Red Sorghum

shout. The gate banged open, and a dozen or so half-naked men came rushing out. The western gate also opened, and the wizened old man with the pitiful little queue stumbledout, screaming and wailing. Two big yellow dogs flew past him towards the raging fire and raised a howl.
    ‘Fire . . . put it out. . . .’ The old man was nearly in tears. The distillery hands rushed back into the compound, snatched up buckets on poles, and ran to the well. The old man also ran back inside, picked up a black tile crock, and ran towards the well.
    After shedding his straw rain cape, Yu Zhan’ao crept along the base of the wall and entered the western compound, flattening up against the Shans’ screen wall to watch the men scurry back and forth. One of them dumped a bucketful of water on the fire, the stream of liquid looking like a piece of white silk in the glare of the flames, in whose heat it curled and twisted. They poured bucketful after bucketful of water onto the fire, high arching waterfalls one minute and puffs of cotton the next, forming a scene of exquisite beauty.
    A prudent voice of reason called out, ‘Let it burn, Master. It’ll soon burn itself out.’
    ‘Put it out. . . . Put it out. . . .’ He was in tears now. ‘Hurry up and put it out. . . . That’s enough mule fodder for a whole winter. . . .’
    With no time to waste on the scene outside, Yu Zhan’ao slipped into the house, where he was met by an overwhelming dampness. His hair stood on end. A mildewy voice emerged from inside the room to the west.
    ‘Dad . . . what’s burning?’
    Having entered the house after staring at the flames, Yu Zhan’ao was forced to wait until his eyes had adjusted to the darkness. When the voice repeated the question, he headed towards it. The room was lit up by the glare through the paper window, making it easy for him to see the long, flat face on the pillow. He reached out and held down the head, which cried out in alarm, ‘Who . . . who are you?’ Two claws dug into the back of Yu Zhan’ao’s hand as he drew his sword and buried it in the pale skin of the long, thin neck. A breath of cool air escaped onto his wrist, followed by hot, sticky blood that gloved his hand. He felt like throwing up. Fearfully, he took his hand away. The wrinkled, flat head was convulsing on the pillow, golden blood spurting from the neck. He tried wiping his handon the bedding, but the harder he wiped, the stickier it got, and the stronger his feelings of nausea grew. Grasping the slimy sword in his hand, he turned and ran into the outer room; there he scooped a handful of straw out of the stove to clean off his hand and his sword, which glinted in the light and seemed to come alive.
    Every single day, he had engaged in secret swordplay with the weapon given to him by Little Cheng the blacksmith, and each time he heard the pillow talk emerging from his mother’s room he sheathed and unsheathed it over and over. Villagers began taunting him by calling him Junior Monk, to which he reacted with a blood-curdling glare. The sword now lay beneath his pillow, keeping him awake at night with high-pitched shrieks. He knew the time had come.
    The full moon was hidden behind dense leaden clouds that night, and as the villagers were falling asleep, a light rain began to fall, the scattered drops slowly soaking the ground and filling the hollows with silvery water. The monk opened the door and walked in under a yellow oilcloth umbrella. From the vantage point of his room, he watched the monk fold his umbrella and saw his shiny bald pate as he unhurriedly scraped the mud from the soles of his shoes on the threshold.
    He heard his mother ask, ‘What are you doing here at this time of night?’
    ‘I had to say a seventh-day funeral mass for the mother of “Man-Biter” in West Village.’
    ‘I mean why so late? I didn’t think you’d come.’
    ‘Why not?’
    ‘It’s raining.’
    ‘If it had been raining daggers, I’d have come with a pot over my head.’
    ‘Get in here, and be quick about it.’
    ‘Does your belly still hurt?’ the monk asked softly as he entered her room.
    ‘Not so bad, ahhh . . .’
    ‘What’s wrong?’
    ‘The boy’s dad has been dead nearly ten years, and look what I’ve become. I don’t know if I’m up or I’m down.’
    ‘Be up. I’ll chant a sutra for you.’
    He didn’t close his eyes that night, as he listened to the shrieks of the sword beneath his pillow, to the patter of