Both of them jumped up immediately pouring forth a flow of curses and were ready to resume fighting; but at that moment some rhythmical tapping at the gate made all combatants stand still better than the thunder and lightnings of the Jasper Lord should do it were it his will to come to the place in his heavenly bronze chariot.

A small demon was standing near the opened gate.

At least, one could think that only a demon should have such a face. His mouth was like a narrow black slot twisted in the most incredible way, his right cheek was composed of interlaced seams and scars, his nose was mutilated by a double fracture and eyes were hardly visible between the heavy eyelids and wide oedemata below. He had a large wooden disk pressed under his elbow.

The small demon went slowly to the guards and the guilty monk who leant at the fence, put his disk down at the latter's feet and stretched his hand commandingly.

The monk gave him his basket without saying a word. The monster rotated it in his fingers, threw it into the air several times and deftly caught it again by the handle, then made some steps along the waiting men, as if deep in thought.

– Old Ghao is looking at the see, – the muffled words went out of the awful mouth.

The basket made an intricate loop over the demon's head.

– Old Ghao wants to catch a wily fish, – the basket rushed up but stopped halfway, flew off the monster's hand, turned upside down, then it was grasped by his foot and finally seized.

The guards picked up their halberds and watched this performance shaking their heads in sheer astonishment.

– Old Ghao plays with the wind, – the demon began to jump adroitly on one foot, from time to time sitting down for a moment and turning the basket around him.

All of a sudden, as unexpectedly as he has begun his play, he stopped, threw the basket to the naked monk and went away to the gate, not forgetting to take up his disk.

– Reverend Feng! – shouted the lascivious monk. – Please, wait a little! I beg you, show me the trick once more! Reverend Feng!..

He ran to the gate after the demon.

The guards didn't even move to stop him.

...When the invaders have finally left the yard, the plump woman shut the window; but in a minute she opened it again and looked out: it seemed to her that some shadow passed by her house. But there was nobody there.

For safety's sake the woman looked up. There was of course some place above the window just up to the eaves but it was not enough for any creature larger than a swallow, and the worthy woman was not afraid of swallows.

If she were told that this swallow was Cai the Baby Snake, she would be very surprised indeed.

The great teacher Sunzi was the author of many wise sayings which should be constantly quoted by anybody who wants to deserve the name of a strategist, and one of his sayings was such:

– Subtlety! Subtlety is the thing you need! There are no such affairs in which you would not use scouts.

The honest family that has given birth to our friend Cai the Baby Snake agreed completely with this piece of wisdom quite proved during the long centuries. For the professional scouts of the Cai family participated in almost all famous events giving food for long chatter in marketplaces and taverns. Baby Snake’s great-grandfather had contributed much to the success of Zhu Yunzhang, leader of the rebelled "red kerchiefs", who managed to take Beijing in incredibly short time, – afterwards it was explained by the activity of spirits wishing to help the future monarch and founder of the new dynasty; old Cai used to giggle for all remaining years of his inconspicuous life remembering how he had once spent three days hiding in a cesspool at the outskirts of the future Northern Capital [16] .

Baby Snake's grandmother was so diligently asking for alms in the northern provinces that two of the local governors died suddenly of volvulus and thus had no possibility to discuss in details the plan of their conspiracy. Cai the Baby Snake did not know his father; there were hardly more than three persons in the whole Empire who'd seen the face of Cai the Big Ears, for he covered it with a hood even visiting his wife; Baby Snake himself also happened to do some things of the kind not meant for telling in taverns.

They were not meant to be told anywhere at all.

Judge Bao, thanks to his post, was one of the few who were let into the mystery of the Cai family; he liked to repeat from time to time the words of an ancient treatise:

– There are five ways to use scouts: most common are the local scouts, sometimes you find inner scouts as well as reverse scouts, there exist also scouts of death and scouts of life. The latter are appreciated above all.

Then he always used to add:

– The scouts of life are those who return with reports.

Cai the Baby Snake was a scout of life.

When he came to this world gliding out of his mother's womb his granny who was believed to be (and really was) an experienced midwife took the crying baby in her hands, slapped his little bottom as red as a monkey's, looked at him and announced, touching the "dengchu" point with her fat finger:

– He's Baby Snake!

– Are you sure, mother-in-law? – asked the woman weary of childbirth.

The granny simply laughed and lighting up her pipe went to rinse the linen. Everything had been quiet in the northern provinces for about eight years, so there was no necessity for the old woman to go there asking alms.

They washed the baby with cold infusions of Hangzhou chrysantemum, unripe ounaby fruits, lizard cheeks and many other components the complete list of which would have surprised very much even a highly experienced physician if by chance the latter could have seen it. Cai’s mother ceased to feed him with her milk when he was still very small; after that the child was fed twice in twenty four hours, at dawn and after sunset. They massaged his tiny body many times and covered it with thin needles like a hedgehog: the granny Cai was skilful in the art of wielding the needles giving life or death on her choice; the baby was always tightly swaddled and his cradle rocked in such a way that it would often hit the walls of the room: the baby, frightened and shaking, had to roll himself into a ball to endure the shock. Later on still more powerful methods and measures were introduced. Being one year old Baby Snake looked like a five-month baby, in his sixth year he seemed younger by half, in the eleventh year people thought he was seven, and the family had to leave their house in order to avoid gossip and to move to Ningo where they settled in a uninhabited place out of town...

Now Baby Snake Cai, the scout of life, the one who must return, was forty-two years old.

His biography included about two dozens of tasks successfully fulfilled and about fifteen persons who had been a bit too zealous during their last existence and died because they had underestimated the naive young boy.

Cai the Baby Snake hoped sincerely that their next reincarnation would be more lucky.

But last winter the scout of life had suffered from a hard fit threatening with paralysis; he understood that it was time to "put off old skin".

You can cheat the Time for some period but not for ever. He knew it perfectly well. He also knew that one must pay for everything. If you should not take measures in time, if you'd not come to your senses and look around you and feel the acute necessity to return to the natural way of life then your skin would loose the youthful elasticity and in a year become aged and flabby, the stiffened muscles would not obey your will, your teeth, healthy and white, would be spoiled and fall out, the joints would grow stiff and the former boy would swiftly become and old man today.