Yang Yuwei had moved to a house by the bank of the Sishui River. His study faced an open wilderness. Outside the wall were many ancient tombs. At night, winds blew through white poplar trees, setting them to roaring like sea waves.
Yang was feeling lonely and sad in the dim candlelight, one sleepless night, when suddenly he heard someone murmuring, “Dead night, only the wind blows, nobody but fireflies roam.” The verse was repeated in a sad, girlish voice. Yang felt strange. The next morning, he went outside the wall to check but found no one; there was only a purple ribbon in the bush. He picked up the ribbon and hung it on the window. That night at about the same hour, he heard the strange voice again. He stood on a stool to look over the wall, but the voice stopped abruptly. Yang realized it must be a ghost but felt attracted to it all the same.
The following night, Yang hid behind the wall. As the same hour approached, a young woman emerged from the bush, her hands touching a small tree, her head lowered as she repeated the verse in a rueful voice. Yang gave a little cough. Instantly, the woman disappeared into the bush. Yang stood there, listening hard, but heard nothing, so he added two lines of his own to the unfinished poem, “A lonely heart nobody knows, pines away on a moon-lit night.” After that, there was total silence. Yang went inside.
No sooner had he sat down than a pretty woman came in. After making a curtsy, she said, “I ought not to have fled in such haste because you are a gentleman.” Delighted, Yang offered her a seat and found the woman extremely frail. “Where are you from? How long have you been here?” he asked.”I’m from western Shaanxi. I came with my father. Twenty years ago, I died of an acute disease at the age of seventeen. In the nether world I suffer the loneliness of a strayed goose. What you’ve heard is a poem I tried to compose to describe my sorrow. I was searching hard for the last two lines when you finished it for me. You made me happy in the nether world,” the woman said. Yang wanted to make love with her, but she frowned, “I’m a dead person. If I make love with a living person, his life will be shortened. I don’t want that to happen to you.” Yang agreed, but his hands started fumbling with her breasts, which felt as smooth as those of a virgin. He wanted to see her tiny feet under her skirt. The woman chided him with a laugh, “You are an annoying pervert!” Yang grabbed one of her feet to caress it. She wore a white silk sock tied with a string on that foot. He looked at the other and saw a purple ribbon around it. He asked why. She said, “I lost one ribbon last night when I was running away from you.” “Let me tie it back for you,” he said, his band reaching for the ribbon on the window sill. After that, the woman began to browse through the books on his table. Suddenly she saw a book of poems by the Tang Dynasty poet Yuan Zhen. “This was my favorite book when I was alive. It all seemed like a dream,” she said sorrowfully. Then they talked about poetry. Yang found she was very knowledgeable and charming. In the candlelight, they talked deep into the night just like two old friends.
From then on, the woman ghost would often visit Yang’s house. She told him to keep their meetings secret because she was extremely shy and feared that someone might make trouble for them. Yang promised. The two fell very much in love. Although they did not have sex, they behaved like a married couple. She would help him transcribe manuscripts in her delicate handwriting and recite poems she copied from books. She also played chess with him and the pipa (a 4-stringed Chinese lute). The tune of “Night Rain Tapping on the Window”was so sad that Yang asked her to change to a “Garden Alive with Song Birds,” which at once filled the room with a cheerful mood. Often they were having such a good time that they forgot the time until early morning streaked into the room. Alarmed, the woman would run out in haste.
One day, a friend named Xue dropped in while Yang was asleep. He saw the pipa and the chess in the room and wondered when Yang had developed such hobbies. He opened the books on the table and found pages of poems copied in a beautiful handwriting. He sensed something was going on. When Yang woke up, Xue asked him to explain everything. “I just began to learn to play the pipa and chess,” Yang said. Those hand-copied poems, he said, were borrowed from a friend. Xue flipped through the pages and found a line of small characters at the bottom of the last page, saying it was hand-copied by Lian Suo. “That is a woman’s name,” Xue said, laughing. “Why do you want to trick me?” Yang was embarrassed and speechless. Xue begged for truth. Yang was unmoved until he saw that Xue was clutching the pages under his armpit and about to leave. Then, he surrendered. His account fascinated Xue, who asked Yang to introduce Lian Suo to him. Yang said he had promised to keep her visits a secret. Since Xue was persistent, Yang could not but agree in the end. That night Lian Suo came as usual. Yang told her what had happened that day. She was very angry. “What did I tell you the other day? You don’t seem to remember!” she said, refusing to listen to his explanation. “This is the end of our relationship. I’m going.” She rose and left in anguish.
The next day Xue came. Yang told him that Lian Suo did not want to see any strangers. Xue suspected it was a lie, so he invited two friends to a party at Yang’s house. They talked loudly all night, to the chagrin of Yang. This went on for several days but nothing happened. Disappointed, the men talked less and less and were getting ready to leave, when they heard someone reciting a poem. They held their breaths. It was a sad voice. A wuxincai (one who passed the county-level martial arts test during the Ming and Qing dynasties) named Wang threw a big stone in the direction of the voice and shouted, “Come out! Stop hiding there and making that woeful noise!” Abruptly the voice stopped. Everyone blamed Wang for his rudeness, and Yang Yuwei was incensed. The following day, the three men left. Yang was alone in the empty house,longing for Lian Suo, but she did not reappear.
