Now that Jingqiu knew how to paste envelopes, and where to collect and return the goods, she told her mother to rest at home, and not go all the way to the neighbourhood committee to do the work. Secretly, she was hatching a plan: if her mother didn’t come, when Old Third visited she could go swimming with him and tell her mother she had been at the neighbourhood committee, gluing envelopes. But her mother seemed to be able to read her mind and insisted upon coming, even bringing Jingqiu’s little sister. Every day mother and her two daughters got up early and crossed the river while the sun was not yet too high. Then, once they had finished gluing the day’s envelopes, the three of them would walk back home together.
Her mother didn’t offer any more stern words of wisdom, but walked around with a serious expression on her face, as if about to oversee a defensive campaign. Even when Jingqiu and her sister went to the river to swim, her mother came along and sat on the bank, watching them. She was one step behind when they went to cool down in the evening breeze; the three of them would sit together by the river, their mother in the middle, a fan in her hand, swatting away the mosquitoes for her daughters. Sometimes Jingqiu would get a strange feeling, as if Old Third were like the naughty monkey Sun Wukong from Journey to the West , using his magical powers to change into a mosquito so that he could whisper in her ear. But her mother swatted and swatted him, until he flew off.
Twice Jingqiu thought she saw him; he seemed to be following them. But when she got the chance to turn around and look properly he was nowhere in sight. She had no idea if she had been seeing things, or if he had hidden, afraid that her mother might spot him.
One day the headmaster Mr Wang asked Jingqiu to go work at the cardboard factory; he had recommended her as soon as his son had mentioned that they were hiring workers. Jingqiu was immensely grateful, thinking that she could finally slip her mother’s tight surveillance. But despite the fact that her mother would no longer be following her like a shadow, Jingqiu would still not be able to move freely as one of the teachers at No. 8 Middle School, Mrs Li, was sending her daugher Li Hong to work there too. She was a year younger than Jingqiu, and this was her first job, so Mrs Li had asked Jingqiu to take her to and from the factory every day. It was as if her mother had hit upon treasure, and she replied at once on Jingqiu’s behalf that she would.
The two of them talked and chatted merrily all the way to the factory. But deep down, Jingqiu’s mind kept drifting to thoughts of whether or not Old Third would come to Yichang, and if he saw her with Li Hong, would he dare come up to her? A few times she thought of shaking off Li Hong, but she couldn’t think of an excuse. And now her mother was getting better at gluing envelopes, she managed to finish and get home before Jingqiu; by the time she got back her mother would often be standing by the ferry or at the school gate, waiting for her.
Gradually Jingqiu gave up hope, and instead she focused on the beginning of term again in September. The education bureau took another two weeks before they finalised arrangements for Jingqiu’s new job in the school’s kitchens. Her place of work was now only one step away from her front door, in the canteen opposite.
Apart from the fact that she couldn’t see Old Third, life for Jingqiu was getting better, reaching higher, like sunflowers nourished by the sun. The first happy event was when she started to draw a salary. That day, the director of the general affairs department, Mr Zhao, came personally to tell Jingqiu her first paypacket was ready.
‘Jingqiu, you started after the fifteenth, so you’ll only get half a month’s wages for September,’ he said with a smile. To Jingqiu he sounded almost apologetic, but this was already more than she had expected; it had nearly been the end of the month when she started and yet the school was giving her half a month’s wages!
Mr Zhao gave her an envelope which contained nearly fifteen yuan as well as a small piece of paper half an inch wide by eight inches long: her wage slip. She took it out and read it over several times to check. It really did have her name on it. The thought that from now on she would collect a slip of paper like this every month made her so excited she knew she wouldn’t be able to sleep that night.
She gave all her wages to her mother for the family to use, as well as to save for her brother Xin’s wedding, or at the very least so that he would have money to buy Yamin’s family a present at New Year. Until now, Yamin had always bought the present and given it to Xin to take to her family, but each year Yamin’s father threw it out of the front door. Yamin reassured Xin that lots of girls’ parents didn’t agree to a match at first, but time usually wore them down.
Yamin’s prediction soon came true, because at last Xin was called back to Yichang to work in a state-owned factory. Yamin was thrilled, and went out to buy a New Year present for him to take to her parents, despite the fact that it was a long time before New Year and Xin had yet to start his new job.
All Yamin’s parents’ objections melted away when they realised that he had been called back to the city, and to such a large factory at that. Not only did the present not get hurtled out the door, but Xin was even invited in to eat with them. Her brother had finally passed the first test for sons-in-law, and he was honoured with the new job of being Yamin’s coolie. All the heavy work in the house, such as buying coal, rice and firewood, was left to him from then on. It had been a struggle for him to be entrusted with this heavy work, so he was happy to do it.
Sometimes, just as he had sat down to eat, Yamin would call, ‘Xin, Mum wants you to go and buy coal.’ Without a word in protest he would put down his chopsticks and head out. Jingqiu’s mother teased her son: ‘If I were to ask you to do anything you’d drag your feet all right, but as soon as Yamin’s parents say anything, you jump up at once.’
