Under the Hawthorn Tree (8 page)

She climbed on to his back reluctantly, and clasped his shoulders, trying hard to make sure her breasts didn't touch his back. ‘Lean over, and put your arms around my neck otherwise it won't be my fault if you fall in the water.' At that moment he seemed to slip, tilting sharply to one side, so she threw herself forward and flung her arms around his neck, her breasts pressing against his back. It was strangely comfortable. He, however, was shivering all over.

‘Am I too heavy?'

He didn't reply, trembled for a while, and then settled. Carrying her, he slowly waded across the river. Midway, he said, ‘We have a saying where I'm from, “an old man needs to be married, an old woman needs to be carried”. I'll carry you whether you're old or not. How does that sound?'

She blushed, and blurted out, ‘How can you say something like that? Say it again and I'll jump into the water.'

Old Third didn't respond to this but nodded downstream. ‘Your brother Lin's standing over there.'

Jingqiu saw Lin sitting by the river with a water bucket to either side of him. Old Third climbed on to the bank, released Jingqiu, and while putting on his shoes and socks said, ‘You wait here, and I'll go talk to him.' In a low voice he spoke a few words to Lin and then returned to Jingqiu. ‘You go home with him, I'll go back to camp from here.' With that, he slipped out into the night.

Lin collected water in the two buckets, swung them on to his shoulders, and walked back to the house without uttering a word. Jingqiu followed behind, terror-stricken. Is he going to tell everyone about this, tell my association? I'm finished. She wanted to use the time before they got home to speak with Lin: ‘Lin, don't be mistaken, he only accompanied me. We . . .'

‘He said.'

‘Don't tell anyone else, people won't understand.'

‘He said.'

Everyone was surprised that she had arrived so late. Auntie asked repeatedly, ‘Did you come back on your own? Over the mountain? Oh, you're so brave; I don't even dare walk that way on my own during the day.'

Jingqiu was so apprehensive that Lin would tell other people what he had seen at the river that she took a long time to get to sleep. He hadn't told anyone yet, but wasn't that because she was there? Once my back is turned, he's going to tell Auntie, isn't he? If he really was waiting by the river for her return then he'd be sure to blab, because she knew he couldn't stand seeing her with Old Third. The worst scenario would be for Lin to tell people about her and Old Third, and for this information to find its way to the ears of her association, and through it to her school. What would happen if the school found out?

Her bad class status worried her for although her mother had been ‘liberated' and was now serving as a teacher to the masses, her father was still a landowner. Of the five bad elements – landowner, rich peasant, counter-revolutionary, corrupt cadre, rightist – landowner was the stinkiest enemy to the working class of all of them. Her school would certainly seize upon any ‘bad behaviour' and use it as a stick to beat a landowner's daughter like her. And they'd be sure to pull in the rest of her family too.

Her father's class label was extremely unfair. Not only had he left home at an early age to study, but his family had not taken rent from the tenants on their land, so he was doubly wronged and should never have been classed as a landowner. He should have been seen as a progressive youth. He'd fled enemy territory for the liberated areas at least a couple of years before 1949, using his musical talents to serve the people by organising a choir for propagating Communism and Mao Zedong, teaching the masses ‘A liberated sky is a brilliant sky'. No one knew why, but once the Cultural Revolution started he was singled out and accused of being an undercover agent in the service of the Nationalists. Eventually he was branded a landowner, and sent to labour camp. The truth of the matter was that they couldn't give him more than one label, and so only the one capable of causing the most harm would do; ‘secret agent to Chiang Kai-shek', ‘active counter-revolutionary' and heaven knows what else simply weren't injurious enough.

Even the smallest error on her part, therefore, would bring about even greater misfortune. These thoughts filled her with remorse for her actions. She couldn't work out what had come over her, it was as if she had taken some kind of bewitching drug. Old Third told her to take the mountain road, so she took the mountain road. Old Third said he wanted to wait for her in town, so she let him wait in town. Afterwards, she let him take her by the hand, let him hold her, let him kiss her. And the worst of it all was that Lin had seen him carrying her across the river. What now? The worry consumed her. How can I stop Lin from saying something, and if he does, what do I do then? She didn't have the energy to even think about what she felt about Old Third.

