BAF 64 - Kai Lung Unrolls His Mat, page 5
part #64 of Ballantine Adult Fantasy Series
“Enough,” exclaimed the stranger, emerging from his reverie and confronting Ming Wang again. “In that respect, no doubt, a fit example will be made. But what of the greater need besetting you, or who will persuade the seasons to resume their normal courses?”
“As to that,” replied the Emperor agreeably, “we are waiting to tread in your illuminating footsteps in whatever direction you may indicate.”
“He who brings the word is not thereby required to go the way,” replied the one who thus described himself. “You, Younger Brother, hold the Line of the Immortal Eight. See to it that you do not fail their now expectant eyes.”
“It is one thing to hold the line: it is quite another to obtain a message from the farther end,” murmured the Sublime rebelliously, but when he would have again applied for more explicit guidance, it was discovered that the stranger had withdrawn, though none had marked the moment of his going.
“All-knowing,” urged a faithful slave who bore the Emperor’s cup, “if you seek enlightenment, wherefore are The Books?”
“It is well said,” exclaimed the Monarch, casting off his gloom. “What more in keeping with the theme than that a vassal youth should recall what the trusted keepers of our Inner Council have forgot!”
“Revered,” returned the spokesman of the Elder Branch, by no means disposed to have their prescience questioned thus, “if we who guard the dark secrets of the Books forebore, it was not that our minds were tardy in your need, but rather because our passionate devotion shrank from the thought of finding what we may.”
The Divine made a gesture of reconciliation.
“Your loyalty is clear and deep, Tso Paik, nor has its source yet been reached,” he admitted freely. “But what does the somewhat heavily scored music of your genial voice forecast?”
“That is as will presently appear,” replied the other sombrely, “for since the day of your great progenitor Shan-ti (who chose self-ending in consequence of what he learned) the restraining cords have not been cut nor the wisdom of The Books displayed.”
“Certainly there are strong arguments against doing anything of the sort in an idle spirit,” admitted Ming Wang hastily, at the same time spilling the larger portion of his wine upon the kneeling cup-bearer. “Perhaps after all—”
“The requirement has gone forth: the issue must be met,” pronounced the custodian firmly. “Even the lower-class demons have their feelings in such matters.” Then, raising his voice, as his especial office permitted him to do, he called for the attendance of all his satellites and for the bringing of The Books. At this unusual cry, general business of every sort was immediately suspended within the limits of the Palace walls and an interminable stream of augurs, sorcerers, diviners, astrologers, forecasters, necromancers, haruspices, magicians, incantators, soothsayers, charm-workers, illusionists, singers and dancers, thought-readers, contortionists, and the like rallied to his side, bringing with them birds, serpents, fruit, ashes, flat and rounded sticks, cords, fire, entrails, perfumed wax, salt, coloured earth, dung of the sacred apes, crystal spheres, and the other necessary utensils of their enlightened arts. So great was the press that very few ordinary persons gained admittance, and of these only the outspoken and robust. When order was restored, the splendid ceremony of Bringing in The Books was formally observed, the casket opened, and the cords released.
“Ming Wang,” pronounced the one who had made himself conspicuous throughout, “this is the Wisdom of The Books and thus stands the passage on the bamboo slip to which my necessarily inspired finger has been led: ‘Drought, excessive, to assuage. Should a pestilential drought continue unappeased, a palatable extract may be made of the fermented grain of rice—’”
“Tso Paik,” muttered another of the Inner Council, from about his sleeve, “what the Evil Dragon has assailed your mental balance?”
“Imperishable,” pleaded Tso Paik in servile confusion, “dazzled by the brilliance of your shining condescension, this illiterate person misread the initial sign and diverged to an inappropriate line. Yet his arresting finger was not deceived, for the jewelled passage that relates appears on the next slip.”
“Continue, discriminating Tso Paik,” said the Emperor pleasantly. “Nor suffer your finger yet to lose that selfsame place.”
