“Thank you, Chief Liu.. . I know that benevolence must be requited. I’ll remember your generosity and benevolence. Tomorrow, I’ll have all of the people of the county kowtow to you and treat you like a deity.”
CHAPTER 5: THE ENTIRE WORLD BOWS DOWN
Chief Liu’s tears of livening finally fell to the ground.
To his surprise, when he came out of the house the next day, everyone was in fact bowing down to him.
When he woke up, the sun had already passed the highest point in the sky and it was almost time for lunch. What Chief Liu never expected was that after the earth-shattering events of the preceding few days, he would be able to sleep soundly that night. Even Secretary Niu’s telephone calls couldn’t wake him.
Chief Liu was exhausted, and needed a good night’s rest. Therefore, he slept soundly for a while.
“If you were home, then why didn’t you answer the phone?”
“I’m sorry, Secretary Niu, I was too tired.”
“The governor called, and all he said was that he wanted the district to send a new Party secretary and a new county chief to Shuanghuai within three days.”
Chief Liu’s mind was in a fog. Secretary Niu asked, “Didn’t you send the documentation for purchasing Lenin’s corpse over to Russia?” Chief Liu replied, “How could we not have sent it? For such a major business transaction, how could we not have sent the paperwork? We even sent two copies of the intent-to-purchase statement, together with duplicates of all of the accompanying documentation.” He added, “After all, Russia is far away, and consequently we are not able to discuss everything face-to-face, but rather had to first send an intent-to-purchase statement.”
Secretary Niu roared, “That’s just great.. . You send someone to the capital with an intent-to-purchase statement together with a separate refusal-to-purchase statement, whereupon the provincial leaders explode with fury, becoming so angry that their intestines leak out.”
Chief Liu knew that he was Shuanghuai’s county chief as well as its Party secretary, but at this point he felt as though he had come up to the edge of a cliff and had nowhere to turn. He added, “Then, what do I now?” Secretary Niu said, “I’ll find you somewhere to go.” He added, “The district just established a new imperial tomb museum, and they moved the tombs of all of the emperors, imperial family, and ministers who were buried in Jiudu, so that people could observe and appreciate them. The museum is a first-tier work unit, and you could be the museum’s director.” After Secretary Niu finished, Chief Liu felt as if he still wanted to say something, but Secretary Niu hung up the phone.
Chief Liu was thereby relieved of his position, and as for what kind of appointment he would be given next, Secretary Niu told him to wait to see what plans the provincial authorities might have. If he was going to be demoted, so be it; as far as punishments went, this was not such a big deal. The important thing, however, was that he still wanted to say something, but Secretary Niu avoided him like the plague and hung up the phone without even waiting to hear what he had to say. The sound of the phone hanging up echoed coldly, like a knife chopping through ice. Chief Liu sat dumbfounded on the edge of his bed, and a long time passed before he realized that he was still undressed. He threw the telephone receiver onto the table as if it were a small whisk broom, and then put on his down jacket. Apart from words associated with the ancient tomb museum, such as “corpse” and “coffin,” Chief Liu’s mind was a complete blank.
As he sat on the edge of his bed staring blankly into space, he didn’t feel the slightest sense of sorrow or unhappiness, and instead merely felt as though everything was unreal, as though he had not yet woken up and these new developments were all just a dream. He wanted to pinch himself to prove that everything was real, and even raised his hand to do so, but at the same time he was afraid that the pinch would confirm that everything was in fact as it appeared to be. Therefore, he lowered his hand again and continued sitting woodenly on the edge of the bed. He gradually sensed something moving in his head, like a breeze blowing away the fog inside. He tried to grasp at the shadows fluttering through his brain, and stared at the wall across from him and thought intently. It occurred to him that although he had agreed to permit Liven to withdraw from society, he had not yet convened a county-level meeting to this effect. Upon remembering the business about Liven withdrawing from society, Chief Liu suddenly stared in shock as a crack opened up in the fog in his brain. This crack developed into an opening, and a bright ray of light shone through it as though a door had just been opened.
Chief Liu emerged from the room.
He wanted to convene a meeting of the county’s standing committee. Given that the new county chief and Party secretary were already on their way to replace him, this would be his final standing committee meeting.
But as soon as Chief Liu walked out of the building, he found that everyone in the city, and even the whole world, was bowing and kowtowing to him. First, the old man who picked up the trash and swept his courtyard every day walked over, smiling. The man was over fifty, and had been cleaning and sweeping the courtyard for more than a decade. He was smiling silently, as though he had just discovered some gold or silver in the trash. He went up to Chief Liu without speaking, then bowed deeply. Only after he had straightened his stick-thin waist did he open his gap-toothed mouth and say, “Thank you, Chief Liu. I hear that after the end of the year, I’ll start receiving several thousand yuan a month for sweeping the courtyard.”
Chief Liu picked up his trash and headed toward a box of garbage. For a moment, he couldn’t understand what had happened. When Chief Liu arrived at the gate of his family’s courtyard, the old gatekeeper was busy washing his dishes, but when he turned and saw Chief Liu, he immediately dropped the dishes and, shaking the water from his hands, ran out and bowed, saying, “Chief Liu, I should kowtow to you, but I’m too old and am no longer able.” He said, “I really never expected that, despite not having any children, I would one day be able to retire and relax. But now you have constructed a nursing home for the county and announced that everyone over sixty is guaranteed a room there and will receive retirement benefits equal to twice their original salary.” When he finished, the water on his stove began boiling, and he rushed back in.
Chief Liu then went out to the street. To his surprise, upon seeing him, the peddlers who had spent the entire winter selling melon seeds, sugarcane, and winter apples, regardless of whether they were men or women, young or old, broke into broad smiles, and thanked him profusely: “Chief Liu, we are grateful to you. Thanks to you, Shuanghuai now has good fortune, and from now on we will no longer need to stand here in the middle of winter selling melon seeds.” Or, they said, “Thank you, Chief Liu, I never expected that after selling apples for most of my life, I would be able to rest at home when I got old and still have enough to eat and drink.”
A thirty-something-year-old woman crossed the street. She had come to the city from the countryside to sell the tiger-headed children’s shoes she had made, and was huddled against a wall to find shelter from the sun and wind. She timidly came over and, once she was standing in front of Chief Liu, began kowtowing, her face covered in tears. She said,
“Chief Liu, people say that after the end of the year we will no longer need to work the land, and instead every month we will be issued free grain, vegetables, and meat. They say that tourists who come to Shuanghuai will pay several dozen yuan for the tiger-headed shoes I make, so that they can take them home and hang them on their wall.”