Sandalwood Death: A Novel (Chinese Literature Today Book Series)

peonies, and blooming lilacs, whose perfume was nearly suffocating. The garden was also a showcase for potted mums on a little manmade hill. Prized Lake Tai rocks, all delicately shaped, lined a small pond whose lotus leaves were surpassingly lovely. I recalled seeing a pair of butterflies taking nectar from flowers around which buzzing bees flitted. A woman with a ruddy complexion strolled through the garden, the dour look on her face more severe than any seen on Judge Bao. A slim-waisted, light-on-her-feet serving girl followed close behind, and I knew that, though the older woman was not much to look at, she was the Magistrate’s wife, an intelligent woman from a good family who excelled in both talents and intrigues. Feared by the yayi, she was an intimidating presence in the Magistrate’s life. I had once entertained a desire to stroll through the garden, but Qian Ding insisted that I put that thought out of my mind. He kept me hidden in the Western Parlor to prevent our illicit relationship from going public. So here I was tonight, standing in the garden, not to stroll but to stage a rescue.
    Once we were all together in the bamboo grove, including Hou Xiaoqi’s monkey, which he’d brought down from the tree, we crouched out of sight, waiting for the night watchman to sound the third watch on his clapper before moving on. Noise came on the air from up front, most likely an exchange by one team of sentries relieving the other. Then there was silence, broken only by the forlorn dying chirps of late autumn insects. My heart was pounding; I wanted to say something, but dared not. Meanwhile, Zhu Ba and the others sat peacefully on the ground, neither moving nor speaking, like five dark stone statues. That excluded, of course, the monkey, which began to fidget; Hou Xiaoqi quickly forced it to settle down.
    As the moon traveled westward, its late-night rays grew increasingly cold. Chilled dew settled on bamboo leaves and stalks, lending them an oily sheen. The dew dampened my straw hat, my tattered jacket, even my armpits. If we don’t do something soon, Eighth Master, the sun will be up, I thought anxiously. But then there was more noise from up front, with shouts and bawling and the clanging of a brass gong, followed immediately by a red light that painted the compound scarlet.
    A young yayi in uniform emerged from a path alongside the Western Parlor and, bent at the waist, stole over to us. He beckoned for us to follow him back onto the path, past the Western Parlor, the tariff room, the chief clerk’s office, and the dispatch office all the way up to the lockup, which was in front of the Prison God Temple.
    Flames shot thirty feet into the air in the square fronting the lockup. The mess hall kitchen was on fire. Clouds beget rain, fire creates wind. Thick, choking smoke made us cough. The scene was as chaotic as ants on the move, as raucous as a disturbed crows’ nest. Soldiers scurried back and forth with buckets of water. We took advantage of the confusion to slip past the outer cells and the women’s jail, as if our feet were oiled, spry as cats, undetected, all the way up to the condemned cells. The stench nearly made us gag. The rats there were bigger than cats; fleas and ticks were everywhere. Windowless cells were fronted by low doors, the interiors black as pitch.
    As he unlocked the door, Master Four urged us to move fast fast fast! Zhu Ba tossed his firefly sack inside, abruptly flooding the cell with a green glow. I saw my dieh; his face was bruised black and blue, his mouth caked with dried blood. His front teeth had been knocked out. He no longer looked human. My shout of “Dieh!” was cut short by a hand over my mouth.
    Dieh had been chained, hands and feet, to a “bandit’s stone” in the center of the cell. It was immovable, no matter how much strength was employed. In the flickering firefly light, Master Four removed the padlock on the chains and set him free. Then Xiao Shanzi took off his jacket, which he’d worn over tattered clothes the same color as my dieh’s, and sat down in the vacated spot, where he let Master Four put the chains on him as the others quickly dressed my dieh in the jacket Xiao Shanzi had taken off. With a disjointed stammer, my dieh sputtered:
    “What are you people doing? What do you want?”
    Master Four clamped his hand over his mouth.
    “Dieh,” I said softly, “snap out of it. It’s me, Meiniang. I’ve come to save you.”
    He was still making