利痰順氣 Never Mind About Me
行者笑道：「賢弟不知。此藥利痰順氣，蕩肚中凝滯之寒熱。你莫管我。你去取一兩巴豆，去殼去膜，搥去油毒，碾為細末來。」行者笑道：「贤弟不知。此药利痰顺气，荡肚中凝滞之寒热。你莫管我。你去取一两巴豆，去壳去膜，搥去油毒，碾为细末来。」
逐句解 Line by line
Pilgrim laughed and said, "Worthy brother, you do not understand.
不知 — you do not understand — is how Pilgrim opens both of his answers tonight, and he will use it a third time before the scene ends.
"This drug frees the phlegm and settles the breath, and sweeps out the cold and heat that lie congealed in the belly.
肚 stays dù, the belly, not the dǔ of tripe on a menu. 中 is zhōng, within.
"Do not concern yourself with me.
Four characters, and the argument is over.
"Go and fetch a tael of croton seed. Take off the husk and the membrane, pound out the oily poison, and grind it to a fine powder."
And immediately an order for croton seed, which is a good deal more dangerous than rhubarb. 殼 is qiào, the husk. The dictionary sends you round the houses for this one: 康熙 files 殼 only as a variant of another character, and that entry gives the reading glossed 物皮空也 — the hollow skin of a thing — with no listing at all for the everyday modern ké. 為 is wéi again.
Pilgrim's answer is four words of dismissal and then a one-line recital of what the drug does. He never engages the objection — that a weakened patient cannot survive a purgative — at all. He restates that the purgative purges.
Then "never mind about me", and immediately an order for croton seed, which is more dangerous than rhubarb. The shape of the whole scene is now set: a disciple objects on good grounds, is told he does not understand, and is handed something worse to grind.