by Han Shaogong
Her pleasure intensified even further when Xingli passed on to her devices for feminine use. She secretly hid these things away, turning them over, looking at them when there was no one around.
In the end, she left in the night, casting back among Maqiao people the enormous linguistic blank represented by this code name, "riding a wheelbarrow."
*Hey-Eh Mouth
: This word appears in the Annals of the Ministry for the Suppression of Rebellion, in the confession written by the rebel leader Ma Sanbao after his arrest: "I was very scared, but I was tricked by that Hey-eh Mouth Ma Laogua who said the government troops wouldn't come." Reading this, I thought to myself: someone who hasn't lived in Maqiao might not know what a "Hey-eh mouth" is.
"Hey-eh mouth" is still used in Maqiao today, meaning people who argue a lot, who like spreading rumors and secrets; also, unreliable blabbermouths. People like this probably use a lot of interjections like "hey" or "eh" as they talk, which would explain the word's provenance.
Zhongqi, from the lower village, who often reported to Benyi about rapes and other village matters, was a famous Hey-eh mouth. No secret in the village could get past his jug ears. Never mind how hot the day, he'd always stomp around in his shoes. Regardless of what he was working on, he'd never take off those suspicious, battered shoes-even if everyone else was going around barefoot, even if that day there'd be no work for which shoes could be worn, he'd just idly keep watch on the ridges between fields, wasting his time looking on as other people earned work points. No one knew what unspeakable visions hid within those shoes of his. He fiercely guarded the secret of his shoes, just as he tirelessly probed all the other villagers' secrets, and his face always wore an expression of secret satisfaction, deriving from a sense of profiting at others' expense.
Or perhaps I should say: because he himself had two shoefuls of secrets, he had to ferret out other people's secrets to make things even.
He'd creep stealthily up on me, prepare himself for a good long time, finally arrange his features into a smile and say: "Enjoy your sweet-potato flour last night, did you, hmm?" then shrink coyly back into himself, waiting for me to plead innocence or make excuses. Seeing I'd failed to react even slightly, he'd beat a deeply cautious but still smiling retreat from such personal matters. I didn't know how he'd found out about that sweet-potato flour last night, neither did I know why he considered this matter so important that he'd kept it in mind and made pointed reference to it. Even less did I know which part of him inside rejoiced at this ability of his, at his record of achievement in ferreting out the tiniest details.
Sometimes, he'd rouse himself into irregular passions: he'd be digging away at the ground, then suddenly heave a resonant sigh, or howl terrifyingly at some faraway dog, look to see if we'd reacted at all, then finally, his face a picture of misery, burst out with: "Yayaya, terrible." What's terrible? people would ask in surprise. Oh, nothing much, he'd say, shaking his head repeatedly, nothing much, a thread of self-satisfaction hanging from the corners of his mouth, smiling coldly at other people's indifference and disappointment.
Then, after a while, he'd go all miserable again, ah terrible, again. When other people asked him what was wrong, his tongue would loosen slightly, there was low stuff going on, he'd say, someone's got big, big problems, don't you know… Once he'd gotten bystanders interested, he'd promptly slam on the brakes and reply with a complacent question: "Guess who it is? Guess who it is? Can you guess, eh?" He'd clam up, then repeat the performance five or six times, till no one asked anymore, till everyone was totally indifferent to, was exasperated by, his alternating melancholy and complacency; only then would he chuckle jubilantly and return to concentrating on his digging, as if he didn't have a care in the world.,
*Agreed-Ma
: Zhongqi was always a great supporter of the government, and a red Mao button, big as an egg, would usually be pinned conspicuously on his chest and a quotation bag always slung over his shoulder at meetings, long after they stopped being fashionable. Generally speaking, he was pretty handy at using political jargon, watched what he said, didn't let his tongue run unwisely away with him.
And there was always a fountain pen stuck in his breast pocket. He hadn't bought it, of course-one look at the slightly mangled shaft told you it'd been cobbled together from scrap remnants, it'd been through a tough refining process. As I recall, he'd never been a cadre or even held any kind of position in the Peasants' Association. But he loved using this pen, and he'd endorse anything that moved with "Agreed-Ma Zhongqi." Almost every team invoice, receipt, work-point book, account book, newspaper, and so on, carried this three-word mantra of his. Once, Fucha picked out a receipt for the purchase of some baby fish and was about to write it into the accounts when he spotted that, following a momentary lapse of watchfulness, the receipt had fallen into Zhongqi's hands; before he'd had time to shout stop, it'd already been inscribed with "Agreed," the nib being sucked in preparation for the final, solemn blow.
"Writing your funeral speech, are you?" Fucha snapped. "What's your agreeing got to do with it? What right d'you have to agree? Are you team leader, are you Party Secretary?"
Zhongqi laughed, "What skin's it off your nose? These fish were bought honest and above board, what's the problem if people agree? You tell me-did you steal these fish?"
"I don't want you to write on it! I just don't want you to write on it!"
"Did I write it wrong? How about if I tore that bit off?" Zhongqi was in a humorous mood.
"Damned pain he is," Fucha said to the people standing around.
