Barry Hughart - The Story of the Stone

(That gave me my cue. Tsing was the name of the dear old assistant abbot in the monastery near my village, who taught the village boys when they finished working in the fields. He was a sweet kindly fellow who suffered from terminal pedantry, and I used to amuse Master Li by imitating him.)

“Step forward, oaf!” I drooled and scratched my crotch and stepped forward. Master Li looked around and pointed to an ornate bronze bowl. “What decorative motif is that?” he snarled.

I tried to make my eyes film over, and my jaws creaked like unoiled hinges as they relentlessly spread apart.

“T'sao-t'ieh, or ‘glutton mask,’ is a distinctive motif of the Shang and early Chou dynasties,” I droned in a dull monotone. “It is an animal face seen from the front, sometimes recognizable and sometimes stylized to resemble a fabulous monster. It is flattened on a side surface or bent around a corner; in either case a flange is likely to split it into symmetrical halves, each having a protruding eyeball. From each side of the face, sometimes in proper proportion and sometimes not, extends a body in perfect symmetry with its opposite, as if the carcass had been cut through along the backbone and the two halves had been folded out like wing attachments to the head. The bodies have serpentine dragon-like qualities, coiling in spirals or geometric twists and turns, and are themselves covered with spiral or geometric designs, sometimes including smaller t'sao-t'ieh. The same glutton mask usually appears many times on a vessel. It is a striking, powerful, and unique design, and what it represents… (pause, slowly count to ten)… is not known.”

Moon Boy's eyes had glazed, and he was teetering on his feet. The Recorder of Past Existences was slumping at his desk. He jerked his head up when his chin bounced against his inkstone. I picked my nose. Moon Boy woke up and fell at my feet and began kissing my sandals. “Great-great-grand father!” he howled.

My rheumy eyes creaked toward a vase of gray flowers. My relentless jaws creaked open.

“The following plants and flowers,” I droned, “each create a mood. The plum flower goes with poetry, the orchid with seclusion, the chrysanthemum with rustic flavor, the lotus with simplicity of heart, the cherry apple with glamour, the peony with success, the banana and bamboo with gentlemanly charm, the begonia with seductive beauty, the pine tree with retirement, the plane tree with absence of worry, the willow with sentimentality, the—”

“For the love of Buddha, stop!” the Recorder howled.

“Awe-inspiring, isn't it?” Master Li said. “How can one doubt that this worm was tutor to princes when he can put an entire regiment to sleep in two minutes flat? Failure to remove all memory of previous existences is an extremely grave matter!”

“I can't understand it,” the Recorder whispered. “Hundreds of such cases have been reported in the past, but we have been very careful during the past few centuries.”

“It could be fraud,” Master Li pointed out. The Son of Heaven has proposed an infallible test, which is the reason for this visit. We shall simply make this revolting creature stand before Nieh-ching-t'ai, and the truth shall be revealed.”

“It is strictly illegal for the living to stand before the Mirror of Past Existences!” the Recorder snapped.

“The gods look the other way when the cause is just and wise,” Master Li said smoothly. “Besides, this preening peacock claims to be the great-great-grandson, and fraud is so often a matter of conspiracy.”

Moon Boy did a good job of turning pale and trembling, and the Recorder's eyes gleamed. Bureaucrats and courtiers do not love one another, and a few minutes later we were walking down a maze of corridors. A great black door swung open to reveal a dark tunnel at the end of which was a glow of greenish light. As we came closer I realized it was a natural mirror formed by an immense crystal set in the stone wall.

A sense of sacred awe surrounded the Mirror of Past Existences. I found that I was on my knees, kowtowing, and the others were kowtowing in front of me. We got back to our feet. The marks of two sandals were drawn on the floor in front of the mirror, and Master Li shoved me forward. I placed my feet on the marks and slowly raised my eyes. The green light from the mirror was pulsing like a heartbeat. I could see my own reflection clearly, but there was no reflection of the others. A strange sense of peace had entered my heart. I was not frightened when a soft voice spoke in my ear.

“Why does a living person stand before me?”

I had no idea what to reply, so I said the first thing that came to my mind.

“Master Li seeks truth.”

The green light pulsed silently. Then the voice spoke again. “So be it. Look straight at me, Number Ten Ox.”

Two columns appeared at the sides of the mirror. One was headed “Virtues,” and the other was headed “Sins.” Then my image dissolved and reformed, and I realized that I was looking at my first existence upon the earth.

I was a blob of something I couldn't identify, something like a tiny jellyfish. The blob combined with other blobs to form larger jellyfish. Then I became something with tendrils, and then something that crawled, and finally I was delighted to recognize one of my existences: a flatworm. The virtues and sins columns remained empty.

I was reborn as a fish. Then I became some sort of plant, and then some fungus, and then an insect. I was reborn as a hawk moth, a cockroach, a cow, and a tortoiseshell cat. I was quite proud of myself as I moved up the scale of existences.

I frowned. I appeared to be backsliding. I became a piece of kelp, a patch of pond scum, six kinds of rock, four trees, and a number of plants. Then I began moving up the scale again: a snapdragon, a black grouse, a gecko, and a bowlegged mongrel with one eye, chewed ears, and a body bearing the scars of a thousand back-alley battles. The virtues and sins columns remained as empty as the minds of the General Staff. I eagerly awaited my first human existence.

Here it was. I was reforming as a human being. I gaped at the familiar ugly face of Number Ten Ox, and when I felt my body, I watched the reflected hands move in the mirror. The virtues and sins columns disappeared.

“I'll be damned,” said Master Li.

“We don't say that down here, but I know what you mean,” The Recorder said. “Extraordinary! This boy is as innocent as an apricot.”

“Not quite,” Master Li said grimly. “We now know that he was never a tutor to princes, and one wonders about the nature of his accomplice. Peacock, step forward!”

Moon Boy took my place in front of the mirror. That was what Master Li had wanted from the start, and I admired the neat way he had arranged it.

“Virtue” and “Sin” columns appeared. Moon Boy's image began to dissolve, and he too became some kind of blob. Again I saw the procession of other blobs and things with tendrils, but then things turned dramatically different. In rapid order Moon Boy became poison ivy, a patch of deadly nightshade, and a clump of red berries I wouldn't have approached with a barge pole. He was moving up the scale at great speed, and he dissolved into a tarantula, a cobra, and a horrible thing with twenty writhing tentacles. The thing dissolved into the image of a sweet little old lady with twinkling eyes.

The little old lady was bustling about her kitchen adding green and purple powders to a pot. Purple smoke lifted from it, and black liquid boiled over the side, and the sweet little old lady cackled with delight as a kitten lapped at the stuff, turned blue, and dropped over dead. The sins column began to show activity, and apparently the Great Wheel of Incarnations decided to go back and try again.