The following few days Jingqiu was on edge, conscious of every word she said to Auntie and Lin, and scrutinising Auntie for evidence of his betrayal. She realised that Lin did not have a loose tongue; he was like a sealed calabash. It was Auntie she was worried about. If she were to hear about it, then it would definitely get out. Jingqiu felt trapped by the threads of the thoughts as they wound themselves around her. Sometimes Auntie displayed an all-knowing look, but other times she was quiet, as if unruffled by suggestions or wafts of gossip.

Old Third still came to Auntie's house, but his place of work had moved to another part of the village so he couldn't come at lunchtimes. He often came in the evenings, however, and each time he would bring food. Twice he brought sausages that he had bought from a local farmer. Auntie cooked them, cut them into pieces, and prepared vegetables as accompaniments. One such evening, Jingqiu discovered a chunk of sausage hidden beneath the rice in her bowl. She knew Old Third must have put it there. Knowing as he did that she liked sausage, he was making sure she received more than the others.

She didn't know what to do with the extra piece of meat. It disarmed her. Her mother had narrated stories from the old days in which loving husbands from the countryside would hide meat in their wives' rice bowls. Young wives had no status in the family, and had to yield constantly to everyone else. If there was ever something nice to eat she would have to wait for her husband's parents to eat first, then her husband, then any uncles and aunts, and finally her own children. By the time it came to her turn, only vegetables would remain.

Husbands didn't dare display love in front of their parents, so if they wanted to give their beloved wives a piece of meat they'd have to resort to tricks. Her mother told Jingqiu the way such a favoured young wife would eat the hidden meat: first, furtively, she would mash it up, then, lifting the bowl to her mouth, she would dig the meat out from the bottom of the bowl as if excavating a tunnel, pretending only to be shovelling rice. Quietly, she would chew, while ploughing the remaining meat back ‘underground'. She had to be careful not to eat up all the rice before taking a second helping, thereby uncovering the buried treasure. But you couldn't go for another helping of rice without having finished the first because if her parents-in-law saw she would get a terrible telling-off.

Her mother told her about a young girl who, because of her husband's love, choked to death. He hid a boiled egg in her bowl, the family's only egg, and scared that she would be discovered she stuffed it into her mouth in one go. Just as she was about to chew her mother-in-law asked her a question, and so in order to answer, she swallowed it whole. The egg got stuck in her throat and she died.

Jingqiu looked down into her bowl, her heart thumping in her chest. If Auntie sees, won't it be used as evidence against me? If a young wife was caught, she was decried as a temptress who had seduced her husband. If Jingqiu let anyone find out now, she'd be in an even worse position than those wives, and the news would definitely reach her colleagues in the Educational Reform Association.

Jingqiu glanced over at Old Third and saw him looking back at her, his expression seemingly asking, ‘Delicious?' He was artful, and she longed to strike him with her chopsticks. This piece of hidden sausage was a minefield. She was too scared to dig it out from her rice, but if she didn't eat it her rice would soon be gone and the offending sausage would be revealed. Half a bowl in, she rushed into the kitchen and flicked the piece of meat into the bucket for the pig.

After returning to the table she didn't look at him again, but lowered her head over her bowl. Whether she reached for more food she did not know, nor was she aware of what she was putting in her mouth; she was conscious only of the need to empty her bowl. But he was in total ignorance of her turmoil, and picking up another piece of sausage with his chopsticks, gracefully plopped it into her bowl. Enraged, she struck her chopsticks against his. ‘What are you doing? I have my own hands.'

He looked back at her in surprise.

Ever since the day he had walked her back over the mountain she had been snapping at him, and especially when they had an audience she exhibited a particular ferociousness, as if to advertise that there could be nothing between them. He, on the other hand, behaved in the opposite manner. Before, he had spoken to her as an adult does to a child, teasing her, admonishing her. But now he had become cowardly, always trying to guess her thoughts and make himself agreeable to her. She reproved him, and he gazed back at her, pitiable rather than angry, lacking the courage to pick playful fights. The more wretched he looked, the angrier she got: he was giving away their secret.

