Scholar Gu was a native of Jinling. He was gifted in many arts, but his family was desperately poor. And because his mother was old, he could not bear to leave her side; he lived only by doing calligraphy and paintings for people every day and accepting their fees. He had reached twenty-five and still had no wife. Across the street stood a house that had long been empty, and an old woman and a young girl had rented it. Since there was no man in their household, he had never asked who they were. One day, coming in from outside, he happened to see a young woman leaving his mother's room. She was about eighteen or nineteen, graceful and elegant, a beauty rarely seen in the world. She carefully avoided him, and her manner was cold and stern. Gu went in and asked his mother about her. His mother said, "That's the girl from across the street; she came to borrow my scissors and ruler. She just told me it's only her and her mother at home too. She doesn't look as if she was born to a poor family. When I asked why she wasn't promised to anyone, she said it was because her mother is old. Tomorrow I'll go pay a call on her mother and drop a hint; if they don't expect too much, you could take over supporting her mother." The next day she went to their house. The mother turned out to be a deaf old woman. Looking around the room, Gu's mother saw there was not even food for the next day. When she asked how they lived, she learned they depended entirely on the daughter's ten fingers. Gently she sounded them out about the two households living together; the old woman seemed willing and turned to consult her daughter, but the girl said nothing and was plainly displeased. So Gu's mother went home. Thinking it over, she said doubtfully, "Could the girl be put off by how poor we are? She neither speaks nor smiles; she's as lovely as peach and plum blossom and as cold as frost and snow — a strange one!" Mother and son guessed and sighed over it, then let the matter rest.
One day, as Gu sat in his study, a young man came to ask for a painting. He was very handsome but rather flighty in manner. Asked where he came from, he answered, "The next village." After that he came every two or three days, and as they grew familiar he began to banter and flirt; when Gu embraced him he did not much resist, and so they became lovers. From then on the two were very close. Once, when the girl happened to pass by, the youth followed her with his eyes and asked who she was. Gu told him, "The girl next door." The young man said, "So beautiful — why does she look so formidable?" A little later Gu went into the inner rooms. His mother said, "The girl was just here begging for rice; she said they haven't lit their stove for a whole day. She's a very devoted daughter, and so poor it's pitiful. We should help her a little." Following his mother's word, Gu carried a peck of rice over, knocked at her door and conveyed his mother's message. The girl accepted it but said no word of thanks. She often came to Gu's house, and seeing his mother making clothes and shoes, she sewed for her; she came and went in the hall, doing the household work like a daughter-in-law. Gu felt more and more grateful to her. Whenever he was given cakes, he always shared them with her mother, and the girl never so much as mentioned it.
Then Gu's mother happened to develop an abscess in her private parts and wailed with pain day and night. The girl often came to her bedside, washing the sore and applying medicine three or four times a day. The mother felt very uneasy about it, but the girl never minded the filth. The mother said, "Ah! Where could I find a daughter-in-law like you to look after this old body till I die!" Having said it, she choked with grief. The girl comforted her: "Your son is truly devoted — a hundred times better than a lonely widow and her orphan daughter like us." The mother said, "Running back and forth at a bedside — how could even a devoted son do work like that? Besides, I'm near my end and could be gone any day; what worries me most is that the family line won't go on." As she spoke, Gu came in. His mother said in tears, "We owe this young lady a great deal; don't you forget to repay her kindness." Gu bowed to the ground before her. The girl said, "You've been good to my mother and I never thanked you — why should you thank me?" After that he respected and loved her all the more. Yet her manner stayed stiff, and she was utterly unapproachable.
One day as she went out, Gu gazed after her; suddenly she turned her head and gave him a dazzling smile. Overjoyed beyond all expectation, Gu hurried after her to her house; when he made advances she did not refuse, and they gladly made love. Afterward she warned him: "This can happen once, but not again." Gu went home without agreeing. The next day he asked her again, but she turned a stern face and walked off without a glance. She came often by day and they met frequently, yet she never gave him a kind word or look. If he teased her even a little, her cold words chilled him to the bone. Then suddenly, in a private moment, she asked him, "Who is that young man who's been coming lately?" Gu told her. She said, "His behavior and looks toward me have been insolent many times. Because he's so intimate with you, I've let it pass. But give him this message: if he does it again, he must not want to live!" That evening Gu told the young man, adding, "You must be careful — she is not someone to offend!" The youth said, "If she's not to be offended, how is it you've offended her in secret?" Gu protested that he had not. The youth said, "If you haven't, then how did such indecent talk reach your ears?" Gu had no answer. The youth said, "Then trouble yourself to tell her this from me: stop putting on airs of virtue, or I'll spread the story everywhere." Gu was very angry with him, and it showed on his face, so the young man left.
