by Hua Bai
troupe are coming to get their grand piano. The Friendship Store will reclaim their carpet, scrolls, and paintings.”
“Ugh.” Xie Li wrinkled her nose. “Very well, move us.
Have everything moved out. This old dame can sleep on the floor!”
“I’m afraid even you can’t even do that. This house
belongs to a VIP. Do you know the one I mean? She came to inspect the work and living conditions in our city. Everything in the house has to be rearranged by tomorrow – it all has to be done up in green tones. Between you and her,
which old dame is tougher?”
Xie Li lost her voice. Rolling her eyes, she suddenly got an idea: “All right, we’ll move. But you must give us an apartment suitable for a married couple.”
The servant took a letter out of his pocket and passed it 1 5 6
Bai Hua.book Page 157 Friday, October 26, 2001 2:56 PM
to old Gui. “Gui Renzhong, here’s a notice for you from the farm. Read it out loud.”
Before he fished the letter out of its envelope, old Gui’s hands were shaking so hopelessly that the letter and envelope rustled like falling leaves. “Gui Renzhong: On reading this notice, report with your dependents immediately to
your team for reeducation.” Silence hung over the room,
with no sound but that of the servant’s scratching of a
match, lighting a cigarette, and puffing smoke rings. The paper in old Gui’s hands was still shaking.
“Dependents!” Suddenly Xie Li uttered a cry, as if she
had just come to life. “You can’t throw a family dependent into the street. Gui Renzhong is a Stinking Ninth, a bourgeois reactionary; but I am third-generation, urban working-class, one-hundred-percent proletarian revolutionary.
You had better make sure the way you’re treating me is
politically correct!”
“You may be counted as Gui Renzhong’s dependent.”
“What do you mean, counted as? I have a marriage certificate, legal and binding. Why do you say counted as? ”
“The housing problem of Gui’s dependents should be
solved by the leadership of Gui’s unit. Gui Renzhong be-
longs to the East Wind Farm. They will take charge of you.
The farm has plenty of land to put up a thatched shed, and no shortage of work or tools.”
“But I am a registered city resident and have the right to urban supplies,” shouted Xie Li at the top of her voice.
“That depends on whether you want Gui Renzhong or
want city residence and urban supplies.”
Xie Li threw herself onto the sofa in a fit of anger. Turning her head to old Gui, she said, “Speak up, you! What do we do?”
“You should – don’t follow me to suffer on the farm. In
fact, we’re not really married.”
“What? You dirty dog! You want to abandon me?”
“Facts speak louder than words. In the past month you’ve 1 5 7
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– snored every night while I lay wide awake on the floor waiting for dawn. I couldn’t sleep – ”
“Ha! You really are a virgin of fifteen. Give it to me!”
“What?”
“The marriage certificate.” Old Gui took out the wrin-
kled certificate and handed it to her. She said, “I’ll take care of it. Since you’re not qualified to be a proper husband, I’ll deprive you of your conjugal rights. I’m not divorcing you because I know you have lots of school chums in America
who might want to visit you again, and you are incompe-
tent to deal with them.” She turned to the servant. “Say, my old man has a lot of classmates in America. Many of them, more important than Eliot, are big shots in politics, the military, Congress, and news agencies. One after another, they’re going to ask to see my old man. Have you thought of that?”
“Of course we have,” the servant said smugly. “Any for-
eigner coming to our country must apply for a visa first. If we delay his visa one day, we’ll gain enough time to evacu-ate a house, borrow decent furniture and silverware, get proper food from special shops, transfer Gui Renzhong back from the farm, and even let you two remarry. One day is
plenty of time. You only used a quarter of an hour to marry him, didn’t you?”
“You’re not afraid of the inconveniences?”
“No, of course not. We have lots of trucks and plenty of time. No need to worry about us.”
At the mention of trucks, three of them pulled up to the entrance. After putting down the loading ramps, strong
porters rushed into the sitting room like a flock of crows.
Feeling threatened, Xie Li quickly ordered her three comrades in arms, “Hurry! Pack my stuff and move it out. Don’t let them haul my things away as public property.” Her three men dashed upstairs like gangsters, and soon the house was filled with dust and the rumbling of furniture. People
inside fought brutally, knocking into each other, punching 1 5 8
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and kicking each other, cursing each other’s mother and
father. Xie Li led her three comrades in arms, arguing over her so-called private property. Words were not strong
enough, and the three men fought savagely until their blood ran. A rare opportunity. If you can grab something by force or deceit, go ahead. The controversy over the genuine owner of an embroidered curtain got the two warring parties into a bloody fight. In the end, a beautiful art treasure was torn to shreds. When the chaos died down, the house had been
stripped to its bare walls. In the sudden stillness, only three people were left in the vacant sitting room: old Gui, carrying Jane’s ashes in a shoe box; the servant, holding a ring of keys, ready to lock the house after our departure; and me, trembling in fear. “May I leave now?” old Gui asked his
former servant with respect.
“Yes, you may.”
“I’m not taking even a needle of public property with
me.”
