Merchant Chao was widely traveled and a connoisseur of inns. He liked comfort and he enjoyed good food. One day he took an unfamiliar route to the Eastern Capital, however, and near nightfall found himself in a district with which he was not familiar.
Pulling up his riding and baggage donkeys beside a field where some farmers were working, Chou called out:
"Hey there, friends. I'm a stranger in these parts. Can you tell me if there is a good inn hereabouts."
"There's only one place to stay," a farmer responded. "That's the Wooden Bridge Inn just over the hill. That's where they have good donkeys for sale cheap."
"Donkeys?" queried Chou. "Why should they have so many donkeys ill this out-of-the-way place? You say they are good ones? This ancient beast can scarcely bear my weight and I could do with a change."
"You're headed for the right place, then," the farmer answered. "The donkeys of the Wooden Bridge Inn are reputed to be the best in the province, although we don't know where the widow gets so many." He laughed and added, "She's pretty prosperous for an innkeeper. But her prices are reasonable for donkeys as well as for room and board."
"Well, I wouldn't worry too much about where a strong and cheap donkey came from," Chou said, "but it's strange that you don't know where she gets them."
The farmer looked vague. "Maybe you'd better ask her about that," he said, and his companions nodded stolidly in the slow country way.
Chou dismissed the farmers' ignorance as of no importance. Farmers rarely care what is going on a few li from their land. The merchant began to look forward to a good meal, a comfortable bed and a possible bargain in donkeys.
His old donkey plodded on, up the hill and down the other side. There was the inn—too neat and trim for such a place but a welcome sight to Chou. A large sign proclaimed it to be the Wooden Bridge Inn. There were flowers and shrubs and benches pleasantly set outside.
Chou dismounted, tethered the donkey and went inside. There he found the widow serving wine to half a dozen guests. She was thirtyish and not bad looking.
"Hello," he said. "I'd like a room and dinner and somebody to take care of my donkeys."
She smiled. "The first two you can have," she said, "but the third you'll have to arrange yourself. I don't have enough business to hire a groom, so you'll have to take care of the beasts yourself. You will find forage and water in the stable at the back."
If she had so many donkeys, why no servants? Maybe she sold them too cheaply. Chou went out and led his donkeys to the stable. As he fed and watered them, he thought that she really must be very rich with no help to pay. She had to be capable and hardworking, too, to run such a well-kept inn. Why hadn't she remarried—or was she one of those loyal wives who remained faithful to one husband all the way to the grave? Well, no mind. He was hungry. Washing up in the courtyard, he went back into the inn.
The other guests were just sitting down to what turned out to be a delicious meal of chicken, river fish, vegetables and rice. There was also good rice wine and the widow urged the travelers to drink freely. They did—all but Chou—and soon became tipsy. He munched on sweetmeats and left the wine alone. The widow was washing dishes and looked up once in a while as her guests talked noisily.
"Are you going to buy donkeys?" he asked one of the other merchants.
"What donkeys?" the man asked. "You were in the stable and know only our donkeys are there. Where would we buy donkeys?"
Chou said no more. He sat at the table in thought as the others went noisily to bed. He had been given a clean, comfortable couch next to a rush partition. Just beyond was the landlady's chamber. He lay there listening to the snores of the others and pondering the widow's singular success with innkeeping and the selling of nonexistent donkeys.
Just as he was about to doze off he heard a loud noise from the other side of the partition. He sat up and saw that there was a chink in the matting through which he could look. The widow had dragged a heavy trunk into the middle of the room and now was kneeling beside it. Maybe she was going to look at some mementos of happier times.
Then he almost cried out. From the trunk she took out the wooden figure of a man only a few inches tall. She placed the lifelike doll on the earthen floor and then took from the trunk an ox of wood and then a plow. Both were carved on the same scale as the man.
She hitched the plow to the ox by slender threads and placed the man behind the plow. From the table she took a vial and sprinkled a few drops of what appeared to be water over man and ox. Chou held his breath as the little team started to move. In just a few minutes, the floor of the room was plowed and ready for planting. The widow placed a tiny basket of seeds in the hands of the man, who quickly sowed the field. Like magic, the sprouts came up, grew to their diminutive full height and bore rich ears of wheat. Gathering the grain herself, the widow knelt in a corner of the room to thresh and winnow it, then ground the grain into flour. From this she made the dough for cakes and baked these in the oven. The cakes were quickly finished and put away. Only then did the widow sleep. Chou did the same.
