“Wha-wha-wha—” I said, or something equally intelligent as I splashed scorpions away.
“Sorry, Ox. I assure you that I’d first removed the venom from the thing, and I thought it would be funny. I must be farther on the road to senility than the Celestial Master is. Dear me, dear me,” he said as he sauntered happily away.
The pool turned out to be less than two feet deep, so I was not in a modest position as I tried to untangle my clothes and get them back on, and while I was trying to squeeze my left foot into my right sandal a very elegant footman appeared and informed me my presence was demanded inside. He turned me over to a maid who did a great deal of giggling as she led me upstairs, and I was ushered through elegant doors into a luxurious bedchamber with tall windows opening to a narrow balcony that overlooked a shallow pool where tadpoles swam, frolicking through the thongs of my missing left sandal.
“Tee-hee!” said the warden’s wife.
That wasn’t really her style, so she dropped the coyness and crooked a commanding finger.
“Come here, you,” growled the bandit chief’s daughter.
I subsequently learned that nine months later she gave birth to a son (thirteen pounds eleven ounces) and chose the milk name Liu Niu. The assumption was that she was thinking of a minor deity called Liu-hai, so the milk name meant “Lucky Calf,” but if she happened to be thinking of another minor deity called Liu-lang the milk name means “Sexy Ox,” and I will leave it at that.
10
When I passed the tadpole pond again that night I had Master Li riding on my back, and this time I slipped silently behind bushes and then began to climb. Away from us, at the drawbridge, trumpets were blaring and soldiers were standing at attention. The sage had wanted to get the matter of the grand warden’s wife out of the way before we got down to serious business, and the timing couldn’t have been more perfect, because Li the Cat was just entering in a sedan chair decorated with imperial dragons, escorted by the elite Wolf Regiment.
The climb was ridiculously easy. The huge stones that formed the wall were set irregularly, giving all the foot- and handholds I needed, and it was possible to swing back and forth so I could reach the grand warden’s private suite without once leaving the shelter of overhanging parapets and balconies. When I crawled up over the edge of the last balcony we could look through a window into the corridor and outer offices and see just where guards were stationed, and another window let us into the warden’s private sanctuary.
“Why don’t they hang out a sign: ‘Rob Me!’ “ Master Li whispered disgustedly.
It got even better. There was a five-panel decorative screen in a shadowed area away from lamps and moonbeams, but still close to the low jade-covered conference table surrounded by silken sitting pillows, and a cabinet provided Master Li with a jar of excellent wine and me with a jar of the finest pickled seaweed I have ever tasted. We settled down to wait, and we didn’t have to wait long. Within an hour the sounds of guards’ boots clicking together and weapons being grounded announced the arrival of the grand warden, and it was only the warden and Li the Cat who entered, along with two servants, and when the servants had prepared a brazier and placed a pot on it for water to boil they bowed backward from the room and the door shut firmly behind them.
“I can’t wait for the palate of a connoisseur to evaluate this batch,” Li the Cat said unctuously. “To my taste it’s an improvement of fifty percent, at least, but I don’t pretend to be an expert.”
“Neither do I. I’m just facile with experts’ cliches,” the grand warden said with a mock bow, and they both laughed heartily.
Li the Cat opened his money belt and extracted a small round object that seemed to have the imperial seal stamped on it. It was pale green with light purple shadings, and apparently as hard as a hunk of wood. Master Li’s fingers dug into my shoulder.
“Ox, that’s Tribute Tea,” he whispered. “How in hell did that slimy eunuch qualify for Tribute Tea?”
The question was rhetorical, of course, so I said nothing. The eunuch shaved thin pieces from the little hard cake with a silver knife, and the grand warden used a silver pestle to powder the shavings in a silver mortar. With great ceremony they passed the powder three times through a silver sieve, and then poured equal amounts into two wide, shallow chien saucers. The water in the pot (actually it’s not a pot but a “soup bottle”) was boiling, and the grand warden carefully poured it into the chiens. They briskly stirred with bamboo whisks. At first the liquid was white, then it turned bluish gray, and then bluish gold, and the aroma that reached my nostrils was the delicious subtle scent of tea of the very highest quality. They bowed to each other and raised the saucers to their lips and sipped, and then the warden grimaced and spat the stuff into the fire.
“It still tastes like camel piss,” he said petulantly.
“Well, I didn’t claim perfection, and it really does taste better,” the eunuch protested. “Try another sip, and don’t expect miracles.”
The grand warden cautiously tried again, and this time kept it down.
“All right, it is a bit better,” he said grudgingly. “It still wouldn’t fool a baby, however.”
“Who’s in the business of fooling babies? We’re fooling barbarians,” the eunuch said with a chuckle. “Look at the uncompressed leaves and tell me there’s something wrong with them!”
He extended some tiny things from his money belt, which the warden viewed admiringly.
“Buddha, that’s marvelous. You used the same batch?”
“Exactly, and some of the worst of it at that. We have the technique down perfectly, and I’m now guaranteeing a success rate of ninety-five percent. How are things going at your end?” Li the Cat asked.
“Four more barbarian kings have expressed strong interest—two of them are certain customers,” the grand warden said briskly. “The real market would be Rome, of course, but sea routes are very risky and every caravan runs the risk of capture by aspiring princes, who might send the stuff back to China as tribute. Can you imagine?”
Li the Cat shuddered. “Don’t even think about such things,” he said. “Any change in the basic sales tale?”
The grand warden shrugged. “Why change it? We have to explain how we got the merchandise, and the story of bandits capturing caravans and then discovering the cargo was intended for the emperor can’t really be improved upon. My recent marriage into a bandit clan provides authenticity, and it’s easy to explain that my illustrious father-in-law can’t dispose of his loot inside the boundaries of civilization, and has to turn to me for outside markets. Let’s not gild something that’s glowing.”
That was when matters changed dramatically. The warden had taken out a large map and they were starting to discuss routes and new markets when a high and shrill, but rather pretty sound rang through the room. It was like the rapid tinkling of a small silver bell, and instantly both men were on their feet. The warden ran to the west wall and pulled aside a calligraphy scroll stretched on a bamboo frame, and behind it was the door of a safe. Then his back covered the view and I couldn’t tell how he opened it, but when he turned again I had to suppress a loud exclamation. In his hands was an ancient cage, precisely like the other two, and the sound seemed to come from it. The warden trotted back to the table and set the cage down. Then I could see a tiny flickering light glowing in the center, pulsing to the bell sound, but the warden’s shoulder blocked my view and I couldn’t see what he was doing as he reached out to the front of the cage. The ringing of the bell stopped abruptly. The little glowing light expanded until it filled the cage, and then my eyes nearly popped from their sockets. Human features were forming inside the bars, and they resolved themselves into the face of a senior mandarin I had seen at the funeral of Ma Tuan Lin! Master Li’s fingers were digging into my shoulder like knives, and wrinkles had screwed up so tightly around his eyes I wondered how he could see. Then the mouth of the mandarin opened, and we heard his voice as though he were right there in the room.