Old Town

by Lin Zhe

  “Gramps, you can’t keep saying you’re a rightist. Submission to the government is the lot of Christians. If the government says rightists are bad people, then they’re bad people.”

  Ninth Brother turned and gazed at Second Sister. He had something to say but he didn’t say it, just silently lowered his head and went on gardening.

  Second Sister saw that he had heard full well what she had said and the alarm abruptly stopped ringing inside her.

  That afternoon, Second Sister went to a meeting at the neighborhood office and Ninth Brother took Su’er to soak in the hot springs. The hot springs of Old Town’s eastern district were renowned. It was said that they could cure more than ten kinds of disease. Leading Su’er by the hand, husband and wife walked to Little West Lake before going their separate ways. The weather was pleasant and they were all in a good mood.

  Grandfather and grandson passed by a little sundries shop and Su’er saw fruit drops in the glass counter. His eyes homed in on them and he swallowed several times. “Gramps, what are those?”

  Ninth Brother gazed at his grandson in wonder. Every day new continents can be discovered on this little guy. See how cunning he is? He wants to eat candy but doesn’t come right out and say it. He purposely teased Su’er. “That’s medicine for curing coughs.”

  Su’er immediately started to cough. “I want to take medicine.” Ninth Brother couldn’t help letting out a great guffaw. He reached down and fished out some paper currency to buy some candies which he placed in the child’s pocket. Just then, a person called out, “Dr. Lin!”

  Reflexively he turned around to look but it took a while before he recognized the woman with the frenzied and grief-ridden face as that fat nurse at the People’s Hospital. In over half a year since he had last seen her she had lost a great deal of weight.

  “Dr. Lin, how so very carefree you look taking your grandson out for a stroll.”

  “What’s the matter with you? Have you become ill?”

  “I’ve suffered a lot because of you!”

  The nurse wept silently. With trembling shoulders, she whimpered about the tragedies that had befallen her. She had become the hospital’s top rightist, her husband divorced her, and with a child only five years old, she had been assigned to work in some outlying rural hospital.

  The day was still clear and fine but Dr. Lin seemed to be struck by a bolt of lightning. Unable to express himself, he just kept saying, “I’m sorry.”

  “What’s the use of ‘I’m sorry’? You’re the real Big Rightist!” she screamed hysterically.

  “Yes, yes. If there’s any number-one rightist at all at the hospital, it should be me. I’ll go there and tell the leader.”

  The doctor had no sooner said this than he was off, even forgetting to take his little grandson with him. Luckily, Su’er was a sharp lad, and letting out a bellow he ran to catch up. With Su’er in his arms, Dr. Lin went into the leader’s office. The former head of the hospital had been transferred and his replacement called in a clerk to record what was said. “The nurse is still young,” the doctor said, “I hope the leader can give her the chance to correct herself. If the hospital hasn’t met its quota of rightists, then count me as one of them.” The head of the hospital conscientiously took notes and asked him to return home and wait to be dealt with.

  That evening when Su’er had fallen asleep, Ninth Brother told Second Sister all that had happened that afternoon. She stopped her sewing and raised both her hands high above her, holding them there for some time. Just today the alarm had been lifted from within her and now the bomb fell right on top of her. What more could be said? This fish that had escaped the net swam right onto the chopping board and asked to be cut up. She supposed that he was a dead man for sure.

  His eyes tightly closed, Ninth Brother sat behind Second Sister in his rocking chair. Baoqing had given him this for his most recent birthday. Every day at noon he would doze off, holding Su’er as he sat in the chair. It gave him a feeling of satisfaction impossible to put into words. Thinking that he might no longer be able to hold Su’er as they rocked back and forth in the chair, grandfather and grandson daydreaming together, Ninth Brother grew tremendously afraid. He really wasn’t a desperate and daring man, but every time he encountered some major issue, he would sense a force sweeping him along into making some extraordinary decision. It was as if he had received an irresistible order: You must do this.

