Binu and the Great Wall of China (20 page)

Finally the sound of horses’ hooves shattered the silence on the road. All of Five-Grain City cocked its ears and listened. When three cavalrymen galloped up, someone noticed that they were carrying not the Nine Dragon flag, but a white streamer of coarse material. A thunderous sound erupted. ‘Kneel down. Everyone kneel down. The King is dead. Long live the King!’

Deathly silence reigned at the city gate, followed by the collapse of mountains of panic-stricken people. ‘The King is dead, dead!’ Those on the edge of the mountain were able to quickly kneel down, but not those in the middle, who could not find enough room for their knees in the narrow space. So they knelt on others’ legs and backs. No one dared utter a word, so conflicts erupted in silence and were resolved in the same manner, as an undercurrent of suppressed panting and cursing spread
throughout the crowd. Some fought quietly, grabbing and scratching as best they could on their knees until someone cried out, ‘The King is dead, and my eyes are blinded.’

No one knew who the cry belonged to, but it had shattered the solemnity of the moment, quickly turning the sea of humanity into a raging ocean. People forgot that they needed to remain sombre and quiet. Instead, they began excitedly voicing their opinions about the King’s death. One shrill, somewhat hoarse voice spoke the minds of many in the crowd and attracted considerable attention: ‘The King died from being deceived by the officials,’ he said. ‘They gave him a false report so that he would travel south to see the canal. But where is the canal? Where is the landing? Where would the golden-turret boat enter the water? Who knows how much he suffered travelling south with that big boat. Can a boat sail in a wheat field? Can it sail in a ditch? The beautiful, big golden-turret boat had to sail along the ground. How could the King not be angry? He did not just die, he died of anger, I know he did.’

Shared sorrow prompted the people to disregard the spies around them and courageously express antigovernment views. Many even shouted angrily at officials standing at the gate entrance.

The refugees around the granary, too, were getting restless, and a disturbance was quietly brewing as surprise at the announcement of the King’s death gave way to concern about the distribution of the Mercy Rice. The hungry refugees were kneeling on the ground, but their hearts had already crept into the granary. Finally one intrepid individual, claiming it was uncomfortable to kneel on someone else’s leg, decided to move up a bit. With his basket over his head, he stealthily inched towards the granary.

‘Don’t climb so high,’ someone reminded him, ‘or they’ll think you’re an assassin and arrest you.’

Not bothering to conceal his intentions, he said, ‘High or low, it’s still kneeling. The King is dead, so why worry about assassins now? We need to worry about the government. If they cancel the Mercy Rice, we’ll all return home with empty baskets.’

He had put into words what was on everyone’s minds. Some of the others responded by standing up. ‘I can’t kneel here any longer,’ they said. ‘I’m going to kneel over by the granary.’

Before the soldiers and officials guarding the granary could react, the reed mat walls around it collapsed under the weight of the surging crowd, and the newly milled rice cascaded down on them. Some ran over to claim the
rice, but realizing that they could only scoop up a small amount, they lay down and covered the rice with their bodies. Greed was in evidence everywhere: though their baskets were full, people continued to plough towards the centre of the rice mountain. Some jumped over others’ shoulders, some stuffed rice in their shoes when their hands were inadequate, and some shouted at their children to stuff rice up their robes. Older folks, left behind in the free-for-all, shook their baskets impatiently and demanded that the officials come to re-establish order. But Prefect Zhan, along with his underlings, had been so shaken by the crushing news that what was occurring at the granary did not interest them.

As for the three cavalrymen, two seemed utterly deflated, while the third took in his surroundings with concern. Claiming to have grown up in Five-Grain City, he got down from his horse and knelt before Prefect Zhan, quietly enquiring about some property his family had left behind in Five-Grain City.

‘You have been serving the King in Longevity Palace,’ said Prefect Zhan, ‘so why are you worried about a run-down house out here?’

The man replied, ‘I am afraid I cannot return to Longevity Palace, and the only shelter from the elements I have is that run-down house.’

