City of Tranquil Light

by Bo Caldwell

  I listened without speaking, and when he paused, I knew I was expected to respond. “You are indeed a benefactor,” I said carefully. I did not want to praise him for his robbery; I also did not want to anger him.

  “Continue, mu shih.”

  “You are a forward-thinking man in many respects, but there is a practice here that is very backward and that therefore puzzles me. In my country it would be most shameful.”

  Hsiao Lao narrowed his eyes.

  “It is the drowning pool. The killing of infants is barbaric, and it is most surprising that someone as enlightened as yourself would permit it. No doubt it is an outdated practice that has been overlooked.”

  Hsiao Lao still did not speak; he continued to stare at me for perhaps half a minute. Then he started to laugh. “I will close the drowning pool, mu shih. It is a simple enough matter. I have many more important matters to think of.” He yawned and looked around as if getting his bearings. “Tomorrow you will begin treating my men, who are in great need of your care.” Then, whether from fatigue or irritation I did not know, he waved me away, and my first night with the bandits finally came to an end.

  The next day I was taken to a large room toward the front of the residence, where I began my brief career as bandit physician. The rolled-up rug I had seen in Hsiao Lao’s cabinet had been spread out on the floor of the room, a rich oriental tapestry of crimson and deep blue, far more beautiful than anything in our home in Kuang P’ing Ch’eng. A large old wooden table had been set on the rug, and boxes of Hsiao Lao’s confiscated medical supplies had been arranged around the table. A pair of worn Chinese cloth shoes lay on the floor and I put them on eagerly, as my bare feet felt raw.

  Along the walls were benches and crude chairs, where a few dozen bandits sat glowering at me. As they watched I began to take stock of my supplies, trying to look competent. My unfortunate patients passed the time by showing off their stolen possessions to one another, playing poker and fan-tan, cleaning their guns, and drinking hot rice wine from leather flasks.

  Their laughter and talking suddenly stopped, and when I turned from my boxes I found that Hsiao Lao had joined us. As he looked around him, he seemed very proud of the setup, and I could see he expected me to express my amazement, which I did. Then he stood before me, inhaled and exhaled deeply a few times, and said, “I would like an examination.”

  “Very well,” I said. “What is your complaint?”

  He stared at me blankly.

  “Your ailment?”

  “I have none,” he answered.

  “Then what is it I can do for you?”

  “Examine me,” he said impatiently, “so that my men will see what it is to be in perfect health and therefore be given proof of how rightly I live my life.”

  The bandits nodded as if they thought this wise. As there seemed to be only one way forward, I said I would be honored to give the bandit chief a thorough and modern western-style physical examination. I did not say that it was also the first I had ever performed.

  I started by gathering my tools: a stethoscope, thermometer, and package of tongue depressors. I set these things out carefully on a wooden crate and asked the bandit chief to lie down on the table, which he did with much show. I glanced at my audience and saw they were transfixed, and I thought how elated I would be with such rapt attention when I preached.

  I then began to do whatever I could think of to the bandit chief, not knowing exactly what I was doing, but not worrying about it much since he didn’t either. I started by pressing the stethoscope to his chest and listening to his heart. I nodded. “Very strong,” I said. “Like a tiger.”

  Hsiao Lao smiled proudly at his men, and once again they nodded.

  I pressed the stethoscope to his back and told him to breathe deeply as I listened to his lungs. “Excellent,” I said. “The lungs of a stallion.”

  Next I took the thermometer and explained to Hsiao Lao how to hold it under his tongue. I read his temperature and pronounced it perfect as well, then used the tongue depressor to look into his mouth. I did this quickly, as many of his teeth were black and his breath foul. Once again, I said all was well.

  During each of these tasks, Hsiao Lao regarded me as seriously as if he were gravely ill, then seemed elated and relieved by each assurance of good health. His men watched with equal parts apprehension and fascination, and cheered at my pronouncements.

  Lastly I placed my hands gently around the bandit chief’s neck. I saw a flash of suspicion in his eyes, but as I began to check the glands under his jaw and in his neck, he relaxed. “Once again, perfect,” I said finally, and I turned to the men. “Your leader is indeed in excellent health.” At this the men began to cheer as loudly as if a great victory had been won, and the bandit chief stood and smiled broadly at them, relishing their praise. What was odd was that I was telling the truth, for while I was no doctor, I knew enough to know that despite the foul breath and awful teeth, the bandit chief truly was in good health, all the more remarkable because of the life he lived.

  When the men were quiet, Hsiao Lao looked at them somberly. “A man’s good health is his gift to himself,” he said. “A leader’s good health is his gift to his men.” He announced that I was a wise healer, then he glared at his men and told them to obey my instructions, and finally he left.

  Then his men and I were left alone, and my real work began, for unlike their leader they had complaints that were all too real, and I spent that day treating one man after another. I lanced their boils and cleaned their cuts and sores, swabbed their throats, and applied hot compresses and ointment to their bloodshot eyes. I treated mouth sores, scabies, ringworm, and intestinal parasites. Many of them had bullet wounds, some minor, others that should have been fatal, and I addressed the gastric complaints caused by the constant use of opium, for the majority of the men were addicts. But unlike most opium addicts, who were emaciated and skeletal, these men were strong and hardy, which was even more remarkable given their hard lives.