“All right. Please go.” The former servant shook his keys impatiently.
“Thank you very much for all this. Good-bye.”
“Don’t mention it. We’re all doing things according to
revolutionary principles.”
Old Gui walked over to me. “Little Liang, you were sent
by the leaders of the farm to get me, weren’t you?”
“No. I was on my way to the Farm to give my monthly
medical report, and merely dropped in to see you.”
“Oh. Good – we’re going the same way then.”
“Yes.”
Old Gui and I walked silently out of the sitting room.
His eyes surveyed the house where he had lived for a whole month – if it could be called living. The vegetables transplanted to the courtyard, unable to adapt to the desolate wasteland, were already withering. I heard the noise of
shutting windows and locking doors behind us. On the bus, old Gui’s face gradually lit up. He said, “Little Liang, I still 1 5 9
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think the farm is a much better place for me. I feel at home there; those brown cows seem to be fond of me and I feel comfortable with them, without any ideological burdens. A bourgeois intellectual like me should suffer hardships; otherwise I feel uneasy, remorseful, and ashamed. Don’t you agree?”
I didn’t answer. At that moment, a powerful impulse was
impelling me to speak from the bottom of my heart, out of concern for him, with words more penetrating than those I had spoken last time. But he beat me to it. “Thomas didn’t ask me any tough questions, as if he knew everything
already. He only looked me in the eyes from beginning to end. That day I behaved so well that the leadership of the Foreign Ministry praised me, saying I looked very cheerful and displayed
the normal state of mind of a prominent
intellectual. They particularly mentioned the part of my talk concerning my contempt for Western material comforts, as being concrete and sounding real and sincere. And when Thomas asked about the attacks on intellectuals during the Cultural Revolution, I replied, ‘It’s true, but it’s a necessity, just as a mother spanks her own children. It doesn’t matter if the spanking is a little harsh, for the mother’s intentions are good.’ He said, ‘Perhaps the mother you’re talking about is a stepmother.’ I refuted him with a stern face: ‘No, no! She’s our real mother.’ The leadership particularly approved of these words. They said that,
because I love the party and the motherland, I shall be
allowed to meet my other schoolmates from abroad.” A feeling of satisfaction carried him away as he said this, licking his upper lip.
Fortunately, I had suppressed my impulse to reveal the
truth.
I gaze at her window. In the past, it was pasted over with black paper; now a cloth curtain with tiny blue flowers hangs there.
1 6 0
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When we got off the bus and turned down the road lead-
ing to the farm, we met an execution vehicle – actually a military truck – flanked by armed soldiers. Behind the
driver’s cab stood a criminal tied crisscross with ropes. A placard stuck erect in the ropes behind his back rose above his head.
“Someone is going to be executed?!” Old Gui pulled me
over to the side of the road.
“It looks like a woman.”
“Yes, it is. It’s Liu Tiemei from the clinic, isn’t it?”
“Liu Tiemei? How can that be?” No matter how hard I
tried, I could not link the image of Liu Tiemei to the concept of a criminal about to be executed. But soon I recognized her, too.
The execution truck was moving slowly. In the distance,
the public meeting of the farm collective had not yet been dismissed. The sound of shouted slogans rose and fell. The truck was drawing nearer and nearer. Liu Tiemei was wearing a new set of clothes, something I had never seen her do before. Although it was a hot day, she had slipped on a flimsy red wool sweater over her cotton-print blouse and had draped a white gauze scarf over her shoulders. Her hair was combed and shone brightly; a small bunch of nameless wildflowers was pinned to her hair above the temple. She appeared carefree; a naive smile hung from the corners of her mouth. As she looked down at me and Gui, her expression
betrayed a condescending pity for us. On the death sign
were the words Counterrevolutionary Murderer Liu Mei. Perhaps the judicial authorities had thought Tiemei [iron plum blossom], her first name adopted from one of the model
operas, was definitely a model name for revolutionaries and should not be profaned by a criminal. So they had restored her original one-character given name and circled both it and her surname with vermilion. The Four Olds [old ideas, old culture, old customs, old habits] had been abolished at 1 6 1
Bai Hua.book Page 162 Friday, October 26, 2001 2:56 PM
the beginning of the Cultural Revolution. Who would
expect an old custom like a death placard with the name of the victim circled in vermilion to be continued without
question? Liu Mei had even been permitted, according to
her wish, to put on a set of new clothes, wear a bunch of wildflowers, and have a feast – all this according to ancient custom that may well be prehistoric.
Old Gui was terribly frightened, as if he, not Liu Tiemei, were to be executed. Shivering, he kept murmuring to himself, “How could she have murdered someone? How could
she have murdered someone?”
“Right. Why did she murder someone?” I asked myself.
It was impossible to associate her present image with her former life.
“Who did she murder?” old Gui asked me.
“Good question. Who did she murder? Most likely, she
murdered Qin Guangming.”
“Her husband? How could she murder her own husband?
Impossible.”
“Quite simply out of jealousy. She said long ago that
sooner or later she would turn Qin Guangming [bright
light] into Qin darkness. Now he has certainly turned to darkness.”
