Old Town

by Lin Zhe

  The doctor’s fervent prayer moved Division Commander Zhang. All along, he had thought that the doctor was cowardly and weak and that he sought the god’s help as a protective charm, like those men and women believers all burning incense in the temples, knocking their heads on the ground, and praying for blessings and wealth for themselves only. As the doctor said, “Amen,” and got up to return to camp, the division commander called out to him.

  “Dr. Lin, your god still hasn’t moved me, but you have. Thank you for asking for blessings and peace for me. All right then, let’s have a talk about your god. Can he really do anything? And how’s he any different from Bodhisattva who’s worshipped by the common folk?”

  The doctor felt his heart turn over. O Lord! You heard my prayer and have answered my request!

  “Division Commander, if you have been moved, that was nothing at all of my doing. It was God, Jesus, who moved you.”

  With great feeling, the doctor told the story of Jesus, of how that infant, born in a manger, redeemed the sins of men with his own blood. He is the Way, the Truth, and the Life.”

  The division commander only half-believed all this. He thought: In over ten years of military life, I’ve killed men like flies. In the world of men, I am a hero of outstanding achievements. But if there really is a heaven and a hell after death, how will I be dealt with then? When the day comes that I get in the way of a bullet and bite the dust, will the vengeful spirits and wandering ghosts of all those who died under my rifle come looking to settle the score? Since Jesus can forgive sins, why not just believe in him?

  “Doctor, I suppose you have to go to church before you can believe in Jesus?”

  “No, at this very moment you can believe in him. If in your heart and voice you just receive Jesus as your savior, you can gain everlasting life.”

  “OK, I believe in Jesus with my heart and voice.”

  The doctor prayed happily for the division commander. Raising his head, he gazed at the early light breaking magnificently across the horizon. Surely, that is the Lord Jesus showing his approval of me. The Lord has sent me to the army not only to save the lives of the wounded but also to bring more people to everlasting life. This is such a great mission. Ninth Brother felt for a moment he had changed into something extraordinary.

  This day on the march, Ninth Brother wrote a letter to Second Sister, telling of how he had wavered in doubt, how every day he had cried thinking of her and the children who were now all alone. This showed how weak his faith was. He had forgotten what the Bible said: “Everything is God’s will.” God led him to join the army in order to use him. Ninth Brother asked his wife to pray fervently, and in her prayer to remember him, to make his faith all the more steadfast.

  2.

  WHEN THE TROOPS marched into Shandong, they received their battle orders. A division of the Guomindang Army, trapped by Japanese artillery fire, had suffered heavy casualties and was in grave danger. Division Commander Zhang had to lead his troops into an attack from the south and break through the enemy forces to rescue his brother unit.

  The battle command post and the medical station were set up in the home of some local moneybags. That man and his family and everybody in the village had all fled. The sounds of rifles and artillery were now nearby. Ownerless chickens, ducks, pigs, and dogs were running crazily about on the dusty dirt roads.

  This was Dr. Lin’s first time on a battlefield and, in his inevitable terror, his hands couldn’t stop trembling as he set up the temporary first aid station. In his appointment by the division commander as head of the medical station, his only orderly was “Young” Li. Moving with the army up from the south had taught Young Li some rough knowledge of battlefield surgery. In medical college, Dr. Lin had specialized in internal medicine, but would he be able to cope with this? As he looked at the white bed sheets spread over the few camp cots, he thought of the bloody scenes to come when the wounded were brought in with their shattered limbs. Cold sweat beaded on his forehead as a feeling of helplessness spread through him. Ever since he was little, Ninth Brother had feared the sight of blood. When he was an intern honing his skills in the surgery practicum, the moment the senior surgeon’s scalpel made its incision and blood spurted out of the cut in the patient’s abdomen, Ninth Brother’s stomach would revolt and, with a sensation of floating, he’d just about keel over. Now that he was a military doctor, he realized seeing blood would be a far more serious test than just thinking about home.

