A Map of Betrayal: A Novel

by Ha Jin

  “I’ll pay you two thousand yuan for three days, plus gas and all the other expenses,” I told her.

  “No need for that, Professor Shang.”

  “Uh-uh, call me Lilian.”

  “Okay, Lilian, I’d be happy to go and see the countryside with you. You don’t need to pay me.”

  “You’ll work for me for a few days, so I’ve got to pay you. Make sure the car is in best running condition, will you?”

  “It’s my older brother’s car. He has four of them and keeps them all serviced regularly.”

  “That’s good. Don’t let anyone know of the trip. I just want to see what my father’s home village is like.”

  “I won’t let it slip, of course.”

  The college wouldn’t want foreign teachers to move around freely, because it was responsible for our behavior and safety. Minmin and I decided to meet at my place early Saturday morning. She was one of those grad students who I suspected planned to go abroad eventually to work toward a PhD or professional degree, so I assumed she might want to have me as a reference in the future. I liked her for her vivacious personality and her tinkling laughter, which often raised her classmates’ eyebrows.

  We set out around seven a.m. on Saturday. I was wearing a plain flannel jacket and no makeup. This way I looked like a professional Chinese woman. Actually, I’d just given away my new parka (bought at Macy’s specially for my Fulbright stint), because a fine long coat was inconvenient in China—wearing it, you couldn’t sit down freely on dingy buses and subways, or walk on a bustling street where automobiles might spatter dirty water on you, or mix with pedestrians casually, running, pushing, and jostling to get where you wanted to be.

  It took Minmin and me almost an hour to get out of Beijing, where many streets were jammed and the area near the Great Hall of the People was blocked by the police to make way for a motorcade. But once we got on the expressway, traffic became sparse and we started cruising with ease. The new eight-lane road, four lanes each way, was well built, washed clean and shiny by a rainsquall before dawn. Minmin was at the wheel, her narrow hands in the nine and three positions. She said she’d never driven such a long distance before; at most she’d spun to Huairou, a town about forty miles north of Beijing, so she was excited about this trip. The roadsides were hardly used, and only a couple of billboards appeared along the way. I noticed that the tolls were expensive. The ticket Minmin had picked up at the entrance to the highway stated seventy-six yuan from the capital to Tianjin, about twelve dollars for ninety miles. That might account for the scarce traffic.

  It was warm for mid-March, and patches of distant woods were just in leaf, the fuzzy branches shimmering a little. Spring seemed to be coming early this year. It had been a dry, warm winter in the Beijing area, and it had snowed only once, lightly. Somehow since getting out of the city, we hadn’t encountered any of the police cars that were omnipresent in Beijing. I gathered that only on the highway could you escape the police’s surveillance, though the absence of the slashing strobes and blasting bullhorns gave me more discomfort than ease.

  As we were approaching Tianjin, we saw a brand-new billboard that declared: WELCOME MIGRANT WORKERS!

  “That sounds fishy,” Minmin said, flicking her fingers dismissively.

  “Unconvincing at least,” I agreed, knowing how migrant workers were viewed by common Beijingers—like underclass citizens; their children couldn’t even go to public schools. It had always bothered me that the Chinese were not born equal in spite of their constitution that guarantees every citizen the same rights. People from the countryside, greatly deprived compared with city dwellers, had to own real estate in a city in order to become its legal residents. Even though this was an improvement over the former policy, which did not allow country people to become legal urbanites at all, it was still discriminatory. It reminded me of the investment immigration practiced in North America, where a large sum of money can buy a U.S. green card or a Canadian maple leaf card. Yet I’d never heard a Chinese complain about the discrimination against the country people. As a matter of fact, most Chinese viewed the current policy as a progressive step toward reducing the gap between the country and the city. I once asked a reporter why this inequality hadn’t raised any public outcry, and he merely shook his head and gave a resigned smile.

  I had not expected to travel so fast. Within three hours we’d almost reached the border of Shandong province, so we pulled off the expressway to grab a bite. We found a restaurant called Jade Terrace, where the waitstaff wore tangerine-colored shirts and white aprons. A thin young waiter with a raw, new haircut seated us and asked, “What would you two beauties like for lunch?”

