Master and disciples came forth from the cave, climbed into the saddle, found the high road, and set their hearts steadfastly westward.

攀鞍上馬 and 篤志投西 - into the saddle, hearts set west. This is the formula that puts the road back under them once an episode has been wound up.

They had journeyed a month and more when of a sudden they heard the sound of water ringing in their ears.

Six characters carry a month and more. Between adventures the narrator disposes of unmarked time this cheaply, and then a noise starts.

Tripitaka started in alarm and said, "Disciples — where is that sound of water coming from now?"

那 is nǎ here, the questioning "which, where," not the pointing nà. The chapter has eighty-one of this character: nine ask a question, seventy-two point at something.

Pilgrim laughed and said, "You, old master, are far too full of doubts; you would never make a monk."

Pilgrim's bedside manner. 忒 is tè, spoken emphasis meaning "far too," used once in the chapter, and 做不得和尚 puts that inserted 得 to work again - "could never make a monk," not "is forbidden to be one."

"Here are the four of us together, and you alone must be hearing some sound of water."

四眾, "the four," is the standing collective for master and three disciples. It names them twice in the chapter.

"Have you gone and forgotten the Heart Sutra again?"

The charge is that he has mislaid the sutra itself. 把 shoves the object forward, doing here the job 將 does elsewhere.

The Tang Monk said, "The Heart Sutra was given me by word of mouth by the Crow's-Nest Chan Master of Pagoda Mountain — fifty-four lines in all, two hundred and seventy characters."

He knows the specification by heart, which is the point of quoting it: 多心經 is the Heart Sutra, the Prajñāpāramitā-hṛdaya, and the Crow's-Nest Chan Master taught it to him by mouth in chapter 19. The figures he gives - fifty-four lines, two hundred and seventy characters - are the master's own, handed back exactly. Note that they count written characters, not words.

"I received it then by ear and recite it constantly to this day — how should you know which line I have forgotten?"

耳傳, received by ear, with no written copy anywhere. That claim is what Pilgrim is about to test, and the test is a nasty one.

Pilgrim said, "Old master, you have forgotten: 'No eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, mind.'"

And here it is: 無眼耳鼻舌身意, "no eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, mind" - one of the sutra's best-known lines (Sanskrit na cakṣuḥ-śrotra-ghrāṇa-jihvā-kāya-manāṃsi). Pilgrim has not caught him out on a line he forgot. He has caught him out on a line he remembers and does not live by.

"We who have left the household — our eyes look on no form, our ears heed no sound, our noses smell no fragrance, our tongues taste no savor, our bodies feel neither cold nor heat, our minds harbor no idle thought: this is what is called driving out the Six Thieves."

The 六賊, the Six Thieves, are the six senses, and the novel treats them as a gang who rob the mind from inside. Pilgrim runs through all six - eyes and form, ears and sound, nose and scent, tongue and taste, body and weather, mind and daydreams - to define 祛褪六賊, driving the thieves out.

"But you, now, for the sake of seeking scriptures, keep it all in mind thought upon thought;"

Now he turns the list around and reads it back as an indictment, starting where the sutra ends. 念念在意 is thought upon thought, kept in mind - the sixth sense, the mind, taken first.

"you fear the fiends and will not give up the body;"

捨身 is the Buddhist term for letting go of the self, and Tripitaka will not. Second in Pilgrim's list, fifth in the sutra's.

"you crave your vegetarian fare, and so the tongue stirs;"

Wanting your dinner is the tongue at work. The trap is neat: the master's only appetite is for a strictly meatless meal, and it convicts him anyway.

"you delight in sweet scents, and so the nose is touched;"

Liking a sweet smell is the nose being touched. Each clause pairs an appetite with the sense-gate that lets it in.

"you catch at sounds, and so the ear is startled;"

Sounds caught, ear startled - which is precisely what has just happened. The river noise that opened this whole conversation is the fault being described, and Pilgrim has walked his master into naming it himself.

"you gaze on things, and so the eye is fixed."

The list closes on the eye, first in the sutra's order. 眸 is the pupil, standing in for the sutra's 眼.

"Summoning up these Six Thieves in their swarm — how then will you reach the Western Heaven and behold the Buddha?"

得 stands alone after the question word here, so it is the full verb dé, to get there. Following a verb, as in 降得 earlier, the same character goes unstressed to de.

Hearing this, Tripitaka fell silent and, sunk in thought, said, "Disciple — I..."

The sentence stops in the middle. 默然沉慮 - silent, sunk in thought - and then two words and a break, because what comes next is not a reply but a poem.