The Dragon's Village: An Autobiographical Novel of Revolutionary China

by Yuan-Tsung Chen

  Locked in our thoughts, we lay in silence on the kang. I was just dozing off when I heard a loud knock followed by urgent thumps on our door. Xiu-ying leapt up.

  It didn’t take too much effort to open a cottage door in Longxiang. To our astonishment Landlord Wu burst in. Someone had given him a push in the back and he stumbled in flailing his arms before he tumbled to the floor. Laughter cackled outside. Reeking of alcohol, Wu twisted around and, still seated on the floor, let out a string of abuse at the man outside. I saw it was the idiot. “What do you want?” I cried, utterly astonished.

  Outside, the idiot stood gesticulating. I slammed the door in his face. The noise jolted Landlord Wu momentarily to his senses. But only for a moment. He looked confusedly from me to Xiu-ying and back and then cocked his head to one side as if recalling something. A hint of recognition appeared in his drunken, bleary eyes. For a moment he looked anxious and then again maudlin and stupid.

  Xiu-ying’s father’s voice came muffled from the inner room: “What’s happening?” and Xiu-ying calmed him with a “Nothing, Father!”

  Landlord Wu slumped back to the ground and promptly fell asleep, snoring with his mouth open. I heard a noise like a cat clawing at the door. I thrust the door open and nearly knocked the idiot to the ground. Recovering his balance, he tugged at my sleeve, pointing at Landlord Wu and then at the darkness outside. He ambled to a tree that swayed its branches there and climbed into its forked cleft, squatting there like an owl and pointing now to the door.

  Xiu-ying and I gazed in wonder at this performance for a while before we shook Wu from his stupor and drove the two intruders away. One of us would have to go to visit the Wus and find out what was behind this pantomime.

  I lay on the warm kang with Xiu-ying beside me. In the utter silence I half dreamed, half imagined a glimmer of light. A firefly’s glimmer, shining for one instant. I was an invisible atom in that glimmer. If I disappeared, who would notice?

  I heaved a deep sigh. Before I lost consciousness completely I felt as if a heavy load had been lifted from my chest.

  “What have you been doing?” There was disbelief in Cheng’s voice. “Did you see Chi’s swollen feet? Did you see the sweat pouring off him in that cold cell?”

  He had rushed into the office. Upset and perplexed, he nervously mopped his forehead, face, and neck with his handkerchief although there wasn’t any sweat. He had caught me by surprise and I sat in silence.

  Soon, his first sense of shock over, he considered the situation a little more calmly. “You must put a stop to this brutality.” He spoke mildly enough, considering the provocation, but from the look he shot at me I could read the reproach in his eyes: “What you denounced others for doing you have done yourself—and overdone.”

  “You were disgusted with the way the feudal landlords dealt with people. They flouted their own laws. They ruled over their clans like tyrants. They could arrest, interrogate, and jail people, torture them, and even sentence them to death. They were the accusers, police, judges, and executioners all in one. And now you yourself are trying to do the same as they did!”

  “I guess I’ve gotten into a situation where I can’t help contradicting my belief that I should always be on my best behavior.” I tried to give a short, cynical laugh.

  “That’s no excuse.”

  “Who’s asking for it?” I asked defensively.

  “I’ll go tell them to untie Chi and Tu,” Cheng said.

  “You’re the senior cadre. Your decision can overrule mine.” I was beginning to feel that I didn’t care what happened to Chi and Tu. I half hoped that Cheng would take over and clear up the mess. But then again I felt the urge to put up a last-ditch fight to save some of my self-esteem. As he turned to go, I shouted, “But don’t release them!”

  “I didn’t say I was going to release them. Why did you shout at me?” The color was rising in his face.

  “You came in and didn’t ask anything. You jumped to conclusions and decided right away that I’m in the wrong.”

  “That isn’t why you were rude. Maybe you don’t think you have to listen to me, and perhaps you’re right. I don’t count for much, and I’m not very ambitious. Many of my old friends are now important people like Wang Sha.” Cheng gave me a searching look.

