Red Scarf Girl

by Ji-Li Jiang

  I had the window over the sink open, and warm air blew over my face as I rinsed the vegetables and put the rice on the stove.

  I heard steps on the stairs, and thought it was Mom coming back from the doctor. But when I turned around I saw Dad. I shouted. Grandma and Ji-yun came running out the door. As we met on the landing, Dad lifted his arms to embrace us. Then he immediately lowered them and glanced over his shoulder at the two stern men who were right behind him. Ji-yong pounded up the stairs and pushed between the men, then stopped.

  “I came… to get some clothes,” Dad said.

  “Aren’t you coming back to stay?” Ji-yong asked, and we all looked at Dad. He just shook his head.

  “We’re going to have shrimp,” Ji-yun announced hopefully.

  Grandma started to say something, then looked at Dad’s two escorts and shut her mouth. She hurried away to open the chest, and the rest of us followed Dad slowly into the apartment. Even Ji-yun was silent now.

  It had been three months since I had seen him last. He looked smaller. His old blue jacket hung loosely on his body, and his back stooped wearily. His shaggy hair hung over his collar, and the black stubble on his face made his eyes seem even more sunken.

  We all looked at each other, wanting to ask so many questions but not daring to say anything in front of the guards. Grandma hurried up and laid a pile of clothes on the table. Her hands shook, and so did Dad’s as he took the bag she handed him. He slowly sorted through the clothes and put some of them in his bag.

  Something wet fell on the bag.

  I looked up. A tear rolled down Dad’s cheek, and another. He wiped it away, but as soon as he did, another took its place.

  I had never seen Dad cry before. Soon I was crying too, and so was Ji-yun. We all wept along with him.

  “Let’s go. Bring your clothes,” one of the men ordered.

  Dad picked up his bag and looked at us. “I’m going. Be good. Tell your mother to take care of herself.” He turned toward Grandma but then turned his eyes away. “Good-bye, Mother.” He quickly followed the two men down the stairs.

  We clung to each other as we watched him go. We all dashed up to the roof to watch him walk down the alley. He walked a little in front of his escorts. The triangle made by the three heads grew smaller and smaller.

  “Dad!” Ji-yun finally shouted, but he had already vanished around the corner.

  A week passed and Dad still had not come home. And no one knew why.

  As I came up the stairs after school, Mom was just seeing a man and a woman out the door. I had never seen them before, and I immediately wondered if they had come with news about Dad. Leaning weakly on the doorframe, Mom politely said, “Please take care,” several times, but the visitors went straight downstairs without making any response.

  I walked into the room and saw two cups of tea on the table, no longer hot but obviously untouched. Grandma had collapsed in the old rattan chair, not moving, her face pale and filled with despair. Mom sat down and leaned limply against the back of her chair. Her eyes were closed and she said nothing. I could not bring myself to ask what had happened. I fiddled with the cold teacups, more and more nervous.

  After a long while Mom gestured for me to sit down beside her.

  “Yesterday’s Workers’ Revolt had an article on the front page about the Jiang family.” She had to stop for breath. “It said that the Jiangs were a big landlord family in Nanjing that owned over thirty-three hundred acres of land and lots of businesses. They were so rich that people called them the ‘Half-City Jiangs.’ Would you go buy a paper? I want to look at it.”

  I blinked my eyes in confusion but could not get up.

  Mom nodded in the direction of the untouched teacups on the table. “The people who were just here came to investigate. Your cousins were mentioned in the article, and they wanted to know more about them… .”

  I did not hear the rest of what Mom was saying. My mind was swimming. “Half-City Jiangs” and “thirty-three hundred acres of land”! Everybody read the Workers’ Revolt. Suddenly I pictured my teachers and classmates reading the sensational article, passing it around and gossiping about it. “Jiang Ji-li’s family is the Half-City Jiangs… thirty-three hundred acres of land.” Somehow I found myself standing up, a teacup in my hand, and a puddle of spilled tea on the table.

