The Boat Rocker

by Ha Jin

  Then Haili mentioned a column I’d written about the recent arrest of a woman, “a snakehead” nicknamed Sister Liang, who had operated a smuggling ring in Chinatown to bring in illegal immigrants. Haili declared that someday I would be hauled in by the FBI or the Department of Homeland Security if I continued to interfere in the affairs of others. “Maybe a deportation is awaiting him,” she concluded.

  I didn’t bother to counter the attack. I rejoined with only one sentence below her article on The North American Tribune website: “I wish that my bladder were larger than my ego so I could piss off more people of Yan Haili’s ilk.”

  The story she referred to, the arrest of Sister Liang, was another investigation I’d been working on recently, and I would keep writing about it regardless of the fact that my reports might contradict the official findings. Though Sister Liang, a stocky, homely woman, had broken the law and pulled in millions of dollars from human trafficking, I suspected she was a scapegoat. There must have been more powerful collaborators who had given her name to the FBI. I had interviewed dozens of immigrants in Chinatown, Brooklyn, and Queens, and not a single person voiced a negative opinion about her. Some insisted on her innocence, some said they would visit her in prison, and some still regarded her as their benefactor. She had helped many people, especially newcomers who had landed in this city penniless and hapless, even as she had charged sixteen percent annual interest on loans. A young man I talked to said he still owed her eleven thousand dollars and didn’t know how to pay it back now that she was in jail. The people of her home village, to which she’d donated a schoolhouse and a veterinary clinic, had sent a letter to the federal judge to appeal for her release. Nevertheless, the judge gave her seventeen years for being guilty of five of the six charges.

  I knew Haili was angry at Sister Liang because she had lost her investment, probably tens of thousands of dollars, in the woman’s underground bank, which had offered eleven percent annual interest on CDs but which had been shut down by the police for money laundering. In my reports, I mainly quoted others without putting in my views. Granted that the way I presented her story might have been a different take on the case, it was my job to let people hear different voices so that they could make their own judgments. They mustn’t just accept the official verdict without question.

  —

  ON SATURDAY MORNING the city was fogged in, and I set out to see Niya. My 7 train stopped now and then due to delays and crossed signals. The train ran on an elevated track; I liked the view of the city in the fog, which smoothed out the untidy features of the rooftops and graffiti-covered walls. The city appeared serene, mysterious, less populated. I got off at Elmhurst, in Queens, and headed toward the café in which she and I were to meet and which offered breakfast and lunch and a variety of coffees. The soles of my boots crunched half-shriveled leaves as I plodded along the sidewalk. The late October air was milky and cool. A heavy-duty truck emerged, huffing like a boat plowing through water, while tendrils of ground fog curled away.

  No sooner had I taken a seat than Niya appeared, wearing an off-white windbreaker. Wouldn’t the color of her coat make her appear ghostly in the fog? Her roundish cheeks glowed with health. Seated with a square table between us and with her coat draped over the back of her chair, she ordered a cappuccino and I coffee and pancakes. She didn’t want any food, saying she’d eaten breakfast already.

  “Oh, it’s so warm in here,” she said and undid the top button of her tunic.

  “You’re quite cheerful today,” I observed.

  “Yes, I am in a bullish mood.” Her smile dimpled her right cheek. “I just got promoted to associate director of the IT help center.”

  “Congratulations. Does this mean NYU will give you a raise?”

  “You bet it does. You look out of sorts today. What’s up?” She sipped her cappuccino, then licked the foam off her upper lip, which was shaded by downy fuzz visible only when it was wet.

  I said, “I never thought I’d be labeled a separatist by the Chinese officials—Katie cannot get a visa on my account. I worry that I won’t be able to go back to see my parents for a long time. My mother has angina and diabetes, and I’m their only son.”

  Niya breathed a feeble sigh. “That’s why as soon as your tangle with Haili went political, I backed out. Politics is where I’m out of my element. Before my father died, he made me promise never to mess with politics.”

  “He died? Is your mother still living, or are you an orphan now?”

