齋戒日期 It Is a Fast Day
行者道：「早是說哩，快不要去請：一則齋戒日期，二則兄弟們未到。索性明日進來，一家請個表子，在府上耍耍時，待賣了馬起身。」行者道：「早是说哩，快不要去请：一则斋戒日期，二则兄弟们未到。索性明日进来，一家请个表子，在府上耍耍时，待卖了马起身。」
逐句解 Line by line
Pilgrim said: "As well you mentioned it — don't go fetching them. For one thing it is a fast day; for another, our brothers have not arrived.
一則 and 二則 are for one thing and for another, the ordinary way of numbering reasons in speech. He gives two and the second one is the load-bearing lie.
Better they come in tomorrow, each of us send for a girl, and we amuse ourselves at your place until the horses are sold and we set off."
索性 is might as well, better to just — the word for cutting through to the simpler course. 表子 is a blunt word for a prostitute and its last character takes the everyday zi; Pilgrim has switched from her polite term to the coarse one, which is what a merchant talking business would do.
Pilgrim cancels the girls by promising more of them tomorrow, which is the same manoeuvre he used on the meat: never refuse, always postpone.
He is also keeping the story alive. Every deferral pushes another obligation into a tomorrow that will not happen, and each one makes the invented six brothers more real to her.