  “Sometimes a disagreeable thought flits across my mind: ‘Cheng, what have you done with your life?’ I always seem to fall behind everyone else. I fret and fume, but I don’t get ahead. Oh, yes, I know what I should think. ‘Comrade Cheng [he mimicked the voice of a lecturer], don’t think about yourself. Put ambition behind you. Think only of service to the people and the revolution.’

  “But sometimes what does one see happening? An eager beaver puts on a very revolutionary front, acts more left than the left, gets a gentle tap on the shoulder: ‘Now, now. You are too left,’ and then is promoted! I won’t go in for that sort of thing.” As he went, he threw his arms out in a mock dramatic gesture and declaimed, “To be left or not to be, that is the question.”

  He left me riled and irresolute. I was buoyed up again, however, when Xiu-ying came in to tell me what she had learned in a talk with the Wu family. As I had surmised, they did have a suspect in mind. They couldn’t remember his name or which village he came from, only that he had borrowed money from Landlord Wu after he had gambled away all his earnings. They had no idea who his two partners in the rape had been. Only after they got news of Tu’s arrest did they realize that not even a poor peasant or even a poor peasant cadre was immune from punishment for wrongdoing. Wu’s wife had then nagged her cowardly husband to go and tell the work team all he knew about the crime and its possible perpetrators. Before he had gone halfway, however, he had lost his nerve and gone off to drink with the idiot.

  “What has the idiot got to do with all this?” I asked.

  “Wu’s wife thinks that he hid himself somewhere in their courtyard that night and saw something.”

  “I think we’re getting somewhere,” I said with some satisfaction. I wanted desperately to track down the men who had ravished Little Jade. But at the same time I felt a bit guilty for calculating that if we caught these criminals it would to some extent offset what might well turn out to have been an appalling blunder—imprisoning Chi and Tu. But clearly Tu’s exposure and downfall, whether right or wrong, was unlocking doors that up till now had been closed.

  22

  Getting at the Truth

  Wang Sha returned to Longxiang the next day at noon, and soon after called me to his room. When I went in, he did not turn around to greet me but just stared at the map of the county tacked to the wall. I waited for a while, but he still kept silent. Then I saw that he was actually looking intently not at the map but at a black, dirty spot on the wall beside it.

  “You must release them today. First let Tu go, and then Chi. And you must do it yourself.”

  His face was set in rigid lines. I prickled at his first words until I realized he was speaking to me as frankly as he would to himself.

  “All right,” I agreed grudgingly. After all, his reputation as our leader was also riding on me and my gamble: How many of his friends had grown disillusioned, wavered and doubted, been disgraced and disappeared into obscurity? Wang Sha had gained both fame and position. If he went on striving, he would reach the peak of his literary and political careers. But I was in a different position. I was a very junior cadre, an unknown without social status or political prestige to lose. If I made a mistake, at worst it would lead to a reprimand: “A silly little bourgeois miss from Shanghai.”

  “I can’t ask you to gamble on my suspicions. You have too much to lose if they should prove to be wrong,” I said.

  He was taken aback by my boldness and rudeness. He glowered at me as though he was ready to bring the roof down on my head. But again he held himself in check and changed his tone.

  “Whatever I do, I am always in the wrong either in this one’s or that one’s view. But as you once put it, I’ve gotten used to that,”
he said without rancor. “You know, the county court won’t sentence anyone on the basis of suspicion and hearsay.”

  He thought for a moment or two, and then continued in a different tone, one so peremptory that I was forced to understand that so far as we two were concerned the discussion was at an end. “I am only the leader of the work team, but I am in charge here. You’ll have to do whatever is decided. Wait, one more thing. Keep this in mind: The meeting we’ll hold is not being held for you to show off your detective talents.”

  The work team and activists were all called to a meeting set for the late afternoon. The whole affair would be thrashed out and a decision made on how to handle it. But I already knew what the outcome would be.

  I hurried back to the outer office.

  “Where is Xiu-ying?” I asked.

  “She just left,” someone answered.

  I dashed out of the room. But I had forgotten to ask where she had gone. I dashed back. “Where did she go?”

