On the Road

Amid the clash of gongs and drums. Upon the stage, that Zhong Kui now stroked his beard with a smile, now raised his fan and glared—and with just a few gestures, he portrayed the light and joyful heart of Zhong Kui traveling home. On all four sides, the ghost rhythm surged darkly. Beneath the assault of the ghost rhythm, Ding Ling still performed Zhong Kui's every movement and posture without the slightest slip. Her mind, too, gradually fused with the state of the character in the play as she went through these motions. When she opened her eyes again, up on the stage, she had already become a "living Zhong Kui"! Watching quietly from the side, even Zhou Yang marveled at how swiftly Ding Ling had slipped into the role. No wonder, after teaching her to sing but a few times, even Chang Dafeng had praised her as a born talent for the opera. It was a pity Ding Ling could not breathe fire; otherwise she could have used it to display Zhong Kui's divine majesty, and would have rendered Zhong Kui so lifelike, so penetrating in its truth. Just as Zhou Yang was still inwardly lamenting this, the audience below the stage—having watched Ding Ling's every posture and gesture—actually all clapped their hands together, as though in high praise of her performance, much to their liking. Fervent applause erupted from the pile of the dead. One dead thing clapped until the rotting flesh on its hands scattered apart; another shook an arm loose; another clapped until its knuckles snapped off one after another. Still beside themselves, they simply scooped up the rotting flesh and severed hands that had fallen away, and as if these things were fresh flowers and colored ribbons, kept hurling them onto the stage, scattering them over the "Zhong Kui" at its center! In the air on all sides, the ghost rhythm suddenly gathered, and drawing up a yin wind, loosed a whistling cry: "Bravo!" The pieces of the corpses came raining down onto the stage like flowers, and the ghost rhythm clinging to them made the parts rot faster still, so that in an instant they turned to dripping filthy blood and poured down in a torrent over Ding Ling at the center of the stage! Zhou Yang's heart clenched! But on Ding Ling's face, beneath the hooked-flower ingot opera facial makeup, a pair of eyes sat half-open, half-closed. The corner of its mouth stirred; with a flick of the folding fan it revealed the great clustering peony blossoms—emblems of auspicious wealth—painted across the fan's face, and at the same moment it sang: "Set out in a row: a broken umbrella, a solitary lamp; "Facing those words of peace and auspicious joy; "Brilliantly gleaming, the sword spits cold starlight! "With the book chest beside me, the green-silk zither following, riding this cold donkey with its plodding gait; "For the thousand-li journey to marry off my sister; "What a scene brimming with joyous celebration!" The moment Ding Ling opened her voice to sing, Zhou Yang suddenly sensed it too—the first gate outside her body, the Opening Door, had already opened. The slender female warding spirit, long hair veiling her face, merged with her form. Before, she had portrayed Zhong Kui so lifelike; now she simply was Zhong Kui. The ghost candle was held aloft by Daole, giving off a faint glow in the corner. The candlelight fell upon Ding Ling, who was channeling her warding spirit, so that her whole person radiated a forbidding, inviolable air—and the downpour of foul, rotting blood that streamed toward her, seared by that air, momentarily scattered like smoke and cloud! Zhong Kui's divine eyes flashed like lightning, sweeping over the audience below. The clamor and applause beneath the stage fell silent all at once! Ding Ling lifted her black boots high, striking the manner of riding a horse along the road, and circled several times about the stage. The "lamp ghost" hiding in the corner now raised the gauze ball lantern high, letting its eerie green firelight fall upon Zhong Kui, and went ahead to lead the way. Hopping and skipping, it bounded down off the stage in a few leaps, forcing the spectators below to scatter in every direction. Some who could not retreat in time were caught in the light of the ghost candle held up by the Daole warding spirit, and froze instantly where they stood. Just then, from behind the straw effigy there suddenly grew a pitch-black, withered, skeletal arm, which gave those frozen dead a gentle push—dead that had still been able to walk and leap, whose every movement was no different from the living—and at once they pitched face-first to the ground! The ghost rhythm upon their corpses was wiped clean away, and they rose no more! The Daole warding spirit drove into the mass of the dead like a stake, clearing a passage for Ding Ling all around it. Ding Ling felt the pressure ease sharply. Following behind the Daole warding spirit, she too stepped down from the stage, and along the passage he had opened, walked toward the small courtyard. As she walked, she sang: "I see only birdsong on the branches, toying with new notes, "By the little bridge, the lingering snow heralds a clear spring. "These few dots of plum blossom add spirit to the snow; "the plum yields to snow in whiteness, yet the snow yields to the plum in fragrance. "Both are pure of character. "Under this faint moonlight, I wind around and around every desolate path. "And again I see the hall and gate so cold and deserted, doubly wounding to the heart— "hear, from the watchtower, the first watch has already sounded." As Ding Ling walked on, the dead crowded thick upon her left and right. Again and again they reached out to touch this Zhong Kui, but each time the firelight of the ghost candle burned them; the hands and arms they stretched forth were scorched to charcoal and fell to the ground one after another. Before long, corpses missing arms and legs lay