“I only remember that grass lawn. It was a home for the elderly,” Lisa said, unbending. “The other things were like floating clouds, they weren’t important. The selectivity of my memory is very strong.”
“So you also think the casinos are empty?”
“Yes. Although they are full of people, in reality they are empty.”
Vincent and Lisa’s talk led to nothing. In fact, this situation was predictable. Vincent’s company was expanding as before. His luck was so good it was hard to believe. He brought in several aides to develop two subsidiary companies. He asked Lisa whether he should retire. Lisa said people like him couldn’t retire, so he should work up to the end. He thought about what she said and felt it to be correct. She was always right, as if she were his road sign. When she said, “Although they are full of people, in reality they are empty,” Vincent felt as though he wanted to cry.
Recently, Lisa had undergone a transformation. She drifted around in dirty clothes, as if she had lost her awareness of the people surrounding her. But at night she didn’t go outside any more. She slept heavily. One night at midnight, Vincent came home from a bar out on the street and walked into the bedroom. In the dark he felt the air in the room buzzing, weng weng, hurried and nervous, like an air-raid siren. He sat on the bed, collected himself, and clasped one of Lisa’s hands as she slept. The situation didn’t change. He said to himself, “Lisa, Lisa, you are capable of so much.” In the dark Lisa suddenly spoke to him distinctly, “Vincent, after this don’t cross over that little bridge. You have fallen from the bridge into the stream. The river water is shallow, shallow. Your head rests on a rock sticking out of the water, only your clothes are wet.” Vincent turned on the light and discovered that Lisa was still dreaming. She no longer needed to move her body to seek those remote stories. Now she lived inside them, day and night. But he, as before, rose during the night and searched wildly until he wore himself out. Woman, woman, what kind of miracle was she? Had her birth in the gambling city determined everything about her? Sometimes Vincent saw the relationship between them as a race between competitors. This way of thinking even influenced his heart. Recently a stifling sensation grew more evident. But he already understood that no matter how hard he ran, he couldn’t catch up to his wife asleep at home. He was no more than a shadow in the light of a streetlamp; she was a rock within history. Yet she was reluctant to part from him! What for? She didn’t ask about the Rose Clothing Company’s affairs, but Vincent had always felt that the business’s prosperity bore a direct relation to her undertaking in the earth’s deep core. Vincent wanted to comprehend how her desire was brought into being at that core, but his effort was futile.
“Vincent, are you still excavating that gully? There are more and more little fish, little shrimp.”
Once she woke Lisa said this to Vincent, her face filled with the fatigue of her nighttime life. He could see that her rest was painful. He understood that the most active part of her life was now separated from him.
“This unforeseen gain from the stream gives me temporary satisfaction. Darling, I love you.”
“I love you, too, Vincent. But I can’t search on the earth’s surface with you. There are problems emerging in my life. Now I’m on a drilling crew. Don’t you think so?” Her expression was contented. “Have you heard the story of Maria’s long march? She is also on a long march. How strange!”
Vincent had nothing to say. The noise of the air-raid siren disappeared from the bedroom, but his heart still leapt with a peng peng throbbing sound. He’d heard Joe’s insinuating tone when he spoke of Maria’s long march. In his memory it was a kind of sweet punishment since Joe, always stiff in conversation, grew red-faced and excited when he talked about it. Similarly, Vincent could not figure out what Maria’s activity was. But his wife could communicate with Maria, without their actually meeting. Everything was changing. Even this morning, he could no longer enjoy that strange territory with Lisa through the intercourse of their bodies.
The whistle of the train entering the station woke Vincent. He walked out onto the platform with no plan in mind. He left the station alone and discovered himself in a small rural town. The town had only one road, thinly dotted on both sides with shops and the residents’ houses. As it was early in the morning, not a single person was out on the street. He thought, This is what the gambling city is like. Where were the casinos? He turned his gaze toward the distant stone mountains beyond the small town and saw low-hanging clouds covering their summits. He stood for a good while until a black woman, a street cleaner, appeared. The woman looked just like the street cleaner in his own city. She waved her broom, sweeping little by little over in his direction. The closer she came, the more Vincent felt that she was just like the beautiful street cleaner he’d seen so often before. He simply stared. Finally, she swept up right to his feet.
When her broom touched Vincent’s leather shoes, he almost jumped.
“Welcome to the gambling city, Grandfather.” The young woman smiled charmingly, showing her appealing teeth.
“Do you recognize me?”
“I’ve seen you on my sister’s street. I knew you would come here.”
“Why?”
“Because everyone comes to the gambling city. This road is covered with traveler’s footprints. They’ve even worn down the granite pavement. Our place here is beautiful, isn’t it? At dusk, it’s like the whole city is filled with rose blooms. . They say a white elephant will come to the city soon.”
There weren’t even many trees in the crude little town. He couldn’t see the scene she spoke of, but the young woman’s description of it enchanted him. What sort of migratory bird was she? He inquired about a hotel. She pointed out a stone building and said that was one, but she urged him not to stay there. She said that once he entered he would turn into a real gambler. After this, she suddenly became upset. Because talking delayed her work, she lowered her head to sweep the ground and didn’t acknowledge Vincent again.
Vincent walked toward the stone building. First he rang the old-fashioned doorbell. It rang for a long time without anyone answering. Then he experimentally pushed the door, without thinking it would actually open. Inside was an empty parlor with a few sofas. Vincent went over and sat down on a sofa, waiting for someone to come. He waited a long time, yet no one came. Was it really a hotel?
Later someone finally came, but it turned out to be the same street cleaner. She had probably swept the entire road.
“Is this your home?” Vincent asked her, perplexed.
“No, this is my hotel, Grandfather. I’ll take you to your room.”
She led him to the rooms below ground. Vincent was a little unhappy, but she said, “In the gambling city, we have to have rooms underground, because of the daily earthquakes.”
They followed the staircase down turn after turn in a spiral. The room he was going to appeared to be buried deep underground.
She turned her head and spoke vivaciously: “There will never be earthquakes down here. This has been proven. I am named Joyner, too. I am my mother’s obedient daughter, and so is my older sister. I never thought you could love this place. All the people who come here come out of love. How else could it be? Or else why would they come?”