Zhao Bin was only a small merchant and was not saving any money for the future. His poor old mother talked to him seriously about taking care of himself and his future. From then on, he became less careless and indolent.
On the morning of the day that Ji Gong was arrested, Zhao Bin had been at the West Lake selling fresh fruit when he saw a large number of soldiers surrounding the Monastery of the Soul’s Retreat. He saw someone he recognized and went over to ask what was happening. Then he learned about how Ji Gong had beaten the managers and how Prime Minister Qin had sent the soldiers to surround the monastery, seize Ji Gong, and bring him back. He also heard that Ji Gong no doubt would be beaten to death.
When he heard all this, Zhao Bin was terribly shocked. He thought to himself, “Ji Gong was kind enough to save my own life, and now the reverend gentleman is in deep trouble. How can I not save him? My mother does not want me to go out at night! I have it. I will deceive her. I will wait until she is asleep. Then I will take that big vegetable chopping knife and go to find Prime Minister Qin at his estate, where I will kill him. Thus I will avenge my teacher, the senior monk Ji Gong.”
He slowly returned home. There his mother asked, “Why did you not sell the rest of your fruit today?”
Zhao Bin answered, “Today I did not feel well.”
The old lady said, “If, indeed, your body does not seem well, you had best rest at home.”
After the evening meal, as Zhao Bin and his mother were about to go to their beds, they suddenly heard someone knocking at the gate. When Zhao Bin heard it, he felt quite unhappy. He thought to himself, “My mother was just about to go to sleep and then someone knocks at the gate.”
When he went out to look, it was Old Lady Wang from across the way. As soon as she saw him, she said, “Zhao Bin, I have to trouble you about something. Early this morning when my son, Wang Xing, went out, he spread his carpet and arranged the fruit he was selling on the ground near the prime minister’s gate. At exactly noon a man came here, riding in a small sedan chair. He said that my son had just been stricken with cholera, and he took my daughter-in-law away with him. I have not seen either my son or his wife since, and I am very worried. May I trouble you to go and ask about them?”
Zhao Bin immediately agreed to go. He had always done such things with a willing heart. He told his mother, changed his clothes, and took the large vegetable chopping knife with him. When he left, he went straight to the neighborhood of the Qin estate. By this time it was already late. He saw that Wang Xing’s carpet with the fruit spread on it had not yet been taken away. He also saw that a guard named Guo Four was there keeping watch over it. As soon as Zhao Bin saw that the guard was someone he knew, he asked, “Headman Guo, where did my dear brother Wang go?”
Guo Four replied, “Ah, it is you, Zhao Bin. You ask about Wang Xing. Do not mention it. Today at mid-morning the second master, the prime minister’s son, called to him to come in. Wang Xing sold him some fruit amounting to a good deal of money. I was told to keep watch here. I had other things to do, and when he did not come out, I went in and asked about him. Everyone I saw told me not to ask, and no one knew anything.”
Zhao Bin himself did not understand what could have happened to Wang Xing, or what it was all about. After leaving Guo Four, he asked in many places without learning anything. It was very dark and now at the second watch. He quickly went again to the estate of Prime Minister Qin and climbed stealthily over the roofs. Looking down from a rooftop, he was surprised to see in the courtyard below, lit by flickering candlelight, those household people who truly resembled a troop of demons. Trembling with fear and very cautious, Zhao Bin leaped from roof to roof and hurried off to the west.
Arriving at a distant flower garden, Zhao Bin stopped, looked east and west, and then said to himself, “This flower garden is not part of the prime minister’s mansion. Whose home is it?”
When he had looked about for some time, he saw that at the northeast corner there was a courtyard where he could see a twinkling light. He jumped down and moved in for a closer look. He saw that the flower garden was surrounded by the saplings of cassia trees. When he went through the gate, he saw before his eyes a short section of an ornamental wall that closed off the view to anyone standing in the gateway. In the center of the wall there was a design like a chessboard done in gray plaster. Beyond, to the north, was a building of three sections on a high platform with appropriate lower buildings on the east and west, each with three sections. A bamboo curtain was hanging in the door of the north building, and because of the light it was possible to see quite clearly into the room from the outside. He could see a square table inside. On the table was some fruit, hot and cold dishes with meat and fish, and the best quality strong wine. It was a most finely set table.
Zhao Bin thought to himself, “It would suit me just right to have such a meal prepared for me to eat and drink my fill, before going to kill that beastly person.”
He took a couple of steps forward. Just then he began to feel quite differently and said to himself, “Zhao Bin, you are too simple-minded. What if there is someone in the room and you simply walk in? How could you avoid being seen? That would be most inconvenient. I will have to find a small stone with which to try to find out whether anyone is there.” He searched about in the courtyard until he found some small stones, and threw one against the lattice. It was an oft-repeated saying among the brotherhood of the Greenwood that, if one threw stones in this way and the sound was heard, there would be a reply. More importantly, if there was a guard dog it would bark, and the one who had thrown the stone would swiftly depart.
Zhao Bin threw the stone, but there was no apparent movement within. Feeling satisfied that there was no one there, he walked forward. Not until he was on the first step did he hear someone say, “Ai yah! Big Brother has come. Quick, come and save us!”
Zhao Bin was greatly surprised. As he looked about carefully, he saw Wang Xing and his wife hanging upside down from a beam. Both were covered with blood.
CHAPTER 12
Qin Da practices a cruel deception; Qin Da seeks to separate a faithful couple
A thousand ounces of the yellowest gold
Would not suffice to buy that little body.
It is her love that made her rouge besmeared
And left a puzzle in the library.
ZHAO Bin could hardly help but be terribly shocked at the sight of his friend Wang Xing and Wang Xing’s wife both hanging there from a beam, certainly injured. How could they have been so mistreated?
Now this was the flower garden of Qin Da, the second noble son of Prime Minister Qin. Ordinarily, Qin Da made no attempt to behave in ways proper to his position. He took advantage of the fact that his father was prime minister. Since Qin Da’s elder brother had died some time earlier, Qin Da was now the only remaining son. He was quite unrestrained in his vicious behavior. Under his patronage he had a considerable number of hired thugs, whom he had gathered and trained. Frequently they went out robbing, plundering, and taking young wives and girls by force. Then the ruffians treated them without mercy. Qin Da even permitted his uncontrolled thugs to kill these unfortunate females. If anyone came to the prefectural offices to complain, the guards would not accept their petitions. They all knew that Qin Da was the noble son of Prime Minister Qin. Because of this, they gave Qin Da the nickname of “Demon of Doom.”
On this particular day he had been reading a book in the flower garden. When he read, he never looked at proper books. They were always licentious books with perverted viewpoints. The one he had been reading was The Emperor Tang Minghuang Vows to Make Yang Gueifei His Favorite Concubine. He had just reached a very satisfying place when he slapped the table in astonishment.
There beside him was one of his household servants, Qin Yu, who commonly was most eager to do any service for him. “Which