The Plum in the Golden Vase or, Chin P'ing Mei

by Roy, David Tod

  The plaintiff, née Wu, is a thirty-three-year-old woman who is the widow of the deceased Battalion Commander Hsi-men Ch’ing.

  The target of her accusation is her unworthy son-in-law, who has taken advantage of her widowhood by crediting the accusations of a singing girl, and mistreating her daughter so egregiously that she has committed suicide by hanging herself. She importunes you to show her due consideration by undertaking a thorough investigation of this case, and thereby saving her from an early death.

  The son-in-law in question, whose name is Ch’en Ching-chi, originally sought refuge by residing for some years in my husband’s household because his family was implicated in a legal case. He is given to drinking to excess and becoming violent, is not the sort to abide by his lot, and is wont to take his cut of both outgo and income. For this reason, fearing legal entanglements, I expelled him from the household. I failed to anticipate that this Ch’en Ching-chi would harbor such hatred for me that he would constantly mistreat my daughter, Hsi-men Ta-chieh, in his own home, and force her to put up with it for some time. Unpredictably, he also brought a singing girl from Lin-ch’ing named Feng Chin-pao into his home and gave her the master suite in which to reside. Believing whatever she said to provoke him, he resorted to humiliating his wife in every way, beating her, pulling her hair, and kicking her until her entire body was covered with bruises, and she could not bear it any longer, feeling as though she was about to die. This year, on the twenty-third day of the ninth month, during the third watch of the night, he drove his wife to commit suicide by hanging herself. If I had not brought an accusation against him, I fear that this Ch’en Ching-chi, with his fierce and uncontrollable nature, would take advantage of my widowhood, since he has actually threatened to attack me with knife in hand. These circumstances are intolerable.44 I therefore implore that you have him arrested and brought before you in order to examine thoroughly the facts behind my daughter’s death. If this case is pursued according to the law, potential felons will be deterred, law-abiding citizens will be able to live in peace, and the dead will be relieved of their sense of injustice. This is the reason why I have brought this accusation before you, as the presiding magistrate of this district, Lord “Azure Heaven,” in the hope that you will act upon it.

  The district magistrate, Huo Ta-li, in his position on the bench, read the accusation, and observed that Wu Yüeh-niang was attired in mourning garments, was the widow of an official of the fifth rank, and that:

  Her countenance was upright and correct, and

  Her bearing both nonchalant and elegant.

  He then bowed toward her, rose from his seat, and addressed her, saying, “Lady Wu, please stand up. I see that you are the widow of a duly appointed official, and I understand the charges that are enumerated in your accusation. Please return home. There is no need for you to remain here any longer. In the future, it will suffice to have a servant from your household attend the court proceedings. I will issue a warrant for his arrest here and now.”

  Wu Yüeh-niang promptly bowed to the district magistrate, went outside, and rode home in her sedan chair, delegating Lai-chao to monitor the court proceedings for her.

  The magistrate then signed the deposition and deputed two yamen runners with a bench warrant to take Ch’en Ching-chi and the singing girl Feng Chin-pao into custody, along with the neighbors to either side of his residence, and the head of the relevant mutual security unit, who were required to attend the court in person for the scheduled hearing.

  Ch’en Ching-chi was at home at the time, engaged in making the funeral arrangements. When he heard that Wu Yüeh-niang had lodged an accusation against him, and that the district yamen had sent runners with a warrant for his arrest, he was so perturbed that:

  His ethereal souls flew beyond the sky, and

  His material souls fled to the nine heavens.

  Feng Chin-pao, for her part, had been so badly beaten that:

  Her entire body was racked with pain,45

  and she was trying to recuperate by lying in bed. When she heard that runners had come to arrest her:

  Her fear was so great,

  She lost her bearings.

  Ch’en Ching-chi impulsively offered money to the runners in order to treat them to wine and food, but they proceeded to truss him up, together with the singing girl, with a single length of rope, and drag them off to the district yamen, along with their next-door neighbors Fan Kang, who lived to the left, and Sun Chi, who lived to the right, and the head of the mutual security unit, Wang K’uan.

