by Su Tong
‘What do you want to know that for?’
‘No reason. I was just curious.’
At this Papa Qi laughed and said, ‘You intellectuals, curious about everything. But can you eat curiosity?’ Meng felt a little awkward, but Papa Qi gave him a hearty pat on the back and said, ‘He’s a relative, I suppose, but that doesn’t count for much. We’re mostly friends; we gradually got to know each other.’
The Mengs were duly grateful for Papa Qi’s help, and the day before Meng reported for duty in the zone, the two of them went to buy gifts for him. Obeying the conventions, they purchased high-quality cigarettes and alcohol. Then Ningzhu, anxious to do right, said, ‘Papa Qi’s chin is always so stubbly. Why don’t we get him an electric razor?’
‘If we get one, then it should be top-grade,’ Meng replied, so in the end they shelled out a thousand yuan for a Philips razor.
Just as the couple had expected, Papa Qi refused this windfall of gifts, remarking, ‘If I’d known you intellectuals believed in bribes like everyone else, I wouldn’t have helped you out in the first place.’
Fortunately, Ningzhu knew how to be persuasive: ‘We know how things work. You must have spent quite a lot of money running around to get this done for us. If you won’t accept even these poor tokens of our gratitude then Meng simply won’t report for work in the zone.’
Only when she had put it so boldly did Papa Qi finally agree to take the cigarettes and the alcohol; but when it came to the razor he exhibited his unconventional side, saying, ‘I’ll accept the razor too, but I won’t take it home with me. If I take it home, I’ll just end up giving it away to someone else, so it’ll be best if you take care of it for me. I come here all the time anyway. This way it’ll be mine just the same, right?’
From then on, the buzzing sound of an electric razor was often to be heard in the Meng’s home, generally on Saturday afternoons but sometimes also early on a Friday or Sunday evening. And that was how Papa Qi’s visits became part of Meng family life. He made them when the working week was done, so naturally those were the days when Ningzhu was particularly busy with her housekeeping. While she was cooking or washing up, she could always hear Papa Qi shaving in the sitting room. Their flat was far too small, and even from the kitchen she could clearly hear the three revolving blades rasping against the bristle of his beard. Not only that: since Papa Qi’s beard was very tough, even two rooms away Ningzhu could make out the sound of the stubble rattling around inside the razor. One day, she grew very agitated at the noise and cried out loud, ‘That racket is driving me crazy!’
The two men hadn’t heard Ningzhu’s complaint, but when Papa Qi took his leave that day she didn’t see him to the door as usual, but instead vanished into the bathroom. She came out only once he had left, and her expression showed she was annoyed. She said to Meng, ‘You two talked together the whole evening. What did you talk about? You talk to him almost every other day. What on earth do you find to talk about? How can there be that much to say?’
Meng, aware of his wife’s mood, said, ‘I don’t really know what we talk about. He wants to sit there and talk, so I just talk back. When there’s something to say, we talk, and when there isn’t, we sip tea. And while we’re sipping, we come up with another topic.’
Ningzhu frowned and said, ‘It’s very odd. He’s always saying he’s so busy, but if he is, why is he always sitting around our home all evening or afternoon?’
‘Are you annoyed with him?’ replied Meng. ‘He’s not just some run-of-the-mill acquaintance, you know, he did us a huge favour.’
‘You’re right, I shouldn’t be irritated. I don’t know what’s happening to me, but as soon as I hear that razor it just gets to me. It’s like a swarm of mosquitoes buzzing in my ears. If I’d known it would be like this, I’d have made him take it home when we first gave it to him.’
They were greatly in Qi’s debt. Except for their parents, their brothers and sisters, was there anyone as interested in their affairs? When the toilet flush broke, it was Papa Qi who fixed it. They felt the deepest gratitude towards him, realizing you could scour the earth and never find another friend like him. On the other hand, they developed an ever-deepening dread of Saturdays. On Friday evenings, when Meng went to bed, he would laugh hollowly and say, ‘Tomorrow’s Saturday. Papa Qi will be coming again.’