  “I’m no beauty,” I said. “I’ll become a senior citizen in a few years, so save that word for a nice-looking girl.”

  Nonplussed, he looked at Minmin inquiringly, then they both laughed out loud. I had a problem with the term meinű, a beauty, employed indiscriminately by the Chinese. Every young woman was called that, whether she was homely or beautiful. I disliked such a careless use of language, which blurred the actual forms of things and ideas. The word “beauty” ought to refer to someone who at least had some pretty features. My objection to the waiter’s greeting also implied I knew I was average-looking.

  We ordered steamed fish, spiced tofu skin mixed with mustard greens, and sautéed lotus root to go with rice. I calculated that we should be able to reach Linmin in less than two hours. “Let’s relax and take our time,” I told Minmin, who was fanning herself with a menu. It was warm inside the dining room, the air thick with the smell of frying oil.

  Our order came, all at once. To my amazement, the fish was a sizable salmon fillet, garnished with a few slivers of daikon and two sprigs of cilantro. I told Minmin, “I don’t think I ever saw salmon in China twenty years ago.”

  “This fish was imported,” she said.

  “But they sell the dish for only twenty-two yuan here. How can they make money?”

  “I don’t mean the full-grown salmon were imported. The fry were originally bought from Europe and then sold to domestic fish farmers. So this salmon must have come from a local farm.”

  “I see.” I noticed that she didn’t touch the fish and served herself only the tofu skin and the vegetables. “You don’t like salmon?” I asked.

  “I like it, but it’s not safe to eat fish randomly. Don’t ever eat fish heads and innards at restaurants. A fillet might be all right, less contaminated.”

  “Contaminated by what?” I asked in surprise.

  “Chemicals. My brother saw local farmers feed their fish lots of antibiotics to keep them alive in polluted ponds.”

  “Oh, I see,” I said. Food contamination was indeed a major problem in China. Just a week ago I had read in a newspaper that a small boy died after eating two pork buns bought at a food stand. It was also common knowledge that contaminated baby formula and poisonous milk were still rampant in some cities and towns. Word had it that thousands of infants had been sickened by drinking milk adulterated with melamine, a chemical used in making plastics. But I was nearly fifty-four and wasn’t terribly bothered by the problem. I told Minmin, “By Chinese standards I’m an old woman and shouldn’t worry too much. But you youngsters should be more careful about what you eat.”

  “Especially when you want to get married and have a baby,” she said.

  Minmin mentioned that her sister-in-law had been on a strict diet to detoxify her body so that she could have a better chance of giving birth to “a clean, healthy baby.”

  “What does she eat? Vegetables and fruits only?” I asked.

  “No. Some vegetables aren’t safe either, like napa cabbage, leeks, bean sprouts, tomatoes. Leeks are the worst because you have to use a lot of insecticide to keep worms from eating the roots.”

  “What vegetables are safe then?”

  “Potatoes, taros, carrots, turnips. This is okay too.” She picked up a perforated slice of lotus root.

  “How long will your s
ister-in-law continue to detox?”

  “A whole year. Besides the diet, she must drink an herbal soup every day.”

  “Ugh, I’d rather eat contaminated food.” It gave me a chill just to think of the bitter medicinal liquid.

  Minmin went on to say that her brother, a real estate developer, had urged his wife to go live in L.A. so she could give birth to their baby there. “Besides the better living environment,” Minmin said, “the child would become a U.S. citizen. But my stupid sister-in-law won’t go, saying she’s afraid of America and doesn’t mind living and dying in China, blah blah blah. What she really fears is that my brother might shack up with another woman in her absence, so she claims she doesn’t want to be a new member of the Mistress Village in L.A.”

  I laughed but immediately covered my mouth with my palm. Hundreds of young Chinese women, mostly mistresses of wealthy businessmen and powerful officials, had been living in a suburb of L.A. where they could get around without speaking English and where a whole support system was provided for those expectant mothers. The gated community was nicknamed the Mistress Village, a moniker that often cropped up in the Chinese media.

