by Jin Yong
“Most admirable!” many people declared, nodding. “Master Liu knows what’s important and what’s not. People like that are rare.”
“Then Great Mr. Mo is really making a great mistake. Isn’t he weakening the power of his own Hengshan Sword School by forcing Master Liu to renounce the Martial World?” someone else asked.
“How can one man figure everything out? All I want is to be the Head Master of the Sword School without challenge. Who the hell cares if the power is more or less?” the middle-aged man in silk sneered in imitation of Great Mr. Mo.
The short fat man took a couple of sips of tea and began banging the lid of the teapot loudly. “More tea, more tea!” he shouted. Then he said, “See, this is really a big event for the Hengshan Sword School. There are guests from every kind of school and clan, but the Hengshan Sword School itself….”
Before he could finish his sentence, someone near the door struck some chords on a huqin,25 and someone began to sing, “The poor Yang Family, showed great loyalty, protected…the Song Government….” The words were drawn out and sounded quite melancholic. Everybody turned around to look, and saw an old, tall, thin man sitting next to a table. His face looked haggard, and he was dressed in a long blue robe. The robe had been washed so many times that some parts looked more white than blue, making him look quite decrepit. He was obviously some kind of a begging performer.
“Shut your devilish voice,” the short fat man yelled at him. “Don’t you know that you just cut me off?”
The old man stopped playing his huqin so loudly, but continued humming, “At the Golden Sand Beach…double dragons met…lost the battle….”
“Hey, buddy, you were just talking about all the schools and clans having sent people, so what about the Hengshan Sword School, itself?” someone asked.
“The apprentices of Master Liu are greeting guests all over Hengshan town, but other than Master Liu’s apprentices, have you seen any other apprentices from Hengshan Sword School?” the short fat man continued.
The people in the crowd just looked at each other and their speculation turned into an indistinct buzz.
“That’s right! How come we didn’t see any? But isn’t that a bit disrespectful to Master Liu?”
The short fat man grinned at the man in the silk robe. “That’s why I think you are just plain chicken; afraid to talk about the internal conflict in the Hengshan Sword School. What are you worried about? No one from the Hengshan Sword School is going to be here, so how are they going to hear about this?”
The sound of the huqin once again got louder and the tune changed. The old man began to sing again, “The young lad caused great trouble….”
“Stop annoying people,” a young man yelled at him. “Here’s some money!” He flicked his hand, and a bundle of copper coins flew over and landed right in front of the old man. The aim was very accurate. The old man thanked him and put the coins in his pocket.
“Hey, brother, you are a projectile expert! That throw was most excellent!” the short fat man exclaimed in praise.
“It was nothing.” The young man smiled. “So brother, according to what you are saying, Great Mr. Mo is not showing up!”
“How could he show up? The relationship between Great Mr. Mo and Master Liu is like that of water and fire. They’d start a fight the minute they saw each other. Master Liu has already given ground. Great Mr. Mo should be satisfied,” the short fat man said.
The old huqin player stood up suddenly, and walked slowly in front of the short fat man. He looked him up and down.
“What do you want, old man?” the short fat man demanded in annoyance.
“You are talking nonsense!” The old man shook his head then turned around and walked away.
Infuriated, the short fat man stuck his hand out to grab the old man by his scruff. Without warning, a light flashed in front of his eyes and the blade of a long thin sword flew toward the table. The sharp ring of the blade echoed. The short fat man was so astonished that he jumped back instinctively, afraid of being hurt by the sword. Then he saw the old man slowly insert the sword into the bottom of the huqin till the entire sword disappeared into the instrument. No one would have expected a sword to be hidden in an old huqin.
“You are talking nonsense!” the old man shook his head again, then slowly walked out of the teashop. Everyone watched him disappear into the rain, and all there was left was the sad music from the huqin, drifting aimlessly in the distance.