  Young Li quickly finished the work at hand and, coming to attention in front of Ninth Brother, said, “Reporting to the station head. Everything is now in proper readiness!”

  Ninth Brother said, “Let us both say a prayer.”

  Ninth Brother had nurtured Young Li into becoming his first fellow believer in the army. As a child, Young Li had known only misery and suffering in a mountain district near Old Town. He had never gone to school. It was only because Station Head Lin was a good man that he had been willing to follow his beliefs.

  “O Lord, please bless and protect this little medical station. And please give us the fortitude and ability to give the very best treatment to every one of the wounded.”

  “Amen,” said Division Commander Zhang as he walked in. “Brothers, neither of you have seen real battle, right? Don’t be afraid. You’ll be safe with me here. Even if something unexpected happens, we can always meet in heaven.”

  When he said, “Heaven,” the mouth of the division commander spread in a mocking smile. He still only partly believed.

  A bomb exploded not far off. All around was in utter confusion. The roof beam, doors, and windows shook with each blow. Dirt and waste fell and thickly layered the newly spread white bed sheets.

  The two armies were exchanging fire. The bloody battle had started.

  Just as the division commander was about to head out the door, the first stretcher was brought in. The wounded soldier was covered in blood, just like someone pulled out of a vat of dye. The doctor had no idea where he had been hit and, with his scissors, cut through the blood-soaked uniform with delicate and refined motions. Watching alongside, the division commander stamped his foot in growing agitation. “What the…! You’re an army doctor! This is a battlefield! Don’t act like some big girl stitching flowers.” And as he said this, he reached out and wiped off some blood from the soldier’s face. “He’s no longer breathing! So quit the useless work!”

  His hands covered with fresh blood, Dr. Lin just stood there blankly. He felt angry and hurt at the division commander’s insensitivity. This was someone’s life!

  The pungent smell of blood was a poison gas that made his heart race double time and his head giddy. The division commander saw his face turn ashen and the sweat drip from his nose and this just added to his fury. “I really never thought you’d be so useless. What made you think you had it in you to do this sort of thing? Just go home when the battle’s over!”

  The second stretcher was carried in. The soldier’s legs had been blown off and these, with parts of their shoes still on them, had been placed alongside him. Blood was still spurting out of him.

  The doctor clenched his fists and shouted, “Help me, Lord!” The words were no sooner out than it was as if some force thrust him aside, making him a bystander, and, as the saying goes, “watching a battle from the ramparts.” He saw a pair of bright red hands pick up a forceps and lightly probe this way and that searching for the blood vessel in all the gore. After he had finished ligating and sewing, the doctor’s face was covered with a film that spread all over in a dark red scab.

  The third wounded soldier suddenly sat up on the operating table and fell over dead.

  The fourth one’s stomach had been split open, his intestines flowing out over the entire stretcher and stinking to the high heavens.

  The division commander was just then in the rear courtyard pacing back and forth inside the command post. Looking abruptly into the first aid station set up in the front room, he saw the curtain, bed sheets, and t
he doctor’s overcoat all dyed red with blood. The doctor was holding the gleaming white intestines in both his hands, his face totally without expression. He looked like a professional butcher. Where did that scholar suddenly get this courage? Just a moment ago, he was shaking and shivering all over.

  Stretchers with their wounded covered the ground. One by one, those with serious injuries died. Late that night, combat faded away and stopped. The doctor looked at one after the other of the stiffening corpses, thinking that as strangers dying in a strange land, they would become solitary wraiths and wandering ghosts. He felt guilt and pain that he had not been able to save their souls.

  This battle was one of the defeats. After their encircled fellow unit broke out, the division commander received the order to withdraw. Immediately afterward, the several dozen hamlets surrounding the village they had set up in were occupied by the Japanese.

  The doctor was totally unaware of the military situation and supposed that their own soldiers were driving off the Japanese troops and everything was safe and sound here. Before withdrawing, he took Young Li with him to the well and got water to splash off the bloodstains inside the building. The division commander, who had been waiting impatiently in his vehicle, rushed in and hauled the doctor out, calling him a bookworm.

