One Man Read online

  Without waiting for the officer to finish talking, he started a barrage of pratde, explaining in a single breath his resolve and his need to undertake labor and reform. He added, "Officer Zhang, I want to report that my girlfriend was allocated work in the country after graduating from university. When the cadre school is fully established, I can get my girlfriend to come, then I will be able to carry out a lifetime of revolution in the countryside!"

  He had made it clear that he was not hiding anything and that he had given thought to practical matters. Officer Zhang rolled his eyes. His fate had been decided.

  "All right!" Officer Zhang took his application.

  He heaved a sigh of relief.

  Only one person said, "You shouldn't go!"

  It was Big Li, and he knew that he was reproaching him. Comrade Wang Qi, whom he had protected, also came to see him off, her eyes were red and she looked away. Big Li had turned up to say good-bye and shook hands with him. His puffy eyes made him look even more sincere, yet somehow the two of them had found it hard to become friends. He detected Big Li's loneliness. Among the disbanded rebel faction, there had been fighting companions, but no real friends. And now he was abandoning all of them.

  Before going downstairs to assemble, he went to the room of his former superior Old Liu and shook hands with him. Old Liu tightly clasped his hand, as if he was clutching a piece of straw to save himself, but this piece of straw wanted to escape sinking. They each held the other's hand for a while without saying anything, but both knew that clinging together meant sinking together, and Old Liu was the first to let go. He had finally succeeded in escaping from this beehive of insanity, this building that manufactured death.

  At Qianmenwai, the railway station was as usual crowded with milling people, and on the platform and in die carriages, only the heads of those leaving and those seeing them off could be seen moving around. University students had already been sent to the country and border areas earlier on. This time, those being sent to the country to work were mostly middle-school students, who were being sent to settle permanently, as well as workplace staff and cadres. Boys and girls on board the train crammed around the windows, and their parents stood outside the windows, giving numerous instructions. On the platform, there was a loud burst of gongs and drums as a worker propaganda team, leading a band of children who were too young to be sent, transformed the farewell scene into a festive occasion.

  The stationmaster in a blue uniform blew his whistle a few times, and people retreated behind the white line, but, for a long time, the train showed no sign of moving. Suddenly, there was a commotion, as armed military police ran up and formed a single row. Then came a long contingent of prisoners, heads shaved, each humping a bedroll on their backs and holding an enamel bowl. They were marching in time, softly chanting in a clear rhythm the slogan: "Strive hard to remake yourself, to resist means death!"

  It was a soft chant with the solemnity of a hymn, repeated over and over, and the children stopped beating on their gongs and drums. The line of prisoners crossed the platform diagonally, and, to the sound of the repeated slogan, entered several stifling windowless carriages that had been added to the tail end of the train. Ten minutes later, there was an eerie quiet as the train slowly moved off. At that point, a few irrepressible sobs came from the platform, and, instantly, the inside and outside of the train filled with the sound of weeping children and adults. Of course, some people waved and put on smiles, but the artificially happy atmosphere had completely vanished.

  Outside the train window, cement telephone poles, red brick houses, gray concrete buildings, chimneys, and bare branches on trees rapidly receded. However, this was what he wanted: he had finally fled that city of terror. The winds would be colder and harsher, but at least he would be able to breathe freely for a while without having to be on guard all the time. He was young and strong, without a wife or children, without responsibilities, and had only to work the soil. While he was at university, he had worked in the villages. Farmwork was exhausting, but the mental stress would not be as great. He wanted to hum a song, but what old song was there to sing? All right, then he wouldn't sing anything.

  39

  That soul mate of yours, Louis Armstrong, you think of as a brother. He has been dead a long time, but those old black-and-white movies raining with white lines, that old black soul mate's singing, still have you rolling on the floor.

  Gossamer floating in the wind…

  You must live happily and fully. Oh, Margarethe! You're thinking of her again, it was she who got you to write this damn book that has made you so wretched and miserable. That slut has caused you excruciating pain, and you want to fuck her really hard, so that you will make her hurt like she wants to, that masochist. But even if you were to hurt her much more, you would still not be able to cry.