Prefect Zhan knew there was more to it than that and, nagged with doubt, he disregarded the taboo of speaking about a fallen ruler and asked the cavalryman how the King had died. What came out of the man’s mouth was shocking, ‘The King died three days ago on the road,’ the cavalryman revealed. ‘Rotten fish and stinking shrimp could no longer mask the stench from his corpse.’ News of the King’s death had already begun to spread, threatening chaos in the land. The Nine Dragon flag in Longevity Palace had been replaced by the White Tiger flag, and the King’s brother, Chengqin, was now sitting on the throne.

Binu

No one in the crowd had been concerned about having to kneel in mud; but there were so many knees and so many rear ends, and so little room, that it led to silent wranglings over space. A few young girls, who foolishly worried too much about their new robes, complied with reluctance and complained loudly. One of them pointed to the caged prisoner and muttered, ‘Everyone else is kneeling, why isn’t she?’

The girl’s mother slapped her. ‘My little ancestor,’ she said menacingly, ‘there are plenty of people to envy, but she cannot be one of them. If you don’t want to kneel, if you think it’s too uncomfortable, why not climb into that cage and stand there with the assassin?’

The forgotten Binu was indeed the only person left standing. Her legs were bound to the iron slats, so she could not have knelt even if she’d wanted to. The soldiers by the city wall had laid down their weapons and fallen to their knees. Even the executioners had put away their blades and knelt beside the cage. The King was dead,
and everyone was required to kneel, even ducks and chickens, but not her. She remained standing, waiting for someone to discover the omission, but no one did, except for the little girl. Or maybe they did, but didn’t dare say so, since they were required to keep their eyes lowered, and were afraid that someone might ask how they had discovered the omission if they hadn’t looked up.

The hearse carrying the dead King had not moved, so the people continued to kneel facing the road. Since the cage stood between them and the road, it looked as if the citizens of Five-Grain City were prostrating themselves before a cage. A crow flew off from Five-Grain Tower and passed overhead; an ignorant bird, it thought that the people were kneeling to Binu, so it circled in the air above the prisoner, cawing its respect. She did not understand the bird’s call, but she sensed its emotion, believing that the caws voiced feelings for the kneeling crowd. ‘Binu, Binu, those people kneeling at your feet are asking your forgiveness.’ It was not clear if the idea had come from the crow or from herself, but it startled her nonetheless. She wanted to look away, to gaze at the sky or the city wall, anywhere but at the countless knees, but the pillory obstructed her movements. Since she could not turn her neck, she shut her eyes, which
prompted tears to flow. Considering her status, she thought this would not be a good time to be crying. Other people were crying on their knees, but she was standing and so it was inappropriate for her to be crying too. So she opened her eyes and forced herself not to look at the knees or the lowered heads. What then should she look at? Perhaps their robes. She could not forget her mourning robe, which had been taken from her at the Zhan mansion, and she wondered who was wearing it at that moment.

Binu told herself to stop thinking about the robe. The Kindling Village sorceresses had predicted that she would die on the road, but there had been few details in their prediction. They hadn’t said to her, ‘You will die shorn of all possessions and the winter robe will never reach Qiliang. Your Qiliang is doomed to have nothing to cover his back, unless he has learned how to turn the yellow sand of the north into thread and weave it with rocks from Great Swallow Mountain.’ Standing there in her prison cage, Binu was terrified by her thoughts of Qiliang.

A Great Swallow Mountain widow in Five-Grain City had once told her not to think about him all the time. ‘You poor woman,’ she had said, ‘thinking about him is also suffering. You think about him every day and every day he suffers.’

One of the weepers in Prefect Zhan’s mansion had also warned her, ‘Be careful with your dreams. Don’t ever dream about going to see your husband. With your luck, the person you dream most of seeing will suffer just like you.’

So Binu cleared her mind of thoughts of Qiliang, forcing herself to think instead about the pampered body of the King and wonder where it was lying, in a coffin or on the golden-turret boat. What were his funeral clothes made of, gold or silver? Were there King’s marks on his wrists? She suddenly realized that she had substituted the King for the thief Qinsu, with his small eyes and ratty beard. She would never know if the King had the word ‘King’ tattooed on his wrists. She felt unspeakable regret, not over her life and death, but the King’s. Who among the commoners did not want to see the King with their own eyes? She had wanted to look at his face and his wrists. But the King was dead.