“Look, look at the table!” someone uttered in a cry of surprise. Everyone looked in the direction his finger was pointing. There were seven teacups on the table where the short fat man had sat; a ring, about half an inch wide, had been neatly sliced from each cup. The seven china rings had fallen by the cups, yet none of the cups even moved an inch.
People in the teashop gathered around and everyone started talking about the cups.
“Who is he? What incredible sword skills!” one person exclaimed.
“One slice gets all seven cups and none of the cups moved at all, it’s almost like magic!” another one praised.
“Luckily the old gentleman showed mercy upon you,” someone said to the short fat man, “otherwise your head and neck would have been just like these cups.”
“Nah! That old gentleman must be a famous master; he would never have lowered himself to behave so commonly!” another one commented.
The short fat man just stared at the seven half-cups blankly. His face was completely white and he did not hear a word said by the crowd.
“See, I told you not to talk so much,” the middle-aged man in the silk robe said. “Trouble comes from unnecessary words; worry comes from acting without thinking. Right now there are all kinds of hidden dragons and crouching tigers in Hengshan, and many of them are elite fighters! That old gentleman must be a good friend of Great Mr. Mo. He heard your disrespectful words about Great Mr. Mo, so of course, he decided to teach you a lesson.”
“He wasn’t a good friend of Great Mr. Mo,” The graybeard said coldly. “That was the Head Master of Hengshan Sword School, ‘Night Rain of Xiaoxiang,’ Great Mr. Mo, himself.”
“What? He…he was Great Mr. Mo? How do you know?” Everyone was shocked and asked the question simultaneously.
“It’s quite elementary,” the graybeard said. “Great Mr. Mo loves to play the huqin and especially the song ‘Night Rain of Xiaoxiang.’ It could move the listeners to tears. The words ‘sword hidden in the huqin, sword plays the music’ are an apt description of his Kung Fu skills. Since all of you are in Hengshan town, how could you not have heard of that? That brother said earlier that Master Liu could pierce five wild geese with one thrust, but that Great Mr. Mo could only get three, so he sliced seven cups to demonstrate his abilities. If even cups can be sliced into pieces, how hard do you think it would be to get wild geese? No wonder he said that you were talking nonsense.”
The short fat man was still in shock. He lowered his head, speechless. The man in the silk robe paid the bill and dragged him out of the teashop.
The people in the teashop had watched the magic thrust from “Night Rain of Xiaoxiang” Great Mr. Mo, and suddenly they all felt a chill settle in their hearts. Since none had dissented while the short fat man was defaming Great Mr. Mo, they were worried that they might have planted seeds of trouble, so they all paid their bills and left hurriedly. In a short while, the once crowded teashop became almost empty. Other than Lin Pingzhi, there were only two other guests, bent over a table, dozing off.
Lin Pingzhi gazed at the seven half-cups and the seven china rings on the table and sank deep in thought. The old man had been so wretched looking, that it seemed someone could have pushed him over with a single finger, yet with a mere wave of his sword, all seven cups had been sliced in half. If Lin hadn’t left Fuzhou, he would have never known that there could be people with such outstanding skills in the world. He was like a frog, watching the sky from inside a well back at the Fortune Prestige Escort House. At that time, he thoug
ht that the highest level of Kung Fu people could achieve would be, at most, on par with that of his father. If he were to become a student of this old man and work hard on his Kung Fu training, he might actually have a chance to avenge the Escort House; otherwise, there was really no hope.
Lin Pingzhi mulled over the idea a bit longer. Why couldn’t he go and find this Great Mr. Mo and implore him to rescue his parents and take him as an apprentice? He stood up in excitement, but a seed of doubt sprouted within his thoughts. After all, Mo was the Head Master of the Hengshan Sword School, and the Five Mountain Sword Alliance had a good relationship with the Qingcheng Sword School; why would he offend his allies for a total stranger? At this discouraging thought, he sat back down feeling utterly depressed.
Just then, a melodious and tender voice rose, “Second apprentice brother, it looks like the rain just won’t stop. I’m almost soaked through. Why don’t we stop here for some hot tea?”
