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expression was interesting, in that three or four drugs could have caused it, but none of them was common to
    
    
     China
    
    
    . He rolled up his sleeves and opened his case, and the blades glinted like icicles in the cold musty chamber. The abbot appeared to be on the verge of fainting, as did his four assistants, who hovered on the staircase. I myself will never get used to it, and I had to force my eyes to watch. The minutes passed like molasses dripping in winter. After ten minutes Master Li straightened up, and the murderous expression on his face was not entirely a trick of shadows.
    “Bat shit,” he said.
    He bent back over the cadaver, and his knives moved angrily.
    “No yak manure, no volcanic ash, no nuns' pigtails, and no Tsao Tsao,” he muttered. “Nothing but another corpse.”
    He went back to work, and various pieces of Brother Squint-Eyes landed on the ice beside the body.
    “Our departed friend was recently in a large city,” Master Li said matter-of-factly. “His death occurred not more than four hours after his return.”
    The abbot stepped nervously backward, as though fearing witchcraft. “Brother Squint-Eyes went to Ch'ang-an,” he whispered. “He died within a few hours of his return.”
    “He had also been playing fast and loose with his vows,” Master Li remarked. “I would rather like to know how he could afford thousand-year eggs.”
    “No monk can afford thousand-year eggs,” the abbot said flatly.
    “This one did. At least three of them.”
    “Eggs can last a thousand years?” I asked skeptically.
    “Fraud, Ox! Fraud and forgery,” Master Li said disgustedly. “Paint slapped over the rot of reality and gilded with lies. They're simply duck eggs that have been treated with lime. The lime works through the shells and slowly cooks the contents, and after eight or ten weeks the treated egg is billed as being a thousand years old and is sold for a ridiculous price to a credulous member of the newly rich. Delicious, actually. Certain barbarian tribes grow a fruit that tastes quite like it. It's called avocado.” He deposited some revolting stuff in a bucket on the floor. “Constipation is a godsend to a medical examiner,” he said. “Abbot, you might also consider the fact that in addition to the eggs, Brother Squint-Eyes regaled himself in Ch'ang-an — it had to be a large city to get the eggs — with carp and clam soup, lobster in bean curd sauce, pickled ducks' feet smothered with black tree fungus, steamed shoats with garlic, sweetmeats, candied fruits, and spiced honey cakes. I estimate the cost of his last meal at three catties of silver.”
    The abbot reeled. “Check the books!” he screamed to his monks. “Take an inventory of the candleholders and incense burners! See if there have been any reports of highway robbery!”
    “While you're at it, somebody find out if Brother Squint-Eyes ordered an unusual amount of ink for the library,” Master Li said. “The type called Buddha's Eyelashes. Also parchment of the type called Yellow Emperor.”
    The monks galloped up the stairs, and the abbot lifted his robe and wiped his forehead with it. Master Li displayed another gory object.
    “Ox, you should learn a lot more about physical sciences,” he said. “This thing is the spleen. It isn't a very good spleen; functional, but not completely reliable, which is unfortunate because the spleen is the seat of good faith.”
    He detached another unpleasant object and waved it around.
    “The same applies to the heart, the seat of propriety; the lungs, the seat of righteousness; and the kidneys, the seat of wisdom. The only first-rate organ Brother Squint-Eyes possessed was his liver, which is the seat of love, and I would suspect that the late librarian led a somewhat tortured existence. It's damned dangerous to walk around overflowing with love when you're deficient in wisdom, righteousness, and propriety.”
    “That was Brother Squint-Eyes,” the abbot sighed. “He