It is wise to avoid examining these matters too closely. How could a man like Feng Four be qualified to recognize the orphaned son of the martyred Deng Shaoxiang? One of the members of the investigative team, a college student who knew his history, even suspected that Feng had done a swap, palming off his own bastard child as the legitimate offspring of Deng Shaoxiang. It was an audacious charge that took the other team members’ breath away. Unwilling either to dismiss or endorse this theory, they wound up simply including it in the remarks column of their report as an item for consideration.
Everything centred on the birthmark. Drawing on the scientific study of heredity, the team rejected the fish-shaped-birthmark theory, announcing that the residents of the Golden Sparrow River region were all Mongoloids, who had birthmarks on their backsides. And if the birthmarks looked exactly like fish, that was mere coincidence, with no basis in science.
But the residents of Milltown hankered after things that had no basis in science. They went crazy that autumn looking for birthmarks on their bodies. At first the craze was limited to males around the age of forty, but it spread to children and then to old men, until nearly every male in Milltown was caught up in it. Walk past any public toilet, and this is what you might have seen: a man taking down his trousers or asking someone else to take his down so they could eagerly look for birthmarks on their backsides. And in public baths, it was rare for a person not to show off his birthmark, which frequently led to watery squabbles, not to mention the occasional fistfight. But despite the outrageous extremes of the birthmark craze, since people lacked eyes in the backs of their heads, they could not examine their own backsides. That, of course, was how the craze worked to some people’s advantage, for there was always someone eager to analyse the prophetic symbols imprinted there. Several of the examined backsides revealed fish-shaped birthmarks. Some were like goldfish, others resembled carp, and some actually looked like pomfrets. But not all inspections ended happily. Some of the exposed flesh was dark as ebony, some white as ivory, but could boast no birthmark. Had it faded over the years or had it never been there in the first place? Imagine the consternation this caused these unfortunate individuals, who quickly covered up and would let no one else look. Left to taste the bitter fruit of failure alone and in silence, they suffered from a crippling sense of inferiority.
As for my family, the craze took a back seat as rising winds threatened to engulf our home. I ignored the gentle and persistent entreaties of my classmates at school and refused to be caught up in the entanglements out on the street, which all centred on one thing: they wanted me to drop my trousers. My backside was not for public viewing — end of discussion! I tightened my belt and heightened my vigilance, taking a brick along whenever I visited a public toilet, and keeping my hands in my pockets when I was out walking, eyes peeled and ears alert to all sounds. By forestalling sneak attacks, I managed to preserve the integrity of my backside, but was powerless to ward off the domestic storm that had been gathering for so long. It hit, in all its fury, on the twenty-seventh of September, when the visiting team announced the startling results of their investigation. Ku Wenxuan, they concluded, was not Deng Shaoxiang’s son!
They said my father was no longer Deng Shaoxiang’s son!
The events of that day are indelibly etched on my memory. The twenty-seventh of September — coincidentally the commemoration day for the martyr Deng Shaoxiang, the day when my father ought to have been wreathed in glory — turned out to be the day of his greatest shame. I recall that my mother emerged from her propaganda broadcast studio in a daze, looking like someone who had just escaped from hell. She wore a white scarf as a makeshift mask as she pedalled her bicycle precariously down the busy People’s Avenue, weeping the whole time. People she passed noticed that the scarf was wet. Sending humans and animals scurrying out of her way, she careened into Workers and Peasants Avenue and stopped at a blacksmith’s shop, where she borrowed a hammer and chisel. People said they saw her lips quiver under the scarf, though they could not tell if she was cursing or praying. ‘Qiao Limin,’ they said, ‘what do you need those for? What’s wrong?’
‘It’s nothing,’ my mother replied. ‘It’s just my lungs, they’re about to explode from anger!’
The twenty-seventh of September. I heard someone hacking away at our front gate, so I went out and saw that my mother had chiselled off the red plaque announcing that we were honoured as a martyr’s family. She weighed the plaque in her hand for a moment before stuffing it into a cloth sack. Then, before any passers-by could open their mouths, she pushed her bicycle into the yard, closed the gate behind her and sat on the ground.
When my mother said her lungs were about to explode, it was no exaggeration. Her anger was so intense that her face had lost all its colour, and there were traces of tears on her cheeks. ‘Go and get the first-aid kit,’ she said. ‘My lungs are bursting, I need to take something.’
But instead of leaving, I asked, ‘Why did you take down the martyr’s family plaque?’
She removed the scarf from her face and glared at the little table my father and I had set up in the yard the day before, on which a chess board and pieces rested. Another white-hot flash of anger filled her eyes. I stood watching as she walked over, picked up my father’s chess set and flung it over the wall, as if she was dumping rubbish. ‘So you like to play chess, do you? Well, from this day on, you’re no longer a martyr’s descendant. No, you’re the son of a liar, and the grandson of Feng Four, a river pirate!’
Hearing the sound of shuffling feet outside the yard, I climbed the wall in time to see our neighbours scrabbling about on the ground, snatching up the chess pieces. Some got their hands on steeds, some on warriors; the blacksmith’s son managed to get hold of a general, which he waved proudly in my direction. I had no idea why these people had gathered outside our yard, but now they were looking at me as if their eyes held secrets, happy secrets. A slightly demented guffaw burst from the mouth of one woman. Then she became serious. ‘You!’ she screeched. ‘You gutless little boy, no wonder you wouldn’t let anybody see your backside! A guilty conscience, that’s what it was. Just whose grandson are you?’ I ignored her, preferring to watch what was happening down there from my perch on the wall and to keep my eyes peeled for my father. I didn’t see him; what I did see was a town in mutiny, now that the news had spread. I heard shouts of liberation and screams of joy from the heart of Milltown and beyond. Milltown was in uproar.
My father was not Deng Shaoxiang’s son. That was not a rumour, not hearsay. He just wasn’t. So who was the martyr’s son? The investigative team would not say, and my mother certainly didn’t know. Based on hope alone, most of the town’s residents were caught up in the birthmark craze, running around making wild guesses, with no two people able to agree. Who is Deng Shaoxiang’s son? Whose birthmark looks most like a fish? I heard several names being mentioned, including the idiot, Bianjin, whose birthmark came closest. I didn’t believe that for a second. Nor did anyone else. An idiot like Bianjin could not possibly be a martyr’s son. So who was it? No matter what anyone said, only the investigative team could provide the answer. And all they were prepared to say was that Ku Wenxuan was not the one. It was not my father.