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made the sweat spill from my pores. I looked at Tiangua—she was in a similar state. We took turns removing sheets of paper from the stack in front of us and burning them. Her sober expression was short on grief and there were no signs of tears on her cheeks; perhaps she had no more tears to shed. I was faintly aware of talk that the woman in the casket wasn't her birth mother and that she'd been bought from a human trafficker. Another rumour had it that she was born of an affair between Lao Lan and a young woman in another village, then brought back to be raised by his wife. I kept looking at her and at the face of the woman in the framed photograph behind the coffin but saw no resemblance. Then I compared her with Lao Lan and saw no resemblance there either, so perhaps she had been bought from a human trafficker after all.

    Mother walked up with a cool wet towel and wiped my sweaty face. ‘Don't burn it too fast,’ she whispered. ‘Just enough to keep the fire going.’

    She folded the towel, walked over to Tiangua and wiped her face as well. Tiangua looked up at Mother and rolled her eyes. She should have thanked her but she didn't.

    Intrigued by our burning of the spirit money, Jiaojiao tiptoed over and crouched down next to me. Picking up a sheet, she tossed it into the clay pot and whispered: ‘Could we barbecue meat in that?’

    ‘No,’ I said.

    The two newspaper photographers we'd hired walked in from the yard, one carrying a video camera, the other a light, to film the activity round the bier. Mother rushed up to take Jiaojiao outside; she balked and Mother had to grab her under her arms and drag her away.

    Since I was being filmed, I affected a sombre expression as I placed a sheet of paper into the bowl. Tiangua did the same. After turning his lens to the fire, nearly touching the flames, the cameraman moved first to my face and then to Tiangua's. Next my hands, then her hands and from there to the coffin. Finally, to the framed picture of the deceased, which drew my attention back to the pale, oversized face on the wall. There was sadness in Aunty Lan's eyes, belying the trace of a smile on her lips, and as I stared at her I became aware that she was staring at me. I was awestruck by how much was hidden in her gaze; I looked away, first to the reporters in the doorway and then to Tiangua, who sat head-down, looking stranger to me by the minute. She grew less like a person and more like some sort of sprite, while the real Tiangua died along with her mother (birth mother or not, it didn't matter). What filled my eyes next was a funeral cart pulled by four horses along a broad dirt road heading southwest from their yard, carrying Aunty Lan and Tiangua, their baggy white attire billowing like butterfly wings.

    At noontime, Huang Biao's wife called Tiangua and me into the kitchen; there, she laid out a platter of meatballs, a winter melon soup with ham and a basket of steamed buns for the two of us and Jiaojiao. I didn't have much of an appetite—the day was hot and I'd spent most of the morning breathing in smoke from the burning paper. But Tiangua and my sister wolfed down their food—a meatball washed down with a spoonful of soup, followed by a bite from a steamed bun. They ate without looking at each other, as if engaged in an eating contest. Lao Lan walked in before we'd finished. He hadn't combed his hair or shaved, his clothes were rumpled, his eyes were bloodshot and he looked utterly dejected.

    Huang Biao's wife went up and gazed at him with her limpid eyes. ‘General Manager,’ she said, her voice heavy with concern, ‘I know how painful this is for you. One night between a man and a woman produces a lifetime of affection. And you were together for so many years. Your wife was a virtuous woman, so saintly that we are as saddened by her departure as you. But she has left us, and there is nothing we can do about that, while you have your family to look after. And the company cannot operate without you. You are the village backbone. So, my dear elder brother, you must eat something, not for yourself but for all us villagers…’

    His eyes red and puffy from crying, Lao Lan said: ‘I appreciate your kind thoughts but I can't eat. Make sure the young ones are fed. I have many things to do.’ He rubbed my head, then Jiaojiao's and Tiangua's, before walking out of the kitchen with tears in his eyes.

    Huang Biao's wife followed him with her eyes. ‘He's a fine man with a good