The Vagrants

by Yiyun Li

  “But you're walking in the wrong direction,” Kwen said.

  Bashi looked at the road, leading west into the mountain where the woman's body lay butchered under a bush. He wondered if Kwen had seen through him. He wanted to report the news to Old Hua and his wife first, Bashi said, as they were old friends of his grandmother's.

  Kwen studied Bashi, and he felt his scalp tighten under the man's gaze. “So I'm going,” Bashi said, raising a hand hesitantly.

  Kwen lit a cigarette. “You know I don't like anyone to be naughty around me?”

  “Why would I want to? I have my own grandmother to take care of.”

  Kwen nodded. “Just a reminder.”

  Bashi promised that he would behave and left in haste. He should have returned the boulders to their place the night before. A good detective did not leave any traces of his investigation around. He wondered if it was too late for him to correct his mistake.

  The Huas’ cabin was padlocked. Bashi picked up a small piece of coal and wrote big scrawling characters on the door: My grandma is dead—Bashi. He looked at the characters and then wiped out the word dead and wrote gone. There was no need to disturb two old people with the harshness of reality, Bashi thought, and then it occurred to him that the Huas might not be able to read.

  The visit to the morgue was disappointing, one more sign that this world was becoming as bad as it could get. The woman at the front desk threw a pad across the table, before Bashi could explain things to her. When he opened his mouth, she pointed to the papers. “Fill them out before you open your mouth.”

  It took Bashi some time to work out how to answer the questions. He had forgotten to bring the household register card; the woman wouldn't be too happy about it, but she would certainly understand negligence from a bereft grandson. Perhaps people would regard him differently now that his grandmother was dead; perhaps they would forgive him and love him because he was an orphan. He dipped the pen into the ink bottle and said to the woman as he wrote, “You know, she is the only one I have and I'm her only one too.”

  The woman raised an eyebrow and glanced at Bashi without replying. Perhaps she did not know who he was. “My grandma, she left me today,” he explained. “I don't have parents. I never did, as long as I can remember.”

  “Did I say not to open your mouth before finishing the forms?”

  “Yes, but I'm just being friendly,” Bashi said. “You don't have many people to talk with you here, do you?”

  The woman sighed and put a magazine up in front of her eyes. He looked at the magazine cover; Popular Movies, the title said, and a young couple leaned onto a tree and looked out at Bashi with blissful anticipation. Bashi made a face at the couple before going back to work on the forms. The last paper was a permission sheet for cremation. Bashi read through it twice before he could understand it. “Comrade,” he said in a hoarse, low voice, intending to earn the sympathy that he fully deserved.

  “Done?”

  “I have a question. My grandmother—she was eighty-one and she raised me from very young—she already had a casket made. She didn't like the idea of being burned,” Bashi said. “I don't know about you but I myself would rather not be burned, alive or dead.”

  The woman stared at Bashi for a long moment and grabbed the registration from his hand. “Why are you wasting my time then?” she said. She ripped the sheets off, squeezed them into a ball, and targeted the wastebasket by the entrance. She missed, and Bashi walked over to pick the ball up. “I don't get it, comrade,” he said, trying to sound humble. “You asked me to fill out the forms and open my mouth afterward, and I did as you told me.” Most women were ill-tempered at work, according to Bashi's observation; at home they served their grumpy husbands, so women had to show, at work, that they were fully in control. Bashi was willing to humor this one despite her looks—she was no longer young, and the dark bags underneath her eyes made her look like a panda.

  The woman pointed to a poster on the wall. “Read it,” she said and went back to the magazine.

  “Of course, comrade, anything you say,” said Bashi. He read the poster: The city government, in accordance with the new provincial policy to transform the old, outdated custom of underground burying, which took up too much land that could otherwise be used to grow food for the ever-growing population, had decided to make cremation the only legal form of undertaking; the effective date was two and a half months away.

  “It seems we still have some time till the policy becomes effective,” Bashi said to the woman. “Enough time to bury a little old woman, isn't it?”

  “That's your business,” the woman said behind the magazine. “Not ours.”

  “But can I rent some space in your freezer, until the ground starts to thaw?”