They had once supposed that Papa Qi had an ulterior motive, but the two of them quickly came to realize that to think that way was to do him an injustice. Meng was an automation programmer, Ningzhu an accountant; what use could they possibly be to him? They realized that Papa Qi was someone whose word was his deed; a person utterly devoid of ulterior motives, who paid them visits purely out of friendship. Neither Meng nor Ningzhu was odd or eccentric, and in their opinion making friends was a nice, harmless thing to do, but they didn’t understand why Papa Qi had to come every Saturday, and why, when he did, he had to stay quite so long.
Ningzhu hatched a variety of schemes to curtail the length of Papa Qi’s visits. Once, when Papa Qi and Meng were chatting in the living room, she carried out a pile of accounts books and explained that she was helping a coworker make a little cash by doing extra bookkeeping, so she had to have them ready for the next morning. Then she sat down right under their noses, thinking it would be seen as an obvious hint. But Papa Qi seemed totally undisturbed, and concentrated on the political joke he was telling. The joke was in fact very funny, but Ningzhu couldn’t bring herself to laugh. Instead she enquired of Meng, ‘Can’t you hear that the water on the stove is boiling? Go and pour it into the Thermos!’
Before he could get up, Papa Qi was already on his feet, saying, ‘I’ll do it.’ Then he rushed into the kitchen as if he was in his own house while Meng, caught between sitting and standing, said to his wife, ‘You’re going too far.’
Ningzhu rolled her eyes at him, picked up the things from the table and flounced into the bedroom. Once there, she had a private temper tantrum, throwing Meng’s pillow viciously to the floor and stamping wildly all over it. That was the day Papa Qi brought back the repaired wall clock. When he had gone Meng wanted to hang it on the wall, but Ningzhu wouldn’t allow it. Meng realized then that she was very angry with Papa Qi.
What could account for his behaviour? Did he really not see how they felt or was he merely pretending not to? Ningzhu sighed, ‘I practically ordered him out. How come he didn’t react?’
‘He’s the straightforward sort, that’s all. He’s not used to people beating about the bush,’ Meng replied. ‘Besides, it probably hasn’t occurred to him that he annoys you. He’s helped us with so many things without the slightest hope of getting anything in return. Why would it even cross his mind that he annoys you?’
‘Nothing in return?’ Ningzhu shouted. ‘He takes our time away, he takes our Saturdays away. Other people have seven days in a week, but we only have six. Isn’t that compensation enough?’
Meng could think of no immediate response. As a bookkeeper, Ningzhu had a way of presenting facts so clearly that others always saw her point. He chuckled for a moment, and then said to his wife, ‘If he’s really getting on your nerves, why don’t you just go home to your mother’s on Saturdays? I’ll stay here and keep him company. He’ll only be stealing my Saturday that way, so we’ll be cutting our losses by fifty per cent, right?’
The next Saturday closed in on them with quick steps. In the morning, Meng was shaken awake very early by Ningzhu and took fright when he saw her haggard face and bloodshot eyes. His first thought was that she must be ill, but Ningzhu said, ‘I’m not ill, I just haven’t slept. I’ve been thinking the whole time of what will happen when Papa Qi comes. I try to force myself not to think about it, but as soon as I close my eyes, I hear the sound of that damned razor.’ Then she said, ‘I can’t take it any more, really I can’t.’
Meng felt the issue had become a major concern and tried to console his wife, saying, ‘It’s not as bad as all that. Think of his good points. If you remember all the
things he’s done for us, you won’t feel that way.’
‘I did think about them. I’ve thought all I can about his good points, but if he hadn’t helped us at all, wouldn’t we still have been fine? We could picnic on the mountain, we could go to the movies, or we could not go out at all and stay in reading, just the two of us. Wouldn’t that be nice? Why did he have to force himself between us?’
‘What do you mean, "force"? He’s our friend, after all.’
But Ningzhu was no longer interested in the topic of friendship, being steeped too far in resentment. ‘No,’ she said suddenly in a tone that brooked no argument, ‘you can’t stay at home today. You’re coming with me.’