  And you really want to cry, to roll on the floor like a spoiled brat and to cry as hard as you can. But there are no tears, no tears, none at all. Hey, man, you're just getting old!

  So what if you're a worm or a dragon! You're more like a homeless dog without an owner, so you don't have to please anyone and don't have to try to get anyone to like you. You, you're a mole that bores holes in the ground. You like the dark, you can't see a thing in the dark, you can't see the hunting rifles. You no longer have goals and what use are goals anyway?

  Now that you have a new life, you want to use it as you want to, and you want what's left of your life to be lived more meaningfully. Most important of all, living has to bring happiness, and you must derive happiness from living for yourself. What others think is of no relevance whatsoever.

  To be self-activated and to exist for yourself is a freedom that is not external to you. It is within you, and it depends on whether you are aware of it and consciously exercise it.

  Freedom is a look in the eyes, a tone of voice, and it can be actualized by you, so you are not destitute. Affirming this freedom is like affirming the existence of a thing, like a tree, a plant, or a dewdrop, and for you to exercise this freedom in life is just as authentic and irrefutable.

  Freedom is ephemeral; the instant of that look in your eyes and that tone of your voice springs from a psychological state, and it is that flash of freedom that you want to capture. To express this in language is to affirm freedom, even if what you write can't last forever. In the process of writing, freedom is visible and audible, and, at the instant of writing, reading, and listening, freedom exists in your mode of expression. To be able to obtain that small luxury of freedom of expression and expressive freedom is what it takes to make you happy.

  Freedom is not conferred, nor can it be bought, it is your own awareness of life. Such is the beauty of life, and, surely, you savor this freedom just as you savor the ecstasy of sexual love with a wonderful woman.

  This freedom can tolerate neither God nor a dictator. To be either of these is not your goal, nor would such a goal be attainable, so rather than wasting the effort you may as well simply want this bit of freedom.

  Instead of saying Buddha is in your heart, it would be better to say that freedom is in your heart. Freedom castigates others. To take into account the approval or appreciation of others, and, worse still, to pander to the masses, is to live according to the dictates of others. Thus it is they who are happy, but not you yourself, and that would be the end of this freedom of yours.

  Freedom takes no account of others and has no need for acceptance by others. It can only be won by transcending restrictions that are imposed on you by others. Freedom of expression is also like this.

  Freedom can be manifested in suffering and grief, as long as one does not allow oneself to be crushed by it. Even while immersed in suffering and grief, one can still observe, so there can also be freedom in suffering and grief. You need the freedom to suffer and the freedom to grieve, so that life will be worth living. It is this freedom that brings you happiness and peace.

  40

  "Don't think peace will reign once old counterrevolutionarie
s have been purged. Rub your eyes hard and be vigilant, those practicing counterrevolutionaries are dangerous enemies! They are carefully hidden and crafty, they have accepted our proletarian revolutionary slogans but are secretly instigating capitalist factionalism and blurring our class demarcations. We cannot allow ourselves to be hoodwinked by them, think hard about the people who were sneaking around during the movement. Those two-faced counterrevolutionaries that hold up the red flag while opposing the red flag are sleeping right next to you!"

  The deputy chairman of the Army Control Commission, Officer Pang, was political commissar in the army and had come especially from Beijing to visit the farm. Wearing glasses with thick black frames, he stood on the stone mill in the drying square and waved a document in his hand as he made his rallying call: "The May Seventh Cadre School is not a haven from the class war!"

  A purge of the practicing counterrevolutionary group designated "May Sixteenth" was under way, and leaders and activists of rebel factions from the beginning of the movement were all marked for investigation. He was instantly relieved of his position as squad leader, and told to stop work to write a full report on those years, detailing the dates and places when and where which people had what secret meetings and had engaged in what shady activities.