Anger welled up inside the two executioners as they knelt alongside the cage. At first they quietly complained about the King’s untimely death, which had cost them the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to perform the ceremony they had rehearsed so many times. In the past, they had been rewarded whether the prisoner was executed or not, but now they would receive nothing;
and, given the chaos at the gate entrance, who would be interested in watching them chop off someone’s head now? When the commotion broke out at the granary, one of them had begun sharpening his sword with a violent ferocity, while the other had simply stood up and stretched before kneeling again.

‘Looting is not our responsibility,’ he said, ‘that’s for the constables to deal with, so let’s just kneel here.’

Soon they saw some of the officials filing out through the gate entrance and heard someone shout, ‘Hey, why are they leaving, when we’re still here? Being good citizens has cost us our Mercy Rice.’

One of the men said defiantly, ‘Let’s not kneel any more. Let’s get up. Why should we keep kneeling now that the officials have fled? What’s the point? Get up, everybody, get up. All the Mercy Rice is gone, but there’s plenty more at the rice shop. Let’s go and get it.’

At this point, the executioners could no longer contain themselves. They stopped one of the officials, who was running their way. ‘Are we going to use these swords today or aren’t we? Tell us, or we’ll join the crowd looting the rice shop.’ Getting no response, they walked off with their swords, still in their red uniforms. One of them followed the mob to the rice shop, while the other was caught and beaten by some angry old men and women,
who pulled and grabbed him, crying and cursing, ‘You have chopped off too many people’s heads, and we’re not going to let you go today. Cut off our heads if you dare.’

The executioner raised his shiny sword high above his head and ran off. ‘Don’t think the world has changed,’ he shouted. ‘The old King is dead, but there’s a new King. Tomorrow I will start beheading people for the new King.’

Binu stood alone in her cage and watched as the executioners disappeared in the rioting crowd. The crowd swallowed up the officials and soldiers, and no one had any thoughts for the prisoner. She wondered if anyone would remember her. She felt like shouting, but her mouth was still gagged; she wanted to leave the cage, but her body was still confined by the pillory. She watched people emerge from the rice shop and disappear into the nearby fabric and blacksmith shops. Someone came out with a farm tool in his arms, bright red blood streaming down his face, the result of a fight over a hoe. Another man carried a bolt of silk, but it was quickly shredded by other hands and, by the time he broke free, all that was left on his shoulder was the wooden roll.

The uproar stirred Binu’s blood as she watched, and she heard herself shouting directions, ‘Go over to Used
Clothes Street. Get their winter clothes. Get me a set of winter clothes for Qiliang.’ Her voice burst out of her frail body, and she shut her eyes, as a fresh teardrop rolled out of the corner. She knew it was a tear of shame.

Binu stood in the cage, waiting for the rioting crowd to remember her. She knew that the pillaging would come to an end at some point. She could only wait for someone to loot her cage. Finally some boys from the area below Five-Grain Tower came running towards the cage. One held a rock, another a scythe he’d stolen from the blacksmith’s shop. The flames of plundering burned brightly in their eyes. They hacked and beat at the cage, until it gave way. One boy grabbed Binu and began chopping at the pillory. Seeing that she wasn’t helping, he tore the black cloth out of her mouth and stuffed it in his pocket. ‘Why don’t you move a bit?’ he said. ‘I’m trying to save you, so stop acting like a corpse.’

So Binu began screaming in time with the boy’s hacks with the scythe, and she was still shrieking when the pillory was removed. They tried to force her out of the cage.

‘Foolish woman, why won’t you come out? We’re going to sell this cage, so get out. You’re free to go.’

She felt like sitting down, but her waist refused to
bend. Perhaps she had been standing in that narrow cage so long she’d forgotten how to sit. Holding onto the bars, she looked around, then started off towards the city wall, but could only take a few steps. Slowly she retreated to the cage to lean against the bars for support. That, of course, made it hard for the boys to remove it.

One of the boys pried her hands off and said, ‘Foolish woman, can’t you bear to part with the cage? Standing in here has dulled your mind.’

They dragged her towards the city gate. ‘Everyone else is plundering,’ they said. ‘Why aren’t you? Go and get something for yourself.’