"Afanti," called Master Hu. "This labourer says you're going to speak for him. Why are you so late?"
Afanti bowed before him. "I'm sorry, but I had some important business to attend to," he said.
"How could it be more important than settling this dispute?" Master Hu replied.
"It was much more important," said Afanti. "Tomorrow, I am going to plant some wheat, but I had not yet fried the seeds or eaten them. I fried them three times and it took me a long time to finish them up."
"Nonsense!" roared Master Hu. "How can you plant seeds that you have eaten?"
The crowd laughed heartily, but Afanti just stroked his large beard and smiled. After a while, the hubbub died down, and he said: "You say that wheat seeds that have been eaten cannot be planted. Well, how can the chicken that the labourer ate lay any eggs?"
The crowd thought for a second, and then cried out: "Yes, that's right, how can a chicken that's been eaten lay eggs?" Everyone began shouting and laughing and lifted Afanti up onto their shoulders.
Seeing the crowd's reaction, Master Hu had no alternative but to announce: "The labourer should pay one hundred copper pieces to the innkeeper in return for the chicken he ate."
The labourer happily handed over the string of copper coins to the innkeeper. "I wouldn't dare to eat on of your chickens again," he said.
The innkeeper took the money and walked silently away. The crowd of Muslims laughed at him and some small children threw stones at his back.
Master Hu walked up to Afanti. "The saucepan I lent to you gave birth to a son. That's very good. When will it be giving birth again?"
An expression of deep sadness appeared on Afanti's face. "Master Hu," he said. "Your saucepan is dead."
"How can a saucepan die?" Master Hu replied angrily.
"If a saucepan can give birth to a son, of course it can die."
"You charlatan," cried Master Hu. "You just don't want to return my saucepan."
"All right," Afanti shouted back. "We'll let everyone decide."
But Master Hu remembered how he had accepted the small saucepan, and decided he had lost enough face. He waved his hand to indicate he had had enough and walked off through the crowd.
Afanti was extremely pleased with himself for having managed to cheat Master Hu, himself a master at cheating the poor, and he threw back his head and roared with laughter. Suddenly, a voice behind him said: "Well Whiskers, what ridiculousness are you up to now?"
Afanti turned and saw it was the Strange Knight of the Heavenly Pool, Master Yuan. He jumped up happily and grabbed Yuan's arm.
"Aha! So you're here. Come and see my wife," he said.
"What's so special about your wife that you keep showing her off like a monkey would a jewel…" Before Yuan could finish, Xu and Yu came forward and kowtowed before him.
"Enough, enough, there's no need to kowtow. I'm not your teacher," Yuan protested. "Where is your Master Chen?"
"The Great Helmsman came on ahead of us…" Xu began. Suddenly, he noticed the Twin Eagles of Tianshan, Bald Vulture and Madame Guan, behind Yuan and bowed to them. He was surprised to see Madame Guan was riding Chen's white horse.
"Where did you find that horse?" he asked.
"We found him running free in the desert. It took the three of us quite a while to catch him," she said.
Xu was shocked. "Could the Great Helmsman be in danger? We had better go and find him," he said.
They finished lunch quickly and bade farewell to Zhou Qi. Afanti's wife, was furious that he was leaving again after only a few hours at home, and grabbed his beard, wailing and screaming as she did so. Afanti laughed and tried to comfort her.
"I`ve found a young lady to keep you company," he said. "In fact, there's a baby inside her, which means two people to keep you company, much better than me by myself." But his wife wailed even louder.
Yuanzhi rode the white horse and let it lead the way to back to Chen. Afanti again rode his donkey, but the animal was much too slow. By nightfall, they had gone only ten miles, and everyone was getting anxious.
"We will go on ahead," Xu finally said to Afanti. "We are afraid that our Great Helmsman may be in trouble."
"All right, all rightm" Afanti replied. "When we get to the next village, I'll buy a better donkey. This stupid donkey thinks he's something special, but really he's useless." He urged the animal on and caught up with Yuanzhi.
"Mistress, why are you so unhappy all the time?" he asked.
Despite his apparent silliness, Yuanzhi knew that this strange Muslim was very wise, and she decided to ask his advice.
"Uncle Afanti," she replied. "How would you deal with someone who was unreasonable?"
"I would cover his head with my saucepan and skewer him with a sword."
