婆婆哂笑 The Old Woman Laughs
三藏聞言甚喜，卻打白馬。不一時，到了村舍門口下馬。但只見那門兒外有一個老婆婆，端坐在草墩上績麻。行者上前，打個問訊道：「婆婆，貧僧是東土大唐來的。我師父乃唐朝御弟，因為過河吃了河水，覺肚腹疼痛。」那婆婆喜哈哈的道：「你們在那邊河裡吃水來？」行者道：「是在此東邊清水河吃的。」那婆婆欣欣的笑道：「好耍子，好耍子。你都進來，我與你說。」三藏闻言甚喜，却打白马。不一时，到了村舍门口下马。但只见那门儿外有一个老婆婆，端坐在草墩上绩麻。行者上前，打个问讯道：「婆婆，贫僧是东土大唐来的。我师父乃唐朝御弟，因为过河吃了河水，觉肚腹疼痛。」那婆婆喜哈哈的道：「你们在那边河里吃水来？」行者道：「是在此东边清水河吃的。」那婆婆欣欣的笑道：「好耍子，好耍子。你都进来，我与你说。」
逐句解 Line by line
Tripitaka was greatly cheered to hear it, and whipped up the white horse.
甚 is shèn, the intensifier — greatly — and not the shén of 甚麼. The cheerfulness is misplaced, and the narrative gives it a whole clause to make sure the reader notices.
Before long they reached the gate of the village cottage and dismounted.
舍 is shè, a dwelling. The character also reads shě, to give up or relinquish, which is a different word entirely and never the one wanted in this chapter's village scenes.
Outside the gate they saw only an old woman, sitting upright on a straw cushion and twisting hemp.
但只見 narrows the field of view to a single figure. 績麻 — twisting raw hemp into thread — is the standard image of a woman's domestic industry, and its very ordinariness is the point. There is nothing uncanny here at all.
Pilgrim stepped forward, made his salutation and said, "Grandmother, this poor monk is come from the Land of the East, from the Great Tang.
打個問訊 is the Buddhist greeting made with the palms together. 貧僧, this poor monk, is the standard clerical way of saying I, and Wukong produces it correctly despite being nobody's idea of a monk.
My master is the sworn brother of the Tang emperor; because he drank river water in crossing, he feels a pain in his belly."
唐朝 takes 朝 as cháo, the dynasty. 因為 is causal, with 為 as wèi. 御弟 points back to the brotherhood sworn between the emperor Taizong and Xuanzang in chapter twelve, which Wukong is producing here as a credential.
The old woman said, all chuckles, "Where was it you drank the water — in the river over that way?"
喜哈哈 imitates chuckling and keeps its ordinary reading. Both 那 are nà, that. Note what she actually asks: not what is wrong, but where they drank, and she names the direction herself. She is asking for confirmation of something she has already worked out.
Pilgrim said, "It was in the clear-water river east of here that we drank."
清水河 is Wukong's own description rather than a name — clear-water river. He is repeating the evidence of his eyes, which is precisely the evidence that misled them.
The old woman laughed with great good humour and said, "What sport! What sport! Come inside, all of you, and I will tell you."
耍子 takes the suffix zi; 好耍子 is roughly what a lark. This is the second expression of amusement in three sentences, and by now the reader has enough of them to feel the pattern before anybody explains it.
The scene is built almost entirely out of the ordinary. An old woman sits on a straw cushion twisting hemp outside a village door; Wukong makes a proper monastic greeting and gives a proper account of himself. Nothing is strange. The one thing out of place is the woman's reaction, and the narrative registers it twice — 喜哈哈的道, and then 欣欣的笑道 — before it will consent to explain anything at all.
Her question gives the game away on rereading. She does not ask what is wrong; she asks where they drank, and supplies the direction herself. She knows the answer before Wukong gives it and is enjoying the confirmation. 好耍子 — what sport — is not exactly cruelty. It is the amusement of somebody watching a very old joke land on new arrivals.
Wukong's credentials deserve a note. He offers two: the pilgrims come from the Great Tang, and his master is the emperor's sworn brother. Both are true, both are irrelevant, and both belong to a diplomatic language that will be of no use whatever in the country they have just entered. The novel lets him deploy the whole machinery of imperial introduction at a woman spinning hemp who is laughing at him.