Meng was the kind of man who cherished his wife, and though he was extremely reluctant to agree, in the end he was unable to dissuade her. Before leaving home at noon, he wrote a note informing Papa Qi that they had gone out. Ningzhu was against even this, and said, ‘If you say you’re busy today, what about tomorrow? He’ll come back tomorrow for sure.’
‘But won’t he notice we’re avoiding him on purpose?’
‘We want him to notice! Didn’t you say he was straight-forward? This time we won’t beat around the bush, we’ll let him find out. Maybe he is straightforward, but not to the point of idiocy!’
That night, when they returned home they discovered several cigarette butts outside the door. Meng counted them; there were six altogether. He picked them up one by one and threw them in the rubbish. A strange sensation accompanied the action, as if, bit by bit, he was picking up his friendship with Papa Qi and throwing that in the rubbish too. He felt empty inside, but strangely enough his movements seemed filled with exaggerated glee. Meng himself could not have explained his frame of mind that evening. All he could remember later was the first thing Ningzhu said after they got home: ‘Now he gets it! He won’t come back next week.’ And he also remembered how full of joy and hope her voice was.
* * *
Indeed he did not come. Having waited until two in the afternoon, the Mengs felt certain that he would not; they had become familiar with the pattern of Papa Qi’s visits. When the clock struck two, they looked at one another and smiled. Ningzhu said, ‘Like I said, he won’t come today.’
Meng replied, ‘He didn’t come today; he’s given us our Saturdays back.’ He’d meant to say it in a humorous tone, but could tell that somehow he’d sounded nervous, serious, anything but humorous.
Papa Qi did not come, and Saturday afternoon seemed very tranquil and empty. For a time, Meng didn’t know what to do with himself; it felt as if this interlude had been stolen from Papa Qi. Somehow, he couldn’t bear to fritter it away. He wandered around at home, and in the end asked Ningzhu, ‘Tell me what I should be doing.’
She said, not without satisfaction, ‘Anything you like. Why don’t you read? You haven’t read in six months.’
So Meng took a specialist book out, read a little and then raised his head, saying, ‘What’s that sound? I keep hearing something.’
Ningzhu put down her magazine, too, and said, ‘You’re right. It’s some kind of droning. I can hear it. Weird. The noise doesn’t seem to be coming from anywhere.’
Both their glances came to rest simultaneously on the shelf underneath the coffee table where the Philips razor lay silent. Since no one had switched it on, it couldn’t possibly be making any noise, and both of them knew that this incident could only be attributed to their own hypersensitive nerves.
Meng couldn’t remember at what time – perhaps it was three o’clock, perhaps four, in any case later than Papa Qi usually came – they suddenly heard the sound of a bicycle bell outside. Before Papa Qi knocked on the door he always rang his bicycle bell; it was practically a rule. Meng felt stunned for a moment; he watched Ningzhu jump up from the sofa. Panic-stricken, she grabbed his hand, and before he had worked out what was going on, she had pulled him behind her into the bedroom.
‘Don’t say anything.’ Ningzhu covered his mouth and hissed at him, ‘You mustn’t say anything – you mustn’t open the door to him. He’ll knock for a little longer and then leave.’
Meng felt like a burglar, his heart beat so fast it threatened to stop altogether. He stared at Ningzhu, wanting to laugh, but couldn’t get the sound out. ‘Are you sure this is a good idea?’ he mumbled as he put out his hand and quietly shut the bedroom door.
Outside Papa Qi knocked on the front door, and as he knocked he called out their names. Initially, the knocking was gentle and patient but gradually it became louder and more urgent, like thunderclaps they could hear all the way from the bedroom. Meng’s hand kneaded his chest while Ningzhu covered her ears. They looked at each another and saw the resolve on one another’s face. They waited for about five minutes until finally it was silent outside.
Meng sighed first and said to Ningzhu, ‘We’re going too far. He might realize we’re at home.’
She shook her head at him, and walked stealthily to the window. He understood what it was she intended to do as she carefully turned up a corner of the curtain to peer outside. Suddenly he had a premonition, but it was the kind of premonition that comes too late – already he could hear Ningzhu’s hysterical screams.
