by Mo Yan
With a wave of his hand, he signaled his men not to approach any closer. Then with another wave he signaled the militiamen behind me, who wanted either to capture or kill me to bring credit to themselves, to stop where they were. He alone, raising his hand to his mouth to give out a whistle that was music to my ears, walked up to me. When he was four or five yards away, I spotted the toasted bean cake in his hand and drank in its heavenly fragrance. He treated me to a familiar little whistled melody, which brought feelings of mild sadness. My tensions dissolved, my taut muscles relaxed, and I wished for nothing more than to place myself in this man’s caressing hands. And then he was standing next to me, draping his right arm over my neck and holding the bean cake up to my mouth with the other. When the cake was gone, he rubbed the bridge of my nose and muttered:
“Snow Stand, Snow Stand, you are a fine donkey. Too bad people who have no understanding of donkeys turned you wild and unruly. It’s all right now, you can come with me, I’ll teach you how to become a first-rate, obedient, and courageous donkey that everyone will love.”
He first ordered the militiamen away and told his driver to return to town. Then he climbed aboard, bareback, like a pro, straddling me right at the spot where I was most comfortable. He was a practiced rider who knew his way around a donkey. With a pat on my neck, he said:
“Let’s go, my friend.”
From that day forward I was County Chief Chen’s mount, carrying a lean Party official with an abundance of energy all over the vast spaces of Gaomi County. Up till that time, my movements had been restricted to Northeast Gaomi Township, but after I became the county chief’s companion, my traces were found north to the sandbars of the Bohai, south to the iron mines of the Wulian Mountain Range, west to the billowing waters of Sow River, and east to Red Rock Beach, where the fishy smells of the Yellow Sea permeated the air.
This was the most glorious period of my entire donkey life. During those days, I forgot about Ximen Nao, forgot about all the people and events that had colored his life, even forgot about Lan Lian, with whom I’d had such close emotional ties. As I recall those days now, the basis of my contentment was most likely linked to a subconscious appreciation of “official” status. A donkey, of course, respects and fears an official. The deep affection that Chen, the head of an entire county, held for me is something I’ll remember to the end of my days. He personally prepared my feed and would let no one else brush my coat. He draped a ribbon around my neck, decorated with five red velvet balls, and added a red silk tassel to the bell.
When he rode me on an inspection tour, I was invariably accorded the most courteous reception. Villagers supplied me with the finest feed, gave me clean spring water to drink, and groomed my coat with bone combs. Then I was led to a spot on which fine white sand had been spread, where I could roll around comfortably and take my rest. Everyone knew that taking special care of the county chiefs donkey made him very happy. Patting my rump was equivalent to patting the county chief’s behind with flattery. He was a good man who preferred a donkey over a vehicle. It saved gasoline and was superior to walking on his inspection trips to mine sites in the mountains. I knew, of course, that at bottom, he treated me the way he did because of the deep affection he’d developed for my kind during his years as a donkey trader. The eyes of some men light up when they see a pretty woman; the county chief rubbed his hands when he saw a handsome donkey. It was perfectly natural that he would feel good about a donkey with hooves as white as snow and intelligence the equal of any man.
After I became the county chief’s mount, my halter served no further purpose. A surly donkey with a reputation for biting people had, in short order, thanks to the county chief, become a docile and obedient, bright and clever young donkey — nothing less than a miracle. The county chief’s secretary, a fellow named Fan, once took a picture of the county chief sitting on my back during an inspection tour of the iron mines; he sent it with a short essay to the provincial newspaper, where it was prominently published.
I met Lan Lian once during my stint as the county chief’s mount. He was carrying two baskets of iron ore down a narrow mountain path while I was on my way up the mountain with the county chief on my back. When he saw me, he dropped his carrying pole, spilling the iron ore, which rolled down the mountain. The county chief was irate:
“What was that all about? Iron ore is too valuable to lose, even a single rock. Go down and bring that back up.”
