Wu Jun, styled Qing’an, made a name for himself while still young. The academician Ge1 read his essays and praised them every time. Through a friend they had in common he had Wu invited to his house, to hear his talk and see his bearing. “How could a talent like young Wu stay poor and lowly for long?” he said. Then he had a neighbour and friend carry a message: “If Qing’an sets his sights on the clouds, I will give him my daughter to bring him towel and comb2.” The academician had a daughter of rare beauty at the time. Wu was overjoyed when he heard, and was sure of himself. Then he failed the autumn provincial examination. He sent word to the academician: “Wealth and rank are mine by right. All that cannot be known is whether they come early or late. I ask you to wait three years for me. If I have not succeeded by then, marry her to someone else.” After that he set himself to study harder than ever.

One night, under a bright moon, a licentiate came to call: fair-skinned, with a short beard, a slender waist and long nails. Asked where he came from, he said, “My surname is Bai, my courtesy name Yuyu.” They talked a little, and his talk opened the heart. Wu liked him and kept him for the night. At dawn Bai wanted to leave; Wu begged him to drop in often whenever he passed. Moved by such warmth, Bai offered to come and lodge with him, fixed a day, and left. On the day, an old servant came first with cooking things. Soon Bai arrived, riding a fine horse like a dragon. Wu put him up in separate quarters. Bai had his servant lead the horse away. From then on they were together morning and evening, delighted with each other. The books Bai read were nothing Wu had ever seen or heard of, and there was not one examination essay3 among them. Surprised, Wu asked him about it. Bai laughed. “Every man has his own aim. I am not one for rank and honours.” Each night he invited Wu to drink. Once he brought out a scroll and gave it to him. It was all arts of breathing; much of it Wu could not understand, and thinking it impractical, he put it aside. Some days later Bai said to him, “What I gave you the other day was the essence of the Yellow Court4, the ladder and the boat to immortality.” Wu laughed. “That is not what I am in a hurry for. Besides, one who seeks immortality must cut every tie of love and still every thought. That is beyond me.” “Why?” asked Bai. Wu said he worried about carrying on his family line. “Then why have you gone so long without marrying?” Wu laughed: “‘I have a weakness5: I am fond of women.’” Bai laughed too: “‘I beg Your Majesty not to be fond of petty beauty.’ What is she like, the one you are fond of?” Wu told him the whole story. Bai doubted she was really so beautiful. “Everyone far and near has heard of it,” said Wu. “It is not just my poor eyes.” Bai smiled faintly and let it drop. The next day he suddenly packed up and said goodbye. Wu, full of sadness, talked on and on and could not stop. Bai had his page go ahead with the baggage. The two could not bear to part. Then a green cicada, chirring, dropped onto the table. Bai took his leave. “My carriage is ready. Let us part here. If you think of me, sweep my bed and sleep in it.” Wu was about to ask more when, in the blink of an eye, Bai shrank to the size of a finger, sprang lightly onto the cicada’s back, and flew off with a shrill buzz, vanishing into the clouds. Only then did Wu know he was no ordinary man. He stood dumbfounded a long while, forlorn and lost.