‘What can I do?’ he laughed in response. ‘That’s the fashion these days. Jingqiu, why don’t you hurry up and get someone to carry the family’s coal.’
‘Don’t make stupid jokes!’ her mother snapped. ‘Jingqiu’s job isn’t yet permanent, don’t go ruining her chances just so we can have someone carry the coal.’
Her brother’s unexpected success made Jingqiu twitch with excitement, and she started to draw up in her mind a blueprint for Old Third to achieve the same. Most probably they’d have to wait until she had been made permanent, then her mother wouldn’t have so much to worry about, and she and Old Third would be able to spend time together in public just like Yamin and her brother. Old Third would then collect the family’s coal. The thought of it was funny; her brother collected the coal for Yamin’s family and Old Third for hers. But who would get the coal for Old Third’s family?
Suddenly it seemed as if they couldn’t keep good fortune from knocking on their door. The headmaster, Mr Wang, revealed some important inside information to Jingqiu’s mother. He had suggested to the school that when the time was right they might let Jingqiu teach instead of work in the kitchens. Because the area around No. 8 Primary and Middle Schools was cut off by the river, very few people agreed to be transferred there from the city. It was the kind of place that the Bureau of Culture and Education sent either teachers who had committed some misdemeanour, or else naive young teachers from the teacher training college, who as soon as they figured out the situation, got themselves transferred elsewhere. The schools were always short of teachers. They could use this excuse to petition the Bureau of Culture and Education to let Jingqiu become a teacher.
‘Tell your Jingqiu to behave herself, and you go and try to influence some of the other senior staff at the school.’
Even though Jingqiu had officially replaced her mother the school still treated her as a child, and everything went through her mother. Her mother went to see the school’s leaders and begged them to let Jingqiu teach when the situation allowed. A few of them made promises. They knew Jingqiu had had good ma
rks and was good teacher-material, it was just a matter of time before they would let her teach, she needn’t worry. ‘But just now, she’s only just started work and she’s not the only one who’s replaced their parent. If we let her start teaching now other people might have something to say about it. We have to wait until it won’t cause trouble.’
Jingqiu was ecstatic to hear this latest piece of news, and was desperate to tell Old Third at once. But she had heard nothing from him since the day he left. She grew more nervous by the day; she couldn’t work out why he wasn’t coming to see her. There were three possible reasons, she thought. The first was that he had contracted tetanus but she reassured herself that should Old Third have died of tetanus Fang would have told her. The second was that Old Third was keeping the promise he had made her mother, and that he was waiting for her position to be made permanent before visiting. But he had also acknowledged his planned deceit. ‘So, it turns out I’m a traitor,’ he had said. Had he subsequently decided not to be a traitor after all?
There was one more possibility, that her mother’s interrogation had angered him so much that he wasn’t going to come back. She knew of many such stories, where the girls’ parents were so harsh towards their future son-in-laws that the young men stormed off in anger. When she thought of this third possibility she started to get angry herself. If he ran away because of that discussion he’d definitely failed the test.
But then she thought that perhaps he was waiting for her, suffering even. Perhaps he often came to Yichang to see her but just didn’t have the chance to speak to her. This thought made her angry with her mother. My brother was my age when he had a girlfriend, why are you singling me out to be watched so closely?
After working a while in the canteen, Jingqiu was informed that she was being sent to the school’s farm for six months. If she didn’t go people would object to her becoming a teacher. If she did go, however, there would be nothing they could say.
The school had just set up a farm in a small village called Fujia Plateau, just beyond Yanjia River, in order for students to take turns working on it. The reason for choosing Fujia Plateau was because one of the heads of the school, Mr Zheng, was from the village, and it was only due to this connection that the village had agreed to give the school some land, and had even helped them construct some buildings.
The school sent a few teachers to the farm, along with Jingqiu. The women were to take charge of the meals and the men were to lead the students in their physical labour. This first group was the vanguard, preparing the farm for the other students’ arrival. Jingqiu was overjoyed to be sent as it meant that she could escape her mother’s close surveillance and, furthermore, West Village was only a few kilometres away from Fujia Plateau, so she would be very close to Old Third.
Her mother was a bit nervous but she wasn’t nearly as worried as she would have been if Jingqiu had been properly sent down. Jingqiu had a job, and after six months she would be back and teaching. Moreover, she was going with other teachers, so her mother was relatively confident about the arrangement. Most importantly, though, her mother didn’t know how close Fujia Plateau was to West Village.
Mr Zheng took this first group to the farm. They were accompanied by a young female teacher in her twenties, Miss Zhao, and another male teacher in his forties, Mr Jian, who had previously taught Jingqiu physics and had often played volleyball with her team. Mr Jian was not tall, but he had previously been a gymnast so his arms were strong, and he often did forward rolls when catching the ball, gaining cheers of admiration from the girls.
