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

my dieh had gone a bit overboard by forcing the Magistrate to kneel, an act that could be seen as turning the world upside down, reversing the order of official and subject. But to do it twice? I think you’re flirting with danger, Dieh. Niang said it best: The Emperor is a mighty force, but a distant one. A County Magistrate is a low-ranking official, but local. It would not be hard for him to find an excuse to make our lives difficult. Magistrate Qian is not someone you want to provoke, Dieh. I told you how he broke my friend Xiaokui’s leg just because he spat at the Magistrate’s palanquin.
    Magistrate Qian rolled his eyes. “When did the Emperor sit in this chair?” he asked frostily.
    “On the eighteenth day of the twelfth month in the Ji-Hai year of 1899 at the Imperial Residence in the Hall of Benevolence and Longevity. When the Empress Dowager heard Grand Steward Li’s report on how I had carried out my duties, She favored me with a private audience. It was then that She presented me with this string of Buddhist prayer beads, telling me that when I laid down my executioner’s sword, I ought to become a Buddha. She then had me seek a reward from the Emperor Himself. His Imperial Majesty stood up and said, “We have nothing at hand to give you, and if you are not bothered by a bulky object, you may take this chair with you.”
    A smirk appeared on the County Magistrate’s gloomy face. “I am a man of little learning and few talents. Yet however ignorant and ill-informed I may be, I have read a classic or two, ancient and modern, domestic and foreign, and in none have I ever read that an emperor would willingly surrender the chair in which he is sitting to anyone—especially not to an executioner. I submit, Grandma Zhao, that this tale is a bit far-fetched, even for you, and that you display unwarranted audacity. Why not go further and maintain that His Imperial Majesty rewarded you with three hundred years of property belonging to the Great Qing Empire, including its rivers and mountains? You wielded a sword for the Board of Punishments for many years, from which we must conclude that you are familiar with most, if not all, national laws. And so, I ask you, how should your fabrication of an Imperial Edict, your bogus assertion that you have come into possession of Imperial furniture, be dealt with under the law, given that you have created a rumor that touches upon the persons of the Empress Dowager and His Imperial Majesty? The slicing death? Or perhaps being cleaved in two at the waist. Shall your entire clan be exterminated?”
    Oh, Dieh, how could you make such wild claims first thing in the morning? Now look what you’ve done—we’re doomed. I was so frightened, my soul flew out of my body, but not before I fell to my knees to beg for forgiveness. “My dieh has offended you, Your Eminence,” I said to Magistrate Qian, “and he is fully deserving of being chopped to pieces that are then tossed to the dogs. But she and I are blameless, and I beg you to be lenient. Please do not exterminate our clan, for if you did, who would bring you dog meat and spirits from now on? On top of that, my wife has now informed me that she is carrying a child, and if there is no way to avoid extermination, you must wait until after the child is born.”
    Diao Laoye rebuffed me: “Use your head, Zhao Xiaojia. Exterminating a clan means precisely that, not letting a single member off the hook. Do you really think they would let a son off just so you could have an heir?”
    My dieh walked up and kicked me. “What are you up to, you no-account son? You are the perfect son so long as there is no trouble. But in a crisis, this is what you turn into!” Then he spun around to face Magistrate Qian. “Since the County Magistrate seems to believe that I am spreading a rumor to dupe him, why not ask the Empress Dowager and His Imperial Majesty in the capital? If you are afraid that is too great a distance to travel, we can go to the yamen to see what Excellency Yuan has to say. He ought to recognize this particular chair.”
    My father’s brief monologue sounded as soft as silk, but a barb was hidden inside it. A stunned and frightened Magistrate Qian shut his eyes and sighed. Then, opening his eyes again, he said, “No need for that. I am a man of inadequate knowledge and deserve Grandma Zhao’s ridicule.” He cupped his hands in front of him in a gesture of respect, after which he once again lowered his wide