Old Town (21 page)

The fisherman’s two visitors stayed on this small boat. These two Old Town “land ducks” learned how to toss and retrieve the fishing net and to work the scull. Every time the fisherman went ashore to sell the fish, they would take the vessel far out in the stream for safety’s sake and wait for the fisherman’s return before sculling back to the riverbank to meet him.

The doctor’s skin darkened and he grew more robust. Calluses formed on his hands. Now the urge to return home gradually flagged and faded. He forgot that he was, as the poet said, “but a guest here.”
²⁴
Life on the water passed day by day. Only occasionally in a half-dreaming, half-awakened state did he realize he was floating on a river, and then dejection would take him.

One day, the fisherman came back from the riverbank and quietly said, “This evening there’s going to be a steamship carrying goods down to Shanghai. One of you can go first.”

The doctor was stunned. Young Li asked, “How do you know we want to go to Shanghai?”

The fisherman said evasively, “The first day I saw you I knew where you had come from.”

“And where was that?”

The fisherman raised his hand and jabbed it in the direction of the north. So all along he had taken these two men to be communists from “north of the river.”

‘“People often go by water to Shanghai. That steamship is still helping ‘up north’ to send its goods. Don’t worry, it’s reliable.”

Actually, he had been making discreet inquiries about the route for some time. It was only that these two men were much too fair and clean looking. He worried that they would never make it through all the checkpoints along the way.

What the fisherman said made the doctor feel ashamed of himself. Even though he had left Division Commander Hu totally out of a sense of justice, he was, after all, a deserter. He hadn’t even tried to find another army unit truly prepared to bathe in its own blood in order to fight the Japanese.

They both went at it long and hard about which one should go first. Young Li became quite agitated. He stood at the prow of the boat and said, “Sir, if you make me go first, I’m just going to jump into the water right here and feed the fish!”

The doctor said nothing. He just sat stock-still under the awning. The hope of returning home had kindled anew within him, but why wasn’t he feeling any joy? He couldn’t bear leaving Young Li. Though he had not yet been separated from this capable assistant who had been with him day and night, the doctor already felt unbearable pain. Nor could he bring himself to leave the fisherman. Once they parted, they probably would never have the chance to meet again. When he thought of the fisherman, floating all alone on the water, growing older and dying of some disease without a single person to ask about him, the doctor’s heart broke within him.

Sculling his boat late that night, the fisherman found the steamship and came up alongside the larger vessel. The doctor looked at Young Li and the fisherman, unwilling to leave. The master of the steamship reached out and hauled him straight up on board. Just as the vessels were separating, Young Li thrust two gold pieces into the doctor’s hand. By the time the doctor realized what had happened, Young Li was already out of reach.

The steamship’s engines throbbed to life. Young Li cupped his hands over his mouth and shouted, “When I get to Old Town I’ll go to Officials Lane and look for you at the Lin residence. If I can’t make it back, please look after my ma! We live in Li Village, Tongpan District, out in the east!”

The doctor fought to hold back his tears but in the end shed a few furtive ones. He was so choked up he couldn’t open his mouth, and just stood there gazing at the little boat rapidly moving farther and farther away.

3.

O
N A
B
LAZINGLY
hot summer’s day, my grandfather was making his way through a mass of porters and climbing the steps of Sixteen Wharf Landing, a bulging hemp sack balanced on his shoulders. Shanghai had been a second home for him when he was a young student, and after returning to Old Town, he often longed for the day when he could take Second Sister and the three children to tour all those places of his earlier life. But never did he think that returning to his second home would be like this. The load on his shoulders weighed more than he did. Although over the past two months the fisherman had deliberately made him do heavy work, and made him bare his arms so they would be burned dark by the sunlight, he still had trouble bearing such a heavy weight. He was bent forward almost horizontally and both legs trembled with each step. From the way he looked, you might think he was some pathetic person who insisted on working in spite of being sick. Surprisingly, he wasn’t stopped for an identity card check as he passed through the inspection hatch. But he never made it with his sack to the nearby warehouse. Only a few steps past the hatch his legs gave way under him and he feebly collapsed to the ground, the big sack pressing down on him. He tried to push it away but couldn’t move. Some unknown carrier helped him get his load into the warehouse. There grandpa lingered until about evening and then followed the group of workers going off shift and returning to their homes in Shanghai.

