Sandalwood Death: A Novel (Chinese Literature Today Book Series)

spoon touched Sun’s lips, his mouth opened greedily, like a newborn puppy that has found its mother’s teat. Xiaojia’s hand shook slightly, spilling most of the liquid onto Sun Bing’s chin, where a fine beard had once grown.
    “Be careful!” Zhao Jia snapped unhappily.
    Obviously, Xiaojia, a man who butchered pigs and dogs, was not cut out for a job that required finesse. Most of the second spoonful ended up dripping onto Sun Bing’s chest.
    “What are you trying to do?” The loss of the ginseng pained Zhao Jia, who held the lantern out to his son and said, “Hold this. I’ll feed him!”
    But before he could take the bowl from Xiaojia, Meiniang stepped up and snatched it away.
    “Dieh,” she said in a comforting tone, “you are suffering so. Drink some of this ginseng tonic, it’ll make you feel better . . .”
    Tears filled Meiniang’s eyes. Zhao Jia, lantern still in hand, raised it for Xiaojia to tilt Sun Bing’s head up by the chin so Meiniang could spoon the liquid into her father’s mouth, little by little, without wasting a drop.
    For a moment I forgot that I was standing on the Ascension Platform, where a man was being put to death, and imagined that I was watching a family of three feeding a tonic to a sick relative.
    Sun Bing started coming back to life by the time the bowl was empty. His breathing was not as labored, his neck had regained the strength to hold his head up, and he was no longer spitting up blood. Even the bloating in his face had begun to recede. Meiniang handed the bowl to Xiaojia and reached out to untie the straps binding his arms to the crossbar, muttering comfortingly:
    “Don’t be afraid, Dieh, you’re going home . . .”
    My mind went blank. How was I supposed to deal with this sudden turn of events? Zhao Jia, an old hand, sprang into action. Thrusting the lantern into his son’s hands, he interposed himself between Sun Bing and Meiniang, as cold gleams of light flashed in his eyes.
    “Good daughter-in-law,” he said with a dry, sinister laugh, “snap out of it. This man has been condemned by the Imperial Court. If he is freed, the family of whoever lets him go will be slaughtered all the way to the ninth cousins!”
    Sun Meiniang slapped Zhao Jia in the face, then turned and did the same to me. Then she got down on her knees before us both and released a gut-wrenching wail.
    “Free my dieh,” she sobbed. “I beg you . . . free my dieh . . .”
    Aided by the bright moonlight, I saw the crowd below the platform fall heavily to their knees as a din arose from their depths, and only a single utterance:
    “Free him . . . free him . . .”
    Powerful emotions surged through my heart. People, I sighed, you do not know what is happening up here. You cannot know what is in Sun Bing’s mind. All you see is how he suffers physically, but you do not realize that by swallowing the tonic, he has shown us that he is not ready to die. Nor is it life he seeks. If he had wanted to live, he could have made his escape from the prison and gone to a place where no one could find him. But the way things were now, I could do nothing but wait and see what happened. Sun Bing’s suffering had already transformed him into a saint, and I could not defy the will of a saint. So I signaled for several of the yayi to come up, where I quietly told them to carry Sun Meiniang down off the platform. She fought and cursed me in the vilest of language, but the result was never in doubt, not when she was up against four men who managed to drag her down off the platform. My next order was for two shifts to stand guard on the platform, while the other two rested, trading places every hour. They were to take their rest in an empty Tongde Academy room facing the street. On the platform I said, “Permit no one but Zhao Jia and his son to come up the plank. You are also to ensure that no one attempts to climb onto the platform from any side. If anything happens to Sun Bing—if he is put out of his misery or taken away, Excellency Yuan would begin by having my head lopped off. But I’d see that yours already lay on the ground before that happened.”
    ————
    3
    ————
    The next two days and nights passed with agonizing slowness.
    After making my inspection of the Ascension Platform at dawn on the third day, I returned to the Academy room and lay down on the mat-covered brick floor, fully dressed, to rest. Yayi between shifts filled the room with their thunderous snores; some even