The first days after she got back Old Third was still trying to carry on as before; coming in to help her whenever he saw her in her room writing. She hissed, ‘What are you doing coming in here? Go, quickly, before anyone sees.' And he was brazen no longer. When she told him to leave he stood in the doorway, mute, before leaving obediently. She could hear him talking with others in the family, and sometimes she would have to pass through the living room in order to go round the back. He would break off mid-sentence and watch her pass through without saying anything to her, forgetting to reply to whoever else was there.

She heard Auntie's daughter-in-law, Yumin, say, ‘Isn't that so, Old Third?'

He grunted an ‘Mmm' in reply, and then, confused, asked, ‘Isn't what so?'

Yumin laughed at him. ‘How come you're so distracted lately? I have to repeat myself several times, and you still don't understand. You're just like my naughtiest students, never listening in class.'

Jingqiu discovered sausage, and even egg, buried in her bowl a few more times, and each time she was wild with anger. She decided to tell Old Third that if he ever did that again someone would find out. He obviously wasn't scared; he was a working man, it was natural for him to have a girlfriend, but she was still at school. His behaviour was putting her in danger.

One day the oldest brother, Sen, arrived home from Yanjia River, bringing with him a friend called Qian, a driver, who, the previous evening, had run down a wild deer. He and some other drivers had slaughtered it and divided up the meat. Sen had received some and had taken it home so everyone could have a taste. Sen sent Jingqiu to fetch Old Third; Qian's watch was broken and he'd come to ask if Old Third could fix it.

Some distance before the geological unit's camp, she heard the sounds of Old Third's accordion. He was playing the polka – a tune she knew well. She came to a stop and thought of her first day in West Village, and the first time she heard Old Third's accordion playing. It was right at this very spot. That day her thoughts extended only as far as meeting him and exchanging a few words by way of a greeting. Afterwards she had started longing for him, becoming distracted if she went a few days without seeing him. But from the day she had walked with him back over the mountain her feelings had changed. Now she was tormented by the thought of being caught. My capitalist thoughts are deep-seated, and I'm such a hypocrite, I only worry about someone finding out about them. If Lin hadn't seen us that day I'd probably still be longing to be with him. Lin has saved me from sliding deeper into this abyss.

Her thoughts were swirling. Eventually, she mustered the courage to collect Old Third. He opened the door and said, ‘How come you're here?'

‘Sen asked me to come and get you for dinner.'

He found her a chair and poured her a glass of water. ‘I've already eaten, but tell me what good things Sen has brought to eat and perhaps you can persuade me.'

Jingqiu continued to stand, and said, ‘Big brother wants you to come now. Someone's come with a broken watch and he wants you to fix it. He also brought some venison and he wants you to have some.'

Overhearing this, one of Old Third's middle-aged roommates teased, ‘Little Sun, venison's no joking matter. Don't you know it stokes the fires, and you've got no means of putting a fire like that out. Wouldn't that be terrible? Take my advice, don't go.'

Jingqiu was afraid that Old Third would not come on account of this advice. ‘Don't worry, venison is indeed a warming food, but we can ask Auntie to cook some mung bean soup. That's supposed to be good for cooling you down.'

The other men guffawed, and one said, ‘Okay, okay, so that's how you reduce heat, eh? Eat mung bean soup.'

Old Third was visibly uncomfortable and once outside, apologised to her. ‘Those men have been away from their families for a long time so they're a bit careless with their words. They're always making jokes like that. Don't take any notice.'

Jingqiu didn't understand. Surely someone saying venison was a warming food wasn't something that needed an apology? Whenever she ate warming foods, like chilli for example, her mouth would blister and sometimes her teeth would hurt, so she had to be careful not to eat too much. And what do liking jokes and not being around your family have to do with each other? Their meaning may have remained a mystery to her, and seemed rather incoherent, but she didn't give it too much thought – she was otherwise occupied with finding a way of telling him not to hide any more food under her rice.