Read Online Bridge Of Birds by Barry Hughart - Free Book Online

their
     daggers. The animal noises stopped abruptly when Li Kao entered and climbed up upon a
     table.
    It was as if hands had been clapped over their filthy mouths. Their eyes bulged, and sweat
     poured down their greasy faces. The leader of the thugs turned quite gray with terror, and
     I thought that he was going to faint.
    Master Li was wearing a red robe that was covered with cosmological symbols, and a red
     headband with five loops. His right trouser leg was rolled up, and his left trouser leg
     was rolled down, and he wore a shoe on his right foot and a sandal on his left. He laid
     his left hand across his chest with the little and middle fingers extended, and he slid
     his right hand back inside the sleeve of his robe. The sleeve began to flutter in peculiar
     patterns as he wriggled the concealed fingers.
    Four of the thugs grabbed their leader and forced him forward. Cut-Off-Their-Balls Wang
     was shaking so hard that he could barely stand, but he managed to slide his own right hand
     inside his sleeve, and the sleeve began to flutter in response. Master Li's sleeve moved
     faster and faster, Cut-Off-Their-Balls Wang replied in the same silent fashion, and so it
     went for many minutes. At last Li Kao extracted his hand from the sleeve and gestured
     dismissal, and to my astonishment the thugs and their leader backed out of the room on
     their knees, humbly banging their heads against the floor.
    Li Kao smiled and opened a jar of better wine and motioned for me to join him at a table.
    “The lower the criminal, the more impressed he is with the childlike mumbo-jumbo of the
     Secret Societies,” he said complacently. “For some reason Cut-Off-Their-Balls Wang is
     under the impression that I am a great grand master of the Triads, and that I intend to
     cut his gang in for a share of the loot when I make my move against the Ancestress. In the
     latter respect,” said Master Li, “he is absolutely right.”
    Two days later some aristocratic ladies who were returning to the estate of the Ancestress
     were ambushed by villains whose appearance was so terrifying that the guards fled and left
     the ladies to their fate. Things were looking very bad for them until two intrepid
     noblemen rode to the rescue.
    “On your knees, dogs, for you face the rage of Lord Li of Kao!” Master Li yelled.
    “Cower, knaves, before the fury of Lord Lu of Yu!” I shouted.
    Unfortunately, our lead horse slipped in some mud, and our carriage crashed into the
     ladies' carriage, and we were pitched on top of half-naked females who were screaming
     their heads off. We gazed groggily at a pretty jade pendant that was dangling between a
     pair of pretty pink-tipped breasts, and it took a moment for us to remember what we were
     doing there. Then we jumped down to engage the ruffians.
    Li Kao stabbed right and left with his sword, and I swung away with both hands - he was
     missing, of course, and I was pulling my punches short - and the thugs remembered that
     they weren't actually supposed to rob and rape anybody and began to do a very good job of
     acting. Once, when my foot slipped in the mud, a punch accidentally landed and sent the
     leader of the bandits sprawling. I forgot about the accident, and soon the bandits fled in
     terror and we turned to accept the gratitude of the rescued ladies.
    Cut-Off-Their-Balls Wang had already lost his nose and both of his ears in back-alley
     battles, and he did not appreciate losing several teeth as well. He crept up behind me
     with a log in his hands.
    “A present for Lord Lu of Yu!” he yelled, and he swung with all his might, and I saw a
     glorious burst of orange and purple stars, and then everything turned black.
    I awoke in a very expensive bed surrounded by very expensive women who were battling for
     the honor of bathing the bump on my skull.
    “He wakes!”
    
    
     they shrieked at the tops of their lungs.
    
    
     “Lord Lu of Yu opens his divine