  He opened his eyes and sorrowfully addressed Second Sister, “Let’s say a prayer together.”

  Second Sister, wordlessly and devoid of any expression, went into the bedroom and dug out some silk wadding and cloth and spread it out on the dining table. Her skilled hands then dexterously cut out padded jacket and padded trouser patterns for Ninth Brother. She had heard that Old Town’s rightist elements were all sent to mountainous areas for labor reform. Since it had come to this, she had to plan for the worst and she hurriedly made several sets of warm clothing for him.

  “Second Sister, this isn’t something I want either. If you don’t forgive me, I’ll feel even more miserable.”

  Crick, crick, crick went the scissors. When Ninth Brother’s padded jacket and trousers were done, she still had to make some for herself. She had steeled herself. No matter where Ninth Brother might be assigned, she would follow him, even to the ends of the earth. Residence committee director, glorious army dependent, all the honors that she had cared about she now tossed aside. Suddenly she felt her heart grow lighter. Actually, the terror and panic that people feel in confronting disaster more often than not is even more painful than actually going forward to endure the disaster. She had always been in a state of fear that the sword hanging over her head might fall. Now the very moment she relaxed her vigilance, the sword had fallen, catching her totally unprepared. All she could do was wait to be butchered. She’d take things as they came. After all, Second Sister was a woman who had weathered great storms before.

  Ninth Brother stared intently at his wife. Finally, the shame and panic in his eyes moved her and called up her mother’s tenderness. She put down her needle and turned to comfort him. “Don’t think about it too much. It’s just fate, your fate and mine too. We’d like to avoid it, but we can’t.”

  Ninth Brother wanted to say something, but the corners of his mouth started to twitch and suddenly he was crying like a child.

  They didn’t tell their children of the dreaded event that might occur in the family. They treasured every day, every hour they had before that event happened. Second Sister requested sick leave and didn’t participate in any more meetings. The two old folks brought Su’er all over Old Town, wherever there was a place for him to play, and they ate all over Old Town, wherever there was a place to eat. It was just at that time that Grandpa bought a 120 mm camera. Everywhere they went they took souvenir photos of the images of the family happiness shared by grandparents and grandson. Many pictures were candid snapshots that recorded Su’er’s every expression, and these were extremely vivid. My grandfather had the pictures developed and inserted into photo albums. He was preparing this to console his moments of wistfulness and longing after he and Su’er were parted.

  One month, two months, passed by. “Oppose Rightists” gradually became a term of the past. The reason was unclear, but the hospital leadership once again released the big fish that had thrown itself into the net. Grandma recommenced her committee work and was so busy going in and coming out of meetings that she was gone from sight the whole day long. My grandfather often held Su’er in his arms as he sat in the rocking chair late at night waiting for “the director’s” return. Sometimes he would tease and joke with her. “If another “Oppose Rightists” movement starts up again, I would still throw myself into the net. In that way, every day you would keep me and Su’er company.” To which, Grandma had this reply: “You’re the fish that swims right onto the chopping board and asks to be cut up. The government has let you go. No matter how much work I do, I could never repay this immense favor.” />
  After Grandpa passed on, Grandma gave that photo album to Su’er. She turned page after page, recalling the story behind each picture. “This picture is at Gathering Spring Garden Hotel. You were eating prawns. Here’s one of you at Drum Mountain. You were all tired out from walking and lay on the ground and wouldn’t get up.” Su’er said, “Gramps and Granny really knew how to have fun, bringing a grandchild on their honeymoon.” Grandma said, “Did you know? At that time a calamity struck our home. There was no reason to be happy. Nowadays, I think it’s God who lets us be happy. Su’er, you just believe in God. I’ll take you to church.” Su’er was absorbed in admiring his picture when he was a child. “Look! I was already a handsome guy when I was this small!”

  Grandma sighed. “None of you believe. Later, where will your Gramps and I go looking for you all?”

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN – CHANCE AND PREDESTINATION

  1.

