Kai Lung's Golden Hours by Ernest Bramah (best detective novels of all time .TXT) 📕
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- Author: Ernest Bramah
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“When the oil is exhausted the lamp goes out,” admitted Chang Tao, “but my time is not yet come. During the visionary watches of the night my poising mind was sustained by Forces as you so presciently foretold, and my groping hand was led to an inspired solution of the truth.”
“This points to a specific end. Proceed,” urged Pe-lung, for Chang Tao had hesitated among his words as though their import might not be soothing to the other’s mind.
“Thus it is given me to declare: she who is called Melodious Vision is rightly of the house of Shen, and Fuh-sang is no less innate of your exalted tribe. The erring gnome, in spite of his misdeed, was but a finger of the larger hand of destiny, and as it is, it is.”
“This assurance gladdens my face, no less for your sake than for my own,” declared Pe-lung heartily. “For my part, I have found a way to enlarge you in the eyes of those whom you solicit. It is a custom with me that every thousand years I should discard my outer skin—not that it requires it, but there are certain standards to which we better-class dragons must conform. These sloughs are hidden beneath a secret stone, beyond the reach of the merely vain or curious. When you have disclosed the signs by which I shall have securance of Fuh-sang’s identity I will pronounce the word and the stone being thus released you shall bear away six suits of scales in token of your prowess.”
Then replied Chang Tao: “The signs, assuredly. Yet, omnipotence, without your express command the specific detail would be elusive to my respectful tongue.”
“You have the authority of my extended hand,” conceded Pe-lung readily, raising it as he spoke. “Speak freely.”
“I claim the protection of its benignant shadow,” said Chang Tao, with content. “You, O Pe-lung, are one who has mingled freely with creatures of every kind in all the Nine Spaces. Yet have you not, out of your vast experience thus gained, perceived the essential wherein men and dragons differ? Briefly and devoid of graceful metaphor, every dragon, esteemed, would seem to possess a tail; beings of my part have none.”
For a concise moment the nature of Pe-lung’s reflection was clouded in ambiguity, though the fact that he became entirely enveloped in a dense purple vapour indicated feelings of more than usual vigour. When this cleared away it left his outer form unchanged indeed, but the affable condescension of his manner was merged into one of dignified aloofness.
“Certainly all members of our enlightened tribe have tails,” he replied, with distant precision, “nor does this one see how any other state is possible. Changing as we constantly do, both male and female, into Beings, Influences, Shadows and unclothed creatures of the lower parts, it is essential for our mutual self-esteem that in every manifestation we should be thus equipped. At this moment, though in the guise of a substantial trader, I possess a tail—small but adequate. Is it possible that you and those of your insolvent race are destitute?”
“In this particular, magnificence, I and those of my threadbare species are most lamentably deficient. To the proving of this end shall I display myself?”
“It is not necessary,” said Pe-lung coldly. “It is inconceivable that, were it otherwise, you would admit the humiliating fact.”
“Yet out of your millenaries of experience you must already—”
“It is well said that after passing a commonplace object a hundred times a day, at nightfall its size and colour are unknown to one,” replied Pe-lung. “In this matter, from motives which cannot have been otherwise than delicate, I took too much for granted it would seem.... Then you—all—Shen Yi, Melodious Vision, the military governor of this province, even the sublime Emperor—all—?”
“All tailless,” admitted Chang Tao, with conscious humility. “Nevertheless there is a tradition that in distant aeons—”
“Doubtless on some issue you roused the High Ones past forgiveness and were thus deprived as the most signal mark of their displeasure.”
“Doubtless,” assented Chang Tao, with unquenchable politeness.
“Coming to the correct attitude that you have maintained throughout, it would appear that during the silent gong-strokes of the night, by some obscure and indirect guidance it was revealed to you that Fuh—that any Being of my superior race was, on the contrary—” The menace of Pe-lung’s challenging eye, though less direct and assured than formerly, had the manner of being uncertainly restrained by a single much-frayed thread, but Chang Tao continued to meet it with respectful self-possession.
“The inference is unflinching,” he replied acquiescently. “I prostrate myself expectantly.”
“You have competently performed your part,” admitted Pe-lung, although an occasional jet of purple vapour clouded his upper person and the passage of his breath among his teeth would have been distasteful to one of sensitive refinement. “Nothing remains but the fulfilling of my iron word.”
Thereupon he pronounced a mystic sign and revealing the opening to a cave he presently brought forth six sets of armoured skin. Binding these upon Chang Tao’s back, he dismissed him, yet the manner of his parting was as of one who is doubtful even to the end.
Thus equipped—
But who having made a distant journey into Outer Land speaks lengthily of the level path of his return, or of the evening glow upon the gilded roof of his awaiting home? Thus, this limit being reached in the essential story of Chang Tao, Melodious Vision and the Dragon, he who relates their commonplace happenings bows submissively.
Nevertheless it is true that once again in a later time Chang Tao encountered in the throng one whom he recognized. Encouraged by the presence of so many of his kind, he approached the other and saluted him.
“Greeting, O Pe-lung,” he said, with outward confidence. “What bends your footsteps to this busy place of men?”
“I come to buy an imitation pig-tail to pass for one,” replied Pe-lung, with quiet composure. “Greeting, valorous champion! How fares Melodious Vision?”
“Agreeably so,” admitted Chang Tao, and then, fearing that so far his reply had been inadequate, he added: “Yet, despite the facts, there are moments when this person almost doubts if he did not make a wrong decision in the matter after all.”
“That is a very common complaint,” said Pe-lung, becoming most offensively amused.
