My sister jumped to her feet and, in an indignant tone I’d never heard from her before, said, “Just what do you expect of me, Mother? All you care about is Jintong. As far as you’re concerned, we girls aren’t worth as much as a pile of dog turds!”
“Laidi,” Mother said, “don’t change the subject. Jintong may be gold, but you girls are silver. So no more talk about dog turds! It’s time for mother and daughter to have a heart-to-heart talk. That fellow Sha is a weasel coming to the chickens with New Year’s greetings. He does not have good intentions. He has his eye on you for sure.”
Laidi lowered her head and stroked the foxtail again as tears glistened in her eyes. “Mother,” she said, “I’d be happy to marry a man like him.”
Mother reacted as if struck by lightning. “Laidi,” she said, “you have my blessings no matter whom you marry, just so long as it isn’t that Sha fellow.”
“Why?”
“Don’t you worry about why.”
With a hateful edge to her voice that seemed out of place for a girl her age, Laidi said, “The Shangguan family has worked me like a beast of burden long enough!”
The shrillness of her comment stunned Mother. Scrutinizing her daughter’s face, red with anger, she then glanced down at the hand stroking the foxtail. I felt her reach for something close by; it was the whiskbroom used to keep the kang neat. Raising it over her head, she screamed hysterically, “How dare you talk to me like that! Just see if I don’t beat you to death!”
Mother jumped off the kang, holding the whiskbroom high in the air. But instead of getting ready to duck the blow that was sure to come, Laidi raised her head defiantly, and Mother’s hand froze in midair; when it finally came down, there was no steam behind it. Letting the whiskbroom fall to the floor, Mother threw her arms around my sister’s neck and sobbed, “Laidi, we and that fellow Sha live in two different worlds. I can’t sit by and watch my own daughter throw herself into a burning pyre …”
By then, Laidi was sobbing too.
Once they’d cried themselves out, Mother dried my sister’s face with the back of her hand and implored her, “Laidi, give me your word you won’t have anything to do with that Sha fellow.”
But Laidi stood her ground. “Mother,” she said, “this is something I really want, and not just for me, but for the good of the family.” Out of the corner of her eye, Laidi looked down at the foxskin overcoat and the two little lynx jackets lying on the kang.
Mother too stood her ground. “I want you all to take off those coats tomorrow.”
“Don’t you even care if we freeze to death?” my sister said.
“A damned fur coat peddler is what he is,” Mother complained.
My sister unbolted the door and strode to her room without a backward glance.
Mother sat down feebly on the edge of the kang, and I heard raspy breaths coming up from her chest.
Then I heard Sha Yueliang’s hesitant footsteps outside the window. His tongue was thick and his lips seemed paralyzed; I knew he wanted to knock against the window frame and, in a tender voice, raise the subject of marriage. But alcohol had dulled his senses and made it impossible for his actions to match his desires. He banged on our window frame so loud and so hard that his hand tore through the paper covering, letting cold air from the outside pour in, along with the stench of alcohol on his breath. In the tone of voice so common to drunks — disgusting yet at the same time somehow endearing — he bellowed, “Mother —”
Mother jumped down off the kang and stood there sort of dazed for a moment, before climbing back up on the kang and dragging me over from beneath the window, where I’d been lying. “Mother,” Sha said, “Laidi and me, when can we be married … I’m not a patient man …”
Mother clenched her teeth. “You there, Sha,” she said, “like the toad who wants to feast on a swan, you can just dream on!” “What did you say?” Sha Yueliang asked her. “I said, dream on!”
As if he’d suddenly turned sober, Sha said without a trace of slurring, “Adoptive mother, I have never in my life begged anyone for anything.”
“Nobody’s asking you to beg me for anything.” With a snicker, he said, “Adoptive mother, I tell you that Sha Yueliang gets and does exactly what he wants …” “You’ll have to kill me first.”
“Given that I want to marry your daughter,” Sha said with a laugh, “how could I kill you, my future mother-in-law?” “Then you can forget about marrying my daughter.” Another laugh. “Your daughter is a grown woman, and you can no longer decide her fate. We shall see what happens, my dear mother-in-law.”
Sha walked up to the eastern window, poked a hole in the paper covering, and flung a handful of candy into the room. “Little sisters-in-law,” he shouted, “have some candy. As long as Sha Yueliang is around, you’ll eat sweets and drink spicy drinks along with me….”
