The Warning Voice by Cao Xueqin Read Free Book Online

daythat the ten of you were due to enter your human bodies, I happened to have been around at old Yama’s place and done a little piddle on the floor, and just before she was born, that little sister-in-law of yours drank it all up. That’s what gave her such a clever tongue. If clever tongues are all you want, I can do as much piddle for you as you like.”’
    The story ended amidst laughter.
    â€˜It’s a good job all of
us
are such stupid, tongue-tied creatures,’ said Xi-feng. ‘I should hate to think that any of
us
had drunk monkey’s piddle!’
    You-shi and Lou-shi turned towards Li Wan, laughing:
    â€˜I wonder who she thinks she’s fooling. It’s very clear which of us in this room is the one who drank monkey’s piddle!’
    â€˜A joke is always the better for being apt,’ Aunt Xue observed.
    While she was speaking, the drumming began again. The maids, who wanted only to hear Wang Xi-feng tell a joke, had come to a secret understanding with the blind women that if one of them coughed it would be a signal to stop, and when the branch had been round twice and had just reached Xi-feng for the second time, the maids all coughed and the drumming stopped. There was a shout of laughter from all present.
    â€˜Ha!’ they said. ‘Now we’ve got you! Hurry up with your wine and tell us a good one – only don’t make us laugh so much that we get stomach-ache!’
    Xi-feng thought for a few moments and then started:
    â€˜A family was celebrating the First Moon festival, just as we are doing, admiring the lanterns and drinking wine together. It was a very lively party and everyone in the family was there: the grandmother, the great-grandmother, the daughters-in-law, the granddaughters-in-law, the great-granddaughters-in-law, the grandsons, the great-nephews, the great-grandsons, the great-great-grandsons, the great-little-medium-grandsons, the granddaughters, the great-nieces, the first cousins once removed, the first cousins twice removed, the second cousins two-and-a-half times removed – oh, goodness gracious me, it was a really lively party! –’
    Her audience were already laughing.
    â€˜She’s a caution!’ they said. ‘I wonder which of us she’s got it in for this time.’
    â€˜Don’t you bring
me
into it,’ said You-shi, laughing: ‘I’ll tear your mouth for you!’
    Xi-feng stood up and struck her hands together in mock despair:
    â€˜Here am I going to all this trouble to entertain you and all you do is keep interrupting. All right then, I won’t go on.’
    â€˜Go on, go on! Take no notice of them!’ said Grandmother Jia. ‘What happened then?’
    â€˜What happened then?’ said Xi-feng. ‘Oh, there they all sat, and after drinking together all night long, they went to bed.’
    She said this straight-faced and in a very matter-of-fact tone of voice. Her audience waited open-mouthed for her to continue, but nothing was forthcoming, and at last they realized, with a chill of disappointment, that that was all they were going to hear. After a long, old-fashioned look from Shi Xiang-yun she relented, however.
    â€˜All right, let me tell you another story about people celebrating the First Moon festival.
    â€˜Some men were taking an enormous rocket outside the city and a crowd of thousands had collected behind them to see them let it off. While they were still on their way, some impatient character who couldn’t bear to wait any longer put a lighted incense-stick to the touch-paper and lit the fuse. There was a great WHOOSH ! and the rocket went off. Everyone burst out laughing and went off home – all except the man who had been underneath, carrying the rocket on his back. He just stood there all on his own, complaining what a rotten job the firework-maker had made of the rocket. He’d put it together so badly, he said, that all the gunpowder had