She invites me to a game of go, and I pretend to hesitate to make my character more believable. Before I left the Chidori restaurant, Captain Nakamura’s collaborator told me that over the last ten years my country has become a window on the Western world for the whole of Asia. If I claim to be one of those Chinese students who has spent a long time in Tokyo, that will justify my manner, my accent and my ignorance of some topical issues.
The Chinese girl doesn’t much like talking; without asking me a single question, she urges me to start. Her very first move establishes a perverse and extravagant strategy. I have never played go with a woman; I have never been so close to one except for my mother, my sister, Akiko, geishas and prostitutes. Even though the checkered tabletop lies between me and my opponent, her young-girl smell makes me uncomfortable.
She looks as if she is dreaming as she tilts her head to one side, completely absorbed in her thoughts. Her soft face contrasts sharply with her prickly maneuvers—I find her intriguing.
How old is she? Sixteen? Seventeen? Her flat chest and her two plaits suggest all the ambiguity of adolescence, which makes girls look like transvestite boys. And yet the first signs of femininity are just emerging, like snowdrops in early spring: there is an indolent roundness to her forearms.
Night is falling quickly now and I have to get back to the barracks. She invites me to come again, and this invitation from any other woman would be somehow immodest, but this young girl knows how to put her innocence to good use.
I do not answer. She puts the stones away in their pot, clattering them against each other, a racket that is clearly a protest against my indifference. I laugh inwardly: she would be a great player if she could moderate her aggression and apply herself to a more spiritual path.
“Ten o’clock on Sunday morning,” she says.
I like her perseverance: I offer no further resistance, and agree with a nod.
At home, when women laugh they hide their faces behind the sleeves of their kimonos. The Chinese girl smiles without embarrassment or artifice. Her mouth opens with all the irresistible power of a grenade exploding.
I look away.
47
A group of pilgrims walks along an apparently endless wall and, finding a breach, they step into the enclosed area. Inside there are thousands of trees around a sparkling, rippling lake. A child is playing with a kite inside a ruined pavilion.
He smiles maliciously at the pilgrims and greets them, telling them that his kite can predict the future.
“Does it know where we are going?” asks the oldest in the group.
The kite flies off towards a corner of the ceiling, then changes direction and hurtles towards the opposite corner. Like a bird trapped in a cage, it flaps against the walls, crashes into the windows and suddenly plummets to the ground.
“Into the Darkness!”
I wake up.
This morning Min on his bicycle catches up with my rickshaw and thrusts a book into my hand. I leaf through it and find a note folded into four. He is inviting me over to Jing’s house in the late afternoon to celebrate his friend’s twentieth birthday. I decide to introduce Huong to Jing— their meeting can be my birthday present.
In the garden of Jing’s house students are smoking, drinking and chatting. The boys, with their white silk scarves round their necks, posture like tragic poets. With their flat shoes and short hair, the girls are more masculine than their male companions. One of the girls is in the center of the gathering, haranguing her fellow students, and Min is leaning up against a tree, listening attentively. From time to time he casts his eye over the crowd, but doesn’t see me.
Jing comes out of the house and puts a tray of tea down on a stool. I introduce him to Huong, who is intrigued by these young revolutionaries, and they launch into an animated conversation.
I flop down onto a chair and, in my boredom, I split open salted sunflower seeds as I watch the student girl talking. I am surprised to find her pretty despite her fierce, indomitable manner. She is only twenty, but she is an orator, she knows how to modulate her voice and to keep her listeners’ attention. With each word I am gripped by a devastating admiration.
“Japan is in the throes of massive military expansion; it’s not going to be satisfied with colonizing Manchuria; the next step will be Peking, then Shanghai and Guang Dong. The sovereignty of China is at risk! Soon we shall be servants, slaves, stray dogs! The warlords, the provisional governments and the military authorities have carved up our continent. Only patriotism can unite our strength and hope. We must rebel, we must expel these invaders and exterminate the corrupt soldiers who thirst for the blood of our people. We must give the land back to the peasants, we must give the serfs back their dignity. Let us build on the ruins of this semifeudal, semicolonial regime; let us build a new China where democracy reigns, where there is no corruption, no poverty and no violence. Equality, freedom and fraternity—that will be our motto. Every citizen shall work according to his needs. The people will be masters, and the government will be at their service. Only then will we know peace and happiness again!”
People clap and, having waved to her admirers, she turns towards Min. The hard glint in her eye gives way to gentleness, and he responds with a smile. I get up and go over to join Jing and Huong. She is exercising her charms on him, talking about her family and her arranged marriage. She is watching him with unbearable intensity and he is fascinated, he can’t take his eyes off her. His face reflects curiosity and pity in turn. The fact that I am there makes him uncomfortable; he keeps glancing towards me and when he catches my eye he looks away, gives a little cough and resumes his haughty expression.
I wander round the garden, but I can’t shake off the crushing pain inside me. There are red dragonflies alighting on flower stems and flitting away in the last rays of sunlight. Through the bedroom window I can see the bed I lay in just yesterday, covered in that same crimson sheet embroidered with chrysanthemums. The sight of it hurts me.
