daoist priest who is overseeing the coffin carriers. Make sure he does not escape.”

Having seen the abbot only the day before, the detective would surely be able to easily identify him. Plus, the abbot was, at that very moment, giving orders to the coffin carriers. The detective seized him with one hand and showed him the arrest order. Unable to resist, the abbot resignedly let himself be taken into the prefect’s presence.

Prefect Li asked, “Why did a priest like you buy someone a coffin and hire the carriers?”

Unable to deny the facts on the spur of the moment, the abbot said, for lack of a better excuse, “That woman is a cousin of mine. She asked me to do this as a favor, which I granted.”

“A fine uncle you are, helping to kill your nephew!”

“That was a family matter. It has nothing to do with this poor priest.”

The prefect continued, “As a relative of hers, you didn’t stop her from taking her son to court, but you were certainly very helpful in providing the coffin. You’re having an adulterous relationship with the woman, and you two are in this together! Even death won’t expiate your crime! Scoundrel!”

Thereupon, he ordered that the ankle-squeezer be applied to the abbot so as to make him confess under torture. The pain being too much for him, the abbot confessed. The prefect obtained his signature and wrote this conclusion on the confession: “Huang Miaoxiu, abbot of West Hill Temple, has been found guilty of adultery and instigation of murder.”

Wu-shi, on her knees at the foot of the dais, moaned in anguish as she watched the proceedings.

The prefect then ordered that the detainee, Liu Dasheng, be brought from the jailhouse to the courtroom. On first entering the jailhouse the day before, Dasheng had said to himself, “The prefect sounds like a good man. I don’t think he’ll sentence me to death.” But now, on his way to the courtroom, he took fright at the sight of a brand-new coffin and thought, “Can he really mean to beat me to death today?”

As he knelt down in trepidation, the prefect asked, “Do you know Huang Miaoxiu, priest of West Hill Temple?”

Dasheng was impressed that the prefect had hit home, but he still feigned ignorance and said, “No, I do not.”

The prefect insisted, “How can you not know your enemy?”

Dasheng turned his head and saw Abbot Huang on the floor, moaning in pain from the torture. Dasheng gave a start. Wondering what could have happened, he kowtowed and said, “I bow to Your Honor’s divine wisdom, but I still dare not say anything.”

The prefect said, “I’ve been questioning you repeatedly since yesterday without getting anything out of you. I know you consider it your filial duty to do this. Little do you know that I’ve already gotten to the bottom of this case.” Having said that, he told Wu-shi to rise, adding, “I’m going to return the coffin to you, with a dead body in it.”

Wu-shi assumed that the prefect was going to have her son beaten, but she heard him roar, “Put Huang Miaoxiu on the floor and apply the rods on him with extra force!” The abbot was beaten until his skin split and his flesh ripped. When he appeared to be breathing his last, several lictors were ordered to put him in the coffin, and nails were then driven into the coffin lid. (MC: Bravo! Better than Ren Daoyuan’s experience with the whip.)3 All color drained from Wu-shi’s face, and her teeth clattered uncontrollably.

After the coffin lid had been nailed into place, Prefect Li turned to Wu-shi and thundered, “You whore! For your illicit lover’s sake, you demanded your son’s death. What good does it do to keep a person like you in this world? You also deserve to be beaten to death. Lictors! Take her down and beat her hard!”

Like eagles swooping down on a little bird, the lictors forced Wu-shi to the floor. They were about to start applying the bamboo rods on her when Liu Dasheng threw himself across his mother’s back, crying, “Beat me instead! Beat me instead!” As the lictors stood there, unable to execute the prefect’s order, more lictors came over to pull Dasheng away, but the boy held on to his mother and refused to let go, all the while wailing with grief.

Moved by Dasheng’s sincerity, the prefect ordered the lictors to stop and told Dasheng to approach the bench. “Your mother wants to kill you,” said the prefect. “I was going to have her beaten just a few times to give you some satisfaction. Why are you so protective of her?”

Dasheng replied, “How can I bear grudges against my own mother? What’s more, Your Honor did not call me an unfilial son but censured my mother. This will trouble me until the day I die. Please consider my request, Your Honor!”

As Dasheng kowtowed repeatedly, the prefect told Wu-shi to rise to her feet, adding, “You should have been beaten to death, but I’m going to spare your life out of regard for your son. (MC: He’s letting her off too lightly.) You must mend your ways from now on. If you fall back into your old ways, I won’t let you off, not on any account!”

With the abbot’s death, Wu-shi thought that her number was also up. Her son’s offer to take the beating for her and his pleas on her behalf saddened her. While wondering what was going to happen next, she was relieved to hear the prefect’s pronouncement. Moved by her son’s kindness, she broke down in tears (MC: It’s now clear that his tricks to block the adulterers were motivated by his commitment to filial piety.) and said to the prefect, “I deserve death for having betrayed my own son. (IC: Her conscience awakens.) In the future, I’ll be content to spend my days with my son as he grows up and will never do wrong again.”

“Your son will surely go far. I’m going to praise him publicly for his filial piety.”

Dasheng kowtowed and said, “If so, Your Honor will only be praising me at the expense of my mother. I wouldn’t dream of letting such a thing happen in my lifetime.”