Sha Yueliang did not sleep that night. Instead he walked around the yard and, except for an occasional cough or an outburst of whistling, which he did quite well, since he could imitate the voices of a dozen different birds, he sang arias from old operas or contemporary anti-Japanese songs at the top of his lungs. One minute he’d sing about Chen Shimei, the evil husband beheaded on the order of the angry Kaifeng magistrate, the next he’d bring his sword down on the neck of a Jap soldier. To keep this resistance hero, drunk on alcohol and love, from breaking into the room, Mother added a second bolt to the door, way up high, and, if that weren’t enough, stacked anything she could move, from a bellows to a wardrobe to a pile of broken bricks, up against the door. Then, after putting me safely on her back, she picked up a cleaver and paced the room from one end to the other, back and forth. None of my sisters took off her new fur coat; they huddled together, sweat beading the tips of their noses, as they slept amid the noise created by Sha. Drool from Qiudi’s mouth wetted Zhaodi’s marten coat; Niandi slept nestled up against Lingdi’s bearskin coat like a lamb. Now that I think back, Mother never stood a chance in her struggle with Sha Yueliang. He won over my sisters with his fur coats, and they formed a united front with him; having lost the support of the masses, Mother became a lone warrior.
The next day, with me on her back, Mother ran over to tell Third Master Fan that she’d decided that the best way to repay Aunty Sun for her midwifery was to marry Laidi to one of the mute sons of the Sun family — the hero of the battle with the crows. The day the decision was announced would begin their engagement; the dowry would be presented the next day; and the wedding would take place the day after that. Third Master Fan stared at Mother with a look of confusion in his eyes. “Uncle,” Mother said, “don’t worry about the details. I’ll take care of Matchmaker Xie.” “But this is doing things backward.” “Yes, it is,” Mother replied. “Why do it this way?” “Please, Uncle, don’t ask. Just have the mute come to our house at noon with his engagement gifts.” “What can he possibly have as gifts?” Third Master Fan asked. “Tell him to bring what he can,” Mother replied.
On the way home, I sensed Mother’s fear and deep anxiety. She’d been right to be worried. The minute we walked into the yard, we were confronted by a pack of animals, dancing and singing: a weasel, a black bear, a roe deer, a dog, a sheep, and a rabbit; the only one missing was a marten. The purple marten, a fox wrapped around its neck, was seated on sacks of grain in the eastern side room, staring at the commander, who was sitting on the floor cleaning his powder gourd and musket.
Mother dragged Laidi off the sacks of grain and announced icily, “Commander Sha, she has been promised to another. You resistance fighters aren’t the type to take another man’s wife, I presume.”
“That goes without saying,” Sha replied evenly.
Mother dragged my eldest sister out of the eastern side room.
At noon, the mute son of the Sun family showed up at our door carrying a wild rabbit. He was wearing a tiny padded jacket, with his belly showing below and his neck above; the sleeves barely covered half his thick arms. All the buttons were missing, so he
used a hemp rope to hold up his trousers. He nodded and bowed to Mother, an idiotic grin creasing his face. He held the rabbit up to Mother in both hands. Third Master Fan, who had come with the mute, said, “Shangguan Shouxi’s widow, I’ve done as you asked.”
Mother looked down at the wild rabbit, a trickle of blood congealing at the corner of its mouth, and stood frozen to the spot. Then she pointed to the mute son of the Sun family and said, “Uncle, I’d like the two of you to stick around. Don’t go home yet. We’ll stew the rabbit with some carrots for an engagement dinner.”
Laidi’s wails erupted in the eastern room. At first she sounded like a little girl crying, shrill and childish. That lasted a few minutes, and was quickly replaced by throaty, jagged wails wrapped around a succession of frightful, filthy curses. After about ten minutes, when the moisture was gone, those gave way to arid, brittle cries.
Laidi was sitting on the dirt floor of the eastern room, in front of the kang, soiling her precious coat, and not caring. She was staring straight ahead, no tears on her face, her mouth hanging slack and looking like a dried-up well. Arid-brittle cries were emerging from that dried-up well, endlessly. My six other sisters were sobbing softly, tears rolling over a bear hide, dancing atop a roe deer hide, shimmering on a weasel hide, wetting a sheep hide, and soiling a rabbit hide.
Third Master Fan stuck his head in the door; as if he’d seen a ghost, his eyes bugged out and his lips twitched. He backed out of the room, turned, and stumbled off as fast as he could.
The mute son of the Sun family stood in our living room, twisting his neck to gaze curiously at everything within eyesight. Besides the idiotic grin, the expression on his face revealed a host of impenetrable thoughts, a fossilized bleakness, a numb sorrow. Eventually, I even spotted a fearful expression of rage on that face.
