Sons

by Pearl S. Buck

  But Wang the Tiger would not have such generous help free and unrewarded with no more than this, and so he said, looking hard at the man as he stood before him between the two soldiers who held him,

  “You are a very proper man not to bear insult and no good fellow will. I am glad to have so good and brave a man with me. Go back, then, and tell your fellows and all the soldiers that I will take them under my own banners, all who surrender themselves and their guns, and not one of them shall be killed. As for you, you shall be a captain in my army, and I will give you two hundred pieces of silver and five pieces to every man with his gun that you bring also.”

  Then the man’s twisted face lightened and he cried warmly, “You are such a general as I have been searching for all my life long, and I will surely open the gate to you at the moment when the sun is at its zenith on this very day now dawning!”

  With this the man turned abruptly and went back and Wang the Tiger rose and went out of his tent and watched the man as he climbed nimbly and skillfully over the wall, catching hold of the roots and the gnarled trees as a monkey might, and so he climbed and disappeared over the wall.

  By now the sun rose like a copper rim over the edge of the fields and Wang the Tiger commanded his men to be roused but quietly and without any noise lest some enemy see a commotion and suspect a new plan. But many of the men knew already that one had come out of the city and they had risen in the night and made ready without lighting a single torch. And indeed the light of the moon had been so bright that it was like a pale sun and the men could see such things even as how their triggers were set and where a string should pass through the eyelet of a shoe. By full sunrise every man was in his place and Wang the Tiger gave orders that to each meat should be given to eat and a full deep drink of wine to make his heart warm and brave, and thus fed and comforted the soldiers waited for the drum to beat that would send them forward.

  Then as the sun rose high and full and beat down with a breathless heat upon the plain where the city lay, Wang the Tiger shouted from where he stood and his men gathered as they had been told to do in six long lines and when they heard their general shout every man shouted also, and the noise ran like an echo among them. And as they shouted every man lifted his weapon in his hands, each man a gun and a knife, and they all ran forward. Some crossed the moat by the bridge, but many ran across the shallow moat and clambered dripping up the further bank and they pressed against the city wall and clustered about the north gate. But the captains would not let Wang the Tiger stand too near the front, for they did not know at this last moment whether the man would be true or not or whether there would be treachery. Yet Wang the Tiger trusted the man because he knew that revenge is the surest sort of hatred.

  Thus they waited, and not a sound came out of that city, and there was no sound of guns upon the city wall. Then as the sun swung upwards into its place in the zenith, Wang the Tiger stood stiff and watching, and he saw that great iron gate swing a little and one stooped and peered and there was a little crack of light along its top. He shouted once, and they rushed forward and Wang the Tiger with them and they pressed against the gate and burst it wide and they poured into the streets of that city like water freed from a dam, and the siege was ended.

  Then Wang the Tiger did not stand a moment, but he commanded to be led instantly to the palace where the robber chief lived, and he shouted and roared at his men that they were not free yet and not until he had found the old chief. Then swiftly because of the haste of their greed his men hurried him to that palace, asking as they went and laying ruthless hold on any terrified man they saw. But when Wang the Tiger entered the courts of that palace with a great flourish of drums and bugles it was empty, for the robber chief had fled. How he had known of the betrayal could not be said, but as Wang the Tiger’s men had poured into the north gate the old robber and his loyal followers escaped out of the south gate and were fleeing across the countryside. Wang the Tiger hearing this from soldiers who had not gone with him rushed upon the south wall of the city and looked out and far in the distance he could see but a flying cloud of dust. He was in two minds for a while whether or not to pursue it, but it came to him that he had what he wanted and it was the city and the key to this region, and what did a robber and his few men mean?