After Wu-shi heard her son out, mother and son fell into each other’s arms and burst out sobbing right there in the courtroom. (MC: Evidence of the natural bond between mother and son. This proves that all human beings are capable of kindness.) The prefect then released them.

Thereafter, Prefect Li issued a summons for Abbot Huang Miaoxiu’s disciples at West Hill Temple to go to the yamen and claim the corpse and the coffin. The news having already spread to the temple, Taisu and Taiqing were chosen to carry out the mission. On seeing the two handsome young men being led into the courtroom, the prefect thought, “So, those who have supposedly renounced the material world lure young men from decent families in order to satisfy their own lust. These two handsome ones, when their turn comes, will involve more women in scandals.” Whereupon he ordered lictors to escort the two acolytes out, let them bury the coffin, and then return them to their parents so that they could resume their secular lives. They were also forbidden to enter the temple ever again. (MC: Good rulings. In this day and age, he would be forced to serve as a janitor.) After all this had been done and duly reported back to the yamen, accompanied by the receipts from the two families, the prefect also gave words of admonition to other priests at the temple, but that is no part of our story.

Now, back to Wu-shi: She returned home with her son, overwhelmed by gratitude to him. Henceforth, she treated him well, and he, on his part, complied with her every wish. No tension ever arose between them again. Moreover, with the abbot dead and the two acolytes dismissed, Wu-shi resigned herself to the situation and turned over a new leaf. However, memories of the past depressed her, and the shock she had suffered took a toll on her health. She died soon thereafter.

Liu Dasheng buried her remains with his father’s, in the same grave. After the mourning period was over, he took a wife. They lived in harmony, with full respect for each other, and maintained strict discipline in their home. Later, he went out to seek literary honors. With strong recommendations from Prefect Li Jie, he was assigned a government position and held the office to the end of his life.

Let us retrace our steps and come back to the day when Taisu and Taiqing were taken under guard out of the yamen. In their conversation about the event along the way, Taiqing said, “Last night, the great Laozi appeared to me in my dream, saying, ‘Your master was such an unusual man of the cloth that I’m going to give him a raise. You two can claim it for him.’ I said to myself, my master was unusual all right—unusually wicked! Why would he deserve a raise? And we’re supposed to claim it for him, too! As it turned out, the yamen summoned us today to claim his coffin—which is a case rather than a raise!”

Taisu said, “Master enjoyed so many pleasures that his life was not lived in vain, but now that he’s dead and gone, it’s too bad that he took our chance with him to the grave!”

“But even if he were still around, you and I could only drool in vain.”

Taisu said, “Oh, I did get one little taste of the sweetness.” (MC: Even at this point, he still doesn’t heed the example of his master but instead crows about his accomplishment. He deserves to die.) Whereupon he told Taiqing everything about his dalliance with Wu-shi.

“Weren’t both of us disciples of His Reverence? And yet you got the better end of the deal! Well, now that we’re returning to secular life, I suppose we can each get a wife and satisfy our thirst.” (IC: One who knows when to be content will be spared humiliation.)

They buried their master in the ancestral graveyard of the temple and went their separate ways home to resume their secular lives.

Sometime thereafter, Taisu recalled Wu-shi’s affection for him and could not banish her from his thoughts. He went to the Liu residence to find out how things stood but was deeply saddened to learn that she had died. From that day onward, he seemed to have lost his mind. The moment he closed his eyes, he would see Wu-shi approaching for a sexual encounter with him. Sometimes he dreamed of his master, here to snatch her away from him. His nocturnal emissions weakened his constitution, and he succumbed to consumption.

Taiqing had married by this time. On hearing of Taisu’s death, he said with a sigh, “Now I know that Daoists should not break the commandments. Master did, and he died as an inevitable consequence. Taisu did, in a small way, and he died of illness. Luckily, I wasn’t involved at all. Otherwise, I would have joined them in the netherworld.” Henceforth, he behaved properly and abided by the law to the end of his life.

Clearly, divine justice never misses the mark. All Daoists must wake up to this truth. A later poet wrote these lines about Huang Miaoxiu:

The magic charms at West Hill worked wonders;

He lured the living rather than raised the ghost.

He stopped only when death came to him;

The demon had in fact been in his pants. (MC: Facetious but true.)

There is also a quatrain about Wu-shi:

She carried at her waist a sword, no less;

Driven by lust, she meant to kill her son.

The evil priest died for the same reason,

As if she had a sharp knife in her hand. (MC: And as if he had died by his own hand.)

A quatrain about Liu Dasheng:

He was charged with filial impiety,

Yet he hated to see his mother suffer.

At court, he withheld the truth, proving to the judge

That the orphan was a most filial son. (MC: His sincerity moves one to tears.)

The following lines are about the two acolytes Taisu and Taiqing:

One served his master in his bed

But enjoyed female charms as well.

The innocent one was spared,

But the guilty one was not.

Last, a quatrain about Prefect Li’s sharp perception:

The prefect in his divine wisdom

Never let off the unfilial.

But he turned this case on its head—

Proof that his strictness had been justified. (MC: If he used filial impiety as a general criterion in giving death sentences, injustices would abound.)