Hooligans send in their cards and collect gratuities,
And petitioners protest injustice and start lawsuits.
Yu Jiafu and the two runners went up to Paria’s room in Qiang Da’s house, where Qiang joined them and thanked them for their help. He ordered tea and tobacco and arranged for an opium lamp to be lit so that Yu Jiafu could satisfy his habit.
The moment Lucky heard of their arrival, she rushed in and greeted them. “I quarreled with them over those things of yours—jewelry, a silver dollar, and a note,” Yu Jiafu told her, “but no one would own up to having them. I’m afraid you’re just fated to lose out on this. One day I’ll catch a wild pig1 and make it up to you.”
“Thank you, godfather, for all the trouble you’ve taken,” she said. Noticing that the lamp was lit, she said, “Let me get the pellet ready for you.” She lay on the bed and prepared the opium with the pick. Yu Jiafu lay down and began to smoke.
Qiang Da took a seat beside him. “Tell me, Master Yu, how on earth am I going to keep this place going?” he asked. “Business is getting steadily worse, and in the last few days I’ve had to deal with invitations to those hooligans, as well as with name cards, weddings, and funerals, and I simply can’t cope. Not only do I not know some of the people who send in cards, I’ve never even heard of them. What’s even more absurd, that old fellow from Luzhou who used to sell tobacco outside the yamen gate, the one known as Paper Tiger, sent in a card under the name of Liu Shi, and yesterday he came along to collect his gratuity. I gave him the standard eighty cash, and he just stood there and kicked up the most terrible fuss in a mixture of accents. Luckily he ran into a client who knew him and who forked out a few dozen cash, and after that he finally took himself off. Whether these people are men or ghosts, they’re equally vicious. Frankly, I don’t know what it is they expect. Yesterday the local warden, Fang Sheng, brought me in a petition that he said had come from old man Bi—I haven’t told you about it. And now today Fang has brought me in another one that he says is from the military licentiate Bao Qiong. None of these things is very important, but all of them cost money. Before I know where I am, we’ll be in the middle of the Dragon Boat Festival. Tell me, how am I going to cope?”
“Let me see the petitions,” said Yu Jiafu. Qiang Da went inside and came back with two petitions on white document paper. Yu Jiafu told Qiang Da to hand them to Wang Seven. “I can’t read,” he said to Wang. “You read it out to me.” Wang read one, as follows:
Petition prepared by Bao Qiong, military licentiate, and presented by his agent, Li Sheng.
I beg to inform you of the seduction of my nephew by a prostitute and also of an act of violence perpetrated by people relying on superior numbers.
Following the death of my brother, I brought my nephew Bao Jing back to my house and raised him. Failing to complete his studies, he gave himself up to idleness and dissipation. Despite frequent remonstrances from me, he did not reform his ways but sometimes stayed out all night. On more than one occasion he took clothes and jewelry from my house. I intended to have him declared incorrigible but was deterred by his widowed mother’s protectiveness toward him.
On the eighth of this month my degenerate nephew was so brazen as to sneak my wife’s gold earrings, silver bracelets, gold rings, and so forth out of the house. For several days thereafter he did not show his face at home. I searched high and low for him and found that Qiang Da, who keeps a brothel on Ninth Lane, had enticed him in and concealed him in the house. I went there to find my nephew and personally observed him sitting at a table and drinking wine with Paria, Lucky, and other prostitutes. I was about to roar at him when, to my surprise, Qiang Da drew himself up and came forward and blocked my way. After hiding my nephew, he had the effrontery to threaten me with violence. Following a brief argument, he ordered a number of servants, both male and female, to charge at me and beat me up. Since I was on my own, it was not possible for me to contend with them, and I hastily made my escape.
I appealed to the local warden for protection, but he paid no attention. Acts such as harboring prostitutes to lure young men of good family and leading a group of people to commit violence are against the law. If this affair is not investigated and prosecuted, my nephew will surely meet his death at their hands. To complete the information, I have asked the local warden to file a report.
I humbly request Your Honor to speedily grant that constables be dispatched to arrest Qiang Da and investigate the case thoroughly, that my nephew and the articles he took from us be turned over to me, and that punishment be administered according to the law. This petition that I have prepared is the truth.
When Wang had finished reading it, Yu Jiafu asked Qiang Da: “What made Bao Qiong decide to play the petition game?”
“I happened to run into him at the Willow Lane opium parlor the other day, and he asked me for money to buy a couple of packets, but I didn’t give him any. I expect that’s why he’s making trouble.”
“Look, if you make your living running a brothel, you need to keep your wits about you. Even if you’d bought him the two packets, at most it would have cost you only a few dozen cash. You must realize that you’ll never be able to settle for as little as that now.” He turned to Wang: “Now read me the other one.”
Petition prepared by Bi Qingjia, Candidate for Subprefect, and presented by his agent, Wang Shun.
