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08 The Stolen Cassock

"You worry too much, Master," said Wukong carelessly. "What harm in showing a cassock?" He hurriedly undid the bundle, took out the cassock and shook it open. At once the room filled with red light and the courtyard with coloured radiance, and the monks stood gaping. At the sight of such a treasure the Venerable Jinchi's heart was stirred. He fell to his knees before the Tang Monk. "It is late, and this disciple's old eyes are dim; I cannot see it clearly. Might I take it to the back room and study it carefully overnight, returning it to you at dawn?" The Tang Monk was startled. But Wukong said with a laugh, "With old Sun here, what is there to fear?" He handed the cassock to Jinchi, adding, "Look at it as you please — but it must come back tomorrow morning, clean and undamaged." The old man was beside himself with delight. He put the cassock away, then had the monks sweep the front meditation hall clean, brought in two rattan couches and made up bedding, and asked master and disciple to rest. Back in his room, the Venerable Jinchi examined the brocade cassock by lamplight. As he looked, he suddenly burst into bitter weeping. "Grandmaster," asked his young disciple, "why do you weep?" "I have lived two hundred and seventy years in vain and never seen a cassock to match this. If I could wear it for a single day, I would die content." "What is so hard about that?" said the boy. "Keep the Tang Monk a few days longer and wear it." The old man sighed. "But when he leaves I must give it back. In the end I cannot keep it." A monk named Guangmou offered a plan. "Keeping it for good is easy enough. Burn the front meditation hall — those two monks die, and the cassock is ours." Jinchi dried his tears. "Excellent!" he cried, and ordered the monks to fetch firewood. That night more than two hundred monks in the temple busied themselves hauling straw and firewood until they had ringed the front meditation hall tight as a drum, and made ready to set the fire. Meanwhile the Tang Monk and his disciple were resting in the meditation hall. Wukong heard people moving about outside without pause. "Can thieves have come?" he wondered. Not wishing to wake his master, he turned himself into a bee and flew out. Outside, one look told him what the monks were about. He laughed to himself. "They mean to kill us. But if I beat them dead with my staff, my master will say I have shed blood wantonly. Very well — I will meet their plot with a plot of my own." His mind made up, Wukong somersaulted up to the Southern Gate of Heaven. The guards cried out in alarm, "Trouble! The monkey who wrecked the heavenly palace is back!" Wukong waved them down. "Spare me the courtesies — I am looking for the Wide-Eyed Heavenly King." The Wide-Eyed Heavenly King arrived just then. "I hear you are escorting the Tang Monk — what brings you here?" "No time for old gossip," said Wukong. "Someone is setting fire to the Tang Monk, and I have come to borrow your fire-shield." "If there is fire," said the king, "you should borrow water to save people. Why a fire-shield?" Wukong laughed. "If I borrow water it will not burn at all. I mean only to shield the Tang Monk — let the rest burn!" The king dared not refuse. "You have not improved, monkey," he said with a laugh. "You look after your own and care nothing for anyone else." And he handed over the fire-shield. Wukong took it, dropped back through the clouds, and covered the Tang Monk, the white horse and the baggage. Then he settled himself on the roof of Jinchi's room to keep watch over the brocade cassock. Seeing the monks start the fire, Wukong formed a mudra, muttered a spell and blew a breath at the flames. At once a wind sprang up.

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