  At the time, he didn't know that, in Beijing, Big Li had been interrogated for days and nights on end, and that, after being beaten and kicked, confessed to being a May Sixteenth element. Of course, Big Li also named him. Big Li further confessed that the meeting in Wang Qi's home was part of a secret counterrevolutionary plot, which allowed them to collude with members of the counterrevolutionary gang and receive instructions for the ultimate goal of overthrowing the dictatorship of the proletariat. Big Li ended up in a mental institution. Wang Qi had also been interrogated. Old Liu had been beaten to death during an interrogation in the underground room of the workplace building, then taken upstairs and thrown out of a window. It was construed that he had committed suicide to avoid punishment.

  Luckily, he got wind of the hunting dogs closing in on the horizon. By this time, he already knew how the political hunt operated. Based on the Number One War Preparation Mobilization Command authorized by Deputy Commander-in-Chief Lin Biao, large numbers of personnel and their families had been sent to the countryside, and this was the sign of an even more thorough purge. The peaceful mood, despite the hard physical labor people were subjected to, swiftly vanished. With the arrival of the newcomers, hostility was reignited and replaced that bit of friendly solidarity that had developed. The old company, platoon, squad units, were dismantled and reorganized, and a branch of the Party was reestablished with cadres appointed by the Army Control Commission in Beijing. He had to watch for a chance to break through their siege and escape before the hunt closed in. In the middle of the night, he sneaked into the county town to send a telegram to his middle-school classmate Rong.

  It is said that Heaven never cuts off the road for people. In his case, it was more like Heaven took pity and gave him a road out. In the afternoon, while everyone was working in the fields, he was in the empty dormitory, writing his confession. Someone was outside, so he put on an act and wrote down a few of Mao's sayings. The postal worker from the commune was on his bicycle in the square outside the door, shouting, "Telegram! Telegram!"

  He ran outside; it was from Rong. He was smart: for "sender" Rong had written only the telegraphic registration number of the farm technology promotion station of the county where he worked. The message read: "In the spirit of the Party Center document on war preparation, it is agreed that such-and-such a comrade may settle down and work in the agricultural commune of our county. He must report immediately, before the end of the month, after which he will not be accommodated."

  While everyone was still working in the fields, he rushed to the cadre-school office that was more than five kilometers away. No one was in the big room with a telephone and typewriter. The small inner room was where Officer Song worked and slept. The door was shut, and there was a rustling noise inside.

  "Reporting to Officer Song!"

  This was military practice, and he had learned well. After a while, Officer Song emerged in his army uniform, looking immaculate except for an undone hook-and-eye on his collar.

  "I count as having graduated from this cadre school, but I am waiting for you to issue me with a certificate!"

  He had thought this up on the way, and he said this in a casual manner and with a happy look on his face.

  "What do you mean, you've graduated?" Officer Song had an unfriendly look on his face.

  With a smile firmly fixed to his face, he presented the telegram in both hands. Officer Song took it with one hand. The man was barely literate and pondered over each word before finally looking up. But, no longer frowning, he said, "Quite right, it does accord with the spirit of the document. Do you have relatives there?"

  "I'll be joining relatives and friends to make a living." He quoted verbatim from the war mobilization document transmitted by Officer Song, then hastened to add, "A friend there has arranged it. I'm going to a farming village to settle down permanently! I'll receive a thorough reeducation from the poor and lower-middle-class peasants and then marry a village girl. I can't stay a bachelor all my life!"

  "Have you already found a girl?" Officer Song asked.

  He detected friendliness, or, maybe, it was sympathy or understanding. Song was a farm villager when he joined the army, and, starting off as an army bugler, he would have had to tough it out before becoming the deputy operations staff officer of a regiment. His wife and children still lived in the village, and he only had two weeks of annual leave to visit his family, so, of course, he missed having a woman. The Army Control Commission had assigned him the hard task of supervising die work of this very large group of people. It was, indeed, a case of Heaven's will in the dark unknown that the deputy chairman of the Army Control Commission, Officer Pang, who was in charge of the purge, had finalized arrangements with the company Party branch secretaries and had hurried back to Beijing two days earlier.