I beg to inform you of a display of violence on the part of a brothel keeper and of the urgent need for an investigation. My family is originally from Huizhou, but I live on Eighth Lane in the Old City of Yangzhou. While returning home last night, I was passing along Ninth Lane when in the distance I saw flames leaping into the sky and heard a flurry of shouts and cries. I assumed that some house had caught fire and went ahead to investigate, only to find that it was the prostitutes Cassia, Lucky, and others from the house of the veteran brothel keeper Qiang Da returning from an assignment. Their bearers were fighting with their torches in front of the gate, blocking the lane. I ordered them to give way, but instead they turned violent. Qiang Da was present, but rather than shout at them to stop, he had the gall to order the bearers, the brothel steward, and his servants to rush at me and beat me. Their torches badly singed my clothes, which are available for Your Honor’s inspection. Fortunately there were some people passing by, and I managed to make my escape. I informed the local warden, but he took no action. I submit that harboring prostitutes is against the law, and that leading others to commit acts of violence is even more illegal. If these matters are not investigated, the neighborhood will not be safe. To complete this information, I have asked the warden to file his report.
I humbly request that Your Honor look into this matter and order arrests and investigations to uphold law and morality. In this petition that I have prepared everything is the truth.
“Why is the old fellow doing this, too?” asked Yu Jiafu.
“He always comes along at festival time for his gratuity. Last year, during the New Year festival, he came for it on the very day the kitchen god was being sent off.2 Then in the second month he sent in his card, and I responded. The other day he happened to see me on the Parade and asked me to help him out by lending him a few hundred cash. I told him I’d done no business in days and turned him down. I suppose that must be the reason.”
“That was another mistake on your part. You just weren’t very smart. If you had given him the two hundred when he brought up the matter, that would have been the end of it. Now you’re going to have to pay out a bit more. People like that will first cook up a petition, assuming it’s the key to success. If you don’t buy into it, they’ll spend a few cash on a charge and submit it to the magistrate of one of the counties, or to the prefectural registry, or to the police department, and for those people the accusation is as good as a banknote. The officials will send out a runner, and you may be sure it will cost you money—nine or ten silver dollars at the very least. And you’ll have to buy off the plaintiff, too, before you can settle the case. What you’re doing is called ‘losing a lot to gain a little.’ If you’re going to run one of these damned places, you’ve got to be savvy and loosen your purse strings. As the saying goes, ‘Brothel inflow, brothel outflow.’ Without these expenses, the owners of these damned rice bowls would all be as rich as salt merchants. Give me the petitions, and tomorrow I’ll meet both men on the Parade and lay out a few cash on a confounded meal.”
“How much will it cost?”
“At least two forty-percent discounted notes for each of them before they’ll show you any mercy. Oh, and there’s one other case that I haven’t told you about. There’s someone named Guo Xueyou who’s sent around a note demanding four silver dollars from each house.”
“Who is he?”
“He’s either a stipendiary or a licentiate, I’m not sure which. A couple of years ago he was a pigeon,3 a big player in the first-class houses. He had a heap of money, which he’s completely run through, and now he’s learned to play the villain himself. He writes up legal charges for other people and provokes lawsuits in order to collect the fees. This spring he held a banquet at the Yuanxingtang in Ganquan that cost him a lot of his own money. In his case we have no choice but to respond. He’s already spoken to me twice about it, and if we don’t give him the money, I’m afraid he’ll come here himself. He has such a huge opium habit that, once he lights up, goodness knows how many of those little packets of yours he’ll go through. And if you fall just a tiny bit short in your attentions, he’ll launch a vicious attack on you. In my opinion, you’ll just have to do these things. You ought to send him two notes at a twenty percent discount. I’ll still have to go and plead poverty for you, and even so, I can’t be sure that he’ll agree.”
“These last few days I really haven’t had any money. I’ve missed a dozen payments on the high-interest loan I took up with that out-of-town lender. The day before yesterday I spoke to him about working out some arrangement, and he allowed me to pay him the day after tomorrow. So please hold these ones off for two more days. I’ll see to them as soon as I’ve repaid the loan.”
“You don’t expect old Bi and Bao Qiong to wait, do you? Why, if they were cooking shrimp, they couldn’t wait for it to turn red! Let me put up the money for you, and for Guo Xueyou’s note as well.”
“Even better. Thank you.”
“With regard to those cards you received from swindlers, you need to fit the gratuity to the person. Big ones get a lot, small ones get little. Even if you don’t recognize the names on the cards, you can’t say so. You just have to work out a standard amount for them, lest one small thing mushroom into all kinds of problems—another case of losing a lot to save a little. If you’re not doing any business, go and buy a cockerel today and sacrifice it tonight, hold a celebration, and then tomorrow morning pluck up your spirits and struggle along one day at a time. Providing you put your trust in heaven, your business will turn the corner. Cleaning up your personal debts—that can be left until later. Just now you’re carrying so much debt that you’re like someone riding a tiger—you can’t get off. Think about it. Am I right or not?”