  As I treated each man, all the while praying I wasn’t killing any of them, those waiting their turn watched warily. I desperately tried to recall the hours I had spent assisting Katherine, and sometimes I imagined her watching me. The alarm I knew she would feel at the idea of me acting as physician was the only thought that made me smile.

  July 21, 1917

  Will has been gone for nine days, the longest he has ever been away. I expected him home three days ago, but a letter was left at the gate during the night—by whom we don’t know—in which he says he is safe but that he has been ill and will be home in four weeks. This has never happened before, and while Chung Hao tells me that all is well and that mu shih is most certainly needed somewhere for legitimate reasons, I am not convinced.

  This morning as I sat with Mo Yun at breakfast, I stared out at the courtyard, waiting to see Chung Hao come toward the house with news of Will. I had no interest in my meal. Without looking at me, Mo Yun pushed my bowl an inch closer to me, then continued eating in silence. I pushed the bowl away. She pushed it toward me again. Once more I pushed it away.

  Again she pushed it toward me. Then she said, “Worrying this way does you no good, Mei Li. It is drinking poison to quench your thirst. I know that I am young in my faith and there is much I do not know, but of this I am certain: if your fears rob you of your strength and conquer your heart, it is the people of Kuang P’ing Ch’eng who will pay the price. Surely you do not wish to punish them.” She nudged the bowl a little closer to me. “You must eat. If not for yourself, then for them.”

  I started to reply, to ask her crossly when had she lost a child and possibly a husband, but before the words left my mouth I tasted their self-pity and recalled that the woman speaking to me has buried not one but three children and has felt such pain that she wanted to end her life. In fact, nearly everyone I know in Kuang P’ing Ch’eng has known more loss than I, and I saw that even now my life is blessed.

  So I ate, and today I gave myself to my work wit
h a concentration I have not felt since before Lily’s death, and therein found some relief for my anguish.

  For many days after that I treated one man after another. I prayed each morning to do God’s will, then treated men who had burned whole villages, stolen from us, and demanded extortion money from peasants who had never in their lives had enough to eat. My ministrations were often given through clenched teeth and with an angry and bitter heart. But each morning when I asked God for the grace to obey Him, I remembered a story from my childhood. A man sees a blacksmith hammering a sheet of metal. The bystander, after watching the blacksmith’s efforts for some time, says, “Schlag nur zu. Es gibt eine Schaufel”—“Keep knocking away, a shovel is taking shape.”

  I estimated that somewhere around eighty men lived in that strange house, and as I saw at least a dozen men a day, I thought my work would soon be done, and I hoped I might then be able to persuade the bandit chief to release me. But I was mistaken, for the bandits surprised me: they liked being treated. Day after day I found them waiting for me, sometimes with new complaints, sometimes just wanting me to repeat whatever I’d done before, seemingly on the theory that if a little was good, more was better. I also began to suspect they were becoming hypochondriacs, for some of them invented new and vague illnesses that tended to disappear the moment I applied ointment to whatever part of their body they claimed was hurting.

  As I spent time with them, I began to know them. Some were just local hoodlums; some were farmers who saw stealing and kidnapping as quick ways to make money. Others had had no other way to make a living and found themselves forced into banditry by necessity, or they were ex-soldiers who, after going for months without pay, left their units and joined whatever bandit gang was strongest. Their main topic of conversation was opium: how much they had and when they might get more. On the days when their supplier brought his usual amount—two hundred egg-sized lumps wrapped in oiled paper—the bandits were cheerful and content. But there was no guarantee as to the quantity: soldiers sometimes confiscated much of the region’s available opium, in which case the supplier might bring half or less of the normal quantity. At such times, the bandits were like men possessed, wailing and shouting and abusing one another until dawn.

  Each evening after delivering my ministrations, I was returned to my small room until Hsiao Lao demanded my company. In my cell, I was given a bowl of moldy-tasting boiled corn and water from an earthenware jug that looked ancient. Most of the time Hsiao Lao ate what his men ate, but there were exceptions. One day he grandly offered to share with me some half-cooked pig tripe, which I could not stomach. Another time he gave me soup with pieces of tough meat that he said was “young cow” but which I learned from my jailer was Shantung dog, and still another time he offered me a thin flat kaoliang cake stuffed with boiled scorpions minus their stingers and shells. I refused these and ate only what the men ate, partly because I couldn’t tolerate Hsiao Lao’s offerings, but also because I knew they were stolen. When I mentioned this to him he only shrugged, but the next night when he sent for me, he smiled. “I have solved your problem. You may eat our eggs. Those we do not steal. We raise the chickens ourselves.” Then he handed me an egg, took one himself, poked small holes in both ends of the shell, and sucked out its contents. He motioned for me to do the same, saying, “Eggs bring longevity.” I refused at first, but Hsiao Lao regarded me sternly and said, “Surely you are not so foolish, mu shih. Is a long life not something you hope for? If not, I can arrange otherwise.”

