Sandalwood Death: A Novel (Chinese Literature Today Book Series)

by Mo Yan

  “Good Brother Shanzi,” I said, saluting him with cupped hands, “you have been well since last we met?”

  “Good Brother Shanzi,” he repeated my greeting, “you have been well since last we met?” His shackles clanked when he brought his hands together to return my salute.

  How absurd, utterly preposterous that was, a performance of the true and false Monkey King there in the middle of the Great Hall!

  “On your knees, condemned prisoner,” Yuan Shikai demanded majestically, “and answer my question!”

  “I am like bamboo in the wind, which will break before it bends, like the mountain jade that will shatter before it is taken whole.”

  “Kneel!”

  “Kill me, take my head, do as you please, but I will not kneel!”

  “Put him on his knees!” Yuan ordered, by now nearly apoplectic.

  The yayi pounced on Xiao Shanzi like wild beasts, grabbed him by the arms, and forced him to his knees. But the minute they took their hands away, he shifted his legs out in front, just as I had done. Now we were sitting side by side. I grimaced; so did he. I glared; he did too. I said, “Shanzi, you are a scoundrel.” He said, “Shanzi, you are a scoundrel.” We were like performers in a comic skit, one aping the other, with the surprising effect of taking the edge off of Yuan Shikai’s anger. He actually chuckled, while von Ketteler, who was sitting right beside him, laughed like an idiot.

  “In all my years as an official, I thought I had seen every type of bizarre behavior possible. But this is the first time I’ve watched two people vying to be a condemned prisoner. Gaomi Magistrate, you are a wise and worldly man,” Yuan said sarcastically. “Explain to me what has just happened.”

  “Your humble servant is a man of little learning,” Qian Ding said in a reverential tone, “and requires guidance from above.”

  “Then tell me which of the two people sitting on the floor is the true Sun Bing.”

  Qian Ding walked up to us and looked first at one and then at the other. The look in his eyes said he was having trouble making up his mind, but I knew that this official, cleverer than a monkey, was able to tell the real Sun Bing from the fake at first glance. So why the hesitant look? Could it be as simple as trying to protect the father of his lover? Was it possible that he would willingly let a beggar suffer the sandalwood death in my stead?

  The Magistrate studied the two of us for a long moment before turning to report to Yuan Shikai:

  “Excellency, my eyesight is poor, and I truly cannot tell them apart.”

  “Look closer.”

  The Magistrate put his face right up next to us. He shook his head.

  “I still cannot tell, Excellency.”

  “Look at their mouths.”

  “They are both missing teeth.”

  “Do you see a difference?”

  “One is missing three teeth, the other is missing two.”

  “How many teeth is Sun Bing missing?”

  “Your humble servant cannot recall.”

  “The dog bastard von Ketteler knocked out three of my teeth with the butt of his pistol,” Xiao Shanzi eagerly volunteered.

  “No,” I corrected him forcefully, “von Ketteler knocked out two of my teeth.”

  “Gaomi Magistrate, you should remember how many of Sun Bing’s teeth were knocked out.”

  “Your humble servant truly cannot recall, Excellency.”

  “So you are telling me that you cannot tell the real from the fake, is that it?”

  “My eyesight is poor, and I truly cannot tell them apart.”

  “Well, then, if even the local Magistrate cannot tell them apart, there is no need to keep trying,” Yuan Shikai said with a wave of his hand. “Lock them both up in condemned cells. Tomorrow they will both have a date with a sandalwood stake. Gaomi Magistrate, tonight you will watch over them. If there is a problem with either one, it will be on your head.”

  “Your humble servant will do his best . . .” The Magistrate bowed deeply, and I saw that the back of his robe was wet from perspiration. Nothing remained of his erstwhile poise and proud demeanor.

  “This switch could not have taken place without the assistance of someone in the yamen,” Yuan Shikai said, having seen the obvious. “I want the jailer and all those assigned guard duties at the condemned cells here first thing tomorrow to answer some serious questions!”

