Pearl of China

by Anchee Min

  For by the sin of man we fell

  By the Son of God

  He crushed the power of Hell

  Death we fear no more

  Absalom sang as if he were in his church.

  “Prepare to shoot!” Bumpkin Emperor shouted.

  I moved behind Bumpkin Emperor and took out the knife.

  Hearing the noise, Bumpkin Emperor turned. I could clearly see his big frog eyes.

  I have no memories after that. I only knew that I had lifted the knife and then everything went dark.

  “You are an ant who tries to shake a pine!” was what I was told Bumpkin Emperor had said, after one of his soldiers had hit me in the back of the head.

  When I opened my eyes I heard “Kill the rice Christians!” I discovered that my hands were tied behind my back and I was on the ground. The back of my head throbbed with pain.

  “Have mercy!” I heard Pearl beg. “Willow is pregnant!”

  “Pregnant?” Bumpkin Emperor laughed. “Good! I will save a bullet!”

  The soldiers lifted me and placed me next to Absalom.

  “Praise the Lord,” Absalom said. “He will bless you with courage.”

  Papa threw himself to the ground and kowtowed to Bumpkin Emperor. “Let my daughter go!”

  Soldiers beat Papa with their rifles until he was silent.

  “Willow, we are going home,” Absalom said to me.

  I looked into Absalom’s eyes. I saw no fear—only confidence and love.

  “The angels are here,” he murmured. “God is waiting for us.”

  I shut my eyes and leaned against Absalom. I didn’t want to die.

  The soldiers took up their positions and pointed their rifles at us.

  Bumpkin Emperor shouted, “Get ready and . . . f—”

  Before Bumpkin Emperor finished his sentence, the earth leaped beneath me. There was a flash followed by a loud roar.

  I lost my balance and fell.

  Clods of dirt rained down.

  I choked as clouds of dust rolled across the ground.

  “What is happening?” I heard Bumpkin Emperor yell.

  “It must be the Christian God showing his anger!” Papa’s voice said.

  The soldiers ran like scattered monkeys.

  When the dust cleared, I saw that hills near the city were burning and black smoke spiraled into the sky.

  “The American fleet is here!” Carpenter Chan and Lilac shouted, running along the riverbank toward the crowd.

  Another round of explosions came. The earth trembled again. There was more dust and smoke and flames.

  My ears filled with a ringing sound. It was as if someone had stuffed them with cotton.

  Bumpkin Emperor followed his soldiers and ran as fast as he could.

  The crowd scattered, and soon we were alone in front of Soo-ching’s burned-down hut.

  Carpenter Chan untied Pearl’s ropes. “Sorry it took so long for me to deliver your letter!”

  “What letter?” Absalom asked.

  “How did you do it, Chan?” Pearl’s face was animated withexcitement.

  “I thought I was never going to find any help, but I was lucky,”

  Carpenter Chan replied. “I found the American fleet near the mouth of the Yangtze and managed to get your note to their leader. He sent one warship.”

  “God has heard our prayers,” Absalom said in his loud preacher’s voice.

  Pearl stared at the river. She then turned to Lilac, who was tending to Carpenter Chan’s blistered feet.

  The warship steamed along the shore. Flames burst from the muzzles of the cannons and there were more explosions in the hills. The ground kept shaking. I watched Pearl’s lips as she said, “Thank you, America.”

  CHAPTER 24

  Twenty-four hours was all she had to say good-bye. She would be uprooted and transplanted to America, a country she called home but barely knew. Later in her life, this last day in China would haunt her. It never stopped haunting her as long as she lived. It was useless to tell herself, “My roots in China must die.”

  Life simply caught her. The American captain wouldn’t wait. His ship was literally the last boat leaving China. Pearl had only a few hours to pack up forty years of her life.

  I convinced myself that our separation would be temporary. Since we had been children, it had happened before. She had gone to Shanghai and then America, but always she had returned. I had no doubts that we would see each other again.

  Pearl said that she didn’t feel at home when she was anywhere else, even when she was in America, her birthplace. When she talked of home, she meant China.

