When Zheng Xiong heard this, he was amused and said, “How easily you gave up the idea of becoming a merchant. I will take them today, but tomorrow when you come, do not bring any more.” Then he told the servant to give Zhao Bin four strings of cash for the fruit, and Zheng Xiong and Zhao Bin went their separate ways.
Zhao Bin took the money home and from that time became more skilled in buying and selling. Sometimes he lost money and at other times he made up his losses. Occasionally he saw Zheng Yuanwai.
One day, Zhao Bin was at the West Lake looking at the girls passing over the causeway when a gang of toughs attacked him. The gang had nearly killed him when Ji Gong rescued him and saved his life. From then on Zhao Bin recognized Ji Gong as his teacher.
Now when Ji Gong had left the home of Li Guoyuan, he met Zhao Bin as he was selling fruit. The monk said, “Zhao Bin, come and have a drink of wine with me.” Zhao Bin went with the monk to a wine shop for a few drinks.
The monk said, “Today you will take on the role of Wei Tuo for me.”
Zhao Bin asked, “How will I act as Wei Tuo?”
Ji Gong explained how Li Guoyuan had lost the prince’s tally scroll and how it had found its way into the upper room of a pavilion in the flower garden of the prime minister’s estate. Ji Gong then asked Zhao Bin to steal it unseen and unheard and get it back to the home of Li Guoyuan while pretending to be Wei Tuo.
Zhao Bin said, “But I do not know Li Guoyuan.”
The monk said, “I will take you there.”
After they had finished eating and drinking, he gave Zhao Bin the money he had received from Li Guoyuan and took him to the gate of the Li family home.
The monk said, “Come tonight,” and then gave him some further instructions.
Zhao Bin nodded his head. Then he went home and told his mother: “My teacher, Ji Gong, wants me to act as Wei Tuo tonight.”
His mother asked, “What is acting as a Wei Tuo?”
Zhao Bin replied, “My teacher wants me to go to the prime minister’s estate and find a five-thunder, eight-trigram scroll for someone while pretending to be a Wei Tuo.”
His mother knew that Ji Gong was a good man. If it had been anyone but Ji Gong, she would not have let Zhao Bin venture out at night.
Zhao Bin changed his clothing and took a large knife used for chopping vegetables. When it grew dark, he climbed out over the wall, telling his mother to keep the gate fastened. He then went over the rooftops to the Li home and waited there above in the darkness. When he heard Ji Gong say that Wei Tuo had not yet arrived, Zhao Bin waited for a short time and then answered: “I am here! The spirit has come!”
The monk said, “Old Wei, go to the upper room of the pavilion in the flower garden of the prime minister’s estate. Get the prince’s tally scroll and bring it here.”
Zhao Bin said, “I will obey!” Then he turned and dashed nimbly off across the roofs.
He quickly arrived at the neighborhood of the prime minister’s estate and hastened on to the flower garden. When he looked around, he saw that the garden was very large. He could not immediately identify the pavilion for which he was looking. There was a little pavilion over the water, a pagoda in a miniature forest, flowers for the four seasons, and foliage for the eight festivals. He leapt down and began to search about until he came to the northeast corner of the garden, where there was a small courtyard. The largest building there was a house of three sections on the north side. To the east and west were two smaller matching buildings.
In a room of the north building, the light of a lamp shone dimly, and the shadows of people passed across the paper windows. Zhao Bin moved closer. From outside he moistened the paper of the window with the tip of his tongue and made a small hole. When he looked inside, he saw along one wall a bed and on the north side a square table with two chairs. A sharp-edged saber hung on that wall. There was a candle in the lantern on the table.
Two men sat in the chairs facing each other and drinking tea. The man on the east side was at least sixty years old. The skin of his face had a sickly pallor. His two eyebrows were like spear points and his eyes like a pair of triangles. His hair was as white as a white flower. On his head he wore a blue kerchief, and around his body a blue silk robe with a pattern of seal characters.
The man to the west was about thirty. He wore a dark green cloth hat and a black silk jacket. Around his waist was tightly tied a wide silk sash, while over his shoulders was carelessly thrown a dark cloak of the kind commonly called a hero’s cloak.
Zhao Bin could hear the older man saying, “Now, my brave young man, I have sheltered and taken care of you well. If you perform the business that I have asked you to do and if you really do it properly, I will give you a hundred ounces of silver. You may take it to the faraway places of heaven and the edges of the seas, where you will be beyond men’s powers to try you for taking a man’s life.” As he spoke, the older man reached into his clothing, took out two packages of silver, and placed them on the table. It was truly silver of the finest quality.
The younger man said, “I have learned so much from your kindness, venerable sir. You have granted me favors often when it would have been rude to refuse and embarrassing to accept. They have been such that now it would be a sin to refuse your request.”
The older one said, “Young man, carrying out an order is worth much more than being respectful.”
Zhao Bin then saw the younger man take the silver and place it inside the front of the upper part of his jacket. The man then reached out and took down the saber hanging on the wall, saying, “Venerable sir, whatever you hear moving outside, I say one thousand times ten thousand times, pay no attention. In a little while a man’s head will come to see you.” With this he went out of the building.
Zhao Bin quickly concealed himself and watched where the young man went. Zhao followed him, thinking to himself: “He must be going somewhere to kill a man. I will go along and watch!” He observed the man walk west through two courtyards, until on the west side there was a screen decorated with wooden placards covered with characters. Following the man through the gate beyond the screen, Zhao Bin saw a flickering light in a building of three parts to the north. There was a sound, as if someone were reading aloud to himself from a book. After he saw the man holding the saber go into the building, Zhao Bin made a hole in the paper window and saw a square table and two chairs. Seated in one of the chairs was a refined and studious-looking young man, while nearby was an old manservant.
The man who had just come in struck the table with the saber and said, “Whoever is the master, quickly speak for yourself. I have come here to put an end to your life.”
The young gentleman, who had been intimidated by the sight of the armed intruder, prostrated himself on the floor together with the servant, and spoke: “Spare our lives, good man! Since you ask, let me tell you why I am here.”
As he heard this, Zhao Bin began to burn with anger at the would-be assassin. He grasped his vegetable chopper and was about to burst into the room and intervene.
CHAPTER 7
Reunited heroes rescue a studious young man; Han Dianyuan reforms his ways with Ji Gong’s help
Life in a thatched hut beside a mountain