  ————

  2

  ————

  Before Yuan’s soldiers could carry out his order, the jailer had hanged himself in the Prison God Temple. Yayi dragged his corpse out of the compound like a dead dog and deposited it alongside those of Zhu Ba, Hou Xiaoqi, and the others. While soldiers were dragging me over to the condemned cells, I saw executioners cutting off the dead beggars’ heads on someone’s orders. Sick at heart, I experienced intense feelings of remorse. Maybe, I thought, I’ve been wrong; maybe I should have done what Zhu Ba wanted me to do, which was to quietly slip away and foil the scheming collaboration between Yuan Shikai and von Ketteler. I’d wanted to render a great service, to leave a good name for posterity, and to have been loyal, trustworthy, merciful, and benevolent, but I wound up causing the deaths of so many. Enough; no more such thoughts. I’ll cast away all that has tormented me and somehow make it through the night, waiting for the light of tomorrow.

  The County Magistrate had his men chain Xiao Shanzi and me to the same bandit’s stone and light three candles inside the cell and a row of lanterns outside. He moved a chair up and sat just beyond the door. Through the tiny window I saw seven or eight yayi assembled behind him and an array of soldiers behind them. The fire in the mess hall kitchen had been put out, but the air was still thick with smoke, and it was getting worse.

  The fourth watch was sounded.

  Roosters crowed, some near, some far, and lantern light dimmed; the candles in the cell had burned down halfway. The County Magistrate was still in his chair, head slumped down on his chest, like a wheat stalk weighted down after a frost, seemingly neither dead nor alive. I knew he was in a perilous situation, that even if he didn’t lose his head over what had happened, his days as an official were over. Ah, Qian Ding, what happened to that hard-drinking, poem-writing man you once were? County Magistrate, oh, County Magistrate, mortal enemies are bound to meet; my death tomorrow will erase all debts of gratitude and enmity.

  Xiao Shanzi, Xiao Shanzi, whom I count as my protégé, by disfiguring your own face and taking another’s place in jail, you have earned a place in the annals of history for your incorruptible loyalty. Why did you adamantly insist that you are Sun Bing? Had you told the truth, you would have lost your head, but how much easier that would be than suffering the sandalwood death!

  “Worthy brother, why did you do what you did?” I asked him softly.

  “Shifu,” he replied in an even softer voice, “if I had taken the easy way out by letting them lop off my head, wouldn’t I have lost three teeth for nothing?”

  “But have you given any thought to the sandalwood death?”

  “Shifu, we beggars are hard on ourselves from the moment we’re born. On the day Master Zhu Ba took me on as his disciple, he made me stab myself with a knife. I have trained myself in the ruse of self-injury, and I have trained myself in taking a knife to the head. There are blessings in this world not meant for beggars, but no suffering we do not endure. I urge Shifu to disavow his claim to be Sun Bing; let them punish you with a quick death, and allow your young brother to take the punishment meant for you. By letting me suffer the sandalwood death in your place, it will be your good name that gains the credit.”

  “Since your mind is made up,” I said, “then let us crash the Gates of Hell arm in arm. We will show them the meaning of a heroic death and give those foreign devils and treacherous officials a taste of Gaomi courage!”

  “Shifu, daybreak is still a ways off,” Xiao Shanzi said. “While you have the chance, won’t you tell me about the origins of Maoqiang opera?”

  “Yes, Shanzi, I will.
My good young protégé, there is an adage that goes, ‘When death looms, a person can speak only good.’ As your shifu, I will relate for you the history of Maoqiang opera, from its beginnings up to the present.

  ————

  3

  ————

  “It is told that during the reign of the Yongzheng Emperor, in the eighteenth century, a truly remarkable man by the name of Chang Mao was born in Northeast Gaomi Township. Single and childless, he had but one companion, a black cat. A crockery mender by trade, he walked the streets and alleys from dawn to dusk carrying his tools and his cat in baskets on a shoulder pole, stopping to mend people’s cracked and broken crockery. He was very good at his trade and, as a man of fine character, was well liked by all. One day, at the funeral of a friend, as he stood before the gravesite, sadness welled up inside him as he thought back to how decently this friend had treated him, and he was moved to pour out his grief in a voice with such lush qualities that the family of the deceased stopped crying and everyone within earshot fell silent. Listening with rapt concentration, they were amazed to discover that a crockery mender had such an affecting voice.