Not far from the farm, on the other side of the mountain, a road big enough to drive the smallest tractor along wound its way down to a small town called Chrysanthemum Field, from which buses left for Yanjia River. The school had one of these small tractors, the type known as ‘Little Hauler’, which they used to transport goods to market. The young man in his twenties who drove the tractor was called Zhou Jianxin or ‘Little Zhou’. His father was headmaster of Yichang’s No. 12 Middle School. Little Zhou wasn’t sent down after graduation due to a heart condition, and instead learnt to operate these tractors. Jingqiu had seen Little Zhou transporting goods before, usually when she was working in a factory as part of her school work. Later, once she started working in the school’s kitchens, she used to see him regularly, his face covered in engine oil, tinkering with a ‘Little Hauler’, encircled by a group of small children watching him while he desperately tried to jig it back to life using a crank.
Little Zhou was not only called Jianxin – just like Old Third – but he also looked a bit like him. They were of similar height, although Little Zhou was a bit skinnier, his skin a little darker, and his back wasn’t as straight. They shared one special characteristic, however: when they laughed their whole faces would crinkle up.
The four teachers, including Jingqiu, took the bus from Yichang to Yanjia River and from there they walked to Fujia Plateau and then to Chrysanthemum Field. On the walk up the mountain, the teachers sang a series of songs known as the Songs of the Long March, and as there were no other people on the mountain even the more shy among them gathered their courage and really let go, singing at the tops of their voices. Little Zhou drove the tractor the thirty or so kilometres from the school although he had to stop just short of the farm as the road ahead had yet to be repaired.
The buildings on the farm were basic. The sleeping quarters had earth floors that had not even been flattened, but were just made from clods of earth. There was no glass in the windows, nor was anything put to cover them, so they used bamboo hats. The beds were made from heaped-up earth with a couple of wooden boards laid on top. Jingqiu and Miss Zhao shared a room, and as there were no bolts across the door, they propped a large wooden stick against it in lieu of a lock.
The first thing they did was build a toilet by digging a hole and resting two planks across it. Then they stuck a few poles made from a nearby sorghum tree in rows into the ground, creating walls on all sides. According to legend, a dangerous animal that the local people called a balangzi stalked this part of the mountain, and it especially liked to attack people who were doing their business at night. It would come up to you and lick your bottom with its tongue, which was covered in long quills, before it gouged out your intestines and gorged on them. Everyone carried an axe with them whenever they went to the toilet for fear of such an encounter. People did their utmost to avoid going after dark, and if they really couldn’t avoid it, the men would run round the back of the house and relieve themselves there. Jingqiu always needed to go once or twice in the evenings, so she had no choice but to brave the couple of hundred metres to the toilet, axe in hand.
Little Zhou also lived at the front of the building and if he didn’t close his door he could see when Jingqiu went out. She soon discovered that every time she came back from the toilet Little Zhou would be standing by the path, smoking, perfectly positioned so that she wouldn’t feel awkward and yet were anything to happen he could run up to save her. When she walked past they would greet each other and walk back to the building, one behind and one in front.
The first days after they arrived there were no vegetables on the mountain for them to eat, so everyone brought out their own private supplies. When the weather was clear they would all go to collect wild onions and wild garlic, and when it was raining they went picking dijianpi , a sort of black fungus they cleaned and fried. Miss Zhao and Mr Jian would always go off together leaving Jingqiu on her own, but before long Little Zhou would appear and they would work together.
Life was hard on the farm, but the teachers were lively and witty, so for Jingqiu the days passed quickly. During the day they worked and in the evening, before going to sleep, they would gather and tell stories. Jingqiu discovered that Mr Jian was particularly good at telling historical s
tories, Mr Zheng and Mrs Zhao were better at folk tales, and Little Zhou’s speciality was stories involving Sherlock Holmes.
Once they were more or less finished with their preparations the farm welcomed its first group of students. Their first task was to repair the road up on the mountain so that the tractor could drive all the way up to the L-shaped building on the farm. Once they finished Little Zhou and his tractor became regular features of the landscape. He loved wearing an old army uniform with a pattern of wrinkles that seemed to suggest he might be stuffing it in the pickling barrel every evening before bed. The army hat he wore was a sort of floppy cap, and looked like the ones the soldiers of the routed Nationalist army used to wear. He was very focused when driving, riding at lightning speed, leaping up and down in his seat like an unstoppable force, before screeching to a halt at the kitchen door. As soon as the students heard the ‘du-du-du’ sound of his tractor they poured out of their rooms. The tractor was their only connection to the outside world.
As usual, Little Zhou’s face was smeared with engine oil, a look that had almost become a badge of his professionalism and skill. Sometimes Jingqiu would point to the oil on his face, and he would wipe it with his sleeve, more often than not spreading it still more widely across his cheeks. Jingqiu would double over in laughter and he would lean towards her so that she could wipe it for him, startling her into running away.
The five adults worked well together. At regular intervals either Jingqiu or Miss Zhao would ride with Little Zhou on his tractor to buy vegetables and rice. After a couple of times Miss Zhao said she didn’t want to go any more, she couldn’t stand the smell of diesel oil, and after a few kilometres of du-du-du her bottom came out in blisters. Jingqiu was not bothered by the smell so she went instead. They would leave after breakfast and try their best to be back in the afternoon in time to make the students’ dinner so that Miss Zhao wouldn’t have to do it on her own.
Under the Hawthorn Tree Page 27