Page:Ernest Bramah - Kai Lungs Golden Hours.djvu/273

 discreet hand. Yet before you go, if there is any particular mark of Imperial favour that we can show—something of a special but necessarily honorary nature—do not set an iron screen between your ambition and the light of our favourable countenance."

"There is indeed such a signal reward," admitted the aged person, with an air of prepossessing diffidence. "A priceless copy of the immortal work"

"By all means," exclaimed the liberal-minded Sovereign, with an expression of great relief. "Take three or four in case any of your fascinating relations have large literary appetites. Or, still more conveniently arranged, here is an unopened package from the stall of those who send forth the printed leaves—'thirteen in the semblance of twelve,' as the quaint and harmonious phrase of their craft has it. Walk slowly, revered, and a thousand rainbows guide your retiring footsteps."

Concerning the episode of this discreetly-veiled personage the historians who have handed down the story of the imperishable affection of Hien and Fa Fei have maintained an illogical silence. Yet it is related that about the same time, as Hien was walking by the side of a bamboo forest of stunted growth, he was astonished by the maiden suddenly appearing before him from the direction of the royal camp. She was incomparably radiant and had the appearance of being exceptionally well satisfied with herself. Commanding him that he should stand motionless with closed eyes, in order to ascertain what the presiding deities would allot him, she bound a somewhat weighty object about the end of his pig-tail, at the same time asking him in how short a period he could commit about nineteen