“Sublimity, the guidance sought is that entitled: ‘Drought, caused by Good or Bad Spirits, to disperse,’” resumed Tso Paik in a less compelling voice. “Thus and thus the message is pronounced: ‘He who stands between the Upper and the Lower Planes alone can intervene when the Immortals have so far declared their wrath’—there follows much of a circumlocutory nature connected with the Inherent Principle of Equipoise, and so forth.”
“That can fittingly be reserved for our leisurely delectation at some future date,” put in the Highest. “Insert your chop-stick in the solid meat, Tso Paik. What have we got to do?”
“Putting aside these gems of philosophical profundity, Benign, the nature of your submission is neither palatable nor light.” At these foreboding words a thrill of apprehension swayed the vast concourse, but it was widely noticed that the crude Tso Paik’s lamentable voice took upon itself a pleasurable shade. “Decked to the likeness of a sacrificial ox, shorn both of hair and rank-denoting nails, and riding in a farm-yard cart, it is your unpleasant lot to be taken to the highest point of the sacred Ia-ling range and there confess your sins to Heaven and undertake reform. When this humane sacrifice has been achieved (providing no untoward omen intervenes meanwhile) the healing rain will fall.”
At the full understanding of this direful penance, an awestruck silence fell upon the throng. The first to break it was the captain of the Emperor’s chosen guard, and although he was incapable of producing more than an attenuated whisper, his words expressed the thoughts of every loyal subject there.
“Sins! Who speaks of sins?” he murmured in a maze. “How can that which is not, be? The Ever-righteous has no sins!” Never was the profundity of the All-grasping more lucidly displayed than in that exacting pause when, whatever else happened, a popular rising, in one direction or another, seemed inevitable.
“Peace, worthy Sung,” he cried, in a voice that carried to the public square outside, where it was rapturously acclaimed, although at that distance it was, of course, impossible to distinguish a word he s&id; “restrain your generous zeal and whet your docile ears to an acuter edge. The obligation is to confess sins: not to possess them. Admittedly we have no sins, for, little as the censorious credit it, your Unapproachable is often denied what the meanest outcast in his realm can wallow in. Nothing that we may do is, or can be, wrong; but the welfare of the people is our chief concern, and to secure that end there is no catalogue of vice that we shall not cheerfully subscribe to.”
So unutterable was the effect produced by this truly regal magnanimity that all who heard its terms were rendered speechless. Those outside, on the contrary, hastily assuming that Ming Wang had said all that he intended, testified their satisfaction more joyfully than before, and loud cries of “A thousand years!” filled the air.
“In the detail of promising amendment, also, there is nothing to which the most arbitrary need take exception,” continued the enlightened Monarch when his voice could once more be heard. “What, after all, is a promise of amendment but an affirmation that the one who makes it will be more worthy of homage to-morrow than to-day? There is nothing new about that in your Immaculate’s career; every day finds him better than before.”
“Your words are like a string of hanging lanterns, where the way has hitherto been dark,” fervently declared an aged counsellor. “But, Preeminence, your polished nails, your cultivated hair-1”
“It is better to lose two spans outward than one span inward,” replied the practical-minded Sovereign, dropping his voice for that one’s ear alone. “Yet,” he continued, turning to Tso Paik again, “in one respect the limit of compliance has been reached, and he who opens a hand so freely on the right may close one as tightly on the left. The likeness of an ox,’ is doubtless a picturesque analogy, and the similitude is not bereft of a certain massive dignity. But if at the extremity of your prolific mind, Tso Paik, you cherish the questionable ambition of displaying your confiding Ruler to a superstitious though by no means simple- minded populace, wearing horns—”
“Mirror of felicity!” protested Tso Paik, as one who is maligned; “if my crude tongue offends, let it cease. You wear a sword and my head has but a single neck.”
“In our romantic land there should be room both for your tongue and my sword to move without any overlapping,” reassured Ming Wang. “Proceed, in your sublime office, therefore, to the exactitude of detail, and let harmony prevail.”
