‘I thought you were dead!’ Black Eye exclaimed.
‘I wanted to see you dead first!’
‘You think you can kill me with that thing? Men, bring me a knife!’
A soldier walked up with a butcher knife. Black Eye held his breath and gave a sign to the man. Granddad watched the blade of the knife hack Black Eye’s exposed abdomen as though it were a chunk of hardwood, but all it left were some pale scratches.
The Iron Society soldiers began to chant in unison: ‘Amalai amalai amalai iron head iron arm iron spirit altar… iron ancestor riding iron tiger urgent edict amalai… amalai… amalai…’
Granddad was stunned. How could anybody be impervious to knives and bullets? He pondered the Iron Society chant. Everything on the body was iron – everything, that is, but the eyes.
‘Can you stop a bullet with your eye?’ Granddad asked.
‘Can you stop a knife with your belly?’ Black Eye asked in return.
Granddad knew he couldn’t stop a knife with his belly; he also knew Black Eye couldn’t stop a bullet with his eye.
The Iron Society soldiers came out of the hall armed to the teeth and formed a ring around Granddad, glaring like tigers eyeing their prey.
Granddad knew he only had nine bullets left in his pistol, and that, once he killed Black Eye, the soldiers would pounce on him like mad dogs and tear him to ribbons.
‘Black Eye,’ Granddad said, ‘since you’re so special, I’ll spare those pisspots of yours. Turn the bitch over and we’re square!’
‘Is she yours?’ Black Eye asked him. ‘Will she answer if you call her? Is she your legal wife? A widow is like a masterless dog – they both belong to whoever raises them. If you know what’s good for you, you’ll get the hell out of here! Don’t blame Old Blackie for what happens if you don’t.’
Granddad raised his pistol. The Iron Society soldiers raised their cold, glinting weapons. Seeing their lips twitch, chanting, he mused, A life for a life!
Just then Granddad heard a mocking laugh from Grandma. His arm fell to his side.
Grandma stood on a stone step holding Father in her arms, bathed in the rays of the sun in the western sky. Her hair shone with oil, her face was rosy, her eyes sparkled.
‘Whore!’ Granddad railed, gnashing his teeth.
‘Ass!’ Grandma fired back impertinently. ‘Swine! Scum! Sleeping with a serving girl is all you’re good for!’
Granddad raised his pistol.
‘Go ahead!’ Grandma said. ‘Kill me! And kill my son!’
‘Dad!’ my father yelled.
Granddad’s pistol fell to his side again.
He thought back to that fiery red noon in the kingfisher-green sorghum and pictured her pristine body lying in Black Eye’s arms.
‘Black Eye,’ he said, ‘let’s make it just the two of us, fists only. Either the fish dies or the net breaks – I’ll wait for you on the banks of the river outside the village.’
He thrust his pistol into his belt and walked through the ring of stupefied Iron Society soldiers. With a glance at my father, but not at my Grandma, he strode out of the village.
As soon as he stepped up onto the steamy bank of the Salty Water River, Granddad took off his cotton jacket, threw down his pistol, tightened his belt, and waited. He knew Black Eye would come.
The Salty Water River was as murky as a sheet of frosted glass reflecting the golden sunlight.
Black Eye walked up.
Grandma followed, with Father in her arms. She wore the same look of indifference.
The Iron Society soldiers brought up the rear.
‘A civil fight or a martial fight?’ Black Eye asked.
‘What’s the difference?’
‘A civil fight means you hit me three times and I hit you three times. A martial fight means anything goes.’
Granddad thought it over and said, ‘A civil fight.’
‘Who first?’ Black Eye asked.
‘Let fate decide. We’ll draw straws. The longest goes first.’
‘Who’ll prepare the straws?’ Black Eye asked.
Grandma put Father on the ground. ‘I’ll do it,’ she said.
She plucked two lengths of straw, hid them behind her back, then brought them out in front. ‘Draw!’
She looked at Granddad, who drew a straw. Then she opened her hand to show the remaining one.
‘You drew the long straw, so you go first!’ she said.
Granddad drove his fist into Black Eye’s belly. Black Eye yelped.
Having sustained the first punch, Black Eye straightened up, a blue glint in his eyes, and waited for the next one.
Granddad hit him in the heart.
Black Eye stumbled back a step.
Granddad drove his final punch into Black Eye’s navel with all his might.
This time Black Eye stumbled back two steps. His face was waxen as he pressed his hand over his heart and coughed twice, spitting out a nearly congealed clot of blood. Then he wiped his mouth and nodded to Granddad, who concentrated all his strength in his chest and abdomen.
Black Eye waved his huge fist in the air and swung it hard, stopping inches away from Granddad. ‘I’ll spare you this one, for the sake of heaven!’ he said.
He also wasted his second punch. ‘I’ll spare you this one for the sake of earth.’
Black Eye’s third punch knocked Granddad head over heels, like a mud clod; he hit the hard, alkaline ground with a loud thud.
After struggling to his feet, Granddad picked up his jacket and his pistol, his face dotted with beads of sweat the size of soybeans. ‘I’ll see you in ten years.’
A piece of bark floated in the river. Granddad fired his nine bullets at it, smashing it to smithereens. Then he stuck his pistol into his belt and staggered into the wasteland, his bare shoulders and slightly bent back shining like bronze under the sun’s rays.
As Black Eye looked at the shattered pieces of bark floating in the river, he spat out a mouthful of blood and sat down hard on the ground.
Cradling Father in her arms, Grandma ran unsteadily after Granddad, sobbing as she called his name: ‘Zhan’ao -’
9
MACHINE GUNS BEHIND the tall Black Water River dike barked for three minutes, then fell silent. Throngs of Jiao-Gao soldiers who had been shouting a charge in the sorghum field fell headlong onto the dry roadbed and the scorched earth of the field, while, across the way, Granddad’s Iron Society soldiers, who were about to surrender, were cut down like sorghum; among them were longtime devil worshippers who had followed Black Eye for a decade and young recruits who had joined because of Granddad’s reputation. Neither their shiny shaved scalps, the raw rice steeped in well water, the iron ancestor riding his tiger, nor the mule hoof, monkey claw, and chicken skull shielded their bodies. The insolent machine-gun bullets streaked through the air to shatter their spines and legs and pierce their chests and bellies. The red blood of the Jiao-Gao soldiers and the green blood of the Iron Society soldiers converged to nourish the black earth of the fields. Years later, that soil would be the most fertile anywhere.
Having suffered defeat together at the hands of a common foe, the retreating Jiao-Gao regiment and Granddad’s Iron Society were immediately transformed from sworn enemies into loyal allies. The living and the dead were cast together. Little Foot Jiang, wounded in the leg, and Granddad, wounded in the arm, were cast together. As Granddad lay with his head against Little Foot Jiang’s bandaged leg, he noticed that his feet weren’t all that little, but their stink overwhelmed the stench of blood.
The machine guns opened fire again, their bullets smashing into the roadbed and the sorghum field, where they raised puffs of dust. Jiao-Gao and Iron Society soldiers tried to bore their way under the ground. The topography couldn’t have been worse: nothing but flatland as far as the eye could see – not a blade of grass anywhere – and the blanket of whizzing bullets was like a razor-sharp sword slicing the air; anyone who raised his head was finished.