He poked and jabbed, but the fire was out. Sweat dotted his forehead. Footsteps sounded beyond the opening, and he backed away, terrified, until he was up against the cold stone wall. He watched as a stumpy-legged young man entered the opening at a crouch, apparently intended to show that the archway was low and that he was tall. Hei-hai drew back his lips. The stumpy young man looked at the now cold forge, partially opened the bellows, then let his eyes fall on Hei-hai, up against the wall. ‘You little son of a bitch,’ he cursed. ‘What do you think you’re doing? The fire’s out and the bellows are crooked. You’re just looking for a beating, little bastard!’ Hei-hai heard the sound of wind overhead. He felt a hard-edged hand swish above him, followed by a crisp smack, like a frog being thrown against a wall.
‘Go back to breaking rocks, you little prick,’ he cursed.
Hei-hai knew that this was the blacksmith, a young man with a pimply face and a nose as flat as a calf ’s, covered with sweat. Hei-hai watched as he deftly put the forge back in order. Then he watched him gather up golden wheat stalks from the corner, stuff them into the forge, light them, and, by gently pumping the bellows, produce wispy white smoke, followed by flames. The blacksmith shovelled in a thin layer of wet coal without letting the bellows stop. Another layer of coal was followed by yet another. Now the choking smoke was burnt brown and reeked of coal. He poked at the coal with his shovel, creating bright red flames. The coal was burning.
Hei-hai uttered an excited cry.
‘You still here, you little prick?’
A tall, slight old man ambled into the opening. ‘I thought the fire was banked,’ he said to the young blacksmith. ‘Why’d you bring it up again?’ The voice rumbled, the words sounding as if they emerged from somewhere below the old man’s diaphragm.
‘This little prick put it out.’ He pointed at Hei-hai with his shovel.
‘Let him pump the bellows,’ the old man said. He wrapped a yellow oilskin apron around his waist, then two more pieces around his ankles to protect his feet. All were covered with holes from hot sparks. Hei-hai knew this was the old blacksmith.
‘Let him pump the bellows, so you can concentrate on your hammer. That way you won’t have to work so hard.’
‘Let a little kid like him pump the bellows?’ the young blacksmith muttered unhappily. ‘He’s so monkey-skinny, the forge will bake him into kindling.’
Liu Taiyang burst in on them. ‘What’s the problem?’ he asked with a look of exasperation. ‘Didn’t you say you wanted someone for the bellows?’
‘Not this one! Just look at him, Director Liu, he’s so skinny I doubt he could lift a fucking coal shovel. Why’d you send him to me? That’s like adding rotten food to a plate just to make it look full.’
‘I know exactly what’s on your devious mind. You were hoping I’d send you a woman to do it, weren’t you? The prettiest one of the bunch, maybe? How about the one in the crimson bandana? Fat chance, you dog turd! Hei-hai, pump the bellows.’ He turned back to the blacksmith. ‘You can teach him, damn it!’
Hei-hai walked timidly over to the bellows, but his eyes were on the old blacksmith’s face, looking almost expectant. He noticed that the old man’s face was the colour of burnt wheat, and that the bulb of his nose looked like a ripe haw berry. He came up and began teaching Hei-hai the basics of pumping a bellows; the boy’s ears twitched as he took in every word.
At first he fumbled with the bellows and was sweating heavily; the heat from the flames pricked his skin painfully. The old blacksmith’s face was expressionless, hard as a broken tile. He didn’t so much as look at Hei-hai, who bit his lip and wiped the sweat from his face with a sunburned arm before it ran into his eyes. His gaunt chest rose and fell like the bellows; puffs of air burst from his mouth and his nostrils.
The mason carried in blunt-nosed chisels to be repaired. ‘Can you hold out?’ he asked Hei-hai. ‘If not, tell me, and you can go back to the rock pile.’
Hei-hai didn’t so much as look up.
‘Pig-headed kid!’ the mason said as he dumped the chisels on the ground and walked off. But he was back shortly, now in company with Juzi. She had tied her bandana around her neck; it framed her face perfectly.
Under the bridge, a light shone in the young blacksmith’s eyes; he swallowed hard, licking his dry, chapped lips with a thickened tongue. His eyes were as big as Hei-hai’s, but the right one was covered by an eggshell-coloured film. Over time he’d come to rely on his left eye, leading to a habit of cocking his head to the right. With his head pillowed on his right shoulder, he sent a burning gaze from his left eye to the woman’s rosy face. An eighteen-pound sledge stood between his legs, head on the ground; he rested his hand on the handle as if it were a cane.
The fire in the forge blazed, sending black smoke and sparks up to the bridge, where it swirled and returned angrily to enshroud the boy’s face. He coughed, his chest wheezed. The old blacksmith gave him a frosty look, took a pipe from a leather pouch that had been rubbed shiny, slowly filled and lit it from the forge, and blew two streams of white smoke into the black cloud, making his nose hairs twitch. He cast an indifferent gaze through the smoke at the mason and Juzi. ‘Not so much coal,’ he said to Hei-hai. ‘Nice, even layers.’
The boy frantically pumped the bellows, his skeletal figure rocking back and forth. Flames shone on his sweaty chest, throwing his ribs into clear relief. His heart beat pathetically, like a tiny mouse tucked between a pair of ribs. ‘Make long, steady motions,’ the old blacksmith said.
Juzi’s eyes filled with tears when she noticed the blood on Hei-hai’s lower lip. ‘Hei-hai,’ she shouted, ‘don’t work for them. Come back with me to break rocks.’ She walked up to the bellows and grabbed his kindling-stick arms. He fought to break her grip, and made throaty noises that sounded like the growl of a dog about to bite. He was so light she had no trouble dragging him out of the opening. His calloused feet scraped noisily across the rocky soil.
‘Hei-hai,’ she said as she set him down, ‘let’s not work for them. The smoke’s too much for you. You’re so skinny there isn’t a drop of sweat left in you — you’re baked dry. Come break rocks with your big sister, that’s much easier.’ She pulled him back toward the rock pile. She had strong arms and large, soft hands that enveloped his wrist as if it were a twig. Hei-hai’s heels ploughed furrows in the rocky soil. ‘Stop that, you foolish little boy,’ she stopped to say. ‘Walk with me.’ She tightened her grip on his wrist. ‘You’re so skinny, I could shatter your bone with a squeeze, so how could you take on that kind of hard work?’ Hei-hai gave her a nasty look, then dropped his head and sank his teeth into her fleshy wrist. ‘Ow!’ she cried out, and let go of his wrist. Hei-hai spun around and ran back to the bridge.
His teeth left deep imprints on her wrist. His canines, practically fangs, had drilled two bloody holes in her skin. The troubled mason ran up and took out a wrinkled handkerchief to wrap around her bleeding wrist. She shoved him away, wouldn’t even look at him, as she bent down, scooped up a handful of dirt, and smeared it over the bite marks.
‘That’s got germs!’ he shouted, startled.