by Qiu Xiaolong
“He must have connections at the top.”
“That I don’t know,” Bao said gingerly. “He’s from Shanghai. I don’t think too many are familiar with his work.”
“As Chairman Mao said, literature and art should serve the broad masses of workers, peasants, and soldiers. Only a handful of intellectuals would enjoy those obscure poems,” Hong went on, draining his wine in one gulp. “I came to know your work, ‘The Working-Class Are Strong-Backboned,’ I still remember, through a song in the radio. We the working-class are strong-backboned. / Following Chairman, we march forward, / With the country and the world in our heart, / We do not stop on the road of the revolution. / Holding the red flags high, we move on courageously. / We’re the locomotive of the new era.‘ So clear, and so powerful. I memorized it, indeed-”
“Let’s talk no more about it,” Bao said. “You know an old Chinese saying: An aged hero does not want to talk about his glorious past.”
“Think about it. Chen must have studied your famous poems as a middle-school student.”
“Well, because of the new cadre policy, people of his age with a higher education have been rocketing up.”
“Does he work in the Writers’ Association?”
“No, he’s a cop in Shanghai, but he’s a member of the association.”
“Now that’s something. A cop. He could have some secret mission for this trip.”
“Not that I know of,” Bao said vaguely, “but anything is possible with him.”
The chef served on the table an earthen pot of fish soup. The soup was steaming hot, red with dried peppers and indescribable herb. Bao helped himself to a spoonful, which was so spicy that he felt as if there were thousands of ants crawling on his tongue. He had to take a gulp of cold water.
“This is a world changed beyond our comprehension.” Hong smacked his lips, launching into another topic. “Don’t think life is easy for me here. In the restaurant business, so many Chinese are struggling for one small bowl of rice in cutthroat competition. People work like dogs, seven days a week. Visitors from China marvel at my house, at my restaurant, and at my cars, but they don’t know everything here is on the loan. I am breaking under the burden.”
“I know,” Bao said, wondering at Hong’s sudden change of subject. “Visitors from China ” might have touched Hong for money, but Bao had never thought about doing that. “You earn every penny the hard way.”
“Those good old days of the Workers’ Culture Palace. We were the backbone of the socialist China. Our songs were loud and clear. If I can manage to go back next year, I’ll revisit the palace.”
“Don’t mention it again. It has been turned into an entertainment center. Karaoke, belly dance, massage, whatnot! I fought hard against it, but to no avail.”
Their talk was once again interrupted by the chef, who put in a platter of steaming pork-and-cabbage dumplings with white garlic and red pepper sauce.
“The socialist China is going to dogs,” Hong said with a sigh. “I still remember an old Beijing couplet: The most delicious is having dumplings- with garlic, and the most comfortable is lying on a bed-with a book. At least we are enjoying dumplings with garlic tonight, and then I’ll read your book on my bed.”
The Erguotou was smooth, yet strong. Bao felt the liquid shooting all the way down like an arrow. It was not common for him to have such a devoted audience, and it seemed only to add to his frustration. Then the discussion came back around to the delegation again.
“Has Chen done anything in secret-a cop in a writer’s clothing?” Hong resumed, twirling the cup in his fingers.
“No, I don’t think he spies on the others. To be fair, he knows how to show off. He speaks a little English and tossed in a handful of new terms. I guess that’s why he was chosen. A new image.”
“A new image? I don’t buy it. As you have said, we, the working-class people alone, are the revolutionary models for the socialist society.”
“You are right. Chen does not even make a good model for the delegation. According to the regulation, no one should go out without having obtained the delegation approval. But Chen went out with his buddy this afternoon. What was he really up to? No one can tell.”
“I can,” Hong said. “Topless or bottomless shows. A lot of Chinese visitors are drawn to them like flies drawn to blood. A friend of mine has a tourist business here. An expert for delegation activities, he always arranges such a show at the top of the activity list. These visitors do not have to worry about the expense-the receipts will declare it as decent business expense without giving them away.”
