Under the Red Flag (8 page)

Their wailing seemed contagious. Within half a minute the whole furnace room was ringing with the sound of crying, and the floor was sprinkled with tears. People were weeping and blowing their noses. Even Secretary Yang lost self-control, using a handkerchief to wipe his eyes. Some women were supporting each other with their arms while sobbing. Their faces were disfigured by the pain and sadness that suddenly prevailed among the crowd. Only the workmen, who were jaded by this kind of mourning, appeared emotionless. They were smoking quietly. One of them was wiping the ash box on a table with a towel.

Twenty minutes later the flames grew lower and lower as the whirring in the furnace stopped. By and by, an empty chamber could be seen through the small hole. A worker opened the furnace, in which remained a layer of ashes that looked like broken clamshells. Another workman used a poker to gather everything into a large shovel. Then he poured the ashes into a sieve to get rid of the cinders. People began to move out, while the Dings were putting the ashes into the box of sandalwood.

The clerk raised his camera and shot half a dozen pictures, in which the Dings stood against the tall chimney and the neat rows of pines, holding the ash box that had the old woman’s portrait and name on its front. By custom, the ashes should be left at the crematory for a month, so the father and the son, who carried the box, went to the small house where the dead souls were stored temporarily. Once inside, they saw dozens of boxes on the shelves that had been set up along the walls. The floor was littered with bread, fruits, colorful paper, burned joss sticks, dog and human feces. They placed the box on top of a shelf and
went out for fresh air. Although the place was untidy, they felt it was bearable, since they would take the old woman home soon.

Then the whole crowd climbed on the trucks, which carried them to East Wind Inn, where Yuanmin worked as the vice-manager. There they would have the feast, for which the inn had butchered two pigs. Everybody was welcome. The food was not fancy, only plain rice and four dishes—fried eggplant, pork stewed in soy sauce, tomatoes with scrambled eggs, and cabbage salad—but there was plenty of meat and liquor. Yuanmin paid two hundred and fifty yuan for all the expenses, because she didn’t want to give a handle to the Yang faction.

Three days after Sheng had returned to Gold County, an article appeared in
Evergreen News
, Dismount Fort’s town paper. It was entitled “Between the Party’s Principle and a Son’s Filial Duty.” It reported on the funeral affairs in detail, describing the old woman’s wish to be buried and Chairman Ding’s integrity in upholding the Party’s policy by refusing his mother a ground burial. Though full of praise, the article had a lot of overtones. Between the lines, an explicit message was conveyed to the reader: Ding Liang was an unfilial son who had burned up his mother in spite of her imploring. It went so far as to say, “Ever since the ancient times, official integrity and family duty have been on contradictory terms. Chairman Ding resolutely sacrificed his old mother to prove his loyalty to the Party and our country.”

After reading the article, Ding threw the paper down and flew into a rage. His face turned red, and his big eyes flashed. If he could grab hold of Secretary Yang, he would strangle him.
His anger wouldn’t go away even if he ate Yang’s crooked heart. Everyone has a mother, but Yang acted as if he came from a pumpkin. Let him wait, wait for the day when his old mother went west.

That night Ding held a secret meeting in the Commune Guest House on West Street. Both Feng and Tian were present. In addition to them was the head of the Propaganda Department, Shao Bin, who was the best writer and painter in town and had recently switched sides, from Yang’s faction to Ding’s. After a round of Golden Orchid wine, Ding took the newspaper out of his pocket and put it on the table. He said, “Brothers, you know what’s in the paper, don’t you?”

Everybody nodded without a word. “Damn their ancestors!” Ding cursed. “They are screwing me. If I buried my mother they would report me to the higher-ups. Now my mother has been burned up, they begin bad-mouthing me. Whatever I do, they want to do me in. This world was not made for both Yang Chen and us, and he won’t share the same sky with us!”

“I thought they would relent this time, especially after you feasted them,” Tian said. “At the crematory I saw Dong Cai, the son of a snake, wiping his eyes with paper. I was amazed that he could have a sympathetic heart. Now his tears turned out to be a trick.” Tian took a bite of the chicken leg in his hand.