On the third day, Lian Suo suddenly finally made an appearance. Crying, she said, “Look at what you have done to me with your evil friends.” Yang begged her pardon, but she turned and said, “I’ve told you our relationship is finished.” Yang tried to hold her, but she vanished again. Another month passed without a trace of Lian Suo. Yang grew haggard and emaciated from longing.
One night, Yang was drinking liquor by candlelight when, all of a sudden, Lian Suo entered the room. Yang was overjoyed. “Can you forgive me now?” Lian Suo did not reply but tears poured down her cheeks. Finally, her lips moved, “I overreacted last time, now I feel embarrassed to come back for help.” Yang asked why. “There is a ghost who wants to force me to marry him. But I’m a virgin and I don’t want to debase myself serving as a ghost’s wife. Since I am too weak to resist him, I’ve come here for help.” Yang was indignant upon hearing this and wanted to fight a duel with the ghost. But he wasn’t sure if a living man could subdue a ghost. Lian Suo said, “Go to bed early tomorrow evening and I will meet you in dream.” They talked affectionately that night until dawn. Before leaving, Lian Suo reminded Yang not to sleep during the day so they could meet early in a dream that evening. Yang promised.
When darkness fell, Yang drank some liquor and went to bed with his clothes on. Shortly, he saw Lian Suo coming. She handed him a knife, led him into a courtyard, latched the door and was about to say something when they heard someone knocking at the door with a rock. Lian Suo shivered, “Here comes the ghost!” Yang opened the door and leaped out. There stood a ghost wearing a red hood and black apparel, with shaggy hair around his mouth. The two began to hurl curses at one another. Outraged, Yang charged at the ghost, who pelted him with stones and hit his wrist. The knife slipped. At this very moment, Yang saw a hunter with a bow in the distance. It was Wang, the wuxiucai. Yang cried out for help. Wang hastily shot an arrow which hit the ghost’s thigh. He shot another and killed the ghost. Yang was joyous and thanked his rescuer. Wang asked what had happened and Yang told the whole story. Wang was glad that he had atoned his earlier offense with a good deed. He followed Yang to Lian Suo’s house. She was very shy and stood in one corner, wordless. On her table was a foot-long knife in a gilded, gem-embedded sheath. The blade, when drawn, glittered like a mirror. Wang fondled it admiringly. The two men spoke briefly, but seeing Lian Suo was wary and nervous, they soon said good-bye and went home. Yang had a fall while climbing over the wall, which woke him from the dream. Roosters crowed in distant villages. Yang felt one of his wrists hurt and found it was bruised.
In the afternoon, Wang came and said he had had a strange dream the night before. “Did you dream that you were hunting with a bow?” Yang asked. Wang was amazed that his friend could describe his dream.
Yang then showed him his wrist and described how it had been injured. Wang recalled how Lian Suo looked and wished he could see her again, since he had helped her. He asked Yang to arrange a meeting. That evening, Lian Suo came to thank her friend. Yang spoke highly of Wang and mentioned that he wanted to see her. “I will never forget his help, but I found his manner intimidating.” she said. “I noticed that he likes my knife. My father bought it with a hundred taels of silver while he was an official in Guangdong. I also like the knife and decorated its handle with gold and gems. When I died, my father put the knife in my tomb. Now I’m willing to part with it and give it to Wang. Seeing the knife is just like seeing me.” The next day, Yang passed her words on to Wang, who felt happy. As night came, Lian Suo returned with her knife. “Tell Wang to treasure this knife, it was not made in China.” Afterwards, she and Yang met regularly as before.
Several months passed. One night, in the candlelight, Lian Suo gazed at Yang with a smile. Something was on her mind but she hesitated to speak out. He pulled her into his arms and urged her to tell. She said, “Your love has invigorated me with the energy from the world of the living and my bones are filled with marrow again. Just a little semen and blood with bring me back to life.” Yang said, laughing, “It’s you who did not want to have sex. I don’t mind risking my life by making love with you.” She said, “After making love with me, you will be very sick for about twenty days, but you can be cured with medicine.” So decided, they copulated with joy. After that, Lian Suo said, “Now I need a drop of your blood. Can you make a sacrifice for me?” Yang fetched a sharp knife, slit his arm and dropped some blood on her navel. When this was done, Lian Suo began to dress. “I shall not come here any more. Remember, one hundred days from now, you will see a black bird singing on the tree over my tomb. That is time to dig up
my coffin.” Yang listened intently. Just before disappearing, she added, “Remember, don’t dig at my tomb too early or too late.”
After a few days, Yang Yuwei did fall ill and his abdomen bulged with pain. A doctor gave him some medicine which emptied him of a pile of mud-like feces. After another two weeks, Yang regained his health. When the designated day arrived, he went to Lian Suo’s tomb with a spade and waited. Shortly after sunset, a black bird could be seen on the tree overhead, singing loudly. Yang started with joy. “It’s time!” He shoveled off the weeds on the tomb and started digging. Soon he found a rotten coffin but, inside, Lian Suo looked as vivid as if she were alive and her body felt slightly warm. Yang wrapped her up with clothes and carried her home. Lying in the warm bed, Lian Suo began to breathe faintly. Yang fed her porridge spoonful by spoonful. At about midnight, she came around, saying, “The past twenty years seem like a dream.”
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