  “They’re both gone. I’m a twenty-nine-year-old orphan, still looking for a man and a home.” She laughed but stopped short.

  “You don’t have a boyfriend?”

  “I was dating a guy for a couple years, but he realized he was actually gay and broke up with me for an American man. He claimed he finally understood his sexual orientation and had to be honest with himself and with me. I think he has some trauma involving women—sometimes he said things that made me think he was abused by his mother or sisters when he was little.”

  “His masculinity was injured?”

  “You have a nice way of putting it. You’re like my father—he also had a way with words.”

  I laughed and realized we were enjoying each other’s company, perhaps partly because we were both from the northeast of China. “How did your father die?” I asked.

  “He died about ten years ago, of complications from AIDS.”

  “I’m so sorry. AIDS was very rare in the northeastern provinces at the time, wasn’t it?”

  “Still, there were victims. My dad had a stomach perforation and underwent an operation at a hospital in Harbin. They gave him a transfusion, but the blood was contaminated. Afterward he got sicker and sicker and was finally diagnosed with AIDS. We demanded that the hospital cover his medical expenses and pay damages, but they denied any responsibility. It was outrageous, and it wasn’t an isolated incident—a number of women in labor at that hospital had also received contaminated blood and became HIV positive. My father was so outraged he couldn’t stop cursing the hospital administrators. He went to Beijing to present a petition, but he was detained the day after he arrived and was escorted back to our home province.” She paused and collected herself.

  Then she went on, “They incarcerated him and wouldn’t release him until he agreed not to go to the capital again. He filed a grievance with the local government, but officials all turned a deaf ear. So he wouldn’t stop drinking and went downhill. When he was dying, he told me to leave China and never return. He even suggested I go to Siberia, where some of his acquaintances were doing business and running orchards and vegetable farms. He said, ‘This is a country that devours its people. Go live elsewhere and don’t mix with the Chinese.’ ”

  “But your father was Chinese, wasn’t he?” I asked. I was moved by her story.

  “Yes, but many of his friends were minorities—Koreans, Huis, Manchus, Mongolians. He got along better with them. At one time he thought of fleeing China too.”

  “Where would he have gone?”

  “Taiwan, perhaps, or Hong Kong or Southeast Asia.”

  “He never left?”

  “The government wouldn’t give him a passport. Even with a passport in hand, I doubt he would have been able to leave because it would’ve been hard for him to survive elsewhere. Even though he hated the government, he was Chinese to the bone.”

  “So you have nothing to do with China anymore?”

  “Believe it or not, despite everything, I still love our motherland.”

  “But you’re naturalized, aren’t you?”

  “A U.S. passport makes my life easier, especially when I travel, but at heart I still belong to China. I love everything Chinese besides.”

  “But you don’t seem to like Chinese men, do you?”

  “Well, how should I put it?” Niya considered the question. “Maybe I’ve changed a lot since coming to the States. Sometimes I’m attracted to Chinese men, but whenever I spend time with them, I begin to feel u
ncomfortable and even annoyed. Many of them were spoiled by their parents and have huge egos. And so many of them are political animals that love power more than anything else. Their only ambition in life is to become a high official. They don’t have any spiritual depth. They’re pragmatic and self-interested. Oh, present company excepted, of course.”

  “I could be like that,” I admitted, “or used to be. But it’s the culture that shapes people in such ways.”

  “See, you’re different, in a good way. Tell me, won’t your girlfriend be mad at you if she finds out that you’ve spent time with another woman alone?”

  “Especially a Chinese woman?”

  Niya grinned, almost innocently. I noticed that she looked much better when she smiled—every feature on her face was in symmetry, and even her teeth were white and neat. I said to her, “Since we Chinese men don’t appeal, do you want to marry an American man, like Haili did?”

  “Well—” Niya pursed her lips. “I once dated a white guy, and it was hard for me.”

  “Why?” I was intrigued.

  “This guy—he was an overgrown child. He wasted all his time in bars and playing games online. He made me feel like I was just his provider. I’m pretty sick of American men.”

