by Yan Lianke
The dog continued along the original path toward the mountain ridge, and the Elder followed it—his footsteps sounding like withered leaves landing under the hot sun. However, the seedling’s crisis resembled the Elder’s and the dog’s footsteps—it followed them away, then followed them back.
After the seedling’s sixth leaf appeared, the Elder went to fetch some water, but as he was on his way to the well a sudden breeze blew off his straw hat. The hat rolled down the street, and the Elder ran after it.
That breeze started off slow, then gradually picked up speed, forming a little twister. As a result, the hat always remained a foot ahead of the Elder, who chased it all the way to the village entrance. Several times he just barely managed to touch the hat, but the twister always pulled it away again. The Elder was seventy-two years old, and his legs were not as strong as before. He thought to himself, I don’t even want this hat anymore. How about that? I’m the only person left in this entire village. I could easily go into anyone’s house and find myself another one. The Elder looked up, and saw a solitary house on the mountain ridge—like a temple on the side of the road. The twister bumped against that wall, and stopped moving.
The Elder walked slowly to the wall and kicked at the twister a few times. Then he leaned over, picked up the hat, and tore it apart. He threw the pieces to the ground and stomped on them while shouting,
I told you to run away!
I told you to go with the twister.
I don’t want to have to keep waiting for you to leave.
After the Elder tore the hat to pieces, the fresh scent of the straw slowly dissipated. Along that mountain ridge, which had endured scorching weather for so many days, there now appeared a new scent. The Elder rolled what remained of the hat into a ball, then threw it down and stomped on it again, exclaiming, Aren’t you going to run away? This way, you’ll never be able to run away. The sun and the drought want to torture me, and even your fucking mother wants to torture me. As he was saying this, the Elder took a deep breath, then gazed at the hillside beyond Baliban Field. As he was looking, his feet stopped stomping on the remainder of the straw hat, and his mumblings were also cut short like a rope.
Over by the hill, the mountains and plain were covered with fiery red dust, like a translucent wall that swayed back and forth. The Elder stared in disbelief, realizing that what he had seen was actually not a little twister but rather a major wind. As he stood in front of the wall under the searing sun, his heart pounded, as though the wall had collapsed and was crushing him.
He started to rush over to Baliban Hill.
In the distance, the wall of translucent dust began to thicken. It rose and swayed, as though it were the beginning of a flood that was about to bury the entire mountain range.
The Elder reflected, It’s over! He was afraid this was really the end. When that twister blew my hat off, it was actually leading me over to the mountain! It wanted to tell me that a strong wind had developed on the hill. He continued, I’m afraid I let you down, little twister. I really shouldn’t have kicked you. He continued, There’s also my straw hat. It had no qualms about going wherever the little twister was blowing it, so why did I have to rip it up? I’m getting old—really old. I may even be getting a bit senile, and am having trouble distinguishing right from wrong. These self-recriminations sprouted from his mouth like a continuous vine. As he began to calm down, the wind started to subside, as did the pounding in his ears—although the sudden silence left him with a piercing pain in his eardrums. The sunlight also regained its earlier dynamism, becoming strong and hard. The rays generated a clear, white squeaking sound in the fields, as though bean pods were exploding under the searing heat of the sun. The Elder’s pace slowed, and his panting subsided. When he reached the hill, he stood at the front of his field, and his breath was cut off by the scene before him.
The seedling had nearly been blown over by the wind, and was now trembling like a broken finger. Under the hard sunlight, a dense green sorrow was flowing like a silk thread.
The Elder and the dog decided to relocate to Baliban Hill.
The Elder didn’t hesitate and, like an old melon farmer who has to live in his melon field when the melons are about to ripen, he relocated to the field. He planted four posts in the ground next to the seedling, placed a couple of wooden doors on top of the posts, and draped four straw mats over them, making a simple shed. Then he hammered some nails to the posts, from which he hung his pot, spoon, and brush. He stuffed his bowls into a flour bag, and hung it under the pot. Finally, he dug a hole for a small oven in the ground under the cliff. Then, he simply waited for the seedling to sprout more leaves.
