The Boat to Redemption (17 page)

T
HE GOLDEN
Sparrow River was calm and tranquil the following autumn. The riverbed shrank and the banks receded, revealing patches of
swamp land overgrown with reeds and water grasses. An occasional egret landed, but only briefly, as wild dogs prowled around
and barked enthusiastically at passing ships. There was a sometimes bleak quality to the prosperous scenes on the densely
populated shore, with villages big and small dotting the area. I knew all their names, but after the floods had passed, the
one called Huage had disappeared; the eight dye mills had moved away, and I no longer saw Huage’s blue and white fabric billowing
in the wind from the boats. The Fairy Maiden Bridge had sunk into the river, like an old man beaten down by time who could
no longer raise his head, while by gazing into the distance at the steel tower and traces of high-voltage wires not far from
Li Village, I could see a new marketplace that had exploded into existence on the marshy bank, large clusters of simple structures
that had seemingly risen up overnight, with red brick walls and white asbestos tiles. From afar, it looked like a mushroom
farm. ‘They call that East Wind Villa,’ someone told me. ‘It’s where the East Wind No. 8 construction workers who chose not
to return to their homes live.’

As autumn arrived, a rash developed in my groin. It itched like
crazy, and I couldn’t stop scratching, an inelegant practice my father couldn’t help noticing. He told me to drop my pants,
which exposed my rash, as well as my genitals, for him to see. I’ll never forget the look of shock in his eyes, not from seeing
the rash – he asked me what I expected, since I hated taking baths and paid no attention to my personal hygiene – but from
the physical changes; maturation had occurred unnoticed. The damned ‘helmet’, with all its rosy freshness, gave off a cursed,
wicked glint; bad for others and bad for me. The sight put a worried scowl on Father’s face, and I was so embarrassed I wanted
to crawl into a hole. The look of fear in his eyes was unmistakable, for this involved desire and tumult, danger and sin.
The devil was on its way, the very devil he had extirpated from his own body had now shown up on mine. Any comparison between
us was cruel, and the results were hard to utter. Father took out a bottle of gentian violet. His mood resembled the purple
liquid in the bottle – irritable and gloomy – while his gaze remained fixed on my crotch, cold and hostile, mixed with profound
misery. His eyes were like a pair of scissors, terrifyingly open. I trembled; my rash mutated into a barely perceptible pain
that covered my crotch. I knew that Father hated my ‘helmet’, and it disgusted me too. But what was I to do? Once a male dons
the ‘helmet’, it’s impossible to take it off.

Fortunately, they were eventful days. Father got busy as the twenty-seventh of September, the anniversary of Deng Shaoxiang’s
martyrdom, neared, and so did I. In order to prepare River Day candles and paper flowers, he sent me into town to buy coloured
paper and a jug of rice wine. The wine served two functions: I was to spray half of it on the martyr’s memorial and bring
the rest back to the boat for him. He never touched alcohol, except on the twenty-seventh of September, when he drank to the
spirit of Deng Shaoxiang.

I went first to the stationery shop to buy coloured paper. As she was taking a stack of paper down off the shelf, the shop
assistant
blurted out, ‘You’re not from the school, are you? And you’re not from the General Affairs Building, so what do you need coloured
paper for?’

‘Coloured paper isn’t rationed,’ I said. ‘What do you care where I’m from? I’m buying, and you have to sell it to me.’

She gave me a suspicious look. ‘Do I have to sell it to you if you’re buying it to write counter-revolutionary slogans? Don’t
roll your eyes at me. I know who you are. You’re Ku Wenxian’s son, aren’t you?’

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘So what? Can’t Ku Wenxian’s son buy coloured paper?’

She looked at me out of the corner of her eye and snorted. ‘Your father owes us money. Back when he was one of the town’s
big shots, he took lots of our paper – plain white paper, writing paper, coloured paper, even some fine paper for calligraphy.
But we never saw any money.’

‘That’s your problem,’ I said. ‘You could have made him pay for those things.’

‘You’re quite the talker,’ she said. ‘He was a local tyrant who told us to charge it to the General Affairs account. Who’d
dare to refuse? Then there’s your mother, Qiao Limin. She wasn’t in the habit of paying for her purchases either: books, fountain
pens, pencils, pencil cases, notebooks. All for official business, she said, so charge it. Oh, we did that all right. It would
have been fine, except that Ku Wenxuan fell from power and Zhao Chuntang refused to honour the bill. We’re the losers. Our
books and inventory never match.’