  “I don’t believe that most American men are like that,” I said sincerely. “Some of them I know are quite warm and decent.”

  “They must be gay,” Niya replied promptly. “Most good men in New York are gay.”

  “Heaven help me, you’re so prejudiced! You can’t just think of people in categories like that.”

  “I know I sometimes throw out clichés.” She smiled as if to apologize. “Guess I’ve had bad luck with men. After I broke up with the white guy, I was too afraid to date anyone for a long time.”

  “Was he before your Chinese boyfriend or after?” I asked.

  “After.”

  I had not expected she’d speak so personally and candidly. I confided, “My girlfriend, Katie, sometimes complains I’m too rational.”

  “That might not be so bad, though. At least one person should be clearheaded if a relationship is going to work. Are you two engaged?”

  “No, there’s no engagement.”

  “Have you thought about proposing to her?”

  “Neither of us really believes in marriage, and we may never reach that point. But don’t tell Haili this, all right?”

  “I won’t breathe a word,” Niya promised. “But why are you and Katie still dating if the relationship isn’t getting anywhere? I wouldn’t plunge into something if I wasn’t certain it would last.”

  “I just don’t want to lose her,” I said.

  “Oh—” Niya smiled impishly. “I see why.”

  “Why?”

  “Vanity. You want to show that just as Haili has a white husband, you can have a white woman. To prove that you’ve really made it here.”

  “Well—” Wounded, I began to protest, but then stopped. “I care about Katie, but there might be some truth to what you’re saying. Like most men, I’m afraid of becoming a man nobody wants.”

  “But vanity cannot make a relationship last,” Niya insisted. “Even if you two get married, the marriage won’t be stable.”

  “Like Haili’s, you mean,” I said.

  “Well, with her—I actually believe Larry really loves her.”

  “But he made her sign a prenup.”

  “That’s commonplace among Americans,” Niya said dismissively, “especially the rich. Larry has been generous to Haili. Look at the clothes she wears. I’ve seen designer bags in her wardrobe.”

  Her praise of Larry vexed me, so I said, “She just tries to look like old money.”

  “But Larry always provides for her.”

  “Then why have they broken up?”

  “Actually,” Niya said, raising an eyebrow, “she just moved back. She told me how Larry called her again and again, saying he couldn’t sleep for thinking of her and that their apartment felt desolate. He couldn’t concentrate at work because he was worrying about her. He begged her to come home or he might lose his mind.”

  “He seems quite devoted,” I said drily.

  “Very much so.” Niya shrugged.

  “What has Haili been doing these days,” I asked, “besides smearing me?”

  “Working on her movie script.”

  “You mean she’s still at it?”

  “Yes, she was very excited about the progress she’d made when we spoke last time.”

  “Obviously there’s been no movie deal,” I reminded her. “But I must admit I’m impressed that she can still concentrate, even under so much pressure from the media.”

  “Genius is concentration.” Niya seemed very sure of herself. “She’s a tough woman, can take everything in stride, and goes to great pains to get what she wants. She’s also very thorough, down to the last detail. I don’t know anyone like her.”

  “I wonder if I might turn out to be the only loser in this scandal,” I said ruefully. “Sometimes the whistle-blower blows so hard he busts his own bladder.”

  She burst out laughing. The black waitress with wide-set eyes and a small waist came over again and placed the bill on our table. As Niya picked it up, I tried to grab it from her. “No argument, okay?” she said. “Remember I just got a promotion? Plus, you came all this way to see me.”

