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"Hell, I'll go inside and take a look," Wheatie Liu a
Like everyone else, Broad Bean watched Wheatie Liu enter Talented Wu's house; but instead of just standing there, he felt compelled to go inside and take a look for himself. Picking up a nearby bottle, he dabbed some wine on his upper lip, then stormed into Talented Wu's yard. He had a fit of sneezing, which made him feel, if anything, worse.
Talented Wu's room was too dark for the men to see anything. So Broad Bean closed his eyes to accustom them to the dim light; when he opened them, he was in for a shock. Wheatie Liu, who had lit the lamp, was looking down into the face of the murderer Talented Wu and stabbing him over and over with a pointed stick- always where the eyes had been.
"Scooping out maggots," Wheatie Liu said as he looked up at Broad Bean. "Those damned things go straight for the eyes," he added without a pause in his violent stabbing.
Broad Bean heard a snapping sound, not particularly loud but loud enough to scare the hell out of him. Wheatie Liu was holding half a stick in his hand; the other half was buried in one of Talented Wu's eye sockets!
The True and Final Ending
Truth be told, I really don't have anything to add to the above; force me, and I'll say the obvious, that presently they went ahead and buried Talented Wu. Closely related to this event was a trip to the county seat by Wheatie Liu and his daughter, where she was fitted for a glass eye. Not much to that either, but since the thing had to be taken out and washed on a regular basis, the following was bound to happen: one night, Maple Leaf removed the eye and placed it in a drinking glass before going to bed, and Wheatie Liu came home from drinking with some friends from the district office; feeling particularly thirsty, he picked up his daughter's glass and gulped down every last drop. You can guess the rest.
Sometime later, Wheatie Liu's stomach started acting up, and he couldn't move his bowels no matter what. He went to see the district doctors, who put him through a rigorous examination of his digestive tract. When New China Fan, a renowned internist, looked through his anoscope, he nearly keeled over. After regaining his composure, he turned to the others and said something so fu
And that, dear reader, is the end of my tale, except to say that Maple Leaf got another glass eye, and Wheatie Liu regretted not gouging out one of Talented Wu's eyes when he was alive, and so on and so forth…
Translated By Howard Goldblatt
About the Authors
AI BEI ("Green Earth Mother"), born in Shanghai in 1957, has been a doctor and an army writer. She now resides in the United States.
BI FEIYU ("The Ancestor") was born in Jiangsu province in 1964. He graduated from college in 1987 and is currently a reporter for the Nanjing Daily.
CAN XUE ("The Summons") was born in Hunan province in 1953; there she finished primary school only. She has been a "barefoot doctor," a laborer, and a tailor; she is now a professional writer.
CAO NAIQIAN ("When I Think of You Late at Night, There's Nothing I Can Do") was born in 1949 in Shanxi province. He was once a miner and now works in the Public Security Bureau of Datong City. He started writing fiction in 1986.
CHEN CUN ("Footsteps on the Roof") was born in Shanghai in 1954. Having worked as a peasant, a laborer, and a teacher, he is now a professional writer.
CHEN RAN ("Sunshine Between the Lips") was born in 1962 in Beijing and studied music in her childhood. She turned to literature when she was eighteen and published her first works when she was twenty. She is now an editor for the Writers Publishing House.
CHI LI ("Willow Waist"), born in Hubei province in 1957, was sent to the countryside in her teens. Afterward she worked as a primary school teacher, a doctor, and an editor. She is now a professional writer.
DUO DUO ("The Day I Got to Xi'an "), born in 1951, is known for both his stories and his poetry. He was a journalist before leaving China for the West, where he now resides.
GE FEI ("Remembering Mr. Wu You"), born in 1964 in Jiangsu province, studied Chinese literature at East China Normal University in Shanghai and taught there after graduation. The story included here, his first work, was published in 1986.
HONG YING ("The Field") was born in 1962 in Chongqing. She began writing poetry in 1981 and fiction in 1988. She now lives in London.
KONG JIESHENG ("The Sleeping Lion"), born in Guangzhou in 1952, worked in a steel mill for two years before being sent to the countryside during the Cultural Revolution. He was one of the earliest writers to emerge in the post-Mao period.
LI RUI ("Sham Marriage") was born in 1950 in Beijing. Sent to a village in Shanxi province, where he spent several years, he later worked in a steel mill and began publishing fiction in the 1970s. He has been an editor for Shanxi Literature since 1977.
LI XIAO ("Grass on the Rooftop"), the son of Ba Jin, the celebrated novelist of the 1930s, was born in 1950 and now works in a government office in Shanghai.
MO YAN ("The Cure"), born in 1956 in Shangdong province into a peasant family, joined the army in 1976 and later taught in a cultural unit of the People's Liberation Army in Beijing. In 1981 he started his career as a writer; he is the author of Red Sorghum.
SHI TIESHENG ("First Person") was born in Beijing in 1951. Crippled during the Cultural Revolution, he began publishing in 1979, frequently writing about the lives of handicapped people in China.
SU TONG ("The Brothers Shu"), a native of Jiangsu province, was born in 1963. He studied Chinese literature at Beijing Normal University and was an editor for Zhongshan, a literary magazine. The author of Raise the Red Lantern, he is currently a professional writer.
WANG MENG ("A String of Choices"), was born in Beijing in 1934. A member of the Communist Party, he served as Minister of Culture but was dismissed after the June Fourth Movement in 1989. He began writing in his twenties.
WANG XIANGFU ("Fritter Hollow Chronicles") was born in 1958 in Shanxi province. After graduating from college, he worked as a photographer for six years and a teacher for nearly ten.
YANG ZHENGGUANG ("Moonlight over the Field of Ghosts"), a native of Shanxi province, was born in 1957. Besides fiction, he also writes film scripts.
YU HUA ("The Past and the Punishments"), born in Hangzhou in 1960, works in a cultural center in Haiyan county, Zhejiang province. He started publishing fiction in 1983.