Chapter 160 — The Recluse

After a good while, Ming Li, without a word, suddenly turned and walked toward that deep, secluded path. Master Ghost stood behind him, watching him go.

But just then, all at once, an aged voice came drifting out from the little path toward the Ancestral Master's Hall, out of the pale mist drifting in that direction—a voice laden with an indescribable weariness of the years. An old man's voice said, "You two—where might you be going?"

Both Ming Li and Master Ghost started. They turned to look, and saw the mist on the little path part as a stooped figure slowly emerged. He bent slightly at the waist, as though the years had pressed him so that he could scarcely breathe; knife-cut wrinkles crisscrossed his face, as if telling of time frittered away. Even the broom in his hand now looked as worn and old as its master.

Yet as the old man walked slowly forward, coming to a stop six feet before Ming Li and Master Ghost, and faced these two personages—this old man, faintly weary though he was—he slowly raised his head, and there were, startlingly, a pair of clear, piercing, sharp eyes fixed on what lay before him.

"The morning chill is deep, and the weary birds have not yet stirred. Would you two care to share a bowl of hot tea with an old man?"