“You’re right, of course, but with business the way it is, how am I going to get by?”
“What owner of a house doesn’t have debts? If they all fretted about them the way you do, they’d worry themselves to death!”
“How much did breakfast and lunch come to?”
“Over seven thousand cash.”
“It’s just as they say, ‘You shut your door and sit quietly at home, and disaster strikes from the sky.’ It’s like bumping into an old man on the street and causing his death.”
“Oh, there’s something I almost forgot to tell you. Another funny thing has happened. Bai Shixin told me that he wants you to help him out, which is an indirect way of asking for a reward. I chuckled to myself, but I couldn’t very well turn him down. I agreed to meet him in a day or two. You’ll need to give him a small tip.”
As they spoke, Fang Sheng, the local warden, came looking for Qiang Da. On hearing Yu Jiafu’s voice, he walked in and greeted the two men.
“Well, Warden Fang, what brings you here?” asked Yu Jiafu. “What do you have to tell us?”
“There are two things. First, I’ve come about what happened last night. I’m still concerned about it, and I’m here to ask some questions. Second, this morning old Bi came to ask me about it, and just as I was having tea with him, Bao Qiong brought in a petition. I told them both to wait until last night’s trouble had been settled, when someone would of course come and talk to them. They left after drinking tea that cost me several dozen cash. I brought the petition over here before noon, but I didn’t find Qiang Da in, so I’ve come back again.”
“What happened last night has already been settled, but thank you for your concern,” said Yu Jiafu. “I’ll be meeting old Bi and Bao Qiong on the Parade. You certainly won’t be put to any trouble. Qiang Da, bring me a hundred cash.” Qiang Da fetched the money and put it on the table, and Yu Jiafu handed it to Fang Sheng. “Take this in return for this morning’s tea, and then in a few days’ time you should get Qiang Da to treat you,” he said.
“My friendship with Qiang Da goes back a long way. I’m indebted to him for help in many things. If I asked him for money for everything I do for him, I’d hardly be a friend.”
“Very well, then. If I have to put it this way, let’s say I am the one who’s providing the tip.”
Fang Sheng picked up the money and took his leave.
Lucky was preparing the opium for Yu Jiafu when Sanzi walked in and said, “Miss Lucky, Master Wei is here.”
“You mean the one who came to the party yesterday?”
“That’s right.”
“Off you go,” said Yu Jiafu. “Put in a request and make up for the money and jewelry they took away from you last night.”
“I’ll leave you for a moment, godfathers,” she said with a smile. “Please excuse me.”
Qiang Da was about to call for another courtesan to prepare the opium, but Yu declined: “Don’t bother. I’ll do it on my own.” He smoked a while, satisfying his habit, then took up the petitions and left with the runners. He found Bi Qingjia at the Bamboo Heater teahouse on the Parade and joined him at his table. “I don’t mean to be critical, old friend,” he said, “but you’re already receiving gratuities from Qiang Da’s house at festival time, and now you want him to help you out on top of that. Even if he failed to do you some favor or other, you should have come to me about it. How could you be so thoughtless?”
“I do get a few cash from him at festivals, but that’s your generosity, not his. I was in a tight spot a few days ago, so I called on him for help, and he turned up his nose at me. That’s why I played this trick on him.”
“There’s no need to say any more. Here’s a note. Look, do me a favor, will you? From now on let’s have an understanding about this sort of thing.”
Bi Qingjia looked at the note in his hand, which was for four hundred and eighty cash, and clicked his tongue in disappointment. “Fourth Brother, this is too little!”
“Don’t tell me it’s too little. I’m the one who’s putting up the money.” He handed back the petition. “This must have cost you all of one penny!” Bi Qingjia took charge of it, after which he and Yu Jiafu bowed to each other and parted.
Yu Jiafu also found Bao Qiong. “Brother Bao,” he began, “when you were trying to get money recently, you weren’t at all fair! You take money at the festivals, and on top of that you go and cause trouble with your petition. You’re depriving the owner of any chance of making a go of it!”
“Don’t blame me, Fourth Brother. Qiang Da has forgotten his beginnings as a house handyman. Now that he’s an owner and has made some money, he looks down on all the rest of us. The way he took that pipe in the Willow Lane opium parlor the other day was the last straw! I really did want to clip his wings. And I don’t want any more favors from him at festival time.”
“I don’t mean to offend you, Brother, but you shouldn’t talk like that. If you get no more favors from this or that house, where will you go for gratuities?” He took out a note for three hundred and twenty cash and handed it to Bao Qiong together with the petition. “Here, go and smoke some opium. From now on let’s have no more of this uncalled-for behavior.”
Bao Qiong took the note and the petition and, glancing at the amount on the note, said, “Please forgive me,” gave a deep bow, and left. Yu Jiafu then went in search of Guo Xueyou, to deal with his demand.
If you are wondering what happened, please turn to the next chapter.