V
Thus in the third year of his short but glorious reign the well-disposed Ming Wang set out to free his people from the evil that oppressed them, draped in the semblance of a sacrificial ox (the metaphor, it was found, did not demand more than a screen of rushes to enclose his lower half), shorn, and riding in a dung-cart through the land. With so liberal-minded a prince, in so ambiguous a guise, it was impossible that the journey should be devoid of incident, but this is the essential story of Wan, and he who, while gathering mast, suffers his mind to dwell on the thought of peaches, will return with an empty sack.
In due course the company reached the lower slopes of the Ia-ling Mountains and thenceforward all progress was on foot. Tso Paik, who was gross by nature and very sluggish on his feet, would willingly have remained below to offer
32 up (he said) an invocation to the gods, but Ming Wang would not suffer this, claiming that if he did their appetities might become satiate before his own chance came. Being of a slight and strenuous cast, this mode of progress was more congenial to the Emperor’s taste than the restricted freedom of the dung-cart, and from time to time he inspired his train by pointing out to them that what they deemed to be the highest point was an imposition of the eye, and that yet another peak lay beyond. Finally, Tso Paik rolled bodily upon the ground and declared that, as he could go no farther, where he lay in his official rank as Chief Custodian of The Books must constitute the limit, and this was then agreed to.
No complete record of Ming Wang’s confession now exists, all those who accompanied him having entered into a deep compact to preserve a stubborn silence. It is admitted, however, that it was of inordinate length, very explicit in its details, and that it implicated practically every courtier and official of any standing. In a final access of self-reproach, the Emperor penitently admitted that he was the guilty head of a thoroughly decayed and criminal autocracy, that he weakly surrounded himself with greedy and incompetent officials, and that he had thoughtlessly permitted sycophantry, bribery, and peculation to abound.
Almost before he had begun to speak, heavy clouds were seen to drift up from the west; with the first words of definite submission, a few drops fell, and the ceremony was concluded in a steady downpour. The conscientious Monarch did not allow the undoubted discomfort of all concerned to stem the flow of his inspired penitence, but when the last atrocity that he could lay to his own and, even more pointedly, to his ministers’ charge had been revealed, he called upon Tso Paik.
“You, Tso Paik, as Ceremonial Director of the Enterprise, have accomplished an end. Yet, no longer to maintain a poise, does not the copious promptness of the response astonish even you?”
“Omnipotence,” replied Tso Paik, looking steadily before him, “my faith was like an elephant tethered to a rock.”
“It is well,” agreed the Greatest, endeavouring to shake his scanty outer garment free of moisture. “Bring forward now our largest state umbrella.”
At this sudden but in no way unreasonable command, a very concentrated silence engaged the company, and those who had not the opportunity to withdraw in unstudied abstraction sought to anticipate any call upon themselves by regarding the one involved expectantly.
“Alas,” confessed the dense Tso Paik, “it had not occurred to this one’s bankrupt mind that there would-be any likelihood—” But at that point, understanding the snare to which he had enticed himself, he stopped ineptly.
A passing shiver disturbed the royal frame, though with high-born delicacy he endeavoured to conceal it. Only a faint elevation of the celestial eyebrows betrayed the generous emotion at the painful obligation laid upon him.
“It wrings my tenderest parts with hooks of bitterness,” he said, “that so loyal and trustworthy a subject should have brought himself within the Code of Yaou and Shun, under the Section: ‘Conduct in an official whereby the wellbeing of his Soveriegn is directly or indirectly menaced.’ Li Tung, you are a dignitary of high justice; receive the unfortunate Tso Paik into your charge until the Palace executioner shall require him at your hands. Let us now strive to avert, so far as we can, the ill consequences of this fatal indiscretion by seeking the nearest shelter.”