“Really?” Bao said. “That’s a possibility.”
“Let me do something for you. Tell me what you know about Chen, about his activities here. I may be able to find a queue or two of his. It’s so unfair. We need to do something about it.”
In the Qing dynasty, a queue-a braid of hair worn at the back of the head-could be grasped by an opponent in a fight. In the Cultural Revolution, Deng Xiaoping had once described himself as “an Urgue girl with so many queues.” Later on, he got into trouble because of his queues being pulled by Mao.
“Don’t go out of your way for me, Hong.”
“Not just for you, Master Bao. People like Chen will be no good for our socialist literature. Believe me, my heart always remains a red, loyal Chinese heart.”
“Well…” So far Bao did not really have anything to complain about regarding Chen. But Hong had his point. With people like Chen in power, the future of Chinese literature would be predictable. If evidence of Chen’s inappropriate behavior could be obtained… “Oh, I remember one thing. He made phone calls-not in the hotel room, but at a public phone booth. A couple of times.”
“That’s very suspicious.”
“Yes, the Americans are covering the hotel phone bill, I think. He doesn’t have to save a few pennies for them. He may be making contact for those shows.”
“That’s important. I’ll check into this,” Hong said, not trying to hide his excitement as he raised the cup again. “To your greater success-with people like Chen out of the way.”
To his dismay, Hong found the cup empty. So was the bottle. He looked out with an apologetic smile. Customers still came in at this late hour. There was only one waitress bustling around with platters overlapped on her bare arms. The chef must have been too busy to come back to them. The dishes on the desk turned cold. Bao contemplated, digging into a fish head.
Hong seemed to be growing sentimental as he got further in his cups, his face flushing like a coxswain’s. “Did I have a choice when I left China? The state-run factory was losing money, unable to pay its employees. I could not make a living writing poetry. So I came out. Not easy for me to start all over. All these years, I’ve written only a couple of lines: ‘Washing possible recollection / from a greasy mop, I’m ladling / my fantasies out of the wok.’”
“That’s really not bad, Hong.”
“I remember the lines because I have come up with nothing else, because it’s a true picture of my life, day in and day out,” Hong said, draining the last drop before he produced an envelope. “Don’t look down on me, Master. Here is five hundred dollars. I am not rich, but that’s a token of my respect to you.”
“No, I cannot accept it.”
“It’s nothing. As our old saying goes, you can be poor at home, but not poor on the road. So give me an opportunity to pay respect to my respected working-class master.”
“I don’t know what to say, Hong.”
“And here is a prepaid cell phone. Call me when you want me to do anything-or when you want to tell me something about Chen.”
“That’s expensive. Chen alone has such a cell phone in the delegation.”
“You are the Party secretary. Of course you should have one too. If we workers don’t help each other, who will?” Hong said. “Oh, by the way, do you know the name of Chen’s friend?”
“No, I don’t, but he has a hi-tech company, I think, like those upstarts in
China.”
“It is so unfair.”
“Yes, even in the hotel, Chen alone is given a suite.”
“I have read that he shared the suite with somebody else-two men on the same bed. Some Americans must have made a joke about it.”
“Oh, Dai, that capitalist poet. He’s not a member of our delegation. So he touched Chen for the night. But it was my idea.”
Hong really knew a lot about Chen. Was Chen reported so much here? Bao felt uncomfortable. It was time for him to stop drinking, he knew. He did not want to go back to being a drunkard. It was against a working-class poet’s image, which he had cherished for years.
17
THE CONFERENCE WENT ON as before, though not without a few skirmishes between the writers from the two countries. In spite of his earlier, pacifist intentions, Chen could not help getting into heated discussions.
One particular topic that came up upset the Chinese. In the contemporary Chinese literature sessions, the Americans kept talking about a handful of dissident writers, making it seem as if they were the only worthy ones. Bonnie Grant, a senior sinologist with an exclusive translation contract with Gong Ku, a leading Misty poet who had killed his wife and then committed suicide, praised him at the expense of other Chinese poets.