  “How could I go someplace else when my mother’s grave is here?” she once said.

  Pearl was used to accepting reality. She knew that Bumpkin Emperor and his kind would return and murder again. “There is a positive side to moving to America,” she reasoned. “Carol will receive better medical care there.”

  “What about Lossing?” I asked.

  “I haven’t heard from him,” Pearl said. “He hasn’t bothered to send one word or to try to find out how his daughter is.”

  The American captain insisted that Pearl and Grace leave all their belongings behind. Pearl wanted to take Carie’s piano, but she had to give that up. Instead she took Carie’s sewing machine.

  Absalom gathered his congregation at the church and announced that Carpenter Chan would take his place. Carpenter Chan was to head the Nanking church while Papa continued to head the Chin-kiang church.

  But Carpenter Chan had no confidence in himself. With tears filling his eyes, he pleaded, “Old Teacher, I am not capable of doing as good a job as you.”

  “God has let me know that you’re the one to carry on in my place.”

  Absalom told Carpenter Chan that if he ran into difficulty, Papa would be there to help.

  Papa was touched—he couldn’t believe that Absalom’s feelings hadn’t changed after he had betrayed him.

  While the children’s choir sang, Absalom delivered his final sermon. It was the first time Lilac’s youngest son, Triple Luck Solomon, led the singing. The young man had inherited his mother’s beauty. Carie would have loved his sweet voice. We all wished Pearl’s family a safe journey to America.

  I told Pearl that I would take care of her garden. “I’ll bring fresh flowers to Carie’s grave in the spring.”

  “I’ll return soon,” Pearl promised.

  If I had known that this was the last time we would see each other, I would have held her longer and closer. I would have made an effort to remember how she looked, the clothes she wore and the expression on her face. I would have perhaps tried to talk her out of leaving.

  But I didn’t know. In fact, we wanted to get the pain of saying goodbye over with as quickly as possible. The sooner the parting was over, the sooner we could start working our way back together. Pearl was not usually one to dwell on sadness. It was Carie’s training to press back and swallow your bitter tears. Always look forward and be hopeful.

  We all started for the river. Lilac came with her children and Soo-ching brought her son, Confucius.

  We carried the family’s luggage to the smaller boat waiting to take them out to the warship in the middle of the river.

  The large ship excited the children. They called it a big floating temple.

  Carpenter Chan followed Absalom. He had been weeping and begging. “I can’t do without you, Old Teacher!”

  Papa echoed, “Absalom, without you as our compass we will lose our direction on the sea.”

  “Have faith in God” was Absalom’s reply.

  “But there are qualities needed in a pastor I don’t possess,” Carpenter Chan insisted. “People won’t follow me the way they follow you! Monkeys will flee when the big tree is down. I am afraid the church will fall apart.”

  “Carpenter Chan is right,” Papa agreed. “No matter how hard we work, people see God’s spirit in you, Absalom—not in us.”

  Wang Ah-ma, Carie’s former se
rvant and Pearl and Grace’s nanny, arrived to say good-bye. The seventy-year-old woman surprised everyone. After Carie died, Wang Ah-ma had moved back to the provincial village where she had grown up. After hearing the news of foreigners being murdered in Chin-kiang and Nanking, she had come to check on Absalom, Pearl, and Grace. Wang Ah-ma hadn’t known that she was reaching Nanking just in time for the family’s final departure.

  “Wang Ah-ma!” Pearl and Grace cried, getting down on their knees to kowtow.

  “My sweet girls!” Wang Ah-ma touched Pearl and Grace all over with her trembling hands. She said that her sight was failing and that she could barely see.

  “You shouldn’t travel so far.” Pearl wiped her tears.

  “When will you return to China?” Wang Ah-ma wanted to know. “Before the New Year or after?”

  “What’s the difference?” everyone asked.

  “The fortune-teller predicted that I will expire soon after the New Year,” Wang Ah-ma replied.

  “Grace and I would like to prove that you wasted your money on the fortune-teller,” Pearl said.

