The Paper Figure

In Qingzhou was a paper-craft shop, kept by old Bu, who pasted paper into figures and horses, sold to mourning households. Behind the shop a small loft held old paper figures like a forest. At midnight came often a rustling, as of one adjusting robes. Bu first thought rats; peeping, he saw a white-robed paper maiden standing in the moon, smoothing her hair, straightening her collar, moving without dust beneath her feet. He lit a lamp; she was still as before. So ten days. Bu took heart and asked: "Lady, what do you?" She turned, her eyes two dots of cinnabar, and said wanly: "I am Shen. I died unwed; my father, poor, buried me with a paper figure, and my soul clings to it. I had an embroidered kerchief, a gift for my love Zhang, never given. I beg you bear it to him." Then she stiffened again. Bu sought Zhang; he was real, already married. Shown the kerchief, Zhang wept: "This was my pledge. Since Shen died I have not dared forget." Bu made offering, and burned the kerchief with the paper maiden at her grave. That night the loft fell silent. The Chronicler of the Strange remarks: For a single kerchief, she held through life and death; Zhang's tears showed feeling yet remained. Those who break their vows should read this and blush. The paper thing has no heart, yet what it bears is true; men of flesh and blood are sometimes colder—is it not sad?