The Propitious Dissension between Two whose General Attributes have already been sufficiently Described
When Kai Lung had related the story of Chang Tao and had made an end of speaking, those who were seated there agreed with an undivided voice that he had competently fulfilled his task. Nor did Shan Tien omit an approving word, adding:
“On one point the historical balance of a certain detail seemed open to contention. Accompany me, therefore, to my own severe retreat, where this necessarily flat and unentertaining topic can be looked at from all round.”
When they were alone together the Mandarin unsealed a jar of wine, apportioned melon seeds, and indicated to Kai Lung that he should sit upon the floor at a suitable distance from himself.
“So long as we do not lose sight of the necessity whereby my official position will presently involve me in condemning you to a painful death, and your loyal subjection will necessitate your whole-hearted co-operation in the act, there is no reason why the flower of literary excellence should wither for lack of mutual husbandry,” remarked the broad-minded official tolerantly.
“Your enlightened patronage is a continual nourishment to the soil of my imagination,” replied the story teller.
“As regards the doings of Chang Tao and of the various other personages who unite with him to form the fabric of the narrative, would not a strict adherence to the fable in its classical simplicity require the filling in of certain details which under your elusive tongue seemed, as you proceeded, to melt imperceptibly into a discreet background?”
“Your voice is just,” confessed Kai Lung, “and your harmonious ear corrects the deficiencies of my afflicted style. Admittedly in the story of Chang Tao there are here and there analogies which may be fittingly left to the imagination as the occasion should demand. Is it not rightly said: ‘Discretion is the handmaiden of Truth’? and in that spacious and well-appointed palace there is every kind of vessel, but the meaner are not to be seen in the more ceremonial halls. Thus he who tells a story prudently suits his furnishing to the condition of his hearers.”
“Wisdom directs your course,” replied Shan Tien, “and propriety sits beneath your supple tongue. As the necessity for this very seemly expurgation is now over, I would myself listen to your recital of the fullest and most detailed version—purely, let it be freely stated, in order to judge whether its literary qualities transcend those of the other.”
“I comply, benevolence,” replied Kai Lung. “This rendering shall be to the one that has gone before as a spreading banyan-tree overshadowing an immature shrub.”
“Forbear!” exclaimed a discordant voice, and the sour-eyed Ming-shu revealed his inopportune presence from behind a hanging veil. “Is it meet, O eminence, that in this person’s absence you should thus consort on terms of fraternity with tomb-riflers and grain-thieves?”
“The reproach is easily removed,” replied Shan Tien hospitably. “Join the circle of our refined felicity and hear at full length by what means the ingenious Chang Tao—”
“There are moments when one despairs before the spectacle of authority thus displayed,” murmured Ming-shu, his throat thickening with acrimony. “Understand, pre-eminence,” he continued more aloud, “that not this one’s absence but your own presence is the distressing feature, as being an obstacle in the path of that undeviating justice in which our legal system is embedded. From the first moment of our encountering it had been my well-intentioned purpose that loyal confidence should be strengthened and rebellion cowed by submitting this opportune but otherwise inoffensive stranger to a sordid and degrading end. Yet how shall this beneficent example be attained if on every occasion—”
“Your design is a worthy and enlightened one,” interposed the Mandarin, with dignity. “What you have somewhat incapably overlooked, Ming-shu, is the fact that I never greet this intelligent and painstaking young man without reminding him of the imminence of his fate and of his suitability for it.”
“Truth adorns your lips and accuracy anoints your palate,” volunteered Kai Lung.
“Be this as the destinies permit, there is much that is circuitous in the bending of events,” contended Ming-shu stubbornly. “Is it by chance or through some hidden tricklage that occasion always finds Kai Lung so adequately prepared?”
“It is, as the story of Chang Tao has this day justified, and as this discriminating person has frequently maintained, that the one in question has a story framed to meet the requirement of every circumstance,” declared Shan Tien.
“Or that each requirement is subtly shaped to meet his preparation,” retorted Ming-shu darkly. “Be that as it shall perchance ultimately appear, it is undeniable that your admitted weaknesses—”
“Weaknesses!” exclaimed the astonished Mandarin, looking around the room as though to discover in what crevice the unheard-of attributes were hidden. “This person’s weaknesses? Can the sounding properties of this ill-constructed roof thus pervert one word into the semblance of another? If not, the bounds set to the admissible from the taker-down of the spoken word, Ming-shu, do not in their most elastic moods extend to calumny and distortion.... The one before you has no weaknesses.... Doubtless before another moon has changed you will impute to him actual faults!”
“Humility directs my gaze,” replied Ming-shu, with downcast eyes, and he plainly recognized that his presumption had been too maintained. “Yet,” he added, with polished irony, “there is a well-timed adage that rises to the lips: ‘Do not despair; even Yuen Yan once cast a missile at the Tablets!’”
“Truly,” agreed Shan Tien, with smooth concurrence, “the line is not unknown to me. Who, however, was the one in question and under what provocation did he so behave?”
“That is beyond the province of the saying,” replied Ming-shu. “Nor is it known to my remembrance.”
“Then out of your own mouth a fitting test is set, which if Kai Lung can agreeably perform will at once demonstrate a secret and a guilty confederacy between you both. Proceed, O story-teller, to incriminate Ming-shu together with yourself!”
“I proceed, High Excellence, but chiefly to the glorification of your all-discerning mind,” replied Kai Lung.
The Story of Yuen Yan, of the Barber Chou-hu, and His Wife Tsae-che“Do not despair; even Yuen Yan once cast a missile at the Tablets,” is a proverb of encouragement well worn throughout the Empire; but although it is daily on the lips of some it is doubtful if a single person could give an intelligent account of the Yuen Yan in question beyond repeating the outside facts that he was of a humane and consistent disposition and during the greater part of his life possessed every desirable attribute of wealth, family and virtuous esteem. If more closely questioned with reference to the specific incident alluded to, these persons would not hesitate to assert
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