Phoenix maliciously incites an unrequited passion. In spite of warnings,
Chia Jui looks into the forbidden side of the Wind and Moon Mirror.
PHOENIX HAD HARDLY FINISHED THE SENTENCE WHEN A VOICE FROM
outside announced: "Chia Jui is here."
"Let him come in," ordered Phoenix.
Beaming with joy all over his face, the visitor entered, bowing and
scraping and rubbing his hands, and burst out with a rush of questions
about the "esteemed" well‐being and the "precious" and "nephrite"
health of his hostess. She welcomed him with hypocritical friendliness,
invited him to take a seat, and served him tea.
The fact that he was permitted ‐to see her in her negligee attire made
him soft as cheese, and his amorous gaze dripped honey as he asked,
suddenly resolved to come straight to the point:
"Why is Cousin Lien not here?"
"How can I know where he may be?" she replied with an air of in‐
difference.
"Perhaps his foot became entangled in some gentle snare on his way
home?"
"Possibly. Men are like that; they fall in love at first sight with the
first woman they meet."
"Oh, Sister‐in‐law, I am certainly not one of that inconstant kind."
"Then you must be a praiseworthy exception. One could hardly find
one man in ten of your sort," she flattered him. And he found her flat‐
tery so pleasing that he almost felt as if she were fondling his ear and
stroking his cheek.
"You must suffer great boredom in your solitude, day in, day out,"
he bravely continued.
"Indeed, yes. And my only comfort is when someone comes to visit
me now and then and breaks the monotony."
"How would it be if I were to take over this role of your comforter in
loneliness? I have plenty of free time and would be at your disposal
every day with the greatest pleasure."
"Surely you are joking! Would you really take as much trouble as
that?"
"May I be struck by lightning and split in two halves if my intentions
towards you are not sincere! Up to now I did not really trust myself to
show my feelings, you were always said to be so terribly strict and cor‐
rect. But having convinced myself of how entertaining and charming
and delightful you are, I shall no longer refrain, but shall hasten to
come to you, and I will give my life willingly if only I may enjoy your
company ! "
"What a high and noble nature your words betray!" she said, assum‐
ing an enraptured tone. "How absolutely different you are from your
simple cousins Chia Yung and Chin Chung, whose attractions are
merely superficial and who do not possess a scrap of understanding or
delicacy of feeling."
This praise tickled his very vitals and encouraged him to edge closer
and closer to her side and to fondle her with his eyes more and more
brazenly. His glance rested boldly in the region of her lotus‐shaped
girdle pocket. He was in a fever to touch her.
"May I have a close look at your ring?" he asked her, boldly trying
to grasp her hand.
"Not so vehement, please!" she rebuffed him gently. "What if some‐
one should catch us unawares?"
He quickly moved away from her again as obediently as if it were a
matter of an Imperial edict or a command of Buddha.
"Now you must go!" she said, smiling.
"Do not be so cruel, but let me stay a little longer!" he begged.
"Impossible!" she breathed. "There are too many people about here
during the day. It would be too risky. But tonight at the time of the
first night watch wait for me outside in the park by the western covered
passage."
Chia Jui received this with a feeling of keen delight, as if a precious
jewel had fallen into his hands.
"You are not joking, are you, Sister‐in‐law? And are we safe from
eavesdroppers there?" he asked excitedly.
"Do not worry! I will give leave of absence to the servants who are
due for watch there tonight; and once the gates above and below are
locked, no one can come through," she reassured him.
He hurried off in blissful anticipation of what was to come. As dusk
was falling he slipped once more into the Yungkuo palace precincts,
and shortly before the gates were locked took up his position in the pas‐
sage indicated. Soon the surrounding park lay in complete darkness and
silence. Not a human sound was to be heard. Half the night through he
waited and listened in vain. She had made the appointment with him
for the first night watch. The second night watch had passed meantime,
and she had not arrived. Then it became clear to him that he had been
hoaxed and he decided to get away. But he tried the east gate and the
west gate in vain. They were securely locked and bolted from the out‐
side. He now tried to climb the wall; but it was too high and there was
no ledge or foothold anywhere by which he could heave himself up. For
good or ill, he had to pass the whole night in the inhospitable, empty
passage. That was far from pleasant at that wintry season. An icy wind
blew right in around the edges of the door and window and cut him pitilessly to the very bone. His limbs were stiff with cold when morning
dawned at last and an old gatekeeper came and first opened the eastern
gate and then began rattling at the western one. As soon as she turned
her back, he slipped swiftly from his hiding place and flew like smoke
out through the eastern gate. Luckily, everyone was still asleep at this
early hour, so that he was able to escape unseen from the estate by a
postern gate at the back. Then he ran home to his grandfather's house
For Chia Jui, who was orphaned young, lived with old Tai Ju, who
maintained him.