Mother ran a wire through the rabbit’s mouth and hung it from a rafter. The wails of terror from my eldest sister fell on deaf ears. The mute’s strange expression did not register with Mother, who attacked the rabbit with her chipped, rusty cleaver. Sha Yueliang walked out of the eastern side room, his musket slung over his back. Without even looking up, Mother said icily, “Commander Sha, today is my eldest daughter’s engagement day, and this rabbit is the engagement gift.”
“What an extravagant gift,” Sha Yueliang said with a laugh. Mother chopped down on the rabbit’s head. “Today she is engaged, tomorrow the dowry will be settled, and the day after that she will be married.” Mother turned and stared at Sha Yueliang. “Don’t forget to join us at the wedding banquet!” “How could I forget?” Sha replied. “I definitely will not forget.” He then turned and walked out through the gate with his musket, whistling a loud tune.
Mother continued skinning the rabbit, although it was clear her heart was not in it. When she finished, she hung it over the doorway and went inside, with me on her back and the cleaver in her hand. “Laidi!” she shouted. “The bonds between parent and child are formed by enmity and kindness. Go ahead, hate me!” This angry outburst was barely out of her mouth when she began to weep silently. As tears wet her face and her shoulders heaved, she sliced the turnips. Ke-chunk! The first turnip separated into two white, greenish halves. Ke-chunk! Four halves. Ke-chunk! Ke-chunk! Ke-chunk! Faster and faster Mother sliced, her actions more and more exaggerated. The now dismembered turnips lay on the cutting board. Mother raised her cleaver one more time; it nearly floated down as it left her hand and landed on the pile of dismembered turnips. The room was suffused with their acrid smell.
The mute son of the Sun family gave Mother a respectful thumbs-up along with a series of grunts. Mother dried her eyes with her sleeve and said to him, “You can leave now.” He waved his arms and kicked out with his feet. Raising her voice, Mother pointed in the direction of his home. “You can leave now. I want you to leave!”
Finally grasping Mother’s meaning, he made a face at me; the mustache atop his puffy upper lip looked like a swipe of green paint. First he made as if to climb a tree, then he made as if to fly like a bird, and finally he made as if he had a struggling little bird in his hand. He smiled as he pointed to me, and then pointed to his chest, over his heart.
Once again, Mother pointed in the direction of his home. He froze for a moment, then nodded in understanding. Falling to his knees before Mother — who quickly backed out of the way, so that he was now facing the sliced turnips on the cutting board — he banged his head against the floor in a kowtow. He then got to his feet and walked off proudly.
Worn out by all the activity of the day, Mother slept soundly that night. When she awoke the next morning, she saw wild rabbits hanging from the parasol tree, the cedar tree, and the apricot tree in the yard, as if laden with exotic fruits.
Holding on to the frame of the door, she sat down slowly on the threshold.
Wearing her marten coat, the red foxskin wrapped around her neck, eighteen-year-old Shangguan Laidi ran off with the leader of the Black Donkey Musket Band, Sha Yueliang, taking the black mule with them. Those wild rabbits were Sha Yueliang’s engagement gift to my mother, as well as a display of his arrogance. My second, third, and fourth sisters were accomplices in First Sister’s plan to run away. It was carried out in the middle of the night, while Mother was snoring loudly, deep in an exhausted sleep, and my fifth, sixth, and seventh sisters were fast asleep. Second Sister climbed out of bed; walking barefoot, she groped her away over to the door and removed the objects Mother had piled up behind it, after which my third and fourth sisters opened the double doors. Earlier that evening, Sha Yueliang had oiled the hinges with rifle grease, so the doors swung open without a sound. Standing under the cold, late-night moonbeams, the girls hugged each other and said their good-byes. Sha Yueliang grinned furtively at the rabbits hanging from the trees.
The day after that was to be the mute’s and my eldest sister’s wedding day. Mother sat on the edge of the kang, silently patching clothes with needle and thread. Just before noon, the mute, unable to curb his impatience, showed up. Using hand gestures and facial expressions, he signaled Mother that he had come to fetch his woman. Mother stepped down off the kang, pointed to the eastern side room, then to the trees in the yard, where the rabbits, now frozen stiff, still hung. She didn’t have to say a word — the mute understood exactly what had happened.