Morning came. Chou was up first, washed and went to the table for his breakfast. At each place was one of the freshly baked cakes of the wheat that had been grown the night before. Chou ate quickly but did not touch his cake. He hid the morsel in his sleeve and went out to the stable as the others sat down to breakfast. His donkeys were all right and he readied them for the road. Maybe he had dreamed it all.
Thinking to go in and pay his bill, he obeyed an impulse to look in the window first. He was just in time to see the other guests tumble from their benches, one after another, and roll on the floor. Before his eyes their clothing turned to coarse hair, tails emerged and their ears grew long and pointed. In a few moments, half a dozen donkeys were pawing at the floor and braying. As he pulled back from the window, the widow came into the room with a stick and herded the donkeys toward the stable at the back.
Chou lost no time in stirring up his donkeys and getting away as fast as they would move. He pondered all that he had seen on the rest of the journey to the Eastern Capital and came to the conclusion that to buy donkeys from the widow of the Wooden Bridge Inn would be neither moral nor profitable. He said nothing to anyone of his experience. Completing his business as quickly as possible, he bought some wheat cakes of the same size and shape as those the widow had made and set out for home.
She welcomed him politely. If she remembered his previous visit, she said nothing. Dinner was as good as before. As there were no other guests, she sat with him afterward.
"Won't you drink with me?" she urged. "The wine is very good and not strong."
"Oh, I'm not a drinking man," he said, "but I'll try a little."
He scarcely wet his lips but she drank heavily and appeared not to notice his abstention. No sooner had he taken to his bed than he heard her drag the trunk out once again. This time he didn't raise himself up to look. He smiled and then slept well.
In the morning he placed his wheat cakes on the table before she came in with the supply that she had baked the night before.
"Where did these cakes come from?" she asked.
"I bought them in the Eastern Capital," he replied. "They are very popular nowadays. Won't you share mine and save your fresh ones for tonight's guests?"
She didn't look too pleased but offered no objection. He held out the plate toward her. He had carefully placed the cake saved from his previous visit apart from the others and closest to her. She took it and began to nibble. After only a few bites, she rolled on the floor and turned into a donkey.
Chou was immensely pleased. He prodded the beast to its feet and looked it over closely. She was a fine plump donkey and strong. He led his acquisition to the stable and then went back to the inn.
From the trunk he took the carvings of the man, the ox and the plow, placed them as she had, and sprinkled water from the vial. Nothing happened. Maybe she had pronounced an incantation under her breath and he hadn't been able to hear it. No mind. To make sure that magic crops were at an end, he threw the wooden objects on the fire and watched as they turned to ash.
He distributed his baggage between his two old donkeys and mounted the new one, then set out at a brisk pace. What a pleasure to have a strong young widow to carry him on his travels! His business prospered and he was careful not to travel again the road past the Wooden Bridge Inn.
One day four years later, he was riding the donkey along a street on Changan.
An old man looked hard at the donkey and waved Chou to a stop. He peered at the beast carefully and said to Chou: "How do you come to be riding the widow of the Wooden Bridge Inn?" Then to the donkey, he added: "I'd know you anywhere and you are looking sleek and healthy—not that you haven't changed a little. Hee! Hee!"
Chou said nothing. The old man looked at him and then at the donkey.
"You don't make a bad pair," he said. "But maybe it's time you released her from the spell. She was very bad but you have punished her enough in these last four years. Don't you think so? If you forgive her, all the other donkeys would be released also. That's part of the magic."
Chou dismounted. From his sleeve, the old man drew a knife and slit open the donkey's belly. Out stepped the widow of Wooden Bridge Inn. Hiding her face, she ran away. When Chou turned back to the old man, there was no one there—not even the remains of a donkey.
Chou never saw widow or old man again. His life was long, happy and prosperous. Only one thing worried him. Whenever he met a strange donkey he wondered if the widow's release had set free all the other spellbound donkeys. His conclusion, on the whole, was yes and for good reason.
After he had lost his widow-donkey, he had to buy a replacement. The price was high.
"Donkeys are in short supply this year," said the dealer. "You wouldn't believe what I have to pay for a bag of bones."
Chou paid. He insisted on only one thing: that the donkey be another lady, even if not a widow. He couldn't go around slitting donkeys open to find out what was inside. By sticking to female donkeys he was pretty sure the donkey he was riding was really a donkey. —Based on the Cyril Birch translation of an old folktale.