VI
In this remarkable manner, two of the most notable characters of any age, Wan the son of Ah-shoo, and Ming Wang (to whose memory posterity has dedicated as a title “The Knowing”) at last encountered, for it was to the penurious home of the former person that destiny inclined the Emperor’s footsteps. Recognizing the languished fortunes of the one whose roof he sought, the considerate Monarch forebore to stand on ceremony, merely requiring a reclining stool before the charcoal fire.
“Beneficence,” exlaimed Wan, falling on his face to the best of his ability as he offered a steaming cup, “admittedly the hearth will warm the muscles of your lordly body, but here is that which will invigorate the cockles of your noble heart.”
For a perceptible moment the Imperishable wavered—certainly the balance of the analogy might have been more classically maintained, or possibly he remembered the long succession of food-tasters who had fallen lifeless at his feet—but in that pause the exquisite aroma of the fragrant liquid assailed his auspicious nose. He took the cup and emptied it, returned it to Wan’s hand with an appropriate gesture, and continued thus and thus until the latter person had to confess that his store was destitute. Not until then did Ming Wang devote his throat to speech.
“What is this enchanted beverage?” he demanded, “and why has it been withheld from us until now?”
“It is the produce of a sacred tree, high Majesty, and its use but lately revealed to me by special favour of the Powers. Never before, from the legendary days of the First Man until this hour, has it been brewed on earth, and save for the necessary tests, your own distinguished lips are the first to taste it.”
“It is certainly miraculous,” agreed Ming Wang ecstatically, and unable to contain himself he began to cross and recross the room, to the embarrassment of the assembled nobles who were thus also kept in a continual state of flux. “It has a perfection hitherto unknown among the liquids of the world. It cheers yet without any disconcerting effect upon the speech or movements. It warms where one is cold and cools where one is hot. Already every trace of fatigue and despondency has vanished, leaving us inspired for further deeds of public usefulness, eager to accomplish other acts of justice. It stimulates, invigorates, rejuvenates, animates, lubricates—”
“Sublimest of Potentates,” pleaded the recorder of his voice, “retard the torrent of your melodious soliloquy! How else shall this clay-fingered menial take down your priceless words which it is his design presently to set to appropriate music?”
“It will be as acceptable at the earliest gong-stroke of the yet unawakened morn, as it will become the inevitable accompaniment to the afternoon rice. Into the inner office of the commercially inclined it will be brought to smooth the progress of each bargain, and in the dim recesses of our departmental archives it will produce harmony and discreet mirth among the abstemious yet sprightly of both sexes. In the chambers of our lesser ones its name is destined to rank as a synonym of all that is confidential and inexact. The weary student, endeavouring to banish sleep; the minor priest, striving to maintain enthusiasm amid an inadequacy of taels; the harassed and ill-requited inscriber of the spoken word—”
“Proceed, O Tap-root of Eloquence, proceed!” murmured the one who plied a hurrying brush. ’To an accompaniment of drums, horns, and metallic serpents—”
’To cope the final pinnacle, it is an entirely new thing; indeed it is the new thing, and unless our experience of an imitative and docile people is signally astray it will soon become ’the thing.”’ It is hardly necessary to insist at this late date how noticeably the prescient Ming Wang’s words have been literally fulfilled. Known for many centuries as “the new thing,” the popular decoction passed by a natural stage into “the thing,” and then, in affectionate abbreviation, to “the.” By this appropriate designation it is recognized in every land to which our flowery civilization carries, though doubtless on barbaric tongues the melodious word is bent to many uncouth similitudes.
“It now only remains,” continued the even-handed lawgiver, “to reward virtue and to eradicate vice. The former is personified before us—the latter we shall doubtless very soon discover in some form or another. What, O benefactor of mankind, is your upright name?”
“My low-class appellation is Wan, that of my mentally defective father being Ah-shoo, we springing from the lowly house of Lam,” replied the other suitably. “The inconspicuous shadow lurking in the background is Lan-yen, whose name entwines with mine.”
“Yet how comes it that you, who are evidently under the direct protection of the higher Forces, are in so—as it may be expressed-?” and with commendable tact the humane’