I could tell that Lan Lian hadn’t hear a word the county chief said. His eyes flashed as he ran up, threw his arms around my neck, and said:
“Blackie, old Blackie, at last I found you . . .”
Recognizing that he was my former owner, Chen turned to Secretary Fan, who followed us everywhere on an emaciated horse, and signaled for him to come deal with the matter. Fan, always alert to what his boss wanted, jumped off his horse and pulled Lan Lian off to one side.
“What do you think you’re doing? This is the county chief’s donkey.”
“No, it isn’t, it’s mine, my Blackie. He lost his mother at birth and only survived because my wife fed him millet porridge from his first days. We relied upon him for our livelihood.”
“Even if what you say is true,” Secretary Fan said, “if the county chief hadn’t come along when he did, a group of militiamen would have made donkey meat out of him. He now has a very important job, taking the county chief into villages and saving the nation the expense of a Jeep. The county chief cannot do without him, and you should rejoice in knowing that your donkey is playing such an important role.”
“I don’t care about that,” Lan Lian replied stubbornly. “All I know is, he’s my donkey, and I’m taking him with me.”
“Lan Lian, old friend,” the county chief said. “These are extraordinary times, and this donkey has been an enormous help to me in negotiating these mountain paths. So let’s just say I’ve got your donkey on temporary loan, and as soon as the steel smelting project has ended, you can have him back. I’ll see that the government gives you a stipend for the duration of the loan period.”
Lan Lian wasn’t finished, but an official from the co-op walked up, dragged him back to the side of the road, and said sternly:
“Like a goddamn dog who doesn’t know how lucky he is to be carried in a sedan chair, you should be thanking your ancestors for accumulating good luck, which is why the county chief has chosen your donkey to ride.”
Raising his hand for the man to stop the harangue, the county chief said:
“How’s this, Lan Lian? You’re a man of strong character, for which I admire you. But I can’t help feeling sorry for you, and as chief official of this county, I hope you’ll soon be leading your donkey into the co-op and stop resisting the tides of history.”
The co-op official held Lan Lian to the side of the road so the county chief—so that I — could pass, and when I saw the look in Lan Lian’s eyes, I felt pangs of guilt and wondered to myself: Could this be considered an act of betrayal to my master on my way up to a higher limb? The county chief must have intuited my feelings, for he patted me on the head and said consolingly:
“Let’s go, Snow Stand. Carrying the county representative is making a greater contribution than tagging along behind Lan Lian. Sooner or later, he’ll join the People’s Commune, and when he does, you’ll become public property. Wouldn’t it be perfectly normal for the county chief to ride on a People’s Commune donkey?”
As you’ll see, this was a case of: Extreme joy begets sorrow; when things reach their extreme, they turn and head in the opposite direction. At dusk on the fifth day after the encounter with my former master, I was carrying the county chief home from a visit to the iron mine at Reclining Ox Mountain when a rabbit hopped across the path in front of me. Spooked, I reared up and caught my right front hoof between some rocks when I landed. I fell, and so did the county chief, who hit his head on a sharp rock, which knocked him out and opened a gash in his head. His secretary immediately told some men to carry the unc
onscious county chief down the mountain. Meanwhile, some farmers tried to free my hoof, but it was stuck tight and deep. Nothing worked. They pushed, they pulled, and then I heard a crack rise up from the rocks and felt a pain so severe I too passed out. When I came to, I discovered that my right front hoof and the bones that connected it to my leg were still stuck in the rocks, and that my blood had stained a large section of the roadway. I was overcome by grief. My usefulness as a donkey was over, that I knew. The county chief would have no further use for me. Even my master would have no interest in feeding a donkey that could no longer work. All I had to look forward to was the butcher’s knife. They’d slit my throat, and once I’d spilled all the blood in my body, they’d skin me and slice my flesh into morsels of tasty meat that would wind up in people’s stomachs . . . Better that I take my own life. I glanced over at the cliff and could see the misty village below. With one loud hee-haw — I rolled across the roadway toward the dropoff. What stopped me was a loud cry from Lan Lian.
