Han Na refused. Nor would she have needles or herbs.
“Han Na,” I begged, “if you will not do it for yourself, do it for me.”
Han Na only shook her head. Her gaze was always on the door, waiting for Quan. I would have gone myself to drag Quan home from his beloved city, but I could not leave Han Na. It was nearly the end of the fifth moon when Quan came. He was tender with his mother and wept at her weakness, but he took no notice of the rice paddy and sent me to the village to buy him the Shanghai newspaper.
In the evening Han Na asked Quan to carry her out to the courtyard so that she could see how the rice was growing. “Quan,” she asked, “could you not return and work the land? Chu Ju has added fish to the rice, so the paddy is as good as a lake. It is a wonderful thing.”
“No, Ma Ma. I am happy where I am. I was never meant to be a farmer. There is nothing about putting my hands into the earth that raises my spirits. I am a builder. The choosing and lifting and placing of the stones is what gives me pleasure, that and the great city.”
“But when I am gone, Quan, what will become of the land? And the money you have sent—it is all there. We have not spent a penny.”
“I will take the money I have sent you. It may be that it will let me marry. Do what you want with the land.”
“Then it must be Chu Ju’s. She has planted the rice and tended it as it should be tended. Even the little fishes have thrived under her hand. Chu Ju will make enough money from the crops to pay the rent fees and the taxes. She is eighteen now, and if she marries, her lease on the land will be her dowry.
“But Chu Ju,” Han Na said to me, and took my hand in hers, “do not think that the land is payment for caring for me. There can be no payment for that. Where there was your love, there is only my love. And Chu Ju, you must promise me to see your parents. Look how I waited for Quan. Your ma ma waits for you as well. Promise me you will see her.”
I promised.
In two days’ time Quan was ready to return to the city, but Han Na said, “Wait a few days and you will not have to make the return trip.”
Quan was horrified. “Ma Ma, are you to hurry with your dying so that I need not make a second trip? I am only going because I am sure you will soon be well.” No one believed Quan’s words, least of all Quan.
Han Na had only a little strength, but with the little she had, she mended the worn places on her best jacket. Neither she nor I said a word, yet we both knew why the mending was carried on.
On the day Quan was to return to the city, Han Na died. I saw that Quan was ashamed of his tears, and leaving Quan with his ma ma, I took my tears out to the paddy. I thought back to the day when I had first seen Han Na in the paddy, working alongside Quan. She had asked no questions of me but had taken me into her house and given me a home. Her house had become my house. What would my life be without her? I had given up my own family, and now the only family I knew was gone.
A soft wind rippled the rice, making green waves on a green ocean. Beyond our paddy were endless paddies, endless green oceans whose harvest would one day fill a million bowls. In the distance a heron stalked a frog, piercing it with its sharp beak, throwing it up in the air, and swallowing it with one gulp. With all the plenty there was cruelty. There had been Han Na’s love as wide as a hai and now she was gone, snatched from me forever. I hunched down and, covering my face with my hands, cried until there were no tears left.
Ling’s ma ma came bringing food and comfort. Together we readied Han Na in the mended jacket and covered her face with a bit of silk cloth. Though I thought it superstition, I said nothing when Ling’s ma ma bound Han Na’s feet together with string to keep her from moving about in the coffin should she become possessed by evil spirits. Ling’s ma ma and I fashioned a wreath of white paper and bamboo, while Quan wrote out stories of Han Na’s life on strips of white paper, which he hung at the entrance to the house.
A diviner was called and a date set for the funeral. I knew that it might be as long as a month before a date was chosen for the burial. Perhaps Quan was generous with the diviner, for the diviner found the very next day to be an auspicious one.
A coffin was purchased. A Taoist priest was summoned from the village to chant a sutra for the dead and a musician came to play the suona, whose mournful music tore at my heart. An empty chair was carried in the procession so that Han Na’s spirit might join it and not stay behind to haunt the living, though I would have given much to have her about me.