Telling me about my parents’ past deeds embarrassed me and made me angry. ‘That’s none of my business,’ I said, rapping my
knuckles on the counter. ‘I don’t want to talk about what they did. I’m here to buy coloured paper. If you won’t sell it to
me, I’ll just take it.’

‘Fat chance,’ she replied. ‘The son inherits the father’s debts.
And what makes you think that you, who owes us money, can act like a little tyrant? Nobody’s afraid of you any more. Why should
we be? You can buy your paper somewhere else.’ When she saw me move closer to the display case, she slammed the door shut.
Then she gave me a shrill warning: ‘I doubt you’d dare to rob us, but if you did, the police station is right down the street,
and they’d come running if they heard me scream.’

The assistant and I were confronting one another across the glass-topped counter when a three-wheeled vehicle loaded with
cardboard boxes pulled up in front of the shop. The driver entered carrying a large box and set it down. It was the shopkeeper,
Old Yin, a round-faced man with big ears. He’d save the day, since in the past he’d been a frequent guest in our home. Back
then he used to rub my head whenever he dropped by. He didn’t do that this time, but he hadn’t forgotten who I was. ‘Dongliang,’
he said, ‘why the scowl? You’re not shopping for a knife to kill someone, are you?’

‘That’s exactly what he wants,’ the assistant said, ‘all because I told him to go home and remind his father that he owes
us money. What I got was that look in return. With such a long face, someone who didn’t know better might think we owed
him
money.’

Old Yin was a man who enjoyed digging up local anecdotes and was thoroughly versed in Milltown’s revolutionary history. When
he learned that I’d come to buy coloured paper he glanced up at the wall calendar. ‘Ah,’ he exclaimed. ‘Tomorrow’s Deng Shaoxiang’s
memorial day.’ With that, he agreed to sell me paper, and even separated it by colour to let me choose the ones I wanted.

‘I don’t know how to choose,’ I said. ‘You do it for me.’

So he bent over and began selecting the right colours. ‘Your father has a good heart,’ he muttered. ‘Even after what happened
to him, he makes a point of observing September the twenty-seventh. But what I don’t understand is, since he refuses to come
ashore these days, how will he memorialize the martyr?’

‘Water’s as good as land,’ I said. ‘He’ll just face Phoenix and toss paper flowers into the river.’

Old Yin raised his head and gave me a dubious look. ‘Phoenix, you say? You don’t know? You really don’t know?’

I gaped at him, having no idea what he was talking about. ‘Know what?’

He glanced at me, cleared his throat and spoke in an authoritative, almost callous tone. ‘There’s new information your father
couldn’t know about, since he’s out of the picture. Go home and tell him not to rely on the almanac. They’ve discovered that
Deng Shaoxiang wasn’t from Phoenix after all. That coffin shop was moved to Phoenix from Running Ox Village. You understand
what I’m saying? Deng Shaoxiang was born not in Phoenix but in Running Ox Village. Ever hear of it?’

I stood transfixed in front of the counter. I neither shook my head nor nodded. I glared at Old Yin. I’d never heard of Running
Ox Village, and people were going to think this was a joke. My father insisted that he was Martyr Deng’s son, and that I was
her grandson. But neither of us had ever heard of Running Ox Village!

My face reddened with embarrassment. I scooped up the paper and ran out of the shop, followed by the loud voice of the shop
assistant. ‘Who do you think you are?’ she shouted. ‘A pretender! Stop being stupid. Father and son – one’s a cheat, the other
a little hooligan. If Deng Shaoxiang had descendants like you, any commemoration would be a waste of time.’

I walked down the streets of Milltown with the coloured paper under my arm, anger boiling up inside me, not just because of
the shop assistant, but also because of the murky nature of Martyr Deng’s life. Deng Shaoxiang, your glorious deeds are worthy
of song and tears, but why did you lead such a complicated life with so many twists and turns? You are the most famous of
martyrs, your name remains with us even after your death. You were not a
cloud, so why did you drift from place to place, here one minute, there the next? Where did you actually come from? And who
is your real son? When will all the doubts be dispelled? Martyr Deng Shaoxiang, I beg you, won’t you show yourself to tell
us the truth?

I looked into the sky above the chess pavilion. The people who saw me gave me curious stares. Those who didn’t know me asked,
‘What’s up with him?’ Those who knew me said, ‘Don’t mind him, he’s Ku Dongliang. He often walks with his head up, but sometimes
he keeps it down. Whatever makes him happy.’