One night, as Gu sat alone, the girl suddenly arrived and said with a smile, "The bond between us isn't broken after all — isn't that fate?" Wild with joy, Gu took her in his arms, when all at once they heard a clatter of footsteps; they sprang up in alarm, and there was the young man pushing the door open. Startled, Gu asked, "What are you here for?" The youth laughed: "Just came to see the chaste one." Turning to the girl, he said, "No blaming others today?" Her brows shot up and her cheeks flushed, but she said not a word; she quickly flipped up her jacket, revealing a leather pouch, and in one motion drew out a gleaming, crystal-bright dagger a foot long. At the sight of it the youth fled in terror. She chased him out the door, but looking all around, there was no trace of him. She hurled the dagger into the sky; it rang out sharply and blazed like a long rainbow, and a moment later something fell to the ground with a thud. Gu hurried over with a candle: it was a white fox, its head severed from its body. Gu was horrified. The girl said, "That was your pretty boy. I had already spared him, but he was set on dying!" She put the blade back into the pouch. Gu pulled at her to come inside, but she said, "That monster has spoiled the mood; please wait until tomorrow night." And she went straight out the door.
The next night she came as promised, and they shared their tenderness. When he asked about her art, she said, "This isn't something for you to know. Keep it strictly secret; if it gets out, I fear it will bring you no good." He also pressed her to settle on marriage, and she said, "We share a pillow, I draw water for you — what is that but a wife? We're already husband and wife; why talk of marrying?" Gu said, "Can it be you despise me for being poor?" She said, "You're poor, of course — am I rich? Tonight's meeting was precisely because I pity your poverty." At parting she told him, "Stolen meetings like this mustn't happen often. When I should come, I'll come of myself; when I shouldn't, pressing me is useless." After that, whenever they met and he tried to draw her aside for a private word, she always slipped away. Yet she mended his torn clothes and saw to his cooking and firewood, managing everything just as a wife would.
After some months her mother died, and Gu did all he could to give her a burial. From then on the girl lived alone. Thinking that a woman sleeping alone could be seduced, Gu climbed over her wall and called again and again through the window, but no one ever answered. Looking at her door, he found the room empty and locked. He privately suspected she had a tryst with someone else. He went again the next night and found the same. So he left a jade pendant on her windowsill and went away. A day later they met at his mother's. When they came out, she followed behind him and said, "You suspect me? Everyone has things in their heart that can't be told to others. How could I make you stop suspecting me now? But there's one thing I need you to arrange quickly." When he asked what it was, she said, "I'm eight months pregnant, and I fear I'll give birth any day. 'My standing has no name' — I can bear the child for you, but I cannot raise it for you. Tell your mother secretly to find a wet nurse and pretend you're adopting someone's baby; don't mention me." Gu agreed and told his mother. His mother laughed and said, "What a strange girl! She wouldn't accept a proposal, and yet she's taken up with my son in secret." She gladly went along with the plan and waited. After another month and more, the girl had not come for several days, and the mother grew suspicious and went to look at her door: it was shut tight, silent and desolate. She knocked a long time before the girl came out, her hair unkempt and her face unwashed. She opened the door to let the mother in, then shut it again. When they entered the room, a crying baby was already on the bed. Astonished, the mother asked, "When was it born?" "Three days ago," she answered. The mother lifted the swaddling and looked: it was a boy, with full cheeks and a broad forehead. Delighted, she said, "You've given this old woman a grandson — but you're all alone in the world; whom will you depend on?" The girl said, "My private reasons are something I dare not lay bare even to you. Wait until night when no one's about, and then you can carry the child away." The mother went home and told her son, and together they marveled at it in secret. That night she went and brought the baby home.
Several nights later, near midnight, the girl suddenly knocked and came in, carrying a leather bag, and said with a smile, "My great task is done; I must take my leave of you now." When he anxiously asked why, she said, "Your kindness in caring for my mother has never left my heart for a moment. When I said before that it could happen 'once but not again,' it was because my repayment was not to be made in bed. Because you were too poor to marry, I meant to carry on your family line for you. I hoped to conceive the first time, but my monthly flow came again, so I broke my rule and came a second time. Now your kindness is repaid and my own purpose fulfilled; I have no regrets." He asked, "What's in the bag?" "My enemy's head, that's all," she said. He opened it and looked: beard and hair all tangled, a bloody mess. Utterly horrified, he pressed her again for an explanation. She said, "I didn't tell you before because a secret not kept close may leak out. Now that the deed is done, there's no harm in telling you. I am from Zhejiang. My father held office as a sima; he was ruined by an enemy, who had our family's property confiscated. I fled carrying my old mother on my back, hid my name and kept my head down — for three years now. The only reason I didn't take revenge at once was that my mother was alive; when she was gone, there was a little piece of flesh weighing in my womb, and so it was put off still longer. Those nights I went out before were for nothing else: I didn't yet know the roads and gates, and feared I might make a mistake."
Having spoken, she went out the door and added, "Look after the child well. Your fortune is thin and your life will be short; this boy will bring glory to your family. It's late — don't wake your old mother. I'm going!" Just as Gu, heartbroken, was about to ask where she was going, she flashed like lightning and in an instant was gone. Gu stood rooted, sighing, as if he had lost his soul. In the morning he told his mother, and they could only sigh and marvel together. Three years later Gu did indeed die. His son passed the highest imperial examination at eighteen and still cared for his grandmother until the end of her days.