“We have to figure out a way to fight back,” Feng said, spitting watermelon seeds into his palm. “It seems that this time we’ll have a war of pens.”

“Young Shao,” Ding asked, “what do you think we should do?”

“We should write articles to correct the readers’ wrong impression given by this one.” Shao pointed at the paper on the table.

“I think we must take the high ground,” said Tian, who had been a company political instructor in the army. “We shouldn’t engage them in the same paper. We’d better begin with big papers. If we have articles published in big papers, they will be silenced automatically, because they dare not oppose a higher body’s mouthpiece.”

Ding nodded, impressed by the bright idea. Then the meeting proceeded to focus on what kind of articles should be written and to what papers they should be sent. They all agreed that the emphasis should fall on the old woman’s change of mind, which had resulted from Chairman Ding’s effort to enlighten her on the Party’s concern and on the interests of the future generations. The articles would be sent simultaneously to Beijing, Shenyang—the provincial capital—and Gold County. Since Shao was a regular contributor to several newspapers, he assured Ding that he knew where to send the articles.

“Brothers,” Ding said to conclude, “a good man needs three helpers, as a pavilion has at least three pillars. I’m grateful to you. If I have wealth and rank someday, I won’t forget you, my good brothers.”

That very night, Shao Bin roused two junior clerks in his department, and together they set about writing the articles.

Sooner than anyone expected—a week later—
Liaoning Daily
, the biggest provincial newspaper, published an article about the funeral. Although the contents had been changed a great deal from what Shao had written, it provided the ammunition that the Ding faction needed badly. The changed title was more resonant: “For the Happiness of Ten Thousand Generations.” The story reported that an old progressive woman in a commune town, called Dismount Fort, had volunteered to have her body
cremated after her death, even though her family had prepared an expensive coffin for her. She wanted to leave a clean world for the children to come; for her, that was her best gift for future generations. The paper also printed the picture of the Dings holding the ash box in front of the crematory.

Ding was stunned by the article. He had thought that at best the county’s paper might be interested in the funeral, since he had a few influential friends in the county town and he was not unknown to the local media. Now, obviously, the funeral had attracted the attention of the officials in the provincial capital. Far from the truth though this report was, it gave him what he needed at this moment: an authoritative version for the funeral affairs. Facing that, no one in the Yang faction would dare to challenge his loyalty to the Party and his devotion to his mother again. All Ding needed to do now was repeat what the paper said. He ordered the writers in his faction to stick with this definitive version. From now on, all the guns must have the same caliber.

Though the external crisis was eased, the trouble within the family still persisted. Ever since the old woman died, Yuanmin had not slept well at night. She had her own worries. On the day before her mother-in-law’s death she took away the old woman’s key to the large red chest that contained candies, cookies, and canned fruits. Because Ding was a prominent man in the town, whoever had called on him brought a gift to his sick mother. Sometimes a box of pastry, sometimes a bag of fruits, sometimes a chunk of cooked meat. The red chest was always full of dainties. The old woman opened it several times a day, even at night before she went to bed. That was why she had said, “I’ve eaten whatever I wanted to eat.”

Since it was not healthy to go to bed with a full stomach, Yuanmin was determined to break the bad habit. People ate to work, what was the use of the rich food in the old woman’s stomach while she was sleeping? It would only make her fat. The night before her death, Yuanmin said to her, “Mom, give me the key. You mustn’t stuff yourself before you go to bed. It will ruin your health.”

“No,” the old woman said, “what’s in the chest is mine. No, I won’t give it to you.”

Seeing it impossible to bring her around, Yuanmin fished the key out of the jacket hung on the wall. Her mother-in-law started to cry, but Yuanmin wouldn’t give it back. Though the old woman planned to tell her son when he came home, she tired of crying and fell asleep.

Yuanmin dared not tell her husband what she had done. If he had known, he would have yelled at her, “You sent her to death!” How could she bear the blame for the rest of her life?

Though she didn’t mean to hurt her mother-in-law, the old woman must have hated her at the last moment. If only she had known that was her last day! She would have done anything to please her and let her eat to her heart’s content. It was too late now. She didn’t love her mother-in-law a lot, but she didn’t hate her enough to hurt her. No matter how remorsefully she cried at the funeral, the harm had been done, the wounded soul would never forgive her. She found herself tossing in bed for hours every night.