  So he went down then and back into the deserted palace, and there the many soldiers of the enemy who were left came to do obeisance and to beg his protection. He was pleased to see their number, for they came to him as he sat in the chief hall, and they came in tens and in twenties, the thinnest, most haggard men he had ever seen except in famine years. But they had their weapons and when they knelt before him and held out their hands to show their submission, Wang the Tiger accepted them and ordered that every man be fed as much as he was able to eat and that he be given five pieces of silver. But when the man who had betrayed the robber chief came in at the head of his company Wang the Tiger gave him the two hundred pieces of silver he had promised him and he gave it with his own hands and he commanded that captain’s garb be brought and given to the man, too. Thus did Wang the Tiger remember what the man had done for him, and he rewarded him and took him into his own ranks.

  When this was all finished then Wang the Tiger knew that the time had come when he must redeem his promise to his men, for he had held them as long as he could and they would not be longer held. And Wang the Tiger gave the command for their freedom, wishing he need not while he did. It was a strange thing that now that he had what he wanted his anger against the people was gone, and he shrank from making them suffer. Yet he must keep his word, too, to his men, and when he had given them their freedom for three days he shut himself into the palace and closed the gates and he was alone except for his bodyguard. Yet even these hundred men or so were very restless and demanded their turn, and at last Wang the Tiger had to tell them off and call others back in their place, and when these others came in with their eyes all red and lustful and their faces dark and flushed so that they could not subdue their wild looks, Wang the Tiger turned his eyes away and he would not think of what was going on in that city. When his nephew, whom he kept always by him, grew curious to go out and see what was to be seen, Wang the Tiger burst out on him, glad of one on whom he could with reason fix his anger, and he roared, “Shall my own blood go ravening out like these coarse and common men?”

  And he would not let the young man move out of his sight, and kept him busy about his person fetching this or that to eat or to drink or some change he must have in his garments, and when weak cries came through even into the fast closed courts, Wang the Tiger was more imperious and more angry than ever with his nephew, so that the youth was kept all in a sweat with his uncle’s temper, and he did not dare to answer him a word.

  The truth was that Wang the Tiger could not be cruel unless he was angry, and indeed this was a weakness in a lord of war that he could only kill in anger, whose means to glory is death, and he knew it was his weakness that he could not kill coldly or carelessly or for a cause. And he thought it weakness that he could not keep his anger against the people and he told himself he ought still to hate them because they had been so dull and stubborn and had not thought of a way to open the gates to him. Yet when his soldiers came sheepishly to ask for their food, he cried at them in a confusion of fury and pain,

  “What, must I feed you even when you loot?”

  To this they made answer, “There is not a handful of grain in this whole city and we cannot eat gold and silver and silks. These we find but no food, for the farmers are still afraid to come in with their produce.”

  And Wang the Tiger suffered and was sullen because he saw that what they said was true and he could not but order them fed, although when he did, he shouted in his surliest tones. But once he heard a hearty rude fellow cry coarsely,

  “Yes, and the wenches are all so thin they are liked plucked fowls and there is no pleasure in them at all!”

  Then suddenly Wang the Tiger could not bear his life and he we
nt away into a room by himself and he sat and groaned for a while before he could harden himself again. But he did harden himself once more. He thought of the fair lands and he thought how he had enlarged his power and how he had in this war more than doubled the country over which he ruled, and he told himself that it was his trade and his means of greatness and last and best he thought of the two women he had and how from one of them surely his son would be born, and he cried to his own heart,

  “Cannot I for that one bear that others should somewhat suffer for three little days?”

  Thus he hardened himself for the three days and he held himself to his promised word.

  But on the dawn of the fourth day he rose up early from his restless bed and he ordered signals given and horns blown everywhere and it was a sign to all his soldiers that their looting was over and they must come back to his commands. And because he rose up that morning more than usually fierce and black in his looks and his black brows darted up and down over his eyes, none dared to disobey him.