Given that the Elder had moved to a new location, when night fell he simply couldn’t fall asleep. The moonlike white heat was moving through the air. He removed his underwear, which was all that he had been wearing, and sat naked on the bed, smoking. Under the dim light of the pipe, he found himself gazing at that thing between his legs, which was dangling there like a lantern. Finding it extremely ugly, he put his underwear back on and thought, I am truly old—that is no longer of any use to me, and is no longer capable of bringing me pleasure. It isn’t even as valuable to me as the corn seedling. Every single leaf of the seedling gives me enjoyment, like the women standing in the field or chatting next to the well, whom I would admire when I was young. A languid feeling coursed through his body and he emptied the bowl of his pipe, as the embers fell onto the dark field. Then he woke up the blind dog sleeping next to him.
The Elder asked, Are you awake?
Then he added, You’re blind, yet you are sleeping so soundly. Meanwhile, I can see, yet I can’t fall asleep.
The dog crawled over to lick the Elder’s hand, and the Elder caressed its head, running his fingers through its fur. As he was smoothing the dog’s fur, he noticed that a pair of bright tears had appeared in the animal’s empty eye sockets. The Elder wiped away the tears, and said, This sun, which refuses to die, truly has a black heart. It even burned this dog’s eyes. Upon remembering how the dog’s eyes had been seared by the sun, the Elder felt something tugging at his heart. He pulled the dog over and caressed its eyes, as the animal’s tears drenched his hand like a pair of mountain springs. This is something no one could possibly have expected, the Elder thought. Every time there was a drought, people would always erect an altar at the front of the village and would leave three plates of offerings and two jugs. The jugs would always be full of water, and would have two dragons painted on the side. Then, the villagers would leave a dog tied between the two jugs, and have the dog look up at the sky. When the dog was thirsty they would give it water, and when it was hungry they would give it food, but when it was neither hungry or thirsty they would simply let it bark furiously at the sun. In the past, they would have let this continue for at least three and at most seven days, until the sun eventually retreated in the face of the dog’s barks, and there would be wind, rain, or cloudy skies. But this year, they brought in a wild dog from outside the village and tied it in front of the altar, and although the dog barked for half a month, the sun continued to burn bright, rising and setting every day on schedule. Finally, at noon on the sixteenth day, the Elder walked past the altar and noticed that one of the jugs was bone-dry and the bottom of the other was smoldering. The Elder looked at the dog, and saw that its fur was matted together, and when it opened its mouth no sound came out.
The Elder released the dog, and said, You can leave. It’s not going to rain.
The dog came down from the altar. It took a few steps, then ran into a wall. It turned around, then ran into a tree. The Elder went and grabbed the dog’s ear to take a look, and his heart skipped a beat as he realized the dog’s eyes had gotten scorched by the sun, and all that was left was a pair of sockets as empty as dry wells.
The Elder had decided to keep the dog.
Now, the Elder thought, It’s fortunate I decided to keep this blind dog, because otherwise I would have been left alone here in the
mountains, and who would I have had to talk to? The weather was getting cooler, as the daytime heat began to subside. The moon and stars overhead began to regain their brightness. There was a sound like water flowing, but the Elder knew that this sound was not from water, nor was it from the trees, the grass, or from insects, but rather from the empty sky itself, which produced a sound of silence out of its extreme stillness. He continued caressing the dog’s head, then dragged his hand down its back and patted its rear. Then he returned his hand to the dog’s head, by which point the dog was no longer crying. The Elder caressed the animal’s fur with one hand, as the dog licked his other hand. That night, the two of them were enveloped by a warm sense of shared fate.
The Elder said, Blindy, we should live together. Don’t you agree? Life is more interesting with a companion.
The dog licked his palm.
The Elder said, I don’t have much longer to live. If you could keep me company until I die, then I’d be able to die a good death.
The dog moved from licking the man’s fingers to licking his wrist, which seemed to be interminably long.