A few days later a fine rain set in, and he missed Bai keenly. He looked at the bed Bai had slept in: it was littered with mouse tracks. With a sigh he swept it clean, laid out a mat and lay down to sleep. Before long he saw Bai’s page come to fetch him, and gladly went along. Presently a tung phoenix6 came flying down. The page caught it and said to Wu, “The dark road is hard going. You can ride this instead of walking.” Wu worried that so small a bird could not bear him. “Try it,” said the page. Wu did as he said, and found room and to spare; the page perched on its tail. With a cry it soared up into the sky. Before long they came to a vermilion gate. The page got down first and helped Wu down. “What place is this?” Wu asked. “This is the Gate of Heaven.” A huge tiger crouched beside the gate. Wu was terrified, and the page shielded him with his body. Everywhere the scenery was unlike anything in the world. The page led him into the Palace of Vast Cold7. Inside, the steps were of crystal, and people walking there seemed to be inside a mirror. Two cassia trees, each a full armspan round, rose into the sky; the scent of their flowers came on the wind without end. The pavilions all had red windows, and beautiful women came and went, with alluring faces and delicate bones such as the world had never seen. “The beauties in the Queen Mother’s palace are finer still,” said the page. But fearing his master had waited long, he had no time to linger, and hurried Wu out. After a while they saw Bai waiting at his gate. Hand in hand they went in. Beyond the eaves clear water trickled over white sand; with its jade steps and carved railings, Wu half suspected it was the cassia palace of the moon. They had barely sat down when a lovely maid of sixteen came offering fragrant tea. Soon Bai called for wine. Four beauties, their ear pendants tinkling, gathered their skirts and waited on them. No sooner did Wu feel a slight itch on his back than one of them reached under his clothes with slender fingers and long nails to scratch it. His heart and spirit swayed; he did not know where to put himself. Soon, a little tipsy, he began to lose his hold on himself, turned laughing to the beauties and tried to chat with them. They only laughed and drew away. Bai told them to sing to go with the wine. One in crimson gauze raised a cup to the guest and sang there before the table, clear and sweet, her voice winding. The other beauties played pipes, loud and lively, humming along. When she finished, one in a kingfisher-green skirt both poured and sang. There remained one in purple and one in soft pale-white gauze, giggling in the shadows, each urging the other forward and neither willing to go. Bai ordered that one pour and the other sing. The girl in purple came to fill his cup. As he took it, Wu playfully tickled her slender wrist. She laughed and lost her grip, and the cup fell and spilled. Bai scolded her. She picked it up, smiling, bent her head and murmured, “Cold as a ghost’s hand, and it must come grabbing at people’s arms!” Bai roared with laughter and fined her by making her sing and dance on her own. When she had danced, the one in pale white sent over another horn of wine. Wu declined, saying he could not drain it. The girl, holding the wine, looked abashed, so he forced it down. Looking closely at the four, all graceful and charming, he saw not one who was not peerless. He said abruptly to his host, “Of the beauties among men I have sought only one, and found even that hard. You have gathered all the flowers here. Could you truly make my soul melt?” Bai laughed. “You already have a beauty in mind. How could these be worth your great eyes?” “Now I know how little I have seen,” said Wu. Bai called all the girls and had him choose for himself. Wu was so dazzled that he could not decide. Since he had already taken the girl in purple by the arm, Bai had her bring her bedding and attend the guest. Then, under the quilts, their love was as tender as it could be. Wu asked her for a keepsake, and she slipped a gold bracelet from her wrist and gave it to him. Suddenly the page came in. “The road of immortals and the road of mortals are different. You must go at once.” A tiger’s roar burst out, and Wu fled in fright. He looked down: there was no bottom, and his feet were already falling. He woke with a start; the morning sun was already red. He was about to shake out his clothes when he felt something smooth against the bedding. He looked: it was the bracelet. He marvelled all the more. From then on his old desires turned to cold ash. He often wanted to go off and wander with Master Red Pine8, but he still worried about an heir. Over ten months later, while he was sound asleep in the daytime, he dreamed the woman in purple came in from outside with a baby swaddled at her breast. “This is your own flesh and blood. Such a thing cannot be kept in heaven, so I have brought him to you.” She laid him on the bed, pulled a robe over him, and made to hurry away. Wu pressed her to make love. Then she said, “The first time was our wedding cup; this time is our parting forever. A hundred years of marriage end here. If you have the will, perhaps we will meet again.” Wu woke and found the baby lying on the bedding. He swaddled him and told his mother. She was delighted and hired a nurse to feed him. They named him Mengxian. Wu then sent word to the academician that he was about to withdraw from the world, and that he should choose another good match. The academician would not hear of it. Wu insisted on declining. The academician told his daughter. She said, “Everyone far and near knows that I am promised to young Wu. To change now would be to have two heavens9.” He sent her answer to Wu. Wu said, “Not only have I no wish for rank and honours, I have cut myself off from the love of women. The only reason I do not go into the mountains at once is that my old mother is still alive.” The academician consulted his daughter again. She said, “If young Wu is poor, I am content to eat his coarse greens. If young Wu goes away, I will serve his mother. I will never marry anyone else.” Messengers went back and forth three or four times and nothing was settled, so the academician chose a day, prepared carriages, horses and a trousseau, and sent her to marry into Wu’s house. Wu was moved by her goodness and treated her with the utmost respect and love. She served her mother-in-law with filial devotion, bending to her every wish, more than any poor man’s daughter would have done. Two years later his mother died. His wife pawned her trousseau to pay for the funeral and left no rite undone. Wu said, “With a wife like you, what have I to worry about? Remember: when one man attains the Way, his whole house rises to heaven10. I am going far away, and I leave everything to you.” She took it calmly and did not try to keep him. And so Wu went.