everywhere about her. The stench of char and the reek of rot mingled and eddied through the space. The stretch from the stage to the window of the main hall in the small courtyard—Ding Ling crossed it fairly smoothly. But as Zhou Yang watched the situation on all sides, he grew somewhat uneasy—as the dead villagers kept trying to drag at Ding Ling, who stood lit within the ghost candle's glow, she was in no immediate danger, yet that ghost candle was burning faster and faster. Only this one stretch of road, and the ghost candle—which had been no longer than a palm to begin with—had burned down by a good half! By this reckoning, the ghost candle would never last until the opera troupe reached the bridge! And this was while the opera ghost had yet to show itself! By the time Ding Ling finished singing the line, "hear, from the watchtower, the first watch has already sounded," Zhong Kui had already been led by the lamp ghost into the courtyard and stood beneath the doorway of the main hall. The lamp ghost went forward and knocked at the door. The spectators either crammed at the doorway or clambered onto the walls, ringing the whole courtyard so tightly that not a breath of wind could pass. A vast dark mass of heads, jostling and swaying. "Knock! Knock! Knock!" Three raps sounded at the door in the silent night. A wooden clapper answered close behind. The window, once pitch-black, was suddenly lit bright by candlelight. Within the window there remained the silhouette of a woman. The woman pressed a hand to her cheek and sang mournfully: "Hear the watchtower—the first watch was sounded long ago; "the watchman's rattle has fallen silent, all is still. "I am a woman orphaned and alone; "who is it that calls at my gate?" The arias still left lingering echoes, curling through the courtyard, long without fading. Over here, the main gate of the main hall had already swung open. The lamp ghost raised its lantern and withdrew into the corner; Zhong Kui stood below the steps before the door, meeting Zhong Mei, who had drawn it open. Chang Dafeng's face was coated with rouge, in the full makeup of a guimendan role; his build was slight and small, and dressed as a woman, it suited him well. Every movement, every frown and smile, was all the demure grace of a modest maiden from a humble household. Even Zhou Yang, studying him closely, could not for a moment tell that this seemingly delicate, fragile woman was in fact played by a sinister, vicious old man like Chang Dafeng! He had heard from Ding Ling that in the opera troupe Chang Dafeng mostly played jing roles, and that Troupe Leader Chang was thoroughly skilled at all the acrobatic tricks that came with the various ghost-and-god plays. How was it, then, that now, playing a dan role, Chang Dafeng was every bit as vivid and true? —And this was by no means only because Chang Dafeng was drawing on his Bloated Aspect warding spirit! Chang Dafeng was just as though he had devoted long years to the study of the dan role, steeped in it day after day; with a few gestures, he could make the part come alive upon his body. Truly made up, appearing to sing the opera, Chang Dafeng left Zhou Yang momentarily stunned. Within the courtyard, the brother and sister met. Zhong Kui told Zhong Mei all the changes that had befallen his life and fortunes since he had left home. Then he spoke of the matter of betrothing his sister to Du Ping. His sister's marriage settled, Zhong Kui at once set off to send her on her way. The play Zhong Kui Marries Off His Sister had now formally raised its grand curtain. "Now set for me carriage wheels and horse hooves; "and hasten onward on this journey. "Banners and pennants screening one another; "burning incense and candles, leading with gauze lanterns. "Listen to the luan and phoenix calling in harmony; "sound the dragon flute, strike the ivory clappers, the alligator-skin drum and phoenix pipes; "note upon note of music. "Warm and glowing, spring haze rising thick—a hundred charms come alive of themselves. "Beneath the umbrella, atop the donkey, sits General Zhong; "in the carriage rides a delicate, graceful beauty." Ding Ling escorted Chang Dafeng, her body swaying gently as if riding a donkey, singing the lines all the while. Chang Dafeng had donned the red bridal veil, his body jolting up and down, exactly like someone seated in a horse-drawn carriage. The Daole warding spirit raised the lantern and led the way, guiding the two of them down from the high ground and onto the main road through the village. Along both sides of the road, the dead villagers of Daliangzi lined the way to welcome them. The dead now all moved slowly forward together with the procession. They no longer tried to reach out and snatch at Ding Ling and Chang Dafeng, who stood lit within the ghost candle's glow, and at this Zhou Yang let out a breath of relief. In the pitch-black night, there was only the sound of Ding Ling's singing. After this stretch of arias had sounded for a long while, another wave of opera voices came, one after another, from the very back of the pile of the dead—the different voices of men and women, old and young, singing in answer line by line, until together they made up the entire operatic passage: "Now set for me carriage wheels and horse hooves; "and hasten onward on this journey. "... "Beneath the umbrella, atop the donkey, sits General Zhong; "in the carriage rides a delicate, graceful beauty." When they sang the final line, "in the carriage rides a delicate, graceful beauty," that opera voice had already reached Zhong Kui's back. Its voice seemed both male and female, impossible to tell its sex. An indescribable sense of the strange and the evil radiated straight out from the singing! A withered, rotting palm suddenly came to rest upon Zhong Kui's shoulder! And even the firelight of the ghost candle did not set that arm alight!