He took leave of his grandmother at once and went straight to the capital.

徑往, straight there. The character 徑 is a footpath, and as a verb it means to take the direct line and stop nowhere.

Finding his way to Chancellor Yin's residence on the east street of the imperial city, he said to the gatekeeper:

門上人 is the man on the gate, and getting past him is the whole difficulty of this passage: a chancellor's house on the east street of the imperial city does not admit wandering monks. 丞相 takes 相 as xiàng.

'This humble monk is a kinsman, come to call on his lordship.'

小僧, this little monk, is the humble self-word he uses on doorsteps. The claim he makes is the only one that could work: 親戚, family. 相公, his lordship, keeps 相 as xiàng.

The gatekeeper reported to the Chancellor, who said, 'I have no kin among monks.'

親眷, kin and connections. The Chancellor's answer is flat and faintly offended — he has no relatives among monks — and on that answer the boy would have been sent away. It is a near miss, and what saves it is a dream.

The lady said, 'Last night I dreamed my daughter Mantangjiao came home;'

His wife has dreamed of her daughter coming home. Dreams do a great deal of quiet work in this chapter, and they always arrive one line before a door would otherwise stay shut: his mother dreamed of a broken moon made round again the night before he reached her, and his father's mother will dream of dead wood coming into flower before the last page.

'might it not be that our son-in-law has sent a letter back?'

莫不是, might it not be that — the phrase for a hunch you are half embarrassed to say aloud. 女婿 is a daughter's husband. Her guess is nearly right and completely wrong: there is a letter, and it is not from him.

The Chancellor then had the little monk brought to the hall.

廳 is the hall where a household receives visitors, one step in from the gate. The dream has bought him entry.

Seeing the Chancellor and his lady, the little monk wept and bowed to the ground,

哭拜在地, weeping and bowing to the floor. He says nothing at all. By now the chapter has taught us that this boy's tears arrive well before his explanations.

took a sealed letter from his bosom, and handed it to the Chancellor.

懷中, from inside the robe at the chest, which is where a traveller keeps whatever matters. 一封 is the measure word for a letter, and 封 means to seal — the word still remembers the wax. 相 = xiàng.

The Chancellor opened it, read it through from the beginning, and wept aloud.

拆開, to break the seal. 從頭讀罷, read right through from the top: he does not skim it, and we are made to wait with him. Then 放聲痛哭, weeping aloud — the same phrase the grandmother was given in the tile-kiln, which is the one this chapter keeps for people who have just learned everything at once. 相 = xiàng.

The lady asked, 'My lord, what is the matter?'

相公 here is a wife speaking to her husband, my lord, rather than the courtesy title a stranger uses at the gate. Same two characters, different room; 相 stays xiàng.

The Chancellor said, 'This monk is your grandson and mine.'

外孫, the outer grandson: Chinese kinship marks a daughter's children with 外, outside, because they carry another surname. The word is technically a word of distance, and he is using it to claim the boy. 相 = xiàng.

'Our son-in-law Chen Guangrui was murdered by a villain, and Mantangjiao seized by force as his wife.'

He compresses eighteen years into one sentence and says 賊, the bandit, twice without ever giving him a name. 強占為妻, seized by force as a wife, takes 為 as wéi.

The lady, hearing this, also wept without ceasing.

不止, and it did not stop. Her dream told her that her daughter had come home; this is what the dream turns out to have meant.

The Chancellor said, 'Do not grieve, my lady; tomorrow I shall memorialize the sovereign and lead troops myself, that our son-in-law be surely avenged.'

休得煩惱, do not distress yourself. 來朝 is tomorrow morning, and it takes 朝 as zhāo, daybreak — the other reading of the character that has meant the imperial court, cháo, everywhere else in this chapter. Then the line that changes the register of the whole story: 奏知主上, memorialize the sovereign. Grief has just acquired an army. 丞相, 相 = xiàng.