  Wang Ah-ma smiled, cupping Pearl’s face with her hands. “My child, promise that you will come back as soon as you can.”

  “I promise.” Pearl gently kissed Wang Ah-ma’s cheeks.

  “On board now or never!” the captain of the American warship yelled through a loudspeaker.

  Wang Ah-ma let go of Pearl and Grace as she broke down.

  The family got on the smaller boat that would take them to the warship. Absalom went to stand in the bow with his back to shore. Looking out across the water, he seemed frozen.

  The horn blasted.

  The Chinese Christians moaned, “Old Teacher, Absalom!”

  Carpenter Chan and Papa sobbed like two abandoned children.

  “May the wind blow in your favor!” the crowd chanted.

  Absalom was no longer at the spot where he had been standing. It was as if he had suddenly vanished.

  “Father!” Pearl and Grace called.

  Papa was stunned. “Oh, dear God, Old Teacher has changed his mind!”

  Running along the gunwale, Absalom moved quickly. Like a mountain goat, he jumped into the water and began to swim toward the shore.

  “Old Teacher!” the crowd cheered. “Old Teacher!”

  “Absalom has decided to stay with us!” Papa cried.

  Carpenter Chan waded into the water and swam toward Absalom.

  “Captain, help!” Grace cried. “Please, stop my father!”

  The crowd received Absalom with happy tears.

  A few minutes later the American captain arrived from the warship on another small boat. He talked with Pearl.

  I could guess exactly what Pearl said to the American captain. She would have said, “Let the fighting angel be.”

  When Pearl, Grace, and the children went aboard the ship, Absalom smiled. He waved good-bye to his daughters and grandchildren. His long arms rose like flagpoles in the air.

  Pearl waved back. I sensed that she knew that she had made the right choice in letting go of her father.

  What Pearl did not know was that she would never see her father again. Absalom would continue to do what he loved all the way to the end. One day Absalom would deliver his sermon. Afterward he would tell Carpenter Chan that he would take a break. Minutes later Carpenter Chan would find him in his room, lying on his bed as if sleeping. But he would be dead. Before that moment, Absalom had lived his dreams. With the help of Papa and Carpenter Chan, Absalom had built the largest Christian community in southern China.

  PART FOUR

  CHAPTER 25

  I felt lonely and alone after Pearl left. Living in Nanking became difficult. In order to rid the country of the Japanese and the Communists, the Nationalist government increased taxes. To buy a bag of rice, one had to bring three bags of paper money to the store. Dick wrote repeatedly from the Red Base in Yenan, urging me to join him. Finally I made my decision. I let him know that I was ready to be a “bandit’s wife.” Dick was elated. He prepared me for the hostile, unfertile land and the hardship in Yenan.

  “Try to look on the bright side,” Dick encouraged. “After all, the first emperor of China was born here two thousand years ago.”

  I told Papa that I would worry about him. He told me not to. Before my departure he went back to Chin-kiang. Even Absalom agreed that Papa was a changed man. To redeem himself, Papa had become absorbed in church work. His devotion enabled Absalom to take longer trips inland. During Absalom’s absence, Papa asked Carpenter Chan to build a stained-glass window featuring Jesus Christ for his church. When the work was completed, it delighted everyone. Every morning the sun shone through the glass. Christ looked as though he was floating on top of clouds.

  The stained glass boosted attendance. People loved the “Moving Foreign God.” Sunday-morning service became Papa’s showtime. People told Papa that they liked and felt closer to the image of this particular Jesus Christ. Papa was pleased. He had slightly altered Christ’s features. The stained-glass version of Christ had slanting eyes, a flatter nose, and full lips. The Christ also had large earlobes and browner skin.

  “This goes to show you that ideas spring fastest from a well-furnished mind!” Papa said proudly.

  My daughter was born in a Yenan cave on a snowy day. I tried to find a good name for her but nothing satisfied me. Dick was filled with joy when he held the baby for the first time. “What a beauty!” he exclaimed. “Instead of my lizard eyes and crooked nose, she has her mother’s features: a Chinese princess’s bright almond eyes, a delicate, straight nose, and fine pink lips! What good fortune!”

