There are old men, diehards, who spend all day here with a fan in one hand, a teapot in the other and their birdcage hanging from a tree. They arrive at dawn and leave in the mid-afternoon. When one’s two pots of stones stand open, it means that he is expecting someone; if they are closed, he is waiting for someone to challenge him.
I was afraid that with time they would be able to tell a fake Chinese man, but I have swept aside this fear. Speech loses all its importance here, handing over its authority to the gentle clatter of the stones.
A false identity has been invented for me, but I have never had to use it. The girl has not even asked my name.
Probably thinking that I have already taken the bait, she no longer tries to charm me. She now seems to be saving her smiles and mischievous comments for the next player she will manage to ensnare.
And for some unfathomable reason she seems to be sulking. She has dispensed with all greetings except for a quick nod of the head, and she emerges from her silence only at the end of each session so we can arrange the next one.
In the first few days I saw something of Sunlight in her, but now there is nothing, either from a distance or close up, that reminds me of the refined geisha. She moves lugubriously, her hair messily plaited, black crescents at the ends of her nails. I take her untidiness as a sign of her complete disdain for me. Pimples have appeared on her forehead, and her face has lost all the simple grace that first attracted me. The whites of her eyes have lost their beautiful bluish gleam and her expression has darkened. Her lips are cracked and her hollowed cheeks suggest a hardened soldier. The Chinese girl is changing into a man!
I overcome this disappointment by triumphing in the first direct conflict. The whites, tightly surrounded in the southern corner of the board, are gradually surrendering.
Apparently indifferent to this loss, she makes a note of our positions and hurries away.
61
“I might be pregnant,” my sister whispers.
After supper she follows me to my bedroom and I feel I have to congratulate her. I ask her when she saw the doctor.
She hesitates for a moment and blushes as she admits, “I haven’t been to see him yet. I’m afraid…”
“Well, how do you know then?”
Her period is ten days late.
My heart leaps. My period is ten days late, too.
“Are you sure?”
Moon Pearl takes my hands in hers.
“Listen, I’m normally very regular. This time it’s for real! When I go to bed in the evening I feel dizzy. In the morning I feel sick. All I can eat is pickled vegetables. They say that if you want to eat acidic foods you’ll have a boy. Do you think I’ll have a boy?”
I am unmoved by my sister’s happiness. I tell her she should talk to a doctor.
“I’m frightened. I’m terrified they might tell me I’m not pregnant. I haven’t told anyone about this. It’s a secret I can share only with you. Oh, my sister, I’ve discovered again this morning what it is to be happy! I put my hands over my belly and I could almost sense the baby feeding within me. With him to give me strength, I can endure the infidelity, the abandonment and the lies. With him I can start a new life!”
I find my sister’s exuberance chilling. She may long for a child, but for me to be pregnant would be death.
After Moon Pearl has left, I sit down at my calligraphy table. With a fine paintbrush I sweep black strokes on the rice paper, counting the days since my last period over and over again. It should have come exactly nine days ago.
I flop down onto my bed, my head buzzing. I don’t know how long I lie there in that state, but when I come round, the clock is striking midnight. I get undressed and go to bed, but I can’t get to sleep. It is so strange to know that a new life is germinating inside another, that my body will produce fruit!
It will inherit Min’s slanting eyes. If it is a boy, he will be happy and full of seductive charm like Min, wise and serious like my father. If it is a girl, she will have my lips and my soft skin, she will be demanding and jealous like my sister, and she will have my mother’s majestic bearing. Jing will take the child for walks, proud but still bitter. On the Square of a Thousand Winds it will learn to play go and will eventually be able to beat me.
I stroke my belly and reality intrudes once more: Min is a prisoner of the Japanese; when will he be released? I don’t know his family. If I go to his house, they will drive me away. At school my name will be written in the roll of shame, and I will be expelled. The whole town will know. Even if I can accept the humiliation, my parents couldn’t bear the sneers and the whispers. Children in the street will throw stones at Moon Pearl, jeering, “Your sister is a whore!”
I switch the light on. My belly looks flat, below my navel a line of fine fluffy hair runs down to the denser growth below. When our nurse washed me as a child, this hair used to make her laugh: she said it meant I would have a boy.
I will go down on my knees before my parents, I will beat my head on the ground to beg their clemency. I must go live at the ends of the earth and have my child there while I wait for Min and Jing to be freed.
That happy day will come: two men making their way towards a little cottage lost in the open countryside. The door opens…
62
On July 7, our regiment, posted to Feng
Tai, loses a soldier after a night exercise. The Chinese army refuses us permission to search the town of Wang Ping. The two forces have their first exchange of fire.
On July 8, a second confrontation flares up around the bridge of the Valley of Reeds.
On July 9, the senior officers give the order to the various regiments garrisoned on the plain around Peking to prepare for combat. In Tokyo, the government, responding to international pressure, opts for a low profile: “We should not aggravate the situation. The problem should be solved on the ground.”
The senior officers propose a ceasefire on four conditions: that the Chinese withdraw their garrison from the bridge in the Valley of Reeds; that they guarantee the safety of our men; that they hand over the terrorists; and that they apologize.
The Chinese reject the offer in its entirety.
On July 10, Chiang Kai-shek’s battalions move towards Peking. The first reinforcements of our Manchurian regiments cross the Great Wall.
On July 11, the Tokyo government finally acknowledges the urgency of the situation. It decides to send our battalions from Korea as reinforcements.
The earth underfoot hums in unison with the skies as the first bomber squadrons head for the Chinese interior. Our hearts swell to see our flag painted on the fuselage: a crimson sun against immaculate white snow.
The men begin to shout, “To Peking! To Peking!”
63
The Japanese propaganda machine has been set in motion. The incident in the Valley of Reeds is already in the newspapers: stories pillory the Chinese generals who publicly support the terrorist movement, violating the peace agreement. Blamed for this latest crisis they are called upon to offer their apologies to the Emperor of Japan.
Mother, accustomed since her childhood to endless military conflicts, places her faith in prevailing apathy and in American diplomacy to calm the warmongers. Father sighs: once again the Japanese will improve their financial standing. The public is happy and confident: the Manchurian Emperor is keeping his country out of the conflict. For these cowards, the Sino-Japanese war will only ever be a fire burning on the farther bank-a sideshow.