  When the district magistrate Huo Ta-li saw that the wanted persons had been duly arrested, he promptly took his place on the bench, while Lai-chao knelt up front, and Ch’en Ching-chi, Feng Chin-pao, and the rest knelt at the foot of the steps.

  After rereading the accusation, the district magistrate called Ch’en Ching-chi before him and said, “So you are Ch’en Ching-chi.”

  He then went on to ask, “Which of you is Feng Chin-pao?”

  Feng Chin-pao replied, “I am Feng Chin-pao.”

  The district magistrate then proceeded to interrogate Ch’en Ching-chi, saying, “What a despicable rascal you are. How could you have believed the allegations of that singing girl, and beaten Hsi-men Ta-chieh so severely that she hung herself? What have you got to say in your defense?”

  Ch’en Ching-chi kowtowed to him and said, “I beseech Your Honor, Lord ‘Azure Heaven,’ to investigate the facts in this case. How could I have dared to beat her so severely as to cause her death? It is all because a manager of mine has absconded with the capital I entrusted to him, so that I arrived home in a bad temper and asked her to prepare a meal for me, which she refused to do, that I kicked her a couple of times. Then, in the middle of the night, she:

  Hanged herself until dead.”

  “Since you have taken this singing girl into your household,” exclaimed the magistrate, “why should you have imposed upon your wife to prepare a meal for you? It doesn’t make any sense. The accusation lodged by the Lady Wu states that it was only because you had beaten her daughter nearly to death that she hung herself. Yet you still refuse to acknowledge it.”

  “The Lady Wu and I are enemies,” protested Ch’en Ching-chi. “That is why she is falsely accusing me. I hope that Your Honor will investigate the facts of the case.”

  The magistrate was enraged at this and said, “The fact is that her daughter is dead. Who else do you propose to blame for it?”

  He then ordered his attendants to take Ch’en Ching-chi down and give him twenty strokes with the heavy bamboo; and he had Feng Chin-pao haled before him, put into the squeezers, and given one hundred strokes on them. When these procedures had been carried out, the runners were ordered to take the culprits off and lock them up.

  The next day, he deputed the docket officer Tsang Pu-hsi to take a clerk, along with the head of the mutual security unit, and the next-door neighbors, and proceed to Ch’en Ching-chi’s home, where the corpse was brought out and subjected to a formal inquest. It was found that since Hsi-men Ta-chieh’s entire body was covered with bruises, and there were rope marks around her throat, it must have been true that Ch’en Ching-chi had kicked and beaten her so severely that she could not bear it any longer and had:

  Hanged herself until dead.

  Depositions were taken, bond was posted for the witnesses, and the inquest report was duly filled out and submitted upon their return to the district yamen.

  The magistrate was incensed at this and ordered that both Ch’en Ching-chi and Feng Chin-pao should be stripped and subjected to another ten strokes of the bamboo. He then issued a provisional finding that Ch’en Ching-chi, who was judged guilty of the crime of beating his wife to death, should be sentenced to strangulation; and that Feng Chin-pao should be sentenced to a hundred strokes of the bamboo and sent back to serve in the brothel from which she had come.

  Ch’en Ching-chi was thrown into a panic by this and wrote a note in his prison cell directing Ch’en Ting to scrap
e together the sum of a hundred taels of silver from the capital of his piece goods store and Hsi-men Ta-chieh’s head ornaments, and deliver it secretly to the district magistrate.

  That night, the district magistrate altered the deposition so that the provisional judgement read that the defendant had coerced his wife to death, which was only a miscellaneous capital crime, redeemable by five years of penal servitude, or commutation in return for a payment to be used for the transport of charcoal.

  When Wu Yüeh-niang learned of this, she knelt in front of the yamen gate and pled for reconsideration of the finding.