Along with the other women I walked at the front of the procession. Ling’s ma ma had instructed me that as the “daughter” of the house I had a duty to cry and wail, which would help to destroy the barriers Han Na might meet with as she started her long journey through the many realms of the Underworld. I had no need to be prompted, for the crying and wailing came from my heart.
When we returned home, Quan had the priest kindle a small fire. Before those of us in the procession could enter Han Na’s house, we had to jump across the fire so that any evil spirits remaining from the death of Han Na would be left behind.
In all he did Quan honored Han Na, yet I could see that Quan was eager to return to Shanghai as soon as the funeral was over. “There is nothing more I can do here, and every day I am away, there is the chance that my job will be gone. Of the money I have sent, I will leave some yuan to carry you until the harvest. Unless, Chu Ju, you wish to share it all with me?”
“Share it?” I asked, puzzled. “It is yours, Quan. You are generous to give me the land. You might have sold the lease and taken the money. I am no blood relation to you.”
“It was my mother’s wish, and I could not go against that. Had you not stayed with her, I would never have been able to leave her and go to the city. When I was here, each day in the paddy was like a prison. But Chu Ju, that is not what I am speaking of. You could sell the lease and come with me to Shanghai. With the money of mine that Ma Ma saved and the money from the land, we could marry and find a small room of our own.”
I stared at Quan in amazement.
“I know I am older than you are, Chu Ju, but I am a hard worker and it would be a great thing to live in such a city. You are clever and would have no trouble finding work. I have watched you since I have been here. You would make just the kind of wife I wish for.”
I thought of the city at night with all its lights. I thought of cinemas, and stores with the silk scarves and with everything one could want. I thought also of living in one room, in one of the high buildings. I thought of the rush of people and cars and trolleys and the way when you went from place to place there was no path with paddies and bamboo groves but only a dark tunnel that shot you like a bullet from one stop to another.
“You are kind, Quan, but I would die in the city like a plant stuck into a pot of stones with no water or earth.” I said nothing of Ling.
Quan looked disappointed but not surprised. “Then we must go to the government office and register the lease in your name. You are eighteen now, and there will be no trouble.”
The official at the government office frowned at Quan. “You are giving the lease for the land over to this young girl?”
Quan produced a letter that Han Na had had a scribe write for her and that she had signed with her mark. “It is all here. Chu Ju is to get the land, all five mu. We have the money for the fee, and she can pay the taxes when they are due as well as anyone else.”
The official looked at me and Quan and then at the money Quan had given for the fee to transfer the land. At first I thought he would say no. Instead he said, “This transfer of lease is irregular and will cause me much extra work.” He looked at Quan.
After a moment Quan said, “I am sorry for the extra work. Let me increase the fee to make up for it.” He put down more yuan, which the official swept up as quickly as the heron snatched the frog. The papers were completed and a seal put on them. Quan handed them to me and led me out of the office.
“I will wait in the tea shop for the train.” He too
k my hand. “It was a day of great fortune when you came to us. I am only sorry you will not go back to Shanghai with me.” With that he hurried away, and I turned toward my land.
twelve
Each day I thought of my promise to Han Na to visit my family. The only time I could leave would be after the rice harvest and before the crops were planted. At the end of August the time came. I would take a bus to the river and the riverboat to our village. I remembered my ba ba’s dislike of blue jeans, and I bought new trousers for the trip and a new shirt as well. Then, throwing all caution to the winds, I spent three yuan for a stuffed panda for Hua.
All was ready and everything planned, yet I could not take the first step. It had been like that when I had left my home, and now it was like that when I was to leave Han Na’s house.
Ling said, “Chu Ju, think how pleased and relieved your family will be to see you. You have nothing to fear. Who could wish for a better daughter? They will be proud to hear you have your own land.”
“But I ran away.”
“They will understand. Perhaps there is a son now. Though how any son could make them happier than such a daughter as you there is no knowing.” A worried look came over his face. “You will come back?”