  “We only take in bodies for cremation.”

  “But the regulation says—”

  “Forget the regulation. We don't have enough space here for everyone, and our policy now is to take bodies that are for cremation only,” said the woman. She left the front desk and entered an inner office.

  Bashi left the morgue with a less heavy heart. His grandmother, a wise woman, had chosen the right time to die. Two more months of living would have sent her into an oven; just like she had always said—heaven assigned punishment to any form of greed. The death of his grandmother, instead of being a tragedy had become something worth celebrating. One must always look on the good side of things, Bashi reminded himself. His usual energy was restored. The sunshine was warm on his face, a cheerful spring morning.

  “Bashi,” said a small voice, coming from a side alley. Bashi turned and saw Nini, bareheaded, with his hat in her good hand, standing in the shadow of the alley wall. She did not look as ugly as he remembered.

  “Nini!” Bashi said, happy to see a friendly face. “What are you doing here?”

  “I've been looking for you. I didn't see you this morning,” Nini said. “You said yesterday you would give me coal if I talked to you.”

  Bashi knocked on his head harder than he'd meant to and winced. “Of course, it's my mistake,” he said, and walked over. “But it was only because I was running an important errand this morning. Do you want to hear about it?”

  Nini opened her eyes wide, and for the first time Bashi noticed her lovely, dense eyelashes and dark brown irises. He blew at her eyelashes and she winked. He laughed and then rubbed his eyes hard to look sad. “My grandma died last night,” he said.

  Nini gasped.

  “Yes, my grandma who brought me up alone and loved no one but me,” said Bashi.

  “How did it happen?”

  “I don't know. She died in her sleep.”

  “Then why are you sad?” Nini said. “You should be happy. I've heard people say if a woman dies in her sleep, it means she's been rewarded for her good deeds.”

  “Happy I am!” Bashi said. “But the thing is, nobody is willing to help me with her burial.”

  “Where is she now?” Nini asked. “Did you clean and change her? You don't want her to leave unwashed and in old clothes.”

  “How do I know these things?” Bashi said. “Nobody has died before. You know a lot. Do you want to come and help me?”

  Nini hesitated. “I need to go to the marketplace.”

  “We have enough vegetables to feed you and all your fairy sisters. Coal too. You can get as much as you want. Just come and help a good old woman,” Bashi said. “Come on, don't make a friend wait.”

  A FEW STEPS BEHIND BASHI, Nini counted the lampposts. It was his idea not to walk side by side, so that people would not suspect anything. From the marketplace they turned north and followed the road halfway up the northern mountain. Here the blocks were built in the same fashion as in the valley, but Bashi's house was unusually large. He looked around the alley, which was empty, before unlocking the gate and motioning to Nini to enter. She looked at the mansion in front of her, impressed. The yard was twice the usual size, with a wooden storage cabin as big as the front room of her family'
s home and with a high brick wall to separate it from the neighbors’ yards. His father had been a war hero, Bashi explained, so they were granted more space for their house; however, he added, the construction team hadn't bothered to make it presentable, building a two-room house like every other house on the street, only twice as big.

  “You must need a lot of coal to keep this house warm,” Nini said when she entered the front room. It was divided by a high shelf into a kitchen—with a sink and a water tap, a stove for cooking, and several cabinets with painted flowers—and a living room, which had its own stove for heating. The wall of the living room was covered with posters showing scenes of heroes and heroines from revolutionary movies and operas. Nini touched the table in the middle of the living room, heavy-looking with old-fashioned carvings on its four sides. Two armchairs, dark red, with intricate patterns carved on their backs, showcased soft, inviting cushions. “Where is your mother?” Nini said.

  “Heaven knows. She remarried and left me here.”

  Stupid woman, Nini thought. No one would ever make her give up this luxury. Before she voiced her opinion, she heard some familiar rustling. “Mice,” she said, and squatted down to look for the source of the noise. Her own house was infested with mice, their nibbling keeping her awake at night. They ripped old clothes and, sometimes, new sheets of cardboard that her family used to fold into matchboxes. Except for the baby, every one of the girls in her family was trained to hunt down the mice and put them to death with a single twist of the neck.