The big buildings and mansions of Shanghai were just as before, but this was no longer the Shanghai he had known. The sight, as he remembered it, of Mr. and Mrs. Qiao standing on the dock to welcome his arrival more than ten years earlier came vividly back to him. The last time he had corresponded with them, they were in Beiping, but contact had been lost for quite a long time.
Where were his two saviors now? They were getting on in years. If only they could safely return to their own hometown and live out their remaining days in peace and ease
.

Looking up abruptly, Ninth Brother saw a ragged beggar right in front of him and automatically he quickly stepped aside to avoid him. The beggar did the same. Stopping to take a closer look, Ninth Brother realized he was in front of a shop’s display window and that beggar was him! He looked at the window for a long time. The free and easygoing young student in his long gown and mandarin jacket of those earlier days had become the figure in front of him now. This was just what people meant when they spoke of the transience and vicissitudes of human existence. He didn’t know if the sea lane from Shanghai to Old Town was open. What identity papers did he need? He might have to stay here four or five days. He thought he ought to buy a set of clothes and then go to Zhabei
²⁵
to see a former classmate, one of his best friends then. He also ought to buy some small gifts for the man’s children.

As Ninth Brother stepped into a small shop, the owner standing behind his counter shouted, “I’ve got no money for you!”

Oh, that so-familiar Shanghai speech! In a voice filled with an excitement he couldn’t restrain, Ninth Brother said to him in Shanghainese, “I’d like to buy something.”

“Buy what? You got money?”

“I’ve got silver dollars.”

Immediately a dazzling smile appeared on the shop owner’s face. Ninth Brother reached down to unbind his waistband. But looking down, he discovered that the long cloth strip around his waist wasn’t there. He stood there dumbstruck, just gripping the ends of his shirt. The shop owner put on a long face, thinking this yokel was playing a trick on him. “Go on home, and when you’ve got your money then come back!”

The two pieces of gold Young Li had given him had been wrapped in the waistband and when the steamship docked, he had specially tightened and retightened that cloth. Earlier on the wharf, his stumble and fall had dazed him and once inside the warehouse he had untied the band from his waist to brush off the dust that covered his entire face and body. Then he had dozed off against a stack of cargo. When he left, he had forgotten about his waistband. However, while there were still some silver dollars in his trouser leg, he wasn’t sure how much a silver dollar was worth. Enough to buy a boat ticket back home? He bent over and pinched at his trouser leg. The silver dollars were there, safe and sound. By this time, he had no desire to buy anything and he slunk away under the sarcasm and ridicule of the shop owner.

Ninth Brother remembered the address of his old classmate and found his home. Ten years before he had been invited to a dinner party there. This classmate, surnamed Yang, was slightly older than the others, and so they all called him “Old Yang.” By then Old Yang was already married and his wife had a fine hand at cooking.

Mrs. Yang did not recognize her husband’s good friend. She thought he was some beggar, and said with ill grace, “You’ve come to the wrong place. I’m starving to death here myself!”

“Mrs. Yang!” Ninth Brother called out. She took a closer look at him but still didn’t dare believe that he was her husband’s good friend Young Mr. Lin. “Mrs. Yang, your wine dumpling soup was really delicious.” When she was sure he was the refined and genteel Young Mr. Lin, her lips trembled and she began to cry. Old Yang was also an army doctor and had already been gone from Shanghai for five years. Three years ago, his last remittance home had come down from Shanxi Province. After that, there had been no word. Now, at the sound of the woman’s tragic sobbing, Ninth Brother thought of his long-separated Second Sister.
Oh, Second Sister, useless and incompetent as I am, I overrated myself and thus I abandoned home and family. I thought I could share the cares and sorrows of our country, but have ended up as a vagabond bum. Second Sister, you’ve suffered so. I can’t face you from shame
.

The Yang household consisted of all ages. Old Mrs. Yang’s mind was confused and she mostly kept to her bed. Every day Mrs. Yang herself coughed incessantly. As an internist, Ninth Brother could tell there was something seriously wrong with her. What worried him even more was that because of the straitened circumstances of their family, the two children had stopped going to school. The thirteen-year-old son was hauling heavy sacks at the train station to make ends meet at home.

His face washed and teeth brushed, and wearing Old Yang’s clothes, Ninth Brother restored some measure of his graceful bearing of those earlier years. Two days had passed and he hadn’t mentioned the matter of his returning to Old Town. The few silver dollars might perhaps be just enough for travel expenses, including the cost of the necessary travel permit. But the circumstances of the Yang household were right there in clear view.
Since God has let me see the difficulties they are in and he even wants me to stretch forth my hand to help them, how could I just pack up and walk away?
Ninth Brother struggled with this problem. He had already given Mrs. Yang two silver dollars and that very evening she sent the money to the landlord’s home. There was more than half a year’s rental in arrears and the landlord had given his ultimatum: if she couldn’t hand over the rent he would put them on the street with nothing but the clothes on their backs.