The old gentleman kept the grandson under strict control and super‐
vision and watched him conscientiously to prevent him from loafing
about and neglecting his studies. The fact that the rascal had remained
out the whole night naturally merited the severest reproof from his
grandfather. He suspected that wine and women had kept him out, and
when he arrived home at last in the early hours of the morning he met
with anything but a friendly reception. The grandfather could certainly
never have guessed that the matter was actually far worse than it
seemed, and that the scoundrel was well on the way to creating a seri‐
ous family scandal.
Mopping the cold sweat from his brow, the night reveller appeared
before the enraged old gentleman and tried to lie himself out of his
predicament as well as he could. Yesterday, when visiting a relative he
had stayed too late and had been kept for the night. But Tai Ju read
the lie on his face.
"You should not go out without my permission!" he said severely.
"And for deceiving me as well, you deserve all the greater punishment."
And he made him kneel down and gave him thirty or forty strokes
with a cane. Besides this, he left him without food for the whole day and
gave him as additional punishment an appropriate lesson to learn
kneeling out in the yard. After having been frozen through all night,
the poor devil had to atone still more for his folly with a thrashing,
hunger, still more cold, and some strenuous brainwork.
But all these sufferings failed to cure his depravity. Scarcely two
days had passed when he slipped across again during a free hour to the
Yungkuo palace. He was once more received by Phoenix. She had de‐
cided to cure him even more thoroughly this time. At first she acted as
if she were offended and reproached him for having failed to keep his
word recently. With secret, malicious pleasure she listened to his prot‐
estations to the contrary and let him tell her all he had endured and
suffered on her account. Then she suggested a new meeting for that
same evening, but in a different place. She indicated a little unused gar‐
den house, close behind her dwelling. He was to wait for her there.
"But you really mean it?" he asked diffidently.
"If you do not trust me, you need not come," she informed him
coolly and abruptly.
"I shall come even if I have to suffer a hundred deaths!" he declared
passionately.
Whereupon she graciously dismissed him. While she was holding her
council of war and preparing all the measures to entice him more
thoroughly than the first time into the trap, he, waiting at home, could
scarcely contain his patience. For he had not the slightest doubt that
this time he would attain his end. But first he had to wait until relations
who by chance had come that day to visit had left the house. And then
he had to be patient a little longer until his grandfather retired to rest
after the evening meal. At last he was able to venture forth. It was high
time. Darkness was already falling and the people were carrying lan‐
terns in their hands in the streets. Shortly before the gates were closed
he successfully slipped into the Yungkuo palace grounds and stole into
the empty garden house close behind the dwelling of the beloved one.
There he sat and waited, and ill his excitement and impatience he was
like the proverbial boiling kettle on the hearth. But to the left no human
form showed itself, and to the right no human sound was to be heard.
Already anxious doubts were rising in his bosom. Would she leave
him another whole night waiting and freezing in vain? But then he
suddenly heard soft footsteps. He stepped to the door and saw a ghost‐
like shadow emerge out of the darkness and come straight towards him.
He had not the least doubt that it was Phoenix, and without thinking
long or waiting to distinguish black from white, he rushed at the ap‐
proaching form like a hungry tiger at its prey, seized it in his arms,
and carried it to the couch inside the little house.
"Beloved, I had almost died of longing!" he groaned, while his lips
sought those of his supposed sweetheart and his hand excitedly fumbled
for her garter. What easy game he had ! The beloved let him have, his
way completely, and did not stir. He had now gleefully opened his own
clothing and was just getting down to work when a gleam of light from
outside made him stop short.
"What's going on here?" asked someone who had slipped in un‐
noticed, carrying a lighted candle. It was Nephew Chia Chiang.
"Uncle Jui had gentle impulses," came the laughing reply from the
couch. The voice betrayed to the horrified Chia Jui that he had taken
his nephew Chia Yung for the beloved. Overcome with shame, he tried
to run away, but Chia Chiang blocked his path.
"Stop! Stay here! Aunt Phoenix has already told everything to the
old Tai tai. In order to escape your attentions she has played a little
trick on you. The old Tai tai is enraged at your behavior and has or‐
dered us two to take you to her at once. Come along!"
"Dear nephew, let me get away and do not betray me!" begged Chia
Jui, utterly dismayed. "I promise you a fat reward."
"I could let you run off," replied Chia Chiang, "but first I must know
exactly how much you are willing to pay. And a verbal promise is not
enough for me; you will have to sign a promissory note. For the sake
of decency, the amount in question can be put down on‐*the note as a
gambling debt."
"Agreed. But where can we get paper and ink here?"
"They will be brought to you immediately. Wait one moment!"