He said, Blindy, do you think our corn seedling will bud again? The dog stopped licking his hand, then nodded. He asked, Will it bud tonight, or tomorrow? I’m sleepy. Don’t nod, because I can’t see you anyway. Just answer me—do you think it will bud tomorrow, or tonight? The Elder leaned against the shed wall and closed his eyes, and the darkness covered his face like a piece of wet gauze. He stopped caressing the dog’s back, and his hand came to rest on the dog’s head as he fell asleep.
When the Elder woke up, the sun was already three rod-lengths in the sky. He felt a searing pain under his eyelids, so he sat up and rubbed his eyes. When he gazed out at the golden orb that was still hanging there, he cursed, Fuck your ancestors for eight generations. Watch how one day I’m not going to dig your family’s grave. After this, he noticed that the blind dog was lying next to the corn seedling in the middle of the field. He had a sudden suspicion, and asked, Has it budded? The dog nodded, then the Elder climbed out of the shed. When he reached the seedling, he saw that it did indeed have a new bud. The seedling resembled a newly sprouted cassia tree—it was half a finger tall, so tender it seemed as though it would topple over at the slightest touch, and in the sunlight it appeared as glossy as jade.
The Elder wanted to place something over the sprout to shield it from the sun, so he went down to the gully and looked around, but couldn’t find anything and eventually returned empty-handed. He stood next to the stove for a while, then grabbed the hoe and walked over to the pagoda tree and broke off a branch, which he brought back and carefully placed over the sprout. Next he climbed onto the shed, retrieved his shirt, and draped it over the branch, so that the sprout could have some shade.
He said, I can’t bear to have another accident.
He added, Blindy, you should eat something. What would you like?
Then he said, What is there to eat in the morning? Shall we have some corn soup? Then we can cook something tasty for lunch.
After the sprout grew two new leaves, the Elder returned to the village to look for something to eat. There wasn’t a single grain of wheat in his home. He thought that in such a large village, even if each household had only a handful of grain or a pinch of flour, this would be enough for him and the blind dog to survive this devastating drought. However, when he returned to the village, he discovered that the door to each house was locked, and there were cobwebs everywhere. He returned to his own house. He knew perfectly well that the flour jug had already been swept clean, but he still peered inside, then reached in and felt around. After he pulled out his hand, he stuck his fingers in his mouth and sucked on them, and the pure white taste of wheat blossomed in his mouth and surged through his body. He took a deep breath and inhaled the fragrant scent, then went outside and stood in the street. The sun’s rays shone down, flowing through the village like a river of gold. In the deathly silence, the Elder heard the sound of sunlight dripping from the roof. He thought indignantly, Everyone in the entire mountain ridge has fled, and the thieves have either starved to death or died of thirst. Did all of you fucking lock your doors just to stymie me? I’ll climb your walls and pry open your doors, and find who has left behind any grain. If you didn’t store any grain, then what had you been planning to eat during the drought? And if you didn’t leave behind any grain, then why the hell did you bother to lock your doors in the first place? The Elder stood in the doorway of one family’s house. This house belonged to one of his nephews, with whom he shared a surname. The Elder headed to another house, and stopped in the doorway of an old widow’s residence. When the widow was younger, she would give the Elder a pair of thick-soled boots every winter. Now she was dead, and her son had inherited this compound. The thought of this house gave the Elder a warm feeling that lingered in his empty heart. The Elder studied the door for a while, then continued on. His footsteps were lonely but resonant, like wood being chopped in the forest. The sound echoed past each family’s locked door, flowing by his feet like a dried-up boat. The Elder finally made it through the entire village, by which point the sun had reached its zenith. It was time for lunch, and he mumbled to himself, If only Blindy were here, then whichever house it told me to break into, I’d immediately scale the wall and go inside.
The Elder faced the mountain ridge and shouted, Blindy … Blindy! Whose house do you think I should break into?
The only response the Elder received was deafening silence.
Discouraged, the Elder sat down and smoked his pipe. Then, he returned empty-handed to Baliban Hill. When the Elder approached, the blind dog wagged its tail, then ran up, following his voice, and rubbed its head on his pants. The Elder ignored the dog, and instead went over to the pagoda tree to fetch his hoe. He went to the shed to get a bowl and proceeded to dig a hole. After digging two or three more holes, the Elder finally unearthed a seed he had previously planted. It was golden yellow and completely intact, and was heated by the sun’s rays to the point that it burned his hand. The Elder then dug a series of holes at the same intervals at which he had originally planted the seeds, and from each hole he unearthed one or two seeds. By the time he had traversed half the ridge, his bowl was full of seeds.
