The Fox Unmasked

The trial was set for the morning of the tenth. On the evening before, Siniang asked to be taken into the cell. The guards, who had been well tipped by a quiet woman over a week, let her through without a second look.

She brought Feng a bowl of hot broth, and washed his face with her own handkerchief. She told him, gently, that he must answer the magistrate's questions plainly, and must not, whatever he felt, look Wang in the eye.

"And how is it to end?" Feng asked, his voice cracking. "They will flog me again. They may send me to the frontier."