At this moment, Ninth Brother was sitting in a cramped little room. Mrs. Yang and the two children were away. Only Old Mrs. Yang was there, lying on her bed, babbling endlessly. On the wall, there was a printed picture of the cross. As Ninth Brother gazed at it, all sorts of feelings welled up inside him. He closed his eyes and prayed:
O Heavenly Father, thank you for watching over me at all times, and letting me get through all the dangers in this perilous journey. Without your great love, my life wouldn’t be worth that of an ant. O Heavenly Father, it is from your blessings that all along the way I have met good people. Today my steps are resting awhile at the Yang family. You know better than I the difficult circumstances they face. I would really like to help them, but even if I did everything within my power, it would be just a cup of water poured out on a cart of burning firewood. Tell me what I should do
.

That evening, Mrs. Yang returned from doing the washing at someone’s house. She sat in a chair, coughing and coughing. Ninth Brother suspected she had caught tuberculosis. When he urged her to seek treatment at a hospital, Mrs. Yang glared coldly at him. That look made it impossible for him to hold on to the remaining silver dollars—four of them in all. He handed her three of them and kept one, thinking that tomorrow he would go to the hospital where he had once practiced and get a prescription for her.

He had no travel fare now. And the road back home was a very long one. But, in fact, Ninth Brother’s heart felt at rest. On this night, as he and the older Yang boy squeezed into the little attic, he slept better than he had for the past several days.

Quite early on the second morning, Ninth Brother had just gotten on the electric tram headed for the hospital, when, looking up, he saw a familiar face, a former classmate from Hangzhou in the church school. The two men were overjoyed at this chance meeting. This fellow had just moved from Hangzhou to Shanghai and he was on his way to work at the very hospital that Ninth Brother was going to. When he found out about the Yang family, he gave his full assurance that he would look after Mrs. Yang and the two children. This Hangzhou classmate was from quite a prosperous family and for him to assist the Yang family hardly required any effort on his part. Before alighting from the tram, they had arranged everything. Ninth Brother was so happy he made a total spectacle of himself. Standing in the streetcar, he grasped his two hands together in front of everybody and exclaimed loudly, “Thank you, God! Thank you, Lord Jesus!”

Several days later, the Yang family totally broke free of all their difficulties. Mrs. Yang and her old mother-in-law received the best medical treatment and the two boys were back at school. All the problems of the travel money to return home and the identity documentation were no longer problems. Ninth Brother was ecstatic, like a happy child that is eager for praise and approval after doing something that pleased an adult. When he went to Sixteen Wharf Landing to buy the boat ticket he said to his dear Heavenly Father:
Your child is incapable on his own but thanks to your great power he helped a family in need. Maybe this was your intention—for your child to stay in Shanghai. Helping others fills my soul with happiness. And I see the Yang family’s lives just as if I were seeing the difficulties Second Sister and the children are going through. I beseech you, Heavenly Father, to protect the homeward path of your child. Your child will all the more love the wife and children you have blessed him with.

Whenever my grandfather got elated, he would radiate a kind of childishness. He would do this even in old age. I still remember normally taciturn Grandpa standing under the sky well, playing at squirt guns with my little cousin. These were rough-and-ready toys made from plastic bottles. Grandpa and grandson paid not a bit of mind to the difference between them in age but played together quite happily. At the time, I was extremely surprised since most of the time my grandfather was rather stern and never said much. His final years were not an easy time for him.

Ninth Brother, a childish smile on his face, stepped lightly up the steps of the ticket sales office, only to be told that three days before the Japanese had sealed off the sea route to Old Town—sealed it off indefinitely!

How to take such a direct blow? And how could he go back to the Yang family in Zhabei? Mrs. Yang had prepared a few small dishes and invited the Hangzhou classmate for Young Mr. Lin’s send-off dinner. They waited until past ten o’clock at night, and only then did Young Mr. Lin appear, so drunk he could barely stand up. They rushed forward and asked what had happened. Leaning on the wall, he pulled over a chair and sat down. He opened his reddened eyes and stared first at Mrs. Yang and then at the Hangzhou classmate. Then he said something that seemed to make no sense at all: “When the nest overturns, how can the eggs remain whole?”