Outside, she managed the family’s living; inside, she taught the fatherless boy; and everything was in good order. Mengxian grew up brilliant beyond compare. At fourteen, as a child prodigy, he passed the provincial examination; at fifteen he entered the Hanlin Academy. Each time the court conferred honours on his parents, he did not know his mother’s surname, and so only Lady Ge received a title. At the seasons of frost and dew11 he would ask where his father was, and his mother told him everything. He wanted to give up his post and go looking for him. “Your father left home to follow the Way more than ten years ago,” his mother said. “He must have become an immortal and gone. Where could you look for him?” Later he was sent by imperial command to sacrifice at the Southern Peak12, and on the way he was set upon by bandits. In his desperate plight a Daoist rushed in with a sword, and the bandits all scattered before him; the ring around Mengxian was broken. Grateful, Mengxian offered him gold, which he would not take. Instead the Daoist brought out a letter and entrusted it to him. “I have an old friend from your honour’s own village. Would you trouble to pass on my greetings?” “What is his name?” “Wang Lin.” Mengxian thought back and could recall no one of that name in the village. “A poor humble man of the fields,” said the Daoist. “Naturally a great official would not know him.” As he was leaving, he brought out a gold bracelet. “This is a lady’s thing. I am a Daoist; I picked it up and have no use for it. Take it as my thanks.” Mengxian looked at it: the inlay and carving were exquisite. He carried it home in his breast and gave it to his wife. She loved it, and had a fine craftsman make another to match, but it never came near the original’s delicacy. He asked all over the village, and there was no such person as Wang Lin. He opened the letter in private. It read: “Three years as phoenix mates, then parted, each beneath his own sky. You buried my mother and raised my son, all by your goodness. I have no way to repay you; I send you one pill. Split it and eat it, and you can become immortal.” At the end was written: “To Lady Linniang, at her dressing table.” When he had read it, he could not make out who was meant, and took it to his mother. She held the letter and wept. “This is a letter home from your father. Lin is my girlhood name.” Only then did he see that “Wang Lin” was a split-character riddle13. He was filled with regret. He showed his mother the bracelet too. “This belonged to your mother,” she said. “When your father was at home, he once showed it to me.” He looked at the pill: it was the size of a bean. “My father is an immortal,” he said joyfully. “If you take this, you are sure to live forever.” His mother did not swallow it at once, but took it and put it away. Then Academician Ge came to see his grandson. His daughter recited Wu’s letter and offered him the pill to wish him long life. The academician split it, and they ate it between them. In a moment they were full of vigour. The academician was seventy that year and badly doddering; suddenly he felt strength swelling in his sinews under the skin. He gave up his sedan chair and walked, so briskly and quickly that his household had to pant to keep up. The next year a great fire broke out in the capital and burned all day without going out. No one dared to sleep at night; the whole household gathered in the courtyard. The flames sprawled every which way and spread to the neighbours’ houses. The family was frantic and did not know what to do. Suddenly the gold bracelet on his wife’s arm gave a ringing sound, slipped off and flew away. They looked: it had grown to cover some several mu, spread over the house like the halo round the moon, its open end coming down at the southeast corner, plain to see. Everyone was astounded. In a moment the fire came from the west; as it neared the ring it veered and leapt across to the east. When the fire had moved off, they thought to themselves that the bracelet was gone for good. Then the red glow suddenly drew in, and the bracelet dropped with a clang at their feet. Tens of thousands of houses in the capital burned; on every side all was ash. Only the Wu house was unharmed, except for a small tower at the southeast corner, which burned to nothing — just where the open end of the ring had left a gap. Lady Ge was past fifty, but those who saw her took her for a woman of about twenty.