"Oh!" cried Pei-Hang, "I thought perhaps I should never see you again, and I have found you almost directly."
"And what is my name?" asked the girl, laughing.
"Yun-Ying," replied Pei-Hang. "Yun-Ying, Yun-Ying," he repeated, in a singing tone, just as he had been saying it all the time as he walked along, as if he loved the sound of it.
Yun-Ying was dressed in white underneath, but her over-dress was bright blue, embroidered with beautiful flowers which she had worked herself; and she stood in the door of the hut, with a peach tree in full bloom over her head, making such a picture of youth and loveliness that Pei-Hang"s heart seemed to jump up into his throat, and beat there fast enough to choke him.
"Who are you? And how do you come to know Yun-Ying?" asked the old woman peering and blinking at him, with her hand over her eyes, to shade them from the sun.
And when she heard about the dream, and the red cord, and that Pei-Hang wanted to marry her daughter, she did not look at all pleased.
"If I had two daughters you might have one of them, and welcome," she grumbled.
For Pei-Hang was not by any means a bad match. His parents were well off, and he was their only child.
But Yun-Ying was a very pretty girl, and a mandarin of Chang-ngan was anxious to make her his wife.
"He is four times her age, it is true," said her mother, explaining this to Pei-Hang; "but he is very rich. All his dishes and plates are gold, and they say his drinking-cups are gold, set with diamonds."
"He is old and wrinkled, like a little brown monkey," said Yun-Ying.
"_I_ don"t want to marry him! And, besides, the Fairy of the Moon didn"t tie my foot to his."
"No, that"s true enough," sighed her mother.
She would have liked to tell Pei-Hang to go about his business, but she knew if the red cord had really been tied between his foot and Yun-Ying"s, it would not be safe to do that.
"Come inside," she said at last; "I"ll see what I can promise."
The inside of the hut was fragrant with the scent of herbs which were strewn all over the floor, and on a wooden stool in the middle lay a broken pestle and mortar.
"Now," said Yun-Ying"s mother, "on this stool I pound magic drugs given to me by the Genii; but my pestle and mortar is broken. I want a new one."
"That I can easily buy in Chang-ngan," replied Pei-Hang.
"No; for it is a pestle and mortar of jade, and you can only get one like it by going to the home of the Genii, which is on a mountain above the Lake of Gems. If you will do that, and bring it back to me, you shall marry Yun-Ying."
"Yes, I will do that," said Pei-Hang, after a moment"s thought. "But I must see my parents first."
He had not the least idea where the home of the Genii was; but Yun-Ying took him out into the garden, and showed him, in the far distance, a range of snow-capped mountains, with one peak towering above the rest.
"That is Mount Sumi," she said, "and it is there the Genii live, sitting on the snow-peaks, and looking down at the Lake of Gems."
"But to reach it you must cross the Blue River, the White River, the Red River, and the Black River, which are all full of monstrous fishes. That is why my mother is sending you," sighed Yun-Ying. "She thinks you will never come back alive."
"I know how to swim," said Pei-Hang, "and fishes don"t frighten me."
"Promise me you won"t try to swim," said Yun-Ying, earnestly. "You would be devoured in a moment. Take this box with you. In it you will find six red seeds. Throw one into each river as you come to it, and it will shrink into a little brook, over which you can jump."
Pei-Hang opened the box, and saw inside six round, red seeds, each about the size of a pea; and he agreed to use them as Yun-Ying directed. Then he kissed her, and set out on his journey to Mount Sumi.
But on his way across the plain he pa.s.sed through the town where his parents lived, and he went to see them, and told them all that had happened since he left Chang-ngan.
His mother, who was a very wise woman, as mothers generally are, told him the Genii would be angry if he turned their four great rivers into brooks, and would probably refuse to give him a pestle and mortar made of jade.
"I never thought of that," said Pei-Hang.
"Never mind," said his mother, "I will give you a box containing six white seeds. Cast one into each brook when you have crossed it on your way home, and the brook will expand into a river again."
Early the next morning Pei-Hang kissed her and went on his way.
He rested during the midday heat, and continued his journey when it grew cool again; and in this way, at the end of seven days, he came to the Blue River.
It was a quarter of a mile wide, and as blue as the sky of midsummer, and fishes were popping their heads out of the water in every direction. The head of every fish was twice as large as a football, and had two rows of teeth. But Pei-Hang threw a red seed into the waves which were lapping the sh.o.r.e, and in a moment, instead of the wide blue river, a little brook lay at his feet.
The huge fishes were changed into tiny creatures like tadpoles, and he hopped across the brook on one foot.
Soon afterward he came to the White River, which was half a mile wide, so rapid that it was covered with foam, like new milk, and full of immense sea serpents. "I shan"t be able to hop over _this_ on one foot," thought Pei-Hang, throwing his red seed into the water.
But to his surprise the White River shrank just as rapidly as the Blue River into a tiny rippling brook, with some wee wriggling eels at the bottom.
Pei-Hang leaped lightly over it, and walked a long way before he came in sight of the Red River.
This was three-quarters of a mile wide, and bright scarlet. It looked like a flood of melted sealing-wax, and a row of alligators, with their mouths wide open, stretched right across it like a bridge.
"Now for my little red seed!" said Pei-Hang, opening his box quite cheerfully.
The nearest alligator made a snap at the seed as it sank in the river, but he missed it, and the next minute he found himself no bigger than a lizard, sitting at the bottom of a stream not half a yard across. At the other side of it Pei-Hang was met by one of the Genii, who had come down from his snow-peak to see who it was that had dared to play such tricks with the three mighty rivers.
Pei-Hang showed him the round white seeds in his other box.
"It is all right," he said, "I can make them as large as they were before, on my way back. But first I must find the home of the Genii, and get a pestle and mortar of jade for my future mother-in-law to pound her magic drugs in."
"First you must cross the Black River," replied the Geni, with rather a scornful laugh. "It is a mile wide, and the fish in it are six yards long, and covered with spikes like porcupines."
"How did you get across?" inquired Pei-Hang.
"I? Oh, I can fly," said the Geni.
"And I can jump," retorted Pei-Hang, st.u.r.dily.
The Geni walked with him as far as the Black River, and when our hero saw the great waste of water as black as ink, stretching away in front of him, it must be confessed his heart sank a little.
But he took out his fourth seed, and watched it disappear beneath a coal-black wave.
In an instant, to the Geni"s astonishment, the river dried up, leaving only a shallow stream running through the gra.s.s at their feet.
The Geni was not altogether a bad-hearted fellow, and he was also much impressed by the wonderful things Pei-Hang seemed able to do; so he offered to show him the nearest way to the home of the Genii, on the top of Mount Sumi.
After a long and wearisome climb they got up there, and found eight of the Genii sitting on eight snow-peaks, and looking down on the Lake of Gems, as Yun-Ying had said.