4
the local veterinarian and master archer, third master fan, lived at the eastern end of town,on the edge of a pasture that ran all the way to black water river. the flood dragonriverbank wound directly behind his house. at his mother’s insistence, shangguan shouxiwalked out of the house, but on rubbery legs. he saw that the sun was a blazing ball of whiteabove the treetops, and that the dozen or so stained glass windows in the church steeple shonebrilliantly. the felicity manor steward, sima ting, was hopping around atop the watchtower,which was roughly the same height as the steeple. he was still shouting his warning that thejapanese were on their way, but his voice had grown hoarse and raspy. a few idlers weregaping up at him with their arms crossed. shangguan shouxi stood in the middle of the lane,trying to decide on the best way to go to third master fan’s place.
two routes were available to him, one straight through town, the other along the riverbank.
the drawback of the riverbank route was the likelihood of startling the sun family’s big blackdogs. the suns lived in a ramshackle compound at the northern end of the lane, encircled by alow, crumbling wall that was a favorite perch for chickens. the head of the family, auntysun, had a brood of five grandsons, all mutes. the parents seemed not to have ever existed.
the five of them were forever playing on the wall, in which they’d created breaches, likesaddles, so they could ride imaginary horses. holding clubs or slingshots or rifles carved fromsticks, they glared at passersby, human and animal, the whites of their eyes truly menacing.
people got off relatively easy, but not the animals; it made no difference if it was a stray calfor a raccoon, a goose, a duck, a chicken, or a dog, the minute they spotted it, they took outafter it, along with their big black dogs, converting the village into their private huntingground.
the year before, they had chased down a felicity manor donkey that had broken free of itshalter; after killing it, they’d skinned and butchered it out in the open. people stood bywatching, waiting to see how the folks at felicity manor, a powerful and rich family in whichthe uncle was a regimental commander who kept a company of armed bodyguards, woulddeal with someone openly slaughtering one of its donkeys. when the steward stamped hisfoot, half the county quaked. now here were all these wild kids, slaughtering a felicity manordonkey in broad daylight, which was hardly less than asking to be slaughtered themselves.
imagine the people’s surprise when the assistant steward, sima ku — a marksman with alarge red birthmark on his face — handed a silver dollar to each of the mutes instead ofdrawing his pistol. from that day on, they were incorrigible tyrants, and any animal thatencountered them could only curse its parents for not giving it wings.
while the boys were in their saddles, their five jet black dogs, which could have beenscooped out of a pond of ink, sprawled lazily at the base of the wall, eyes closed to mere slits,seemingly dreaming peaceful dreams. the five mutes and their dogs had a particular dislikefor shangguan shouxi, who lived in the same lane, although he could not recall where orwhen he had managed to offend these ten fearsome demons. but whenever he came acrossthem, he was in for a bad time. he would flash them a smile, but that never kept the dogsfrom flying at him like five black arrows, and even though the attacks stopped short ofphysical contact, and he was never bitten, he’d be so rattled his heart would nearly stop. themere thought of it made him shudder.
or he could head south, across the town’s main street, and get to third master fan’s thatway. but that meant he would have to pass by the church, and at this hour, the tall, heavyset,redheaded, blue-eyed pastor malory would be squatting beneath the prickly ash tree, with itspungent aroma, milking his old goat, the one with the scraggly chin whiskers, squeezing herred, swollen teats with large, soft, hairy hands, and sending milk so white it seemed almostblue splashing into a rusty enamel bowl. swarms of redheaded flies always buzzed aroundpastor malory and his goat. the pungency of the prickly ash, the muttony smell of the goat,and the man’s rank body odor blended into a foul miasma that swelled in the sunlit air andpolluted half the block. nothing bothered shangguan shouxi more than the prospect of pastormalory looking up from behind his goat, both of them stinking to high heaven, and castingone of those ambiguous glances his way, even though the hint of a compassionate smileshowed that it was given in friendship. when he smiled, pastor malory displayed teeth aswhite as those of a horse. he was forever dragging his dirty finger back and forth across hischest — amen! and every time that happened, shangguan shouxi’s stomach lurched amid aflood of mixed feelings, until he turned tail and ran like a whipped dog. he avoided thevicious dogs at the mutes’ house out of fear; he avoided pastor malory and his milk goat outof disgust. what irritated him most was that his wife, shangguan lu, had special feelings forthis redheaded devil. she was his devout follower, he was her god.
after wrestling with his thoughts for a long moment, shangguan shouxi decided to take thenorth and east route, even though the watchtower, with sima ting standing on its perch, andthe scene below had him in its thrall. everything seemed normal down here, except, of course,for the steward, who was acting like a monkey. no longer petrified by the prospect ofencountering jap devils, he had to admire his mother’s ability to size up a situation. but justto be on the safe side, he bent down and picked up a couple of bricks. he heard the braying ofa little donkey somewhere and a mother calling to her children.
