way before we got down to serious business, and the timing couldn’t have been more perfect, because Li the Cat was just entering in a sedan chair decorated with imperial dragons, escorted by the elite Wolf Regiment.
The climb was ridiculously easy. The huge stones that formed the wall were set irregularly, giving all the foot- and handholds I needed, and it was possible to swing back and forth so I could reach the grand warden’s private suite without once leaving the shelter of overhanging parapets and balconies. When I crawled up over the edge of the last balcony we could look through a window into the corridor and outer offices and see just where guards were stationed, and another window let us into the warden’s private sanctuary.
“Why don’t they hang out a sign: ‘Rob Me!’ “ Master Li whispered disgustedly.
It got even better. There was a five-panel decorative screen in a shadowed area away from lamps and moonbeams, but still close to the low jade-covered conference table surrounded by silken sitting pillows, and a cabinet provided Master Li with a jar of excellent wine and me with a jar of the finest pickled seaweed I have ever tasted. We settled down to wait, and we didn’t have to wait long. Within an hour the sounds of guards’ boots clicking together and weapons being grounded announced the arrival of the grand warden, and it was only the warden and Li the Cat who entered, along with two servants, and when the servants had prepared a brazier and placed a pot on it for water to boil they bowed backward from the room and the door shut firmly behind them.
“I can’t wait for the palate of a connoisseur to evaluate this batch,” Li the Cat said unctuously. “To my taste it’s an improvement of fifty percent, at least, but I don’t pretend to be an expert.”
“Neither do I. I’m just facile with experts’ cliches,” the grand warden said with a mock bow, and they both laughed heartily.
Li the Cat opened his money belt and extracted a small round object that seemed to have the imperial seal stamped on it. It was pale green with light purple shadings, and apparently as hard as a hunk of wood. Master Li’s fingers dug into my shoulder.
“Ox, that’s Tribute Tea,” he whispered. “How in hell did that slimy eunuch qualify for Tribute Tea?”
The question was rhetorical, of course, so I said nothing. The eunuch shaved thin pieces from the little hard cake with a silver knife, and the grand warden used a silver pestle to powder the shavings in a silver mortar. With great ceremony they passed the powder three times through a silver sieve, and then poured equal amounts into two wide, shallow chien saucers. The water in the pot (actually it’s not a pot but a “soup bottle”) was boiling, and the grand warden carefully poured it into the chiens. They briskly stirred with bamboo whisks. At first the liquid was white, then it turned bluish gray, and then bluish gold, and the aroma that reached my nostrils was the delicious subtle scent of tea of the very highest quality. They bowed to each other and raised the saucers to their lips and sipped, and then the warden grimaced and spat the stuff into the fire.
“It still tastes like camel piss,” he said petulantly.
“Well, I didn’t claim perfection, and it really does taste better,” the eunuch protested. “Try another sip, and don’t expect miracles.”
The grand warden cautiously tried again, and this time kept it down.
“All right, it is a bit better,” he said grudgingly. “It still wouldn’t fool a baby, however.”
“Who’s in the business of fooling babies? We’re fooling barbarians,” the eunuch said with a chuckle. “Look at the uncompressed leaves and tell me there’s something wrong with them!”
He extended some tiny things from his money belt, which the warden viewed admiringly.
“Buddha, that’s marvelous. You used the same batch?”
“Exactly, and some of the worst of it at that. We have the technique down perfectly, and I’m now guaranteeing a success rate of ninety-five percent. How are things going at your end?” Li the Cat asked.
“Four more barbarian kings have expressed strong interest—two of them are certain customers,” the grand warden said briskly. “The real market would be Rome, of course, but sea routes are very risky and every caravan runs the risk of capture by aspiring princes, who might send the stuff back to China as tribute. Can you imagine?”
Li the Cat shuddered. “Don’t even think about such things,” he said. “Any change in the basic sales tale?”
