Life and Death are Wearing Me Out

openly over his death, and all who heard the news laid down their work, two individuals neither wailed nor wept silently but kept right on with what they were doing. One was Xu Bao, the other was Lan Lian.
    Xu Bao mixed stealthily among the crowd, following behind me. At first I wasn’t aware of his presence, but it didn’t take long to spot that greedy, malignant look of his, and as soon as I realized that his eyes were fixed on my substantial testicles, I felt greater shock and anger than I’d ever known before. At a time like this, all Xu Bao had on his mind was getting his hands on my testicles. Obviously, he was not saddened by Chairman Mao’s death, and if I could have found a way to inform the people what he was thinking, he might well have died at the hands of the mourners. Too bad I was still incapable of human speech, and too bad the people were so caught up in their grief they paid no attention to Xu Bao. Fine, then, I thought. I admit I was once afraid of you, Xu Bao, and I’m still leery of that quick hand of yours. But since even a man like Chairman Mao cannot live forever, I might as well not worry about whether I live or die. I’m here waiting for you, Xu Bao, you bastard. Tonight the fish dies or the net breaks.
    The other person who shed no tears for Mao Zedong was Lan Lian. While everyone else was at the Ximen family compound keening over Chairman Mao, he sat alone on the doorstep of his room to the west, honing his rusty scythe with a whetstone. The scraping sound set people’s teeth on edge and chilled their hearts. It certainly didn’t suit the occasion, and it hinted at something dark. Jinlong, unable to stand it a moment longer, handed the radio to his wife and, with the entire village looking on, ran up to Lan Lian, bent down, grabbed the whetstone out of his hand, and flung it to the ground. It broke in two.
    “Are you human or aren’t you?” Jinlong cursed between his teeth.
    Lan Lian narrowed his eyes to size up Jinlong, who was shaking in anger. He stood up slowly, still holding his scythe.
    “He’s dead,” he said, “but I have to keep on living. There’s millet that needs harvesting.”
    Jinlong picked up a metal bucket with a rusted bottom next to the ox pen and threw it at Lan Lian, who let it hit him in the chest without even trying to get out of the way. It fell at his feet.
    Jinlong’s eyes were red. Picking up a carrying pole, he raised it high and was about to hit Lan Lian in the head when, fortunately, Hong Taiyue stopped him.
    “What kind of a man are you, old Lan?” Hong said unhappily.
    Tears began to flow from Lan Lian’s eyes as he got down on his knees.
    “I loved Chairman Mao more than any of you imposters,” he said indignantly.
    Everyone just stared terrified, at a loss for words.
    Lan Lian pounded the ground with his fists and keened:
    “Chairman Mao — I’m one of your people too — I received my plot of land from you — you gave me the right to be an independent farmer—”
    Yingchun, still weeping, walked over and bent down to help him up. But his knees seemed to have taken root. Yingchun fell to her knees in front of him.
    A yellow butterfly flitted down from the apricot tree and settled like a dead leaf on a white chrysanthemum she wore in her hair.
    Wearing a white chrysanthemum in the hair to mourn a loved one was a village custom. Other women rushed over to Yingehun’s door to pick white mums, hoping that the butterfly would flit over to their heads; but after landing on Yingehun’s head, it tucked in its wings and stayed put.

32

Old Xu Bao’s Greed Costs Him His Life
Pig Sixteen Chases the Moon and Becomes King
    I quietly walked away from the compound, left the perplexed crowd around Lan Lian. I saw the evil eyes of Xu Bao half hidden amid the crowd and guessed that the old thief didn’t dare make his move quite yet, leaving me time to ready myself to fight him head-on.
    Not a single person remained at the farm, and as night began to fall — mealtime for us seventy or so survivors — the sounds of hunger rose. I’d have opened the pens and freed all the pigs, if not for the possibility that they’d pepper me with questions. Go ahead, pals, make as big a scene as you want. I don’t have time to worry about you, since I see the slippery figure of Xu Bao behind the crooked apricot tree. Actually, it’s more a case of sensing the murderous aura emanating from that cruel man’s body. My mind was spinning as I worked on