Border Town Page 5

  “If you go,” he said, “the boat will stay with me!”

  Cuicui knitted her brows and gave him a wry smile: “Oh, so the boat will look after you. Is that right?”

  Grandpa thought to himself, “You will leave me, one day.” But he didn’t dare bring that up. Grandpa didn’t know what to say next, so he went out back of the house to the garden beneath the pagoda and checked on the scallions. Cuicui followed.

  “Grandfather, I’ve made my decision. I’m not going. If someone has to go, let it be the boat. I’ll take its place and keep you company!”

  “Cuicui, if you won’t go then I will, with red flowers in my hair, made up like an old country lady going to town on her first trip!”

  The two of them laughed at this for the longest time. They left the dispute open to settlement.

  While Grandpa tended his scallions, Cuicui plucked a scallion with a big stem to use as a whistle. People on the east bank called out to be ferried across. Cuicui hurried over, blocking her grandpa’s way. She jumped into the boat and tugged it along the cable to the other side where the passengers were. She yelled out to her grandpa:

  “Sing for us, Grandfather, sing!”

  But he didn’t. He just stood on the high crag, watching Cuicui and waving at her silently.

  Grandpa was a little worried.

  Cuicui was growing up, given to blushing now when certain things inadvertently came up in conversation. The passage of time was ripening her, as if urging her forward, making her pay attention to new things. She loved now to look at brides with their powder and makeup, to adorn her own hair with wildflowers, and to listen to songs. She was beginning to understand some of the sentiments in the local Chadong love songs. She seemed a little distant sometimes; she liked to sit on the rocky bluffs, fixing her gaze on a patch of clouds or a star in the sky. Grandpa would ask, “Cuicui, what are you thinking about?” And she would whisper, embarrassed, “Cuicui’s not thinking about anything.” But at the same time she was asking herself, “Cuicui, what are you thinking about?” And she’d answer, “I’m thinking about lots of things, things that carry me far away. But I don’t know what they are.” She was indeed wrapped up in thought, in thought that even she could not identify. Her girl’s body had now completely filled out, and she had reached the age when she experienced a miracle of nature each month. This set her to thinking all the more.

  Grandpa understood the impact of such things on a girl, and this in turn affected him. He had lived his full seventy years amid nature, but some natural happenings in human life were beyond his control. Cuicui’s maturation made her grandpa recall events in the past. From stories buried in the accumulations of time, certain things came back to haunt him.

  Cuicui’s mother had once been just like her: long eyebrows, big eyes, rosy complexion, and a winsome charm that made you adore her. She was a clever one, knowing just how to roll her eyes and arch her eyebrows to the delight of family elders. One would have thought she, too, was incapable of leaving the old man. But then misfortune came: she met the soldier. In the end, she abandoned her elder and her young one to die with that soldier. The old ferryman did not blame anyone for these things; he chalked it all up to Heaven. Cuicui’s grandpa never cursed Heaven, but in his heart he could never completely accept its cruel disposition of things. He was still young at heart. He said he had put it aside, yet it was something that couldn’t be put aside, even though he must.

  And then there was Cuicui. If Cuicui did as her mother did, could a man of his age bring up another baby? The gods would not necessarily consent, even if he were willing! He was too old, ready for his rest. All the toil and hardship that accompanied the life of a good and honest Chinese country fellow, he had already experienced. If there really was a God up on high, and this God had two hands that could dispose of everything with perfect justice, He ought to take Grandpa first, letting the young people enjoy all that was due them in their new lives.

  But Grandpa didn’t think this way. He was concerned about Cuicui. Sometimes he lay down on the bluffs under the stars to mull things over. He felt that death would be coming for him soon. The fact that Cuicui had grown up proved how old he was. Yet, whatever happened, he must get Cuicui settled. Cuicui’s poor mother had given her to him. Now that she had grown up, he must pass her on to someone else before his work on earth was done! But who was the proper husband for her? Who could he be sure would never hurt her?

  A few days before, when the frank and outspoken Tianbao, Shunshun’s No. 1, had crossed the stream and talked to Grandpa, the first words out of his mouth were:

  “Elder Uncle, your Cuicui has grown quite beautiful. She’s a real Guan Yin. Two years from now, if I can take charge of business in Chadong instead of having to fly over the landscape all day like a crow, I’ll be coming by this stream every night to sing to Cuicui of my love.”

