且莫殺生 Take No Life Today
去那樓門邊跌跌腳道：「趙媽媽，你上來。」那媽媽上來道：「二官人有甚吩咐？」行者道：「今日且莫殺生，我們今日齋戒。」去那楼门边跌跌脚道：「赵妈妈，你上来。」那妈妈上来道：「二官人有甚吩咐？」行者道：「今日且莫杀生，我们今日斋戒。」
逐句解 Line by line
He went to the stairhead and stamped his foot. "Mother Zhao! Come up."
跌跌腳 is stamping the foot, doubled to make it a repeated knock — the way you call downstairs in a building with no bell. He does this twice in the chapter and both times it summons the landlady.
Up she came. "What are your orders, Mr Second?"
甚 is shén, what — the interrogative standing alone without the 麼 that usually follows it. 吩咐 is an instruction from someone entitled to give one, and she uses it because she still believes he is a merchant with money.
Pilgrim said: "Take no life today. We are keeping a fast today."
殺生 is the taking of life, the Buddhist term for killing any living creature — the first of the precepts. Pilgrim has just used a monk's vocabulary to a woman he is pretending not to be a monk in front of, and got away with it because ordinary lay people kept fasts too.
The solution is not to refuse the meat but to postpone it, which is cleverer. A refusal invites the question why; a fast day is a fact about the calendar and nobody argues with a calendar.
He is also about to invent one. Watch what happens when she asks which fast.