  "A friend has set up a girl for me, and, if I don't show up, the whole thing will fizzle out. People are doing hard labor everywhere, so, if I get myself a wife, I'll just set up a home!"

  He had to say something that would appeal to Officer Song's village background.

  "Quite right. But think about it properly, because, once you go, your Beijing resident permit will be revoked!"

  Officer Song had stopped talking as a bureaucrat. He took a book of forms from his drawer, told him to fill it out, then shouted toward the inside room, "Little Liu, he needs a letter with an official stamp!

  Hurry up and type the letter!"

  The young telephone operator and typist emerged gracefully. The rubber bands tight against the back of her head made her freshly combed hair stand out in two bunches. She unlocked a drawer and took out the stamp, then, sitting on the stool in front of the type-writer, began striking one character at a time on the heavy keyboard. As Officer Song checked the letter, he hastened to ingratiate himself, "I'm the first person to graduate under Officer Song!"

  "This damn place is all alkaline soil, and nothing will grow except wind and sand. It's not like my old home, where whatever you plant grows, so, it's not, in fact, a matter of it being hard labor everywhere!"

  Officer Song eventually put a red stamp on the official letter. Many years later, he met a person who had worked with him in the cadre school and learned that, not long after he fled the place, this kindly Officer Song was caught without his trousers. They happened to shine a torch into the wheat field, and there he was, doing it with the telephone operator. They sent him back to the army. It was Officer Song's fate that his career in the army would be stunted, just like the wheat growing in that poor soil.

  On the way back, he heard in the distance the chugging of a tractor plowing the soil and shouted out, "Hey, Tang!"

  Tang, who used to ride a motorbike as a traffic officer in Beijing, h
ad lost his job and now worked on the farm in the machinery squad, riding a tractor. He ran across the soft, loose soil and caught up with the tractor.

  "Hey!" Tang raised an arm to greet him.

  "I need your help." He was running alongside the tractor.

  "In these turbulent times, when the clay Buddha statue is crossing the river, it's hard even for Buddha to protect himself. What is it? Be quick and don't let anyone see me talking to you, I've heard you're being investigated in your company."

  "It's all right now! I've graduated!"

  Tang stopped the motor. He climbed up onto the driver's platform and flashed his official letter with a red stamp in front of Tang.

  "Right, let's have a smoke!"

  "It's all thanks to the kindness of Officer Song," he said.

  "You've managed to escape from the sea of suffering, so hurry up and get away."

  "Can you help get my luggage to the county railway station at five o'clock tomorrow morning?"

  "I'll get a truck. After all, you do have Officer Song's permission."

  "Don't mention it to anyone, who knows what dangers are still lurking."

  "I'll definitely be there with a truck. If there are any questions, I'll tell them to see Officer Song!"

  "Remember, tomorrow morning, at five o'clock sharp!" He jumped down from the driver's platform.

  "I'll sound the horn on the road near your dormitory, and you can get on board. Leave it to me, I won't let you down!" Tang said, beating his chest.

  The tractor chug-chug-chugged into the distance. He took his time walking the remaining two or so kilometers as he worked out how to deal with this last night, and how to move his luggage and those heavy boxes of books with utmost speed from the dormitory onto the truck at dawn. He waited until dark, dawdled through the dinner period, and only showed up in the dormitory when people had started crowding around the well to draw water for a wash. He also had a wash, and, at the same time, collected all of his things. Before the lights went out and people had to be in bed, he called on the company Party secretary to present his documents for settling permanently in a farming village. The secretary, who had been newly appointed by the Army Control Commission, was sitting on a bench with his shoes off, washing his feet. Once again with an air of jest, he reverently announced to the room full of people, "Officer Song has approved my graduation, so I have come to bid farewell to all you comrades. This does not mean we will not meet again, but just that I am one step ahead. I'm going to be a real peasant, so that I can thoroughly reform myself!"