“Can that be true? “
Old Gui gaped for a long time. Not until we came to the
farm did we learn that Liu Tiemei’s victim had not been Qin Guangming – the eternal case of murdering one’s spouse –
but Yu Shouchen’s wife, Jin Xiangdong. Why had she
killed Jin Xiangdong? (Yu Shouchen’s wife was not a young woman but had a fashionable name. Originally, she did not even have a first name and had been legally registered as Jin’s. At the beginning of the Cultural Revolution, Yu
Shouchen had written a formal petition to change her name to Xiangdong [facing the east], to imply that her heart
turned toward Mao Zedong.) Jin Xiangdong was born ugly,
and the older she grew the uglier she became. Why had Liu 1 6 2
Bai Hua.book Page 163 Friday, October 26, 2001 2:56 PM
Tiemei, a young woman, killed such an ugly old hag? Was
it possible that she and Qin Guangming were caught hav-
ing an affair? A childlike curiosity drove me to search for the truth.
But a complicated love-murder case demanded more than
a few words of clarification, and I dared not stay long on the farm, for it was a hotbed of trouble. Fortunately, I met Song Lin, a freshman at the College of Theater and Drama, who perceived my curiosity at a glance and took me to the Propaganda Office. Closing the door behind us, he whispered,
“You are dying to learn the details of the case, aren’t you?” I nodded. “They have been working on this case for a whole month now. Today, after the final judgment, she was sent to the farm for a public trial. Finally, they identified her officially, and she was ready for execution. I work in the Propaganda Office. The pavilion by the water is the first to receive the reflected moonbeams. Taking advantage of my
job, I not only read through her file but also secretly wrote a play based on my readings. I’m sure my play is a time-less masterpiece, but, if anyone reads it, it will be criticized like poison weeds. Worse still, my head may have to be
patched up.”
“Why? Your play is based on real persons and real events, isn’t it?”
“You stupid fool! After years of the great Cultural Revolution, how can you still behave like a guest from America?
As if anyone were allowed to write about real people and real events! The more realistic it is, the more your writing will be vilified. Haven’t you read Yao Wenyuan’s important article ‘On Realism’?”
“Too many articles for us to read, published simulta-
neously by our two newspapers and one journal [ People’s Daily, Liberation Army Daily, and Red Flag]. And even if I were to read them, I can’t keep anything in my head.”
“We’re not allowed to write about real people and real
events, not even about the real deeds of the members on the 1 6 3
Bai Hua.book Page 164 Friday, October 26, 2001 2:56 PM
party central committee of the Cultural Revolution, who are correct at all times. Anything we write that breaks the rule cannot be let loose on the public. Those are the principles you must learn by heart. It’s a matter of life or death.”
“Then why did you write the play?”
“My hands were itching.”
“So, it’s a biological problem.”
“That’s right. Isn’t your curiosity also a biological problem?”
“Yes. All right, your hands were itching, so you wrote it; my mind is itching, so I want to read it.”
“You may take the script with you as long as you read it while squatting in the hospital latrine.”
“Thank you
so much.”
“Wait. First you must write me out a receipt.”
“What kind of receipt?”
“Write the following: ‘I am keeping the script of the play Flames of Passion of my own accord. Every word Song Lin wrote fully expresses my own imagination and thoughts.’
Liang Rui, month, day, year.”
“Why should I write such a thing? I don’t even know the
plot yet.”
“Well, to be mean is to be generous. The human heart is
hidden beneath the skin. Who knows whether or not you
will report me for public criticism after you’ve read it? If I have your receipt in my hand, I won’t worry. Good for both of us. As the saying goes, two locusts are tied to one string –
you cannot fly away, and I cannot hop away. If you want to read it, write the receipt. If not, you may regret it your whole life.”
“I’ll write it. You’re awfully clever.”
“If I wasn’t, how could I be invincible?”
Song Lin put a slip of paper in front of me and passed me an uncapped fountain pen. I wrote down everything he said.
Then with one hand I turned it over to him, while with the other I took the script, which I stuffed into my bag as Song 1 6 4
Bai Hua.book Page 165 Friday, October 26, 2001 2:56 PM
Lin opened the door for me. “My duties keep me from see-
ing you off.”
“See you later.” I left.
I gaze at her window. In the past, it was pasted over with black paper; now a cloth curtain with tiny blue flowers hangs there.
Yunqian was angry with me for bringing home the script
because she hated it when I was curious about anything. It wasn’t worth signing a contract with the Devil in order to satisfy one’s curiosity. But once I started reading her the script, her anger vanished.
Here is the original script, just as Song Lin wrote it:
F L A M E S O F P A S S I O N
a c t 1
Time: Month X, day X, year X. Night.
Place: A strange clinic on a strange farm in a strange
country.
Characters (in order of appearance): Doctor L, Doctor
Y, and the Serpent from the Garden of Eden.
As the curtain rises, Doctor L and Doctor Y are sitting upright on the stage, reading attentively in murmuring voices. The Serpent slithers in through the window.