| When a maid in Zhang Xuaner's house was suddenly found missing one
evening, the family thought she had run away. The following day she
was found laying in a drunken stupor in the firewood storeroom behind the
house. She did not sober up until noon to tell her story. The
night before, she had heard laughing and voices in the storeroom.
As the place was known to be inhabited by foxes, she did not feel scared
but went up to peep through a crack in the door. Several young men
were carousing at the table laid out with wine and meat. Catching
sight of her, they jumped up and dragged her into the room. She felt
as if she were drifting into a trance, paralyzed and unable to speak.
They made her sit down at the table and kept urging her to drink until
she became totally intoxicated. She had no idea when she had fallen
asleep or when the young men had left.
A stern man of firm principles, Zhang went in person to the storeroom
to rebuke the foxes. "In the many years we've shared this place,
my family never created any trouble for you other than fetching firewood
every now and then. How could you do something so indecent, forcing
the maid to sit with you at the wine table? Why didn't the elders
of your family check the young men from behaving so rudely? Don't
you feel any sense of shame for what you have done?" At midnight
Zhang heard a voice outside his window. "The young ones have received
a sound beating for their improper behavior, but there is an explanation
I have to make. It was the maid who stretched out her hand to beg
for some meat in the first place. She was not taken into the room
against her will. Moreover, this girl has several secret lovers and
lost her virginity a long time ago. That's why the young ones dared
flirt with her. If it were not so, why didn't they dare take liberties
with some of the other maids in your house who are just as pretty?
It seems that you and I should share the blame for failing to maintain
strict discipline." "Since you have punished your children," Zhang
said, "I will also give the maid a thrashing." The old fox chuckled.
"You haven't found a husband for her when she is well over the marriageable
age; as a result she did things that went against public morality.
Can you blame everything on her?" To this Zhang had nothing to say.
The next day he sent for a matchmaker and had marriages arranged for several
older maids in his house. |