Chia Chiang disappeared and at once returned with writing materials.
After lengthy bargaining Chia Jui had to agree to write out a promis‐
sojy note for fifty taels. Chia Chiang put the note in his pocket and took
Chia Yung by the hand to depart. But suddenly Chia Yung became re‐
fractory and declared defiantly that he would tell the story to all the
clan in the morning. This threat gave Chia Jui a new fright, and even
induced him to humiliate himself by making a kowtow to his torturer.
But the latter would not let him go until he too had a promissory note
for fifty taels in his pocket.
"Well, for today we will let you go free on our own responsibility,"
salu Chia Chiang magnanimously. "But now you must get off, it is only
a question of which way. You cannot go through the domain of the old
Tai tai, for all the gates are locked. And you dare not venture near the
residence of Great‐Uncle Cheng. He is still sitting up over his official
documents. Woe betide you if he were to catch you !. But you cannot stay
here any longer, either; at any moment one of the servants may come
over, for there is 'a storeroom near by. The only exit possible for you
is the back park gate; but we must first go out and see if the coast is
clear, for if you were caught, it would be bad for us too. I know a cer‐
tain place where you can wait for us in the meantime. Come with us!"
He blew out his wax candle, seized Chia Jui by the hand, and dragged
him out. He carefully groped his way in the darkness until they got into
a farmyard where they stopped beneath a stairway. "You are safe here
for the present," he whispered. "Squat down on the ground and keep
very quiet until we come back and call you!"
He went away with the other youth. Chia Jui squatted obediently on
the ground at the edge of the stairs, hardly daring to breathe. While he
was crouching there thinking over his strange position, he suddenly
heard above him a gurgling, splashing noise and immediately a thick,
disgusting fluid human excrements was poured over him. A sup‐
pressed cry escaped him, but immediately remembering that he had
been ordered to keep silent, he pressed his hand to his mouth. The evil‐
smelling liquid dripped down his forehead and cheeks, drenched his
clothing through from top to bottom, and made him shiver with cold
and discomfort. How long must he endure this miserable state? He was
immensely relieved when at last he heard the two return and call out:
"Quick, get away, get away!" He got up quickly from his crouching
position and ran in great bounds to the back garden gate. Completely
exhausted and out of breath, he arrived about midnight in front of his
home. The houseboy who opened the door shrank back startled at
sight of him;
"What has happened to you?" he asked, holding his nose.
"I fell into a cesspool in the dark," lied Chia Jui; and he rushed to
his room, where he threw off his odorous clothes and washed himself
thoroughly. Although he was dead‐tired, he could not sleep a wink that
night, his mind was so agitated by the adventure he had gone through.
Indeed, he could not but feel a grudge against the beloved one who had
played him such a vile trick, but her lovely image, which persistently
flitted across his mind, again dispelled the grief and rancor and only
left place for one craving to be permitted to fold her in his arms in
spite of everything. To be sure, his desire for further visits at the
Yungkuo palace had vanished completely after this last experience.
A period of real suffering now began for him. The persistent dunning
by his two creditors for payment of the promissory notes which they
had extorted from him, the constant fear of being found out by his
strict grandfather, the consuming, unfulfilled desire for the beloved
woman which reduced the unmarried twenty‐year‐old to frequent
nerve‐shattering finger play; added to this the burden of the debts
which he felt heavier day by day, and finally, the cold which he had
caught as a result of his two nocturnal adventures all these things had
the cumulative effect of making him a sick man in a short time. He lost
his appetite, his digestion failed, he felt heavy and giddy as if his legs
were made not of bones and sinews and muscles but of cotton‐wool; his
eyes became dull, as if vinegar had been sprayed into them, he spat
blood when he coughed, fever and sleeplessness tortured him by night,
by day he suffered drowsy exhaustion. When he did go to sleep he fell
into restless dreams and stammered in delirium. Such were the manifold
infirmities which came upon him by degrees in the course of a year.
His anxious grandfather tried all possible doctors, and made him
swallow pounds of medicine, but it was all in vain. Only a good dose of
ginseng could save him, said the doctors. But where could a poor
scholar get the means to acquire this unusual and expensive drug?
The old Tai Ju turned to his rich relations in the Yungkuo palace.
Madame Cheng, to whom he made his request, passed it on to Madame
Phoenix, the mistress of the kitchens and stores. She asked her to
weigh out two ounces of ginseng for him. But Madame Phoenix had no
intention whatever of helping the invalid, whom she preferred to see
die. She replied that she had recently given her last supply to the sick
wife of Marshal Yang, at the request of the Princess Ancestress. Let her
try to get some from her mother‐in‐law, Princess Shieh, or from Princess
Chen, for, after all, it was a matter of a human life, urged Madame
Cheng. But Madame Phoenix sent neither to the house of Chen nor to
the house of Shieh but scraped together a small remnant of waste roots
from her own supply, scarcely one‐tenth of an ounce, and sent the
rubbish to the home of the invalid. The Tai tai Cheng sent it but would
be unable to send any more, she gave word. She deceitfully told her
aunt, however, that in accordance with her instructions she had bor‐
rowed two ounces of the best ginseng for the sick man. Naturally, the
miserable refuse which she really sent him did not have the least effect.
