Lady Chen

> Yuyang County Office, Taiyuan Prefecture. Case file.

> Matter: Death of Wang, a licentiate of Taiyuan.

> Case number: Kangxi Guihai year, Criminal, No. 19.

> Deposition VI: testimony of Chen, wife of Wang (first recorded). Note of the interrogating official: this deposition is to be read with the earlier testimony of the maid Chen-ma.

> — Liu, chief clerk, respectfully noted.

**【Deposition · Chen, wife of Wang】**

Your honor asks me of my husband. I answer: I know what your honor means to ask. From the moment your honor sat to this court, and questioned Afu, and Old Li, and Chen-ma, I knew the turn would come to me.

Your honor asks when Wang brought the woman home. I answer: the third of the ninth month, that very day. He went out in the afternoon and came back at dusk, the sky just dark. When he entered the inner court I was sitting by the window doing needlework. He stood at the door and did not come in; through the door he said, "I am back." I said, "Back, good." He said, "In the study of the back garden there is lodged a… lady, met at the west market, fled from a cruel husband's house, pitiable. Let her rest a few days while we find her a place." As he spoke his eyes did not look at me; they looked at the cassia tree in the courtyard.

I said, "Good." He stood a moment and said again, "Her name is Zhang." I said, "Good." He stood there as if he had more to say; in the end he did not say it, and went.

Your honor asks whether I knew then that the woman was no common woman. I answer: I knew. If I had not known, I would not be the daughter-in-law of the Wang house.

I married into the Wang house seven years. What sort of man my husband is, I know in my own heart. He loves women; he loves face; he is soft-hearted; his ear is soft too. He would not keep a woman outside the house—he lacks the nerve, and the money. But this time, standing at the door and speaking, his feet were unsteady under him, and the words came out one by one, squeezed, like recitation. I knew then that the thing was not right.

The next day I sent Chen-ma with a bowl of bird's-nest soup to the study, to sound it out. Chen-ma came back and said that at the study door she had heard the young master and a woman speaking, of some mirror. When I heard it my heart gave a lurch; I asked again, and Chen-ma answered all. Then I told Chen-ma: "After this, nothing more need be sent to the study side."

Your honor asks why I did not send. I answer: sent or not, it makes no difference. What matters is that I must not go push open that door. If I pushed it open and saw what there was to see, heard what there was to hear, this house of mine would scatter.

(Here the deponent paused, and was silent a while.)

Your honor asks whether I slept in those days. I answer: I slept. One night I slept and dreamed a dream. In the dream I stood outside the moon-gate of the back garden; the study door stood open, and a lamp burned within. I wished to go in, but my feet were rooted, would not lift. So I stood outside the gate and watched the lamp within the open door a whole night. When day broke I woke; the pillow was wet. This dream I told to no one.

Your honor asks what I did in those days. I answer: I kept the house as usual—reckoned the accounts, watched the kitchen, set out the needlework. What the house required, that I did. By night, when I could not sleep, I sat and listened. The back garden lay two courtyards from the inner court; no sound carried across. But I knew the sound was there. When I could not sleep I counted my own breathing, counted till dawn.

Your honor asks whether I ever thought of speaking plainly to my husband. I answer: I thought of it. I thought of it a hundred times.

The first day I thought: if I speak, will he believe it? If he does not believe, he will suspect me of spite. If he believes, what then should he do? He fears ghosts; and the ghost is what he brought home himself. He brought her home happy. If I told him, "What you brought home is a ghost," could he believe it? And if he believed, what then? Go to the ghost and say, "Leave"? A ghost that would leave on being asked is no ghost.

When I had thought my hundred thoughts through, I understood. This matter can only be seen clear by himself. The day he sees it clear, this house will either scatter or live. Until that day I can only stand here and keep the house.

Your honor asks whether Wang came back to the inner court in those days. I answer: he did. The first days he still came back for meals, and sat at table hollow-eyed, the chopsticks lifted, hanging in the air half a while. I asked him, "Is the study side comfortable?" He said, "Comfortable." I asked, "What family is that lady of?" He said, "Of the west market." I asked, "Has anyone of her family come looking?" He said, "No." Every answer his head sank lower. Before the meal was done he set down the chopsticks and said, "I will go over and look," and went.

After that he stopped coming back to the inner court for meals. The meal was sent to the study and returned untouched. I sent Chen-ma to fetch it; she came back and said the bowl's rice had barely been touched.

In those days he came back to the inner court twice. The first time, to fetch a padded robe. He stood before the cabinet and rummaged and did not find it; I went over, drew it from the very bottom, and handed it to him. He took it and said, "Thank you." I said, "The clothes are washed; they are clean." He said, "Good," and went off with the robe. The second time, to fetch some books. He chose a while among the shelves, chose three, and stood holding them to go. I said, "Reading late hurts the eyes." He said, "I do not read much." I said, "The study door is shut by day as well." He said, "She copies scripture; she fears noise." I did not answer. He stood a moment and went off with the books.

Between those two visits, my husband and I spoke no more than ten sentences.

Your honor asks whether I wept. I answer: no. I married into the Wang house seven years and never wept before anyone. In those days I did the needlework over and over, and took the clothes from the cabinet and refolded them. I thought: if he means to live over there for good, I can wait for good. If he comes back and says one sentence, "I was wrong," I will count it as if he had never brought that person in.

(Here the deponent paused again, and was long silent, before she said:)

Your honor asks whether I ever saw the lady Zhang. I answer: no. I never saw her face. Only on the third day after she moved into the study, at a distance, across two courtyards, I saw a shadow come from the study to the well-head and draw water. The way that shadow walked was not like a living person. In what way, I cannot say. Only that it was too steady. Step by step, walking on the ground as if walking on a sheet of ice.

Your honor asks how long she drew water. I answer: I stood under the eaves about the space of half a joss-stick. She drew the water, lifted it, walked back to the study step by step; the door closed; she did not come out again.

(Note of the interrogating official: this deposition ended here; asked "do you know what that creature is," Chen made no answer. Asked "what do you intend after Wang's death," Chen answered:)

Your honor asks this; my plan is already made in my heart. My husband's body, I will take in. When that is done I will go seek a man. In Green Cliff Abbey there is a Taoist, who is said to master evil influences. I will go and beg him.

(When she had said this, no further word. The interrogating official dismissed her. Chen rose and walked out steady, without once looking back.)

**【Marginal note of the clerk】** This deposition of Chen answers to the earlier testimony of Chen-ma: Chen-ma said "the young mistress never set foot in the study," and Chen says of herself "I never saw her face." Yet in Chen's deposition the phrase "as if walking on a sheet of ice" agrees with Afu's testimony that "she walks step by step." Asked whether she knew what the creature was, Chen would not answer. Asked why she had not sought the Taoist, Chen answered: "It is not yet time." Asked when it would be time, Chen looked at the interrogating official and said: "After he is dead."

**【Marginal note of the clerk · added】** This deposition of Chen being finished, the clerk records in private: when Chen answered, "After he is dead," no one in court made a sound. The interrogating official sat long before he could question on.