  THERE’S SO MUCH chance behind just our births alone. Everyone arrives in this world as the result of a string of accidents, that’s all. People find this idea discouraging.

  If only Miss Baohua had not been so headstrong and felt she just had to go to far-off Xinjiang, if only my real father had not gone on an assignment to a small town on the border where he caught pneumonia, there would have been no me in this world. I am just so paltry and insignificant, so marginal.

  Baohua thought that dropping out of school and joining the army was rather an earthshaking deed. The whole of West Gate would move heaven and earth for her, and all the Lins and their very near and dear Chen family would make a wall of their bodies to keep her from leaving Old Town. Actually, to her great surprise, apart from her mother, nobody else expressed opposition to what she did. At the time her father was closedmouthed and went around with a saddened expression. He loved her the most. Of all the family he was the one who wielded the most authority and had he resolutely opposed this, Baohua could not have walked out the gate. But he never once said no. How could he have been so hard-hearted? This hurt and bitterly disappointed Baohua. The military vehicles carrying the new soldiers set out. As they sped along under towering mountains and over lofty ranges, Baohua suddenly realized that she had not at all been mentally prepared for such a journey and she started to blubber. Then the two other women soldiers traveling with her followed suit. Their troop leader was like a kindergarten teacher, cajoling this one and encouraging that one, telling jokes, and doing magic tricks. The women soldiers smiled through their tears and then a second later broke out crying all over again.

  Baohua cried like this all the way to the border town of Kashgar.48 There she worked as a medical orderly in a military hospital. Hearing that after two years of military service she could be demobilized and return home, she bought a kind of speckled broad bean and put seven hundred and thirty of these into a bottle. Every morning she would tip one of these out and just waited for the day when the bottle would be empty and she could submit an application for demobilization. Women soldiers at the base were rare birds. Every one of them had many suitors, and Baohua was no exception. However, she had made her mind up to return to Old Town and she consistently refused all those who were chasing her, including several leading cadres to whom she had been introduced through her organization. She made one very clear commitment: to get back south to Old Town, she would make sure not to fall in love and get married. Daddy also advised her like this in every one of his letters.

  Very quickly the bottle was emptied of its last bean and that very day Baohua submitted her application for demobilization. This was refused by her superiors and they promoted her from medical orderly to nurse. Tearfully, she refilled the bottle with beans. Two years later she once again applied to be demobilized, and once again this was refused. But Baohua didn’t cry this time. She pursed her lips and said to her leader, “If you don’t release me to go home, when the weather gets warmer I’m just going to get in a truck and go home by myself.” The leader let out a big laugh and didn’t take her seriously.

  Every woman soldier at this frontier base was petted and flattered. Frail and delicate Baohua was even more the object of tenderness. Though she had been a soldier for several years now, her “Eldest Young Miss” temperament hadn’t changed one bit and she really did start planning to run away from the frontier. Between Kashgar and Old Town stretched the endless land and rivers of China, and in those days communications were primitive to the extreme. She would have to go seven days and seven nights by long-distance bus to the region’s capital, Urumqi. Then she would take a plane to Lanzhou in neighboring Gansu Province, where there was a train to Shanghai. From Shanghai she would go by boat to Old Town. Baohua still needed to work for quite a while to be able to save up enough to pay for such a journey.

  Just at this moment there was a patient in the internal medicine ward, a reporter named Xiao. The moment Baohua laid eyes on him, the medicine tray fell out of her hands onto the floor, for she really and truly saw Enchun. There had been no news of Enchun for several years and her father’s letters never mentioned him. She thought that Enchun was now a big official in the Communist Party. He had taken part so early in the underground movement that these days he just had to be a high-level cadre in the party.

  This patient, Xiao, was reading a book and the tray’s fall startled him. When he looked up he saw standing in the doorway a little nurse whose eyes were brimming with tears. At that instant he felt she was extremely beautiful.