  Why had my parents hidden these things from me? What else was there? Had Dad really committed a crime? Why hadn’t the theater let him come home? Anger rose in me. Didn’t they know how hard I’d been working to overcome my family background? Now all my efforts were wasted.

  “I hate landlords. I hate this landlord family,” I burst out. They were the first words I had spoken since I got home.

  As I turned to leave, I saw tears welling out of Mom’s closed eyes.

  I had not talked to Mom for two days. If she asked me to help set the table or to call Ji-yong to dinner, I did it, but I did not say a word to her. Every time I looked at her, I saw the tears welling out of her eyes, but I could not apologize.

  As usual, I walked past the police station on the way home from school. When I was past it and almost to the corner, I stopped. I hesitated for a long time, then turned back.

  It was lunchtime. There was no one in the street in front of the police station. The red light beside the gate seemed to welcome me.

  I timidly looked inside. The room was so dark that I could not see whether anyone was there or not. I started to turn away. I could come back another time, I told myself.

  I heard Pudge’s snide voice again. “Jiang Ji-li, is your family related to Chiang Kai-shek too?” My other classmates had stood in excited knots, looking at me over their shoulders, before turning back to their gossip. I remembered the jeering chant of the neighborhood boys who had followed me down the alley: “Half-City Jiangs! Half-City Jiangs! Down with the landlord Half-City Jiangs!”

  No! I did not want to have this damned name anymore! I had had enough. All my bad luck and humiliation came from the name Jiang. I had seen stories in the paper about people who had changed their names. They had started life anew. If I just dropped my family name, I could be named Ji Li and be lucky, just as it meant.

  I stepped forward. “Comrade?” I called toward the dark reception room. No one answered.

  I looked at the directory and headed up the stairs to the household registration office.

  The sign on the door said, RESIDENCE REGISTRATION, and below that was an even larger sign that said, NO ENTRANCE WITHOUT PERMISSION. There was a barred window about two feet square and a huge slogan, which occupied one whole wall: CLASS STRUGGLE IS THE KEY.

  I looked through the window. The office was empty, but the lights were on, and I could hear a radio playing behind a plywood partition.

  “Comrade.”

  There was no answer.

  “Comrade?” I raised my voice and knocked loudly on the counter.

  A chair moved inside the office, and a man came out from behind the plywood partition. It was Officer Ma, the policeman in charge of residence registration for our neighborhood.

  “What do you want?” he asked impatiently before he even looked at me. “Can’t you let me have lunch in peace?” He waved his chopsticks at me.

  “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m terribly sorry,” I said, shrinking back with my schoolbag in front of me like a shield.

  “What is it?” He stared down at me through the window, picking his teeth with his finger.

  “I can wait until you’ve finished lunch,” I said apologetically.

  “I asked you what you want, but I don’t care if you don’t want to tell me.” He turned around.

  “Wait! I… I want to change my name,” I said timidly.

  “What?”

  “I want to change my name.”

  “Change your name? Why?” He picked his teeth again.

  “I… I don’t have a good class status. So I want to change my family name.”

  He took his finger out of his mouth and beg
an to pay attention. “Good. Revolutionary action.” He opened the door. “Come in, come in. I’ll be ready in no time.”

  I looked at him nervously. When he came into our alley, he held his head high and spoke in domineering tones. He seemed to swagger, and enjoyed having power. I did not trust this sudden friendliness.

  He pointed me to a chair. “Making a clean break with your black family, that’s good. We absolutely support you.”

  Break with my family? I did not understand him.

  “Chairman Mao says you can’t choose your class status but you can choose your future. You couldn’t choose the family you were born into, but now that you’ve grown up, it’s time for you to choose your future. You can tell your parents you’ll follow Chairman Mao, not them. If they give you any trouble, just come here and tell us. We’ll go to their work units and hold struggle meetings against them… .”

  He went on and on, waving his chopsticks. I was totally confused. I had only wanted to break with all those landlords in my family, not with Mom and Dad. Would changing my name mean breaking off relations with them? I thought of Aunt Xi-wen lying in the alley, and Shan-shan walking right past her.

