Tiger's Heart (21 page)

On New Year’s Eve I returned to the Shen Hamlet, distraught by the news about Xiao Yi. It was my first time going back to the hamlet since I had left for the South the second time. After I had settled down in Xiamen, I had called my mother and told her that I was making five thousand yuan a month. She simply didn’t believe me.

Now on the plane from Xiamen to Shanghai, I touched my handbag, where I had thirty thousand yuan in stacks. It immediately cheered me up, and I smiled to myself. Finally I was returning to the hamlet with victory instead of lice, with joy instead of sorrow.

Instead of the crowded bus, I took a taxi from the Shanghai airport, and it pulled up to the curb in front of the house just in time for dinner. The cacophony of fireworks rising and exploding filled the air. My mother came to the passenger-side door. “You stupid girl, why take a taxi?” she said. “Instead of twenty yuan for the bus, you pay 360 yuan for the taxi.”

I patted my handbag. “Mama, don’t worry,” I said proudly. “Look, I have money now.”

Seeing her huge happy smile made me forget my troubles with Song and Xiao Yi. I was delighted to make Mama proud. Watching her from behind as we walked to the house, I vowed to try to forget the past and enjoy life in the Shen Hamlet. Here, now, this was what I had—my aging mother on New Year’s Eve, who was finally happy to see my return. She ran around busily, getting me rice and chopsticks. It didn’t matter, I told myself, that my father was icy-cold or that Spring acted as if I had just come back from running to the store for a bottle of soy sauce. I should just be appreciative that I was home and no longer a pauper.

I sat down at the table, on which there were so many dishes that they had to be stacked on top of each other. I saw all the familiar dishes that I used to long for year-round because they were only served on New Year’s Eve. My parents always prepared them, no matter how little money we had, because a lavish dinner on New Year’s Eve was symbolic of good luck and a good beginning to a new year. A whole young chicken, soaked in a creamy broth and stuffed with marinated sticky rice, lay in a big aluminum bowl with a few pieces of winter mushroom floating around it. In the middle of the table, a big smoked pork shoulder was steaming in a ceramic bowl. I knew it would be delicious, as my father always soaked it in soy sauce for at least a month before taking it out and drying it in the sunshine for another month.

I looked across the table at my father. I wanted to say something to him like, Dad, how are you? How is the end of the year treating you? Do you know that I made money in Xiamen? But my tongue flinched when my eyes met his, as cold as the frost outside. I watched him sip rice wine silently, and I shivered. Winter in the unheated house in the Shen Hamlet was as cold as it was in my memory.

20

WHEN THE VACATION
was over, I returned to Xiamen with tangled emotions. The plane circled above the bay for a long time before it was granted permission to land. Looking down at the ocean, as deep-blue and pure as a sapphire, I almost wished that we could stay in the air forever.

The anti-theft door of the apartment was shut tightly, and Old Two didn’t appear to be home. I opened both the anti-theft door and the wooden inside door and paused at the threshold. The apartment was empty and quiet. The Compaq computer sat on the desk in the corner; beside it, the bonsai Xiao Yi and I had bought together was as verdant as ever. Yet Xiao Yi, my former best friend, was not sitting in front of the screen. In fact, she would never be there again, and I had ultimately been part of the scheme to get rid of her. The guilt gnawed at me.

I put my luggage down on the floor and went to the computer. Besides Xiao Yi, there was one other person who I had thought of often when shivering in the much colder weather in the Shen Hamlet—Steven. It would have been so nice to hear a sweet word from him at that moment. But when I opened my mailbox, there was nothing from him or anyone else. Had the passionate American lost interest in me?

I heard a key jingling in the lock, and then Old Two entered, carrying two plastic bags of fresh vegetables and some seafood.

“Oh, Ah-Juan, you are back,” he said.

“Yeah, I just got in.”

“I bought some fresh crabs and jumbo shrimp for dinner. Do you want to help me cook?”

“Oh, no, Brother Two, you know I don’t know how to cook. I’ll burn down the kitchen.” After a short hesitation, I said, “Brother Two, did you call Xiao Yi during Spring Festival?”

“Yes. I told her that she didn’t need to come back to Xiamen. Oh my God, you would never guess that such a skinny girl could yell so loudly and curse with such dirty words, like a peasant woman. Even worse, her mother took over the phone and yelled at me even more.” Old Two grinned and shook his head.

I turned my eyes back to the computer screen, to my empty inbox. Downstairs, the young boy from Shandong Province had already set up his barbecue stand on the sidewalk and lit the coal in the stomach of the sheet-iron stove. While fanning the fire with his tattered bamboo fan, he quickly sprinkled spices on the skewers and flipped them. Soon smoke filled the air, and the smell of marinated lamb strips rose all the way up to us on the nineteenth floor. Xiao Yi and I used to run downstairs at this time every day, get at least ten skewers of these strips, and then walk along the street in the evening breeze, enjoying the delicious meat.

I made the pain curl inward, like an injured snail. Everything was memory now. I told myself to let it go. I took a deep breath and grabbed the phone. I needed to talk to Steven. It was the first time I had called America. He was the only person I could think of talking to at that moment.