  Even though they were looking each other right in the eye, Baohua still saw Enchun. Indeed, Enchun and Xiao strongly resembled each other. From a photograph taken of Xiao when he was young, he and Enchun both had the same big physical build and a similar bookish air about them.

  Reporter Xiao laughed as he walked over from his bed and helped pick up the tray and the pills spilled all over the floor. “What did you see that scared you so much?”

  His accent was very thick and Baohua couldn’t locate it. Its strangeness roused her from her dream: This isn’t Enchun. For some reason she cried brokenheartedly all the more. Sobbing, she dispensed the pills and took his temperature. Like a big brother, Reporter Xiao asked her all kinds of questions. Was she homesick? Was anyone bullying her? The more he asked, the more brokenhearted she grew. The next day, Baohua told him, “You look a lot like one of my older brothers back home.” “Then just see me as that older brother,” Reporter Xiao said.

  When Reporter Xiao was discharged from the hospital he gave Baohua a letter. This was the first love letter that Baohua had ever received. Most of the women soldiers who came to the frontier were matched up within three months, so Baohua, who “guarded her body like jade,” had long been the target of a multitude of enlisted men and officers, all vying for her. They’d ask their leaders to come forward as their matchmakers. All one of these would have to say was, “Ah, Miss Lin, let’s just have a chat,” and she would know—here was one more matchmaker. Report had it that a regiment-level cadre was lovesick for her, but up until now no one had ever wooed her with a love letter.

  Reporter Xiao’s love letter was elegant and polished and as gorgeous as a poem. Just above his signature he wrote, “I think I have fallen in love with you.” Suddenly she burst into loud and inconsolable tears of grief: for her distant home, for her father and mother who anxiously waited for her return, for the promise she had kept all these years that was now broken. She wanted to marry this young reporter so overflowing with talent!

  Baohua’s writing style wasn’t too bad either. When she was little, arithmetic problems scared her but her marks in Chinese were always at the top of her class. As for verse, she could reel off Tang shi and Song ci backward. She now commenced a love-letter correspondence with Reporter Xiao, then in Urumqi. There was a letter every week, and every letter was several pages long.

  Reporter Xiao’s going to Kashgar to do interviews had occurred purely by chance. Until then he had merely been an insignificant night-desk editor at his newspaper. Reports about Kashgar’s rural land reform not
only had to appear as the headline in the first edition, these also had to be sent to the central leadership for their review and approval. Such an important, on-the-spot reporting mission couldn’t be given to Comrade Young Xiao. But an “old revolutionary” senior reporter got sick along the way there and came back without accomplishing anything. A subeditor who set out had just met with a car accident and was now laid up in the hospital.

  Young Xiao, although virtually an unknown, cherished lofty ambitions, and while normally a quiet person, he strived for the chance to show what he could do. Because the leaders fretted about having no one suitable to assign, here was his golden opportunity. He sought out the director of his newspaper for a talk and quite systematically presented his understanding of rural policy. This conversation achieved the intended effect. On the road the second day the reporter began to get sick. The weather on the desert was extremely changeable, with temperatures dropping more than forty degrees at night. A trip like this of seven days and seven nights was a test greater than the normal person could bear and his own physique was not as strong as that of normal men. But he knew what this trip across the desert meant for his future prospects, and pushing on to his destination he was put right into the hospital barely breathing. Though still sick, he did a splendid job in carrying out the assignment. His report of many thousand words earned him honors, and right afterward an important Party member selected him among all the rest to be his secretary. This position was a stepping-stone to promotion. Secretary Xiao now saw a brilliant career ahead of him: section chief, bureau head, department head, and positions even higher than these.

  This string of chances and accidents was thus the origin of my life and, furthermore, set the course of my destiny.

  I think that when Reporter Xiao fell in love with my mother, this was something real and true. Although extremely ambitious, at that time he was, after all, still young and exuded scholarly airs. Love, marriage, pregnancy and birth, all followed logic and nature. However, while I was still an embryo inside my mother, a time of nightmares and vexation began for my father.