Commander Yu spat out angrily, ‘You can’t scare me with the Wang regiment’s flags and bugles, you prick. I’m king here. I ate fistcakes for ten years, and I don’t give a damn about that fucking Big Claw Wang!’
Detachment Leader Leng sneered. ‘Elder Brother Zhan’ao, I’ve got your best interests at heart. So does Commander Wang. If you turn your cache of weapons over to us, we’ll make you a battalion commander, and he’ll provide rifles and pay. That’s better than being a bandit.’
‘Who’s a bandit? Who isn’t a bandit? Anyone who fights the Japanese is a national hero. Last year I knocked off three Japanese sentries and inherited three automatic rifles. You’re no bandit, but how many Japs have you killed? You haven’t taken a hair off a single Jap’s ass!’
Detachment Leader Leng sat down and lit a cigarette.
Father took advantage of the lull to hand the wine jug up to Grandma, whose face changed as she took it from him. Glaring at Father, she filled the three cups.
‘Uncle Arhat’s blood is in this wine,’ she said. ‘If you’re honourable men you’ll drink it, then go out and destroy the Jap convoy. After that, chickens can go their own way, dogs can go theirs. Well water and river water don’t mix.’
She picked up her cup and drank the wine down noisily.
Commander Yu held out his cup, threw back his head, and drained it.
Detachment Leader Leng followed suit, but put his cup down half full. ‘Commander Yu,’ he said, ‘I’ve had all I can handle. So long!’
With her hand still on his revolver, Grandma asked him, ‘Are you going to fight?’
‘Don’t beg!’ Commander Yu snarled. ‘I’ll fight, even if he doesn’t.’
‘I’ll fight,’ Detachment Leader Leng said.
Grandma let her hand drop, and Leng jammed his revolver back into its holster.
The pale skin around his nose was dotted with dozens of pockmarks. A heavy cartridge belt hung from his belt, which sagged when he holstered his revolver.
‘Zhan’ao,’ Grandma said, ‘I’m entrusting Douguan to your care. Take him along the day after tomorrow.’
Commander Yu looked at my father and smiled. ‘Have you got the balls, foster-son?’
Father stared scornfully at the hard yellow teeth showing between Commander Yu’s parted lips. He didn’t say a word.
Commander Yu picked up a wine cup and placed it on top of Father’s head, then told him to stand in the doorway. He whipped out his Browning pistol and walked over to the corner.
Father watched Commander Yu take three long strides to the corner – three slow, measured steps. Grandma’s face turned ashen. The corners of Detachment Leader Leng’s mouth were curled in a contemptuous smile.
When he reached the corner, Commander Yu whirled around. Father watched him raise his arm, as a dark-red cast came over his black eyes. The Browning spat out a puff of white smoke. An explosion erupted above Father’s head, and shards of shattered ceramic fell around him, one landing against his neck. He shrugged his shoulder, and it slid down into his pants. He didn’t utter a sound. The blood had drained from Grandma’s face. Detachment Leader Leng sat down hard on a stool. ‘Good shooting,’ he said after a moment.
‘Good boy!’ Commander Yu said proudly.
The Browning pistol in Father’s hand seemed to weigh a ton.
‘I don’t have to show you,’ Commander Yu said. ‘You know how to shoot. Have Mute get his men ready.’
Gripping his pistol tightly, Father darted through the sorghum field, crossed the highway, and ran up to Mute, who was sitting cross-legged on the ground, honing his sabre knife with a shiny green stone. Some of his men were seated, others lying down.
‘Get your men ready,’ Father said to him.
Mute looked at Father out of the corner of his eye, but kept honing his knife for another moment or so. Then he picked up a couple of sorghum leaves, wiped the stone residue from the blade, and plucked a stalk of grass to test its sharpness. It fell in two pieces the instant it touched the blade.
‘Get your men ready,’ Father repeated.
Mute sheathed his knife and laid it on the ground beside him, his face creased in a savage grin. With one of his mammoth hands he signalled Father to come closer.
‘Uh! Uh!’ he grunted.
Father shuffled forward and stopped a pace or so from Mute, who reached out, grabbed him by the sleeve, jerked him into his lap, and pinched his ear so hard that he grimaced. Father jammed his Browning pistol up into Mute’s rib cage. Mute grabbed Father’s nose and pinched it until tears came to his eyes. An eerie laugh burst from Mute’s mouth.
The seated men laughed raucously.
‘A lot like Commander Yu, isn’t he?’
‘Commander Yu’s seed.’
‘Douguan, I miss your mom.’
‘Douguan, I feel like nibbling those date-topped buns of hers.’
Father’s embarrassment quickly turned to rage. Raising his pistol, he aimed it at the man wishfully thinking of date-topped buns, and pulled the trigger. The hammer clicked, but no bullet emerged.
The man, ashen-faced, jumped to his feet and wrenched the pistol away. Father, still enraged, threw himself on the man, clawing, kicking, biting.
Mute stood up, grabbed Father by the scruff of his neck, and flicked him away. He flew through the air and crashed into a thicket of sorghum stalks. A quick somersault and he was on his feet, railing and swearing as he charged Mute, who merely grunted a couple of times. The steely look in his eyes froze Father in his tracks. Mute picked up the pistol and pulled back the bolt; a bullet fell into his hand. Holding it in his fingers, he looked at the notch in the casing from the firing pin, and made some unintelligible hand signs to Father. Then he stuck the pistol into Father’s belt and patted him on the shoulder.
‘What were you doing over there?’ Commander Yu asked.
Father was embarrassed. ‘They… they said they wanted to sleep with Mom.’
‘What did you say?’ Commander Yu asked sternly.
Father wiped his eyes with his arm. ‘I shot him!’
‘You shot somebody?’
‘The gun misfired.’ Father handed Commander Yu the shiny dud.
Commander Yu took it from him, examined it, and gave it a casual flick. It described a beautiful arc before plopping into the river.
‘Good boy!’ Commander Yu said. ‘But use your gun on the Japanese first. After you’ve finished them off, anybody who says he wants to sleep with your mom, you shoot him in the gut. Not in the head, and not in the chest. Remember, in the gut.’
Father lay on his belly alongside Commander Yu; the Fang brothers were on his other side. The cannon had been set up on the dike, aimed at the stone bridge, its barrel stuffed with cotton rags, a fuse sticking out behind. Fang Seven had placed a bundle of sorghum tinder next to him, some of which was already smouldering. A gourd filled with gunpowder and a tin of iron pellets lay beside Fang Six.
Wang Wenyi was to Commander Yu’s left, curled up, holding his long-barrelled fowling piece in his hands. His wounded ear was stuck to the white bandage covering it.
The sun was stake-high, its white core girded by a pink halo. The flowing water glittered. A flock of wild ducks flew over from the sorghum field, circled three times, then dived down to a grassy sandbar. A few landed on the surface of the river and began floating downstream, their bodies settling heavily in the water, their heads turning and darting constantly. Father was feeling warm and tingly. His clothes, dampened by the dew, were now dry. He pressed himself to the ground, but felt a pain in his chest, as from a sharp stone. When he rose up to see what it was, his head and upper torso were exposed above the dike. ‘Get down,’ Commander Yu ordered. Reluctantly, he did as he was told. Fang Six began to snore. Commander Yu picked up a clod of earth and tossed it in his face. Fang Six woke up bleary-eyed and yawned so heroically that two fine tears appeared in the corners of his eyes.