‘No, Luo Binwang has not revisited our temple.’

  Judge Dee saw little point going on with the shadow-boxing performance, though. He suspected that the abbot sitting opposite him had been well prepared for this talk, perhaps for a long time. On the crucial questions, Abbot Vanity had made a point of responding cooperatively, yet had provided no concrete information. Nothing wrong about that, of course. But it also meant there was nothing for the judge to move on.

  Why was such a deliberate performance being staged by the Buddhist abbot? What did the old monk have to hide?

  ‘By the way,’ Judge Dee said slowly, ‘have you any clues pointing to the cause of the recent fire in the temple?’

  ‘No, I have not. Did you notice anything suspicious at the fire scene, Your Honor?’

  ‘Nothing,’ Judge Dee responded. ‘Nothing but a small burnt scrap of paper I pulled out of the fist of a nameless dead body. I put the scrap in my pocket, but when I got back in my room for a closer look, the scrap was already reduced to crumbs like dust.’

  ‘Yes, it was small, and badly scorched,’ Disillusion cut in, ‘with only one or two characters remaining faintly readable, but totally meaningless out of context.’

  ‘From dust to dust,’ Abbot Vanity said reverently, ‘oh Merciful Buddha!’

  After the abbot and his disciple had left his room, Judge Dee stood up and looked out of the paper window, yellowed by time.

  The long-haired, exotic-looking white cat was chasing its own shadow in the deserted courtyard, as if debating philosophically about the difference between being a cat and being a shadow. Turning to rub its back against the wall, it licked its tiny tongue in a gesture of satisfaction with life, slipped by the terrace and curled up on a wooden bench. As if aware of another eventless eventide approaching fleet-footedly, the white cat purred itself gradually to sleep once again.

  There was no point disturbing Yang at this moment, Judge Dee reflected. There were so many new theories somersaulting chaotically into the back of his mind that he’d hardly had time to digest any of them. And he was still debating with himself about what could prove to be the ‘right and proper’ thing for him to do about it all. He heaved another long sigh.

  It began to rain. Taking a small sip of green tea, Judge Dee listened to the raindrops pattering against the temple eaves. In the world of red dust, people are lost in appearances, as Abbot Vanity had just described to him – whether meeting in joy or parting in grief, believing only in the current place, the current moment.

  But in this present moment, nothing appeared real, substantial to Dee, except for the tiny bells tinkling on the glazed eaves of the temple, which were ringing faintly in harmony with the rain dripping down to the temple courtyard, drop after drop in unchanging rhythm …

  And Judge Dee felt the unmistakable wave of a real, terrible headache assailing him.

  Twelve

  ‘Laws are like cobwebs, which may catch small flies, but let wasps and hornets break through.’

  – Jonathan Swift

  ‘But at my back I always hear

  Time’s wingèd chariot hurrying near;

  And yonder all before us lie

  Deserts of vast eternity.’

  – Andrew Marvell

  ‘The most tyrannical of governments are those which make crimes of opinions, for everyone has an inalienable right to his thoughts.’

  – Baruch Spinoza

  Judge Dee stepped out of his room and into the temple’s front yard in the early-morning light, feeling properly rested. He took a deep inhale of the fresh air around the blue hills, and fastened a smooth, shiny bamboo hat on his head. It had just been given to him by an old monk, who was crouching amid piles of newly made hats.

  The old monk cast a toothless grin toward the thoughtful judge stepping over the temple threshold, before he went back to slicing the bamboo in a thoughtless, carefree way, bending the slices deftly with a long cleaver. Judge Dee knew from experience that walking alone helped him to think from a new, different perspective. He could see a belt of green stretching out before him, meandering toward the gray horizon. The morning scene remained wrapped in light, opaque mist, though a ray of pallid sunlight seemed to be attempting to break out of the high, nonchalant sky.

  As he strolled on, the tall, dew-speckled wild weeds that lined both sides of the hill trail kept glistening, like myriads of curious, blinking eyes.

