He Guang in 'Last Will and Testament' takes over the narration from Gong Renzhi. As before Zhang is very careful to arrange an opportunity for Gong to assert his presence and remind the reader of his function as "primary" narrator. This is achieved thus: when Wen Li has finished his story, Gong politely gives him a cigarette and asks him: "Wen, old chap, who is this Tao Gang?" Wen Li has forgotten during the course of his narration to explain the identity of Tao Gang the person who has lost the jug* This gives Gong an opportunity to come into his own. The repartee between the two men sheds an intriguing light on Zhang's attitude towards the relationship between fact and fiction as well as his attitude towards the narrative process. Wen Li answers: "Forgive me, how could I possibly be as good as you (Gong Renzhi) at putting across a story (lit. "making fiction")?" It is
difficult to understand why Zhang chose to make Wen Li say "making fiction" ( l i k . ' I T&. ) rather than "tell a story" ( ^ but be bhat as it may» the remark reveals an attitude towards Gong R enzhi’s activity as narrator and recorder of Xu Changyun's cases. The implication is that Gong makes fiction out of fact for the benefit of the reading public. If this were the only isolated example of consideration of this subject, it would hardly be worthy of comment, but Zhang does on several occasions in his early stories make reference to this subject. In the story 'Empty Room', for instance, the curious youthful detective who came to visit Xu and Gong and reveal the background to the case, remarked: "When I speak, I am sure to
imitate the method used by novelists. This is because this business actually bears some similarities to fiction".
Xu Changyun replies: "Tell your story then (lit. "make fiction")". This further complicates the impression that can be gained of Zhang's attitude towards his craft for here is a character in one of his stories who declares that what he is about to say bears all the marks of fiction. In detective short stories
it would usually seem to be the objective of theauthor and his first person narrator (if there is one) to convince the reader of the plausibility and credibility of the story that is being told. On the surface at least Zhang seems to be going against convention and making a virtue of the fictional appearance of his stories.
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Wen Li's remark seems rather defensive (and almost slightly sneering), apparently implying that Gong Renzhi is a professional writer who knows how to order his material to create a literary effect. The anonymous youthful detective's remark on the other hand seemingly implies that fact is sometimes equally as strange as
fiction. Xu Ghangyun's reply helps to keep the line between fact and fiction indistinct. All of these references to fiction serve to draw attention to the story teller's craft, suggesting that Zhang felt this subject to be worthy of consideration in his stories.
This is not Zhang's final reference to the relationship between fact and fiction and the narrative process, and I shall return to this subject as occasion demands.
To return once more to the story 'Jade Jug*, Wen Li tells his story to Xu and Gong and is astonished to be told by Xu that he has arrested the wrong man. Wen Li naturally demands proof of Xu's assertion and they go to the scene of the crime to investigate. The way in which the evidence is pointedly stacked against the
next-door neighbour makes the robbery of the jug look like a put-up job. In good Holmesian fashion, Xu interviews the victim and snoops about with his magnifying glass. Finally Xu, Gong and Wen Li lie in ambush for the crook, who turns out to be none other than the owner of the "lost" jug, disguised as an old man. His motive for the crime is the arrest and subsequent removal of his neighbour who alone knows him to be a criminal. This aspect of the plot is not altogether satisfactory and Zhang seems
conscious of this for he has Wen Li ask Xu Changyun why the neighbour should have been embarrassed when confronted with his ostensible crime. In an attempt to tie up this loose end,
Xu replies that this is the result of psychology; when the neigh bour heard that "Tao Gang had lost something, he became afraid of
everyone no matter whom".
in the magazine Banyue on 16 May 1923 after an interval of almost six months when no work by Zhang is known to have been
*1
published. This story which deals with a political subject calls to mind the spirit of the May ^i-th Movement, It is most interesting for the language in which it is written and also its conclusion* The language Zhang uses in this story is much
closer to Classical Chinese than the language used in the preceding few stories. The sentences tend to be terse; the whole story is quite short. The quality of the prose is rather purple with many poetic-sounding adjectives and adverbs that are formed by the duplication of characters, such as 'xiong xiong r a n ’
('flaming' ), 'ji j i 1 ^ ^ ('precarious1), 'cen cen' ('steaming'), 'gu gu' ('gurgling'), 'xu xu' ^ ('long-winded'), etc.
The story is passed off as a dream by the first-person narrator; this seems to be utilised as a method of distancing the content of the story from the author/narrator. The story begins with a descriptive section showing how the dream came about. During the course of this introductory paragraph the first person narrator (who incidentally does not reveal his precise identity throughout the piece) suddenly addresses the reader directly: "I shall write down the events of that time and reveal them to the reader".
The narrator, who would appear to be a student, proceeds to tell the events of his dream. The point of the story of the dream is to analyse various reactions to the events that gave rise to the May k th Movement. Once more Zhang seems to be