At Cheng's house we managed to get our hands on a rusty dagger with a blade shaped like a cow's ear. We didn't want a big knife but one we could hide on us, and this one fit the bill. We carried a whetstone into our house, turned up the volume on the TV, shut the door, blocked out the windows and then began to sharpen the knife with which we were going to kill Lao Lan.
My sister and I seemed to have become honoured guests at homes throughout the village during that time and were fed nothing but the best food. We ate camel's hump (a lump of fat), sheep's tail (pure lard), fox brain (a plate full of cunning). I can't list every item we ate, but I have to tell you that at Cheng Tianle's, besides bone soup, we were treated to a bowl of a green, bitter liquor. He didn't tell us what it was but I guessed its origin—liquor in which had been steeped the gallbladder of a leopard. I assumed that the bones in the pot were those of that same leopard. So Jiaojiao and I ate leopard gallbladder—the so-called seat of courage—which converted us from timid, mouse-like creatures into youngsters whose courage knew no bounds.
By plying us with the best food they had, my fellow villagers instilled us with enviable strength and courage. And though no one breathed a word about it, we had no doubts about what lay behind all this nurturing. Usually, after we'd been treated to a fine meal, we'd thank our hosts with vague expressions of appreciation: ‘Elder Master and Mistress, Elder Uncle and Aunt, Elder Brother and Sister, please be patient. My sister and I are people who know their history and are committed to the cause of righteousness. We will avenge every slight and repay every kindness.’
Every time I uttered this little monologue, a sense of solemnity flooded my mind and hot blood raced through my veins. Those who heard our little piece were invariably moved; their eyes would light up and heartfelt sighs escape their mouths.
The day of reckoning drew nearer.
And then it arrived.
A meeting was held that day in the plant's conference room to discuss a major structural change—the shift from a collective ownership to a stockholder system. Jiaojiao and I were stockholders, with twenty shares each. I won't waste time talking about that foolish meeting; the only reason it became the talk of the town, so to speak, was because of our attempt to wreak vengeance. I drew the dagger from my belt. ‘Lao Lan,’ I shouted, ‘give me back my parents!’
My sister pulled a pair of rusty scissors from her sleeve—before we set out I'd asked her to sharpen them but she'd said that rusted scissors would give him tetanus. ‘Lao Lan,’ she shouted, ‘give me back my parents!’
We raised our weapons and ran at Lao Lan behind the podium.
Jiaojiao tripped on the stairs, fell flat on her face and began to bawl.
Lao Lan stopped talking, walked over and picked her up.
He turned up her lip with a finger, and I saw a cut—there was blood on her teeth.
My plans too fell flat. Like a punctured tyre, I felt my anger dissipate. But then how would I face my fellow villagers or fulfil my debt to my parents if I just gave up? So, holding my breath, I raised my dagger once more and, as I moved towards Lao Lan, I had a vision of my father moving towards the same man with his hatchet held high.
Lao Lan dried Jiaojiao's tears with his hand. ‘That's a good girl,’ he said, ‘don't cry, don't cry…’ There were tears in his eyes as he handed my sister to the barber Fan Zhaoxia in the front row. ‘Take her to the clinic and have something put on this,’ he said.
Fan took her in her arms. Lao Lan bent to pick up the scissors and tossed them onto the podium. Then he picked up a chair, carried it up to me, set it down and sat in it.
‘Right here, worthy Nephew,’ he said as he patted his chest.
Then he closed his eyes.
I looked first at his pitted, freshly shaved scalp, then at his newly shaved chin and the ear my father had taken a bite out of and finally at the trails of tears on his twitching face. Sorrow washed over me along with the shameful desire to throw myself into the son of a bitch's arms. At that moment I realized why Father had buried the hatchet in Mother's skull. But there was no one close to Lao Lan, and I had no argument with anyone in the seats before us—so who was I supposed to stab? I was stuck. But, as they say, heaven doesn't shut all the doors at once. Lao Lan's bodyguard, Huang Biao, burst into the room. That tiger-feeding bastard—killing him would be like cutting off Lao Lan's right arm. So I raised my dagger and charged at him, a war cry on my lips, my mind a blank. I've already told you about Huang Biao. Who was I, a young weakling, to take on a man with his uncommon martial skills? I thrust the dagger at his midsection but he merely reached out, grabbed me by the wrist and jerked my arm upward.
I heard a pop as my shoulder dislocated.
My act of vengeance came to a whimpering end.
For a long time after that, Luo Xiaotong's ‘act of vengeance’ was the most popular joke in the village. My sister and I suffered both from considerable humiliation but also from a spot of fame. Some people even came to our defence and said that we were not to be taken lightly, that Lao Lan's day of judgement would come once we grew up. Be that as it may, people stopped inviting us to their homes for a meal. Lao Lan had Huang Biao's wife send food over a few times, but not for long. Huang Biao put aside any grudges he might have had to deliver a message from Lao Lan: I was invited to return to United Meatpacking as director of the meat-cleansing workshop. I turned him down. I may have been small and insignificant but I had my pride. Did he really expect me to go back to work at the plant, now that neither my father nor my mother was there? But that decision had no effect on my memories of the good times in the plant, and Jiaojiao and I often found ourselves walking past it without intending to. Our legs just carried us over on their own, and there we were confronted by an imposing gateway of black granite that sported a new sign—the company's name in a large bold script—and an automated double gate, all modern improvements. The plant had been transformed from the modest United Meatpacking Plant into the imposing Rare Animals Slaughterhouse Corporation. The grounds were landscaped with exotic plants and trees and the workers streaming in and out all wore white smocks. People familiar with the place knew it was a slaughterhouse, but everyone else would have thought it was a hospital. There was one thing, however, that hadn't changed—the pine rebirth platform, which still stood in a corner of the yard, a symbolic link to the past. One night, both Jiaojiao and I dreamt that we climbed the platform and saw Father and Mother moving rapidly along a newly paved road in a wagon pulled by a camel. She saw both our mothers seated at a table groaning under plates of good food, repeatedly clinking their glasses for a toast. The liquor in their glasses was green, she said, and she wondered if it was infused with leopard gallbladder.
What I suffered from most during those days was neither hunger nor loneliness but embarrassment, a result of my failed attempt to wreak vengeance. It simply could not continue; I had to break the hold of this emotion and find a way to make Lao Lan suffer. Killing him was no longer possible, nor was it absolutely necessary. If I managed to stick a knife in him and end his life, we'd wind up suffering a similar fate. There must be better way. But what? Then it came to me—the perfect plan.
At noon on one fine autumn day Jiaojiao and I strode into the plant with our dagger and scissors. No one tried to stop us. We were met by Huang Biao. When we asked him about Lao Lan, he nodded in the direction of the banquet hall. ‘Hey, brave boy,’ he called out as we walked towards the hall.
Lao Lan and the new plant manager, Yao Qi, were entertaining clients and feasting on delicacies such as donkey lips, cow anuses, camel tongues and horse testicles—everything that sounded terrible but tasted divine. We were greeted by the pungent odours of their meal. Neither Jiaojiao nor I had tasted meat in a long time, and the sight of that loaded table made us drool. But we were on a mission and would not be distracted. Lao Lan spotted us when we stepped into the room. The infectious smile on his face was immediately replaced by a frown. At his discreet signal, Yao Qi stood up to greet us: ‘Ah, it's you, Xiaotong, Jiaojiao. The food is in another room. Come with me.’