Old Town (11 page)

Row upon row of gawkers pressed around. “Ah Liu’s dead!” West Street people all knew each other. It was as if everybody could tell an Ah Liu story. The old wife of the Zhang family lifted her cane and pounded the ground. “Today’s Dragon Boat Festival. Just one year ago Ah Liu ate rice dumplings made at our home.” An old gaffer of the Li family said that even when he was little, Ah Liu used to carry water for many homes on this street. His water buckets were bigger than other people’s, and he got less for his work than other people did. “Good old Ah Liu! And you say he’s gone now? Ah Liu went off to be a soldier so he could send money home. He wanted his children to go to school…didn’t want them to have to sweat and slave to support a family like he did. Poor old Ah Liu!”

Second Sister was scrubbing and cleaning the area under the sky well. She was using the same water she had cooked the festival’s rice dumplings in to scour every nook and cranny. People said that doing this could lessen the number of summer mosquitoes. She wasn’t a person to run into the street to see what the fuss was all about. But someone came rushing in through the doorway telling about the woes of Ah Liu’s wife. Second Sister knew that Ah Liu was in the north as a soldier, so naturally this led her to think about Ninth Brother. Shaking the water from her hands, she just stood there blankly for a while, unsure of what to do next. Finally, beside herself with worry, she stepped across the threshold and went over toward the crowd of people.

Her knees went weak when she heard about Ah Liu’s wife. So what the postman delivered weren’t always ten-thousand gold-piece letters. Sometimes the postman was the envoy from hell who would cruelly say to some woman, “Your husband’s dead! From now on you’re a widow.”

After Dragon Boat Festival, Second Sister no longer bought vegetables as an excuse for “running into” the fat postman. When things had come to this, her greatest hope was to get no news at all from her husband.

One rainy day, while she was sewing, she heard a clattering sound on the floorboards in the front parlor. Then a person called out her name in a loud voice. She realized that the postman had come to her house. She lifted her hands from her sewing and locked them on top of her head. Ominous black clouds rolled down from the sky to sweep her into a vast abyss.

A nephew leading the postman pushed open the unlocked door. “Ninth Aunt, there’s a letter from Ninth Uncle.”

Second Sister’s hands were still raised above her head and, panic-stricken, she asked, “In Ninth Brother’s handwriting?”

“Correct, it’s his handwriting.”

Only then did she get up all a-fluster and, forgetting her manners, snatched the letter from him. Then, turning away, she covered her face and sobbed.

That day she signed for three letters and two remittances. From the letters she found out that Ninth Brother had sent far more than just these.
Ah well, never mind, that’s just money lost and gone.
Even if she had received but one word from Ninth Brother, that would be enough to bring her dead heart back to hope and light. Now she was thinking more about setting off a string of firecrackers by the gateway to tell the world that Ninth Brother was still alive! This really wasn’t news. All the relatives in the Lin family thought that Ninth Brother had been sending money back every month. If any of the sisters-in-law were hard up, Second Sister was the first person they’d go to for rescue. She quietly closed the door, and fervently dropped to her knees.
O Heavenly Father, Lord, thank you for deigning to hear your daughter’s unworthy prayer. She still entrusts Ninth Brother into your hands
.

The children returned home from school. Second Sister opened her arms and clasped them all in her embrace, “Daddy has sent money and letters!”

Baohua said, “I want to buy a pair of leather shoes.”

Baosheng said, “I want to eat three bowls of meat all in one go!” Baoqing said, “I’d like a pencil. I can write and I want to send a letter to Daddy.”

Their mother had a lot she wanted to say to these children. She wanted to teach them to know their Father in heaven, to be grateful to him for protecting Ninth Brother on the battlefield. But she couldn’t say a single word. She only nodded her head, as tears streamed down from her eyes.

1.

O
N AND ON
the monotonous wheels of the train roll and turn. My consciousness drifts into a haze and then gradually clarity returns.

Those children under the seat, not yet ten years old, are Chaofan and me. We’re curled up like little mollusks and playing poker. Around us are pairs and pairs of swollen feet and, with them, pair after pair of dirty shoes all packed and piled up together. This is the first time that I remember leaving Old Town and the first time for me to ride on a train. My grandpa is being banished to a far-off mountain district. Grandma could have chosen to stay behind but she wouldn’t even consider that, and so she boarded the train, taking me with her. Chaofan’s own grandpa is no longer alive and his parents are still in the “cow pen,” so there was nothing left for him but to go with his grandma, also in the ranks of the exiled. The whole train is filled with people being sent away for labor reform. In total contrast to the desolated, baffled, or resigned-looking adults are the children in the passenger cars. For them, totally ignorant of the outside world, traveling so far away from home is an ecstasy and excitement beyond measure. It doesn’t matter to them if they know each other or not, they just squirm this way and that and band together to play in the stuffy, crowded cars. Grandma doesn’t stop me from wriggling under the passenger seats. She is no longer telling me that “girls are golden branches and jade leaves,” or that when you stand or sit you must do so properly. Her eyes gaze far out into the distance but don’t see a single thing, not even the muck on Grandpa’s and her own shoes. Shoes that never before had a speck of dust upon them. Chaofan and I are playing “winner,” a kind of poker. In the dim light, I see the corners of his mouth curl into a pleased and wicked grin and I know that he’s lucked out on a winning card. That wicked grin on his mouth and the melancholy in his eyes just fascinate me.