  Grandpa smiled to encourage him to go on with this declaration. He looked at No. 1 with narrowed eyes while tugging the boat, as if to say,

  “I catch the meaning of your foolish confession, and it doesn’t anger me. Go on—what else have you to say?”

  Whereupon No. 1 continued:

  “Cuicui is so delicate, I worry that she may be suited to listening to our Chadong love songs but not the humdrum errands of an ordinary Chadong wife. I want a sweetheart who can listen to my songs but she also has to be a wife who can manage household affairs. ‘I want a horse I don’t have to feed, but I want it to run fast, too!’ The ancestors must have thought up that saying just for me, to show that you have to feed a horse to make it run fast!”

  Grandpa unhurriedly turned the boat around, putting the stern in to shore, and said:

  “No. 1, anything can happen! Wait and see.”

  After the young man left, Grandpa mulled over the boy’s frank words. He was happy and at the same time worried. Cuicui had to be entrusted to a husband. Was this the best one to take care of her? And if he did bequeath her to him, would Cuicui be willing?

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  A fine rain was falling at daybreak on the fifth of the month. Rising water levels upstream had provided the seasonal “Dragon Boat tide” and the river was already pea-green. Grandpa was on his way to town to buy goods for the festival, with a coolie hat made of phrynium fiber on his head and a bag containing a string of six hundred old imperial copper coins slung across his shoulder. He carried a basket and a big gourd full of wine. Because it was a festival day, folk from all the little villages and Miao stockades had come bearing goods and money for buying, selling, and trading. They had all arisen very early too, so Cuicui and the yellow dog tended the ferryboat in Grandpa’s absence. Cuicui wore a brand-new coolie hat as she ferried passengers back and forth, one trip after another. To the amusement of all, the yellow dog sat in the bow and, when they landed, jumped ashore before everyone else, carrying the tie rope in his mouth. Some country folk brought their own dogs with them to town, but as the old saying goes, “dogs ought to be kept at home.” Away from their territory, even accompanied by their masters, these dogs had to be on their best behavior. On the ferry, Cuicui’s dog would go up and sniff at them until Cuicui threw him a cross look; he seemed to understand that she was telling him to stand back. Even after landing, when he’d done his duty with the rope, he had to follow the unfamiliar dogs all the way up the hill. Whether he was barking softly at a dog’s master or following the dog, Cuicui would yell at him, with a little anger in her voice: “Hey, there, dog! What’s gotten into you? What makes you run off when we have work to do?” The yellow dog would quickly run back to the boat and go back to sniffing every place in sight. Cuicui said, “What nonsense is this? Where’d you learn that? Lie down over there!” As if he understood her words, the dog immediately went to his place in the boat and only occasionally gave a few soft yaps, as if he’d just remembered something.

