Everyone in the car could not help feeling puzzled. Why was she coming back with a photo album? As she came near, she showed one of the photographs in the album to Uncle Quan, "Is this your teacher?" Uncle Quan looked closely and gasped, "Ah! He is, even though I have never once addressed him so! How is it possible that you have the photograph of my teacher!" The woman smiled mischievously and revealed, "Your teacher and mine were husband and wife!" Surprised by this, Uncle Quan said immediately, "I see! Where is he now? Is he well?"
"They have passed on..." The woman said somberly. "Huh? Was he also buried at the same graveyard? Stop the car! I must pay my respects!" But the woman stopped him and said, "No. They were buried at Shanxi!" Uncle Quan stopped short and asked, "But how did you know? How did you know that I was the student of your teacher's husband?" The woman sighed before she said,
Just then, I noticed a slight expression of bewilderment on Uncle Quan's face. The woman's story had finally explained why did his teacher treat him with so much love and affection. He must have been about the same age as his teacher's own child. If she had detected the change on Uncle Quan's face, the woman certainly showed no indication of it. Instead, she pressed on bluntly, "But it was none other than my teacher's husband's junior sister who had stolen their baby boy. She had an intense loathing for my teacher's husband – your teacher and her senior brother – who had rebuffed her love for him. Days turned sour and bitter for my teacher and her husband. This went on for many years until the junior sister of your teacher, reflecting upon the horror that she had wrought on the person whom she had once adored and loved, confessed everything to the man, the baby boy she had stolen now grown up, on her deathbed. The man, now middle-aged, came from Shanxi in search of his
The distressed look on Mrs. Lee's face was a clear sign that something was wrong. When we had first met, I had come to know both she and her husbands were straightforward people. Everything in their minds was either illustrated on their faces or directly conveyed via words. I put aside my lunch box and went out to her, "You look worried, Auntie. What's wrong?" Mrs. Lee sighed once and said, "Aye... Is your father in, Shiyan?" She must have gotten herself into a tight spot again since she asked for my father immediately when we met, and I said to her, "Urm... My father had gone fishing with Uncle Quan. They had left even before the sun was up." She immediately asked where he had gone fishing. The matter seems to be extremely urgent, I thought, she might even had thought of going to the place where my father was fishing to ask for his help! Knowing that the matter could wait no longer, as clearly shown by her tone and the looks on the people behi
And where did the second brother carried the baby to? The market. In those days people were openly trafficked in the market without suffering much scrutiny and stigma. The man found a spot in the market, laid a piece of cloth on the ground and placed his nephew on it, himself kneeling just beside. Anyone walking past him would instantly realize that he was putting the baby up for sale. Before long, troupes of onlookers began clustering around curiously. Oddly, the baby neither cried nor wailed. Some of the onlookers began teasing him, and he laughed adorably like a sacrificial lamb oblivious of its fate. Until suddenly, a manservant plowed through the crowd to make way for his master, a wealthy-looking merchant who had another servant following behind with a large pouch over his shoulder. The merchant marched forward and inquired the second brother of his plight that had led to such a pitiable decision to sell a child. Still on his knees, the second brother gave a deep bow
Sighing with exasperation, Mr. Lee shook his head. He rose from his seat and turned to walk out. He walked for a few paces and turned back suddenly, "Wait! You may not be able to divine a person's fate twice a day. But your apprentice can! Chongxi can do it for me again!" Yuan Chongxi burst out guffawing hard and remarked, "You are indeed a shrewd businessman, Mr. Lee. Your mind is truly quick to find loopholes to exploit!" Mr. Lee fished out a Suyan cigarette from its box and offered it to Yuan Chongxi, pleading, "Please, my boy. Just help me this time..." Yuan Chongxi took Mr. Lee's hand in his, patted it and said, "Very well. I'll have another go. Only for you. But please forgive my bluntness if I am too forthcoming about the outcome!" Revitalized with fresh hope, Mr. Lee slapped his chest and said, "Who do you think I am? I have had my share of great things myself! I will never be angered nor frightened by anything you will s
Old Man Chen had grown up an orphan boy since his youth, knowing only his teacher as a parent figure. Since his boyhood, his teacher had meticulously trained him in the skills of divination and had provided him with the essential fundamentals for his future. He would watch from the side and quietly test his skills whenever his teacher worked his magic for clients and patrons. As time passed, the boy grew up, and so did his skills. He began feeling more and more confident in his abilities and was proud of himself, until Fate grew jealous and vengeful. Old Man Chen was a boy of 12 that year, still an apprentice who followed his teacher everywhere. They had taken up lodging one night at a Taoist monastery when a call roused them from their rest. Religious faiths were viewed as one of the elements of the Four Olds during the height of the Cultural Revolution. A rowdy mob marched up the hills, each brandishing flaming brands in their hands, and arrived at the monastery to burn i
We had a look at each other, and Uncle Old Chen first said, "Yes, you can invite a master to do fortune-telling for you." I thought in my mind that you could do that. But now do your words mean that you don't want to do and push it to others? The grandmother didn't know his real meaning. Hearing what the old blind man said, she turned to other people sitting around the table and said, "Sorry to trouble you. Which master can fortune-tell for me? I'm so worried." Uncle Chen, an old blind man, was obviously reluctant to do it. Except for him, only my father, Chongxi and I could do, among us only my father was a master. At this time, however, my dad pointed to Yuan Chongxi and said, "He is the master. He can fortune-tell for you." What dad said astonished us all including Yuan Chongxi.The child's grandmother seemed didn't know how to react, and could only smiled. At this time, she must have thought in her mind, "He doesn't look like a
A wave of fear descended on me as what the old university guard said to me gradually sank in. Being in trade of dealing with the supernatural, it was hardly a coincidence that my first thoughts wondered that this might have been the doing of something otherworldly. With hurriedness and concern showing on my face, I muttered to the old man, "I must go up to have a look. My teacher..." But the old man stopped me in my tracks, saying, "She's no longer upstairs. She was the first to be stretchered off into the ambulance that day." I ignored the old man and immediately rushed towards the rooms where training lessons for zithers were held. "Why did no one notice the incongruity and queerness of all the sicknesses? Why was only the students and teachers of the zither class riddled with this strange sickness? Something must be wrong," I thought. As I walked through the doors of the classroom, I met head-on with a young lady whom I asked sharpl
The tunes of "Liu Qing Niang" (literally the Lady of the Green Willow) wafted heavily over the eaves of a zither lessons classroom in the university; the sad, sorrowful tune cast a blanket of gloom and melancholy across the whole room. Never did anyone expect that the instructor for zither lessons, Yang Na, would be urgently hospitalized that night after playing this song. A piece of a wooden block was unearthed from the ground; an ancient relic found during the excavation of the school grounds which was part of the university's recent expansion project. By a stroke of coincidence, the Archaeology lecturer was present, and he called out frantically for the construction workers to handle the wooden block with care. After cleaning it, it was discovered that it was the board of an ancient zither! The age-old instrument was then delivered to Yang Na, the lecturer in charge of Ethnomusicology, for further examination and study. Judging by the number of strings able to