Hibaku wakes from a dream of Josei and recalls the poem 'The spring breeze came blowing into my chamber, and I dreamed of you in far away Shanchan. In my sleep I travelled 3,000 ri to meet you.'

Josei in fact is in far-off Hunan. This story could be called 'Josei and the Beautiful Lady Bandit', and probably is somewhere. We have of course a corrupt governor who does things like forcing innocent girls into marriage against their wills with ne'er do well highborn gentlemen. Josei politely introduces himself at this point and the governor abruptly backs off- Kou Josei! The Emperor's favourite! Ack! Equally we have a band of outlaws, 'gentlemen of the highways and brothers of the greenwood', chivalrous Robin Hood type bandits. They're headed by, of course, a beautiful young widow whose husband died, of course, at the hands of a corrupt official. She kidnaps Josei for her own purposes, but apologizes quite politely for doing so. Then there are betrayals and thickening plots, the governor learns that hey, Josei's out of favour cause why else would he be here in the countryside, great, he must be a confederate of this bandit, all we have to do is beat a confession out of her and there's the end of that sniffy disapproving interloper. Josei goes to rescue her, which under the circs will seal his doom.

And who should appear at this juncture but Hibaku- "The Emperor indulged your whim and let you go off to the country, but now he misses you desperately. 'I worry how my obstinate little flower is doing.' I'll tell him you're well, if a little dirty just now" since Josei has just been climbing over roofs. Governor is kerblonxed. Beautiful lady bandit vanishes from story. Hibaku and Josei tryst wistfully by the sea. Friends, huh? OK.

A story about Shukujin, off in the country for the wedding of an old friend. On the night of the wedding, one of the friends is stabbed by a mysterious assailant. Later that evening a woman appears for a moment in the garden where Shukujin is. She's one of the lily-pickers, girls who go out in little tubs to pluck the waterlilies from the lake's surface, that Shukujin met here ten years ago when he and his friends were all studying for the Imperial examinations. He calls her by name. "I thought you would remember me," she says. "You were always so kind." She gives him a strange message and vanishes. Shukujin makes his investigations and unravels an old tale of love, cowardice, and betrayed friendship.

A young scholar has been adopted into a wealthy family as the son-in-law, an unenviable position in any Asian society because it means being at your wife's beck and call. The wife is clearly more than a little unstable, as Josei sees for himself when she makes a scene in front of this stranger, her husband's guest. No surprise then when that night she kills herself. But Josei has never been one to accept things at face value, and he finds out the surprising truth underneath the appearances.