That young woman is the newly wed me, sweetly sleeping, my head pillowed on Chaofan’s arm. We’re on our way back to Old Town to see our families. We bought two sleeper-berth tickets but squeeze together into just one and are never apart the whole trip. The person I am then is so happy, so content. I guess I had come into this world just to find him, to be his wife, wash his clothes, cook his meals, and bear his children. The person I am then is such a loser. No enterprising spirit, no grand aspirations. Chaofan is a genius. This is not blind hero worship on my part. His graduation work has just won the top national prize. In his presence, I feel myself all dull and dreary. Every time I nuzzle up against him in sheer happiness, I could just die. This was probably because I had such a poor image of myself. I was terrified of losing him.

Scene after scene from the past is just like the uncut version of a movie flashing kaleidoscope-like before my eyes and I feel a sadness that penetrates to my very marrow. Such emotions are so unlike me. Over the past ten years, I merrily laughed at the world, and railed angrily at it too. I thought only silly women like Lin Daiyu
¹¹
could feel brokenhearted when those memory-evoking seasons roll around again. The utter monotony of the train wheels is again making me foolishly melancholy.

I’m doing my best to control myself from expressing this inner weakness. I tell myself it is only the conditioned reflex of my subconscious, because every scene connected in my memory with trains holds an image of Chaofan. This reminds me of the doorsill of Grandma’s house. After I finished university the house underwent a renovation, and the newly fixed doorsill was now higher by one inch. I can’t tell you how many times I tripped on that one inch. I know very well that the sill is now higher, but even when I lift my step I still trip on it. A scientist has said that the holding capacity of the human subconscious is thirty thousand times greater than that of full consciousness. In such an enormous space are ware-housed my saddest and innermost feelings—toward Chaofan, and the height of Grandma’s doorsill—just like dust-covered debris. In the aura of specific scenes, such feelings are ready to be inventoried. I’m clear-headed again now, and it’s obvious that the conflicted feelings between Chaofan and me have long since been razed flat, like Grandma’s home. There isn’t even one little bench left behind.

During the eight years of the War of Resistance against the Japanese, the Guomindang army fought twenty-two major battles, suffered eighteen defeats, and lost almost one hundred general-rank officers on those battlefields. The name of the division commander who went to the clinic in Old Town is on that long, long list.

I don’t know his full name. In my grandpa’s “Confession Materials,” he’s labeled “Bogus Division Commander Zhang.” He was a hero in the war, but during the so-called Great Cultural Revolution, he could only be called a “bogus division commander.” Nowadays, we can again openly and grandly honor him as the hero he was. How could I ever explain to you that crazy time when everything in life was as unpredictable as the skies in April? After the “Bogus Division Commander” sacrificed himself for our country, there came a period in Grandpa’s personal history for which he had no one to attest on his behalf. If you couldn’t come up with someone to vouch for you, even frank and candid confessions were taken as lying attempts to cover up some misdeed. He was suspected of having been a Japanese collaborator, a secret agent, a spy—every crime in the book could be written onto this blank page of his history. Way back in 1954, the new regime launched a movement to liquidate counterrevolutionary elements, and Grandpa accordingly began his “Confession Materials” about this unexplainable period of his history. In all the many political movements that followed, he would be given this same writing assignment. It was something that could never receive a final approval. At our home, there was a big wooden box with a bronze lock on it. Once, it had been stuffed full with “Confession Materials.” It wasn’t until Grandpa realized his own Great Day of Departure was approaching, that, sick as he was, he burned those papers. Personal history confessions wouldn’t be needed in heaven. I wonder what he must have felt as he watched the flames consume those papers with all his handwriting on them.

As the army truck started up to leave West Gate Street in the pale morning mist, Ninth Brother stared into the mirror on the outside of the truck. He watched as Second Sister covered her face and crouched down on the ground crying. Second Sister was a strong woman. Ninth Brother fully appreciated her strong character. Though the head of the house, he really didn’t exercise the authority of a husband and a father but, always with a grin, would join the children in calling her “Ah Ma.” The people in the household thought he was just joking around, but in, fact, he was seeking in her the mother’s love he never had when he was little. Second Sister’s tears didn’t just get flicked away. Second Sister’s tears had the greatest weight. And at this moment each teardrop was a bullet shot straight into Ninth Brother’s heart.

