Now, Ji Gong came to Chancellor Qin’s mansion, and the men on duty went in to report. Chancellor Qin gave the order: “Bring the mad monk in.” His attendants answered as one. It was still Head Constable Zhao who led Ji Gong inside by the chain. Ji Gong looked: the old abbot, the prior and the attendant were all there, and seventy-two household men stood along the two side galleries. Ji Gong came in and stood there without kneeling. From inside, Chancellor Qin looked out and saw nothing but a poor, ragged monk. He slapped the table and said, “What gall, you mad monk! I sent my men to your temple to borrow timber. Lending it would have been a favour; refusing it was your right. And you dared work sorcery and black arts and beat my steward! Tell me the truth!” Now the monk ought to have told it straight: how they had come to tear down the Great Stele Tower, how he had told them not to, and how the fight had started. Ji Gong said nothing of the kind. “Your Lordship,” the monk said, “you’re asking me? You hold the post of chief minister and rank among the Three Eminences1. You ought to do good, store up virtue and spread blessings. Instead, for no reason, you tear down holy ground. The more this monk talks, the angrier he gets! Drag His Lordship down and give him forty strokes of the board for me, and then we’ll do the asking!” At these words Chancellor Qin flew into a rage. “What gall, you mad monk, to slander a minister of state! Here! Men, drag the mad monk down and give him forty hard strokes of the bamboo rod!” Now these bamboo rods were the house punishment of Chancellor Qin’s mansion, and nothing was crueller. The hollow of the bamboo was filled with quicksilver, and however strong a man was, forty strokes would split his skin and lay his flesh open. Today the rods were to be used on the mad monk. When Ji Gong heard he was to be beaten, he turned and crouched down among the five monks, the old abbot and the prior and the rest. Three household men came over, grabbed Ji Gong and pinned him to the floor. “All right, monk, you think hiding in there gets you off?” One held down his shoulders, one held down his legs. The monk lay with his head to the west. The man with the rod stood on the south side and asked His Excellency to witness the punishment, then swung the rod and laid on forty strokes. The monk did not make a sound. When they had finished, the three stepped aside. Chancellor Qin looked out from inside. “You pack of curs! I told you to beat the mad monk. Why have you beaten the prior?” The three looked and thought it very strange. A moment ago they had plainly grabbed Crazy Ji. How had he turned into the prior, Guangliang? Only now could Guangliang get the words out: “Oh, you’ve beaten me to death!” A moment ago he had opened his mouth and no sound would come. Now the forty strokes were done, his skin split and his flesh laid open, and the blood ran down. Chancellor Qin ordered, “Change the men. Another squad, and give the mad monk forty hard strokes of the bamboo rod! You mad monk, if I don’t beat you, may I be no man!” Three more men came over to do the beating. One grabbed Crazy Ji. “Monk, we won’t get the wrong man this time.” “If it’s my turn, I’ll go,” said Ji Gong. “Monk,” the three said, “are you going to make us work for it? Lie down.” “Have you spread out the bedding?” said Ji Gong. “Don’t play the fool,” said the servant. “We’re about to beat you, and you want bedding?” He grabbed Crazy Ji and threw him down. One man straddled his shoulders and held him by both ears, another straddled his legs, and the third flipped up the three flaps of his trousers and raised the bamboo rod. “Beat him! Beat him! Beat him!” Chancellor Qin ordered. The man brought the rod down with all his strength. It was still a foot from Crazy Ji’s legs when, of its own accord, the rod bent aside and came down whack on the waist of the man astride the shoulders, sending him flying three or four paces. Clutching at his waist and legs, the man yelled, “Ow! Ow! You’ve killed me! Fine, fine, fine! This morning you wanted to borrow two hundred cash off me and I wouldn’t lend it, so now you use your office to settle a private score!” Chancellor Qin, furious, had him taken away and ordered, “Change the men again, and give the mad monk eighty hard strokes! If I don’t beat you, mad monk, may I never hold office again!” “If I let you beat me,” said Ji Gong, “may I never be a monk again.” Three more men came over. One of them said, “Right: I straddle his shoulders, Qin Sheng holds his legs, and you do the beating. And don’t go swinging that bamboo rod all over the place.” The man doing the beating said he wouldn’t, took aim at the monk’s legs and brought the rod down. The moment it fell, it bent aside, and crack! it landed on the back of the man astride the legs and pitched him forward on his face. Inside, Chancellor Qin saw it and understood. The first time they had beaten the prior by mistake, the second time the man on the shoulders, and this time the man on the legs: this had to be the monk’s sorcery and black arts. He ordered his men to take down the hall curtain, thinking that the majesty of the reigning chancellor in person would ward off the monk’s magic. The servants took down the curtain, and Chancellor Qin strode out. At that moment Ji Gong, lying on the floor, rolled his eyes up to look. Chancellor Qin was a most imposing sight. What did he look like? There is a poem to prove it. All one saw was:

Chancellor Qin’s face, in that fit of fury, was frightening to see. He ordered his men, “Beat him! Beat him! Beat him!” How could the servants dare hang back? One snatched up the bamboo rod and came at the monk savagely. He raised the rod and brought it down, but he put too much force behind it: the rod flew out of his hand and went straight for Chancellor Qin. The servant was frightened half to death! At this sight Chancellor Qin’s anger surged up. He stooped and picked up the rod, meaning to beat the monk himself, when all at once a sound came from the inner quarters, and Chancellor Qin gave a great start. Now, Chancellor Qin kept a well-ordered house. There were no men in the inner quarters, and even the old serving women, the maids and the little boys no more than three feet tall could not go into the inner quarters unless they were called. Only for urgent business was the signal gong5 struck. Today, hearing the gong, Chancellor Qin stood stunned, when an old serving woman came running out of the inner quarters. “Your Lordship, something terrible has happened! Your Lordship’s bedchamber is on fire!” Hearing this, Chancellor Qin knew it was the monk’s sorcery. He hastily ordered twenty of his men: “Lock the monk up in an empty room. At the third watch6 I will question him.” Pointing at Ji Gong, Chancellor Qin said, “Mad monk, even if you burn my mansion till not a tile is left, I will still send you to the proper court and have you given eighty strokes of the bamboo rod. Only then will I have vented my anger.” With that he told Qin Sheng, “Take twenty men and guard the monk. I am going to the inner quarters to see.” Taking several dozen household guards, he went to the inner quarters. His wife stood in the courtyard, trembling with fright, and the serving women and maids were rushing to put out the fire. “Where did the fire start?” his wife asked. “From the big incense burner,” said a maidservant. “A spark from it caught the green gauze on the window lattice.” Chancellor Qin at once sent the servants to put the fire out, then picked up the incense burner himself and dashed it to the floor. The frightened maidservants hurried to pick it up. When they looked it over, the burner was not damaged at all, for it was cast of solid gold. As the saying goes: A golden basin may break, but it is still a treasure; its weight is not short by half a grain. When Chancellor Qin saw the fire was out, he went into the room. “Your Lordship,” his wife asked, “what has made you so angry?” Chancellor Qin told her how the mad monk had beaten his men by sorcery, and how he had had troops surround Lingyin Temple and the monks of the temple brought in chains. “I was just about to have the mad monk beaten, and three times running he slipped out of it by his black arts. I was about to beat him myself when the fire broke out in the back quarters. I have still had all the monks locked up in an empty room, and at the third watch that mad monk will be beaten without fail.” “Why should Your Lordship trouble to contend with such ignorant people?” said his wife. As they were talking, a maidservant came to report: “Supper is ready. Where will Your Excellency take it?” “Here will do,” said Chancellor Qin. The maids set out cups and chopsticks, but Chancellor Qin was so full of anger that he could not eat. He drank a couple of cups and had it all cleared away. Then he sat in the room with a book. The lamp was lit, and Chancellor Qin read it over several times but could not take it in. He slumped over the desk, his head pillowed on his bent arm7, and just as he was drifting off, on the edge of sleep, in that drowsy haze, all he heard was:

Now, the Chancellor looked, and in from outside came a great ghost, eight feet tall, his face like black smoke. On his head was a black satin warrior’s cap of six panels. He wore a short black cotton jacket, a black gauze sash knotted at his waist, bright red silk trousers and light black satin boots. He had curving brows and big eyes, and in his hand he held a three-pronged sky-propping trident wreathed in fierce smoke. Behind him came another, eight feet tall, his hat a good two feet high, white from head to foot, his face a faint purple, purple shot with black. In his hand he held a mourning staff8, and he planted himself in front of Chancellor Qin. Behind him came one more, wearing a ruyi scarf with two ruyi wings pointing at the sky, a green satin robe and official’s boots. His face was pale and square, and in his hands he held a brush and a ledger. Behind him came yet another, his head wrapped in a soft kerchief of blue satin embroidered with roundels of flowers in five colours. He wore soft black satin armour and light black cloth boots. His face was faintly purple, with heavy brows and wide eyes, and in his hand he dragged an iron chain locked fast on a man. That man wore a great lock at his neck, manacles on his hands and fetters on his feet. His face was withered, his hair wild and tangled, his beard a clump like a tangle of weeds. Chancellor Qin looked: it was his own father, the old Grand Preceptor Qin Hui9, come home on his soul’s return10. Behind him, close on his heels, followed a little ghost. A silk kerchief covered his head, his face was blue as mud, he had two cinnabar-red brows and a pair of golden eyes bulging from his head, and his body looked as if it had been brushed with lacquer. Round his waist was a tiger-skin war skirt, and in his hands he held a great toothed spike and a wolf-fang club. “Father,” said Chancellor Qin, “your son thought you had long since gone up to heaven. Who would have thought you were still in the Underworld, suffering such torments? Go back for now, sir. Tomorrow without fail your son will invite eminent Taoists and eminent monks to perform rites for your soul, so that you may soon rise to heaven.” “My son,” said Qin Hui, “while your father was in the world of the living, he held the highest seat in the government for many years and blocked the road of worthy men. At Fengbo Pavilion he put Yue and his son to death. Above, he provoked the wrath of Heaven; below, he earned the hatred of men. Now I have been cast into the Black Hell, where I suffer every kind of torment. Today, by command of King Yama, I have come home on my soul’s return to warn you. You are chancellor: you ought to do good, store up blessings and build up virtue. Not only do you do no good, you even mean to tear down holy ground. Your sins are grave. It is because you tore down the Great Stele Tower of Lingyin Temple and had the monks taken in chains. Heed your father’s good advice: let the monks go home at once and rebuild the Great Stele Tower.” Just as he got this far, the great ghost with the trident said, “Brothers, drag him off!” With a clatter he shook his iron trident of yin and yang, and they hauled Qin Hui away. “Father, don’t go yet!” said Chancellor Qin. “Your son has more to tell you.” The ghost runners would hear nothing of it and dragged him off. Chancellor Qin rushed forward and caught hold of him, and heard a loud clang. Chancellor Qin opened his eyes and looked, and something startling had happened.

To learn what happened next, read the next chapter.