The Golden Rat

by Don Wulffson

  “I guess you’re right,” Baoliu agreed. “Thank you. I never thought of that.”

  BY MIDAFTERNOON, THEY were headed into town, picking their way along narrow streets squeezed between clusters of look-alike buildings, all with the same tiled roofs and oiled paper windows.

  “Jin Haozi!” The words were coming at Baoliu. “It is him, isn’t it?”

  Baoliu froze inside as he realized they were approaching two people he knew—a mother and daughter. The girl, Tao-an, was pretty, and once he’d had a crush on her. As they passed, Baoliu looked at her, embarrassed. Her mother made the sound and motion of spitting; then the two hurried on.

  Zhou put a hand on his shoulder. “Forget it,” he said.

  Baoliu wanted to scream. He wanted to run—hide his face. He kept expecting to hear the words repeated, and kept looking around, scanning the way ahead and glancing over his shoulder.

  But no one else seemed to notice him. Not even people he knew. He passed two sisters he’d known since he was a little boy, and even a former tutor. None of them gave him a second look.

  They made their way through the main marketplace. Familiar sounds. Familiar sights, familiar places: an apothecary offering everything from electric eels to cure insanity and snake venom to stop pain; a small stand selling beauty products; a chandler’s, the sweet smell of candle wax emanating from the place. And next to it, dwarfing it, was his father’s shop.

  For a long moment, Baoliu stood staring at the long green building—breathing hard, his mouth dry.

  “You all right?” asked Zhou.

  “I’m fine.”

  They rattled through the beaded doorway; the pleasant aroma of leather and the rhythmic tapping of hammers greeted them—and the sight of a half-empty shop. Hai Nan, seated at a high desk, writing in a ledger, glanced up, his eyes growing wide with surprised recognition, and then looked to his father, halfway across the room, examining a half-finished sandal.

  “Baoliu!” his brother exclaimed, both surprise and fear in his voice. “Why are you here? What do you want?”

  “My substitute—where was he from?” he asked, his voice tight. “Shen Manfong, the man whose hands were burned. I need to find his family.”

  Hai Nan’s eyes were averted. Baoliu followed his gaze—and saw his father approaching him. The tapping of hammers stopped. His father turned on the workers. “Gankuai zuo!” “Back to work!” he ordered.

  Heads lowered. The gentle tapping resumed.

  Baoliu’s father studied Zhou for a moment and then, scowling, looked at his son. “What do you want?” he asked, his voice strained, unnatural.

  Baoliu repeated the question, and was startled when his father responded directly to him.

  “He lived somewhere in the Minkao district. I do not know exactly where. Nor do I know—or care—why you want this information. But now you have it. And now you will kindly leave.”

  He bowed.

  Baoliu did the same. He looked at his brother, and then left with Zhou, angrily slapping strings of beads aside as they made their way out.

  “Where’s Minkao?” asked Zhou.

  Baoliu opened his mouth to speak, and then looked away, clenching his jaw.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “Everything. The way he spoke to me, the way he looked at me. And the business—with so few workers, things must be bad. And my brother, the whole thing. Everything’s wrong.”

  “At least he spoke to you. It’s more than you expected.”

  “He talked to me like I was dirt, like I was a stranger.”

  “Maybe,” said Zhou. “But he wasn’t exactly expecting to see you; he was shocked and still mad. But he talked to you. And you got what you came for; you got the information you wanted.”

  “Yeah,” said Baoliu, exhaling noisily.

  “Where’s the Minkao district?”

  “Minkao? It’s about the worst part of Yongjia,” he said, gesturing in the direction they should go. “It’s a horrible place, on the outskirts of the city.”

  They backtracked through the marketplace and then followed a trail that led up through sparse, half-dead vegetation. A sick stench began to envelop them; alongside the trail stretched a deep ravine littered with garbage and trash of every sort.

  The trail rose steeply, and they found themselves emerging into a wretched slum. Dirty, naked toddlers wailed. Chickens pecked for seeds in barren-looking soil. The smell of garbage, rot, and cooking food wafted over the dreary sprawl of sagging, dilapidated huts.