“Those Misty may not be bad,” Chen responded, “but that does not mean they are the only good poets. Their introduction to the Western world could have been done in a more objective way.”
Bonnie hastened to defend her choice, concluding with a sarcastic note, “Gong wrote under a lot of political pressure. For instance, the last two lines in his poem ‘After Rain,’ ‘A world of colorful poisonous mushrooms / after a sudden rain.’ Why poisonous? It’s not about mushrooms, but about new ideas. New ideas that are poisonous to the official ideology. As a member of the Chinese Writers’ Association, you were probably not aware of any political pressure.”
That rattled Chen. It was so ironically untrue. Some Chinese orthodox critics had condemned his own work as being “modernist decadent” too. Chen had intended to argue that the Misty poets had courted Western attention through their political gestures. Instead, he checked the notes and counterargued by pointing out her erroneous rendition, particularly with regard to the image of poisonous mushrooms.
“Your interpretation about ‘poisonous mushrooms,’ I have to say, is farfetched, though you are certainly entitled to your reading. After all, every reading is said to be a misreading in deconstruction. But I happened to be with Gong that day-at a conference in the Yellow Mountains. As always, Gong wore a self-made tall red hat, imagining himself to be a child lost in the woods. That was his adopted persona, and he played that role so completely that he could hardly distinguish between it and his real self. That day he talked about picking mushrooms. It was after a rainfall, the hillside was a riot of them. He declared that he would make mushroom soup that evening, and I told him that some mushrooms could be poisonous-”
“But we can judge only by the text, not by the real or imagined experience behind it,” Bonnie interrupted. “Writing is impersonal, Mr. Chen, haven’t you learned that?”
“You don’t have to use Eliot’s theory to show off to me,” Chen retorted. “In the fifties and sixties, we judged Chinese writers only by political criteria. That was wrong. But today, there seems to be another trend, the opposite political criteria. I liked Gong’s poetry because it was fresh from his deliberately childish perspective-fresh after the Cultural Revolution. How can such a child be so political?”
Chen’s speech nettled Bonnie, but she was at a disadvantage. Chen was far more familiar with the background of the lines she had quoted. The Americans did not make an immediate response. Zhong applauded, and the other Chinese followed. Afterward, Martin Beck, an American publisher, asked Chen to write an article for his magazine.
As they left the conference hall at the end of the morning session, Chen got an unexpected call from Tian. It would be unrealistic, Chen had believed, to expect any breakthrough from a bookish businessman who had had no experience in investigation, but Tian surprised him with new information.
“Xing’s mother will go to the Buddha Glory Temple this afternoon. She is a devoted believer. She goes every Thursday afternoon, her weekly routine, like other people going to church here. And Xing will be with her.”
“That’s something, Tian. What does she do there?”
“Burn tall incenses, I think, and draw bamboo sticks of divination.”
“I see,” Chen said. Buddhism remained popular among old Chinese. His mother, a passionate believer, kept burning tall incenses to a Buddhist shrine in her attic home, praying that Chen might settle down with a family of his own in the near future. Years earlier, she had taken him to an ivy-mantled temple in Hangzhou, he remembered, where she drew bamboo sticks of fortune shortly before the outbreak of the Cultural Revolution, but that marvelous oracle did not prove true. Her husband passed away with the Red Guards’ slogans rattling the window over his deathbed. And her son later became a cop. “And what does Xing do there?”
“He keeps her company. He has made several donations on her behalf.”
“How have you learned all this, Tian?”
“I called local Chinese newspaper editors. Now don’t worry, Chen. I haven’t approached any of them directly. Xing’s going to make another statement exposing and condemning his persecution by the Beijing government. So they brought up the subject.”
“Thanks, Tian. That may be really important to my work.”
That afternoon there was a scheduled visit to Disneyland, Chen knew. During the lunch, he found himself finally embraced as “one of us,” as approval poured in from the delegation members.