“I would never leave my land,” I said. “And my friends are here. How could I leave your parents, who have been so good to me?” I smiled. “And their son as well.”
As the bus pulled away from the village, the last thing I saw from the window of the bus was Ling standing at the station waving. I closed my eyes, holding the memory to carry me in the days to come.
The bus passed near the worm farm and I longed to stop and see Ling Li, Song Su, and Jing, but I could not stop, for I had to return in time to get the crops planted. The riverboat carried me on the water, and I looked for Yi Yi and Wu and the boys. There were many fishing boats, but none of them was familiar.
At last we came to the village where I had grown up. I left the boat, checking carefully to see that my return tickets were in my bag. It was early evening and many of the stalls in the village were closed. The dentist and Ba Ba were not there, but I saw my old schoolmaster. I was ready to greet him but he hardly looked at me, passing me quickly. I hurried on, thinking it might be possible to visit my home and see my family from a distance without being recognized.
My old home and its plot of vegetables had grown large in my memory. Now, with it there before my eyes, it appeared small. I stood hidden beside the many branches of the banyan tree. What I saw seemed both as real and yet as unreal as the pictures I had seen on the dian-shi screen in the window of the store. There was Nai Nai, older and frailer, sitting with Ba Ba at the table in the courtyard. Ma Ma held Hua in her arms. No. It could not be Hua, for the baby in her arms was only a few months old. A child ran out of the house and climbed onto Ba Ba’s lap, and I saw that it was Hua. The terrible worry I had had all these years disappeared. My sister was safe.
Perhaps the new baby was a boy. I could see no place for myself and resolved to leave now, saying nothing. Later I would send a letter telling all that had happened to me. Yet in spite of my resolve to run away again, I drew closer. I might just say a word or two, ask directions as if I were a stranger, and not be recognized. My heart pounding, my legs weak, I stepped away from the shadow of the tree.
Ma Ma looked up and saw me. She thrust the baby into Nai Nai’s arms and ran toward me. “Chu Ju! Chu Ju!” I felt the familiar softness as her arms enclosed me and smelled the familiar fragrance of the many herbs she gathered and preserved for Ba Ba. “Oh, Chu Ju, how could you have left us? Every day has been a torture worrying about you.”
Ba Ba hurried toward me as well. He took my hands. “Chu Ju, your leaving us was a bitter thing. But let me look at you. The little girl is gone. You are a young woman now and comely.”
Nai Nai was staring at me over the baby in her arms. I could not tell whether her eyes were bleary with age or whether tears lay in them. “How well you are dressed,” she said. There was suspicion in her voice.
Hua, for I knew it was my sister, stood apart, staring at me, her thumb in her mouth. I knelt down and drew her to me. “Hua,” I asked, “do you remember me? I am Chu Ju, your sister.”
I took the panda bear from my bag and handed it to her. “I brought you a present.”
Hua grinned and looked up to Ma Ma as if asking permission. Ma Ma nodded, and Hua reached for the bear, hugging it to her.
I was sorry I had not brought something for the new baby. “What is the new baby’s name?” I asked.
“She is called Nu Hai,” Nai Nai said. “Nothing else is needed.”
Nu Hai, Girl, a name given with no great thought or hope.
“You must be hungry,” Ma Ma said. “Come and sit down and let me get you tea and a little something with it.”
Ma Ma brought out a hard-boiled egg and flat-cakes and my favorite pickles. The tea came in the familiar blue bowls I had drunk from so many times.
Watching me, Ma Ma said, “Every day I wondered, Where is Chu Ju this day? and even Where is Chu Ju this moment?”
Ba Ba said, “When I read your note, Chu Ju, I said it was all my doing. If there had been no talk of sending Hua away, we would still have our Chu Ju. In our desire for a son, we lost a daughter.” He sighed. “Now we have another daughter, but this one stays, though I will never live to see a son.”
When the table had been cleared, Ba Ba said, “Now, Chu Ju, you must tell us where you have been.”
