‘Shut up!’ Magistrate Cao barked.
‘Who said you could talk?’ Five Monkeys Shan castigated Great-Granddad.
‘Damned fools!’ Magistrate Cao banged his fist on the table, causing Five Monkeys Shan and Great-Granddad to shrink in terror. As a benevolent expression reappeared on the magistrate’s face, he pointed to the bodies beneath the willow tree and asked, ‘You there, woman, do you know those two men?’
Grandma glanced out of the corner of her eye, and her face paled. She shook her head in silence.
‘They are your husband and your father-in-law. They have been murdered!’ Magistrate Cao shouted.
Grandma reeled before collapsing to the ground. The crowd surged forward to help her up, and in the confusion her silver combs were knocked loose, releasing clouds of black hair like a liquid cataract. Grandma, her face the colour of gold, sobbed for a moment, then laughed hysterically, a trickle of blood seeping from her lower lip.
Magistrate Cao banged the table again. ‘Listen, everyone, to my verdict. When the woman Dai, a gentle willow bent by the wind, magnanimous and upright, neither humble nor haughty, heard that her husband had been murdered, she was stricken with overpowering grief, spitting a mouthful of blood. How could a good woman like that be an adulteress who plotted the death of her own husband? Village Chief Five Monkeys Shan, I can see by your sickly pallor that you are an opium smoker and a gambler. How can you, as village chief, defy the laws of the county? That is unforgivable, not to mention your tactics to defile someone’s good name, which adds to your list of crimes. I am not fooled in my judgements. No disciples of evil and disorder can evade the eyes of the law. It must have been you who murdered Shan Tingxiu and his son, so you could get your hands on the Shan family fortune and the lovely woman Dai. You schemed to manipulate the local government and deceive me, like someone wielding an axe at the door of master carpenter Lu Ban, or waving his sword at the door of the swordsman Lord Guan, or reciting the Three Character Classic at the door of the wise Confucius, or whispering the ‘Rhapsody on the Nature of Medicine’ in the ear of the physician Li Shizhen. Arrest him!’
Soldiers rushed up and tied Five Monkeys Shan’s hands behind his back. ‘I’m not guilty, I’m innocent. Your honour, Magistrate…’ he shrieked.
‘Seal his mouth with the sole of your shoe!’
Little Yan drew out of his waistband a large shoe made just for this purpose and smacked Five Monkeys Shan across the mouth three times.
‘It was you who murdered them, wasn’t it?’
‘I’m innocent I’m innocent I’m innocent…’
‘If you didn’t do it, who did?’
‘It was… oh my, I don’t know, I don’t know…’
‘A few minutes ago you had it all figured out, and now you say you don’t know. Use the shoe sole again!’
Little Yan smacked Five Monkeys Shan across the mouth a dozen times, splitting his lips, from which frothy blood began to ooze. ‘I’ll tell,’ he muttered tearfully, ‘I’ll tell…’
‘Who’s the murderer?’
‘It… it… was a bandit, it was Spotted Neck!’
‘He did it on your orders, didn’t he?’
‘No! It was it was it was… Oh, Master, please don’t hit me…’
‘Listen to me, everybody,’ Nine Dreams Cao said. ‘Since assuming office as head of the county, I have worked hard to stamp out opium, outlaw gambling, and annihilate bandits, and I have had notable success with the first two. Only bandits remain a serious problem, running rampant in Northeast Gaomi Township. The county government has called upon all law-abiding citizens to report incidents and expose offenders in order to bring peace to the land.
‘Since the woman Dai was legally wed into the Shan family, she may assume its possessions and wealth. Anyone attempting to take advantage of this poor widow, or scheming to deprive her of what is legally hers, will be charged with banditry and disposed of accordingly!’
Grandma took three paces forward and knelt before Magistrate Cao, raising her lovely face and calling out:
‘Father! My true father!’
‘I am not your father,’ Magistrate Cao corrected her. ‘Your father is there, holding the donkey.’
She crawled forward and wrapped her arms around Magistrate Cao’s legs. ‘Father, my true father, now that you’re the county magistrate, don’t you know your own daughter? Ten years ago you fled the famine with your little girl and sold her. You may not know me, but I know you…’
‘My goodness! What kind of talk is that? It’s a bunch of nonsense!’
‘Father, how’s my mother? Little Brother must be about thirteen now. Is he in school? Father, you sold me for two pecks of red sorghum, but I held your hand and wouldn’t let go. You said, ‘Little Nine, when Father has turned things around he’ll come back for you.’ But now that you’re the county magistrate you say you don’t know me…’
‘The woman is mad, she has mistaken me for someone else!’
‘I’m not mistaken! I’m not! Father! My true father!’ She held tightly to Magistrate Cao’s legs and rocked back and forth, glistening tears streaming down her face, the sun glinting off her jadelike teeth.
Magistrate Cao lifted Grandma up and said, ‘I can be your foster-father!’
She tried to fall to her knees again, but was supported under the arms by Magistrate Cao. She squeezed his hand and said with childish innocence, ‘Father, when will you take me to see Mother?’
‘Soon, very soon! Now, let go, let go of me…’
Grandma let go of his hand.
Magistrate Cao took out a handkerchief to wipe his sweaty brow.
Everyone stared at the two of them.
Nine Dreams Cao removed his hat and twirled it on his finger as he stammered to the onlookers, ‘Fellow villagers – I have always advocated – stamp out opium – outlaw gambling – annihilate bandits -’
He had barely finished when – pow! pow! pow! – three shots rang out, and three bullets flew over from the sorghum field by the inlet, releasing three puffs of smoke when they hit the brown hat perched atop his middle finger. It sailed into the air, as though in the grip of a demon, and landed in the dirt, still twirling.
The gunshots were met by gasps and whistles from the crowd. ‘It’s Spotted Neck!’ someone shouted.
‘Three-Nod Phoenix!’
‘Quiet down! Quiet down!’ Magistrate Cao shouted from his refuge under the table.
The people, crying for their parents, scattered like wild animals.
Little Yan quickly untied the black colt from the willow tree, dragged Magistrate Cao out from under the table, helped him onto the horse, and swatted it on the rump. The colt, its mane standing straight up, its tail bristling, ran like the wind with the county magistrate in the saddle, while the soldiers fired a few random shots towards the sorghum field before making themselves scarce.
The banks of the inlet grew strangely quiet.
Grandma rested her hand sombrely on the donkey’s head and stared towards the sorghum field. Great-Granddad had thrown himself under the donkey and covered his ears with his hands. Steam rose from the clothes of Uncle Arhat, who hadn’t moved.
The water in the inlet was smooth as ever; the floating white lilies had spread open, their petals like ivory. The village chief, Five Monkeys Shan, whose face was bruised and swollen by the shoe sole, shrieked ‘Spare me, Spotted Neck! Spare me!’
His shrieks were answered by three more rapid gunshots, and Grandma saw the bullets strike his head. Three tufts of hair stood straight up as he fell over, kissing the ground with his open mouth, a mottled liquid oozing from the upturned back of his head.
Grandma’s expression didn’t change; she gazed at the sorghum field as though awaiting something. A breeze swept across the inlet, raising ripples on the surface, setting the lilies in motion, and bending the rays of light on the water. Half of the gathered crows had flown down to the bodies of Shan Tingxiu and his son; the other half remained perched on the willow branches, raising a clamour. Their tail feathers fanned out in the breeze, revealing glimpses of the dark-green skin around their rectums.