"Young Master Zhou, sit here."
Chen Ling suddenly sprang from his seat, grabbed the other man's hands, and pushed him down into his own chair, switching their positions in an instant. Zhou Xingfan had no strength to resist at all. "I knew you looked familiar! We met at Lord Lai's banquet in Xuzhou the year before last. You were still a boy then... What brings Young Master Zhou here to have a bit of fun with little old Chen?"
Still holding the calligraphy model, Zhou Xingfan looked bewildered for a moment. He started to speak, then stopped, and could only look toward Zhang Xing.
Zhang Xing, meanwhile, studied with interest Chen Ling's face, suddenly wreathed in smiles beneath the lamplight, and actually felt some admiration-not merely for his thick skin. The crucial thing was that even now, he could find no handle by which to determine whether this Eagle-Raising General was genuinely dull-witted or so shrewd that he was feigning ignorance.
All he could say was that the more watertight the man's performance, the more Zhang Xing personally leaned toward the latter.
"General Chen, could you dismiss the serving girls?" Even as he thought, Zhang Xing spoke solemnly... There was no helping it. However difficult it might be, the business still had to be done.
Chen Ling turned back, wearing the ghost of a smile. "Are the country girls too coarse for you, Zhang White Ribbon?"
"That's exactly what I mean..." Zhang Xing smiled and actually admitted it.
General Chen stalled again, but could only nod and send the serving girls away.
The moment the girls left, Zhang Xing began speaking slowly from his seat, his words clear. "I am Zhang Xing, a White Ribbon of the Jing'an Directorate's Second Patrol Team. My immediate superior is Inspector Bai Yousi, the