  The gunfire to their rear was now continuous. The doctor asked the division commander, “How come fighting’s still going on?”

  “A company’s been left behind to cover us.”

  “Then what about the wounded?”

  “This is what’s called ‘losing a few to save the army.’ They’re in heaven’s hands now.”

  “I should stay behind. I’m a doctor and I’ve learned a bit of Japanese. They shouldn’t do anything to me.”

  “Don’t talk nonsense. I’m not about to let you leave me!”

  “If the battle isn’t over yet, why are we withdrawing?”

  The division commander laughed harshly, “You know the saying: ‘A scholar meets a soldier—reason can say nothing to force.’ Here I am, a soldier, meeting a scholar, and I’m the one who can’t say anything. Just let’s get going out of here!”

  After several hours, their unit regrouped and rested by a small river. Both officers and men stripped bare and washed in the stream. The doctor waded in, still wearing his uniform. An officer with a northern accent shouted out, “Hey, doc, strip off yer duds!” Several guys laughed and reached out for him, scaring him so much he ran several yards off. Northerners seemed to have a kind of primitive frankness about their own bodies. Twenty or thirty men could strip naked and sleep all bunched together on one kang.13 At night it wasn’t uncommon to see a totally naked man relieving himself by the base of a wall or on a tree root. The first time he confronted “sky bodies” in the camp was when there was a midnight emergency. Still half-asleep, the doctor bumped into a row of men on a large kang, none of whom had a stitch on. He was so embarrassed he blushed like a girl. Backing out the door, he told them to put on some clothing. For a while, this incident became a big joke throughout the unit. Nowadays, although he was no longer shocked by such things, he still couldn’t manage that kind of “frankness and sincerity” with them.

  The doctor went over to a shady spot under some nearby trees and, wading into the water, washed away the bloodstains from his body. A streak of red spread and drifted on the surface of the river. Looking at the blood clots he was scrubbing from the ends of his hair, he wondered: Whose blood had that been? Is he now dead or alive? In two days, he had seen far too much fresh blood and too many dead men. His ability to be so unmoved at the reek of blood surprised him. It was just war, brutal war. In just one day, it could take a person and forge him into someone else.

  He sat on the riverbank and took out of his haversack the half letter he had written before the battle. He purposely changed to a fountain pen with dark ink. “Dear Second Sister, here is a letter which I didn’t finish writing. The fighting began, and for two short days and nights, I passed between life and death. With my own eyes, I saw the evil and destruction of this world. I am a different person now, it would seem. I want to tell you everything, bit by bit, to make you mentally prepared; otherwise, someday later on when we meet, you won’t recognize your husband. The bloodletting of war knows no pity. Anything at all could happen. You are a strong woman. If only you would become even stronger and not be afraid. We Christians have always seen death as a return home.”

  Mail was still flowing between Old Town and Jiangxi Province. But leaving Jiangxi, there was nowhere to post the seven or eight letters he wrote along the way. Nonetheless, he persisted in writing something to her at every place they stopped.

  3.

  THE TROOPS THAT had marched out from Old Town continued their way north. They fought and marched and marched and fought the whole way. Every battle they were ordered to fight in was still little stuff, cut-and-thrust flanking attacks, and never anything head-on with the Japanese army. The generalissimo wanted this force to conserve its strength and then rush into Henan Province to lead a major attack.

  While the troops were stationed in a small market town on the Anhui and Henan provincial border awaiting orders, each meal in the camp was like the Last Supper—no one knew what the next day would bring. “If this morning we have wine, this morning we’ll drink it,” as the saying goes, and life became one great debauchery of eating, drinking, whoring, and gambling.

  The division commander seemed to realize that Henan would be his burial ground. Every evening he would invite the doctor for a heart-to-heart talk over cups of wine. After he had passed his test of fire, this scrawny student of a doctor was no longer the object of the division commander’s scorn. In fact, as time passed, the more the division commander trusted him. There was nothing, affairs of state or matters of home, that they didn’t touch on in their discussions.

