Old Gao said, "In this village of ours, from ancient times until now, we have never known of any spectre or goblin, any fiend to work us mischief.

鬼祟魍魎 stacks up the whole vocabulary of haunting. 祟 is suì, a visitation from a spirit; the character survives in the modern word for creeping about furtively. 魍魎 are the sprites of wood and water, named as far back as the 左傳. 作耗 is to make trouble, with 耗 as hào. 不曉得 takes 得 as the unstressed de.

It is only that I, an old fool, have had the misfortune to father no son. I got but three daughters:

老拙 is this old clumsy one, the humble way a man of years refers to himself. In 不曾有子 the 子 is the full zǐ, a son, not the unstressed suffix. The whole disaster follows from that single word.

the eldest was named Fragrant Orchid, the second Jade Orchid, the third Kingfisher Orchid. The first two were married young to families of this village.

All three names are orchids: 香蘭 Fragrant, 玉蘭 Jade, 翠蘭 Kingfisher. 從小兒, from childhood, keeps its 兒 as er. Only the youngest was kept at home, and only because there was no son.

For the youngest I wished to take in a husband, hoping he might live in the house with me,

招 a 女婿 is to take a husband into the wife's household rather than send the daughter out — the 贅婿 arrangement, and always the sign of a house with no male heir. It carried a faint stigma for the man, which is why it was generally the poor and the rootless who agreed to it. 指望 is to look for, to count upon.

and be a son-in-law to keep me in my age, to hold up the door and the household, to do the work and answer the levies.

撐門抵戶 is to prop up the gate and hold the door: to keep the household's standing in the world. 做活當差 pairs the farm work with the state's labour levy — 當 is dāng and 差 is chāi, the conscripted service every household owed. The squire is describing a job, not a marriage.

Three years ago, unlooked for, there came a fellow whose looks were passable enough.

不期 is unlooked for. 模樣 takes 模 as mú, the reading this site holds to, and its 兒 as er. 精緻 of a man's looks means trim, neatly made. Remember the word: it is the last flattering thing anyone says about this creature's face.

He said he was of a family on Fuling Mountain, that his surname was Zhu, that he had neither father nor mother above him nor brothers below, and that he was willing to be taken in as a husband.

福陵山, Fuling Mountain; and the surname 豬, Zhu — which means Pig. The old man reports both without a flicker, and the reader is invited to notice what he did not.

Seeing a man so wholly without root or tie, I, old fool, took him in.

無根無絆 is without root and without tether. What recommended the stranger was precisely that no family would ever come asking after him — and that same fact is why the household now has nobody to complain to.

From the day he entered the door he was diligent enough: he ploughed and harrowed without ox or gear; he reaped the grain without sickle or staff;

耙地 is to harrow; 牛具 is the ox and its tackle. The parallel is exact: he needs neither beast nor blade. Squire Gao is describing strength beyond anything human, and the word he reaches for is 勤謹, diligent.

at dusk he went and at dawn he came, and truly it went well. There was but one thing: he had a way of changing his face."

昏去明來, out at dusk and home at dawn, is offered as a virtue and is in fact the first clear warning. 變嘴臉 is literally to change mouth and face. The soft word is the old man's own, and it is doing a great deal of work.