as he walked past the sun compound, he was relieved to see that the wall was deserted: nomutes saddled in the breaches, no chickens perched on top, and, most importantly, no dogssprawled lazily at the base. a low wall to begin with, the breaches brought it even closer tothe ground, and that gave him an unobstructed view of the yard, where a slaughtering was inprogress. the victims were the family’s proud but lonely chickens; the butcher was auntysun, a woman of ample martial talents. people said that when she was young, she was arenowned bandit who could leap over eaves and walk on walls. but when she fell afoul of thelaw, she had no choice but to marry a stove repairman named sun.
shangguan shouxi counted the corpses of seven chickens, glossy white, with splotches ofblood here and there the only traces of their death struggles. an eighth chicken, its throat cut,flew out of aunty sun’s hand and thudded to the ground, where it tucked in its neck, flappedits wings, and ran around in circles. the five mutes, stripped to the waist, hunkered downbeneath the house eaves, staring blankly at the struggling chicken one minute and at the razor-sharp knife in their grandmother’s hand the next. their expressions and movements werealarmingly identical; even the shifting of their eyes seemed orchestrated. for all her renown inthe village, aunty sun had been reduced to a skinny, wrinkled old woman, although her faceand her expression, her figure and her bearing, carried evocative remnants of her former self.
the five dogs sat in a huddle, heads raised, blank, mysterious looks in their eyes, bleak gazesthat defied attempts to guess what they meant.
shangguan shouxi was so mesmerized by the scene in the suns’ yard that he stopped towatch, his mind purged of anxieties and, more significantly, his mother’s orders. he was nowa forty-two-year-old shrimp of a man leaning up against a wall, a rapt audience of one.
feeling the icy glare of aunty sun sweep past him like a knife, yielding as water and sharp asthe wind, he felt scalped. the mutes and their dogs also turned to look at him. evil, restlessglares emerged from the eyes of the mutes; the dogs cocked their heads, bared their fangs, andgrowled as the hair on the back of their necks stood up. five dogs, like arrows on a taut string,ready to fly. time to get moving, he was thinking, when he heard aunty sun coughthreateningly. the mutes abruptly lowered their heads, swollen from excitement, and all fivedogs hit the ground obediently, legs splayed in front of them.
“worthy nephew shangguan, what’s your mother up to?” aunty sun asked calmly.
he was stuck for a good answer; there was so much he wanted to say, and not a wordwould come out. as his face reddened, he just stammered, like a thief caught in the act.
aunty sun smiled. reaching down, she pinned a black-and-red rooster by the neck andstroked its silky feathers. the rooster cackled nervously, while she plucked the stubborn tailfeathers and stuffed them into a woven rush sack. the rooster fought like a demon, madlyclawing the muddy ground with its talons.
“do your daughters know how to kick shuttlecocks? the best ones are made from the tailfeathers of a live rooster. ai, when i think back…”
she stopped in midsentence and glared at him as she sank into the oblivion of reverie. hergaze seemed to bounce off the wall then bore through it. shangguan shouxi’s eyeballs didn’tflicker, and he held his breath, fearfully. finally, aunty sun seemed to deflate in front of hiseyes, like a punctured ball; her eyes went from blazing to mournfully gentle. she steppeddown on the rooster’s legs, wrapped her left hand around the base of its wings, and pinchedits neck. unable to move, it gave up the struggle. then, with her right hand, she beganplucking the fine throat feathers until its reddish purple skin showed. finally, after flicking therooster’s throat with her index finger, she picked up the shiny knife, shaped like a willow leaf,made a single swipe, and the throat opened up, releasing a torrent of inky red blood, largedrops pushing smaller ones ahead of them. aunty sun slowly got to her feet, still holding thebleeding rooster, and looked around wistfully. she squinted in the bright sunlight. shangguanshouxi felt lightheaded. the smell of poplars was heavy in the air. scat! he heard auntysun’s voice and watched as the black rooster tumbled through the air and thudded to theground in the middle of the yard. with a sigh, he let his hands drop from the wall.
suddenly, he remembered that he was supposed to be getting third master fan to help withthe donkey. but as he was turning to leave, the rooster, bloody but fighting to stay alive,struggled miraculously to its feet, propped up by its wings. shorn of feathers, its tail stood upin all its strange, hideous nakedness, frightening shangguan shouxi. blood still streamedfrom its open throat, but the head and comb, bled dry, were turning a deathly white. yet itkept fighting to hold it up. struggle! it held its head high, but then it sagged and hung limply.
again it rose in the air, then drooped, and rose one more time, this time, it seemed, to stay. itshook from side to side, as the rooster sat down, blood and foamy bubbles seeping from itsbeak and then from the opening in its neck. its eyes glittered like gold nuggets. distressed bythe sight, aunty sun wiped her hands with straw and seemed to be chewing on something,even though her mouth was empty. she spat out a mouthful of saliva and yelled at the fivedogs, “go!”
shangguan shouxi fell flat on his backside.
when he pulled himself back to his feet, black feathers were flying all over the yard; thearrogant rooster was being torn apart, splattering the ground with raw meat and fresh blood.
like a pack of wolves, the dogs fought over the entrails. the mutes clapped their hands andlaughed —guh-guh. aunty sun sat on the doorstep holding a long pipe, smoking like awoman deep in thought.