The grand warden shrugged. “Why change it? We have to explain how we got the merchandise, and the story of bandits capturing caravans and then discovering the cargo was intended for the emperor can’t really be improved upon. My recent marriage into a bandit clan provides authenticity, and it’s easy to explain that my illustrious father-in-law can’t dispose of his loot inside the boundaries of civilization, and has to turn to me for outside markets. Let’s not gild something that’s glowing.”
That was when matters changed dramatically. The warden had taken out a large map and they were starting to discuss routes and new markets when a high and shrill, but rather pretty sound rang through the room. It was like the rapid tinkling of a small silver bell, and instantly both men were on their feet. The warden ran to the west wall and pulled aside a calligraphy scroll stretched on a bamboo frame, and behind it was the door of a safe. Then his back covered the view and I couldn’t tell how he opened it, but when he turned again I had to suppress a loud exclamation. In his hands was an ancient cage, precisely like the other two, and the sound seemed to come from it. The warden trotted back to the table and set the cage down. Then I could see a tiny flickering light glowing in the center, pulsing to the bell sound, but the warden’s shoulder blocked my view and I couldn’t see what he was doing as he reached out to the front of the cage. The ringing of the bell stopped abruptly. The little glowing light expanded until it filled the cage, and then my eyes nearly popped from their sockets. Human features were forming inside the bars, and they resolved themselves into the face of a senior mandarin I had seen at the funeral of Ma Tuan Lin! Master Li’s fingers were digging into my shoulder like knives, and wrinkles had screwed up so tightly around his eyes I wondered how he could see. Then the mouth of the mandarin opened, and we heard his voice as though he were right there in the room.
“Esteemed colleagues, an incredible development has taken place! Incredible!” he said so excitedly he was spraying spittle, and he made a visible effort to calm down. “All our hopes and dreams, the ultimate goals we have aspired to but despaired of attaining, may be in our grasp! I would never be believed should I explain it myself, and I am honored, I am awed, I am exalted to bring you the message from the source. Further introduction would be gross impertinence.”
His image wavered and dissolved like a cloud breaking apart, and then the pieces began to re-form, and I smothered a yelp as an unmistakable face filled the cage. It was the Celestial Master.
“So you’re the colleagues of this creature, eh?” the saint said softly. His face flushed and his voice raised to a roar. “You doltish donkeys! You emasculated earwigs! You idiotic apes whose sole talent is to make dinners of your own defecation! Stick the turd-stained tips of your fingers into your ears and dig out the dung beetles, because I am about to demonstrate the error of your halfwitted ways!”
The grand warden was transfixed, but unfortunately Li the Cat was not. He was clawing at the warden’s arm and pointing urgently at the door, and the warden grasped the simple fact that palaces breed eavesdroppers the way granaries breed rats, and he picked up the cage and ran with the eunuch to the south wall. They opened a small door and dove through, and the Celestial Master’s furious roars abruptly stopped when the door slammed shut.
Master Li supplied corrosive words of his own as he bolted from behind the screen and ran to the door. It wouldn’t budge, and when I bent down and peered through a tiny crack I could see that lock picks wouldn’t be of any use. There was a heavy bar rammed through slots on the other side, and the only thing that would help would be a battering ram.
“We have to hear what the Celestial Master is up to,” Master Li said grimly. “He’s been too long away from the grimy affairs of the world, and he doesn’t really understand how dangerous it is to try to trick men who stand to suffer the Thousand Cuts if they’re caught. Ox, go back out the window.”
He jumped up on my back and I vaulted out over the balcony and down the wall until we reached the level of the formal reception hall, which was really like a throne room with the grand warden’s high gilded chair raised on a small dais that extended from the central tower. I haven’t mentioned that the castle was constructed in the style called Pine Tree, with a stone tower in the center supporting floor beams that arched like branches to the outer walls.
“Ox, the passage they took seemed to lead in toward the tower, and almost all Pine Tree palaces use the tower for secret conference rooms, as well as the central source of light and air,” the sage said.
He had me climb inside and race to the dais and pull tapestries aside on the wall behind the warden’s chair.