  “Probably home, but—”

  “Thanks.” Out I dashed again. They must have thought I was crazy.

  No sooner had I started to run down the village lane than I saw her coming towards me. I was sure she had sensed she was needed.

  “Xiu-ying!” I called joyfully. I stumbled over a stone and practically fell into her outstretched arms.

  “Xiu-ying, let’s go find someplace quiet. There’s something important I have to consult you about.”

  The urgency in my voice alarmed her. She looked grave now.

  “I’ve also got important news to tell you. Shall we go to my home?”

  “No. There’s no time to be polite to your parents or neighbors.”

  “Where shall we go then? Da Niang’s?”

  “No, no.” I stopped in the middle of the road. “Xiu-ying, I can’t wait. Every minute counts.”

  A few passers-by greeted us. We waved back and shouted the old greeting, “Have you eaten?”

  “All right. We’ll have to talk here.”

  “What’s your news? Good or bad?” I asked her.

  “It’s good. A bit of luck.”

  “We’ll need all we can get of that.”

  “Da Niang thinks she knows who the rapists might be, at least one of them.” She stopped, wishing to see how I would react to this revelation. To her surprise, I frowned. Da Niang had let me down. Why hadn’t she told me first?

  Xiu-ying was downcast. She realized that I was discomfitted although I welcomed her news, so she hastened to add, “Da Niang didn’t tell me. She told my mother. She says she didn’t tell you because she never got an opportunity. You were hardly ever at home. I think she was afraid that we might ask her too many questions if she came to tell us directly and that it might put her in danger. The night the rape took place Da Niang saw the rapist and his two pals carrying packs and hurrying away from the village. She recognized him because she had been hired by Landlord Wu that year to cook for the temporary farmhands at harvest time.”

  “Does she know which village he came from?”

  “Yes. It’s not very far from here. It’s called Xi Cun.”

  “We must report this immediately to Wang Sha. Perhaps it will get him to postpone the decision to release Tu and Chi this afternoon.”

  “But the rapist isn’t from here. How does his case involve Chi and Tu?”

  “I don’t know yet. But what were they doing in Longxiang? What were they carrying away? If only Da Niang had told us this earlier we might have gotten a clue to other things. Damn her!” I stamped my foot furiously.

  “Mother said that Da Niang was terribly shaky when she told her all this. She must have worried her head off during the last two weeks wondering what to do.”

  “What about my head? Did she think a tiny bit about what I’ve been going through? Anyway, Xiu-ying, will you go and tell all this to Wang Sha. You see, Landlord Wu only began to speak out after Tu was locked up. And Da Niang has only begun to speak out now that both Chi and Tu have been caught. That means her news must in some way concern them.”

  “Where are you going?”

  “I’ll tell you later.” I had changed my mind. I didn’t want anyone to know where I was going.

  For some time I had thought of sounding out Tu’s wife. She was weak and vulnerable—Tu browbeat her, taking advantage of the fact that he had “saved her life” and that of her daughter. I doubted that she knew much about Tu’s outside activities, but I was sure I could get her to talk. Exploiting that vulnerability myself had seemed an unscrupulous thing to do, but I forced myself to put my doubts out of my mind. There was only a slim chance that I would gain much, and this was no time for scruples.

  Before I knocked on her door, I stood for a moment, ears pricked up, listening. There was no one else inside; I didn’t want anyone to witness what was to happen.

  After a whole day and night of tense anxiety, Tu’s wife looked pale and tired. Yet she pulled herself together when she saw me. Both of us were wary, but there were many advantages on my side. I was the attacker. I didn’t shout at her but spoke in a friendly manner. I had to offer her some hope, some inducement to talk, or, failing that, frighten her into talking. As if in confidence, I told her, “If only I could tell you that everything is all right and your husband will soon come home—” I suddenly checked myself. She looked at me expectantly.

  “But that wouldn’t be true,” I abruptly exclaimed. “The truth is, you’re in serious trouble.”

  She looked at me wild-eyed. Her whole body was a question mark.

  “You’re in serious trouble. Your husband has confessed. Our militia is on its way to search your house.”

