8

the bite had been absorbed with less than full force, possibly because father was wearing twopairs of pants, but the results were bad enough: the dog’s teeth had ripped open one side of hisscrotum, leaving an elliptical testicle the size of a quail’s egg hanging by a thin, nearlytransparent thread. when granddad moved him, the little red thing dropped into the crotch of hispants. granddad cupped it in the palm of his hand. it seemed to weigh a thousand pounds, bentover the way he was. his large, rough hand shook as though the thing were burning a hole in it.

‘uncle,’ mother asked him, ‘what’s wrong with you?’

she was watching the muscles in his face twitch painfully, and noticed that his pale skinseemed covered with a yellow cast; despair filled his eyes.

‘it’s all over.?.?.?. everything ended in that instant?.?.?.’ granddad mumbled in a voice thatquavered like an old, old man’s.

he took out his pistol and shouted, ‘you’ve ruined me! dog!’

he aimed the weapon at red, who was still panting faintly, and pumped several shots into him.

father struggled to his feet, rivulets of fresh, warm blood coursing down the inside of histhigh. he didn’t seem to be in much pain. ‘dad,’ he said, ‘we won.’

‘uncle, hurry up and take care of douguan’s wound!’ mother said.

father looked at the testicle cupped in granddad’s hand and asked with a note of astonishment,‘dad, is that mine? is it?’ a wave of nausea hit him. he fainted.

granddad threw down his staff, tore off two clean sorghum leaves and gently wrapped thething up, then handed it to mother. ‘beauty,’ he said, ‘hold it carefully. i’m taking him to drzhang xinyi.’ he bent over, picked father up, and then hobbled off down the road. dogswounded by the exploding grenades in the marshland whimpered pitifully.

dr zhang xinyi, a man in his fifties, parted his hair right down the middle, something youseldom saw in the countryside. he wore a long, dark-blue gown, and had a pale face atop a frameso thin he seemed incapable of withstanding even the slightest breeze.

by the time granddad had carried father to the doctor, his back was bent almost double andhis face had a ghostly pallor.

‘is that you, commander yu? you certainly look different,’ dr zhang said.

‘name your price, doctor.’

father had been laid out on the wooden-plank bed. ‘is this your son, commander?’ dr zhangasked him.

granddad nodded.

‘the one who killed the japanese general at the black water river bridge?’

‘i only have one son!’

‘i’ll do the best i can!’ dr zhang took some tweezers, a pair of scissors, a bottle of sorghumwine, and a vial of iodine out of his instrument bag, then bent over to examine the injury onfather’s face.

‘take a look down there first, please, doctor,’ granddad said sombrely. then he turned tomother and took the sorghum leaves in which the testicle was wrapped out of her hands. heplaced it on the wooden cabinet beside the bed. the leaves spread open.

dr zhang picked up the messy thing with his tweezers. his long, nicotine-stained fingersshook as he stammered, ‘commander yu?.?.?. not that i’m unwilling to do my best, but your son’swound?.?.?. my skills are not great, and i haven’t the proper medication.?.?.?. you must seesomeone more talented than i, commander.?.?.?.’

granddad bent over and stuck his face right up into dr zhang’s, his rheumy eyes boring intothe man. ‘where can i find someone more talented?’ he asked hoarsely. ‘tell me, where can igo? should i take him to the japanese?’

‘commander,’ zhang xinyi defended himself, ‘that’s not what your humble servant meant.?.?.?.

your esteemed son is injured in a critical place, and the slightest slip could bring an end to yourglorious line.?.?.?.’

‘i brought him here,’ granddad said, ‘because i have faith in you. do what you can.’

‘since commander yu says so,’ zhang xinyi said, gritting his teeth, ‘i’ll do it.’

he soaked a cotton ball in the wine and cleaned the wound. the pain brought father to. hetried to slide off the bed, but granddad climbed up and held him down.

‘commander yu,’ zhang xinyi said, ‘we’ll have to strap him down.’

‘douguan!’ granddad said. ‘you’re my son, and i expect you to tough it out. bite down hard!’

‘but, dad,’ father groaned, ‘it hurts.?.?.?.’

‘tough it out!’ granddad said sternly. ‘think about uncle arhat!’

father didn’t dare argue. sweat covered his forehead.

zhang xinyi took out a needle and sterilised it in the wine before threading it. then he beganstitching the torn scrotum closed.

‘sew that back inside!’ granddad said.

zhang xinyi looked at the testicle lying in the open sorghum leaves on the wooden cabinet andsaid with embarrassment, ‘commander yu?.?.?. it won’t do any good.?.?.?.’

‘is it your intention to bring the yu line to an end?’ granddad asked glumly.

large beads of sweat glistened on dr zhang’s gaunt face. ‘commander yu?.?.?. think aboutit.?.?.?. connecting blood vessels were severed. if i put it back in, it would still be dead.’

‘sew the blood vessels together.’

‘commander yu, nobody in the world can reconnect blood vessels.?.?.?.’

‘then?.?.?. is that the end of it?’

‘that’s hard to say, commander yu. he might still be all right. the other one’s just fine.

maybe he’ll be all right with just one.?.?.?.’

‘you think so?’

‘it’s possible.’

‘damn it to hell!’ granddad swore sorrowfully. ‘bad things always happen to me!’

after the wound down below had been taken care of, father’s face was attended to. drzhang’s sweat-soaked clothing stuck to his back as he sat on a stool and panted breathlessly.

‘how much, dr zhang?’

‘don’t worry about a fee, commander yu. as long as your esteemed son gets better, iconsider myself lucky,’ he said weakly.

