Cloud could see they were upset, so she dropped her bantering tone and became serious. "Now don't get upset. I'm not like that at all. If I'd wanted to keep him to myself, I could have stayed home and enjoyed myself day and night instead of moving in with you. Why move house just to get jealous? The very fact that I told you about him shows my good intentions. Provided we can arrive at some fair and impartial arrangement, so that we remain on good terms after the introduction, I'll bring him over to meet you."

"If you're willing to do that," said Lucky Jade, "it would really give some meaning to our vow. Let's ask you to set the rules and we'll abide by them. There's no need for any discussion."

"I was the first to meet him," said Cloud, "and also the first to sleep with him. By rights I ought to be in the position of a wife as compared with a concubine, or a senior as compared with a junior, and enjoy extra privileges, getting half his time while you two divide the rest. But we're such close friends that I'd be loath to take that line. We don't need to consider any other options, let's just go by seniority. Whether we're enjoying ourselves by day or by night, we'll proceed from senior to junior. We mustn't get in each other's way like the boy of Que Village who 'presumed to sit with his seniors and walk abreast of them.' [74] And in all we say and do, let's give each other a little grace. Someone younger mustn't be too bumptious and try to show up her elders with things she may be better at. The new friendships mustn't get so close as to weaken the old one, making me feel like the fish that got thrown back in the river. If we can stick to this rule, we'll get on well together without quarreling. Agreed?"

Lucky Pearl and Lucky Jade assented in unison: "Your reasoning is absolutely fair. The one thing that worried us was that you might not be willing to share him. Of course we agree."

"In that case get me some notepaper and I'll call him over." The sisters were jubilant. One fetched the paper while the other ground up the ink. Cloud picked up the brush and wrote two lines:

The female companions of Mount Tiantai,

Are waiting for Liu, their pact complete. [75]

She then threw down the brush, folded the note several times, and placed it in the container.

"Why did you write only two lines?" asked Lucky Jade. "You haven't finished it either. What kind of poetry is that?"

"I know what she has in mind," said Lucky Pearl. "She can't bear to make him exert himself, so she saves him the trouble of writing a letter by giving him a couplet to complete." She turned to Cloud. "You're head over heels in love!"

Smiling, Cloud sealed the container, gave it to a maid, and told her to throw it through the gap in the wooden wall of her room and wait there for a reply. Once the maid had left, the three women resumed their discussion.

"Tell me," asked Lucky Pearl, "what method did you use to get him to your place? And how many nights did you sleep with him?"

Cloud told them that he lived next door, had removed part of the wooden wall, and would come over at night and not leave until dawn. She said that they had slept together several nights.

"Well, and what is his ability like, as compared with your husband's?" asked Lucky Jade.

"Speaking of that, well, it's simply adorable! You've seen only his looks, which are unequaled, true, but which an artist or sculptor might conceivably capture. But his endowment is a priceless treasure of a kind that no woman has ever heard of, let alone seen."

Pearl and Jade became more and more excited and bombarded her with questions, like candidates for an examination buttonholing a friend outside the hall and asking him about the paper: How large? How long? From the classics? Were candles supplied? [76] They wanted answers to all these questions.

The meal was over, but the dishes had not been cleared away. Cloud felt she could never describe the object successfully without giving an illustration. When asked how long, she picked up an ivory chopstick and replied, "The length of this chopstick." When asked how thick, she picked up a teacup and replied, "The size of this teacup." When asked how hard, she pointed to a bowl of bean curd and replied, "As hard as that bean curd," a reply that sent her listeners into fits of laughter.

"In that case it's awfully soft," they said. "What's the use of its being so big if it's like bean curd?"

"You're wrong there," said Cloud. "There is nothing in the world that's harder then bean curd. It's harder than metal, for metal, hard as it is, melts on contact with fire, whereas bean curd gets harder and harder the longer it's exposed to heat. That object of his is the same, it gets harder with sex, not softer, which is why I compared it to bean curd."

"We don't believe such a treasure exists," said the sisters. "You're overdoing it."

"Far from it. I haven't even told you all of its strengths. It has two other marvelous qualities apart from those I have mentioned, but if I tried to describe them, you'd be even more skeptical. You'll just have to wait until you're having sex with him and can experience them yourselves."

"Do tell us," chorused the sisters. "Never mind whether we believe you."

But Cloud was not about to reveal his qualities so easily. She let the sisters become more and more agitated before finally giving them a systematic account of Vesperus's ability to get larger and hotter, an account that stirred up the sisters' passions and brought a flush to their cheeks and ears. They longed for him to walk in that very moment so that they could drag him off to bed without a word of greeting and put his extraordinary talents to the test. Unfortunately the maid had still not returned, although she had been gone a long time.

The reason for the delay was that Vesperus was not at home. The maid waited inside Cloud's room, where she was spotted by Satchel, who climbed through the gap in the wooden wall and had a long and heavy session with her. When Vesperus returned, she threw the letter over and received his reply, which she duly brought back.

The three women squeezed together to read it. They saw that he had understood Cloud's intention and, instead of writing a letter, had merely added a second couplet:

All prepared is the sesame food;

Restrain your hunger when we meet.

Now that their night's pleasure was assured, the sisters were eager to go in and arrange their beds, fold the covers, bathe and perfume themselves, and await his lovemaking. Cloud stopped them.

"Don't run away so quickly. Let's get tonight's order settled now, lest we make a spectacle of ourselves with a scramble at the last minute."

Lucky Pearl was well aware that Cloud, having slept with him several nights, ought to give up her place, in which case it would be her turn; this was no time to apply the seniority rule. Instead of saying this, however, she gave a calculated display of deference. "But you set the rules just now, from senior to junior, and it goes without saying that you'll be first. What is there left to discuss?"

"By rights we ought to do it like that," said Cloud, "but a different principle should apply tonight. As the saying goes, 'He who enters first is host, he who enters last is guest.' I've slept with him several nights already and would have to be considered the host. Let's use the host-guest principle tonight and switch to the seniority system after you've both slept with him. That's definitely the right solution, so let's have no false modesty. There's just one question still to be settled: with me out of consideration, he should naturally begin with Pearl. But are you going to take a whole night each or will you divide the night between you? Talk it over and let me know."