“What now?” asked Pei Qing. “Do we really have to head back and get the rafts?” Of course, we all knew this was out of the question. The deputy squad leader scanned the water with his flashlight. The bottom was clearly visible. “We can wade across,” he said.
He made to leap in, but Wang Sichuan held him back. “Wait a moment!” he said.
He swept the beam of his flashlight back and forth across a secluded corner of the river. There, deposited at the water’s deepest point, were a number of iron cages, their interiors hidden in dark shadow.
CHAPTER 15
The Water Dungeon
We had reached a water dungeon. We’d all seen them before in the structures the Japanese built all across Manchuria. The cages were designed so the water would just cover the bars across the top. The prisoner was thus forced to hoist himself up and stick his nose through the gaps if he wanted to stay alive. In the freezing water of the underground river, prisoners would have had to maintain this posture for several days. If they gave up, they drowned.
Iron cages had been sunk all along the length of the river, creating a dense mass beneath the surface, but unless one looked closely, they were undetectable. Bringing the beams of our flashlights together, we could see dim shapes floating within many of the cages. A shiver ran down my spine. Wang Sichuan told us he’d sometimes heard the older generation talk about these things. They said that when the Japanese sealed you inside, there was more than freezing water and exhaustion in store for you. He was sure that leeches and other things also lurked within the river. We couldn’t just jump right in.
Hearing this, our hearts dropped. The deputy squad leader protested that it was too cold for leeches, but Wang Sichuan replied that temperature had nothing to do with it. The Mongolian grasslands were filled with mountain leeches, he said. They would stick to the underside of fallen leaves and come out as soon as it rained. We were well aware of the dangers posed by these creatures. They weren’t fatal, but they nonetheless elicited feelings of intense disgust and their bites could sometimes lead to malarial infections. They were one of the principal dangers of prospecting. We pulled our pants and shoelaces tight. Leeches are extremely small before they fill with blood. Even the tiniest crevice is enough of an opening. We lined any tears in our pant legs with gauze. Once our preparations were complete, we inspected each other to make sure we hadn’t missed anything. We then entered the water one by one. Lifting his belongings overhead, the deputy squad leader led the way. The rest of us followed behind him, our hands in the air like those of surrendered soldiers.
The rocks beneath our feet were bumpy and uneven. As we continued, the frigid water soon rose to the middle of our chests, soaking through our clothes, stealing our body heat, and causing our teeth to chatter uncontrollably. Wang Sichuan was freezing at the back of the line and pressed us to hurry up, but no matter how much we wanted to quicken our pace, we could go no faster. The combination of the freezing cold and the deep water greatly hindered our progress. It was all we could do to keep moving forward, each step requiring an ever-greater effort.
Two of the engineering corpsmen proved more resistant to the cold. They waded on up ahead, sweeping the beams of their flashlights back and forth across the surface of the water. It wasn’t long before we found ourselves amid the iron cages. They were much closer here and their details far clearer. As the corpsmen shined their lights upon the rusted underwater bars, our hearts froze. Hair hung from them in wispy clumps and the outline of twisted limbs slowly rocked beneath the surface.
“Terrible,” Wang Sichuan said through chattering teeth. “To drown in a place like this… Even in death these men will not find peace.”
“Indeed,” added Pei Qing, “and how unexpected, to come across a water dungeon this far below the surface. This was one of the tricks the Japanese used to threaten Chinese laborers. The Japanese must have stayed in these caverns for some time. I bet we’ll find some long-term fortifications up ahead.”
None of us spoke. At last, Wang Sichuan mumbled, “In any case, anything the Japs liked can’t be good.”
We continued on in silence. All that could be heard was the swishing of water and the men in front and behind gasping for breath. This section of river wasn’t long. Soon enough we’d reached the middle. I was already so cold I couldn’t feel my feet. My mind swam through a vague tumult of sensations, the swaying flashlight beams appearing like flowers of light blooming in the darkness. I relied purely on reflex to keep going. Whether or not leeches lurked beneath the surface—I had no strength left to care.
Then the sound of swishing water changed. Someone seemed to have stopped. I squinted ahead into the darkness. It was the deputy squad leader. Shining his flashlight at the water just in front of him, he was leaning forward, searching intensely for something. We asked him what was wrong. When he raised his head, we saw his face was pale. “Something down there just grabbed hold of my foot,” he said.
“Don’t talk nonsense!” cried Wang Sichuan, but I could see the color drain from his face. To say that kind of thing in a place like this was no laughing matter. A moment before we had been merely trudging along, our minds empty from the cold. Now everyone’s energy immediately returned.
“I’m not joking,” said the deputy squad leader. “There’s definitely something in the water.” The deputy squad leader was a serious man not given to making friends. No way would he have waited until this moment to finally tell a joke. We all began scanning the water with our flashlights.
“Could it be a cave fish?” asked Pei Qing. “This same water flows all the way from the top of the cave. There would have to be at least some living in a river of this length.”
“You find one and I’ll believe you,” said Wang Sichuan. Then, in the bright spot lit by our flashlight beams, we saw something very long sweep past, moving fast as lightning.
Everyone gasped. Wang Sichuan was the first to react. Panicking, he turned, splashed over to one of the cages, and climbed on top. The rest of us rushed to copy his example. In a chaos of waving arms and sloshing water, we clambered atop the other cages. Only the deputy squad leader thought to hoist his rifle. The click of a gun being loaded resounded throughout the cave.
We were all soaked to the bone, cumbersome and clumsy under the weight of our dripping clothes. Pei Qing, the smallest in our group, was unable to steady himself. He slumped down heavily onto the cage, his face even paler than usual, and sat staring numbly at the water. Several people began scanning the river with their flashlights, but nothing could be seen. Small waves and concentric ripples covered its surface, the results of our frantic rush to reach the cages a moment ago. What if the shadowy image had been nothing more than an illusion conjured by our nervous minds? No one was brave enough to jump back in and find out.
For a moment we were unsure how to proceed. Then Wang Sichuan spoke up. “Switch off the goddamn flashlights,” he said. “Let’s get to the far bank. Then you can look all you want.” He stood and began sprinting across the cages toward the shore. We watched him run for a moment. Then some nameless terror overtook us. Unable to think for another second, the rest of us took off after him. The cages were packed tight together, the tops of them relatively flat and only a finger’s length away from the water’s surface. I had just been wondering how the Japanese had managed to stick their prisoners inside. Now I could see they’d simply walked atop the cage tops. If only we had realized this earlier, I thought, there would have been no need to wade through the water. The old saying was true: only when the situation becomes critical does a solution ever appear.