Lin Pingzhi was stunned. He recognized the voice the instant he heard it. It was none other than the voice of the ugly wine-selling girl who had saved his life. He lowered his head in a hurry.
“Alright, let’s drink some hot tea to warm up a little,” a much older sounding voice answered.
The two walked into the teashop and sat at a table, diagonally across from Lin Pingzhi. Lin Pingzhi glanced out of the corner of his eyes and saw the wine-selling girl in a green dress seated with her back to him. The person sitting besides her was the old man who claimed to be her grandfather.
“So you two are really fellow apprentices disguised as grandfather and granddaughter to carry out some scheme in Fuzhou,” he thought. But why did they save him? Maybe they would know of his parents’ whereabouts.
The waiter cleaned the table and brought out some hot tea. The old man saw the seven half-cups on the table beside them and could not help but utter a cry of surprise.
“Little Apprentice Sister, look!”
“Amazing! Who could have cut these seven cups?” the young girl was also quite surprised.
“Little Apprentice Sister, let me pose a riddle: One thrust seven directions, powerful enough to cut gold and jade. Who do you think cut these seven cups?” the old man asked the girl in a low voice.
“I wasn’t here when it happened; how should I know who…?” the girl started to protest, when suddenly, she started clapping her hands in glee. “I’ve got it! I’ve got it! It’s one of the thirty-six moves of ‘Wind-twirling Geese-falling Sword,’ the seventeenth move ‘One Thrust Drops Nine Geese.’ This must be the work of Liu Zhengfeng, Master Liu,” she proclaimed triumphantly.
“I am afraid that Master Liu’s skills have not progressed to that level yet; you’ve only got it half right,” the old man shook his head with a smile.
“Hold on! Don’t say it!” The girl pointed at him with a big grin. “I know who it was. It…it…it was ‘Night Rain of Xiaoxiang’ Great Mr. Mo!”
All of a sudden, the sounds of applause and laughter came from seven or eight different directions. “Good job, Little Apprentice Sister!” Several people shouted.
Lin Pingzhi was startled. “Where did all these people come from?” He glanced up from the corner of his eyes again and saw that the two dozing men had stood up, and there were five others who just walked out from the teashop’s back room. One was dressed like a porter; one held an abacus in his hands, and looked like a merchant; another had a small monkey perched on his shoulder and looked like a street performer.
“Ha, so you dirty tricksters were all hiding. You almost gave me a heart attack! Where’s Big Apprentice Brother?” the young girl grinned.
“We’ve just met, and you’re already calling us dirty tricksters?” the man with the monkey said with mock seriousness.
“Well, you hid yourselves and tried to scare me, didn’t you? So of course you’re dirty tricksters,” the girl retorted with a grin. “Why isn’t Big Apprentice Brother with you?”
“How come you don’t ask about anything else but your Big Apprentice Brother?” The man with the monkey laughed teasingly. “We’ve barely spoken two sentences and you’ve already asked about your Big Apprentice Brother twice. Why don’t you ask about your sixth apprentice brother?”
The girl stamped her foot on the floor. “Bah! You’re standing here in perfect shape, safe and sound Monkey-boy. Why should I bother asking about you?”
“Well, Big Apprentice Brother is also safe and sound. Why are you asking about him then?” the man with the monkey shot back with a grin.
“I am not talking to you any more,” the girl exclaimed. “Fourth apprentice brother, you’re the only gentleman of the bunch! Where’s Big Apprentice Brother?”
Before the man dressed as porter could answer, several others began to protest. “Ho! Only your fourth apprentice brother is a gentleman, and we are all villains? Hey, Number Four, don’t answer her.”
“Don’t answer then!” the girl exploded in a huff. “If you don’t want to tell me, fine! But don’t expect me to tell you one word about the strange and interesting things that happened on our way here when I was with second apprentice brother.”
The man dressed as porter did not participate in any of the joking and bantering. He seemed to be a simple and straightforward person.
