no," he whispered with redoubtable intensity, "Yang Kuei-fei still lives."
Li Ting placed his arm about his father's bowed shoulders.
"We will send soldiers to exhume her body," he said gently.
In anguish, Ming Huang cried, "No soldiers may touch her body! There has been enough of war. Enough of fighting. It is my wish that four hundred women proceed quietly to Ma Wei, taking care not to disturb the wind, nor to brush the trees as they pass by. Reverently must they procure the body of my beloved if it can be found."
"If it can be found?" repeated Li Ting, question-ingly. "But, father—"
"I know, I know," broke in Ming Huang wistfully. "You believe she is dead and buried in a simple grave. If so the four hundred women will carry her back."
He drew his hand wearily across his eyes. "I am very tired," he said.
The eunuch, Li Fu-kuo stepped forward and guided him to his own apartments. Kao Li-shih followed his Emperor, stumbling blindly along, his huge body shaken by tumultuous sobs which he struggled to suppress.
24.
When Ming Huang was sufficiently rested, Li Ting went to him. He had dressed humbly in the purple costume of a prince, not in Imperial yellow.
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