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The three visiting police officers really knew their business: the skirt-clad young woman filled every page of her thirty-by-forty-centimeter notebook. One day, she and the others spoke to the person who actually shot Mr. Wu You, a lad named Kangkang. On the eve of the dragon-boat festival, after the magistrate informed him he would be Mr. Wu You's executioner, he decided to make some repairs on his double-barreled shotgun, a family heirloom that hung on the wall of his mother's room. A one-time paralytic whom Mr. Wu You had cured, she had just got out of bed when her son came in to take down the shotgun, which had gathered dust for thirty years or more. "Going after wild boar?" she asked. He walked out without a backward glance.
Kangkang painstakingly wiped down the shotgun three times before taking it to the blacksmith to straighten out the barrel, which was thirty degrees off center. Then he loaded it, went down to the river, took aim at a billy goat, and fired, creating a dark hole the size of a man's thigh in the animal's belly. He smiled contentedly.
The next morning after Old K and I sneaked out to watch Mr. Wu You's execution, we encountered a woman with bound feet, moving as fast as those tiny feet would allow, sort of like bouncing along on stilts. A month or so after Mr. Wu You's execution, we learned the facts of the murder from her lips: her husband had suffered a terrible headache that night, so she took some spirit money into the woods to burn at the family grave site. There she saw the headman force Apricot, who had been walking home alone, to the ground. She was no more than twenty paces from them at the time. The night was absolutely still, she said, and the subtle fragrance of reeds along the riverbank drifted over on gentle winds. It was an intoxicating setting, with a milky miasma that hung over the woods and a lovely halo girding the moon. She declared that the sight of the headman ripping off Apricot's clothes and white underpants had moved her to tears.
For more than a month following Apricot's death, she was in the grips of dementia, her eyes vacant and clouded, until she knew she must do something to keep from going stark raving mad. So on the morning the young wife ran shouting from one end of the village to the other, the bound-foot woman, knowing she could keep the truth bottled up inside her no longer, decided to reveal what had happened that night. She ran like a woman possessed to the execution ground.
The onlookers grew impatient as a light rain fell. Kangkang took aim at Mr. Wu You on a signal from the magistrate, who held a red three-cornered flag in his raised hand. He dropped his arm, and Kangkang pulled the trigger. Blam! The shotgun misfired, blackening the front of Kangkang's white shirt. He spat angrily and reloaded. There was fear in Mr. Wu You's eyes. He strained to open his mouth, but his tongue had been cut out a month earlier. He was gesturing frantically when Kangkang's double-barreled shotgun roared one last time.
By the time the woman with bound feet hobbled up to the execution ground, mud-spattered from head to toe, Mr. Wu You was already in the ground. A few bloodstains and some bristly hairs were all that remained. A fine rain was still falling as way off in the distance a wedding party of men decked out in reds and greens was on its way to fetch a bride, their horns blaring, their drums banging. They disappeared from view on the opposite bank of the river.
Translated By Howard Goldblatt
Chen Cun – Footsteps on the Roof
1
As you all know, I live in the Huangpu East district of Shanghai. There is nothing wrong with the place, except that it is a bit of a pain to get anywhere from here. A tu
For a while, I enjoyed passing through the tu
2
From my window above, I can see the tu
I live on the sixth floor, the top floor.
On my floor, there are four apartments, two on either side of the stairway. Once inside the cast-iron gate, you pass number 602 to reach my apartment, 601. There is rarely anybody living in number 602. It is a rather large two-room apartment, furnished only with a bed, a table, a couple of chairs, and some cooking utensils. The owner, who also has a nice apartment in the Huangpu West district, often lends this one to people passing through Shanghai, such as honeymooners.
Owing to the might of the cast-iron gate, I hardly ever run into 603 or 604. What we see of one another is the laundry we hang out to dry.
I rarely go out. Except to get a newspaper or to take out the garbage, I don't even go downstairs much. I live alone, a very quiet life. Sometimes the doorbell rings, and the door opens to old friends. Then I am happy. Sometimes the telephone rings; I am also happy then.
I have two rooms. There are some books in the study, and a full-length mirror in the bedroom. I rarely stand in front of the mirror, except when I shave. Beyond the bedroom is the balcony. Late at night, there is always a strong wind that makes spooky noises.
That's why I keep a knife by my pillow. When I wake up in the middle of the night and see the knife, my heart calms down, and I can go back to sleep.