  “Well, I’ll go wash my hands and be back to register you in a minute.” He walked out of the office.

  I sat in the empty room, picturing telling Mom and Dad that I had changed my name.

  I jumped up and ran out.

  The street was still the same. The sun was shining warmly, and there were few people in sight. I slowly loosened my fist from the strap of my schoolbag. It was dripping with sweat.

  I was still sweating as I walked in our back door. On the stairs I could hear Grandma talking to someone.

  “Please don’t. You shouldn’t do that. Please.”

  I stopped and listened.

  “Please give me the mop. When you do this, it makes us feel guilty.” Grandma’s voice was anxious now.

  I knew who she was talking to then. Song Po-po must have come to mop the stairs. Ever since Dad had been detained, she had been doing things for us again. When we were not watching, she came and mopped the stairs. Every few days she bought some vegetables for us, and sometimes she even washed them and chopped them. Grandma tried to stop her, but Song Po-po would not listen.

  “Mrs. Jiang, don’t worry. It’s nothing, I just do it when I don’t have anything to do. I did it for so long, I just can’t get used to not doing it. Besides, you’re having hard times right now and you need help. Don’t worry, I won’t let anybody see me.”

  It sounded like Grandma went into the apartment. I was sure Song Po-po had gone back to her mopping.

  Suddenly I found myself weeping. What everyone else was saying about us did not make any difference to Song Po-po. She treated us just the way she always used to. Life couldn’t be easy for her either, since she no longer had a job, but she was still concerned about others. I felt ashamed. I had been selfish and inconsiderate. Life was difficult for me, but it was even more difficult for Mom. How could I think of hurting her this way?

  I heard Song Po-po go back into her room. I ran in and gave her a hug.

  “Be careful, child, be careful. I’m just bringing this bowl of soup to your mother.”

  “I’ll take it,” I said.

  THE CLASS EDUCATION EXHIBITION

  The mournful sound of a Chinese fiddle echoed around the booths in the school exhibition hall.

  It’s only a preview, I thought. I was a veteran of many speech contests and I should not have been so nervous. But the school leaders and district leaders were coming to evaluate us, and because of that article in the Workers’ Revolt, the preview became especially important to me.

  The article had been like a bomb blowing holes in my life. In our alley, at school, and at Mom’s office people gossiped about our family. I had thought I was going to be kicked out of the exhibition. Each night as I lay in bed, I told myself that I would rather quit than be rejected; I would talk to Chang Hong the next day. Then each day in school I had been seized by a new determination not to give in to pressure. I knew that I could represent the class better than anyone else. Why should I quit? Why let those old landlords ruin my life? Finally I had decided. Everyone already knew the worst about me. Let them think what they would. I would do an excellent job to prove myself. I had to win my honor back.

  The exhibition hall seemed like a new building. The partitions between the cafeteria and the gym had been taken down, and the space had been redivided into twelve booths. The pictures, photos, drawings, and clay statues displayed in each booth gave the hall a strong serious atmosphere. I was narrating the part on the horrors of the old China.

  “Now let’s look at two more of Liu Wen-cai’s slaves,” I said, gesturing to the statues of the infamous landlord and his victims.

  “This is the blind old grandfather. Every day, in bitter cold or in scorching sun, his little granddaughter led him out to beg for their food. With the little food that he managed to receive, how could he repay his debt to the landlord? Each year the debt increased. Finally, Liu Wen-cai forced him to give his granddaughter in payment. How could he do that? She was his eyes, his whole life. But what else could he do to escape from this brutal landlord? With tears in his sightless eyes, he said to her, ‘My dearest, you must go with Mr. Liu. It is not because I do not love you, it is that black-hearted landlord who is tearing us apart.’” My voice trembled slightly, and I became more and more emotional as I spoke.

  “The poor granddaughter had never been separated from her grandfather before. He was the one who tucked her quilt around her each night, and he was the one who comforted her when she cried.” I pointed to the statues. “Look at her, crying piteously as she is pulled away by the landlord, her hand stretching out to her grandfather.…”

  I was nearly in tears as 1 finished my presentation. Dozens of evaluators were wiping their eyes as Teacher Yu moved them on to the next booth. Even Bai Shan, who was in charge of the exhibit’s design and had heard my presentation several times in rehearsal, was blinking back tears.