  No, none except one. As Wang the Tiger strode out of the gate that had been fast locked these three days he heard a feeble crying in an alley near by, and being made oversensitive to these cries now, he turned his long steps there to see what it was. In that alley he saw a soldier of his on his way back to the ranks, but he had seen an old woman pass and on her finger was a thin, gold ring, a poor, small, worthless thing, too, for the old woman was only some working wife, and she could not have any great good thing. But the soldier had been overcome with a sudden desire for the last bit of gold and he wrenched at the old woman’s hand and she cried out at him, wailing,

  “It has been on my finger nigh upon thirty years and how can I loose it now?”

  And the soldier was in such haste, for the bugle was blowing, that there before his own eyes Wang the Tiger saw the man whip out his knife and cut off the old woman’s finger clean, and her poor scanty blood had still strength enough to spurt out in a feeble stream. Then Wang the Tiger gave a great roaring curse, for the soldier had not seen him he was in such haste, and Wang the Tiger sprang at the soldier and he drew out his keen blade as he sprang and drove it straight through the man’s body. Yes, although it was his own man Wang the Tiger did it, because his anger came up in him so to see this wretched, starved creature dealt with as she had been before his very eyes. The soldier fell without a sigh and his own blood gushed out in a hearty, red stream. As for the old woman she was terrified at such fierceness, even if it was to succor her, and she wrapped her smarting stump in her old apron and ran and hid herself somewhere and Wang the Tiger did not see her again.

  He wiped his sword on the soldier’s coat, then, and he turned away lest he repent what he had done, and it was useless to repent, since the man was dead. He stayed only to command one of his guards to take the dead man’s gun.

  Then Wang the Tiger went through that city and he was astonished beyond any measure to see the few wretched people there were and how they came crawling out into their doorways and sat listless on the benches upon their thresholds, too weak to lift their heads even to look at Wang the Tiger as he came striding along in the bright sunshine of autumn, and his guards glittering and clattering behind him. No, they sat there as though they were dead, so dull and still they were, and some strange shame and astonishment was in Wang the Tiger’s heart so that he did not stay to talk with any man. He held his head very high and he pretended he did not see the people and only the shops. There were many goods in these shops such as he had not seen before, since this city was on the river to the south, and the river ran to the sea, and such goods could be brought in. Yes, Wang the Tiger saw many curious foreign things he had not seen before, but they were carelessly placed now and covered with dust as though no one had come to buy for a long time.

  But two things he did not see in this city. He saw no food anywhere for sale, and the market place was empty and silent and there were no vendors or hucksters in the streets such as make busy any town and city, and he saw no little children. At first he did not notice how quiet the streets were and then he noticed and wondered for the reason of the quietness and then it came to him that he missed the noisy voices and laughter of the children with which every house is filled in usual times, and he missed their darting and running upon the streets. And suddenly he could not bear to look at the thin dark dull faces of the men and women who were left. He had done no more than any lord of war may do, and it could not be counted to him for a crime, since there was no other way in which he could rise.

  But Wang the Tiger was truly too merciful a man for his trade and he turned and went back to his courts because he could not bear to see this city now his, and he was cast down and ill humored and he swore at his soldiers and he roared at them to be out of his way, for he could not endure at all the sound of their loud, satisfied laughter and the sight of their satiate glittering eyes, and he looked with rage upon the gold rings they had on their fingers and the foreign watches they had hung on them and many such things they had taken. Yes, he even saw gold rings on the fingers of his two trusty men, upon the Hawk’s hard hand a ring of gold, and a jade ring upon the thumb of the Pig Butcher, that was so large and coarse a thumb the ring stuck half way upon the joint and would go no further. But still he wore it so. Seeing all this Wang the Tiger felt very far and separate from all these men and muttered to himself that they were low and beast-like fellows and he was lonely to the depths of his being and he went and sat alone in his room in mighty ill humor and bellowed for the smallest cause if anyone came near him.