“From the moment you left,” Ma Ma said. “Leave nothing out. I went with you on your journey, but I have no picture of it.”
Hua climbed onto my lap, clutching her panda, anxious for a story with no thought that the story began with her.
With every sentence there were questions.
“But why did you think of going to the river?” Ba Ba asked.
“How could you deal with the insides of so many fish?” Ma Ma wanted to know.
“Worms!” Hua giggled. “You tickled the worms with a feather?”
“There can be little money in the tickling of worms,” Nai Nai said. “How is it you have money to come back here? We want no thief in our house.”
And so I told about Han Na’s house.
When I had finished my story, Ma Ma said, “How I wish the good woman had lived so that I might go on my knees to thank her for her kindness to my daughter.”
“You went to Shanghai by yourself?” Ba Ba asked. “That is such a dangerous place.”
“And now that your Han Na is dead,” Nai Nai said, “I suppose this Quan has turned you out, and you come back here like a whipped dog with its tail between its legs.”
“No indeed,” I protested. “It is not like that at all. Han Na left me the lease for her land and Quan took me himself to the village registrar. The lease is mine. It is all recorded. I go back tomorrow to plant the vegetables.”
“No!” Ma Ma cried, grasping my sleeve as if she meant to hold me there. “It is impossible that you should leave so soon. I just have my daughter back with me, and am I to lose her?”
But Ba Ba only asked, “This land belongs to you? How much land is there?”
When I told him, his eyes opened very wide, as if he saw before him the green rice plants rippling in the wind. I could tell that the idea of having even so little a piece of land was a great thing for Ba Ba. As I described the plowing of the land and planting of the rice, Ba Ba’s face lit up as if he, too, were planting and harvesting. “And fish,” I said. “I plant fish with the rice and they grow with the rice so that I have a double harvest.”
Nai Nai gave a little bark of a laugh. “Now I am more sure than ever that you are telling us a tale. Fish in the rice paddy? That can’t be.”
“It can be,” Ba Ba said. “I have heard of such things.”
“With Han Na gone,” Ma Ma said, “you will be alone.”
I told them of the Zhangs’ kindness, and because I wished to bring his name into our family, I told them of Ling
and how he and the beast plowed my land and the cleverness of his orchard.
Ba Ba nodded his head as I described the orchard. “That is a wise choice. I see in the village how much people will give for a fine peach or juicy plum.”
As I spoke of Ling, Ma Ma watched me. Now she smiled. “This son of your friend has an orchard and his family have a water buffalo? They must be well off. Is this Ling a good son?”
My face was burning. “Yes,” I said. “And a good friend.” I said no word of his dangerous books that told the truth.
“Ah,” Ma Ma said, and nodded with satisfaction.
“I have been thinking,” I said. “If the rice and fish do well this year, I could save my money and in a year or so send the fare for the boat and bus. Then you could see my land.”
Nai Nai had been watching me. Now she said, “Why don’t you sell the lease to your land and come here? You are grown now, and we could pass you off as a cousin. Then if there is a son, we would have the money for a fine.”
Ma Ma said, “I am too old for another child. There will be no son, and who would not be satisfied with a daughter like Chu Ju?”
Ba Ba said, “Yes, sell your land and come back, and we will buy land here.” There was eagerness, even hunger in his voice.
For a moment I thought of such a thing, but I saw it could not be done. “The land was left to me by Han Na, who wanted me to care for it. If I were to give it up, the money should go to Quan.” Though I longed to stay close to Ma Ma, I saw my land before me as clearly as if it were there. I knew every furrow and every bit of rich earth. Who would care for the rice and the fish as I would? And was I to say good-bye to Ling forever? I knew something else. If I were to give the money to Ba Ba, it would be Ba Ba’s land to do with as he pleased.
“You are a selfish girl,” Nai Nai said, “to care so little for your family.”
“I care for my family,” I said, “and if money is needed, I will be thrifty and send all I can, but I am going to return tomorrow.”
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