"Do not come for a few days. That will be safer. Let us give them time to forget about it."
But her father had his ears on the alert; he heard the window creak, and he ran up, though again too late. In the morning he said to his wife:
"This baby is certainly about some villainy. She keeps her mouth as tight as a trap."
"I also have a suspicion," replied her mother.
"Yet the room opens on to the stairs, which come down into our room."
"I am going to give her a good taste of the rod to make her speak."
"That is a bad plan, a very bad plan," said her mother. "It is a true proverb that you must not show family blemishes. If you beat her, all the neighbors will know, and who would wish to marry her? Let us rather make her sleep in our room, which has no way out except the door. We will spend the night up the stairs, and see what happens."
On being told of this proposal, Eternal Life dared not say anything. And on the higher floor husband and wife slept in peace.
One evening Wu-ban felt his heart seething with passion. Fearing that he might be attacked by P'an, he armed himself with a knife, which he used to cut pigs' throats. Under Eternal Life's window, he coughed softly. Nothing stirred. He coughed more loudly, thinking she was asleep. But everything remained quiet. He was going back to his house, in a thoughtful mood, when he saw a ladder left near to a house which was being built. He seized upon it, carried it away, and put it up against Eternal Life's window. The catch was not locked. He pushed it open, climbed over the sill, and silently went toward the bed.
Drunken with joy, Wu-ban was already disrobing himself of his clothes, when, in the stillness of the night, his ears caught the sound of two people breathing, instead of one. He listened with controlled breath. Unmistakably the rough breathing of a man was mingled with the softer murmur of a woman.