The Corpse Reader (14 page)

Cí had yearned for months to be back in Lin’an, and now that the capital was in sight, silhouetted against the surrounding hills, his stomach churned. Life was waiting for him in Lin’an.

The barge moved slowly through the mist toward the enormous Zhe estuary, where the river met the filthy western lake, announcing, with an unbearable stink, the richness and misery of the queen of cities: Lin’an, the great prefecture’s capital, old Hangzhou, the center of the universe.

Weak sunlight softly illuminated hundreds of vessels—imposing merchant ships, half-sunk barges like Wang’s, and smaller, worm-eaten wooden skiffs clinging desperately to rotten foundations. The boats tried to maneuver past each other and through the swarm of sampans and reeds for a clear course toward port.

After the calm along the river, now all was frenzied shouts and gasps, warnings, insults, threats, and collisions, and as Wang steered through the churning river traffic, he quickly lost patience. Cí tried to follow Wang’s orders, but the captain was so worked up it wasn’t easy.

“Damn you! Where did you learn to row?” he roared at a passing sailor. “And you, what are you laughing at?” he added, rebuking Ze. “I don’t care how bad your leg is—stop thinking about your whores and lend a hand. We’ll dock farther up, away from the warehouses.”

Ze complied, grumbling, but Cí kept quiet; he had enough to deal with just keeping hold of the barge pole and pushing along.

When the crush of boats had cleared somewhat, Cí looked up. He had never seen Lin’an from the river, and its grandeur struck him all the more. But as they came closer to the docks, the familiarity of the scene also gave him the feeling of a distant family welcoming him home.

The city stood implacable and proud, sheltered by the wooded hills to the west and open to the river on its south side. An enormous flood ditch and a magnificent stone and earth wall prevented access directly from the water.

A slap around the ear from Wang brought Cí to his senses. “Stop gawking and row.”

It was another hour before they found a place to dock; they stopped across from one of the city’s seven great gates, where Wang had decided it would be a good place for Cí and Third to disembark.

“It’s the safest option,” he assured them. “If anyone’s watching for you, it would be near the rice market or the Black Bridge on the north side, where goods are unloaded.”

Cí thanked Wang for his help. During the three-week voyage, the captain had done more for them than all the people in their village ever had. Moodiness aside, Wang was the kind of man you’d trust with your most valuable possessions. And Cí had done just that by trusting him with his and Third’s lives. Wang had gotten them safely to Lin’an, given Cí work, and hadn’t asked questions. In many ways, the captain reminded Cí of his father, and Cí knew he’d never forget him.

Cí took one last look at Ze’s leg and the progress of the scarring under the pressure of the ants’ mandibles. It looked good, but Cí left a few mandibles in place.

“You can pull the rest of the heads off in a couple of days—make sure you leave your own on, though!” Cí slapped him on the back and they both laughed in farewell.

He took Third by the hand and shouldered his bag. Before he got off the boat, he looked back at Wang, wanting to thank him again, but before he could, Wang stepped forward.

“Your wages,” he said, handing Cí a purse of money. “And one piece of advice: Change your name!”

In any other circumstance, Cí would have refused the unexpected money, but he needed it badly to stand a chance of surviving in Lin’an. He tied the purse to his belt and hid it beneath his shirt.

“I…” Before Cí could gather himself to respond, the old captain had turned around and begun to push the barge away from the dock.

Cí trembled as he reached the gigantic wall with its whitewashed bricks and the Great Gate set in its center. Now that his dream to return to Lin’an was within reach, unfamiliar fear gripped him.

Don’t think, or you’ll never do it.

“Come on,” he said to Third. Diving into the vortex of people entering and leaving the city, they stepped across the threshold of the Great Gate.

Everything was exactly as Cí remembered: the shanties lining the banks, the overwhelming smell of fish, the noise of carts rumbling along the streets, food and drink at every turn, sweating youths struggling with bellowing animals, red lanterns swaying on workshop porches, shops selling silk and jade and trinkets, brightly
colored stalls clustered together like carelessly stacked tiles, boisterous stall keepers vending their wares and shooing away children.

They were wandering through all of this when Third started tugging at Cí’s sleeve. She had caught sight of a colorful candy kiosk, presided over by a man who looked like he might be a fortune-teller. Cí was sad that Third was so excited; there was no way he could waste money on a handful of candy. He was just about to say so when the fortune-teller came over.

“Three
qián
,” he said, holding out two pieces of candy to Third.

Cí considered the little old man and his toothless smile as he shook the pieces of candy in his hand. He was wearing a donkey pelt, which gave him a half-repulsive, half-extravagant air and competed as an oddity with his cap, which was made from dried sticks and little windmills. He had a shock of gray hair that made him look like the closest thing to a monkey Cí had even seen.

“Three
qián
,” he insisted, smiling.

Third reached out for them, but Cí stopped her.

“We can’t,” he whispered to her. “Three
qián
would buy us enough boiled rice to feed us for a whole day.”

“Oh!” said Third, turning very serious. “But I think candy might be the only thing I can eat!”

“She has a point,” said the old man. “Take one, try it.”

“Please, we don’t have any money.” He pulled Third’s hand away. “Come on, let’s go.”

“But he’s a fortune-teller,” whimpered Third. “If we don’t buy from him, he’ll curse us!”

“He’s a fake. If he really knew the future, he’d know we can’t spend any money.”