That evening, we all sat around the kang eating turnip slices and slurping wheat congee, when we heard someone pounding on the gate. Second Sister, who had gone over to the western side room to take food to Shangguan Lü, ran in and announced breathlessly, “Mother, there’s trouble. The mute and his brothers are at the gate, and they’ve brought a pack of dogs with them.” My sisters were thrown into a panic, but Mother sat there calmly feeding my twin sister Yunü — Jade Girl — then turned her attention back to the turnip slices, which she chewed loudly. She looked as calm as a pregnant rabbit. The commotion outside the gate died out as suddenly as it had arisen. In about the time it takes to smoke a pipeful, three dark, red-faced figures clambered over the wall on the south edge of the yard. It was the three mute brothers of the Sun family. Three black dogs, their glistening coats looking as if they had been smeared with lard, entered the yard with them. They glided over the wall like black rainbows and landed noiselessly on the ground. The mutes and their dogs froze for a moment in the deep red sunset, like statues. The eldest held a glistening Burmese sword; the second wore a blue steel hunting knife at his waist; and the third carried a large, rusty short-handled sword. They all had little cotton bundles — blue with white flowers — over their shoulders, like men about to set off on a long journey. My sisters sucked in their breath fearfully, but Mother sat calmly slurping her congee. Without warning, the eldest mute roared, followed by his two brothers, and then the dogs. Spittle from human and canine mouths danced in the dying rays of the sun like glowing insects. The mutes then made a show of their skill with their knives and swords, a reprise of their battle with the crows during the funeral in the wheat field. On that winter evening, knives
and swords flashed as three stocky men, looking a bit like hunting dogs, leaped into the air, stretching their bodies as far as they’d go to hack at dozens of dead rabbits hanging from the trees in our yard. Their frenzied dogs howled and swung their big heads around as they flung the rabbits’ broken corpses right and left. When the men finished, our yard was littered with dismembered rabbits. A few lonely rabbit heads still hung from branches, like unpicked, wind-dried fruit. Leading their dogs, the satisfied mutes strutted around the yard a few times in a show of authority before skimming over the wall like swallows, the same way they’d entered, and disappearing in the gloom of falling night.
Holding her bowl out in front of her, Mother smiled slightly. That singular smile burned its way into our heads.
4
The first signs of aging in a woman appear on her breasts and work their way from the nipples backward. After our sister eloped, Mother’s pink nipples, which had always jutted out playfully, suddenly sagged, like ripe tassels of grain. At the same time, the pink turned to date red. During those days, her output of milk fell off, and it wasn’t nearly as fresh or fragrant or sweet as it had been. In fact, the now anemic milk tasted a little like rotting wood. Happily, the passage of time gradually improved her mood, especially after eating a big eel, which sparked a resurgent rise in her sagging nipples and a lightening of the color. But the deep wrinkles that appeared at the base of each nipple, like creases in the pages of a book, were disturbing; granted they were now smoothed out, yet an indelible trace of the indentation remained. This sounded a warning to me; thanks to instinct, or maybe divine intervention, a change in my reckless, indulgent attitude toward breasts occurred. I knew I must treasure them, conserve and protect them, treat them with the care due to the exquisite containers they were.
The winter that year was unusually bitter, but we moved safely and confidently toward spring, thanks to half a room filled with wheat and a cellar piled high with turnips. During the coldest days, heavy snowfalls sealed us inside, while outside, tree branches snapped under the wet accumulation. Wearing the fur coats Sha Yueliang had given us, we huddled around Mother and fell into a sort of hibernation. Then the sun came out one day and began to melt the snow; as large icicles formed beneath the eaves and sparrows reappeared, chirping for us from branches in the yard, we stirred from our wintry slumber. My sisters experienced deep revulsion over the melted snow on which we had relied for so long, and the same meal of turnips boiled in snow water, over and over, hundreds of times. My second sister, Zhaodi, was the first to mention that the snow this year carried the smell of raw blood, and if we didn’t hurry down to the river to draw fresh water, we might all come down with some strange illness, and that not even Jintong, who survived on mother’s milk, would be spared. By this time, Zhaodi had quite naturally taken over Laidi’s leadership role. This particular sister had thick, fleshy lips and spoke with a husky voice that oozed appeal. She became the voice of authority, since she’d assumed complete responsibility for meal preparation as soon as winter closed in, while Mother sat on the kang shy as a wounded milk cow, occasionally wrapping herself in the precious fox fur, as she should, so as to stay warm and ensure the continued flow of high-quality milk in her breasts. With a look at Mother, my second sister said imperiously, “Starting today, we will fetch our water from the river.” Mother did not object. My third sister, Lingdi, frowned and complained about the taste of the turnips boiled in snow water, and repeated her suggestion that we sell the donkey and use the money to buy some meat. “We’re surrounded by ice and snow,” Mother said sarcastically, “so where do you suggest we go to sell it?” “Then let’s go catch some wild rabbits,” Third Sister said. “With all this ice and snow they’re so cold they can hardly move.” Mother blanched in anger. “Children, remember one thing. I don’t ever want to see another wild rabbit as long as I live.”