I was walking with my head up because I wasn’t happy. But the noise from a crowd of people around the general store calmed
me down. I lowered my head, and there on the steps of the store stood a throng of women and children, baskets in hand, lined
up to buy sugar. An announcement had been pasted up on the door:

A SUPPLY OF SUGAR IN COMMEMORATION OF NATIONAL DAY HAS ARRIVED. THREE OUNCES OF SUGAR WILL BE SOLD FOR EACH SUGAR COUPON.

Remembering that I was supposed to buy a jug of strong rice wine, I elbowed my way up to the steps, only to be pushed back.
‘I don’t want any sugar,’ I said. ‘I need to buy rice wine.’

I was wasting my breath. ‘We don’t care what you want or need,’ someone said. ‘Line up.’ Then a woman elbowed me out of line
and, in a voice dripping with contempt, said, ‘You boat people have no manners. Getting you to stand in line is like threatening
your existence. What harm can it do to queue up for a change? Are you afraid you’ll lose weight, or money? Am I right or aren’t
I?’ Other people in the queue nodded in agreement, looking disgustedly at me. I could have pleaded my case, but it would have
been a waste of time. They were there for sugar, I was there for rice wine – two different things. But to them it was all
the same. I
didn’t want to go to the end of the line, but no one was willing to let me go in front of them, so all I could do was step
away, fuming at them.

Feeling restless, I stood to one side to watch the queue when I recalled that one of Huixian’s handbills about her mother
had been pasted up on the wall across the way. I walked over to see if it was still there. Either sanitation workers had torn
down most of what remained or the elements had worn it away; except for a tiny fragment, it was obliterated under a fresh
coat of whitewash. The stubborn defiance of that fragment evoked in me a sense of mourning. With National Day, the first of
October, approaching, the walls of the streets and small lanes had been whitewashed to welcome the holiday. The handbill had
died a natural death. I saw no trace of Father’s calligraphy, nor of Huixian’s name. Not content to leave it at that, I patiently
scraped the whitewash off the remaining scrap of paper, and there beneath my fingernail, the sunflower I’d drawn the year
before came to life before my eyes, slowly blossoming as I scraped and scraped.

That sunflower brought me a strange sense of elation. So I waited at the corner as the queue in front of the general store
grew shorter and eventually disappeared.

As I walked out of the store carrying my jug of wine, I heard a voice behind me. It was Four-Eyes Ma, the store’s bookkeeper.
‘That’s powerful stuff,’ he shouted. ‘When you get home, tell Old Ku not to drink too much. Tell him Bookkeeper Ma says he’ll
get even more downcast if he tries to drown his sorrows!’

I couldn’t tell if there was some hidden meaning in his comment, but I pretended not to hear him. He and my father had once
enjoyed playing chess together, and he had been good at letting Father win by a slim margin. They were on relatively good
terms, but no matter how good the terms were, in the end it was nothing but
kongpi
. I refused to believe that Four-Eyes’ comment was well-meaning, and suspected that his soft-spoken suggestion was
really a ruse to win the respect of the young woman behind the counter. I never passed on people’s greetings to Father, because
I didn’t think they came from the heart. I put my trust in myself alone, his son, since I couldn’t think of a single person
in Milltown who gave a damn about Ku Wenxuan.

I carried out Father’s instruction by taking the jug of rice wine over to the chess pavilion, where a noisy crowd had gathered,
and a gaggle of geese filled the air with their honking. My access to the memorial was effectively blocked. But I got as close
as possible, and there I spotted the idiot Bianjin, cavorting drunkenly in front of the martyr’s memorial, protected by the
geese he tended. He was calling out ‘Mama!’ to the etched likeness of Deng Shaoxiang. ‘Mama! Mama!’ he said. ‘Go and tell
Zhao Chuntang to build a shed for my geese. Mama! Mama! Go and tell Little Wang at the general store to marry me. Mama! Mama!
Give me five yuan so I can buy a jug for good wine. They look down on me, and won’t even drop the price by five fen.’

People tried to stop him, but failed. ‘Even an idiot knows how to take advantage of a situation,’ someone yelled, ‘calling
Deng Shaoxiang Mama. You think calling her Mama is going to help you eat and drink well, do you? We’d like to be the chosen
one, too. What makes an idiot like you think you can make that claim?’