Red Sorghum

his knees, propped himself on his hands, and raised his arms. His face was so puffy the skin shone; his eyes were slitsthrough which thin greenish rays emerged. Father was sure Uncle Arhat could see him. His heart was pounding against the wall of his chest – thump thump thump – and he didn’t know if it was from fear or anger. He wanted to scream, but Grandma’s hand was clasped too tightly over his mouth.
    The officer holding the leash shouted something to the crowd, and a crew-cut Chinese interpreted it for them. Father didn’t hear everything the interpreter said. Grandma’s hand was clasped so tightly over his mouth that he was having trouble breathing and his ears were ringing.
    Two Chinese in black uniforms stripped Uncle Arhat naked and tied him to the rack. The Jap officer waved his arm, and two more black-clad men dragged and pushed Sun Five, the most accomplished hog-butcher in our village – or anywhere in Northeast Gaomi Township, for that matter – out of the enclosure. He was a short, bald man with a huge paunch, a red face, and tiny, close-set eyes buried alongside the bridge of his nose, held a butcher’s knife in his left hand and a pail of water in his right as he shuffled up to Uncle Arhat.
    The interpreter spoke: ‘The commander says to skin him. If you don’t do a good job of it, he’ll have his dog tear your heart out.’
    Sun Five mumbled an acknowledgement, his eyes blinking furiously. Holding the knife in his mouth, he picked up the pail and poured water over Uncle Arhat’s scalp. Uncle Arhat’s head jerked upward when the cold water hit him. Bloody water coursed down his face and neck, forming filthy puddles at his feet. One of the overseers brought another pail of water from the river. Sun Five soaked a rag in it and wiped Uncle Arhat’s face clean. When he was finished, his buttocks twitched briefly. ‘Elder brother . . .’
    ‘Brother,’ Uncle Arhat said, ‘finish me off quickly. I won’t forget your kindness down in the Yellow Springs.’
    The Japanese officer roared something.
    ‘Get on with it!’ the interpreter said.
    Sun Five’s face darkened as he reached up and held Uncle Arhat’s ear between his fingers. ‘Elder brother,’ he said, ‘there’s nothing I can do. . . .’
    Father saw Sun Five’s knife cut the skin above the ear with asawing motion. Uncle Arhat screeched in agony as sprays of yellow piss shot out from between his legs. Father’s knees were knocking. A Japanese soldier walked up to Sun Five with a white ceramic platter, into which Sun put Uncle Arhat’s large, fleshy ear. He cut off the other ear and laid it on the platter alongside the first one. Father watched the ears twitch, making thumping sounds.
    The soldier paraded slowly in front of the labourers and villagers, holding the platter out for them to see. Father looked at the ears, pale and beautiful.
    The soldier then carried the ears up to the Japanese officer, who nodded to him. He laid the platter alongside the body of his dead comrade, after a moment of silence, he picked it up and put it on the ground under the dog’s nose.
    The dog’s tongue slithered back into its mouth as it sniffed the ears with its pointy, wet, black nose; but it shook its head, with its tongue lolling again, and sat down.
    ‘Hey,’ the interpreter yelled at Sun Five. ‘Keep going.’
    Sun Five was walking around in circles, mumbling to himself. Father looked at his sweaty, greasy face, and watched his eyelids blink like a bobbing head of a chicken.
    A mere trickle of blood oozed from the holes where Uncle Arhat’s ears had been. Without them his head had become a neat, unmarred oval.
    The Jap officer roared again.
    ‘Hurry up, get on with it!’ the interpreter ordered.
    Sun Five bent over and sliced off Uncle Arhat’s genitals with a single stroke, then put them into the platter held by the Japanese soldier, who carried it at eye level as he paraded like a marionette in front of the crowd. Father felt Grandma’s icy fingers dig into his shoulders.
    The Japanese soldier put the platter under the dog’s nose. It nibbled, then spat the stuff out.
    Uncle Arhat was screaming in agony, his bony frame twitching violently on the rack.
    Sun Five threw down his butcher knife, fell to his knees, and wailed bitterly.
    The Japanese officer let go of the leash, and the guard dog bounded forward, burying its claws in Sun Five’s shouldersand baring its fangs in his face. He threw himself on the