Min waves to me. At last. In front of his friends he treats me like a little sister and laughs as he tells them how he saved my life. I let him crow; he is ashamed of me.
Jing has just started handing round the birthday biscuits. When it is my turn, instead of offering the plate to me, he stops and takes a leaf that has caught in my hair. Someone taps him on the shoulder and says, “Will you introduce me to your friend?”
I recognize the prophetess from earlier. She doesn’t wait for a response from Jing and addresses me directly.
“Hello, my name is Tang,” she says and goes on to ask me so many questions so quickly that I feel intimidated. She wants to know everything: where I go to school, where I live, how many brothers and sisters I have. Then, without a whisper of embarrassment, she lets me know that she has known my lover all her life—her mother works for Min’s family. She scribbles her address on a piece of paper and invites me to go round and see her.
I tell them that I am expected back at home, entrust Huong to Jing’s tender care and leave the party. Jing catches up with me on the doorstep, puts his hands on the door-jambs to block my way and thanks me for coming. He suddenly flushes scarlet and I realize that he really likes Huong. I feel peculiarly annoyed.
“Go back to the party. They’re waiting for you.”
In my pocket I find the handkerchief he wiped himself with the day he took me home on his bicycle. I take it out. I have cleaned it and embroidered his name on it.
“Here, a little present.”
Jing looks at the handkerchief and stammers, “I’m so glad I’ve met you. You’re special, you’re interesting . . . Min doesn’t deserve you . . .”
I ask him why and he stares right at me, biting his lower lip. I ask again, but he stamps his foot angrily and turns away.
It is hot and humid out in the street. The trees shine with moisture and the green drips from the ends of the leaves. The shop windows scatter their haphazard glints of the failing sun. Children run almost naked along the pavements, brandi
shing newspapers. To attract customers, they chorus: “Woman kills her lover! Body found by Buddhist priest!”
Just before I reach the house, Min suddenly appears and catches hold of my arms to stop me.
“Jing’s gone mad! What did he say to you earlier?”
“Nothing.”
“What did he say about me?”
“Nothing.”
Min is still not reassured, and he looks at me closely.
“He loves you,” he says, “he’s just told me,” and his words seem to pierce my heart.
“Leave me alone,” I say quietly.
“You’ll have to choose between us.”
“Oh, don’t make such a scene!”
“You can’t betray me. Your body belongs to me!”
“I’m free. I can give my body to whomever I like, even the devil!”
“Why did you say that? Why do you want to hurt me? You don’t love me!”
“Leave me alone,” I say again, “my sister’s waiting for me at home, I’ll talk to you when you’ve calmed down. Tomorrow I’m playing a game of go on the Square of a Thousand Winds. Come and pick me up at five o’clock.”
I have never seen Min in such a state: he is trembling, and I run off to get away from him.
48
After dinner we are ordered to sleep fully clothed, weapons to hand. At midnight we are woken by sharp blows of a whistle and I race outside.
Our unit divides into several sections and dives into trucks. We are told that the object of this operation is to arrest a group of terrorists who have gathered in the town this evening. We think that the infamous Colonel Li may be among them.
It is a heavy, humid night. Geometrid moths flap under the streetlights. In the wealthiest, most respectable district there are oil lamps lighting the imposing gateways. Suddenly there is a burst of gunfire. The terrorists know they are being cornered and are trying to escape; our scouts have opened fire on them.
A grenade goes off in a nearby road, and the smell of the powder makes me shudder. It is months since I have taken part in a battle: I have missed that sense of death.
We surround a huge residence. The rebels are inside, crouching below the windows, resisting our attack by throwing grenades. There are trees burning where their projectiles have fallen. The windows with their shattered panes are dark as the mouths of animal lairs.
The assaults made by our section have allowed one of our commandos to get up onto the roof, where he finds an opening. The fighting is over too quickly: I am only just warming up and I have to lower my weapon. The terrorists leave behind five bodies and eight wounded. The famous rebel colonel had the wisdom to take his own life before we broke in. There is much to plunder: in the cellars there are piles of rifles, cases of ammunition and stacks of Chinese currency that the terrorists have not had time to change into Manchurian money. We intervened just in time—a new insurrection was about to explode.
I count our losses: four soldiers and one officer have left their lives for the Emperor of Japan. There is something moving by the doorway of a nearby house: a soldier, hit by a grenade, is crawling along the pavement, taking long, agonizing breaths. His body is reduced to great chunks of mangled flesh, churned up with the shreds of his clothes. His entrails spew from his open belly. He gets hold of me suddenly and implores me, “Go on, kill me!”
He has had it. I know that this is how soldiers die, but I cannot bring myself to draw my pistol.
“Kill me, you bastard! What are you waiting for?”
I am not strong enough. I stand there with my hand on my pistol, feeling light-headed. The ambulance men run over and carry the injured man off on a stretcher, but he keeps on yelling, “Kill me! I beg you, please! Kill me!”