  “This was a seminal moment in the history of Maoqiang opera. Chang Mao’s sung recitation surpassed women’s cries of anguish and men’s dry-eyed wails. He brought solace to the grief-stricken and entertainment to the uninvolved, launching a revolution in traditional funeral expressions of bereavement and giving rise to a new era with fresh sights and sounds. It was like a Buddhist devotee laying eyes on the Land of Ultimate Bliss, with celestial flowers raining down, or someone covered in dirt slipping into a bath to wash away the grime, then drinking a pot of hot tea to force sweat out of every pore. And the talk began, how Chang Mao was more than a fine mender of crockery, that he had a voice that resounded like a brass bell, an unrivaled memory, and the gift of eloquence. As time went on, more and more grieving families requested his attendance at graveside ceremonies, asking him to appease the souls of the departed and lessen the sorrows of the survivors. Understandably, at first he declined the requests. Why in the world would he offer vocal laments at the gravesite of a total stranger? No, he’d say the first time, and the second. But the third invitation was always difficult to turn down—did not Liu Bei manage to get Zhuge Liang to his cottage the third time he asked? Besides, they would be fellow townsmen, tied together one way or another, people you could not help meeting from time to time, and in a hundred years or so, everyone would be related anyway. So if he could not do something for the sake of the living, he ought to do it for the departed. Seeing a dead man is like encountering a tiger; seeing a dead tiger is like meeting up with a lamb. The dead are noble, the living worthless. So he went. Once, twice, a third time . . . and he was always treated as an honored guest, warmly welcomed by all. Human waste spoils a tree’s roots; spirits and good food intoxicate a man’s heart. How could a lowly crockery mender not be moved by such expansive treatment? And so he put his heart into what he was asked to do. A honed knife is sharp; a practiced skill is perfected. Each funeral gave him an opportunity to whet his skills, until finally his artistry was unmatched. In order to introduce something new into his art, he called upon the wisest man in town, Ma Daguan, to whom he apprenticed himself as a student of tales, ancient and new. Then each morning he went alone to the riverbank to practice his singing voice.

  “The first to ask Chang Mao to sing at funerals were humble families, but once word of his artistry began to spread, well-to-do families sought his services as well. During those days in Northeast Gaomi Township, any burial ceremony in which he participated became a grand event. People came from miles around, bringing with them the elderly and the very young. And the ceremonies in which he did not participate? However lavish the procession or plentiful the sacrificial offerings might be—banners and pendants blotting out the sun, forests of food and rivers of liquor—the turnout would be sparse. The day finally arrived when Chang Mao laid down his pole and mending tools for the last time and began life as a master bereavement singer.

  “People spoke of a local family of bereavement singers in the Confucian homeland whose womenfolk had fine voices. But their specialty was to assume the roles of surviving family members of the deceased to wail and howl songs of piteous sorrow, and bore no resemblance to Chang Mao’s performances. Why compare those bereavement singers to our Patriarch? Because many decades ago, a rumor spread that the founder of our tradition had set out on the path of bereavement singing inspired by Confucian singers. So I made a special trip to Qufu, the birthplace of Confucius, and found that women who sang bereavements still existed there, but that their songs had few lines, mostly “Oh, heaven! Oh, earth!” Our Patriarch’s artistry went far beyond that. Comparing those women to him is like equating heaven with earth or a pheasant with a phoenix.

  “Our Patriarch improvised at gravesites, weaving the life of the deceased into his lyrics. He had a quick wit and a brilliant tongue, rhyming in all the right places, colloquial and easy to understand, but soaring with literary grace. His lines of sorrow were essentially a funeral elegy. As demands to meet his listeners’ expectations intensified, he no longer limited his recitations to the life and virtues of the deceased, but introduced philosophical views of life in general. And Maoqiang opera was born.”

