洪江遇害 Murder at the Hong River
途路艱苦，曉行夜宿，不覺已到洪江渡口。只見梢子劉洪、李彪二人，撐船到岸迎接。也是光蕊前生合當有此災難，撞著這冤家。光蕊令家僮將行李搬上船去，夫妻正齊齊上船，那劉洪睜眼看見殷小姐面如滿月，眼似秋波，櫻桃小口，綠柳蠻腰，真個有沉魚落雁之容，閉月羞花之貌，陡起狼心。遂與李彪設計，將船撐至沒人煙處。候至夜靜三更，先將家僮殺死，次將光蕊打死，把尸首都推在水裡去了。小姐見他打死了丈夫，也便將身赴水。劉洪一把抱住道：「你若從我，萬事皆休；若不從時，一刀兩斷。」那小姐尋思無計，只得權時應承，順了劉洪。那賊把船渡到南岸，將船付與李彪自管，他就穿了光蕊衣冠，帶了官憑，同小姐往江州上任去了。途路艰苦，晓行夜宿，不觉已到洪江渡口。只见梢子刘洪、李彪二人，撑船到岸迎接。也是光蕊前生合当有此灾难，撞着这冤家。光蕊令家僮将行李搬上船去，夫妻正齐齐上船，那刘洪睁眼看见殷小姐面如满月，眼似秋波，樱桃小口，绿柳蛮腰，真个有沉鱼落雁之容，闭月羞花之貌，陡起狼心。遂与李彪设计，将船撑至没人烟处。候至夜静三更，先将家僮杀死，次将光蕊打死，把尸首都推在水里去了。小姐见他打死了丈夫，也便将身赴水。刘洪一把抱住道：「你若从我，万事皆休；若不从时，一刀两断。」那小姐寻思无计，只得权时应承，顺了刘洪。那贼把船渡到南岸，将船付与李彪自管，他就穿了光蕊衣冠，带了官凭，同小姐往江州上任去了。
逐句解 Line by line
The road was hard; travelling by day and resting by night, before they knew it they had reached the Hong River ferry.
曉行夜宿 — moving at dawn, lodging at dusk — is the four-character way of saying a long hard journey, and the chapter will reuse it later for an army. 渡口 is the ferry crossing. They arrive without noticing, which is how these things go.
There they saw two boatmen, Liu Hong and Li Biao, who poled their boat to the bank to receive them.
梢子, boatman, with 子 unstressed as zi; 撐船 is to pole a boat along. Two men, named the moment they appear — the novel has no intention of pretending they are anything but what they are.
It was that Guangrui was fated from a former life to meet this calamity, and so ran straight into these enemies.
Before anything happens, the narrator hands us the explanation: this was owed from a former life. 合當 is destined to, ought by rights to; 災難, calamity, takes 難 as nàn; and 撞著, to collide with, takes 著 as zháo, the reading for something that lands. The karmic frame does two jobs at once. It explains the horror, and it holds it at arm's length.
Guangrui had his serving-boy carry the baggage aboard, and just as husband and wife were boarding together,
將 is jiāng again, taking hold of the baggage so the verb can move it. The serving-boy carries; the couple step aboard together.
Liu Hong, opening his eyes, saw that Yin Wenjiao's face was like the full moon, her eyes like autumn ripples, her small mouth a cherry, her supple waist a green willow —
A stock inventory of beauty, delivered from inside the murderer's eyes: face like the full moon, eyes like autumn ripples, cherry mouth, willow waist. Every phrase here is fixed, and every one is still in use. 眼似秋波 takes 似 as sì; 那 in 那劉洪 is the pointing nà.
truly one with the look that 'sinks fish and downs wild geese,' the face that 'hides the moon and shames the flowers' — and a wolf's greed rose up in him.
沉魚落雁 and 閉月羞花 are the two largest compliments in the language: she is so lovely that fish sink out of sight and wild geese drop from the air, that the moon hides itself and flowers are put to shame. Both are ordinary idioms in Chinese today. And the sentence carrying them ends with 狼心, a wolf's heart, going up in him. The loveliest phrases the novel owns are set directly against the worst impulse it can name.
He then laid a plan with Li Biao and poled the boat to a spot without a soul about.
沒人煙處 is a place with no cooking-smoke — the everyday Chinese test for whether anyone lives somewhere. They pole to where nobody does.
Waiting till the still of the third watch, they first killed the serving-boy, then beat Guangrui to death, and pushed both bodies into the water.
三更 is the third watch, around midnight, with 更 as gēng. The prose stays flatly administrative: first the serving-boy, then Guangrui, then both bodies over the side. 將 is jiāng again, and 都 here is dōu, all of them — not the dū of a capital city we met on the first page.
When the lady saw that her husband had been killed, she made to throw herself into the water as well.
赴水 is to go to the water, meaning to drown yourself. Her first impulse is not fear. It is to follow him in.
Liu Hong seized her in his arms, saying, 'If you will be mine, all is well; but if you will not, then it is the end at a single stroke.'
一刀兩斷, one cut and two pieces, is still ordinary Chinese for breaking something off cleanly — a relationship, usually. In his mouth it is not a figure of speech.
The lady, finding no recourse, could only consent for the moment and submit to Liu Hong.
只得, could do nothing but, with 得 as dé; 應承, to assent, takes 應 as yìng. The load-bearing word is 權時, for the time being. She is not surrendering; she is buying time, and she is buying it for the child she is carrying.
The villain poled the boat to the south bank and handed it over to Li Biao to keep,
那賊, that villain. The narrator drops the man's name here and calls him what he is for most of the rest of the chapter. 那 is the pointing nà; 付與 is to hand over.
and himself put on Guangrui's robes and cap, took his official credentials, and went off with the lady to take up the post at Jiangzhou.
衣冠 is the robes and cap of office, with 冠 as the noun guān, a cap, rather than the verb guàn, to cap. 官憑 is the paperwork that proves who you are. He puts on the dead man's clothes, pockets the dead man's credentials and goes off to do the dead man's job. What he steals is not a wife only but an entire identity, and it holds for eighteen years.
The whole catastrophe takes thirteen short segments. Two boatmen see the wife, pole to an empty stretch of water, kill the serving-boy and then the husband, and put both bodies over the side. The widow, pregnant, is offered a choice that is not one. Liu Hong then takes the robes, the credentials and the post, and walks into a governor's job wearing a dead man's clothes.
Notice where the novel puts its prettiest writing. The catalogue of Yin Wenjiao's beauty — moon face, autumn-ripple eyes, 沉魚落雁, 閉月羞花 — is entirely conventional, the sort of thing a storyteller could recite half asleep. It is placed inside Liu Hong's eyeline, and the sentence it belongs to finishes with 狼心, a wolf's heart, rising in him. The convention turns into a motive while you are reading it.
The narrator also gets his excuse in first: 光蕊前生合當有此災難, the calamity was owed from a former life. Karma explains the horror and, in the same breath, keeps it at a workable distance. Underneath all of it sits an older story. This episode is the literary working-out of the 江流和尚 legend, the Monk River-Float — a baby set adrift who grows up to avenge his parents — and Dudbridge traces that material behind the novel's whole account of where Tripitaka came from.