  But when he had sat thus a day or two and his soldiers, seeing how angry he was, were frightened and calmed themselves somewhat, Wang the Tiger hardened himself once more and he told himself that such were the ways of war and he had chosen this way of life and heaven had destined him as he was, and he must finish what he had begun. So he rose and washed himself, for he had sat these three days unwashed and unshaven, he was so angry, and he clothed himself freshly, and he sent a messenger to the magistrate of the city that he must come and submit himself. Then Wang the Tiger went into the guest hall of this palace and sat down there and waited for the man to come.

  In an hour or two the magistrate came with what haste he could muster and he came in leaning on two men, a very ghastly, pale figure of a man he looked. But he bowed to Wang the Tiger and waited and Wang the Tiger saw this man was well born and a scholar by his gentle looks. He rose therefore and bowed in return and he motioned that the magistrate was to be seated. Then Wang the Tiger was seated too and he could but sit and stare at this other, for the magistrate’s face and his hands were the strangest and most dreadful color, and it was the hue of a liver that has been dried for a day or two, and he was so thin one would have said his skin was glued to his bones.

  Then Wang the Tiger cried out suddenly in the midst of his wonderment, “What—did you starve too?”

  And the man answered simply, “Yes, since my people did also, and it is not the first time.”

  “But the man they sent out to make truce the first time was fed well enough,” said Wang the Tiger.

  “Yes, but they fed him specially from the first,” answered the magistrate, “so that if you would not make truce you would see they had stores left to eat and could hold out longer.”

  Then Wang the Tiger could not but approve such good guile as this and he cried out in wonder and admiration of it, and he said,

  “But the captain who came out was well fed, too!”

  The magistrate answered simply, “They fed the soldiers best and to the last the best they could. But the people starved and many hundreds of them are dead. All the weak and the very old and the young are dead.”

  And Wang the Tiger heaved a sigh and said, “It is true I saw no babes anywhere.” And he stared awhile at the magistrate and then he forced himself to say what he must and he said, “Submit yourself to me now, for I have won the right to take that other lord of war’s place over you and over this whole region over which he r
uled. I am the ruler now and I add this to my dominion I have already to the north. The revenues shall come into my hand now, and I will demand of you a certain sum fixed and beyond that a proportion of revenues every month.”

  This Wang the Tiger said with some few courteous words afterwards, for he was not devoid of such courtesy. The magistrate answered in his weak and hollow voice, moving his dry lips over teeth that seemed too large and white for his drawn mouth,

  “We are in your power. Only give us a month or two to recover ourselves.” Then he waited awhile and he said again with great bitterness, “What is it to us who rules over us if we can only have peace and if we can only pursue our business and have a livelihood and nurture our children? I swear I and my people are willing to pay you in all reason if you will only be strong enough to keep off other lords of war and let us live secure in our generation.”

  This was all Wang the Tiger cared to know, and now his merciful heart smote him to hear the man’s feeble, breathy voice and he cried out to his soldiers,

  “Bring in food and wine and feed him and the men with him!” And when he had seen this done, he called his trusty men to him, and he commanded again, “Go out now into the countryside and take soldiers and compel the farmers to come in with their grains and their produce so that the people may buy and eat and recover themselves again after this very bitter war.”

  So did Wang the Tiger show his justice to all the people and the magistrate thanked him, and he was moved with his gratitude. Then Wang the Tiger saw how courteous and gently born and reared this magistrate was for even half starved as he was and his eyes glittered at the food that was set on a table before him, he restrained himself and he dallied and delayed, his trembling hands clasped tightly together, until all the polite and courteous things were said that should be said from guest to host and until Wang the Tiger could seat himself in the host’s place. Then the poor man fell upon the food, and still he tried to hold himself back and in very pity Wang the Tiger at last made excuse that he had some affair to which he must go. He went away then and let the man eat alone, for his underlings ate separately, and afterwards Wang the Tiger heard his men say in wonder that the dishes and bowls needed no washing so clean the starving men had licked them.