The bus is packed to the door. The American editor stays to argue; the photographer stalks off in a mountainous fit of pique. The writer wanders about the square carrying his chair and seeking inspiration. He finds instead a cluster of Chinese people watching a cardboard box sitting on a folding table. Inside the box is a color TV with a bouncing picture of the front runners. He unfolds his chair and joins the cluster. The beautiful woman from last night's dinner comes to share his seat and translate the TV announcer for him. He takes his thermos of gin and tonic from his bag and pours a cup. This is more like it! Inspiration might yet occur.
11:35. It's Mike Pinocci from the U.S., followed by Bobby Hodge, Inge Simonsen, and Magapius Dasong. Mike snags a bottle from a drink table, drains half, and passes the rest to the tall Tanzanian.
In the midst of the Chinese runners, Yang watches the back of his friend's neck. Too stiff, too tense, poor Zhoa…
20 km. It's Pinocci and Simonsen and the Tanzanian.
25 km. It's still Pinocci, looking good, strong; and tall, black Magapius Dasong still right behind him looking just as strong. An American coach tries to hand Pinocci a cup of Gatorade but he's too late. The Tanzanian takes it instead. After a sip lie comes alongside Pinocci and hands him the cup. The runners grin at each other.
28 km. Pinocci and Magapius Dasong side by side; then Simonsen, struggling a little; then, coming up from the pack, the lanky Swede, Erikstahl.
Nearing 30 km a motorcycle cop shoots past to drive a spectator back toward the curb, and Magapius swerves to avoid the bike and clips Pinocci's heel with his foot. The American trips, rolls across his hip and over his shoulder, and comes back up still running, now third behind the Tanzanian and the Korean, Go Chu Sen. He sticks with the front runners, but his wide eyes reveal the fracture in his concentration.
Magapius lets the Korean pass. He shoots Pinocci a quick look of apology and he falls back alongside.
A stretch of rough road jars something loose in the trailing TV camera. The runners become indecipherable blots of color for a few miles.
The crowd back at the square is finally showing signs of restlessness. A drumming can be heard – a banging of fists on empty metal, relentless and rhythmless. A military wagon bores through a throng to check it out…
The wind tries to stir up some relief, swirling shreds of paper across the enforced emptiness of the square. The wagon comes driving back, a half dozen scuffed teenagers in custody, one with a bloody ear. All aboard stare stoically ahead, the catchers and the caught.
35 km. The camera is repaired. The picture clears. Pinocci is falling back, favoring his hip, Magapius still steady alongside, leaving Simonsen, the Korean, and Erikstahl to fight for the front. In the Chinese pack Yang realizes he has passed the 35-km cut-off point. He will be allowed to finish. He feels fine. He begins to open up – why not? As he passes Zhoa, his laboring friend exhorts him to go on, Yang. Chi oh.
Far, far back, Bling is panting oh shit, shit, shit. He sees he'll never make the 35-km cut-off. That smug mother Mude! Will he ever be delighted to hear Mr. Wise-ass Wu was not even capable of finishing.
The Japanese TV crew is disappointed with the crowd action. They're dead as stumps, these Chinamen! A sound man walks to the middle of the street with a bullhorn and tries to get something worked up. At first the crowd is puzzled. Yell? They have nothing to yell.
1:21. Kjell Erikstahl breaks the tape: 2 hours, 15 minutes, 20 seconds. Far from outstanding but, considering the locale, the rigors, the air, it's enough. Close on his heels is Norwegian Simonsen (2:15:51) and third is Jong Hyon Li of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (2:15:52). Li is followed by his Korean compatriot Go Chu Sen, then Chuck Hattersly in fifth, the only Yank to take home one of the vases. The limping American and the tall, gliding Tanzanian tie for tenth. They embrace at the finish line.
On the final turn around the huge square Yang is suddenly passing runner after runner, to the crowd's delight. Now they have something to cheer about. The Japanese sound man gets them going – Chi oh! Chi oh! -- causing the police to gather in worried, fidgeting packs. Crowds should keep calm. When Yang passes two Italians and two Japanese right in front of them they really get into the idea; CHI! OH! CHI! OH! CHI! OH!
Yang is not the first Chinese to finish. He is second behind Peng Jiazheng at 2:26:03. But Peng appears shot at the line, green and gasping, whereas little Yang finishes in a full sprint, arms pumping, looking good, his Gypsy eyes flashing. He's the one the crowd pours across the line to raise on their shoulders.
In Beijing, heroes don't necessarily always finish first.
Later, at the 35-km cut-off, three officials ran into the street with a big red flag to stop Bling. He sped up instead. "Clear the track, you yellow pigs!" He dodged through them, quickening his stride. The officials gave pursuit, to the crowd's great pleasure. The people began to cheer for this plucky laggard. Chi oh indeed. Bling poured it on, yelling back at the receding officials, "You'll never take Bee Wing Lou alive!"
Luckily they gave up after a block and Bling coasted on home. After he finished he apologized to all concerned, swore he was sorry that he had held up traffic for nearly an extra hour and, no, he didn't really know why he had done it.
"Maybe I was motivated by that Red Flag."
The next day was a rest day for the runners, another mandatory tour for the press. This time, the journalists were told, to the rural countryside to see marvels even more ancient!
The little bus had stopped on the statue-lined road to Ming's tomb to allow the photographer out for pictures. The writer also dismounted; he was picking up inner rumblings about a Yellow Peril attack. He trotted across the road and back into a pear orchard about five rows, to consult with his colon.
Hunkered among the fallen pears and the waving weeds, he tried to think about the assignment. The team was getting plenty pics and much info, but no story. That's the trouble with the New Policy of the Open Bamboo Curtain – there's too damn much info to get a unifying hook into. What was needed to hang this all on was a good old Pearl Buck plot, he was telling himself, or a fresh inspiration; then he looked closer at the handful of leaves he'd torn from the weeds. Holy shit, there it was all around him, acres of it, waving wild and free. Ming-a-wanna!
He returned to the bus blazing with excitement. He could hardly wait to get through the echoing tombs and chilly temples and back to his private hotel room. It burned in his pockets like money wanting to be spent. There are no headshops in Beijing but plenty pipes, sold as mementos of the Opium War days.
In his room he crammed seeds stems and all in the clay bowl and fired up. He sighed a grateful cloud. By the time his colleagues called at his door to tell him the bus was waiting to take them to the farewell ceremonies at the Peking Hotel, a plot had been conceived, fertilized, and, if he said so himself, well laid. All that was needed now was the hatching.
Bling and the writer's journalistic colleagues were at first understandably opposed.
"You're crazy. Worse, you're high. What do you think? They're just gonna let us fly out of here with him in a barrel like a souvenir coolie?"
"No, I'm serious. Consider the terrific publicity, the headlines: Shoe Company Smuggles Track Defector Out of Red China. I mean think of it. A couple years at Oregon under a good trainer he'll win the Boston Marathon! Sell a zillion damn shoes! I saw the stats. He went from a 2:06 at 35 km to 2:29 at the finish. That's 4:53 a mile for the last leg of a marathon, a world-record pace. The kid's a treasure, I'm telling you, a diamond that will never be cut without the proper training. Consider it. It's in the kid's best interests.