His melodious voice came to my ears: “James Bond.”

“Hello, Steven. It’s Caroline, from China.” My mouth was dry.

“Oh, Caroline! Darling, what a surprise. I was just thinking about you and how nice it would be if you were here. We could lie in front of the fireplace and make love to each other.”

I giggled at his words but didn’t forget the reason I was calling.

“Steven, you haven’t written to me for many days. You don’t like me any more?”

“Oh, Caroline, of course I still like you.” His voice still sounded like a spring breeze, but then he sighed wearily. “But I’ve become more realistic about our future together. You are so far away, and I’m still living in my sister’s basement, and I need to support my three kids. I am not sure what we can do.”

I stood at the desk, holding the phone to my ear and feeling disappointment lick me like a snake. But you said you would come to China and marry me and become my knight on a white horse, I thought. You said you had never met such a loving person as me. You said you would give me perfume and flowers every day. Millions of questions swirled in my mind, but I only said, curtly, “I understand.” We hung up.

So all my feelings for Steven had been wasted? I sat down in the chair, feeling sad. Page after page of love letters and poems, boxes of chocolate and perfumes—what was this American man doing if he wasn’t serious about the courtship?

A chime from the computer caught my attention.

A chat window popped up with a message from Ethan, one of the American men who had responded to my Yahoo ad and whom I had been talking to sporadically. “Hey, Caroline, how are you?”

“Not good, really. This guy I once told you about, Steven, who I am in love with, isn’t coming to China.”

“Oh, I’m sorry to hear that. Maybe he was never serious about it. After all, China is half a world away.”

Ethan’s words seemed light-hearted but made sense. “But why did he write so many letters and send perfume to me? Why did he talk to me almost every day?”

“I don’t know. He is nuts perhaps. Some people talk the talk but never walk the walk.”

“What do you mean?”

Before Ethan could answer, Old Two called my name. I turned my head, still enmeshed in my own doleful world. With his index finger, Old Two signaled me to follow him. In a haze, I stood up and walked into his room.

“Ah-Juan, now Xiao Yi is gone. It’s just you and me. We ought to look after each other. You are from Suzhou, and I am from Shanghai. We are practically fellow townsmen,” he said genially.

I knew this old fox didn’t give a damn that we were from the same region. Like a typical person from Shanghai, he never even bothered to look straight into my eyes.

“Ah-Juan, I know you think I am just Song’s watchdog, but there’s more to me than that. I am doing so much for him, but that greedy son of a bitch is only giving me five thousand yuan a month.”

Five thousand yuan a month, and he was still complaining? All that for the little work he was doing? This man had only completed elementary school. His greediness amazed me.

“Do you know how much Song has been making since we started this business? You have no idea, do you? He tells you he is not making anything, doesn’t he?”

I kept quiet, trying to hide my enormous curiosity and waiting for him to continue his speech.

“He just ordered a Toyota SUV shipped directly from Japan, the newest model. Do you know how much it is worth? Seven hundred thousand yuan! How can he afford such an expensive thing if he hasn’t made millions from this business?”

Fury flared up within me at this news. Son of a tortoise! I’d been sure he had been concealing his earnings, but I’d had no idea it was so much. He had lied to Xiao Yi and me. He had put all the profit into his own pocket, and I hadn’t gotten a penny. I was too angry to keep pretending I didn’t care.

“Bastard!” I said, enraged. “He’s been lying to me all this time! Brother Two, do you know that in our original agreement he was supposed to share ten percent of the profit with me?”

“I am well aware of that,” Brother Two said, exuding sympathy.

“I am not going to let him keep doing this. He’s got to give me all the money I deserve. Otherwise I’ll leave.” I pounded my fist on Old Two’s desk.

“Ah-Juan, you are so silly. Think about it. Do you think Song will give you the money if you go and fight with him? Not only may he not do it, he would also become suspicious of you in the future. That can only worsen the situation.” Old Two’s words made sense. Maybe this old fox was not as bad as I had thought. Maybe he was trying to help me.

“Let me teach you a good way to get back at him, Ah-Juan. You are so silly. Why don’t you ask for kickbacks from the foreign devils? Song doesn’t even know a word of what you are talking about with them.”

I hadn’t expected this, and I pondered the idea for a second while Old Two fiddled nervously with his sleeves.

“Taking kickbacks? It’s not morally right. Besides, would the devils give me kickbacks? What would they think of me? And what if Song finds out?”

“Ah-Juan, don’t be stupid. Does Song think of you when he puts all the money in his own pocket?”

I shook my head.

“And as far as the devils go, they don’t care as long as they can make money. Give Song a slightly higher quote, and ask the devils to wire the money back to you. And don’t worry. I will help you to make sure Song doesn’t find out. He trusts me, and I won’t ask much. How about you just give me forty percent of the kickbacks you get?”

Now I knew why he was helping me, the old fox. But if he could help hide the kickbacks from Song, forty percent was worth it.