  Dick had been working with Mao’s inner circle. Mao called Dick his secret weapon. Because of Dick, Mao’s image had slowly changed from that of a guerrilla leader to that of a national hero. Through his propaganda, Dick had convinced the masses that Mao, not Chiang Kai-shek, had been fighting the Japanese.

  In 1937, Dick’s agents successfully infiltrated Chiang Kai-shek’s organization. Dick was able to persuade several generals of the Nationalist army to join Mao. One general even arrested Chiang Kai-shek. In history this came to be called the Xian Incident.

  Mao’s name began to appear regularly in the headlines. Chiang Kai-shek was pressured to invite Mao to talk peace. Dick turned the occasion into a publicity opportunity. The stories he created about Mao made him into a myth.

  Dick worked through the night. He composed Mao’s speeches and set up interviews. He often stayed inside a bomb shelter printing leaflets till dawn. Dick put my English to good use. I translated Mao’s articles and mailed them to outside news agencies. These attracted the attention of Western journalists, who came to Yenan seeking private interviews with Mao.

  The town of Yenan was no longer a spot on the map no one could find. Yenan was now the headquarters of the nation’s war against Japan. Mao had become an equal to Chiang Kai-shek.

  Mao was so pleased that he wrote a poem and dedicated it to Dick. In Chinese tradition, this was the highest honor. Mao’s poem was titled

  “In Contrast to Poet Lu You.” As all know, Lu You, born in 1172, wrote the famous lines “With a mountain-high aim, but an old mortal frame.”

  Lake Tongting

  Lake Green Grass

  Near the mid-autumn night

  Unruffled no winds pass

  Thirty thousand acres of jade light

  Dotted with the leaflike boat of mine

  The sky with pure moonbeam overflow

  The water surface paved with moonshine

  Drinking wine from the River West

  Using Dipper as our wine cup

  Felicity to share with you my friend

  No more talk of the bitter Poet Lu You

  Brightness above

  Brightness below

  While life meant hardship for most people in Yenan, Dick and I lived like royalty. We were given one of the best caves for our home. It had two rooms and faced south and was warmed by the sun. We had meat on
ce a week, while the rest ate yam leaves mixed with millet. At first I enjoyed the luxury and Dick’s new status. People came to him at all hours for instructions. But soon I began to resent the intrusions. Sleep was difficult with so much coming and going. I also had trouble reading and writing by candlelight. Dick’s eyesight was so bad he had to wear thick glasses, which enlarged his pupils to the size of mung beans. When Dick took off his glasses at night, his eyes looked like pigeon eggs bulging from their sockets.

  Dick didn’t care about his eyes. He wanted me to be more conscientious about his comrades’ political sensibilities. He asked me to hide my bourgeois habits. My desire for privacy, for instance.

  “It is ridiculous to call privacy or basic hygiene and love of nature bourgeois habits,” I protested.

  The real fight began with naming our daughter. I preferred Little Pearl, but Dick had another idea. He wanted our daughter to be called New Art. By new Dick meant the proletarian art. To create proletarian art was his job for Mao.

  Dick decided to take our argument to Mao, who lived three caves down the slope.

  Mao was in the middle of studying the French Revolution, but he received us warmly. When asked his opinion regarding our daughter’s name, Mao thought that neither of our choices was good. He took a brush pen and wrote down his choice in red ink.

  Thus Rouge Lin was created. It became our daughter’s official name.

  I didn’t like the name. Peace and tranquillity were what I had in mind. In Chinese, Rouge meant revolution. The name was associated with violence and blood.

  “That’s what we are fighting with, our blood!” Dick quoted Mao. “All the parents living in Yenan give their children revolutionary names: Red Base, Yenan, Bright Future, and Soldier of Mao. Our next generation must carry on the red flag and Communism until . . .”

  “What?”

  “Until the world is rouge—in revolution!”

  I could take Yenan’s hardship but not the brainwashing. I resented the fact that I was not allowed to even mention the word God. Dick did everything he could to hide the fact that I was a Christian.