“We departed with Big Apprentice Brother yesterday at Hengyang,” he said. “He told us to come first. By now he is probably already sober, and will be here soon.”
“He got drunk again?” the girl frowned slightly.
“Yep,” the man dressed as a porter answered.
“This time he really drank his fill,” the man with the abacus cut in. “He drank from morning till noon, and then from noon till dusk. He probably drank at least twenty to thirty liters of good wine!”
“That’s not good for his health! Why didn’t you talk to him?” the girl admonished.
The man with the abacus stuck his tongue out and made a face. “If Big Apprentice Brother would listen to other people’s advice, then the sun would have risen from the west. But I guess if Little Apprentice Sister tried to stop him, then he might drink one liter less.” Everyone laughed at these words.
“Why did he start drinking like that? Was he celebrating something?” the girl asked.
“You’ll have to ask him about that,” the man with the abacus replied. “I think he figured he would see his Little Apprentice Sister when he came to Hengshan town and felt really happy about it, so he decided to celebrate.”
“Nonsense!” the girl sniffed, yet she sounded quite pleased.
Lin Pingzhi listened to the joking among these fellow apprentices. “It seems this girl really likes her Big Apprentice Brother very much,” he thought. “But if that second apprentice brother is already so old, the Big Apprentice Brother must be even older. The girl is only sixteen or seventeen, how could she fall in love with someone so old?” He thought a bit longer and then found an answer. “Ah, yes. The girl has pox-marks all over her face. She is way too ugly. No one else would take her, so she has to love an old drunkard.”
Then he heard the girl asking again, “So Big Apprentice Brother started drinking since yesterday morning?”
“I guess if we don’t tell you the whole story, you just won’t leave us alone,” the man with the monkey conceded. “Yesterday morning the eight of us were just about to start the trip when Big Apprentice Brother suddenly detected the scent of some great wine from the street. We checked it out, and found a beggar drinking out of a wine calabash. That really piqued Big Apprentice Brother’s sense of wine, so he went over to talk to the beggar, praising his wine, and asking what kind it was. The beggar replied that it was monkey wine, and Big Apprentice Brother asked what monkey wine was. The beggar then answered that monkeys in western Hunan Province knew how to use fruits to make wine. The fruits those monkeys used were the freshest and sweetest, so the wine made from them was the best as well. The beggar had walked into the monkeys’ domain by accident, and the monkeys happened to be away, so he stole three
calabashes of wine and also caught a small monkey. See, this is him.” He pointed to the monkey on his shoulder. One of the monkey’s legs was tied to his wrist by a line. The monkey kept rubbing its head, scratching its cheeks, and making faces; it looked very comical.
The girl looked at the monkey and burst into laughter. “Sixth apprentice brother, no wonder your nickname is Monkey-Six. You and your little friend here look just like twins.”
“We are not twins,” Monkey-Six said with a straight face. “We are fellow apprentices. This little fellow is my Big Apprentice Brother, and I am his junior.” Everyone burst into loud laughter.
The girl laughed as well. “Aha, you are making fun of Big Apprentice Brother. Wait till I tell him about this. He’ll be sure to kick your backside.”
“How did your brother end up in your hands?” she asked again after giggling for awhile.
“My brother?” Monkey-Six was lost for a moment. “Are you talking about this little critter? Well, that’s a long story. It’s going to give me a headache!”
“You don’t have to tell me, I can guess,” the girl said archly. “Big Apprentice Brother must have asked for the monkey, and asked you to take care of it, hoping the little thing would make a calabash of wine for him!”
“Hey, that’s right!” Monkey-Six said.
“Big Apprentice Brother always likes to come up with these hare-brained schemes,” the girl said. “The monkeys only make wine when they’re in the mountains. Now that he’s caught, why would he collect fruits to make wine? If you let him go loose to find fruits, wouldn’t he just run away?” After a short pause she continued, “Otherwise, how come our Monkey-Six hasn’t made any wine?”