‘dr zhang, i, yu zhan’ao, am strapped at the moment. but someday i’ll thank you properly.’

he picked up father and carried him out of dr zhang’s house.

granddad looked down attentively at my father, who lay semiconscious in the shack, his facecovered with gauze, with only his shifting eyes exposed. dr zhang had dropped by once tochange his dressings. ‘commander yu,’ he said, ‘there’s no infection, and that’s a good sign.’

‘tell me,’ said granddad, ‘didn’t you say he’d be all right with just one?’

‘commander, we can’t worry about that yet. your esteemed son was bitten by a mad dog, andwe’re lucky he’s still alive.’

‘he might as well be dead if that thing’s useless.’ observing the murderous look ingranddad’s eyes, dr zhang mumbled something obsequious and slinked away.

granddad picked up his gun and walked over to the marshland to sort out his chaotic thoughts.

mournful signs of autumn were all around: the ground was covered with frost, and there weresharp, icy brambles on the soggy marshland floor. granddad was sick and very weak, his son washovering between life and death, the family was broken up, some gone and some dead, thepeople were suffering, wang guang and dezhi were dead, gimpy had gone far away, the ulceron the woman liu’s leg was still oozing pus and blood, blind eye did nothing all day long butsit, the girl beauty was too young to know anything, he was being pulled by the jiao-gao troopsand squeezed by pocky leng’s troops, the japanese saw him as their mortal enemy. he climbedto the top of a rise in the marshland to gaze out over the scattered, broken remains of humanbodies and sorghum stalks, utterly disheartened. what had he got from decades of fighting andvying over women? only the desolate scene in front of him.

the autumn of 1939 was one of the most difficult periods in granddad’s life: his troops hadbeen wiped out, his beloved wife had been killed, his son had been severely wounded, his homeand the land around it had been torched, his body was racked with illness; war had destroyednearly everything he owned. his eyes roamed over the corpses of men and dogs, a skein ofthreads getting more and more tangled wherever he looked, until it became a blur. several timeshe drew his pistol, thinking of saying goodbye to this lousy, fucking world. but a powerful desirefor revenge won out over cowardice. he hated the japanese, he hated the troops of pocky lengand of jiao-gao.

on this very spot, the jiao-gao forces had taken over twenty rifles from him, then vanishedwithout a trace. there was no sign that they’d engaged the japanese; he had heard only thatthey’d clashed with the troops of pocky leng. and granddad suspected that it was the jiao-gaoforces who had stolen the fifteen rifles he and father had hidden in the dry well.

the woman liu, who still had a pretty face even in her forties, came to the edge of themarshland to find granddad, trying to comfort him with affectionate gazes at his silver hair. shetouched his arm with her large, rough hand and said, ‘you shouldn’t be sitting here thinking likethat. let’s go back. as the ancients said, “heaven never seals off all the exits.” you shouldconcentrate on getting your health back by eating and drinking and breathing as much and ashard as you can.?.?.?.’

her words touched him. he looked up at her kind face and tears began to fill his eyes. ‘sister-in-law,’ he moaned.

she stroked his bent back. ‘just look,’ she said, ‘a man barely forty reduced to this by hissuffering.’

she supported him as they walked back together. he looked at her lame leg and asked withconcern, ‘is it any better?’

‘the ulcer has healed, but it’s thinner than the other one.’

‘it’ll fill out later.’

‘i don’t think douguan’s injury is as serious as it looks.’

‘what do you think, will he be all right with only one?’

‘i think so. single-stalk garlic is always the hottest.’

‘you really think so?’

‘my younger brother-in-law was born with only one, and look how many kids he’s got.’

late at night, granddad rested his weary head in the warmth of the woman liu’s bosom as shestroked his bony frame with her large hands. ‘can you do it again?’ she whispered. ‘do you stillhave the strength? don’t despair. doesn’t it make you feel better to do it to me?.?.?.??’

granddad smelled the slightly sour, slightly sweet odour of the woman liu’s breath and fellfast asleep.

mother could not rid her mind of the picture of dr zhang picking up that purplish, flattened ballwith his tweezers. he had examined it carefully before tossing it into a dish filled with dirtycotton balls and pieces of skin and dead flesh. yesterday it had been douguan’s jewel; today itlay in a dish of filthy debris. mother, who was fifteen and had begun to understand a thing or two,felt both bashful and frightened. while she was taking care of father, she kept staring at hisgauze-wrapped penis; her heart fluttered, her cheeks burned, she blushed deep red.

then she learned that the woman liu was sleeping with granddad.

‘beauty,’ the woman liu said to her, ‘you’re fifteen now, and no longer a child. try playingwith douguan’s penis; if it gets hard, he’s your man.’

mother was so embarrassed she nearly cried.

father’s stitches were removed.

mother slipped into the shack where father was sleeping and tiptoed up to his kang, hercheeks burning. she knelt beside him and carefully pulled down his pants. in the light streaminginto the room she looked at his injured, grotesque penis. the head, wild and proud, had an air ofdefiance. timidly she held it in her sweaty hand and felt it gradually get warmer and thicker. itbegan to throb, just like her heart. father woke up and squinted at her. ‘beauty, what are youdoing?’

mother shrieked in alarm, jumped to her feet, and ran out, bumping smack into granddad inthe doorway.

granddad grabbed her by the shoulders and demanded, ‘what’s wrong, beauty?’

mother burst out crying, wrenched free of granddad’s grip, and ran away.

granddad rushed into the shack, then rushed out again like a man crazed and ran straight to thewoman liu. he grabbed her breasts and squeezed them tightly. ‘single-stalk garlic is the hottest!’

he said almost incoherently. ‘single-stalk garlic is the hottest!’

granddad fired three shots in the air, then brought his hands together in front of his chest andscreamed: ‘heaven has eyes!’