"D'you want me to write 'Not agreed' then?"
"I don't want you to write anything at all, you shouldn't write anything on it! You want to write something, wait a couple of lives to see if you've turned into something human."
"Fine, then, I won't write anything. Mean little devil."
Feeling he'd got the upper hand, Zhongqi sedately stuck the fountain pen back in his pocket.
Somewhere between amusement and exasperation, Fucha fished another receipt out of his pocket and fluttered it about in front of everyone: "Hey, everyone, look, I haven't settled accounts with him. That catty of meat for the kiln yesterday, I can't charge it to the expense account, he's signed for it too."
Zhongqi reddened and glanced at the rustling receipt, "Don't charge it then."
"What were you doing writing 'agreed' on it? Got cold feet now?"
"I didn't see…"
"You sign something, you take responsibility."
"Well, I'll change it, okay?" He walked back over, hurriedly taking his pen out again.
"Can you change your crappy words? When Chairman Mao writes something, it's set in stone, the whole country follows every thousand-ton word. When you write, it's like a dog peeing, lifting its leg wherever it goes-what's it going to achieve?"
Zhongqi had reddened all the way down his neck, a small patch of light reflecting off the tip of his nose. "You're the dog round here, young Fucha. I reckon the higher-ups'U still pay-you work, you get to eat meat."
"If you've got the money, then get it out and pay! You're going to pay this back if it's the last thing you do today!
What with everyone being there, Zhongqi couldn't easily wriggle out of it. He stamped his foot: "Well, just charge it to me then, see if I care!" He swung off, his shoes clacking away. Shortly afterwards, he returned, rather out of breath, to slam a silver bracelet on the table. "Who's afraid of what a catty of meat costs? Young Fucha, I gave my agreement! Give it here, I'll pay for it!"
Fucha blinked silently; no one else knew what to do either, at that moment. A second ago, we'd been roaring with laughter, just winding Zhongqi up-none of us'd thought he'd be held to what he'd written, that he'd be forced into producing a silver bracelet.
But Zhongqi wasn't so easily put down, and he subsequently started to stamp his approval around even more recklessly. If Benyi or a commune cadre happened to take out a page of anything, he'd rush over and scribble "agreed," str
aight off. Agreeing had become a habit with him and no sheet of paper could escape his fountain pen, could escape his unfettered powers of ratification and approval. Fucha, who liked things to be neat and tidy, who preached orderliness, could only try desperately to avoid him: as soon as he heard the clacking of his shoes, as soon as he saw his face, he'd gather up all material of a papery nature, so as to avoid giving him the slightest opportunity to interfere. He had to pretend not to have seen, and would angrily turn and wander off somewhere else, looking for something else he could agree to, grabbing letters to us Educated Youth from out of the postman's hands, for example. As a result, every letter of mine carried his stamp of agreement to the recipient's name and address, sometimes they even carried his bright red fingerprint.
I found him as intensely irritating as Fucha did and resolved to find an opportunity to deal with him. One day at noon, as he napped, we stole his fountain pen and threw it into the pond.
Two days later, a ballpoint pen appeared in his pocket, its metal clip glittering away-it looked like there was nothing anyone could do.
*The Ghost Relative
: Many years later, it was rumored someone in Maqiao had recognized a relative from a past life. When I was in Maqiao, I'd heard stories like this and after returning to the city I heard that incidents of a similarly bizarre nature had taken place in other parts of Hunan. I didn't place much credence in them. A friend of mine, a scholar of folklore who's done specialized research on the subject, has even taken me off to places he's investigated and pointed out to me example after example of living proof, making each and every one of them relate their past lives. I still felt such occurrences lay beyond my comprehension.
So, of course, you can imagine my amazement when something like this happened to people I knew.
By then it was the 1980s: a young man from Maqiao, working at a bean curd shop in Changle, found himself destitute, had lost everything- even down to his underpants-at cards. He tried calling on some acquaintance of his, but as soon as they saw him they bolted the door fast, gesticulating vigorously at him to leave.
He was so hungry that black stars were appearing before his eyes. Fortunately, one person still had a heart-a girl from the Golden Happiness Tavern, only thirteen years old, called Hei Danzi. While her boss was out, she secretly pressed a few buns on the young man, and two yuan besides. "And what d'you call this?" the young man boasted to his gang of confreres. "This is the magic of Brother Sheng!"
Shengqiu was his name, and he was the son of Benyi, Maqiao's former Party Branch Secretary.
In time, the boss of the Golden Happiness Tavern found out what was going on, that Hei Danzi was often helping Shengqiu out, and suspected that she was abusing her position, giving away things from the tavern. After carrying out a very careful stock check, the boss failed to discover any deficit or goods missing from the shop; but it still struck him as strange: why should a mangy, unemployed vagrant be worth such care and attention from Hei Danzi? As a distant uncle of Hei Danzi's, he felt he should cross-examine her about it and called her to him for questioning.
Hei Danzi lowered her head and wept.
"What are you crying about, what are you crying about?"
"He…"
"What about him?"
"He's my…"
"Spit it out, is he your boyfriend?"