  A misty rain began to fall.

  “Do you know of a man named Shen Manfong?” Baoliu asked a tall woman trying to patch the roof of a shanty.

  She eyed him suspiciously. “No, I’ve never heard the name,” she said, and returned to her work.

  They asked several more people; each time, the answer—and the look—was the same.

  “These people know more than they’re telling,” said Zhou. “They’re hiding something—or they’re afraid of something.”

  The two made their way deeper into Minkao and began asking again, and finally got the answer they wanted.

  “Wo renshi ta.” “I know him,” said a scrawny boy of about twelve or so. He was kneeling over a stove—a small huolu—in a shed, roasting a lizard impaled on a stick. He looked up. “Shen Manfong is dead,” he said. “He was a very brave man. He gave his life in ka-di—for his family. They left many days ago, and moved—to a much better place than this.”

  “Do you know where it is?” Baoliu asked, his heart suddenly racing.

  The boy blew on the lizard. It was small and leathery-looking, and smoke rose from the thing. “For a tongqian I will take you there.”

  Baoliu nodded in agreement.

  He examined the lizard and then took a bite of it. “Come,” he said. “It’s not far.”

  Eating as he walked, the boy led them into the misting rain through the maze of ramshackle huts, Baoliu and Zhou following on his heels. They crossed a footbridge and then found themselves emerging into a better part of the neighborhood, heading down a cobbled street lined with tightly packed shops and homes.

  “That’s it,” said the boy, pointing through drifting curtains of rain at a small, two-story building of wood and bamboo. “That’s where they moved.”

  Baoliu gave him the tongqian they’d agreed upon.

  The boy nodded and then headed back the way he’d come as Baoliu and Zhou began walking toward the place.

  A badly made sign read: SHEN POTTERY AND PORCELAIN. The downstairs was a shop, one that hardly looked open for business; the upstairs, like most places, the living quarters.

  Compared to the wretched hovels in the Minkao district, the place was a palace.

  “To get his family out of poverty. That’s the only reason this man sacrificed his life,” Baoliu told Zhou, as they approached the shop. “Maybe that’s all there is to know.” He took a deep breath and rapped on the door—and stood with Zhou, waiting for it to open.

  “Nobody lives there anymore.”

  “What?” Baoliu looked over his shoulder at a little girl sitting in the doorway of an adjacent shop, and then caught a glimpse of the boy who’d brought them there, hurrying up the street. “Ni!” “You!” he shouted.

  “Little wretch tricked us!” grumbled Zhou.

  The boy glanced back, and then ran, disappearing into the fog and rain.

  “Who lived there before?” asked Baoliu, approaching the little girl.

  “Shen Linlin and her scary grandpa.”

  “What’s scary about him?”

  “He’s got only one eye. But Linlin is pretty,” said the impish child. “And she gave me a pony doll, but then she went there.”

  “Where?” asked Baoliu, and then looked to where she was pointing, at a distant hillside, the sodden slope blurred by rain, decorated with ugly fans of debris.

  “The ravine we passed,” said Zhou.

  “When did they leave?” Baoliu asked, and looked up as a man appeared in the do
orway.

  “Nigei wo gunkai!” he barked. “Out of here!”

  Zhou put a hand on Baoliu’s shoulder. “Let’s go.”

  Baoliu nodded, and backed away, looking the man in the eye.

  “Get inside, Xia,” said the man, taking the little girl by the hand.

  “Yes, Papa,” she said, and hurried into the house. The door slammed.

  Baoliu frowned. “Come on,” he said as they turned and headed back the way they had come, heads bowed to heavy rain.

  “WE’RE IN TROUBLE,” Zhou whispered as they continued back through Minkao, on a muddy pathway between squat gray buildings. His voice was tight, worried. “We’re being followed.”

  Baoliu glanced over his shoulder into drifting rain and caught a glimpse of several boys—and saw clubs in their hands.

  “Don’t look back!” hissed Zhou. “And do what I tell you!” His hand slid down to the knife in his belt.

  Baoliu looked around desperately for something to defend himself with.

  “They got us!” Zhou spat and pulled out his knife.