  “Don't worry, I've got my cure,” Bashi said. He went into the kitchen and, a minute later, came back with a box wrapped in fine red satin. Inside were a few dry roots, wrinkled and earth-colored. “Ginseng roots,” Bashi said, and handed the box to Nini.

  She touched the red satin with her finger. She did not know how much money the ginseng roots cost; the box itself was expensive-looking and finer than anything her family owned.

  “My grandpa was a ginseng picker, and my grandma loved ginseng roots. The best medicine in the world,” Bashi said. “But of course they don't make you live forever.”

  “Where is she now?”

  Bashi gestured at the bedroom. “We'll get to it in a minute, but let's take care of the mice first.” He broke a small branch from one of the roots and put it by Nini's mouth. “Do you want to taste? Sweet as honey.”

  Nini opened her mouth but Bashi took the ginseng root away before she had a bite. “Ha, I'm kidding you, silly girl. Only people older than seventy can eat ginseng. Too much fire in it. It'll make your nose bleed and your skin and flesh burn and rot.”

  Nini shut her mouth tight, a little angry. She did not know why she had agreed to help Bashi. She thought of leaving him with his grandmother and returning to her own life, finding a few deserted cabbage leaves and then going home, watching her little sisters play with the baby, telling them horrible stories if they made Little Sixth cry, threatening to feed them ginseng roots if they dared to complain. But Nini found it hard to move her legs. Bashi had promised many things, coal to take home, vegetables too. Friendship, and something else that Nini could not put into words.

  Bashi found a jar of honey and dipped the ginseng root into it. When he got the root out, it looked dewy and delicious. Nini had eaten honey only once, in Teacher Gu's house. Her stomach grumbled.

  “Here,” Bashi said, pushing a spoon and the jar into Nini's hands. “Eat the whole jar if you like. I don't care for honey myself.” He wiped the ginseng root clean of the dripping honey. Nini stuffed her mouth with a spoonful of honey. He was a good person, after all, generous and kind, even though his jokes left her confused at times. “What are you doing?” she mumbled through the sweet stickiness between her lips.

  “This is my invention of mouse poison,” Bashi said. “Mice love honey, like you, don't they? So they'll eat the ginseng root without thinking and then they'll get such a fire in their stomachs they will wring themselves to death regretting they took that sweet bite of stolen food.”

  Nini shuddered. She looked at the jar in her hands. “Did you put poison in the honey?”

  “Why would I?” Bashi said. “You thought I would poison you? What a funny thought. You're not a mouse. You're my friend.”

  Nini looked at Bashi's grinning face and felt slightly uneasy. “Do you have many friends?” she asked.

  “Of course,” Bashi said. “Half the people in Muddy River are my friends.”

  “You have other girls as friends too?”

  “Yes. Men and women. Young and old. Dogs, cats, chickens, ducks.”

  Nini could not tell if Bashi was joking again. But, if he did have other girls as friends, did they ever come here? The way he had behaved on the way here, making sure people did not see them together, made her suspicious. “Do you bring girls to your house often?” she asked.

  Bashi shook his hand at her, his face taking on a serious look.

  “Are you all right?” asked Nini.

  Bashi wiggled a finger at Nini. “Don't make a sound,” he whispered. “Let me think.”

  Nini looked at Bashi. With his pouting lips and knotted eyebrows, he looked like a small child pretending to be an adult. He was a funny person. She could never tell what he would do next. She had heard neighbors warn their daughters not to talk to strangers; her parents had told her sisters too, but the warning had never been issued to her, as nobody seemed to think she would ever be in danger. Nini studied Bashi again. If he ever did anything very bad, she had a voice to warn his neighbors. But perhaps her worry was unnecessary. He was not a stranger. He was a new friend, and Nini decided that she liked him, in a different way than she liked Teacher Gu and Mrs. Gu. They made her want to be better, prettier, more lovable, but what difference would it make now? They hated her and wouldn't allow her back into their house. Bashi made her forget she was a monster. Perhaps she was not.

