The Book and The Sword - Yong Jin - Страница 113

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Afanti went into the kitchen and brought out a small saucepan which he gave to the boy. "This is clearly the son of a saucepan," he said. "You give it to Master Hu."

Uncertain whether to believe him or not, the boy took the small saucepan and left.

Afanti turned to the labourer and said: "You tell Master Hu you want to hold a meeting to settle the matter."

"But if I lose, I'll have to give him twenty-four taels of silver, won't I?"

"Don't worry," said Afanti, "You can't lose."

After an hour or so, the labourer returned and said: "Uncle Afanti, Master Hu had already called the meeting, and the deliberation has begun. Please come."

"I'm busy at the moment," Afanti replied. "Come back in a little while." He sat laughing and chatting with his wife and the others. The labourer was extremely anxious and pleaded with him and finally Afanti got up and accompanied him to the meeting.

Xu and the others went along too to see the fun, and they found seven or eight hundred people gathered in the centre of the village. A fat man wearing an embroidered fur-lined gown sat in the middle, and they decided he must be Master Hu. The crowd had become very restless waiting for Afanti.

"Afanti," called Master Hu. "This labourer says you're going to speak for him. Why are you so late?"

Afanti bowed before him. "I'm sorry, but I had some important business to attend to," he said.

"How could it be more important than settling this dispute?" Master Hu replied.

"It was much more important," said Afanti. "Tomorrow, I am going to plant some wheat, but I had not yet fried the seeds or eaten them. I fried them three times and it took me a long time to finish them up."

"Nonsense!" roared Master Hu. "How can you plant seeds that you have eaten?"

The crowd laughed heartily, but Afanti just stroked his large beard and smiled. After a while, the hubbub died down, and he said: "You say that wheat seeds that have been eaten cannot be planted. Well, how can the chicken that the labourer ate lay any eggs?"

The crowd thought for a second, and then cried out: "Yes, that's right, how can a chicken that's been eaten lay eggs?" Everyone began shouting and laughing and lifted Afanti up onto their shoulders.

Seeing the crowd's reaction, Master Hu had no alternative but to announce: "The labourer should pay one hundred copper pieces to the innkeeper in return for the chicken he ate."

The labourer happily handed over the string of copper coins to the innkeeper. "I wouldn't dare to eat on of your chickens again," he said.

The innkeeper took the money and walked silently away. The crowd of Muslims laughed at him and some small children threw stones at his back.

Master Hu walked up to Afanti. "The saucepan I lent to you gave birth to a son. That's very good. When will it be giving birth again?"

An expression of deep sadness appeared on Afanti's face. "Master Hu," he said. "Your saucepan is dead."

"How can a saucepan die?" Master Hu replied angrily.

"If a saucepan can give birth to a son, of course it can die."

"You charlatan," cried Master Hu. "You just don't want to return my saucepan."

"All right," Afanti shouted back. "We'll let everyone decide."

But Master Hu remembered how he had accepted the small saucepan, and decided he had lost enough face. He waved his hand to indicate he had had enough and walked off through the crowd.

Afanti was extremely pleased with himself for having managed to cheat Master Hu, himself a master at cheating the poor, and he threw back his head and roared with laughter. Suddenly, a voice behind him said: "Well Whiskers, what ridiculousness are you up to now?"

Afanti turned and saw it was the Strange Knight of the Heavenly Pool, Master Yuan. He jumped up happily and grabbed Yuan's arm.

"Aha! So you're here. Come and see my wife," he said.

"What's so special about your wife that you keep showing her off like a monkey would a jewel…" Before Yuan could finish, Xu and Yu came forward and kowtowed before him.

"Enough, enough, there's no need to kowtow. I'm not your teacher," Yuan protested. "Where is your Master Chen?"

"The Great Helmsman came on ahead of us…" Xu began. Suddenly, he noticed the Twin Eagles of Tianshan, Bald Vulture and Madame Guan, behind Yuan and bowed to them. He was surprised to see Madame Guan was riding Chen's white horse.

"Where did you find that horse?" he asked.

"We found him running free in the desert. It took the three of us quite a while to catch him," she said.

Xu was shocked. "Could the Great Helmsman be in danger? We had better go and find him," he said.

They finished lunch quickly and bade farewell to Zhou Qi. Afanti's wife, was furious that he was leaving again after only a few hours at home, and grabbed his beard, wailing and screaming as she did so. Afanti laughed and tried to comfort her.

"I`ve found a young lady to keep you company," he said. "In fact, there's a baby inside her, which means two people to keep you company, much better than me by myself." But his wife wailed even louder.

Yuanzhi rode the white horse and let it lead the way to back to Chen. Afanti again rode his donkey, but the animal was much too slow. By nightfall, they had gone only ten miles, and everyone was getting anxious.

"We will go on ahead," Xu finally said to Afanti. "We are afraid that our Great Helmsman may be in trouble."

"All right, all rightm" Afanti replied. "When we get to the next village, I'll buy a better donkey. This stupid donkey thinks he's something special, but really he's useless." He urged the animal on and caught up with Yuanzhi.

"Mistress, why are you so unhappy all the time?" he asked.

Despite his apparent silliness, Yuanzhi knew that this strange Muslim was very wise, and she decided to ask his advice.

"Uncle Afanti," she replied. "How would you deal with someone who was unreasonable?"

"I would cover his head with my saucepan and skewer him with a sword."

Yuanzhi shook her head. "That won't do. For instance, what if he was someone very… dear to you. The nicer you are towards him, the more stubborn he becomes, like your donkey."

Afanti pulled at his beard, fully understanding her meaning. "I ride this donkey every day and I've learned a few tricks about how to deal with his bad temper," he replied with a smile.

They entered a village. As they approached the square at its centre, the white horse suddenly gave a long neigh and galloped forward. Yuanzhi pulled desperatelyon the reins, but could not control him and the villagers scattered in front of the apparently crazed animal as it raced up to a group of people and stopped. Yuanzhi dismounted in front of Luo Bing, Wen, 'Leopard' Wei, Zhang Jin, Xin Yan and white-bearded Lu Feiqing.

Yu ran over to Lu and knelt down before him. "Uncle," he cried, and began to sob.

Lu helped him up, tears also glistening in his eyes. "I started out as soon as I heard the shocking news about your teacher, Master Ma Zhen," he said. "I met Master Wen and the others on the road. They are also after that traitor, Zhang. Don't worry. We will avenge the death of your teacher."

The heroes found somewhere to rest briefly while Afanti went off to buy a donkey, Yuanzhi quietly following him. He found and purchased a strong animal, twice as tall as his tail-less donkey which he sold to the donkey merchant for a small sum.

"The official's cap was the undoing of this stupid donkey," he said, and laughed. He threw the cap on the ground, and trampled it into the dust. Yuanzhi led the new donkey for him as they walked back.

"I once raised a donkey that was appallingly stubborn," Afanti said. "If I wanted him to move, he would stand still. If I wanted him to stand still, he would walk round in circles. One day, I wanted him to pull a cart to a mill a few hundred feet away, but no matter what I said, he wouldn't budge. The more I pushed him, the more determined he was to stay put. I shouted, I hit him, it made no difference. So you can guess what I did?"

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