Yuanzhi shook her head. "That won't do. For instance, what if he was someone very… dear to you. The nicer you are towards him, the more stubborn he becomes, like your donkey."
Afanti pulled at his beard, fully understanding her meaning. "I ride this donkey every day and I've learned a few tricks about how to deal with his bad temper," he replied with a smile.
They entered a village. As they approached the square at its centre, the white horse suddenly gave a long neigh and galloped forward. Yuanzhi pulled desperatelyon the reins, but could not control him and the villagers scattered in front of the apparently crazed animal as it raced up to a group of people and stopped. Yuanzhi dismounted in front of Luo Bing, Wen, 'Leopard' Wei, Zhang Jin, Xin Yan and white-bearded Lu Feiqing.
Yu ran over to Lu and knelt down before him. "Uncle," he cried, and began to sob.
Lu helped him up, tears also glistening in his eyes. "I started out as soon as I heard the shocking news about your teacher, Master Ma Zhen," he said. "I met Master Wen and the others on the road. They are also after that traitor, Zhang. Don't worry. We will avenge the death of your teacher."
The heroes found somewhere to rest briefly while Afanti went off to buy a donkey, Yuanzhi quietly following him. He found and purchased a strong animal, twice as tall as his tail-less donkey which he sold to the donkey merchant for a small sum.
"The official's cap was the undoing of this stupid donkey," he said, and laughed. He threw the cap on the ground, and trampled it into the dust. Yuanzhi led the new donkey for him as they walked back.
"I once raised a donkey that was appallingly stubborn," Afanti said. "If I wanted him to move, he would stand still. If I wanted him to stand still, he would walk round in circles. One day, I wanted him to pull a cart to a mill a few hundred feet away, but no matter what I said, he wouldn't budge. The more I pushed him, the more determined he was to stay put. I shouted, I hit him, it made no difference. So you can guess what I did?"
"I'm sure you thought of something."
"The mill was to the east, so I pulled the donkey round to face west and then urged him to moved forward. He retreated one step after another all the way to the mill!"
"You wanted to go east, so it insisted on going west," Yuanzhi said thoughtfully. "So you pushed him westwards."
Afanti stuck up his thumb. "That's right. That's the way." Yuanzhi smiled. "Thank you for your advice," she said.
She decided he was right. The more she was nice to Yu, the more he avoided her, so she decided that she would ignore him instead. Luo Bing and Xu were surprised by her sudden change in attitude, but Afanti just stroked his beard and smiled.
With Afanti riding his new donkey, they made much faster progress. The white horse led them to the White Jade Peak, but it was still fearful of the wolves and stopped outside the maze of paths leading to the Secret City, refusing to go any further.
"The wolf pack went in here," said Master Yuan. "We should be able to find our way easily by following the trail of wolf droppings." Their anxiety about Chen's safety increased.
The path twisted back and forth for a long time. Suddenly, they heard footsteps ahead and four men appeared round a corner, the first of whom was Zhang. His face turned pale at the sight of the heroes, and particularly his martial brother Lu Feiqing. Yu gripped hold of his golden flute and was about to charge forward when Master Yuan lightly touched his shoulder, stopping him dead in his tracks.
Master Yuan pointed at Zhang accusingly. "When we met several days ago, I called you a master of the Wudang School. I did not know then that you were capable of even killing your own martial brother. Why not end it cleanly and quickly yourself?"
Zhang calculated that at least five of his opponents were his equal at kung fu or better and that he would gain nothing from a head-on confrontation.
With one swift, smooth movement, he drew his sword, and flung a large handful of Golden Needles at the heroes. As they ducked, he grabbed Hahetai and squeezed a key Yuedao point on his right wrist. "Run!" he shouted.
Hahetai was no longer master of his own movements. He ran with Zhang back along the path towards the Secret City, with Tang and Gu following along behind. By the time the heroes had picked themselves up, the four had disappeared around the bend. Master Yuan and Afanti were furious, and shot after them at high speed. Master Yuan was particularly fast, and in a moment he had caught up with Tang. He grasped him by the neck and lifted his fat body up off the ground. Unable to see his attacker, Tang kicked out backwards with his foot, but a huge force propelled him through the air, smashing his head into the rock face, killing him instantly.