  I heaved a long sigh and collapsed onto my stool. I wiped my sweaty hands on my pants and picked up a book to fan myself.

  “Ji-li.” I heard someone outside the window calling me. I raised the bamboo blind and saw An Yi and Lin-lin.

  “What are you doing here?”

  “We wanted to see your presentation, but they wouldn’t let us in. We had to stand here and listen to you. You did a terrific job!” An Yi’s face was glowing.

  “It’s true. You were very good.” Lin-lin was more reserved but just as sincere.

  “Well, it’s such a touching story that anyone could make it work.” I leaned farther out the window.

  Someone patted me on the back.

  “What are you doing? Get in here! Chairman Jin is coming.”

  Hastily I drew back inside. The visitors who had just left were standing in front of me again. Chang Hong whispered to me, “Chairman Jin wants to talk to you.”

  I shivered. I knew this would happen, I thought. Now he was going to say I was a landlord’s granddaughter, and humiliate me in front of everyone. I should have quit after all. I should have—I was so flustered that I knocked over a stool as I approached Chairman Jin.

  Chairman Jin towered over me. I looked up into his serious eyes and immediately lowered mine.

  “This Class Education Exhibition is a very powerful weapon,” he said. “Appropriately used, it can strengthen class identification and deepen the hatred of class enemies. Your presentation was very emotional, and the audience was deeply affected. I hope you can help the others to improve their presentations, and make the exhibition a success.”

  I was puzzled. Was he praising me? I looked around the group and saw nothing but approval in their eyes.

  “By the way, I suggest you add a quotation from Chairman Mao’s works to the end of the presentation, so you can finish on an inspiring note.” Chairman Jin clasped his hands behind his back and looked at the others as if he
were asking for their opinions. Everyone nodded. Chang Hong was taking notes with a proud smile on her face.

  They went on to another booth to make their suggestions. I slowly sat down, shouting to myself, “I did it!”

  During Math class a few days later, Teacher Hou from the Revolutionary Committee popped his head into my classroom. He barely glanced at Teacher Li before saying curtly, “Jiang Ji-li, come to our office right away. Someone wants to talk to you.”

  I stood up nervously, wondering what it could be. 1 felt my classmates’ piercing eyes as I mechanically left the classroom. Teacher Hou walked ahead of me without seeming to notice my presence. I followed silently.

  I tried not to panic. Maybe it was not bad. Maybe it was about the exhibition. Maybe Chairman Jin wanted me to help the others with their presentations. At the end of the long, dark hallway Teacher Hou silently motioned me into the office and then walked away.

  I wiped my hands on my trousers and slowly opened the door. The thin-faced foreman from Dad’s theater was right in front of me.

  My face must have shown my dismay.

  “Sit down, sit down. Don’t be afraid.” Chairman Jin pointed to the empty chair. “These comrades from your father’s work unit are just here to have a study session with you. It’s nothing to worry about.”

  I sat down dumbly.

  I had thought about their coming to my home but never imagined this. They were going to expose my family in front of my teachers and classmates. I would have no pride left. I would never be an educable child again.

  Thin-Face sat opposite me, with a woman I had never seen before. Teacher Zhang was there too, his eyes encouraging me.

  Thin-Face came straight to the point. “Your father’s problems are very serious.” His cold eyes nailed me to my seat. “You may have read the article in the Workers’ Revolt that exposed your family’s filthy past.” I slumped down in my chair without taking my eyes off his face. “In addition to coming from a landlord family, your father committed some serious mistakes during the Antirightist Movement several years ago, but he still obstinately refuses to confess.” His cold manner became a little more animated. “Of course we won’t tolerate this. We have decided to make an example of him. We are going to have a struggle meeting of the entire theater system to criticize him and force him to confess.” He suddenly pounded the table with his fist. The cups on the table rattled.