  I let her. Her revelation about Haili and Larry’s reconciliation troubled me, because it meant that my ex-wife could be bolder in her dealings with me. For the rest of the weekend I felt pretty down, though I wrote an English-language article giving an overview of the scandal, about three thousand words. Early the next week I emailed it, with a pitch, to editors I knew at both The New York Times and The Washington Post, in the hope that one of them might run it. English-language newspapers and magazines paid many times more than those printed in Chinese. I knew a freelancer, a Dutchman educated in England, enamored of San Francisco and kung fu movies, who published long articles in Forbes and The New Yorker two or three times a year, and the fees he collected for those pieces were enough for him to live on. Usually he was paid more than a dollar a word. When I heard that for the first time, I was astounded, but later I came to know that was the standard rate among top-tier publications. But in this case, payment wasn’t what I was after. I wanted the mainstream media to pick up the story of the novel; that could give me some leverage, some international help, in tackling those crooks. I had high hopes of seeing the Times or the Post swoop down on this cabal of three.

  Yet an article in English might not affect Haili that much, because she went by a different name here, Heidi Yan, and her prep school would be unlikely to know about her misconduct unless someone alerted them. I’d been debating whether, once the article was out, to pop a copy into the mail to her employer with a letter enclosed, but that would amount to career assassination. So what? I was fighting a war, in which no scruples should apply.

  Katie had gone over my English-language article and made three or four corrections. She said the piece was lucid and readable, but after I had sent it out, she warned me not to raise my hopes that it would see print.

  FIFTEEN

  On November 3, in the middle of a warm Indian summer, Haili’s publisher, Jiao Fanping, appeared at GNA, sporting shiny tassel loafers, a navy blazer with wide lapels and a single brass button, a checkered tie, and a counterfeit Rolex. Despite his flashy outfit, he looked cheap. He claimed that he had come to New York on business and dropped by just to say hello to Kaiming, as if they had known each other for years. His sudden arrival unsettled my boss and Lucheng, but they took him to the small conference room at the eastern end of our office building. They asked me to join them.

  After oolong tea was served, Jiao said, “I want to be open and aboveboard with you fellows. Tell me, why the hell are you so determined to ruin my business and reputation?” He twitched his nose and sparse mustache; above one corner of his mouth, there was a curved scar.

  “We’ve just been doing
our job,” Kaiming answered, smiling coolly but without looking Jiao in the eye. “We have to report the news accurately.”

  I said to Jiao, “I read parts of Yan Haili’s novel. How could you agree to publish such rubbish?”

  “Let’s not talk about my taste and judgment,” he retorted. “Let’s talk about how to solve this confusion or misunderstanding.”

  “I’d rather call it fraud,” I said.

  “It’s a novel,” Jiao replied calmly. “Fiction is supposed to be the work of the imagination.”

  “But you and Yan Haili have claimed that every part of the book is factual,” I countered. “That’s when it becomes fraud.”

  “Feisty guy. The fact is, you have a score to settle with your ex. But surely you know by now that you’re not dealing with her alone. You’ve gone beyond bounds.” His face turned puce, the flesh on his jaw knotted.

  My temper was rising too, and I asked, “Are you threatening us?”

  “Only you.”

  All this time Lucheng sat silently, looking grim and sipping his tea without lifting his gaze. I went on, “This is America and I’m a journalist. My profession requires me to be honest with the public and always report the truth. If I don’t do that, someone else will take over my job. You can’t just shut people up here.”

  “Don’t try to sell me that crap.” Jiao jabbed a forefinger at my face. “I lived in America for years, and I know what this country’s like. This is a place where a man of color has no chance. The honkies might let you grow a little bit, but they’ll always keep you under their thumb. The moment you grow bigger than they expected, they’ll strike you down. So don’t tell me a tale of honesty and freedom and justice. I went through enough abuse here to know those are just fabulous lies. In this place a scribbler like you can thrive only by slinging shit in the face of your motherland. You give the Americans what they want to hear so they can feel superior to us. But they’ll never accept you as a real American—they’ll never see past your Chinky eyes and yellow skin. Once a gook, always a gook. Don’t even attempt to get above yourself. All you can do is malign your own people and talk about how backward we are. But once you run out of tall tales, the Americans will find another to replace you. And don’t forget that we can always hold you accountable for your misconduct here. If necessary, we can turn you into a bum even in this so-called free land.” Jiao’s voice was getting more and more shrill, and there was a bit of foam on his lips.