  We left more than half the salmon untouched. I picked up the tab and gave the waiter two five-yuan bills for a tip, which made him smile gratefully now that most Chinese diners, as was the custom, didn’t offer a gratuity. We hit the highway again around one p.m., and the drive was so smooth that we arrived at Linmin just after three o’clock. The county seat was like a small city, new mid-rise buildings everywhere, a few with gray granite-like façades. The streets were noisy and smelled of boiled peanuts, baked yams, popcorn, deep-fried fish. At a farmers’ market the last few produce vendors were still hawking their wares. Cars were honking, tractors’ two-stroke engines puttering, horses and donkeys pawing the ground, all eager to go home. On a busy street a couple of neon signs flickered here and there, beckoning people to beauty salons, foot spas, karaoke bars, massage parlors. At a tea stand I asked an old man for directions to Maijia Village, and he said it was south of the town, about three miles away. We avoided regular hotels, fearing they might request my ID. If they discovered I was a foreigner, they would report me to the local police. We checked into a family inn, or a guesthouse as the locals called it. Minmin told the young receptionist that I was her aunt, so the girl didn’t ask for my ID card, which every Chinese citizen had. We shared a twin room.

  1953

  By the spring of 1953 Gary had been in Okinawa for three and a half years. He had learned to drive and bought a jeep from an officer who had returned to Hawaii. Sometimes he drove along the military highway to a beach spread with white sand or to a bay lined with red pines and banyan trees, where he’d sit alone, breathing the briny air, lost in his thoughts. He’d begun to smoke and liked American cigarettes, particularly Chesterfields and Camels. In the summer he would don a perforated straw boater, but he wore a felt derby in the other seasons. His hats, fine suits, and patent-leather shoes made him appear a bit dashing, though he always gave off a solitary air and the impression of being absentminded—something of a loner who was careful about his appearance but didn’t know how to blend in. By now his homesickness had grown into a kind of numbness, a dull pain deep in his heart. He felt its heaviness constantly but took it as a sign of maturity, as though he at last had the fortitude needed for fulfilling his mission.

  The semimilitary life gave him a sense of discipline, while his daily work helped him keep at bay the memories of his family and homeland. During the past two years he had also developed a love for popular American singers, above all Hank Williams. He borrowed the records from the radio station’s library and played them on a phonograph with a trumpet speaker that he’d bought secondhand. He learned some of the lyrics by heart and couldn’t help letting the tunes reverberate in his mind. When strolling on a beach or along a winding trail, he would croon to himself, “Well, why don’t you love me like you used to do? / How come you treat me like a worn-out shoe?” Or with a measure of cruel self-mockery, “No matter how I struggle or strive / I’ll never get out of this world alive.” Or touched by a fit of self-pity, “As I wonder where you are / I’m so lonesome I could cry.” Those songs would bring tears to his eyes as though he were a jilted lover whose moaning and pining didn’t make any sense to others. Yet he would force himself to hum them as a way to toughen himself.

  He’d been devastated in late October 1950, when the Chinese army ambushed and mauled the U.S. troops east of the Yalu. Hearing the news, he hurried out of his office and stood behind an Indian almond tree in the backyard, hiding his face in the glossy leaves while tears streamed down his cheeks. He pressed his forehead against the damp trunk and stayed there for almost an hour. He could not explain why he reacted so viscerally. By instinct he must have sensed that because the two countries had virtually gone to war, he might become more valuable to China, which would, he was sure, assign him dangerous tasks. In other words, he might have a long spying career ahead. He hated to be put in such a position and felt marooned, but he kept reminding himself to be more patient. Indeed, every worthy spy must have iron patience, being capable of taking refuge in solitude while biding his time. Ultimately everything would depend on how much he could endure.