  “Yes,” Bashi said, clapping his hands after a moment and smiling. “I've got the whole plan worked out.”

  “What plan?”

  Bashi beckoned Nini to follow him into the bedroom. The curtain between the two beds was not pulled up. He sat her down on his unmade bed. “Can you keep a secret for me?” Bashi asked her.

  Nini nodded.

  “You can't tell anyone,” he said. “Can you do that?”

  “I don't have other friends besides you,” Nini said.

  Bashi smiled. He drew the curtain and Nini saw the old woman, eyes closed as if in sleep, the blanket pulled up all the way and tucked tight under her chin. Her thin gray hair was coiled in the style of an old woman's bun, with a few strands escaping the hairnet. She looked like an old woman Nini might have liked, but maybe death made people look kind, as none of the old women she met in the marketplace was nice to her.

  Bashi put a finger underneath his grandmother's nose for a moment and said, “Yes, she's as dead as a dead person can be. Now you take a vow in front of her.”

  “Why?”

  “Nobody fools around with dead people,” Bashi said. “Say this: I swear that I'll never tell Bashi's secret to other people. If I do, his grandmother's ghost will not let me have a good death.”

  Nini thought it over. She did not see much harm in it, as her parents reminded her often that, with all the pains and troubles she had brought to the family, there would be nothing beautiful in her death. For all Nini cared, there was nothing good in her life either, so why should she be fearful of an ugly death? She repeated the words and Bashi seemed satisfied. He sat down next to Nini and said, “I'm going to kill Kwen's dog.”

  “Because Kwen beat you yesterday?” Nini asked. She was disappointed. A dead dog didn't seem to fit with a solemn vow in front of a grandmother's body.

  “More than that. He's a devil, and I'm going to make the whole town see it. There's a lot I'll tell you later. For now, you just have to know that I'm going to kill that black dog of his before I can go on with the rest of my plan.”

  Nini nodded. She did not know if she wanted to hear more
of Bashi's plan. The old woman, no more than five feet away, distracted her.

  “So here's how it will work. Dogs are not old women and they don't take a liking to ginseng roots, right? What is to a dog as a ginseng root is to an old granny?”

  Nini looked at Bashi, perplexed.

  “Think, girl. A sausage, or a ham, no? Dogs like meat, so do you and I, but we are smarter than dogs,” said Bashi. “This is what I'm going to do: I will give the dog a sausage a day until he wags his tail at me whenever he sees me, and then, bang, a sausage cured with pesticide. The poor dog will never imagine that his only friend in this world has killed him. How does that sound?”

  Nini fidgeted. It seemed that Bashi could sit here talking to her, or to himself, all morning. If she did not return in time to cook before her parents came home for lunch, as she hadn't the night before for dinner, her mother would let that bamboo broomstick rain down on her back again.

  Bashi looked at her. “Don't you like my plan?”

  “It's not good to think of other things before taking care of your grandmother,” she said. “I don't have all day to sit here talking to you.”

  “The business of the living comes before that of the dead,” Bashi said. “But you're right. I need your help to get her into the casket before you leave.”

  “You don't want to hire some professionals?”

  “I'd have to burn her for them to be hired,” Bashi said. “It's all right. We can do it ourselves.” He pulled a trunk from the corner of the bedroom. “I think she got everything ready here. Find what you need and dress her up well. I'll get the casket.”

  Bashi left for the storage cabin before Nini replied. She opened the trunk. Silk and satin clothes lined the inside in orderly layers: coats, jackets, blouses and pants, shoes, and caps. She touched the one on the top with her good hand and her chapped palm caught a thread. What a waste, to bury such fine clothes with a dead woman, Nini thought. She rubbed her hands on the outside of her pants hard before she touched the clothes again. Piece by piece she took them out of the trunk and piled them neatly next to the old woman on the bed. When she reached the bottom of the trunk, she saw several envelopes, each bearing a number. She opened the first one and saw a stack of bills, mostly of ten or five yuan. Nini had never seen so much money. She bit her lips and looked around. When she was sure Bashi was not in sight, she put the money back into the envelope, folded the envelope once in the middle, and slipped it into her pocket.