The next morning, before the sun was up and when the moon still showed weakly in the sky, a panicky flock of crows flew over from the worksite, cawing loudly. Their dirty feathers dotted the floodgate. A dozen grey clouds stood on the eastern horizon like tall trees, tattered streamers dangling from their branches.
When he crawled out from under the bridge, Hei-hai was freezing, shivering as he had a few days earlier during an attack of the shakes. Director Liu had returned the day before, and was furious with what he found. He’d fulminated against the workers, who had showed up early on this day to work extra hard. The constant sound of hammering was like the croaking of pond frogs. There were many chisels to repair, and the blacksmith attacked them with great industry, turning out beautiful work. The masons who came to exchange the worn chisels praised his work, saying he’d surpassed the old blacksmith; the chisels tore through the rocks.
As the sun climbed into the sky, the mason came with two chisels to be repaired. Newly purchased, they were worth four or five yuan apiece. As the blacksmith glanced at the spirited mason, a cold ray of light shot from his good eye. The mason was unmindful of the man’s expression — the eyes of the very happy only see happiness. Hei-hai knew that the blacksmith was going to try to make a fool out of the mason, and that frightened him. The blacksmith heated the two chisels until they were white as silver, laid them on the anvil and hammered the ends into points. Then he dunked them all at once in the bucket.
The mason walked off with the chisels. The grinning blacksmith eyed Hei-hai. ‘What makes that asshole think he’s good enough to use my chisels?’ he said. ‘What do you think, son?’
Hei-hai cowered in a corner. Before long, the mason returned with the chisels and flung them at the blacksmith’s feet. ‘One-eye,’ he growled, ‘what kind of work is this?’
‘What are you shouting about, asshole?’
‘Open that eye of yours and take a look.’
‘They must be flawed chisels.’
‘Bullshit! You did this to make me look bad.’
‘So what if I did? Just looking at you makes my blood boil!’
‘You, you…’ The mason was white with rage. ‘Come over here if you’ve got the balls!’
‘I’m not scared of you.’ The blacksmith untied his oilcloth apron, baring his back, and moved toward the mason like a brown bear.
After taking off his jacket and red athletic shirt, the mason stood on the sandy ground in front of the floodgate in his undershirt. He was tall and husky, with a student’s face, solid as a tree. The blacksmith’s feet, still covered with oilcloth to protect them from the hot metal, scraped noisily along the rocky ground. He had long arms, stumpy legs and a muscular chest.
‘Do we talk it out or fight it out?’ the blacksmith asked scornfully.
‘Up to you,’ the mason said in the same contemptuous tone.
‘Then you’d better go home and have your father sign a guarantee that he won’t come to me for a new son after I beat you to a pulp.’
‘And you’d better go home to prepare your coffin.’
After a spate of insults, the two men drew closer. Hei-hai remained cowering in the corner. He watched the first exchange, which was comical. The mason spat in the blacksmith’s face. Then the blacksmith swung at the mason, who stepped back, the fist missing its mark. More spit, more swings, another retreat, another miss. But before the mason could spit a third time, the blacksmith hit him on the shoulder, spinning him around.
A crowd gathered, amid startled cries. ‘Stop fighting,’ they shouted. ‘Stop it!’ But no one broke it up, and the shouts soon died out. Everyone held their breath and watched wide-eyed as the two combatants, utterly unlike in physique, pitted strength against strength. Juzi, her face white with fear, gripped the shoulders of the woman next to her. Each time her lover was hit, she moaned, the area around her eyes like dark chrysanthemums.
As they traded punch for punch, neither appeared to be winning. The mason’s height served him well, but his showy punches lacked steam, and he could not put his opponent down. The blacksmith’s movements were slow, but his powerful fists landed with authority, and spun the mason around. Then one of the mason’s punches connected, rocking the stunned blacksmith. Seeing an opening, the mason attacked, raining punches on the blacksmith, who hunched over, stuck his head under the mason’s arms and wound his arms around his waist. The mason held the blacksmith in a headlock, and they began wrestling, advancing and retreating, back and forth, ending with the mason flat on his back on the sandy ground.
Shouts erupted from the crowd.
The blacksmith stood up, spitting blood and tilting his head, like the winner at a cockfight.
The mason got up off the ground and charged. Two bodies, one light, the other dark, were once again entwined. This time the mason stayed low to protect his belly, crotch and thighs. Four arms grappled. The mason was sometimes able to pick the blacksmith up and whirl him around, but could not throw him down. He was panting heavily and sweating from head to toe; there was not a drop of sweat on the blacksmith. The mason’s strength was ebbing, his movements were erratic and he was seeing double. As he slackened, the blacksmith broke his hold and wrapped his arms around the man’s waist so tightly he couldn’t breathe. He was back on the ground again.
The mason lost the third round badly. The blacksmith crouched down, lifted him up on his shoulders and flung him at least two metres.
Juzi, weeping, rushed over to help the mason to his feet. The pleasure vanished from the blacksmith’s face as he heard her cry, replaced by a look of misery. As he stood there blankly, the mason got to his feet, pushed Juzi’s hands away, scooped up a handful of sand and flung it into the blacksmith’s face, temporarily blinding him. The blacksmith roared like a wild animal and frantically rubbed his good eye. The mason charged, throttling the blacksmith and forcing him to the ground, where he pummelled him as if he were beating a drum.
At that moment, a dark figure burrowed out from between the legs of the crowd. It was Hei-hai. He flew like a bird onto the back of the mason, grabbed his cheeks with hands like black claws and pulled with all his might. The man bared his teeth, parted his lips and screamed — ‘Ow, ow!’ — before thumping to the sandy ground again.
The blacksmith struggled to sit up and began feeling around on the ground for rocks, picking them up and flinging them in all directions. ‘Bastard! Lousy dog!’ Curses flew with the rocks, landing on the onlookers like a hailstorm. They scattered. Juzi screamed, and the blacksmith’s hand stopped dead. Tears had washed the sand out of his eye, which could now see, though not clearly. He saw a white sliver of stone lodged in Juzi’s right eye, as if she’d grown a fungus. With a screech, he covered his eye and fell to the ground, where he writhed in agony.
Hei-hai’s hands relaxed the moment he heard her scream. His fingers had dug two bloody, coal-smeared gouges in the mason’s cheeks. In the midst of chaos, he slinked over to a spot under the bridge and squatted down in the darkest corner he could find to watch the pandemonium at the worksite, his teeth chattering.
Chapter Six
There was no sign of the mason or Juzi the next day at the worksite, which was shrouded in gloom. Overhead the sun seemed to be convulsing, while below a bleak autumn wind raised waves in the jute field, over which flocks of sparrows cried out fearfully. The wind raised dust as it passed under the bridge and coloured much of the sky yellow. It did not die down until after nine o’clock, when the sun returned to normal.