  Judge Dee had already caught himself yawning, and he stretched repeatedly to wake himself up, but seemingly in vain. The trail leading away from the temple was narrow and slippery, and it took him some effort to step carefully along it, but it was quiet and peaceful, with a view overlooking a verdant expanse of rice paddy field.

  In the enveloping tranquility, Judge Dee heard a tiny pine nut dropping, dropping so lightly, and simultaneously saw his devoted servant Yang running out of the temple gate. He was chasing after him, helter-skelter, like an inseparable shadow … but not like those alien shadows who were tailing the judge in secret. As Yang’s hurried steps drew nearer, a ray of light splashed on to a surprised brown rabbit crouching in the nearby field.

  From time to time, a man may choose to play a role for reasons not necessarily clear even to himself. But after a while, the role starts to play him instead, whether consciously or not.

  That might have applied to the approaching Yang, Judge Dee reflected pensively, who was not just an obedient servant but also a stubborn, self-declared investigation assistant and bodyguard. Yang had never once forgotten those multiple roles while walking beside his master throughout this ill-starred mission.

  But it might also apply to Dee Renjie – otherwise known as Judge Dee – right now, he thought in ironic self-reflection as he trudged along the trail. He was still carrying out an investigation that was turning increasingly unpleasant.

  The sound of the chorus of temple bells seemed to be wafting over to the trail, as if carried by a fresh breeze, but it did not really help to clear his head.

  ‘I have nothing special for you to do this morning, Yang,’ Judge Dee said, when his breathless servant caught up to him. He added after a short pause, ‘Of course, you may prepare another dose of the herbal medicine for me at your leisure. Right now, I just want to take a long stroll around by myself.’

  ‘Don’t walk out too far, Master,’ Yang said ominously. ‘These hillside trails can be treacherous.’

  It did not take long for Judge Dee to arrive at a junction in the trail, the path forking out in front of him.

  He murmured the lines penned by Wang Bo, another one of the four most excellent poets of the early Tang dynasty: ‘Helpless, the road forking in front of us.’

  So, for Judge Dee too, the question was whether to turn left or right here.

  It did not matter that much to Judge Dee, though, at this present moment, at this present place. He did not know which direction he should follow in the Luo Binwang case either. Picking one would be just like tossing a coin in Daoist divination.

  The decision to turn right or left also reminded Judge Dee of another classic Daoist maxim, which echoed in his mind: No specific purpose may turn out to serve all the purposes.

  In the final analysis, what would Judge Dee’s purpose turn out to be?

  It was a warm day for the time of the year, and the judge felt a suggestion of sweatiness. He might as well keep walking, he thought. He hoped some new ideas for the investigation would occur to him, like a white rabbit jumping out of the somber woods.

  Probably still under the influence of the abbot’s Zen-infused lecture, Judge Dee took a careless right turn and continued strolling without a specific purpose.

  Going over the twists and turns of the case, Judge Dee could not help feeling more and more inclined toward his developing hypothesis: that the undisclosed purpose of the investigation involved something crucial in Luo’s possession – or in the possession of someone closely related to Luo.

  Ning, the former Empress Wang’s maid, was a possible exception. She had no direct relationship to Luo; at least nothing that Dee had uncovered so far. On the other hand, after the release of Luo’s ‘Call to Arms’, Empress Wu could have also put Ning under close surveillance. Luo’s powerful poem contained the same sordid details of Empress Wu’s personal life that Ning had confirmed to be true from her personal knowledge. Had Empress Wu’s omnipresent net of spies therefore drawn a connection between Luo and Ning, even if the two of them had never met?

  Hadn’t Judge Dee himself suspected such a connection in his investigation into Luo’s influential ‘Call to Arms’?

  Had Empress Wu also been aware of Judge Dee’s meeting with Ning? He could not tell. To say the least, however, Ning’s murder had taken place less than a day after her meeting with Judge Dee. So he could not afford to ignore the possibility …

  The hill trail appeared to grow narrower, with tall trees arching overhead, patched with colorful growths and dotted with small bamboo groves here and there. Dewdrops blinked their glistening eyes at the approaching intruder.