  At that point in my narration, I turned to see the Magistrate, who was sitting outside the condemned cells, cocking his ear as if listening to what I was saying. Go ahead, listen. I want you to hear. If you don’t have an ear for Maoqiang, you’ll never truly understand Northeast Gaomi Township. Ignorance of its history means you cannot comprehend what is in the hearts of its residents. So I raised my voice even though my throat burned and my tongue ached.

  “I said at the beginning that our Patriarch had a cat, a very clever cat, much like the Red Rabbit steed the Three Kingdoms hero Guan Yu rode. He loved that cat, and the cat loved him back. He never went anywhere without it. When he sang a graveside elegy, that cat would sit on the ground in front of him, listening intently, and when the sorrowful climax was reached, it joined in with a doleful howl of its own. The Patriarch’s voice stood out among his peers; the cat’s howls were themselves incomparable. Owing to the shared intimacy, people of the day took to calling him “Chang the Cat,” since the word for cat—mao—sounded the same as his name.

  “Even now, there is a popular ditty in Northeast Gaomi Township that goes——

  “Better to hear Chang Mao screech than listen to the Master teach,” Xiao Shanzi said with deep emotion.

  “Well, one day the cat died; how it died is unclear. One version ascribes it to old age. Another insists that it was poisoned by an out-of town-actor who was envious of the Patriarch’s talent. There is even a version in which the cat was strangled by a vengeful woman who was rebuffed by the Patriarch in her desire to become his wife. Whatever the truth, the cat did die, an event that so traumatized our Patriarch that he held the cat in his arms and cried for three days and nights, interspersing his wails with songs of bereavement, until blood leaked from his eyes.

  “After overcoming the worst of his grief, the Patriarch fashioned two items of cat clothing from the skins of wild animals. The smaller of the two, made from the pelt of a feral cat, he wore on his head for daily use—ears rising from each side, tail hanging down past the nape of his neck alongside his modest queue. The larger item, made from the skins of a dozen or more cats, was a ceremonial robe, trailing a long cat’s tail behind him; he wore it thereafter when he performed graveside bereavements.

  “The death of his companion initiated a major change in the Patriarch’s singing style. Before that, cheerful banter had been woven into his songs; now forlorn strains dominated from start to finish. There was also a change in his singing style, for now the desolate contents were dotted with dulcet or melancholy or bleak cat cries that changed constantly, like a series of interludes. The new style not only has survived to this day, but has become the central feature of Maoqiang opera.”

 
; “Meow—— Meow—” On an impulse, Xiao Shanzi interrupted my narration with a pair of cat cries pregnant with nostalgia.

  “After the death of his cat, our Patriarch adopted the walking and speaking style of a cat, as if possessed by the spirit of his dead companion. He and his cat had become one. Even his eyes underwent a change: slitted during the day, they glowed in the darkness of night. Then one day the Patriarch died, and a legend was born that he turned into a large cat on his deathbed, but with wings that grew from his shoulders and carried him through the window and onto the limb of a giant tree. From there he flew straight to the moon.

  “The vocation of bereavement singing died with the Patriarch, but his melodic, heartbreaking elegies never stopped swirling in the hearts of our people.”

  ————

  4

  ————

  “Later, during the nineteenth-century reigns of the Jiaqing and Daoguang emperors, small family troupes mimicked the vocal offerings of the Patriarch in performances, usually consisting of a male singer, echoed by his wife, and complemented by their child, dressed in a cat costume, who supplied the feline cries. When the opportunity arose, they sang funeral elegies for rich families—by then, ‘bereavement laments’ had become ‘bereavement songs’—but most of the time they put on public performances at open markets. Husband and wife sang and acted out their parts while their child moved cat-like, making a variety of feline sounds as he circled the crowd with his donations basket. Short performances were the order of the day, including such favorites as Lan Shuilian Sells Water, A Widow Weeps at a Gravesite, and Third Sister Wang Misses Her Husband. In reality, these performances were a form of begging. Maoqiang actors are cousins to professional beggars, and that is how you became my protégé.”