One day a lame wandering Taoist monk knocked at old Tai Ju's
door, begging for alms. He offered in return to cure anyone of any
illness of mind or soul. Chia Jui, who from his sickbed could hear the
stranger commending his power of spiritual healing, became intensely
excited and loudly implored those around him to bring the master to
his bedside so that he might save his life. They complied with his wish
and brought the lame priest into the sickroom.
"Save me, Master!" the sick man implored again and again, kow‐
towing in his bed to the visitor.
The priest, lost in thought, observed him for a while and then he
said: "Your illness cannot be cured by medicine. But I have a precious
object here with me, which I will give you. You need only to look at it
every day, and you will get well again."
With these words he rummaged in his knapsack and drew out a
veiled mirror. The back of the mirror, in which one could also see one's
reflection, had the inscription engraved on it: Magic Mirror of the
Moon and the Wind.
"This mirror comes from the airy phantom castle of the Fairy of
Fearful Awakening in the Phantom Realm of the Great Void," the
priest explained. "Its power consists in purifying corrupted souls and
freeing them from impure thoughts and desires. The fairy has entrusted
it to me in order that I may save highly educated and high‐minded
young people like you, and so preserve them from destruction. But you
may look only in the reverse side of it. A thousand times, ten thousand
times, beware of looking in the front side! Remember that! Remember
that! I shall return in three days and take back the mirror. In the mean‐
time it will have cured you."
He had hardly finished speaking when, to the astonishment of the
bystanders who tried in vain to hold him back, he vanished into thin
air.
The invalid asked the company to leave him alone. Why should he
not try out the mirror? The strange priest had diagnosed his condition
remarkably correctly; this the others could not know, of course. So he
took the mirror in his hand and looked, as the priest had told him to,
into the reverse side. He recoiled in horror. A skeleton grinned at him
from the mirror!
"Did the accursed fellow only want to frighten me?" he cried
angrily. "Now I will just look into the forbidden side."
And he turned the mirror arid looked into the other side. marvel!
The lovely image of Phoenix met his gaze ! She was smiling at him and
beckoning him to her with her hand. Blissfully happy, he felt himself
drawn, he knew not how, into the mirror by some magic force, and en‐
joyed with the beloved one the passionate Play of Wind and Cloud.
When this was over she led him gently out of the mirror again. He
found himself once more lying in his bed, still groaning and moaning
from the aftereffects of the delightful experience.
Now he turned to the mirror again and looked once more at the
other side. Again the horrible skeleton grinned at him, bringing a cold
sweat out of his pores. Though still exhausted from the first enjoyment
of love, he could not resist the temptation of looking into the forbidden
side of the mirror a second time, and again Phoenix beckoned him and
smiled at him alluringly and drew him with magic power into the
mirror, once more to perform the Play of Wind and Cloud. The experi‐
ence was repeated four times. When she led him out for the fourth time
he suddenly felt himself being seized by two men, who put him in iron
chains.
"I will follow you! But let me take the mirror with me!" he cried
aloud.
These were his last words. Those outside had heard his cry. They
opened the door of the sickroom and peeped inside and could just see
him staring at the mirror with wide‐open eyes, when it slid to the ground
as his grip loosened. They all pressed around the bed, but the sick man
did not breathe again. They found the sheets wet with traces of human
emissions. The servants washed and dressed the dead man and laid him
on a bier in accordance with custom. Then they' informed his grand‐
parents that he had passed away.
The relatives raised a loud dirge and did not fail to abuse the lame
priest and his magic mirror.
"The magic mirror must be destroyed; otherwise it will do still more
barm," cried old Tai Ju angrily; and he ordered them to throw it into
the fire. But before they had time to carry out his order a voice was
heard in the air saying: "Why do you want to burn my mirror? It is
innocent. The dead man himself is to blame. Who told him to ignore
my prohibition and look into the wrong side?"
At the same time the mirror rose from the ground of itself and floated
out through the window. Old Tai Ju rushed out the door after it and
tried to catch it, when he saw the same lame priest standing there.
"Who dares to seize my mirror?" he heard him crying in a threat‐
ening voice, and then he saw him stretch out his hand and catch the
floating mirror. The next moment both priest and mirror had vanished
into nothingness.