  Without knowing how far he had walked from the temple, Judge Dee began to worry about the possibility of losing his way on the shaded hill. When he cast a look over his shoulder, however, he thought he could still catch a glimpse of the distant yellow-glazed eaves of the Dingguo Temple, shimmering in the sunlight.

  To his pleasant surprise, he also saw a rough wooden bench located close to a turn of the hill trail. So there must be people regularly walking here. The area was not that deserted.

  He might as well take a short break, he decided, another wave of tiredness assailing him the moment he collapsed down on to the hard bench. Propped against the bench’s hard wooden back, he still felt inexplicably drowsy. He closed his eyes for a moment or two, in the midst of tiny buzzing flies …

  Something uncanny shocked Judge Dee into wakefulness.

  It seemed to him as if he was transported, all of a sudden, to view the romantic rendezvous between Luo and Little Swallow, the couple projected as a darksome silhouette against the surrounding green. The lovebirds were billing and cooing, their shoulders touching each other, their fingers interwoven, while the boat drifted in the shimmering ripples under the soft moonlight. Little Swallow was singing:

  ‘The moon bright as frost,

  the breeze soft as water,

  a scene of ineffable beauty,

  fish jumping in the curving lake,

  dew glistening on the locust leaves …’

  The scene then changed abruptly, and Judge Dee found himself in discussion with Luo on the very same sampan. Little Swallow had vanished out of sight, though her sweet singing of ‘Bamboo Twig Song’ remained audible in the pitch-black background:

  ‘The clear river meanders

  against thousands of willow shoots.

  The scene remains unchanged

  as it was so many years ago …

  This same old wooden bridge,

  where I parted with her,

  brings no news, alas,

  no news for today.’

  Judge Dee was engaged in a serious face-to-face talk with Luo’s silhouette. The conversation jumped between different topics.

  ‘She’s such a vicious woman – greedy, wanton, shameless.’ Luo did not mince his words, taking a sip of blood-colored wine. ‘And you are the one she chooses to trust, Your Honor. Still, no matter how hard you have worked in this so-called investigation, your mission is nothing but a wild goose chase.’

  ‘A wild goose chase? I’m not sure what you mean, Luo. But let’s try to change the perspective of our discussion. What if “the vicious woman” – as you have just called her – gets what she really wants at the conclusion of the investigation? I mean what meets with her hidden agenda, her real reason for launching this bizarre investigation.’

  ‘What on the earth do you mean, my celebrated, experienced Judge Dee?’

  ‘Let’s suppose that the undisclosed, ultimate reason behind the investigation I’ve been conducting is to retrieve something of vital importance that’s in your possession, or in the hands of someone closely related to you. If the woman in question finally obtains it, what would she do then?’

  ‘What do you mean by “something of vital importance that’s in your possession or in the hands of someone closely related to you”, Your Honor? I’m bamboozled, my masterful Judge Dee. Enlighten me, please.’

  ‘You know the truth more clearly than anyone else, I bet. And let’s also suppose she comes to believe that you truly have disappeared from the world of red dust forever. Then what?’

  ‘I’m not a wise, legendary, high-ranking court official like you. Can you do me a favor and make your enigmatic questions a bit easier to understand, Your Honor?’

  ‘Let me put it another way, Luo. Let us suppose I write a report to the empress concluding my investigation into your disappearance, saying that you have been burned to death in the Dingguo Temple, but I managed to retrieve a small, scorched scrap of paper, which you were grasping tightly in your hand.

  ‘And let us suppose, too, my report states that your body, discovered in the back garden of the temple, was burned out of recognition, and only one or two characters on the scrap were readable, and utterly meaningless out of context.’

