such conversations, with a supply of meat and spirits at hand. These talks frequently continue late into the night, so unnerving the Magistrate’s wife that she sends a maidservant to rap on the window and call out, ‘Master, the Mistress says it is getting late; time to take your rest.’ He invariably replies, ‘Meixiang, go back and tell the Mistress not to wait up for me, that our young Li and I have yet to finish our chat.’ I am not in favor with the Mistress, and that is the cause. A few days ago, on my way to the rear hall on an assignment, I met up with her, and as she blocked my way, she said, ‘Aren’t you something, Little Li, keeping the Magistrate up half the night talking about who knows what, to the point that he has even begun to neglect me. You little wretch, do you or do you not deserve a beating?’ Shaken to the core, I stammered, ‘I do, I do!’”
“Elder Brother Li,” Collegian Ma Da interrupted, “none of us here has ever laid eyes on the First Lady, though there is talk that her face is cratered with pockmarks . . .”
“Rubbish! Utter nonsense. Anyone who says that deserves to wind up in the layer of Hell for wayward tongues!” Li Wu was red in the face from anger. “I ask you, Collegian Ma Da, what is that head of yours filled with, soy milk or rice congee? You have been taught in the ‘Zhao Qian Sun Li Zhou Wu Zheng Wang’ of the Hundred Family Surnames and ‘Heaven is black and Earth is yellow, the universe is in chaos,’ from the Book of Changes, so why do you not use your head and consider the august lady’s lineage! Born into a great family, she was a pearl in the hand of a doting father, raised by a nanny and waited on by a household of maidservants. Her quarters are kept in such immaculate condition that a slice of sticky-rice cake dropped to the floor can be retrieved without a speck of dust. How, I ask you, could anyone emerge from such an environment scarred by the unspeakable affliction of smallpox? The only way she would have marks on her face is if you, Collegian Ma, were to scratch it with your fingernails!”
No amount of discipline could have kept the gathered elites from bursting into sidesplitting laughter, and no amount of self-control could have kept Collegian Ma’s face from turning bright red. “Yes, of course,” he said, both to defend and to mock himself. “How could a fairy among mortals possibly have pockmarks? What an ugly, hateful rumor that is!”
Li Wu cast a sideways glance at the nearly empty plate of meat in front of Sun Bing and swallowed a mouthful of saliva. “That His Eminence Qian and I, his subordinate, have a close and cordial relationship goes without saying. He once said to me, ‘Little Li, there is a natural affinity between us. I cannot tell you why, but it seems to me that you and I are of one heart and mind, adjacent lungs, entwined intestines, and overlapping stomachs.”
Sun Bing nearly spat out the food in his mouth along with his derisive snort, and only by stretching out his neck was he able to swallow it down. “What that means to me,” he said, “is that when Magistrate Qian has eaten his fill, you are no longer hungry.”
“Sun Bing!” Li Wu bellowed. “What is that supposed to mean? Aren’t you an actor who plays emperors and kings, ministers and princes, scholars and beauties, praising the virtues of loyalty, piety, benevolence, and righteousness resounding across the heavens, day in and day out? Then how can you be ignorant of what it means to live in civilized society? You have taken for your sole enjoyment the only meat dish on the table, to which the grease on your lips bears testimony. And yet you have the audacity to slander others, you filthy maggot!”
“Now that you have grown tired of your sea cucumber, bird’s nest, camel’s hoof, and bear’s paw,” Sun Bing said with a laugh, “how can you drool over a plate of pork?”
“You are trying to measure the stature of a great man with the yardstick of a petty one! I object not for myself, but for my fellow guests.”
Again Sun Bing laughed. “They have filled their bellies by licking your hot ass, so what need do they have for meat?”
Stung