roared Master Hu. "How can you plant seeds that you have eaten?"
The crowd laughed heartily, but Afanti just stroked his large beard and smiled. After a while, the hubbub died down, and he said: "You say that wheat seeds that have been eaten cannot be planted. Well, how can the chicken that the labourer ate lay any eggs?"
The crowd thought for a second, and then cried out: "Yes, that"s right, how can a chicken that"s been eaten lay eggs?" Everyone began shouting and laughing and lifted Afanti up onto their shoulders.
Seeing the crowd"s reaction, Master Hu had no alternative but to announce: "The labourer should pay one hundred copper pieces to the innkeeper in return for the chicken he ate."
The labourer happily handed over the string of copper coins to the innkeeper. "I wouldn"t dare to eat on of your chickens again," he said.
The innkeeper took the money and walked silently away. The crowd of Muslims laughed at him and some small children threw stones at his back.
Master Hu walked up to Afanti. "The saucepan I lent to you gave birth to a son. That"s very good. When will it be giving birth again?"
An expression of deep sadness appeared on Afanti"s face. "Master Hu," he said. "Your saucepan is dead."
"How can a saucepan die?" Master Hu replied angrily.
"If a saucepan can give birth to a son, of course it can die."
"You charlatan," cried Master Hu. "You just don"t want to return my saucepan."
"All right," Afanti shouted back. "We"ll let everyone decide."
But Master Hu remembered how he had accepted the small saucepan, and decided he had lost enough face. He waved his hand to indicate he had had enough and walked off through the crowd.
Afanti was extremely pleased with himself for having managed to cheat Master Hu, himself a master at cheating the poor, and he threw back his head and roared with laughter. Suddenly, a voice behind him said: "Well Whiskers, what ridiculousness are you up to now?"
Afanti turned and saw it was the Strange Knight of the Heavenly Pool, Master Yuan. He jumped up happily and grabbed Yuan"s arm.
"Aha! So you"re here. Come and see my wife," he said.
"What"s so special about your wife that you keep showing her off like a monkey would a jewel ..." Before Yuan could finish, Xu and Yu came forward and kowtowed before him.
"Enough, enough, there"s no need to kowtow. I"m not your teacher," Yuan protested. "Where is your Master Chen?"
"The Great Helmsman came on ahead of us..." Xu began. Suddenly, he noticed the Twin Eagles of Tianshan, Bald Vulture and Madame Guan, behind Yuan and bowed to them. He was surprised to see Madame Guan was riding Chen"s white horse.
"Where did you find that horse?" he asked.
"We found him running free in the desert. It took the three of us quite a while to catch him," she said.
Xu was shocked. "Could the Great Helmsman be in danger? We had better go and find him," he said.
They finished lunch quickly and bade farewell to Zhou Qi. Afanti"s wife, was furious that he was leaving again after only a few hours at home, and grabbed his beard, wailing and screaming as she did so. Afanti laughed and tried to comfort her.
"I`ve found a young lady to keep you company," he said. "In fact, there"s a baby inside her, which means two people to keep you company, much better than me by myself." But his wife wailed even louder.
Yuanzhi rode the white horse and let it lead the way to back to Chen. Afanti again rode his donkey, but the animal was much too slow. By nightfall, they had gone only ten miles, and everyone was getting anxious.
"We will go on ahead," Xu finally said to Afanti. "We are afraid that our Great Helmsman may be in trouble."
"All right, all rightm" Afanti replied. "When we get to the next village, I"ll buy a better donkey. This stupid donkey thinks he"s something special, but really he"s useless." He urged the animal on and caught up with Yuanzhi.
"Mistress, why are you so unhappy all the time?"