  His bluntness surprised me. I took the egg from him, not for longevity but for protein. “If you kill an American, Hsiao Lao, will your life not be short as well?”

  For a tense moment he glared at me. Then he began to laugh as if both of our lives were a wonderful joke. From that night on, he gave me an egg each night.

  His attire each evening was a puzzle I had to stare at for some moments to decipher, with each ensemble stranger than the last and accessorized with jewelry, belts, scarves, and sashes worn in all kinds of strange ways. One night he wore a bowler hat, a silk kimono, and a mohair scarf tied around his waist; the next night he appeared in a cardigan sweater, pajamas, and a straw hat. Along with the rifle across his lap, the only certainty was that he would be wearing some kind of hat. Had I seen a photograph of him, I would have thought him comical, but the rifle and his unpredictable moods made me take him quite seriously. I had the feeling he put a great deal of thought into his ensembles and that he hoped to impress me, and I complimented him on his choices. I admired his foreign shoes, his wristwatch (which was mine and which I showed him how to wind), his necktie, and whatever else he wore. He was the only one who dressed in this fashion; his men might wear a trinket or two, some new possession of which they were particularly proud, but their clothes were limited to layers of loose brownish-gray rags whose original shapes and colors I could no longer discern.

  August 4, 1917

  Twenty-three days and no word. I read and reread Will’s brief letter, looking for some clue I didn’t see before, but I find none. I try to think of good reasons for his being away but can’t, and I become convinced that he is in danger and that I am going to lose both of them, first her and now him, which terrifies me. I was raised to believe that a loving God directs my steps and that, for those who love God, all things work together for their good. But each morning when I wake and remember my circumstances, I question Him: This is Your design for my life, this agonizing subtraction?

  I want help. I want someone to go looking for my husband, I want to send out the cavalry, I want good news, I want him home. But there is nothing; no action to take, no one to send, no news—no Will. All I can do is wait and pray, and when I have ranted and raved in my mind and worn myself out, I ask God to receive me again.

  My faith feels tattered and threadbare and I am ashamed. What good is it if it does not see me through pain? But a scrap of faith is better than nothing, so I cling to it tightly. With as much trust as I can muster, I ask Him for the thousandth time to keep my dear one safe. Somehow the day passes and I am able to be useful, and at night He lets me sleep. In the morning we begin again.

  During the hours I spent with my host (mostly in the middle of the night, owing to his insomnia), we discussed a wide range of subjects. There was much he wanted to know about America—the distance from my country to the moon, what we ate, how we lived, what kinds of guns we used, how we protected ourselves from foreigners, what our city walls were made of. He wanted to know what my life had been like when I was young, and whether I was wealthy. When I told him I wasn’t and that I would not bring any ransom at all since our mission, like many, refused to pay ransoms, the bandit chief became indignant. This was most offensive, he said; how could I not be wealthy, given my extensive knowledge of western medicine? He said he was most ashamed for me; it was a great affront that I was not worth a large sum of money.

  He also wanted to know about this God I believed in. When I learned that the bandit chief could read, I gave him copies of the Psalms and New Testament in Mandarin. Hsiao Lao seemed to understand the Psalms, which, I told him, were written by a great warrior. I also told him stories of Christ’s life. These stories amused and fascinated him, and at times he seemed even wistful as he listened. “You are fortunate indeed,” he said once, “to have someone such as this as your God, mu shih.” But when I explained that this same God was his Father as well as mine, the bandit chief only shook his head.

  On the nights he didn’t ask questions, Hsiao Lao held forth about his own life and philosophy. He was articulate and intelligent, and he could be charming when he wished. He was a skilled storyteller, very theatrical and a good mimic of the people he described. He had a gentle side that I did not see often, but which was genuine; when he looked at his son, I saw the same love in his expression that I had felt for my daughter. He was also cruel, impetuous, moody, and selfish, but he did not see these qualities in himself; he considered himself a man of reason, passion, and action, and what I c
onsidered superstition he believed was innate wisdom given him by the gods. He demanded complete and uncompromising loyalty from his men, and he severely punished the slightest aberration. A bandit who, when I had successfully treated his trachoma, came to me after nightfall to tell me I was the wisest man he had ever met was found dead the next morning. Another came to me with a large package of opium that he wanted me to sell in Peking for him so he could go to America. When I said I could not do this, he looked completely without hope, and he too was found dead the next day. If I mentioned these deaths to Hsiao Lao, he became angry and would not discuss them.

  While it is true that he terrified me, he also fascinated me, and late in the day when I had seen to my unfortunate patients as best I could, I found I looked forward to his summons.

  August 8, 1917

  Since Lily’s passing, I have many moments when I think she is here. It can be anything—a bundle of clean laundry on the bed whose curved shape is so like that of her body when she was wrapped in a blanket; the sight of a mother carrying her own baby, though the child looks nothing like mine; the sound of mourning doves cooing on the tile roof, so like the sounds she made. For a moment I am elated; I think there has been an awful mistake and that she is here. Then I see the laundry or the other child or the doves, and I remember that she is no longer on this earth, and my heart contracts.