The vehicle turned the corner and there was no more Second Sister in the mirror. When he thought this may very possibly have been his final glimpse forever of her, his tightly held willpower of the last few days dissolved entirely. Instantly the tears were rolling down his cheeks and he quickly took off his barracks cap and covered his face with it. He wavered, suddenly doubting the choice he had made.
Me, this mere weakling of a scholar, compared to the vastness of our country, I’m just a small drop of water in the ocean. But for my wife and children I am the sky above their heads. When Baohua wakes up in a little while and finds her daddy gone, she’ll cry for sure and she won’t be riding the bicycle to school anymore
. Of the three, she was the most like her daddy. A worrywart, brittle, and quick to cry—and always burrowed into some corner soundlessly pouring out her tears. Thinking of his little crybaby girl broke up Ninth Brother inside.

What am I doing? When God created people, he gave them different kinds of gifts. I am weak and incompetent, only fit to open a little clinic to support my family with. Why do I want to go do something that is so far beyond me? The division commander said that Old Town would have a hard time escaping this disaster. I should stay behind and protect my family
.

With this thought, he stopped his crying and pulled the cap away from his face. He now decided to make a humble apology in person to the division commander and beg to be forgiven his cowardice.

The military camp in the northern outskirts was awaiting Dr. Lin. The troops, fully kitted up and ready to set out, lined up on both sides of the road. Opening the truck door and seeing this mighty sight, Ninth Brother was seized by panic. An open car was parked in the middle of the little road. Division Commander Zhang grasped Dr. Lin and pulled him up. “Brothers! Welcome Dr. Lin to the War of Resistance!” There was deafening applause and cheering. Ninth Brother stood at the side of the division commander, as dumb as a wooden chicken.
Am I dreaming? Are they filming a movie?
Division Commander Zhang was an educated man who spoke very eloquently in a voice as resonant as steel balls and bronze cannons, as the saying goes. He waved his arms about in his warm praise of Dr. Lin’s patriotic forsaking of his family. He said that when he saw Dr. Lin’s tenderness toward his child in the clinic, he really couldn’t bear recruiting this loving father into the army. But Dr. Lin himself had a firm grasp of right and wrong. He knew that no egg could remain intact if the whole nest were overturned.
If there were no country, there would be no home!
Division Commander Zhang used this welcome for Dr. Lin to buck up the troops’ spirits for the coming battle. If his speech was like a torch setting their hearts ablaze, the fervor of the camp sent flames raging into the heavens.

Ninth Brother was moved. Here in this great sea of faces, was there anyone who didn’t have worried family members back home?
My life is no more honorable or respectable than theirs. If they can bathe in blood at the front, why can’t I?
He closed his eyes and uttered a prayer to Jesus.
Oh, Lord, you always reveal your great power in the weakness of men. I ask you to take away my weakness and grant me a soldier’s daring and courage. Amen. Jesus said, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is shown perfect in man’s weakness
.”

Division Commander Zhang patted Ninth Brother’s bony shoulder. “Now you say a few words, Doctor!”

Ninth Brother was stupefied for a moment and then said, “I…I’m just a scholar who couldn’t truss a hen, but I will work hard to learn from you all, and I can live and die with you.”

The doctor’s humble and sincere attitude had the unexpected effect of adding fuel to the fire. The applause and cheers the troops gave him were long and loud.

The army set out in a vast and mighty surge. Division Commander Zhang made the doctor sit beside him and stuck a little silver pistol into his belt. “I took this on the battlefield. German-made. I am giving it to you.”

Ninth Brother gave the gun back to the division commander. “I’m a Christian. I cannot shoot someone.”

The other let out a great roar of laughter. “Remember, you’re going into battle and it’s easier to kill a man there than to kill an ant. If you don’t kill the enemy, the enemy will just kill you. Take it!”

Ninth Brother put out his hand to ward it off. “I have a sacred responsibility to rescue the wounded and dying and absolutely
not
to kill people.”

“If the enemy was standing right in front of you, and he had a gun in his hand, what would you do?”

“I’d rather he kill me than me kill him.”

“OK. I will help you achieve your beliefs. I hope I can protect you until this war is over, and when the time comes, I’ll send you home myself. I liked Old Town quite a bit. I’ll buy a house there later and be your neighbor.”

That man would rather die than sacrifice the principles of his belief
. Once again, the division commander looked at the doctor with new eyes.
This scholar isn’t the weakling he seems
. The division commander was older than Ninth Brother by a few years. Later on, in the few days left to him in this world, he looked after and protected the doctor just as he would his own younger brother.