Pow!

heart,’ she said emotionally.

    When we finished eating, we went back to burning spirit paper at the bier.

    A steady stream of people walked in and out of the yard, undisturbed by the family's dogs, which had been struck dumb after the death of Lao Lan's wife. They lay sprawled on the ground, resting their heads on their paws, teary-eyed and sad; only their eyes moved as they followed the people in the yard. The saying ‘Dogs share human qualities’ could not be truer. A group of men carrying papier-mâché human and horse figures entered the yard and made a big show of looking for a spot to place them. The artisan was a fit old man whose eyes darted this way and that. His head was as smooth and shiny as a light bulb, and he sported a few mousey whiskers on his chin. Mother signalled to him to have his men stand the figures in a row in front of the house's western wing. There were four altogether, each the size of a real horse, white with black hooves and eyes made of dyed eggshells. Horse-sized though they were, they had the mischievous look of ponies. The camera focused first on the horses, then moved to the craftsman and then finally to the human figures, of which there were two, a boy and a girl. Their names were pinned to their chests. His was Laifu—Good Fortune—hers Abao—Treasure. People said that the whiskered old man was illiterate, and yet at the end of every year he set up a stall in the marketplace and he sold New Year's scrolls. He didn't write what was on his scrolls—he simply drew what had been written by others. He was a true artist, a master of plastic arts. There were many stories about the man but none that I can go into here. He also brought along a money tree, its branches made of paper and from which hung leaves, each a shiny coin whose sparkle dazzled the eye.

    But before Mother had seen off the first paper artisans, a second group showed up, this one with a Western flavour. The leader, we were told, was an art-institute student, a girl with short hair and glittering hoops in her ears. She was wearing a short fishnet blouse and what looked like rags over a pair of jeans. Her midriff was bare and her trouser legs shredded, like mops, with holes at the knees. Imagine a girl like that taking up a trade like that. Her men carried in a paper Audi A6, a large-screen TV, a stereo system—all modern things. None of those seemed especially out of place—what did were her human figures, also a boy and a girl. The face of the boy, dressed in a suit and leather shoes, was powdered, his lips painted red; the girl wore a white dress that showed her breasts. Everything about them said bride and groom—and not funeral figures. The cameramen were captivated by these new arrivals—they followed their subjects and knelt for close-ups. (The one from the small-town paper would one day gain fame as a portrait photographer.) Yao Qi wove his way through the paper figures crowding the small yard ahead of a band of funeral musicians, led by a man with a suona hanging at his waist and a cassocked monk working his prayer beads. They went straight to Mother.

    ‘Lao Luo,’ she shouted towards the eastern wing as she wiped the sweat from her brow, ‘come out here and give me a hand.’

    Even as the afternoon sun blazed down I remained at the head of the coffin, mechanically tossing paper money into the clay pot, gazing out at the excitement in the yard and casting an occasional glance at Tiangua; she was yawning, barely able to stay awake. Jiaojiao had run off somewhere. Huang Biao's wife, full of energy and reeking of meat, busied herself like a whirlwind, shuttling back and forth in the hall. Lao Lan was in the next room, holding forth loudly—I couldn't say who he was speaking to, given the dizzying number of people who had come and gone. The house was like a command centre, replete with staff officers, clerks, assistants, local officials, society bigwigs, enlightened gentry and more. Father emerged from the eastern wing, bent over at the waist, with a dark look on his face. Mother had shed her coat and was now wearing only a white shirt tucked into a black skirt. Her face was as red as a laying hen. As she surveyed the two teams of paper artisans, she pointed to Father, who was as wooden as she was efficient and passionate, and said: ‘He'll pay you.’ Without a word, Father turned and re-entered the eastern wing; the two craftsmen exchanged a brief disdainful look before following him in. By