  ‘I’m more and more confused. In fact, I am overwhelmed by your wild, absurd argument. How can all these impossible fantasies be dovetailed together to make a coherent picture? There is no logic whatsoever, my most brilliant Judge Dee.’

  Judge Dee thereupon launched into a more detailed narration about the course of his investigation. He told Luo about his speculations and theories, focusing on the mysterious collateral damage, so inhumanly cruel, which had followed the investigating judge from the very beginning of his investigation, starting right in the capital of Chang’an.

  A short spell of silence fell over their boat, which was drifting in the middle of the river. Dead fish were rising to the surface, their ghastly turbid eyes still staring, occasionally goggling, as in a horrible nightmare.

  ‘You’re a clever man, Luo,’ Judge Dee said. ‘And I bet you know what I mean.’

  ‘Well, let me take a guess at what you mean, Your Honor. You are supposing that lascivious, vindictive woman would, after hearing your persuasive theory, finally drop her search for me, without any real evidence of my death?’ Luo said in an incredulous manner, shaking his head wildly. ‘Why should I take your word for it?’

  ‘Trust me, Luo. I’d also be taking a huge risk, as huge as yours. As in the ancient Chinese saying, the company of an emperor can be as dangerous as the company of a tiger. And for that matter, the same can be said for an empress – especially the empress in question.

  ‘Yes, it may be argued that Her Majesty trusts me to some extent, but at the same time she also distrusts, and has suspected me, from the very beginning of the investigation. Sometimes I cannot but wonder what purpose I might have served to her. Simply as a hunting dog or a decoy for those victims she had suspected? This cannot come as too much of a shock to you, Luo. Her Majesty is someone capable of suspecting her own sons, of exiling them and – in whispered hearsay – of slaying them.’

  ‘So you are saying you want to help me?’

  ‘Not just you, but also the innocent victims who’ve followed in the wake of my investigation, the collateral damage. At the scene of the fire at Dingguo Temple yesterday, at least two burnt bodies were discovered. After the deaths of Ning, Hua and Little Swallow, and now the two nameless bodies in the temple, I have said to each of them, “I did not kill you, but you died because of me.” I pledged to do something to redeem myself.’

  ‘If you truly think this, the solution is easy. You can simply call it quits. After all, you don’t have to push the investigation through to the bitter end, my noble-minded Judge Dee.’

  ‘You think the empress would ever listen to me? She listens to the monstrous Monk Xue, to white-jade-face Zhangs, but not to me. As long as she believes you’re still hiding alive somewhere, she will never stop digging three feet deep into the ground, and consequently more innocent victims will become collateral damage.’

  ‘So you, too, have heard of those unbelievable monstrous scandals in her private life?’

  It was a surprising question to be raised by Luo at this juncture. Could it be an unwitting admission of the nature of the “something of vital importance”? Judge Dee’s mind was working at full throttle. Something in Luo’s possession or in the possession of someone closely related to Luo—

  There was a loud, violent, earth-shaking bang – and Judge Dee woke up with a start, rolling off the bench and hitting the ground hard. He groaned, and although his hand had been soiled in the fall, he tried to touch his neck, which was hurting like hell.

  He must have dozed off while sitting on the bench, on the strangely shadowed hill, and sunk into a weird daydream.

  But the dream had been so different from any others he’d had before. It had been unbelievably vivid, realistic and logical too. The various pieces of the puzzle had ‘dovetailed’ into a discernible picture, even though dreams usually had nothing to do with realism and logic, as Judge Dee knew only too well.

  Both in the dream and in reality too, the hypothesis made so much sense to the still disoriented Judge Dee. There was a large, withered leaf stuck on his face and a trickle of drool on the corner of his mouth.

  Perhaps he would have made similar points to Luo, whether he’d been in a dream or not.

  The dream did not come out of the blue, Judge Dee pondered. Particularly because he had been thinking so hard about the ways and means to bring an end – and as soon as possible – to the disastrous investigation into Luo’s disappearance. It was just like another Chinese old saying: What a man is thinking about during the day comes into his dreams at night.