  Ahead, three more boys emerged from an alleyway, leering, blocking their way.

  Baoliu and Zhou froze, then backed away, turning in a circle—as the ragged, sneering troupe came closer, slowly surrounding them. Baoliu clenched his fists, and then spotted a paving stone and snatched it up.

  “What do you want with us?” Zhou snarled, wagging his knife back and forth.

  Everything seemed to stop. Baoliu saw a woman looking out a window—eyes wide, waiting, watching. Someone with a lacquered umbrella hurried past, looking back at them.

  “Where are you two from?” The voice was behind Baoliu.

  “What do you want here?” said a bony, bent-backed boy. “Why are you so interested in Shen Manfong?”

  A boy with blackened, missing teeth came closer, a dripping length of bamboo held high.

  “Huh?”

  “We used to know him,” said Zhou.

  “Don’t you lie to me!”

  The bamboo rod flashed. Zhou yelped, reeled forward, grabbing his wrist as the knife spun away and clattered somewhere. A fist slammed into Baoliu’s face, and knocked him reeling; hands grabbed him, tearing his shirt half off. He swung wildly, heaved the paving stone, and then grabbed hold of a scrawny neck as hands dug at him, pulling him sideways. A face loomed near; he chopped at it open handed.

  Zhou yelled and cursed, and Baoliu caught sight of him falling and skittering through muck.

  An arm went around Baoliu’s neck, dragging him backward as an open hand speared him in the belly. Air exploded from his lungs. He gagged, fell to his knees, felt his money pouch being ripped from his belt. He tried to get up. A wet foot smacked into his face and knocked him sprawling. He rolled over into muddy water and lay gasping on his back.

  “Stay out of Minkao. Don’t ask so many questions,” said someone above him. “It can be dangerous.”

  Baoliu looked up at black teeth.

  Someone else walked past and stepped on his hand. Cursing, he rolled over and watched as the bunch headed away through the rain and then disappeared around a corner. He started to get up, and then sat back in water. He looked at Zhou, leaning against a wall, blood dribbling from his nose. “They get your money, too?”

  “Yeah,” huffed Zhou, struggling to get his breath. He wiped blood from his lip. “My pack, at least they didn’t get that.” He limped to where the thing lay in the mud. “Do you see my knife anywhere?”

  Baoliu looked around, shook his head, and then realized it was right in front of him, half-buried in garbage. “Here,” he said, and held the knife up as Zhou took it from his hand.

  Baoliu ran his tongue over a chipped tooth and put a hand to where his side ached. His knee protruded from his pants, bloody and scraped raw. His shirt and vest were ripped open and hung in tatters.

  “Guess they don’t like strangers,” mumbled Zhou, looking at him out of one eye, the other nearly swollen shut.

  “It’s more than that.”

  “Yeah, I know,” said Zhou, rubbing his knuckles. “But right now, I don’t care. The only thing that matters is that we’ve got no money, not even enough for a wo-pu.”

  Baoliu struggled to his feet. “We’ll find something.”

  “Yeah, what?”

  Miserable, they headed down a side street and then through a marketplace, all of it desolate, shuttered off from the world. More and more, in doorsteps and under awnings, they passed people who had camped out, many of them just shapeless lumps beneath layers of damp quilts and blankets.

  For a time, the rain eased—then hit with renewed fury. It came in driving, drifting sheets. It hissed, poured in splattering waterfalls from eaves, and burst from downspouts, spilling away in snaking little streams. It soaked them, plastering their clothes to their bodies. They hurried, trying to keep warm.

  They followed a twisting path, crossed a footbridge of old planks, and then found themselves on a trail winding between shacks built on stilts on the hillsides. Ahead, a stricken-looking crowd had gathered. A huge wedge of hillside had given way, taking a house with it; what remained of the place lay half-buried in mud in a culvert far below.

  “You’re all safe. That’s all that is important,” said someone in the crowd.

  “I felt the house start to move.” An old man squinted into the rain, telling his story. “I knew what it was immediately. I screamed to everybody to get out. Don’t take anything. Just get out. That is what I yelled.”

