The meeting was dull. Many people dozed off or let their minds wander. But after the report, the secretary switched to another topic, Shao Bin’s recent activities, which at once aroused the audience’s interest.
Liu told them that Bin had been engaged in new calumnious work. He opened his leatherette briefcase and took out a sheaf of paper. “Comrades,” he said, “I have ironclad evidence here. Look, this is Shao Bin’s handwriting, black on white. It’s a thirty-page accusation, all written in brush. My, my, handsome brushwork indeed. What labor! He must’ve eaten a lot of meat and eggs to have the energy for such a project. But I want to ask Comrade Young Shao a few questions here: Why don’t you put more energy into your real job as a fitter? Why are you often late for work? Why are you still unable to operate a universal lathe? Why can’t you fix the forklift truck, although you have tried many times? Why do you enjoy so much fabricating stories and spreading rumors against others?”
Liu slammed the paper on the table, then picked up the last page. He went on, “Here’s how he slandered others. He wrote to the Commune Administration, ‘I believe there is an affair between Liu Shu and Hou Nina. Please order a full inquiry.’ Shao Bin, you are a crook! Nina is just about to get married. Why did you do this to her? To make her unmarriageable? Yes, I love her, but only as a comrade, just like I love my daughter. Shao Bin, you son of a turtle, you have a dirty mind. To tell you the truth, I’ve been thinking of taking Nina as my nominal daughter. Yes, I love her. Say whatever you want, you pathetic imbecile.”
Some people chuckled, and many turned to stare at Bin. Suddenly Nina burst out wailing in the front. She jumped up, running toward the table at which Bin was sitting. Her long hair was swinging around her shoulders; a few people leaped to their feet and stopped her.
“Let me go. Let me scratch his face!” she screamed, her mouth wide open and her eyes shut.
Liu told two young women to take Nina back to her office. After they left, the hall was so quiet that people could hear Liu breathing.
“Yesterday somebody called him ‘lunatic,’ ” the secretary continued. “He went to Director Ma’s office to complain about that. I told him bluntly that I thought he was a lunatic too. Why? Comrades, look at what he did. He tried to destroy an innocent girl’s life, ruin our plant’s name, and in this letter he actually smears soot on lots of people’s faces. I asked myself again and again, How should I handle this fellow? If I treat him as a normal man, then he will be nobody but a reactionary, a criminal. In that way I may put a comrade into the camp of the enemy class. I’ve known him for six years and don’t think his heart is that black, so I believe he has a problem in his brain. Yes, very likely he has a mental disorder. That’s why yesterday I suggested he go to the hospital for a checkup.”
Some people glanced at Bin, tittering and whispering. Bin felt his face burning and knew he couldn’t convince others of what had actually happened, so he remained silent.
“Before I conclude,” Liu said again, “let me give Comrade Shao Bin a piece of advice. An ant can’t shake a tree. If a mantis tries to stop a tractor, it will only get itself crushed. Please have second thoughts before you try again.”
Liu sat down, huffing, and lifted a teacup, as director Ma got up and went to the front.
“Comrades,” Ma said, “I also think Shao Bin is a lunatic. Yesterday afternoon he came to us when we were in the middle of a meeting. I told him to come another time because we were busy at the moment. All of a sudden he yelled, ‘I screw your ancestors! I screw them pair by pair!’ ”
Some men threw their heads back, guffawing. Ma went on, “Both Hong Bao and Huang Dongfang witnessed that. Probably their ancestors were defiled by Shao Bin too.” Again a few people cackled. “Comrade Shao, please leave our ancestors alone. They are dead, cold as stone, not attractive anymore. If you’re not satisfied with us, let us talk and exchange views calmly. We are humans, rational beings, aren’t we?”
Bin wanted to jump up and yell, “I screw your mothers and daughters!” But he controlled himself and sat there motionless; he forced himself to look out the window. In the gray sky the clouds were overlapping one another and creating different shapes like mountains, billows, reefs, fields, forests. A few dried leaves were swirling in the air and gliding into and out of his sight. He kept watching the clouds until the meeting was over.
Bin wasn’t intimidated by the leaders at all. From that day on, his brush was busier than ever. Every night he kept on writing, and sometimes not until daybreak did he go to bed to sleep for two or three hours. Now that he knew Secretary Yang of the commune belonged to the same gang, he addressed the new letter of accusation to higher authorities. This time it included Yang’s crime as well. He was going to send it to the administrations of the county, the prefecture, the province, and certainly a copy to the State Council in Beijing. Though it was said that under heaven all crows are black, there had to be a place where he could let out his discontent and find justice.
Who were Liu Shu and Ma Gong? Two small cadres with glib tongues, uncouth and unlettered. They were wine vessels and rice bags, their existence only burdening the earth, whereas he had read hundreds of books and was knowledgeable about strategies.
He found himself bursting with energy and able to write late into the night without fatigue.
Four
FROST FELL AT NIGHT. In Dismount Fort children began to wear felt hats or scarves when going to school in the morning. The sound of bellows could be heard everywhere in the afternoon, when many families were boiling cabbages to make sauerkraut. A few households were pickling kimchee, and there was a scent of garlic in the air.
The Shaos were upset because they couldn’t pickle sauerkraut; there was no space in their room for a large crock. The corridor of the dormitory house would be blocked if such a thing was put there; also, the smell would be awful. What Meilan did instead was salt a tall jar of turnips. For storing fresh vegetables, Bin was digging a pit in the southern corner of the courtyard, near the street wall. When it began to freeze, he would place their cabbages and turnips into it and cover them up with sorghum stalks, straw sacks, and earth. By comparison, the families in Workers’ Park could put their sauerkraut crocks in their outer rooms and dig vegetable pits in their backyards; some families even built brick vegetable cellars, in which beer and fruit could be stored in summer.
On Sunday, at noon, having shoveled earth out of the vegetable pit, Bin opened the southern window to let in some warm air. The loudspeaker, hung on a pole on the street, stopped playing music and began emitting static. Then a crisp female voice announced that Secretary Yang was a candidate for the position of vice chairman of the County People’s Congress. This was an honor for the whole commune. Together with him, there were two other people running for the position, and the election would be held the next morning at the County Administration.
Bin was convinced that Yang was also his enemy. Obviously, Yang had passed his letter of accusation on to the plant’s leaders; this was a gross violation of the Party’s policy of protecting discontented masses. No doubt the three leaders were in the same clique and should be exposed together. In his new letter of accusation, Bin had written, “The three of them wear the same pair of trousers and breathe through one nostril.” Now, the news of Yang’s candidacy for the congress suggested to Bin a bold idea. He had to do something to prevent Yang from winning the election; the People’s Congress ought to be in the hands of an honest man who would serve the people heart and soul.