Master Yuan ran on and, rounding the next corner, found himself confronted by three paths leading off the main track.
Xu looked carefully at the ground. "Someone trod in this pile of wolf droppings," he said, pointing. "They must have followed the trail of droppings back."
"Very good. Let's go," Master Yuan replied. They followed the droppings all the way to the base of the White Jade Peak without seeing any sign of Zhang and the other two. But they noticed the cave mouth above them, and Master Yuan and some of the others jumped up the cliff while the rest were hauled one by one by Lu and Wen.
Master Yuan pushed open the massive stone door, and ran on ahead of the others down the tunnel. When they entered the Great Hall, their weapons were snatched away by the magnetic force, giving them all a bad shock. But they had urgent business, and picked up their swords and others weapons without bothering to work out what had happened and ran on to the Jade Room, where they saw the tunnel mouth beside the bed. The further they went into the bowels of the mountain, the more astounded they became. Suddenly, they emerged once more into bright daylight, and saw six people standing around the Jade Pool, three on one side and three on the other. On the far side were Chen, Huo Qingtong and Princess Fragrance, while on the near side were Zhang, Gu and Hahetai.
"Master, master!" Xin Yan called excitedly. "We're here!"
"Child! Are you all right?" Madame Guan shouted to Huo Qingtong.
"Fine!" she called back. She pointed at Gu and added: "Please kill that villain quickly." Bald Vulture drew his sword and sprung at him, while Madame Guan began to fight with Hahetai. The other heroes quietly surrounded Zhang.
Gu and Hehetai fought for their lives, but could not hope to win against the "Three-Part" sword style of the Twin Eagles. In the midst of the clash of swords, Bald Vulture gave a roar and blood appeared on Gu's chest. He followed with a swift kick, and Gu fell backwards into the pool, sending fountains of water spraying out in all directions. A trail of blood rose to the surface.
A moment later, there was another splash as Gu surfaced, and began swimming slowly towards the bank. Hahetai threw down his sword and helped him out of the water. Gu was badly wounded and had taken in a large quantity of water, and after laying him down on the bank, Hahetai massaged his chest.
Zhang watched helplessly as Gu and Hahetai were overcome. Then 'Scholar' Yu lunged at him. Zhang swept his left hand across, and as Yu dodged to avoid the blow, Zhang grabbed him with his right hand and threw him at a nearby stone wall with a roar. Horrified, Yuanzhi jumped forward to grab Yu, but Zhang's strength was too great and the two slammed into the wall. A sharp 'crack' sounded as Yuanzhi's left arm snapped.
The heroes's anger flared once more. Master Yuan went over to Yuanzhi and placed a medicine pill in her mouth to ease her intense pain while the others surrounded Zhang.
"The 'Fire Hand Judge' will die as a hero!" he shouted defiantly. "Well, are you coming altogether or one at a time?"
"I'll fight you first!" Bald Vulture shouted back.
"This traitor has wronged me too deeply," Wen interrupted him. "Let me go first."
"He killed my teacher," Yu shouted. "I may not be as good a fighter as him, but I want to be first. Brother Wen, you can take over when I can't take any more."
"Let us draw lots," Chen suggested.
"Master Chen," Zhang broke in on them. "We agreed in Hangzhou to meet at a later date for a duel. Does that still hold?"
"Yes," Chen replied. "As I remember, we postponed the meeting because your hand was injured. Now is an excellent time to settle the affair."
"Then you and I will compete first and the others will wait their turns, agreed?" Zhang had fought with Chen on several occasions and knew he could beat him. He reckoned that if he could capture him, he might be able to find some way to escape. And if he could not capture him, he would at least have the satisfaction of killing the Red Flower Society's leader.
"If you think you are going to escape with your life today, you are deluding yourself," said Chen. "We spared your life in that dungeon in Hangzhou, and on Lion Peak. Only a few days ago, I saved you once again from the wolves. But the Red Flower Society has run out of benevolence towards you."
"Well, come on then," Zhang replied impatiently. Chen leapt at him, his two fists aimed straight at Zhang's face. Zhang ducked and then jumped up out of the way, and Chen followed with a sweeping kick, timing it to strike Zhang as he fell back to earth. Surprised, Zhang had to thrust his sword at Chen's chest to extricate himself. Chen moved back and as fast as lightning, Zhang struck out again.