  The rain would not let up. The river was covered with mist. When work quieted down on the boat, Cuicui rehearsed the old ferryman’s itinerary
in her imagination. She knew just where he was going, whom he would run into and what they would say to each other, what would be going on at the city gate and on River Street—it was all in “the ledger of her mind,” as clear as if she had seen it with her own eyes. And she knew her grandpa backward and forward. Every time he met an army friend from the city, even a horse groomer or a cook boy, he would give him the proper greetings of the day. He’d say, “Honorable Soldier, may you have your fill of good food and drink this holiday!” And the other would say, “Oarsman, may you have the same!” But if the reply to this salute was “What good food and drink do you mean? Four ounces of pork and two bowls of wine are not enough to satisfy anyone or get them drunk!,” Grandpa would earnestly invite his friend to Green Creek Hill to drink up. If the man wanted to drink a swig of wine from Grandpa’s gourd, the ferryman would not be tightfisted—he’d hand it right over. And if the man from the garrison rolled his tongue and licked his lips while praising the wine’s quality, Grandpa would press him to take another swallow. Thus was the wine dissipated, until the ferryman ran back to the shop where he’d bought it to fill his gourd up to the top again. Cuicui knew, too, that Grandpa would go to the docks to talk to sailors whose boats had put in a day or two earlier. He’d ask them the price of rice and salt downriver, and sometimes he’d stoop over and crawl into their cabins, which were steeped in the smells of squid and fish, sundry oils, vinegar, and smoke from the burning of wood. The boatmen would grab a handful of red dates from a little jar and press them on the old ferryman. When Grandpa got home and heard Cuicui’s complaints about his absence, these dates became the instruments of their reconciliation. And when Grandpa got to River Street, many a shop owner would give him zongzi and other treats out of respect for this oarsman who was so true to his duty. Though Grandpa would shout, “It’ll crush my old bones to bring back a pile this big,” he always had to give in to their gestures of gratitude. He’d go to the long table where meat was sold and ask to buy, but they wouldn’t take his money. If one butcher would refuse payment, he’d have to go to another rather than take advantage of others’ goodwill. The butcher would say, “Elder, why are you so unyielding about this? Nobody’s asking you to be a beast of burden in front of the plow!” But he wouldn’t take the offering. To him, this was akin to blood money, in a class of its own. If his money wasn’t accepted, he’d figure out the meat’s cost, thrust the coins into the bamboo tube that was the merchant’s money box, seize the purchase, and leave. The butcher, knowing how he would react beforehand, would give Grandpa the choicest portion and make sure it was overweight. But the ferryman might notice that and say, “Hey there, boss, I don’t want any favors! Tenderloin cuts are for city people to sauté with squid. Don’t make me laugh! I want meat from the neck, rich and sticky. I row a boat. I want to make a stew of it with carrots while I drink my wine!” Meat in hand, he’d count out his payment before handing it over, then insist that the butcher count it again, but the latter would ignore this and throw the coins carelessly into his money tube. The ferryman, as he left, would give a smile that had to be called ingratiating. The butcher and his other customers found this hilarious.

  Cuicui knew, too, that Grandpa would go to Shunshun’s house on River Street.

  She mused about everything she had seen and heard on the festival days of the past two years, joyful at heart, as if something had come to her, like the elusive yellow sunflower she saw with her eyes closed as she lay in bed in the morning. This thing loomed bright and bold before her, but she couldn’t see it clearly or quite grasp it.

  Cuicui wondered: “Are there really tigers at White Rooster Pass?” She had no idea why she suddenly remembered White Rooster Pass. It was located in the middle reaches of the You River, over seventy miles from Chadong!

  And then she thought: “Thirty-two men hefting six heavy oars, hoisting a great sail when the wind comes up, made from one hundred lengths of white cloth, crossing Lake Dongting in such a giant boat—how absurd!” She had no idea how big Lake Dongting was, nor had she ever seen such a big boat. Even funnier, she couldn’t herself imagine why these thoughts had come to her.

  A group arrived to be ferried across, people with goods: men who looked like government messengers and a mother and daughter. The mother wore a blue outfit that had been starched stiff as a board and the girl’s cheeks were rouged like two round cakes. She wore new clothes that didn’t fit too well. They were going to town to greet their relatives at the festival and see the dragon boats. After waiting for the group to get settled on the boat, Cuicui gave the girl a once-over while she pulled the boat across the stream. To Cuicui, the girl looked to be about eleven and already very spoiled, always hanging on to her mother. Her newly polished shoes had pointy toes and spikes on the bottom, but they were splashed with mud. Her trousers were made of leek-green cotton cloth with specks of purple. When she saw Cuicui staring at her, she stared back with eyes bright as crystal balls. She looked a little embarrassed, ill at ease, and at the same time indefinably seductive. The mother then asked Cuicui how old she was. Cuicui smiled, unwilling to answer, and instead asked how old her daughter was. When she said twelve years old, Cuicui couldn’t suppress a laugh. They were obviously the wife and daughter of a rich man; one could tell from their manner. Cuicui spotted a pair of bracelets on the girl, made of interlaced strands of silver. They flashed a shiny white light and made Cuicui feel a little envious. When the boat reached shore and everyone was off, the woman took out a copper coin and pressed it into Cuicui’s hand before going. Forgetting her grandpa’s rule for the moment, Cuicui neither thanked her nor gave it back. She just gaped from behind at the girl among the file of people. The group was about to go up the hill when Cuicui suddenly chased after them. At the top of the hill, she returned the money to the woman, who said, “It’s for you!” Cuicui just smiled and shook her head without replying, to indicate that she couldn’t accept it, and without waiting for the woman to say another word, she quickly ran back to her ferryboat.