  The district magistrate responded by calling her before him and saying, “My lady, your daughter was found to have rope marks around her throat, so how can you claim that her husband is guilty of beating her to death? To do so is surely to make a travesty of justice. If you are afraid that he will continue to molest you in the future, I will issue a written injunction prohibiting him from ever visiting your premises again.”

  He then had Ch’en Ching-chi brought before him and enjoined him, saying, “I have chosen to spare your life today, but it is essential that you should:

  Correct your faults and renew yourself.

  You must never again make trouble for the household of the Lady Wu. If you are ever brought before me for doing so in the future, I will certainly not spare you. You must immediately purchase a coffin for your wife, see that her corpse is dressed for burial, arrange for a funeral procession, and take care of her burial. When you report back to me, I will then forward the necessary documents to the higher authorities.”

  Ch’en Ching-chi, having been spared execution, turned over the sum of money required to commute his sentence and returned home, where he had Hsi-men Ta-chieh’s corpse encoffined, arranged for her to lie in state until the first weekly commemoration was over, held a scripture recitation in her honor, and had her taken outside the city to be buried. Altogether, he had endured incarceration for half a month, had been compelled to expend a considerable sum of silver, and had been deprived of the singing girl Feng Chin-pao. His belongings had been completely cleaned out, he had been forced to sell his home, he had barely escaped with his life, and he no longer dared to bring charges against his mother-in-law. Truly:

  Disaster and good fortune have no gateways,

  people bring them on themselves;46

  One must be aware that when joy reaches its

  zenith, it gives birth to sorrow.47

  There is a poem that testifies to this:

  Storms may be stirred up in untroubled waters

  within domestic confines;

  The value of rectitude and worth of kindness48

  should never be forgotten.

  When the Blue Bridge was inundated by water49

  a meeting was expected;

  But the three lovers have become separated

  like Orion and Antares.50

  If you want to know the outcome of these events,

  Pray consult the story related in the following chapter.

  Chapter 93

  WANG HSÜAN RELIES ON RIGHTEOUSNESS TO HELP THE POOR;

  ABBOT JEN IN THE DESIRE FOR PROFIT INVITES DISASTER

  Who can say that in our mundane existence

  destiny is fickle?

  Good luck and bad, misfortune and fortune,

  travel hand in hand.1

  It is only due to the lure of romance that

  we do ourselves in;

  It is not the case that the human heart is

  straight as a needle.

  One may assume one’s official conduct to be

  devoid of injustice;

  But how can one know what the Way of Heaven

  may reveal about it?2

  If one learns early that success and failure

  are dictated by fate,

  One may be able to walk freely even during

  the dark of night.

  THE STORY GOES that Ch’en Ching-chi, from the time that Hsi-men Ta-chieh committed suicide, Wu Yüeh-niang took him to court, and the singing girl Feng Chin-pao was sent back to the brothel, felt that he had barely escaped with his life. He had been forced to put his house up for sale and had exhausted his capital, had disposed of his wife’s head ornaments, and did not even have any furniture left. He also claimed, once again, that Ch’en Ting had been embezzling the money entrusted to him and dismissed him. He did not have enough money to cover his daily expenses, but merely:

  Sat at home frittering away his resources.3

  He also felt driven to visit Yang the Elder’s home to inquire about the whereabouts of his half boatload of goods.

  One day, upon arriving at the door of Yang the Elder’s home, he called out, “Is Yang the Elder at home or not?”

  Who could have anticipated that Yang Kuang-yen, having made off with Ch’en Ching-chi’s half boatload of goods and sold them for cash, hid out in one place or another until he learned that Ch’en Ching-chi’s wife had committed suicide in her home, that his mother-in-law had lodged an accusation against him in the district yamen, and that he had endured half a month of incarceration. At this, he promptly returned home, but did not venture outside.

  When he heard Ch’en Ching-chi calling for him at the door, and demanding to know what had become of the boatload of cargo, he sent his younger brother Yang Erh-feng out to confront him, saying, “You persuaded my elder brother to accompany you on a business trip, and nothing has been heard of him for the last several months. I don’t know whether you either threw him into the river, or drowned him in the canal, but you actually have the nerve to come here and demand to know what has become of the boatload of cargo. Is a human life more important, or that cargo of your’s more important?”