  Neighbors and others began shepherding the family into their homes. A woman holding a wax-coated rain shawl over her head glanced at Baoliu and Zhou. For a moment, it seemed she was going to say something. Perhaps even invite them in out of the rain. A picture flashed in Baoliu’s mind of sitting by a fire, having tea, maybe even some hot soup.

  Pulling the shawl tighter around her face, the woman hurried away.

  “Now what?” grumbled Zhou.

  Baoliu wiped water from his face. “I don’t know.”

  Hunched against the rain, they followed the muddy trail across an open stretch and then found themselves passing between endless hovels. Tendrils of smoke rose from some, disappearing into drifting sheets of mist. Faces gazed out at them, watching them pass.

  As wretched as the places were, Baoliu wanted to beg to be let inside. Everything hurt and he was so cold. The sky seemed to be darkening. Fog drifted, mixed with rain; a depthless gloom settled over everything.

  The roadway narrowed and then descended sharply.

  “The garbage dump,” said Baoliu, shielding his eyes from the rain and gazing into the ravine below Minkao. “That’s where the little girl pointed when I asked where Shen Manfong’s family is.”

  Zhou shrugged, and slinging his pack over his shoulder, led the way down a gentle slope and into the trash-filled ravine.

  There was nothing better they could do.

  They scrounged planks and propped them against a narrow overhang of rocks, then piled everything they could find on top—a length of filthy matting, a moldy rug, and oversized leaves ripped from an elephant ear plant. Groaning, they crawled into the clumsy lean-to. Zhou sighed and leaned back. Baoliu rested his head against his knees and closed his eyes, grateful just to be in out of the rain.

  8

  Baoliu awoke a hundred times that night. Zhou snored. Water dribbled through their roof of trash. He tried to get comfortable but couldn’t. His knee and jaw ached, and again and again, things stung him—insects and spiders, he guessed. He slapped at them, pinched and crushed them, and scratched under his clothes at itching lumps. Several times during the night he crawled out into the rain to try to wash away the filth and vermin, numb the stinging, and stretch his cramped muscles. And then he could only crawl back in for more of the same.

  Toward morning, the rain stopped, and Baoliu drifted into a deep sleep. He heard Zhou leave.

  Birds began to squall somewhere.

  He opened his eyes onto a triangle of sunlight. Claw
ed feet hopped overhead. A blackbird settled on a gnarled branch, and triggering a shower of water and leaves, took off effortlessly.

  His torn shirt hanging open, he crawled from the sodden lean-to and sat on a lump of rock. Zhou was some distance off, a long stick in hand and chasing something.

  Baoliu groaned getting to his feet and headed down through half-submerged grass and heaps of trash.

  Zhou waved, watched Baoliu for a moment, and then went back to what he was doing—trying to spear frogs with a stick. Already, one lay on a fallen tree trunk, its legs and head removed and its white belly flayed open.

  Picking up a pointed scrap of bamboo, Baoliu joined Zhou in the hunt, chasing after frogs. There weren’t many, and the few Baoliu spotted leaped away as soon as he came near. He managed to spear only one; Zhou collected six, and also a small rat.

  “I’ll clean the rest of them,” said Baoliu.

  “Yeah—good,” Zhou mumbled, sitting down and handing him the knife.

  The first frog he picked up was still half-alive, its eyes moving and its body inflating and deflating with spastic, feeble breaths. He stabbed it, and sliced off its head.

  “Sorry,” said Baoliu, “sorry I got you into all this.”

  “Don’t worry about it,” said Zhou, rubbing at a cut above a black eye. “It could’ve been worse.”

  “The ones who attacked us—what were they so afraid we’d find out?”

  “I don’t know,” said Zhou. “The only thing I’m sure of is that people up in Minkao seem to know something we don’t. And they’re trying to protect Shen Manfong’s family.”

  “From what? And why would they be living in a place like this? From the ka-di, they received four thousand tongqian.”

  “It doesn’t make any sense.”

  “The little girl we talked to in Minkao,” said Baoliu, “she said something about a girl named Linlin and her grandfather—a man with one eye. They’re somewhere in this ravine.”