  She started as if stung. Her face turned deathly white, but this was no time for pity. Too much hung in the balance. I must beware of mercy!

  “He has betrayed you, so it is pointless for you to try and get away from the facts. He will be treated leniently, because he has chosen the best way: to confess. But you—”

  “It’s him. I had nothing to do with it,” she cried, trembling all over.

  I shivered with nervous excitement. I was like a hunter on the trail, the quarry in my sights. I raised my voice in spite of myself: “Now you have betrayed him. The only thing that can save you is to make a clean breast of everything. Out with it!” I was partly playacting, but partly I was deadly serious. I gripped the table between us.

  “Oh, good Heavens!” Her voice was so weak that she seemed to be at her last gasp.

  Pressing on to break her completely, I said as solemnly as a judge, “It will be to your advantage if you confess. If you try to fight it out, you will be condemned.”

  “My own flesh and blood,” she wailed. “Why are we born women? We have to accept our fate. How can you blame me? I am his property.”

  I did not understand what in the world she was talking about. I began shooting at random in the dark. Perhaps Tu was keeping hidden property for Landlord Chi. “Where did you hide it?”

  She was silent except for her sobs, but she fixed her terrified eyes on a spot in a corner of the cottage.

  “You buried it here?” I asked amazed.

  She hugged her chest with quivering arms and her legs went limp. She was too weak even to hold herself on the stool. Her body slowly slipped down and she lay crumpled on the floor.

  “Is that where the things are?” I demanded.

  She turned and stared at me until the whites of her eyes showed. Then all of a sudden she screamed. She knew she had been trapped.

  “Out with it, all of it, everything you have, the false deeds, everything!” I gasped out, not realizing until it was too late that I was overplaying my hand and exposing my bluff. The expression on her face was terrifying.

  I don’t know where she gathered the strength from, but she leapt up and lunged at me, murder in her eyes. Luckily she stumbled over one of the legs of the table. For an instant everything blurred before me. Then in wild desperation I snatched up a bottle and threw it in her face. It gave me time t
o rush out of the door into the daylight. She did not follow me.

  What we dug out of the earthen floor of the cottage were the remains of a corpse. It was Tu’s stepdaughter. When Tu’s wife saw the men opening the grave, she fainted and laid her pitiful small figure on the kang. Her face was burning hot with fever. In her delirium, she talked incoherently. “Don’t, don’t,” she gasped as if begging Fate to desist, to leave her alone, to heap no more suffering on her. Her spirit weakened and her muttering stopped. Her eyes were tight closed, shutting out the light of day and reality.

  Leaving a neighbor to care for her, we went straight to Tu’s cell. Wang Sha let Little Gao take the lead, as this was his responsibility as the militia commander in charge of the prisoner. Without introduction he told Tu, “We have found the corpse.”

  Tu gave a yelp and made a blind leap forward. He took us by surprise, crashed through the crowd of us and out the door. We chased after him. He raced madly up the village lane, the militiamen close behind him, and made for the open country.

  Soon out of breath, I was left far behind. But Tu was also tired, and when he stumbled and fell, the younger men closed in on him. Ringed around like an animal at bay, he rose and stood, back bent and feet braced, arms spread as if he wanted to catch us all. Little Gao, creeping up from behind him, gripped his shoulders and pinned his arms. Tu made a frantic effort to free himself, then, under the weight of his assailants, collapsed in a heap on the ground.

  It was not long before we had the whole tragic story out of him. Tu had raped the girl and, when she had gotten pregnant, afraid of the consequences, murdered her. Like a man pursued by devils, he suffered hallucinations. For several nights he screamed in terror. He saw the girl being stabbed, and when she disappeared her place was taken by a hundred girls with the same face. At her wits’ end, his wife had turned to his old master, Landlord Chi, for help when Tu fell ill. Knowing what kind of a stepfather Tu must have been, Chi had literally smelled out the crime when he visited their cottage. He had confronted Tu with what he suspected and blackmailed him. Tu became his secret agent. But Landlord Chi was too cunning to use Tu openly. He bided his time, content merely to get information about the work team and its plans.