She later described to him the scene as her eyes met Papa Qi’s as he rang his bicycle bell about a metre from the window. When he saw her, his expression became vacant and confused, a sight that made Ningzhu feel so ashamed she wanted to sink to the ground. ‘I’m so terribly sorry,’ she said, choking on her sobs. ‘When I think of the way he looked, I regret everything. I went too far . . . oh, I’m so terribly sorry.’
Now that matters had reached this point, Meng had no way of consoling his wife, and when he imagined Papa Qi’s expression, he too felt wretched. He said, ‘There’s no point regretting it now. He gets it. He won’t come back to our home again.’
After that Papa Qi didn’t return; not on Saturdays, nor Fridays nor Sundays either, not to mention any other day of the week. Meng knew that he had lost his friend for ever. For a very long time after that he would imagine sounds every Saturday: the ringing of bicycle bells in the street always drew his attention, and between two and two-thirty in the afternoon he would dimly hear the buzzing of the razor. One day he took the head off and saw that there was a thick layer of stubble inside, looking just like black dust. He went outside his door, puffed out his cheeks and blew the head clean of stubble. If Papa Qi wasn’t going to come round any more, then the razor was Meng’s to use. Afterwards, without his even noticing, the imaginary sound disappeared.
How many people meet every day on trains, only to go their separate ways when they reach their destination? In the end, the relationship between Papa Qi and Meng confirmed the conventional wisdom. Of course it was sheer coincidence that they saw one another once more on a train platform; the difference this time was that Meng was getting on a train to go out of town on business while Papa Qi had come to the station to see off some guests. It was a group from the north-east, and Meng guessed that these were Papa Qi’s new friends.
Meng was positive that Papa Qi had seen him – his eyes skimmed past Meng several times, but his gaze deliberately blanked him out. Meng was too ashamed to greet him and kept his own head down, observing Papa Qi while he anxiously waited for the train to start. When it did, he saw Papa Qi waving from the platform but Meng knew that he was not waving at him; he was waving to those new north-eastern friends of his.
Thieves
‘The thief reminiscing in a box.’ An intriguing phrase like that doesn’t just come out of nowhere. In fact, it originated from a word game. It was late one Christmas Day and a few Chinese people, in an attempt to be trendy, had consumed a half-cooked turkey and quite a large quantity of red and white wine with surprisingly few ill effects. They chatted until at last there was nothing more to chat about, and finally someone suggested they should play a word game. The rules called for the participants to write down subject, verb and location on separate pieces of paper. The more slips of pape
r submitted, the greater the number of sentences that could be randomly assembled. They were all old hands at this, adept at choosing peculiar phrases. Consequently, the pieced-together sentences could be quite amusing, and sometimes there were real side-splitters. The participants wracked their brains before writing down the words on separate slips of paper and piling them all on the table. Afterwards one of them, a young man called Yu Yong, picked out the following three slips: ‘The thief/reminiscing/in a box.’
The game’s purpose had been achieved. The Yuletide merrymakers broke into uproarious laughter. Yu Yong laughed too. When the hilarity had died down, one of his friends teased him, asking, ‘Well, Yu Yong, do you have any reminiscences like that you can share?’
He responded, ‘What, you mean thieving reminiscences?’
And his friends all said, ‘Of course. Thieving reminiscences.’ They looked at him as he scratched his cheek, searching his memory, but he didn’t seem to be exerting himself unduly, and they were about to start the game again when Yu Yong cried out, ‘I’ve got one – a memory. I really do have a thieving reminiscence – there was something like that, a long time ago . . .’
And to the surprise of everyone present, Yu Yong began a story which no one could have interrupted, even if they’d wanted to.
I’m no thief; of course I’m not. I suppose you all know I’m not from here originally. I was born in Sichuan and grew up there with my mother. She’s a secondary school teacher and my father was serving with the Air Force as ground crew at the time, so he was rarely at home. I’m sure you’ll agree that a child who grows up in such a home isn’t likely to become a thief. The story I want to tell you, though, is about thieves. Keep quiet and I’ll pick out some typical anecdotes . . . Actually, I’ll just tell one story. I’ll tell the story of Tan Feng.