  The Chinese army’s initial victories didn’t hearten Gary, because he knew China was a weak country and couldn’t fight the war for long without the Soviets’ backing. When news came of the horrendous casualties the Chinese had suffered, Gary suspected that his countrymen had been used as cannon fodder for the Russians. His suspicion was verified later on. Through translating articles and reports, he chanced on information unknown to the public. The Soviets had provided a great quantity of weapons for the Chinese troops in Korea, but Stalin gave them only limited air cover east of the Yalu, just down to the Ch’ongch’on River. Consequently, most of the Chinese and North Korean army units were exposed to the U.S. air attacks and dared not move around in daylight. Only by night could their vehicles get on the road. Still, American bombers devastated the Communist forces. That was why Lin Biao, the most brilliant and experienced of Mao’s generals, foreseeing this horrifying slaughter, had refused to take command of the Chinese army in Korea, and Beijing had no choice but to appoint Marshal Peng Dehuai the commander.

  Summer in Okinawa was sultry in spite of the cool breeze coming from the ocean at night, but this year Gary didn’t have to put up with the heat and humidity of the dog days again. In late July he was dispatched to Pusan to help interrogate the POWs held by the UN side. He was pleased about the assignment, believing that once in Korea, he might be able to find a way to contact his superiors back in China. Also, he was eager for a change. The armistice had just been signed, and no more large-scale fighting would be likely, because every party involved seemed too exhausted to continue. The war had reached its tail end. Gary boarded a C-119 one early-August morning and landed in Pusan four hours later.

  There were too many POWs for the UN personnel to interrogate. From the Chinese army alone, more than twenty-one thousand men were held prisoner, mostly captured in the spring of 1951. The Chinese had been mangled severely in their fifth-phase offense, and a whole division, the 180th, was liquidated. That forced North Korea and China back to the negotiation table with the UN. But the talks dragged on and on owing to the thorny issue of the POWs. Many of the Chinese prisoners had served in the Nationalist army before (they’d been caught and then recruited by the Communists) and dreaded returning to the mainland because they’d been instructed never to surrender in Korea, even at the cost of their lives. Fearful of punishment, they wanted to go to Taiwan and rejoin the Nationalist army there. Chiang Kai-shek was badly short of soldiers, so he welcomed these men, whose return to their former ranks would also make the Communists lose a battle on the propaganda front. So some Nationalist officials flew in to persuade more Chinese prisoners to sail for Taiwan.

  Gary served as the interpreter when the top U.S. prison officers received the Nationalist emissaries
, who were not allowed to enter the jail compounds. At most they could meet the POW representatives with barbed-wire fences between them. Nevertheless, they managed to deliver to the prisoners Chiang Kai-shek’s personal presents: cigarettes, playing cards, toffees, books, musical instruments, and a wool overcoat for every man willing to go to Taiwan. Though Gary was not a POW, the Nationalist delegates gave him some presents as well, including a trench coat and a canvas rucksack.

  Gary stayed in a makeshift cottage in the POW collection center on the outskirts of Pusan. The ocean was within view, and large ships in the harbor loomed like little hills in the morning mist. On a fine day fishing boats would bob on the distant swells. The water was uneven in color, some areas yellow and some green. To the north, outside the immense prison camp, spread endless rice paddies, some unsown, choked by algae and weeds. The bustling city was full of refugees. All kinds of Korean civilians had swarmed here and put up temporary shelters; even the nearby slopes were dappled with patches of tents and shacks built of straw, plywood, and corrugated iron. Gary could see that the soil here was rich and the climate congenial. He saw giant apples and pears for sale, much bigger than those in China, and he couldn’t help but imagine how good this place could be in peace. Fluent in both English and Mandarin, he was appreciated by his superiors and peers. He also mixed well with the officers from Taiwan who were here to help the UN with the prison’s administrative work. Most of these officers would stay just a few months. Gary often sat at their tables at mealtimes and also shared cigarettes and beer with them.

  One day at lunch, as Gary was eating a Salisbury steak with a dill pickle, Meng, a broad-shouldered Taiwanese officer in his mid-thirties, came and sat down across from him. The man’s bold eyes shone with excitement while he gave a cockeyed grin. He said to Gary under his breath, “Mind you, I’m having low back pain.”