He had run up the mountain. He was all sweaty, and his knees were spotted with blood. He’d obviously stumbled and fallen on his way up. In a voice distorted by flowing tears, he shouted:
“Blackie, my old Blackie . . .”
He wrapped his arms around my neck as some farmers lifted up my tail and moved my rear legs to help me stand up. Excruciating pain shot up my injured leg when it touched the ground and sweat gushed from my body. Like a dilapidated wall, I toppled to the ground a second time.
I heard one of the farmers say in what passed for sympathy:
“He’s a useless cripple, that’s the bad news. The good news is he’s got plenty of meat on his bones. We ought to be able to sell him for a decent sum to the butchers.”
“Shut the fuck up!” Lan Lian swore angrily. “Would you take your father to the butchers if he broke his leg?”
That stunned everyone within earshot. But the silence was quickly broken by the same farmer.
“Watch your mouth! This donkey, is he your father?” He rolled up his sleeves, itching for a fight, but was held back by the men around him.
“Let it go,” they said. “Just let it go. The last thing you want is to piss off this madman. He’s the only independent farmer in the whole county. They know all about him up at the county chief’s office.”
The crowd broke up, leaving just the two of us. A crescent moon hung in the sky; the sight and the situation made me sad beyond words. After venting against the county chief and that bunch of farmers, my master took off his jacket and tore it into strips to bind my injured leg. Hee-haw, hee-haw — That really hurt. He wrapped his arms around my head, his tears falling onto my ears. “Blackie, old Blackie, what can I say to make this better? How could you believe anything the officials said? At the first sign of trouble, all they care about is saving their precious official. They don’t give a damn about you. If they’d sent for a stonemason to break up the rocks that pinned your hoof, it might have been saved.” The words were no sooner out of his mouth than he let go of my head and ran over to the rocky spot in the road, where he reached down and tried to retrieve my separated hoof. He cried, he swore, he panted from sheer exhaustion, and he eventually managed to retrieve it. Standing there holding it in his hand, he wailed, and when I saw the iron shoe, worn shiny after all that time, I broke down and cried too.
With the encouragement of my master, I managed to stand up again; the thick bindings made it possible — barely — for me to rest my injured leg on the ground, but my balance, sadly, was lost. Fleet-footed Ximen Donkey was no more, replaced by a cripple who lowered his head and listed to the side with every step. I entertained the thought of flinging myself off the mountain and putting an end to this tragic life; my master’s love was all that kept me from doing just that.
The distance from the iron mine at Reclining Ox Mountain to Ximen Village in Northeast Gaomi Township was about twenty miles. If all four of my legs were in good shape, that little distance would not have been worth mentioning. But now one of them was useless, making the going unbelievably hard; I left traces of flesh and blood along the way, marked by wrenching painful cries from my throat. The pain made my skin twitch like ripples on a pond.
My stump was beginning to stink by the time we reached Northeast Gaomi Township, drawing hordes of flies whose buzzing filled our ears. My master broke some branches from a tree and twisted them together to make a switch to keep the flies away. My tail hung limply, too weak to swish; thanks to an attack of diarrhea, the rear half of my body was covered with filth. Each swing of my master’s switch killed many flies, but even greater numbers swarmed up to take their place. So he took off his pants and tore them into strips to replace the first bindings. Now he was wearing only shorts and a pair of heavy, thick-soled leather boots. He was a strange and comical apparition.
Along the way we dined on the wind and slept in the dew. I ate some dry grass, he subsisted on some half-rotten yams from a nearby field. Shunning roads, we walked down narrow paths to avoid encountering people, like wounded soldiers deserting the scene of battle. We entered Huangpu Village on a day when the village dining hall was open, the delightful smells wafting our way. I heard my master’s stomach rumble. He looked at me with tears in his reddened eyes, which he dried with his dirty hands.