"He's my…"
"Spit it out!"
"He's my son."
The boss's jaw-and almost a cup of boiling tea-dropped.
And that was how this surprising piece of news got out. People said Hei Danzi-Hei Danzi from the Golden Happiness Tavern-had recognized her own son from a past life. That was to say, she was the reincarnation of Maqiao's celebrated Tiexiang. If her boss hadn't pressed her, she would never have dared say it out loud. For days on end, people thronged the tavern, pointing and peeking. To cadres from the municipal committee and police substation, this was no trifling matter: this was the revival of feudal superstition-what was the world coming to? Betting was back, prostitutes were back, highwaymen were back, and now, to top it all, there were ghosts too. There was certainly never a dull moment around here.
The cadres did their utmost to deflate this talk of ghosts and to educate the masses, summoning her down to the police substation for cross-examination-drawing a crowd of idly curious onlookers in the process. On and on they went, till the policemen's heads throbbed and ran with sweat, but still the case couldn't be settled; finally they had to agree to take her to Maqiao for further investigation. Even if she could recognize her son from a past life, surely she couldn't recognize other people from a past life? If she couldn't recognize them, then that would put an end to her corrupting claptrap, and about time, too.
Six people went: in addition to Hei Danzi, two policemen, a vice-director from the municipal committee, and two meddlesome cadres who tagged along. When they were still a good distance away from Maqiao, they got out of the car and made Hei Danzi go in front, leading the way, to see whether she truly remembered the scenery of her past life. The girl said that she only vaguely, approximately remembered this past life, and she might go the wrong way. But looking around her after each stretch she walked, she made straight for Maqiao, with a directness that made the people trailing behind break out in goose-pimples.
When her path took her across a stone quarry in the mountains, she suddenly stopped and cried a while. The stone quarry was by now abandoned: a few lumps of dried-up ox dung lay on the fragments of rubble all over the ground; puffy clumps of wild grass poked out that would perhaps, before too long, inundate the rubble. When the cadres asked her why she was crying, she said her husband in her previous life had been a stonemason, had cut stone here. The cadres, who'd made some inquiries in advance, secretly rejoiced, knowing this to be completely untrue.
After entering Maqiao she hesitated a little, saying that there hadn't been this many houses before, she couldn't recognize much of it.
The vice-director was delighted. "Had enough, eh? Don't want to play any more, eh?"
One of the policemen didn't agree with the vice-director and was unwilling to start back to the office: seeing as they'd got there, why not let her keep trying-they weren't going to get anything else done today in any case.
The vice-director thought for a moment, looked up at the sky, and didn't put up any opposition.
It was at this point that the person telling me the story started to get carried away-this, he said, was when things really took a turn for the weird. He said that as soon as she stepped into Benyi's house, Hei Danzi seemed possessed by some spirit: not only did she know the way there and the door, but also where the kettle was kept, the piss bucket, the rice cupboard, everything; she also knew at one glance that the semiprostrate old man on the bed was Benyi. Her tears immediately welled up, and she fell to the ground in obeisance, crying out brother Benyi's name, sobbing away. Even deafer than before, Benyi widened his eyes with a great effort and was utterly bemused to see the room full of strange faces. His bemusement only lessened slightly when his second wife came back from the vegetable garden and roared a few sentences at him. It was just too much for him to take, this little girl, still wet behind the ears, standing before him, and his eyes bulged up as big as copper coins: "If you want money, ask for money, you want food, ask for food, just what kind of ghost are you? She's not even grown-up, how can she be a ghost?"
Terrified into tears, Hei Danzi was hustled outside.
A lot of villagers came to inspect this bizarre novelty, to pick over Hei Danzi's appearance, thinking back to what Tiexiang had been like, subjecting every part of her to comparison. The majority conclusion was: how could this possibly be Tiexiang? Tiexiang had been bewitching, dazzling-what kind of a pickled cabbage dumpling was this? On and on they went, until Hei Danzi, squatting on the stepped eaves, weeping and warbling, suddenly raised her head and asked an unexpected question:
"What about Xiuqin?"
The Maqiao people squinted at each other-this was an unfamili
ar-sounding name.
"What about Xiuqin?"
One after another they shook their heads, mystification shining from their eyes.
"Is Xiuqin dead?"
The little girl was once more on the verge of tears.
An old man suddenly remembered something: yes, yes, yes, he said, I think there's a Xiu-something-Qin, she's from Benyi's same-pot brother, Benren's, family. Benren had fled to Jiangxi many years ago and had never come back, Xiuqin had married into Duoshun's family, she was the third wife now, yes, she was still alive.
Hei Danzi's eyes shone.
With effort, people figured things out for themselves: if this girl before them was Tiexiang, then she'd have been the sister-in-law for a time of Third Wife-no wonder she was asking about her. Swept along by enthusiasm, a few people took her off to find her. "Third Wife lives on the bamboo hill, you come with us," they said to Hei Danzi. Hei Danzi nodded her head, then hurried to follow them over a hill and through a bamboo grove, before far off in the distance she saw a house flash out from among the bamboo.
