When Jie had lain dying, she had been alone. Now that she was dead, her grandson arrived out of nowhere to claim his due. No one wanted to put themselves out on his behalf. Bao did not even have a place to stay in the city. From the neighborhood committee, however, Bao learned one thing: among those who had attended the funeral service for Jie was Yin Lige. She had taken away with her an old photo album, as well as several old letters that no one else wanted.
One of the committee members suggested that Bao approach Yin for help. Hong had also mentioned Yin’s name. She had heard that some of Yang’s earlier translations had already been reprinted. Or maybe it was his poetry. There might be money awaiting him or at least Yin might have some information about it.
That’s why Bao first went to Yin’s room in Treasure Garden Lane.
Yin was all hospitality when he introduced himself. After all, Bao was closely related to Yang. She urged him to stay on for a few days. The location of the lane was convenient, and she suggested that he go sightseeing while she was busy with her teaching. She took him out when she had time. She even treated him to a meal at the Xinya Restaurant on Nanjing Road. Everything went well, until the moment he made known why he had come to Shanghai.
Her attitude changed completely. She had not earned any money from Yang’s earlier translations, but Yang’s poetry collection was another matter. She showed him the statement the publisher had sent to her. It did not specify how much was due to her as special editor, so she arranged a meeting for them with the editor. She insisted on the condition that, in return for a small payment from the publisher, Bao promise that he would never bother her again.
But Bao did not think it was fair. He believed that these city people, especially Yin, had taken advantage of a country bumpkin like him.
He went back to his village with less than a thousand Yuan. It was not such a small a sum to the villagers, but Bao was no longer the same young man, content to work there like his father and forefathers, toiling in the rice paddy, his legs covered in mud. The trip to Shanghai had opened his eyes to a new world. The fact that his grandmother had lived in the city all her life, and his mother for seventeen years, and, more than anything else, the legend of his granduncle, made it impossible for Bao to stay on in the poor, backward village.
He told his mother he was going to become a success in the city of Shanghai.
He was not alone. Several young men from the village had already left for big cities.
Shanghai, however, did not turn out to be the city of Bao ’s dreams. He had neither capital nor any skills with which to compete. Low-paying, hard-working temporary jobs on construction sites were all he could find. Yet he saw with his own eyes how the rich wallowed in money and luxuries, while his wages for a month were not even enough for one karaoke night. Still, if he had been willing to work hard like other provincials, it would not have been impossible for him to survive. But that was not enough for Bao.
With his Shanghai background, he considered himself different. He could not forget his great expectations, his hopes that there would be a lot of money awaiting him as the grandnephew of Yang.
He started reading about Yang and discovered the novel, Death of a Chinese Professor. Like others, he believed that its success was derived from Yin’s relationship with Yang. So Bao felt that his claims as Yang’s legal heir should not have been forgotten.
And if one poetry collection had been left to Yin, he thought there might have been other manuscripts, perhaps translations or novels. His mother had once mentioned that Yang had been writing a story before the Cultural Revolution. Then he learned that, but for the notoriety of Death of a Chinese Professor, Yang’s poetry collection would have gone into a second or even a third printing, from which he would have gotten some money.
Bao did not simply lose himself in such speculations. While working at menial jobs, he tried hard to make a fortune in the ways that occurred to him. He started gambling on mah-jongg. This did not work out. He did not lose much, but those long, sleepless nights at the mah-jongg table cost him several odd jobs. Then he threw himself into the stock market with borrowed money. While he made a couple of hundred Yuan at first, he soon began to pile up losses as the money seemed to sink into a quagmire, and his creditors began hounding him, knocking at the door at all hours of the night.
In desperation, he thought of approaching Yin again. She had a lot of money-at least, it seemed so to him.
He thought she should have helped him.
Yin would have been nobody without Yang. The book, the money, the fame… all of it had come to her because of her relationship with him. And what was that relationship? They had not even been married. She did not even have a marriage certificate.
He, Bao, was Yang’s only legal heir.
Bao hesitated to approach her because of the agreement he had signed. And the effort would most likely be useless, he supposed. When he learned about her visit to Hong Kong, however, he had an idea. At the time, those who came back from their visits to foreign destinations, including Hong Kong, were entitled to a certain quota for imported goods, such as a Japanese TV or an American stereo system. If they did not want to use the quota for themselves, they could sell it on the black market for a fairly large amount of money. Bao did not think Yin would have the space for this kind of equipment in the tingzijian room, or the guts to sell the quota for a profit on the black market. So what he was going to ask of her was to let him have the quota, something that would probably be of no value to her.
He phoned her but before he could begin to explain his proposal, she flew into a rage, threatening to call the police if he came to the lane again. Instead, he paid a visit to her at the school where she taught, calculating that a college teacher like her would not choose to make a public scene about something in her private life. He got through the college gate by claiming to be a former student of hers. And he found her in her office, alone.
“If you are not using the quota, you don’t lose anything by giving it to me,” he explained in a voice he thought full of reason. “As Yang’s only grandnephew, I am asking you to please help me.”
“Well,” she said after giving him a long look. “I’ve been trying to save some money to buy a color TV for myself, but the quota is only valid for six months. Give me a call in two months. If I still do not have enough money by that time, then you can have the quota.”
It was not an outright refusal, and she was already standing up. “You have to leave now. I have a class in ten minutes. Let me walk you to the door.”
Before she marched him to the end of the corridor, however, two young female students came over to her with notebooks in their hands.
“You know the way out from here, “ she said to him.
He did, but he heard something that made him pause and hide behind a concrete pillar.
“Professor Yin. You must remember me,” one of the girls said in a sweet voice. “You taught me two years ago. You said I was your favorite student. And I will need your help when you get to the United States. I will need a letter of recommendation.”
From what he overheard, he concluded that in two months Yin would be far away in the United States. So her promise was worthless.
The more he thought about it, the more upset he became. In his mind, even her opportunity to go abroad was derived from her relationship with Yang. He had to take action, he decided, before it was too late.
He remembered that she had left the keys dangling from the keyhole of her desk when she had literally pushed him out of her office, and that she had not locked the door because one of her colleagues happened to be coming in at that moment. So he sneaked back to her office. Her colleague was not there, and the office door was not locked either. No one had seen him enter the room, but his search of her desk drawer was not successful.