In this way, he was able to enjoy a dish of fried corn seeds.
As he was eating his fried seeds, the Elder sat with the blind dog under the shadow of the shed and began to chuckle. Every family has stored some food for me, he remarked, so if I go out into the field and dig for a day, I could find enough for the two of us to eat for three more days. When he did go to another family’s fields, however, he found the situation wasn’t so simple. He didn’t know where exactly the other family had planted their seeds, and didn’t know where exactly he should dig. Many families, as they rushed to sow their corn before the rains came, had their children grab hoes and start digging frantically, and the result was that the seeds were planted at different depths and at irregular intervals—not at all like the Elder’s perfectly even and regularly spaced holes. In the past, families would never have permitted their children to hoe, but during this drought everything had gotten confused.
As a result, the Elder found that he couldn’t dig for one day and obtain sufficient food for him and the dog to survive on for another three days. Instead, he would exert himself all day, and if he was fortunate he’d find enough grain for two days, and if not he’d only end up with enough for one day. His sprout continued to grow, and in the still night it produced a faint and tender sound, like the quiet breathing of a sleeping baby. The Elder and the dog were sitting next to the sprout, resting after having spent all day digging. When they heard the sprout breathing, their joints suddenly felt warm and relaxed. The moon emerged, as round as a woman’s face, and hung overhead. The stars sparkled all around it, like buttons on new clothing worn for New Year’s, fastened to an unimaginably vast blue silk cloth. At that moment, the Elder suddenly asked the dog, Blindy, when you were younger, did you
do it with a lot of female dogs?
The dog stared at him blankly.
If you don’t want to answer, so be it. The Elder sighed, then lit his pipe. He said to the sky, It’s good to be young. When you’re young, you have energy, and at night you can have a woman. If she is very bright, then when you return from the fields, she’ll bring you some water; if your face is covered in sweat, she’ll hand you a fan; and when it snows, she’ll warm up your bedding for you. If you don’t sleep soundly with her at night, then when you wake up in the morning she’ll urge you to go back to sleep. The Elder took a long drag on his pipe, then exhaled a cloud of smoke like a long embankment. While patting the dog, he asked, How is that sort of life any different from that of gods and deities?
The Elder continued, Have you lived that sort of life, Blindy?
The dog was silent.
The Elder said, Tell me, Blindy, was it not for that sort of life that men came into this world? The Elder didn’t wait for the dog to respond, and instead answered his own question, I would say yes. Then he added, But not when we’re old. When we’re old, we only live for a tree, a tuft of grass, or a passel of grandchildren. Living, after all, is better than dying. As the Elder said this, he took another drag on his pipe, and in the dim light he noticed that the sound the corn sprout was making as it grew was reaching out toward his ear like a tender thread. He leaned toward the sprout, and saw that the top, which was already more than knee-high, appeared disheveled. A new leaf was budding from the pale purplish-yellow stem. There were already nine leaves arching out from the corn sprout like bent bows. The Elder stood up, grabbed his hoe, and dug a hole below the sprout. He and the blind dog both urinated into the hole, filling it with three bowls of urine, then refilled it with dirt. Next, he mixed some dirt and water, and made a small pile of mud around the corn sprout. He was afraid that another gust of wind might blow the sprout over, so that night the Elder returned to the village to fetch four reed mats, then erected four poles around the sprout at intervals of four feet, and placed the mats against the poles to form an enclosure. As he was positioning the mats, the Elder said, Blindy, go to the village and find some rope or string. Any kind will do. The blind dog zigzagged down the mountain path, and finally, as the moon was setting and the stars were beginning to fade, it returned, holding in its mouth the remains of the Elder’s ripped-up straw hat. The Elder used the hat’s string to fasten the mats to the poles, and when he ran out of string he used the black thread from his own pants. By the time he had finished, the eastern sky was beginning to brighten.