“You have reasons, and you have principles, Chen,” Zhong said.
“You have said what we all would have said,” Peng nodded vigorously.
“I am glad that Beijing has chosen you.” Shasha patted his hand. “You are experienced in dealing with those Americans.”
“Those Misty poets are groveling dogs,” Bao said, “chewing a pathetic bone thrown out by the foreigners.”
Chen complained of a headache, making little response.
Shasha said that Chen looked pale, touching his forehead. Zhong claimed that the delegation head had worked too hard. That was probably true. Bao, not unpleased to assume his Party secretary responsibility for one afternoon, urged Chen to take a break in the hotel. Chen agreed reluctantly, like a responsible delegation head.
The moment the delegation left the hotel, Chen changed into a T-shirt and jeans, picked up a mini recorder, and sneaked out. There seemed to be no suspicious-looking people outside. He hailed a taxi.
“To the Buddha Glory Temple,” he told the driver.
It was a long drive. Sitting in the back of the car, he tried to think of a plan for the afternoon. It was out of the question for him to approach Xing. No point revealing his identity as a Chinese investigator. He wondered whether he would be able to talk to Xing at all. Perhaps, as in a proverb, he told himself, there will be a road with the car reaching the mountains.
The temple turned out to be a rather splendid one, made of red walls and yellow roofs and upturned black eaves decked with mythological figurines, like those seen in Suzhou and Hangzhou. There were not only Chinese monks and believers kowtowing and scripture-chanting in the courtyard, but also Americans, some in Asian costumes or with a large Chinese character Fo-Buddha-printed on their T-shirts. No one paid him any special attention.
He walked to the large main hall, in which towering clay images sat majestic in the front. There was a huge bronze incense burner before the gilded Buddha. He bought a bunch of incense, put it into the burner, and imitated others by clasping his palms piously. He then turned around, noticing an oblong mahogany table at one side of the hall. There were books and bamboo containers holding bamboo sticks on the table, behind which stood a middle-aged, deep-wrinkled, clean-shaven monk in a scarlet and yellow patchwork gown, apparently in charg
e of interpretation.
The monk reminded him of one he had seen in his mother’s company, years earlier. He suddenly remembered a Beijing Opera seen also in her company, perhaps even earlier, and it gave him an idea.
He moved over to the monk.
“What’s your honorable name, Master?”
“My monk name is Illusionless. What can I do for you, my most reverend benefactor?”
“My mundane surname is Chen. I am an ignorant scriber in the world of red dust,” Chen said. “I need to ask you a favor, Master. For a book project, I need to have the experience of serving as a fortune-teller in a monastery. So can I stand in your place for a couple of hours?”
“No, that’s impossible. A bamboo stick divination reader is no fortuneteller. It takes a lot of training to give accurate interpretation. We cannot misguide our benefactors.”
“I have read several books in the field. So I think I’m qualified to try. You don’t have to leave me alone here, my profound master. If I say anything wrong, you correct me. Please, let me be your student for one afternoon.” He took out an envelope containing three hundred dollars. “Here is my tuition for the afternoon.”
“Well, I cannot take it, but I’ll put it into the donation box, my benefactor.”
Chen wondered whether the money would eventually go into that particular box. As a student, it did not take him too long to acquire the basic technique from the master. There was a large xuan paper book spread out on a wooden stand next to the table. When a pilgrim picked out a bamboo strip bearing a certain number, Master Illusionless would open the book, turn to a page with the matching number, and interpret the poem on the page in a sort of fortune-telling way. The master could hardly justify the practice, however, in the light of Greater Vehicle, or of Lesser Vehicle, which Chen managed to quote for the occasion.
“Everything comes up in illusion,” Master Illusionless said solemnly, “and interpretation evokes illusions too, all of which make up our world.”
“So we are looking for the ox while we are riding on its very back,” Chen said, paraphrasing a Zen paradox he still remembered.