  One day they talked about the current political situation. The division commander lowered his voice, “Do you know why ‘Old Chiang’14 has his heart so set on Henan?”

  The doctor shook his head. “That’s where the communists’ influence is stronger than ours. The old boy just doesn’t live in reality.”

  “Haven’t the communists and the Guomindang agreed to work together against the Japanese?”

  “You’re still the bookworm. What emperor of any dynasty was ever willing to clasp his hands in front of him and cede half the land? Just you wait, sooner or later, those two sides, the Guomindang and the communists, will start fighting each other.”

  “You mean there’ll be a civil war? Would you join in a civil war?”

  The division commander took off his barracks cap and flung it aside. “Don’t know.”

  The doctor respectfully raised the wine cup in both his hands. “Eldest Brother Zhang, listen to my word of advice. Don’t go and fight your own countrymen. It’s a sin and it will keep you out of heaven.”

  “I can’t think that far ahead. Who knows the day I will join the ranks of the martyrs? Ai! I have no father or mother. Right now, you’re the one I am most concerned about. If I die, just go on back home! There’ll never be another senior officer who would look after you the way I have. Some are wilder than bandits. If they’re in a bad mood, they’ll shoot you and make up some report against you to their superiors. And then your family wouldn’t even be able to get the condolence pension.”

  From what the division commander said in such a casual way, the doctor reflected on his most weighty relationships. Having been born into a big family, he had a multitude of siblings and Eldest Brother was thirty years older than he was. But he had never known any brotherly relationship as deeply affectionate as this one. When he imagined the division commander fallen in a pool of blood, the rims of his eyes reddened and he said in a breaking voice, “I will pray for you and ask the Lord to have mercy on you.”

  The division commander let out a great laugh. “So! Your guts can still churn. I thought that in your heart you were now the Indestructible Adamantine! Hey, can’t we sti
ll meet again up there with Jesus? Right! There are a few small gold pieces in my leather handbag. When I take my last breath, they’re yours. Don’t forget to buy a little wine from time to time and have a drink on me.”

  The doctor wanted to follow up with something funny, like In heaven there are fine wines and luminous cups, but he couldn’t squeeze a smile out of his tight expression.

  Those bandits acting as soldiers that the division commander spoke of were everywhere. One time there was a battalion commander who wanted to be treated for a headache. When Young Li was a bit slow in moving, the officer suddenly pulled out his pistol and brought it up against the orderly’s head. To meet such an enlightened, chivalrous, and kindhearted officer like Division Commander Zhang was really a blessing sent from heaven. O Lord, please bless and protect Division Commander Zhang. This unit couldn’t do without him.

  The Carnival of the Doomed in this little market town went on for about a month. The war had become distant and hazy and officers and men freely squandered every last bit of their pay. The postal routes had been paralyzed for several months now, so there could be no remittances home. The soldiers knew full well that hundreds of miles beyond the flames of war their families waited to put rice in their cooking pots and they wanted to help them, but they couldn’t. So it would be better just to use what time was left to have as much fun as they could. Physically they lived in drunken debauchery; spiritually they were already dead. The doctor took Young Li with him and went canvassing up and down the ranks, telling everyone that death was another kind of beginning, that with the Lord Jesus there was forever a tomorrow. All the officers and men laughed at them and called them crazy. A drunken captain had heard that Jesus could perform miracles. He laughed wildly from a gaping mouth of yellowed teeth. “Have Jesus make me a woman to sleep with and I’ll believe!”

  One day, the division commander discovered that the hard grain liquor he had been drinking was watered down. Bored and irritated, he wanted to pick a quarrel and blow his stack, so, taking his orderly along, he went into town looking for the little shop that had sold the drink. Running the shop was a young widow, not bad looking and charming indeed. In no time at all, she had laid low this fierce tiger, this hero of a hundred battles, in her little garret. Thus were struck the sparks of love between the solitary man and the widow.