Back at the barracks I collapse onto my bed without undressing. The sleeves of my uniform are still wet with the blood of this stranger, who will die slowly and painfully in the hospital. His despair is haunting. I could not give him the gift of death, I was weak, a coward. Buddha would have committed the crime of deliverance. Compassion belongs to those who have strength in their souls.
My mother’s words ring in my ears: “If you have to choose between death and cowardice, don’t hesitate: choose death!”
49
I watch the moon through the window and the trees outside. In my mind, I see Jing again with his hands on the doorposts and a strange gleam in his eye. He is thanking me for coming.
He has seemed wild and aloof for such a long time, and I haven’t dared to tease him once. Now that I have had this confession, via Min, I am no longer afraid of his apparent disdain. He is an open book to me: I could write every word of him.
Why did Jing say that Min didn’t deserve me? How did the two of them end up confronting each other? What persuaded Jing suddenly to make his confession? Did they have an argument? Did they fight?
Min says he wants to marry me, but I am afraid that he will eventually be like my father and my brother-in-law. A man’s passion wanes more quickly than a woman’s beauty.
He asked me to choose, but how could I stop seeing Jing who feeds my attraction to Min? I can’t betray Min, he made me a woman; it is my gratitude, and not his jealousy, which makes me faithful. My relationship with Jing is more subtle than any physical excitement . . . abstinence is the sensuous pleasure of the soul. I know that Jing is watching us, that he is experiencing with me the dazzling discovery of the pleasures of the flesh, and when I look at him all his resentment melts away. When I turn to him, his pale face fills with all the color of life again: he is my child, my brother with whom all physical contact is forbidden. This purity is the beginning of a boundless and defenseless affection that I can’t bring myself to give to Min.
Without Jing, my couplings with his rival would somehow become vulgar. Without Min, Jing no longer exists. Compared to my lover’s flippancy, his arid character seems serious and full of mystery. If I choose one I would have to forgo the other, and I would lose them both.
In this sort of situation in a game of go, the player opts for a third solution: attacking the opponent where he least expects it. When Min comes to get me on the Square of a Thousand Winds tomorrow I will pretend not to see him. When the game is over I will count up the stones, bid my opponent good-bye and watch him walk away until he has disappeared. I will stare at the checkered tabletop as if I am exhausted and then I will ask, “Min, who is Tang?”
He will swear he is faithful to me. I will pretend to be angry, I will stamp my feet and sigh—I remember Moon Pearl’s cries clearly and can play the part to perfection.
To calm me down he will take me to Jing’s house. I will accept his kisses, he will climb on top of me, our two bodies will be wrapped in the crimson sheet like two pine trees bound together by ivy. The bed will be our palanquin, carrying us off to another world.
A deafening sound wakes me from my dreams. Looking out of the window I can see my parents in their pajamas out in the courtyard. The cook has been woken too and has come out of her room with a candle in her hand.
“Put it out!” my father orders her in a hoarse whisper.
“I hope it’s just a military exercise,” says Mother.
Father sighs.
There are more explosions, they sound like the firecrackers we light to celebrate the beginning of spring. Our town counters the explosive din with a stubborn silence: not one footstep, not a single whisper or a sob.
Then everything goes back to the normality of a starlit night. My parents return to their bedroom and the cook shuts the door.
The moon watches us, motionless.
50
As soon as dawn breaks we run tirelessly the three kilometers round the barracks. Our rhythmic footfalls send up clouds of dust and our patriotic songs ring out between the earth and the sky. Our collective enthusiasm warms the heart and dissipates night-mares.
Last night I was wandering through the ruins left by the earthquake. The sky was black with smoke. My ears had become so accustomed to the sobbing that
they could no longer distinguish between people crying and the buzz of insects. I was exhausted and would have liked to stop and rest, but every inch of ground was splattered with blood. I stumbled with each step, cursing the gods and shouting imprecations that still rang in my ears after I woke up.
In the bathhouse my fellow officers spend hours in front of the mirrors shaving so that their mustaches are perfectly squared off. I splash my head with ice-cold water and turn to face the mirror. When my image appears I instinctively look away.
Is there a truth on the other side that we do not want to see?
I hold my breath as I look at myself, with my hair standing up in tufts and my bushy eyebrows. A bad night’s sleep has injected red into the whites of my eyes. I examine my naked torso: my skin is red and steaming sweat from the run; there are thick veins running up my neck; the muscles stand taut on my arms; there is a long scar on my left shoulder, a reminder of a bayonet exercise in which I was injured. The twenty-four years of my life have flown by. Who am I? I cannot find an answer. But at least I know why I am alive: my body, which is now ripe, and my mind, which has doubted, loved and then believed, will be my gift—like a cluster of fireworks—to the party. I will explode on the night of our victory.
A quarter to ten and I am knocking at the door of the Chidori. The manager makes me put on my disguise and, as a Mandarin, I slip out of a secret door and into the street.
From my rickshaw, the town still looks incredibly calm. Along the pavements the nonchalance of the Chinese contrasts with our soldiers’ marching as they move about in square formations. The shops have opened their doors and the traders have set up their stalls. The tireless street vendors intone their litanies. I ask the rickshaw boy whether he was woken by the firing in the night, but he pretends not to hear me.