The Garlic Ballads

Gao Ma said, obviously touched. “She has her hands full with the two children. A bachelor like me doesnt need much.”
    “Bear up, Cousin, and make it through the coming year the best you can. Then when you get out, find yourself a wife and settle down.”
    Gao Ma smiled wanly but said nothing.
    “You re a veteran, after all,” Gao Yang went on. “The camp leaders have their eye on you. I know you can get an early release if you do what you’re told. You could be out of here before me.”
    “Early or late, what difference does it make?” Gao Ma replied. “What I’d rather do is serve your time for you, so you could go home and provide for your family again.”
    “Cousin,” Gao Yang said, “we were fated to have bad luck. For men to suffer like this is no big deal, but think of poor Fourth Aunt….”
    Anxiously, Gao Ma asked, “Didn’t they release her for medical reasons?”
    Suddenly hesitant, Gao Yang said, “My wife said not to tell you…”
    “Tell me what?” Gao Ma demanded anxiously, grabbing Gao Yang’s hand.
    Gao Yang sighed. “She was your mother-in-law, after all, so it wouldn’t be right to keep it from you.”
    “Tell me, Cousin. Don’t keep me in suspense.”
    “Remember when my wife visited me?” Gao Yang said. “That’s when she told me.”
    “Told you what?”
    “The Fang brothers are no-good bastards. They don’t deserve to be called human!”
    Gao Ma’s patience was wearing thin. “Cousin Gao Yang, it’s time to pour the beans out of the basket. Get it ail out. You’re driving me crazy the way you ramble.”
    Gao Yang sighed again. Okay, here it is. Deputy Yang is no good either. Remember his nephew Cao Wen? Well, he jumped down a well, and his family decided to arrange an underworld marriage.”
    “A what?”
    “You don’t even know what an underworld marriage is?”
    Gao Ma shook his head.
    “It’s where two dead people are united in marriage. So after Cao Wen died, his family thought first of Jinju.”
    Gao Ma jumped to his feet.
    “Let me finish, Cousin,” Gao Yang said. “The Caos wanted Jinju’s ghost to be the wife of their dead son, so they asked Deputy Yang to act as matchmaker.”
    Gao Ma gnashed his teeth and cursed, “Fuck his lousy ancestors! Jinju belongs to me!”
    “That’s what makes me so angry,” Gao Yang said. “Everybody in the village knows that Jinju belonged to you. She was carrying your child. But the Fang boys jumped at Deputy Yang’s proposal and sold Jinju’s remains to the Cao family for eight hundred yuan, which they split between them. Then the Caos sent people to open Jinju’s grave and deliver her remains to diem.”
    Gao Ma, his face the color of cold iron, didn’t make a sound.
    Gao Yang continued: “My wife said that the ceremony outdid any regular wedding she’d ever seen. They hired musicians from somewhere outside the county, who played while the guests enjoyed a huge spread. Then Jinju’s and Cao Wens remains were placed in a bright red coffin and buried together. Villagers who came to watch the festivities cursed the Cao family, and Deputy Yang, and the Fang brothers. Everyone agreed that the whole affair was an insult to heaven and a crime against reason!”
    Gao Ma remained absolutely silent.
    Gao Yang looked at Gao Ma. “Cousin,” he quickly went on, “it won’t help to brood over this. They committed this crime against heaven, and the old man up there will punish them.… It’s all my fault. My wife told me to keep quiet, but this stinking mouth of mine can’t keep a secret.”
    A chilling smile spread across Gao Ma’s face.
    “Cousin,” Gao Yang blurted out fearfully, “dont get any wild ideas. You re a veteran, so you can’t believe in ghosts and things like that.”
    “What about Fourth Aunt?” Gao Ma asked softly.
    Gao Yang hemmed and hawed for a moment, then reluctantly said, “The day the Caos came for Jinju’s remains she … hanged herself.”
    An anguished roar tore from Gao Mas throat, followed by a mouthful of bright red blood.

4.

    A major snowstorm fell shortly after New Year’s Day.
    Prisoners shoveled the snow into piles and loaded it onto handcarts to be deposited in a nearby millet field.
    Gao Ma, the first to volunteer, pulled a snow-laden handcart out the main gate. Extra guards had not been posted, since only a few prisoners were let out the gate. Instead, one of the camp officers stood watch at the gate, his arms folded as he chatted with a tower guard.
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