“Brother Two, forty percent is fair. I’m not worried about that. But are you sure this is going to be okay? I don’t want to get into trouble. It’s not right to take kickbacks.”

“Nah, no worries. We’re okay, as long as this thing is only known by you and me, the heaven and the earth. Don’t tell
anyone
!” He pressed his finger to his lips.

My thoughts were muddled, and I couldn’t make a decision right on the spot. “Brother Two, I just don’t feel good about taking kickbacks. Let me think about it.”

“Ah-Juan, be smart. Nobody else can take care of you in this world, only yourself.”

I went to my bedroom and shut the door behind me. For a while, I sat on my bed, trying to clear my mind and weighing the morals in my head against the greed in my heart. I remembered what one of my elementary school teachers had said years ago: “Living in this world, don’t lie, don’t cheat; because if you do, you will get punished.” An honest person would get rewarded eventually, he had told us, standing at the blackboard in front of the room full of children.

I wondered when Director Yip, the Zhou brothers, and Song would get their punishment. They cheated the banks, lied to the tax bureau, and betrayed their wives and employees, but they still got to drive around in Mercedes, bury their faces in shark-fin soup, and watch their businesses grow bigger and the number of their mistresses get larger. After seeing all the inequality, tears, struggles, and cruelty in life, was it possible to really believe in justice?

I called home. I couldn’t think of anyone to talk to except my mother, who I was sure would convince me that only fools believed in truth and honesty these days.

“Mama, Old Two just told me a crazy idea of making money,” I whispered to her on the phone, eyes glancing at the window nervously, as though there were eavesdroppers on the other side of the glass.

“What?” She was interested right away.

“Ask foreign suppliers for kickbacks.”

“Is it safe?”

“It should be. I am the only one who talks to the foreigners. I just need to change the prices on the faxes before sending them to my boss, and then I can ask the devils to wire the money back to me. I know this can work. I could get a lot of money.”

“Really?” My mother sounded more excited than I was.

“Yes. But I just don’t think taking kickbacks is right. Only bad people take kickbacks.”

“Don’t be stupid. Nowadays, in this society, who
doesn’t
take kickbacks? You have to give a few yuan to the head of a canteen when you sell a few chickens to them, and high officials and businessmen are putting thousands and millions of government money into their own pockets under the table. I don’t know much, but I do know the seamy side of this society. You’re a fool if you don’t take kickbacks.”

That night, holding the fax with the offer for KOKETT machines that Jacques had just sent, which I knew my boss would probably buy, I lost myself in my own train of thought for a while. Next to me was an earlier fax from Jacques, who had simply replied
No Problem!
to my request for kickbacks.

I took out the white-out bottle, shook it slightly, chose a number on the fax, and covered it. Once it was dry, with a black pen, I carefully wrote the number 1 on the white spot. I held the fax up before me and exhaled deeply. The quote for the KOKETT machines had changed from “$10,000 each” to “$11,000 each.” I put down the fax and tried to relax. My hands were sweaty. I made a copy of the new fax and sent it to Song in his home town, then dropped into my chair, telling myself that I had just added another big dirty secret to my shoulders, one that I would carry for the rest of my life.

Song confirmed the price with me on the phone. “Book it! Thirty-percent down payment will be sent tomorrow from Hong Kong, as usual.” After giving the order, he quickly hung up. I put the receiver back on the base, feeling ecstatic. I leaned my elbows on the desk, crossed my fingers, pressed them against my forehead, and told myself to calm down. I had made a lot of money in just a few minutes, but I shouldn’t be so proud. After all, it was black money. Yet I couldn’t help wondering: Am I rich now? Will I be rich soon?

I picked up the phone and called home to tell my mother how much money I had made.

“You don’t have to ever worry about money from now on,” I told her. “I’ll wire a lot to you. You don’t have to get up at three o’clock in the morning in the winter to sell vegetables any more. Song buys a lot of machines every year, and I will make so much more,” I babbled to her rapturously.

She was delighted. “Really? I cannot believe this. Really? We’ll be rich? But I need to sell vegetables. What if you can’t make any more? Oh, I should not tell this to anyone. Oh, I cannot believe this.”

I pictured her rough, wrinkled skin and trembling lips at the other end of the phone, and felt so happy, so satisfied and proud, that I told myself I could just die on the spot. No longer was I the useless daughter who couldn’t plant rice shoots, couldn’t cook, and hardly even talked. To think that my father had at one point disowned me. Miserable memories from home began to rush back to me, all the pain I had endured feeling like they hated me. I stood still, my immense joy quickly transforming into resentment.

“Mama, go to sleep,” I said coldly and hung up.

One evening a few weeks later when I returned to the apartment from a walk, Old Two was waiting for me at the door with a pale face. He had found a letter from the Tax Bureau lying at the door. Xiao Xi had sent a letter to the government accusing our company of evading taxes.

She had even listed everybody’s name: “. . . with the help of a girl called Shen Juanjuan. . . .” Old Two read the letter aloud, word by word. Then he put it down. “I told you how slimy she was. You didn’t believe it,” he whined. “You were her best friend, and see what she did to you?”