"I don't believe that any scent from inside you could have such a nice bouquet to it. If so, your body must be a treasure too."

"It's the one real asset I have, something that no other woman possesses. I'm told that at my birth, just before I appeared, a rosy cloud wafted into the room and everyone noticed an exotic scent. Then, when I came along, the cloud dispersed but not the scent, which was often found issuing from me. It was on the strength of this that I was given the name Cloud of Scent. If I sit quietly, the scent is barely perceptible, but if I exert myself and start sweating, it comes from my pores. When that happens, not only are others aware of it, I can sense it myself. Since I have this asset, I don't like to conceal it either. That day in the temple when we met, you looked so terribly handsome that I lingered a while and made eyes at you and left you my fan as a token. I was hoping you would come and seek me out so that I could offer you this scent for your appreciation, but to my great disappointment you never came. Only now do I get my wish."

Vesperus sniffed her body carefully all over and found that each pore gave off a wisp of scent, which convinced him that the most beautiful women are not to be chosen solely on the basis of their visual appeal, just as heroes are not to be judged solely by their physique. Clasping her in a tight embrace, he called her dearest several dozen times, until Cloud broke in: "Have you smelt me all over?"

"Yes."

"I'm afraid there's one place you've missed."

"No, I didn't miss anywhere."

"Yes, you did. You missed one place, where the scent differs from everywhere else. I might as well offer that for your appreciation too.

"Where is it?"

Cloud took one of his fingers in her hand and touched her vulva with it. "The smell in here is different again," she said. "If it's not asking too much, why not sniff it and see?"

Vesperus crouched down and gave several deep sniffs before scrambling up again.

"What a treasure! There's nothing more to be said, I shall love you forever!" With that, he crouched down again, parted that supreme treasure, and began licking it.

"Don't do that! It's too much! It'll be the death of me!" As she spoke, she tried to pull him up, but the harder she pulled the more furiously he licked. Using his three-inch tongue like a penis, he went back and forth, thrusting and withdrawing as in real copulation. When he sensed her fluid coming, he drew it into his mouth, gulping it down without losing a drop, after which he kept on until she spent, when he even swallowed her essence. Only then did he get up and lie on top of her again.

Cloud hugged him tightly. "Dear one, why do you love me so? There's nothing more for me to say either. I shall love you forever, too. If you truly love me, let's take a vow tonight."

"Just what I was going to suggest." They got out of bed, dressed, and took a vow before the moon and stars, praying that, among other things, "Not only may we never part in this existence, but in the next one, too, let us be husband and wife."

Then they took their clothes off again and climbed back into bed, where they began confiding their innermost secrets."

In my opinion," said Vesperus, "there's not another woman in the world to equal you. I don't know how many virtuous lives your husband needed to be blessed with such a supreme treasure. But since he has this treasure at home, why doesn't he stay and enjoy it instead of spending all his time elsewhere, leaving you to sleep on your own? What possible reason could he have?"

"In spirit," said Cloud, "he would like to enjoy it, but he hasn't the strength, so he uses his teaching as a pretext for staying away and avoiding his duties."

"He's still only middle-aged, as I understand. Why is he so weak?"

"In his youth he was a rake who had one affair after another. Day and night he'd be off wenching. He wasted his powers so badly that now, in middle age, he's quite useless."

"How would you compare his capacity in his youth with mine tonight?"

"Much the same in point of technique, but he never had those two special features of yours."

"Mine is unique, and so is yours. Now that our two treasures have fit together, we must see that they never part. From now on I shall be over to sleep with you all the time."

"But you have a wife! How can you be over all the time? I'll be quite satisfied so long as you're not as heartless as you were before."

"I don't know what scandalmonger has been filling your ears with gossip and leaving me without a chance to defend myself. You're still saying I'm heartless. If I knew who it was that told you, I'd go and have it out with him!"

"To tell you the truth," said Cloud, "it was those three women."

"This is getting stranger and stranger! They should have been offended to hear such a nasty remark! How can they be so shameless as to repeat it?"

"To be frank with you, it all began with my telling them. We belong to the same family, and I call the two younger ones sister and the older one aunt. We are all on good terms, and the two sisters and I are particularly close, as close as real sisters, and keep no secrets from each other. Well, that day after I got back from the temple I told them how handsome you were, how you kept stealing glances at me, and how I fell in love with you and left you my fan. They said, 'Since he's so much in love with you and knows you fancy him, he's bound to come looking for you. How are you going to send him away?' I, too, fully expected you to come looking for me, and I waited at the gate for ten days without a sign of you.

"Then, on their return from the temple, they came to visit me and asked, 'What did he look like, that man you saw the other day? What was he wearing?' I gave them a detailed description. 'In that case,' they said, 'we've just met the man you love.' Then they asked, When he fell for you, did he kowtow, by any chance?' I replied, He had to keep his feelings hidden, of course. How could he possibly kowtow in front of all those people?' They said nothing, just looked at each other and smiled in a smug, secretive sort of way. That aroused my suspicions, and I questioned them closely until they told me in great detail, smiling all the while, how you had kowtowed to them.

"There was something awfully superior about their attitude that upset me for days. This is how my thoughts went: 'He was meeting them for the first time too. Why was he so afraid of scandal when he saw me that he didn't even bow once, whereas with them he went wild and kowtowed quite brazenly? Obviously my looks don't compare with theirs and, equally obviously, my luck doesn't equal theirs either.' If you were going to seek anyone out, you'd seek out the ones you'd kowtowed to. You wouldn't come looking for me!

"So I cut my love for you out of my heart and never went back to the gate. But I was constantly on the lookout to see if you came searching for them. Normally we are the closest of sisters, but because of this incident I began to resent them, and that was why, when we met today and you said you had waited six months before paying any attention to me, I couldn't help suspecting them. Only when you swore all those terrible oaths did I realize that nothing of the kind had occurred. This whole comedy was kowtowed into existence by you. Tell me: do you think you were right to do it?"

"With this injustice on your mind," said Vesperus, "no wonder you flared up. But since they're your sisters, they must be my sisters-in-law, and you ought to let me see them. All I have in mind is to address them as sisters-in-law and let them know that you and I are lovers. They put you down with their story about my kowtowing, so let me return the favor by putting them down, not just with these kowtows but with our lovemaking as well. How does that appeal to you?"