“Goddamn it, Blackie,” he blurted out, “what are we doing? Why are we hiding from everyone? We’ve done nothing to be ashamed of. You were injured while working for the people, so the people owe you, and by taking care of you like this, I’m doing the people’s work too! Come on, we’re going in.”
Like a man leading an army of flies, he walked with me into the open-air dining hall. Steamers heaping with lamb dumplings were brought out of the kitchen and placed on a table. They were gone almost immediately. Lucky diners skewed the hot dumplings with thin tree branches and gnawed at them from the side; others tossed them from hand to hand, slurping hungrily.
Everyone saw us come in, cutting a sorry figure, ugly and filthy, and smelling as bad as we looked. Tired and hungry, we gave them a terrific fright, and probably disgusted them in the bargain, costing them their appetite. My master swatted my rump with his switch, sending a cloud of flies into the air, where they regrouped and landed on all those steaming dumplings and on the dining hall kitchen utensils. The diners hooted unappreciatively.
A fat woman in white work clothes, by all appearances the person in charge, waddled up to us, held her nose, and, in a low, muffled voice, said:
“What do you think you’re doing? Go on, get out of here!”
Someone in the crowd recognized my master.
“Aren’t you Lan Lian, from Ximen Village? Is it really you? What happened to you?”
My master just looked at the man without replying, then led me out into the yard, where everyone stayed as far away from us as possible.
“That’s Gaomi County’s one and only independent farmer,” the man shouted after us. “They know about him all the way to Changwei Prefecture! That donkey of his is almost supernatural. It killed a pair of wolves and has bitten a dozen or more people. What happened to its leg?”
The fat woman ran up.
“We don’t serve independent farmers, so get out of here!”
My master stopped walking and, in a voice filled both with dejection and passion, replied:
“You fat sow, I am an independent farmer, and I’d rather die than be served by the likes of you. But this donkey of mine is the county chief’s personal mount. He was carrying the chief down the mountain when his hoof got caught in some rocks and broke off. That’s a work-related injury, and you have an obligation to serve him.”
I’d never heard my master berate anyone so passionately before. His birthmark was nearly black. By then he was so skeletal he looked like a plucked rooster, and a very smelly one, as he advanced on the fat woman, who kept backing up until, covering her face with her hands, she burst into tears and bolted.
A man in a well-worn uniform, hair parted in the middle, look
ing very much like a local official, walked up to us, picking his teeth.
“What do you want?”
“I want you to feed my donkey, I want you to heat a tub of water and give him a bath, and I want you to get a doctor over here to bandage his injured leg.”
The official shouted in the direction of the kitchen, drawing a dozen people out into the yard.
“Do as he says, and make it quick.”
So they washed me from head to tail with hot water, and they summoned a doctor, who treated my injured leg with iodine, put a medicinal salve on the stump, and wrapped it with heavy gauze. Finally, they brought me some barley and alfalfa.
While I was eating, someone carried out a bowl of steaming dumplings and placed it in front of my master. A man who looked like a mess cook said softly:
“Eat up, elder brother, don’t be stubborn. Eat what you have here and don’t give a thought to your next meal. Get through today without worrying about tomorrow. In these fucked-up times you suffer for a few days, then you die, the lamp goes out. What’s that, you don’t want these?”
My master was sitting on a couple of chipped bricks tied together, bent over like a hunchback and staring at my useless stump; I don’t think he heard a word the mess cook said. His stomach was rumbling again, and I could guess how tempting those plump, white dumplings must have been. Several times he stuck out a black, grimy hand to pick one of them up, only to quickly pull it back.
11
With a War Hero’s Help, an Artificial Hoof
Starving Citizens Dismember and Eat a Donkey
My stump healed and I was out of danger, but I’d lost the ability to work and was just a crippled donkey. The slaughterhouse team came by several times with an offer to buy me and improve the lives of Party cadres with my meat. My master sent them away with loud curses.