More frightening than that was her sister-in-law, Shufen, who would arrive in a few days. That country woman had been demented. If she found out what had happened or was unhappy about the cremation, Shufen would fly into a rage and might
have a relapse. Then the Dings would have to send her to the mental hospital again. That would mean another huge debt. Yuanmin was terrified to think of it. She remembered that fifteen years before, Shufen had been here, raving, singing, swearing, and laughing in the yard. Sometimes she would run through the streets, imitating a dog’s barking, a donkey’s braying, a duck’s quacking, a sheep’s bleating, a rooster’s crowing. Children followed her, throwing stones at her. At meals she would stuff herself with whatever she liked without touching anything else, and nobody dared dissuade her. Once she ate a whole bowl of stewed ham and then blasted curses at Yuanmin because while she had been eating, Yuanmin had said, “Sister, why don’t you have some rice?”

At that time, the old woman was still alive; whenever Shufen messed her pants or fell into a public latrine, her mother would wash her and the soiled clothes. But now, if she went mad again, Yuanmin would have to take care of everything. It was horrifying to imagine it. She grew so nervous she cried in front of her husband several times. Ding seemed to understand his wife’s mind, and he promised that he would handle his sister once she was here for the short visit, but Yuanmin must not provoke her in any way. He tried to comfort his wife, saying that as Shufen hadn’t been demented by the death of her husband five years before, it was unlikely that she would have a relapse this time.

After reading the article in
Liaoning Daily
, Sheng felt outraged. How come the whole thing was reversed now? His grandmother had never wanted to be cremated in the first place, and there had never been “an expensive coffin.” Lies, newspapers always tell lies, he said to himself. But he was mature enough to keep the
anger and the questions to himself. His experience in the army had taught him that disaster always comes from the tongue.

This morning his father telephoned him and asked him to come home to see his aunt, who had just arrived. Sheng got permission from the leaders. Having saved a weekend, he would be able to stay home for two days. He took the three o’clock train. It was only an hour’s trip.

When Sheng reached home, his father was in the yard, reading
The Hero and the Eagle
, a chivalric novel. “Was the train crowded?” Ding asked pleasantly, and put the book into his pocket.

“No, I had a window seat.”

“Listen,” his father said in a low voice, “your aunt will stay here just for a few days. We’ll try to do everything to keep her undisturbed. Don’t tell her what really happened, all right?”

“Why?”

“I don’t want her to go mad again. Do you?”

“Of course not.”

“Then just repeat what I tell her. I know her temper better than you do.”

“All right.”

When Sheng stepped in the house, Shufen was helping Yuanmin cut celery in the kitchen. To Sheng’s surprise, his aunt hadn’t changed a bit: the same thick, dark hair coiled on top of her head, the same broad, chafed face, the same bulging eyes shooting eerie flashes. Her laugh was as hearty as her body was stout. She saw Sheng and said loudly, “Big nephew, I didn’t think you’re so tall, a big man now.”

“How are you, aunt?”

“Good, I’m good.”

Soon dinner was ready. The family sat down at the table while Sheng was pouring White Mountain wine, first for his aunt, then for his father, his mother, and himself. Before they began to eat, Chairman Ding straightened his back a little and spoke with a broad smile. “I am very happy today. First, my sister came. I haven’t seen you for fifteen years, Shufen. This is a happy reunion. Second, I was just told that I have been promoted vice-magistrate of Gold County.” He turned to Shufen. “I owe my luck to Mother.”

Glasses clinked and laughter filled the room while spoons and dishes jingled continuously. Sheng was overwhelmed by his father’s announcement. It was a big promotion, which also meant a lot to him. Now his life and future in the county town would be different. His father wouldn’t have to help him overtly. Just by having his old man in the County Administration, Sheng would become somebody in his leaders’ eyes. They wouldn’t dare ask him to buy soy oil for them through the back door again. Instead, they would think of what to offer him on holidays. And the pretty girls in the textile mill; he would marry the prettiest of them and settle down in the big county town. He had never thought fate would favor him this way. Emboldened by the good wine, he stood up and said, “Dad, congratulations!”