Impressed by Friar Sand's noble words, the monster put aside his sword and took the princess in his arms, saying, “Please forgive me for being so boorishly rude.” Then he put her hair up again for her, and turning tender again, urged her to go inside with him. He asked her to take the seat of honour and apologized to her. In her female fickleness the princess was prompted by his excess of courtesy to think of an idea.
“My lord,” she said, “could you have Friar Sand's bonds loosened a little for the sake of our love?” The old fiend ordered his underlings to untie Friar Sand and lock him up there instead.
On being untied and locked up, Friar Sand got up and thought, “The ancients said that a good turn to someone else is a good turn to yourself. If I hadn't helped her out, she wouldn't have had me untied.”
The old fiend then had a banquet laid on to calm his wife and make it up to her. When he had drunk himself fairly tipsy he put on a new robe and girded a sword to his waist. Then he fondled the princess and said, “You stay at home and drink, wife. Look after our two sons and don't let Friar Sang get away. While the Tang Priest is in Elephantia I'm going to get to know my relations.”
“What relations?” she asked.
“Your father,” he replied. “I'm his son-in-law and he's my father-in-law, so why shouldn't we get acquainted?”
“You mustn't go,” was her reply.
“Why not?” he asked.
“My father,” she answered, “didn't win his country by force of arms; it was handed down to him by his ancestors. He came to the throne as a child and has never been far from the palace gates, so he's never seen a tough guy like you. You are a bit on the hideous side with that face of yours, and it would be very bad if a visit from you terrified him. You'd do better not to go and meet him.”
“Then I'll make myself handsome,” he said.
“Try it and show me,” said the princess.
The splendid fiend shook himself, and in the middle of the banquet he changed himself into a handsome man.
Elegant he was, and tall.
He spoke like a high official,
His movements were those of a youth.
He was as brilliant as the poet Cao Zhi,
Handsome as Pan An to whom the women threw fruit.
On his head was a hat with magpie feathers,
To which the black clouds submitted;
He wore a robe of jade-coloured silk
With wide and billowing sleeves.
On his feet were black boots with patterned tops,
And at his waist hung a gleaming sword.
He was a most imposing man,
Tall, elegant and handsome.
The princess was thoroughly delighted at the sight of him. “Isn't this a good transformation?” he asked her with a smile.
“Wonderful,” she replied, “wonderful. When you go to court like that the king will be bound to accept you as his son-in-law and make his civil and military officials give you a banquet, so if you have anything to drink you must be very careful not to show your real face-it wouldn't do to let the secret out.”
“You don't need to tell me that,” he said, “I understand perfectly well myself.”
He sprang away on his cloud and was soon in Elephantia, where he landed and walked to the palace gates. “Please report,” he said to the High Custodian of the gate, “that His Majesty's third son-in-law has come for an audience.”
A eunuch messenger went to the steps of the throne and reported, “Your Majesty's third son-in-law has come for an audience and is waiting for your summons outside the palace gates.” When the king, who was talking with Sanzang, heard the words “third son-in-law” he said to the assembled officials, “I only have two sons-in-law-there can't be a third.”
“It must be that the monster has come,” the officials replied.
“Then should I send for him?” the king asked.
“Your Majesty,” said Sanzang in alarm, “he is an evil spirit, so we mortals can do nothing about him. He knows about the past and the future and rides on the clouds. He will come whether you send for him or not, so it would be better to send for him and avoid arguments.”
The king accepted the proposal and sent for him. The fiend came to the bottom of the steps and performed the usual ritual of dancing and chanting. His handsome looks prevented any of the officials from realizing that he was a demon; instead they took him in their mortal blindness for a good man. At the sight of his imposing figure the king thought that he would be a pillar and the savior of the state. “Son-in-law,” he asked him, “where do you live? Where are you from? When did you marry the princess? Why haven't you come to see me before?”
“I come,” the monster replied, knocking his head on the ground, “from the Moon Waters Cave in Bowl Mountain.”
“How far is that from here?” asked the king.
“Not far,” he replied, “only a hundred miles.”
“If it's a hundred miles away,” said the king, “how did the princess get there to marry you?”
The monster gave a cunning and deceptive answer. “My lord,” he said, “I have been riding and shooting since childhood, and I support myself by hunting. Thirteen years ago as I was out hunting one day with falcons, hounds, and a few score retainers when I saw a ferocious striped tiger carrying a girl on its back down the mountainside. I fitted an arrow to my bow and shot the tiger, then took the girl home and revived her with hot water, which saved her life. When I asked her where she was from she never mentioned the word 'princess'-had she said that she was Your Majesty's daughter, I would never have had the effrontery to marry her without your permission. I would have come to your golden palace and asked for some appointment in which I might have distinguished myself. As she said she was the daughter of ordinary folk I kept her in my home. With her beauty and my ability we fell in love, and we have been married all these years. When we were married I wanted to kill the tiger and serve him up at a banquet for all my relations, but she asked me not to. There was a verse that explained why I should not:
“'Thanks to Heaven and Earth we are becoming man and wife;
We will marry without matchmaker or witnesses.
A red thread must have united us in a former life,
So let us make the tiger our matchmaker.'
“When she said that I untied the tiger and spared its life. The wounded beast swished its tail and was off. Little did I realize that after escaping with its life it would have spent the past years making itself into a spirit whose sole intention is to deceive and kill people. I believe that there was once a group of pilgrims going to fetch scriptures who said that they were priests from the Great Tang. The tiger must have killed their leader, taken his credentials, and made himself look like the pilgrim. He is now in this palace trying to deceive Your Majesty. That man sitting on an embroidered cushion is in fact the very tiger who carried the princess off thirteen years ago. He is no pilgrim.”
The feeble-minded king, who in his mortal blindness could not recognize the evil spirit, believed that his tissue of lies were the truth and said, “Noble son-in-law, how can you tell that this monk is the tiger who carried the princess off?”
“Living in the mountains,” he replied, “I eat tiger, dress in tiger, sleep amid tigers, and move among tigers. Of course I can tell.”
“Even if you can tell,” said the king, “turn him back into his real form to show me.”