  When she reached the boat, people on the opposite shore were summoning the ferry, so Cuicui tugged the boat across. Seven people crossed on this trip, among them two more girls, who also wore clean outfits to go see the boat races. But they were not so attractive; this made Cuicui fix her mind all the more on the previous girl.

  More people than usual needed ferrying today, especially girls. Cuicui pulled them across on the boat, so they made a deep impression on her: the pretty ones, the funny-looking ones, the nice ones, ones with reddened eyes. When the crowds stopped, while she waited for Grandpa and Grandpa didn’t come, she reviewed all of the girls in her mind and sang softly and distractedly:

  The tiger at White Rooster Pass feasts on people

  And he’ ll get the militia captain’s daughter first.

  Sister No. 1 wears a pair of gold hairpins,

  Sister No. 2, a pair of silver bracelets,

  But Sister No. 3, little me, has no jewelry to be found;

  Just bean-sprout earrings, worn all the year round.

  A man came from town who’d seen the old ferryman in front of a tavern on River Street, offering a young boatman his gourd full of freshly bought white liquor. Cuicui inquired further and he told all. She laughed to hear of her grandpa’s generosity, offered at just the wrong time and the wrong place. As the man departed, Cuicui again began to softly hum, just for fun, the chant that the local shaman used to summon the gods:

  Gods and immortals, open your eyes and look at us down here!

  Our young are honest and healthy.

  Our elders know how to drink, and work, and sleep;

  Our children grow up to withstand hunger and cold;

  Our oxen are willing to plow, our sheep to birth, our fowl to hatch eggs;

  Our women are good at raising children, singing, and finding their true loves!

  Gods and immortals, come on down and have a look.

  Lord Guan, mount the Red-haired Steed,

  General Weichi Gong, bran
dish the iron whip.

  Gods and immortals above, ride down on the clouds and look around!

  Old Man Zhang Guo, ride steady on your donkey,

  Iron Crutch Li, be careful where you step!

  Riches and emoluments without end come from the gods;

  Timely winds and rains, too, come from your favor,

  So good wine and food are laid before you,

  Fat pigs and sheep are frying in the pan.

  Hong Xiuquan, Li Hongzhang,

  Once you were lords of all around,

  Murder and arson—suicide and loyalty—each has its art,

  So join the feast, it’s for you to take part.

  Eat and drink, please take your time,

  Moon’s up and breeze’s down; fording the river will be just fine.

  If you’re drunk I’ll take your hand and lead you along,

  So I can treat you to another song.

  The melody was very sweet, full of happiness tinged with melancholy. When she finished singing it, Cuicui felt a little despondent. She recalled the prairie fires and drumbeats at the end of autumn when it was time for rewarding the gods and redeeming promises to them.

  The drumbeats from afar had already begun to sound. She knew that this must mark the dragon boats, painted with their vermilion stripes, going into the river. It was still drizzling endlessly and a layer of mist hung over the creek.

  CHAPTER NINE

  When Grandpa got home, it was almost time for breakfast. Arms and shoulder poles laden with packages, he called out for Cuicui from the top of the hill for her to pull the boat across the stream to meet him. Having seen so many people getting to go to town, Cuicui there in the boat was beside herself with impatience, but the sound of her grandpa picked up her spirits. She hollered back, shrilly, “Grandfather, Grandfather, I’m coming!” When the old ferryman had got into the boat and set down his load in the prow, he helped tug the boat as he smiled at Cuicui, himself as meek and bashful as a child. “Cuicui, I’ll bet you thought I was never coming, didn’t you?” She was going to complain to her grandpa, but instead she answered, “Grandfather, I knew you were on River Street, plying people with wine, having a wonderful time.” Cuicui knew how much her grandpa loved to hang around on River Street, but to go on about it would have made her grandpa sputter embarrassed denials, so she kept it back.