Third nodded. She cleared her throat, but this became a cough, and it stopped Cí cold. It was a cough he knew all too well.

“Feeling all right?”

She coughed again but said she was OK. Cí didn’t believe her, not for a moment.

They made their way toward Imperial Avenue. Cí knew this area near the gate, between the old interior wall and the outer wall. Not a day had passed when he worked for Judge Feng that he hadn’t been down to these slums, the city’s poorest and most dangerous quarter. It was a frightening place, where women sold themselves on corners, men rolled around drunkenly, charlatans and robbers roamed the streets, and if you looked at the wrong person you’d risk having your throat slit. It was also where informants could be found.

Cí began to worry about where they’d sleep that night. He cursed the law that meant government officials were obliged to work somewhere different from their place of birth. It had been put in place to try to stop the nepotism, corruption, and bribery that had been so commonplace. But it also meant government officials were cut off from their families—and that Cí and Third had no one to turn to in all of Lin’an. In truth, they didn’t have any people anywhere—their father’s siblings had emigrated south and died in a typhoon, and they didn’t know their mother’s family.

They had to hurry. When night came, the area would quickly become even more dangerous. They had to find shelter somewhere else.

Third complained, and with good reason. She’d been hungry for quite a while, and Cí hadn’t gotten her any food yet, so she sat down on the ground and refused to go on.

“I’m hungry!”

“We don’t have time now. Get up or I’ll have to drag you around.”

“If we don’t eat, I’ll die,” she said, crossing her arms. “Then you’ll have to drag me around anyway.”

Cí looked at her remorsefully. Yes, they should rest for a bit. He looked around for a food stall, but they all looked too expensive; then he caught sight of one with a small crowd of beggars around it. He approached and asked the prices.

“You’re in luck,” said the vendor, who smelled nearly as offensive as the food he was selling. “Today we’re giving it away.”

In fact, a portion of noodles cost Cí two
qián
—a rip-off.

When he brought the food to Third, she glowered. She’d never liked noodles; they were what the barbarians in the North ate.

“It’s all there is.” Cí sighed.

She placed a few noodles in her mouth but spat them out immediately.

“It tastes like wet clothes!”

“How do you know what wet clothes taste like?” Cí asked sternly. “Stop complaining and eat up.”

But when he tried some, he couldn’t help but spit them out also.

“Filth!”

“Stop complaining and eat up,” sang a rather smug Third.

No sooner had Cí thrown the leftovers to the ground than the nearby beggars were devouring the mush. He grabbed Third and soon found some boiled rice; seeing Third was still hungry after wolfing hers down, he gave her the rest of his.

“What about you?” she said through a mouthful.

“Oh, I had a whole cow for breakfast,” he said, letting out a burp.

“Liar!” she said, laughing.

“I did. When you were still asleep, lazybones.”

Her laughter turned into a coughing fit. Clearly, her cough was getting worse, and the thought of her dying like his other sisters terrified him. He patted her back, and gradually the coughing subsided some, but he could see how much it hurt.

“We’ll get you better. Hang in there.”

He rummaged around in the bag for the dried roots that were her medicine—there were barely a few sprigs left. She chewed and swallowed them, and soon after, the coughing stopped.

“That’s what you get for eating too quickly,” he said, trying to make a joke.

“Sorry,” she said seriously.

Cí’s heart sank.

Racking his brain for a place they could go, he took a street toward Phoenix Hill, a residential area in the south of the city, where they’d lived before. They obviously wouldn’t be able to go back, as the houses were all assigned to current government officials, but he remembered Grandfather Yin, an old friend of his father’s. Cí thought perhaps he would take them in for a few days.

Gradually the five-story buildings of the Imperial Avenue area gave way to detached mansions with curved roofs and ornate gardens; the racket and odors of the crowded area near the gate were replaced with a breeze through trees and the sweet, clean smell of jasmine. Cí briefly savored the feeling of being back in a world where he might dare to belong.

By the time they knocked on Grandfather Yin’s door, it was sunset. Grandfather Yin’s second wife, a haughty, unfriendly woman, opened the door. As soon as she saw them she screwed up her face.

“What are
you
doing here? Do you want to ruin us?”

Cí was dumbstruck; it had been more than a year since they’d seen each other, but it was as though the woman had been expecting them. Before she could slam the door in their faces, Cí asked after Grandfather Yin.

“He isn’t here! He won’t see you!”

“Please. My sister is unwell.”

She looked at the girl in disgust.

“All the more reason for you to go away.”

“Who’s there?” Cí recognized Grandfather Yin’s voice coming from inside the house.

“Some beggar! He’s going already,” she shouted, stepping outside and leading Third by her arm to the street so that Cí had to follow. “This is a decent house, get it? We don’t need thieves like you coming around and muddying our name!”

“But—”

“Don’t play dumb! Sheriff Kao went through the neighborhood earlier today, and he had an enormous dog with him. He snooped around the whole house and told us what you did in the village, get it? He said you’d probably try here. I don’t know what possessed you to flee with that money, but if it weren’t for the memory of your father, I’d march you straight to the police and report you myself.” She let go of Third’s arm and pushed her toward Cí. “Make sure you don’t come back. If I catch you anywhere near the house, I swear I’ll make every single gong in the city ring out, and then there’ll be nowhere for you to hide.”