  This Yang Erh-feng had always been a tough customer, both a gambler and a “knockabout.” His biceps were:

  Bulging lumps of purple flesh;4

  and his chest was covered with:

  Tousled lengths of brown hair.

  He was a “bare stick” pure and simple. Striding outside, he took hold of Ch’en Ching-chi with one hand and demanded to know the fate of his elder brother. Ch’en Ching-chi, in a state of panic, tore himself loose and started to run toward home.

  Yang Erh-feng responded by picking up a three-cornered shard of tile and scratching open the skin on his skull with it, so that:

  His face was covered with flowing blood.5

  He then raced after Ch’en Ching-chi, yelling, “I’ll fuck your mother’s cunt! Since when have I ever seen any silver of yours? If you come farting around my place, I’ll give you a real drubbing with my fists.”

  Ch’en Ching-chi fled homeward, as though:

  Whether his fate were governed by metal or by water,

  There was no place for him to hide;

  and saw to it that the main gate was:

  Locked tight as an iron bucket, so that

  Not even Fan K’uai himself could get through.

  He then permitted Yang Erh-feng to roundly abuse his parents, and try to smash open the gate with a large brick, without allowing so much as the sound of a breath to escape from his nostrils. On top of everything else, he had hardly recovered from a lawsuit and was as nervous as a man who:

  Dreams of a length of rope and fears it is a snake,

  so all he could do was put up with it. Truly:

  Tender plants are afraid of the frost6

  and frost fears the sun;

  One wicked person will be ground down

  upon encountering another.7

  Shortly after this, he managed to sell his spacious house for seventy taels of silver and bought a small dwelling in an obscure alley in which to live. Later on, he was compelled to get rid of one of his two maidservants, selling off Ch’ung-hsi, and retaining Yüan-hsiao to sleep with him at night. In less than half a month after this, he was forced to dispose of his smaller dwelling, and move into a boarding house. On top of this, his servant Ch’en An left him, since he no longer had any business to conduc
t, and Yüan-hsiao died. As a result, he found himself:

  Completely on his own.

  His household belongings and furniture had all been sold, leaving him:

  As poor as though he had been utterly cleaned out.8

  It was not long before he did not even have enough money to pay his rent and had to move into a homeless shelter in order to survive.

  When the other beggars in the shelter observed that he was the profligate scion of a wealthy family, and that he had a naturally clear-cut appearance, they made room for him to sleep on the heated k’ang and gave him some baked wheat cakes to eat. The patrolman on duty that night happened to come in and offered him a job as a night watchman, sounding his clapper and ringing his bell.

  It was already late winter in the twelfth month at the time. There was a heavy snowfall, and the wind was gusting, making it extremely cold. Ch’en Ching-chi, after sounding his clapper for a time, and letting the patrolman go, set out to ring his bell as he patrolled the local streets and alleys. What with the wind and snow, and the ice that had formed on the ground, he was so frozen that all he could do was to:

  Hunch his shoulders and tighten his back,

  as he trembled and shivered with the cold. At the fifth watch, when the cocks crowed, he came upon an ailing beggar who was lying on the ground beneath a wall and feared that he might be dead. The local neighborhood head told him to keep watch over him, and to light a bundle of straw to keep him warm.

  Ch’en Ching-chi, who had been sounding the watches all night long without any rest, promptly proceeded to sprawl out on the ground and go to sleep. Unexpectedly, he started to dream of the:

  Glory and luxury, wealth and honor,

  he had enjoyed as a resident of Hsi-men Ch’ing’s household, and the fun and games he had indulged in during his affair with P’an Chin-lien. When he awoke from the dream with tears in his eyes, the other beggars asked him what he was crying about.

  Ch’en Ching-chi responded to this query by saying, “Brothers, listen to my explanation.”

  There is a song suite beginning with the tune “Powdery Butterflies” that testifies to this: