In relative terms, Wang Yuyang felt more pressure than the others, and not just from the school administration; it came largely from other students, even from herself. Not knowing what she’d done or what others might be thinking she’d done and not being particularly articulate to begin with, she decided not to say anything. But that made it difficult to hold her head up in public. She could be numb to the pressure, but she couldn’t work the same magic on her fellow students, whose eyes were deeply penetrating. More significantly, their imagination was equally penetrating. A rumor was already spreading that Wang Yuyang and Director Qian had entered a stage of stalemate as they waged psychological warfare, waiting to see who would blink first; either the east wind would have the upper hand or the west wind would prevail.[12] The other girls all knew that this was the calm before the storm; it was just a matter of when.
The storm struck without the usual warning signs. Tranquillity had reigned, though only among the school administrators; the turmoil among the students had never ceased. As the saying goes: “The trees want to stop moving, but the wind keeps blowing.” At nine o’clock Saturday morning Beijing time, Director Qian, followed by Teacher Huang and the homeroom teacher, walked into Section Three’s classroom; all the girls were present. Director Qian was all smiles, uncharacteristically relaxed, as if he’d shed a heavy load. Teacher Huang, on the other hand, seemed depressed. Her usual amity was gone, and she seemed to be under substantial strain. One look at Director Qian and the students knew that the case had been solved and that the affair had come to an end. But their anxiety was palpable as they waited to hear a name; the atmosphere was oppressive. Yuyang swallowed, so did the other students. There was plenty of reason for them to be nervous. A chunk of steel was about to drop from the sky, and before it fell, who could predict whose head it would strike?
The students were touched the moment Teacher Huang opened her mouth to speak. Her voice was low, a bit raspy, but they could tell she was trying hard to turn her grief into strength. She began by talking about her son and daughter, the former a student at Beijing University and the latter a student at Nanjing University. Saying she was proud of her children, she spoke in a soft voice, her gentle expression brimming with motherly love and concern, which, for no apparent reason, elicited sorrow from everyone in the room. The students were in a fog, confused over why she was talking about her family at this critical moment. Nonetheless, from her speech they could tell how much she cared. A meeting had been held the night before, and it had been decided to expel the “recalcitrant, unrepentant student.” With a misty gaze coming from her reddening eyes, Teacher Huang said forcefully, “I did not agree.”
She began to reminisce, recalling the dark days when she had been treated unfairly. There had been her son’s dangerously high fever in the countryside, which, since he’d had a seizure, had required half an hour of emergency treatment; and there was the nearly fatal food poisoning her daughter had suffered at the age of four. All these sad moments in her life evoked sympathy. She began to cry as she turned to Director Qian. “Is there a child anywhere who never gets sick? Is there one who never makes a mistake?” Qian could say nothing. Like a gentle breeze and a spring shower, her words caressed and sprinkled the students’ minds, drizzle by drizzle, bit by bit, and drenched their hearts. Lowering their heads, they shed tears of remorse. Teacher Huang dried her tears and continued, “I’ve asked the school’s Party committee for one last chance, two more days. I’m convinced that the student who made the mistake will repent by admitting it; that she’ll go to the post office and mail me the money and coupons, things that do not belong to her. As a mother and a Party member, I promise you that we will handle the matter internally so long as you send everything back. Please believe me, my dear children. Don’t trust to luck in this matter. The police have taken fingerprints from Pang Fenghua’s case. They know and we know who has touched it. Once the police come to campus to make an arrest, it will be too late.” She was anxious, fervently and tearfully hoping that the guilty student would own up to what she’d done. “Please believe me, my dear children, this is your last chance. You don’t want to break your mother’s heart.”
Her plea was so ardent, her expression so intense that she actually choked on her words several times, nearly crying out loud. Those words warmed the hearts of the students, brightened their eyes, and stoked their courage. The result was immediate. A money order arrived Monday morning after the second period. But Teacher Huang was caught in a bind, a truly serious bind. The original plan, elementary and simple, had been to find the thief by matching the handwriting on the money order. Who could have predicted that there would be not one, but four money orders? No matter how you looked at it, the pilfered twenty yuan could not possibly have returned quadrupled. By comparing the handwriting with that on student essays, Director Qian and Teacher Huang found three matches: Kong Zhaodi, Wang Yuyang, and Qiu Fenying. The fourth sample could not be immediately assigned because it had been written with the left hand. Slamming the four money orders down on Qian’s desk, Teacher Huang said, “Take a good look. Can you tell who it was?”
Qian smiled and sighed. “Old Huang, you’ve had twenty years of political experience, positive and negative. When someone comes forward to take the blame, what’s the problem?”
Slapping the back of her right hand against her left palm, she said, “What I mean is, what do we do about the eighty yuan?” Qian fished out the one with unidentifiable handwriting and placed it before her. “Cash this and return the money to Pang Fenghua.”
“What about the other three?”
Qian put the three money orders in his drawer and locked it. “Leave them here for now.”
“Sixty yuan is not a small amount, and we shouldn’t let it go to waste.”
“How would we be doing that? How?” Qian asked.
Confused, Huang asked cautiously, “What exactly are we going to do with the money?”
“Look at you. What can I say? With some matters, we mustn’t be too detail-oriented. Sometimes it’s better to leave an issue hanging rather than try to resolve it. That’s all I’ll say for now. So put this aside and don’t mention it again, all right? It’s over.”
The stolen money had been returned, and everyone in the school now knew; they could breathe a sigh of relief. “I didn’t do it. It wasn’t me.”
What better result could they have hoped for?
None.
Their relief was followed by anticipation as they waited to learn the identity of the thief, but the outcome was disappointing. Four or five days passed, but no punishment announcement was put up on the bulletin board, a clear indication that the theft had indeed been dealt with internally. Yuyang was filled with gratitude and happiness for escaping what can only be described as a “near death.” And yet, gratitude and relief aside, she felt somehow wronged. Why? She had confessed to something she hadn’t done by sending in money. On the other hand, what options did she have? The police had taken fingerprints, and she could not recall whether she had ever touched Fenghua’s case. Maybe yes, maybe no. But common sense would dictate that not touching it would have been just about impossible because the girls shared a dorm room.
12
A Maoist slogan that means the East (essentially China) shall prevail over the West (mainly Europe and the U.S.).