He would have a collection of her poems compiled, and in the course of the compilation, he would be able to learn a bit more about her life.

For all he knew, what he had been achieving in the official world would eventually sink into oblivion. But Xuanji’s poems would not. Judge Dee had reached an age when he could admit to himself what he was capable of doing or not. For one thing, he knew he would not be able to write such exquisite lines as hers, so the compilation of a volume for the beautiful, ill-fated poetess would probably be a project worth attempting in itself.

What’s more, it would serve at the same time as a plausible cover for the investigation – or for the non-existent investigation. At least it could prove to be something for him to give Minister Wu to show that he had tried.

A sparkle sputtered from the candle that was burning out in the hostel room. He could not help nodding to the reflection of the old, bookish man in the bronze mirror, which he usually used to adjust his official black cap.

It brought about another inexplicable wave of weariness that overwhelmed him.

The next morning, he might be able to think a bit more clearly, he reflected, nodding again.

Finally, he began to doze off, still sitting stiff like a bamboo stick in the hard wooden chair. The first gray of the morning appeared to be peeping in through the paper window like a soft-footed fox.

Heavy-eyed, Dee became aware of another man entering the room, heading straight to the seat opposite, across the table from him, the knife still trembling in the pillar overhead between them.

The newcomer turned out to be another candidate at the capital civil service examination, a close friend whose surname was Qiao, in his early twenties, who began talking with Dee in high spirits. Confident of their success with flying colors in the capital examination, they were trying to compose poems about what they were going to do for the Great Tang Empire.

Young men’s aspiration should be catching the cloud in the high skies …

In the skies, all of a sudden, they saw their years flying away like a forsaken kite with its string snapped … Now, both of them with their hair streaked with white, they begin debating heatedly in retrospect.

‘But what have you really become, Judge Dee?’

‘A fat, old, obsequious survivor in the system, I admit. But give the devil her due, Her Majesty is a capable empress, and the contemporary Tang Empire under her rule is enjoying a better, more prosperous time than ever before.’

‘How could a nun-turned-imperial-concubine have justifiably turned into the supreme ruler on the throne in light of the orthodox Confucianism? Alas, you have studied all the classics for nothing!’