Хеннинг Манкелль - The Man from Beijing

San and Qi had no doubt that they wanted to spend the rest of their lives together.

San decided to speak to Elgstrand and Lodin and ask their permission to get married. San went to visit the two missionaries one morning after they had finished breakfast but before they turned their attention to the tasks that filled their days. He explained what he wanted. Lodin said nothing; Elgstrand did the talking.

‘Why do you want to marry her?’

‘She is nice and considerate. She works hard.’

‘She’s a very simple woman who can’t do nearly as much as you’ve learned. And she shows no interest in our Christian message.’

‘She’s still very young.’

‘There are those who say she was a thief.’

‘The servants are always gossiping. Nobody escapes their attention. Everybody accuses everybody else of anything at all. I know what’s true and what isn’t. Qi has never been a thief.’

Elgstrand turned to Lodin. San had no idea what they said in a language he didn’t understand.

‘We think you should wait,’said Elgstrand. ‘If you are going to get married, we want it to be a Christian wedding. The first one we’ve performed here at the mission station. But neither of you is mature enough yet. We want you to wait.’

San bowed and left the room. He was extremely disappointed. But Elgstrand had not given him a definite no. One day he and Qi would become a couple.

A few months later Qi told San that she was pregnant. San was overjoyed and decided immediately that if it was a boy, he would be called Guo Si. But at the same time he realised this news would cause problems — the Christian religion insisted that couples had to be married before they had children. Having sexual intercourse before marriage was considered a major sin. San couldn’t think of a solution. The growing stomach could be concealed for some time yet, but San would be forced to say something before the truth was revealed.

One day San was informed that Lodin would need a team of oarsmen for a journey several miles upriver to a German-run mission station. As always with these boat trips, San would go as well. The evening before the journey he said goodbye to Qi and promised that he would solve everything upon his return.

When he and Lodin returned four days later, San was summoned to Elgstrand, who wanted to speak to him. The missionary was sitting at his desk in his office. He usually invited San to sit down, but this time he didn’t. San suspected that something had happened.

Elgstrand’s voice was milder than usual when he spoke.

‘How did the trip go?’

‘Everything went as expected.’

Elgstrand nodded thoughtfully and gave San a searching look.

‘I’m disappointed,’ he said. ‘I hoped till the very last that the rumour that had reached my ears was not true. But in the end I was forced to act. Do you understand what I’m talking about?’

San knew, but said no even so.

‘That makes me even more disappointed,’ said Elgstrand. ‘When a person tells a lie, the devil has found its way into the man’s mind. I’m referring, of course, to the fact that the woman you wanted to marry is pregnant. I’ll give you another opportunity to tell me the truth.’

San bowed his head but said nothing. He could feel his heart racing.

‘For the first time since we met on the ship bringing us here, you have disappointed me,’ Elgstrand went on. ‘You have been one of the people who have given me and Brother Lodin the feeling that even the Chinese can be raised up to a higher spiritual level. The last few days have been very difficult. I have prayed for you and decided that I can allow you to stay. But you must devote even more time and effort to progress to the moment when you can declare your allegiance to the God we share.’

San stood there, head bowed, waiting for what came next. Nothing did.

‘That’s all,’ said Elgstrand. ‘Go back to your duties.’

As he reached the door, he heard Elgstrand’s voice behind his back.

‘You understand, of course, that Qi couldn’t possibly stay on here. She has left us.’

San was devastated when he emerged into the courtyard. He felt the same as he did when his brother died. Now he was floored once again. He found Na, grabbed her by the hair and dragged her out of the kitchen. It was the first time San had ever been violent to one of the servants. Na screamed and threw herself onto the ground. San soon realised that she was not the one who had gossiped, but that the old woman had heard Qi confessing the situation to Na. San managed to prevent himself from attacking her as well. That would have meant he would have to leave the mission station. He took Na to his room and sat her down on a stool.

‘Where is Qi?’

‘She left two days ago.’

‘Where did she go?’

‘I don’t know. She was very upset. She ran.’

‘She must have said something about where she was going.’

‘I don’t think she knew. But she might have gone to the river to wait for you there.’

San stood up like a shot, raced out of the room, through the main gate and down to the harbour. But he couldn’t find her. He spent most of the day looking for her, asking everybody he came across, but nobody had seen her. He spoke to the oarsmen, and they promised to let him know if Qi showed up.

When he got back to the mission station and met Elgstrand again, it was as if the Swede had already forgotten about what had happened. He was preparing for the service that was to be held the following day.

‘Don’t you think the courtyard ought to be swept?’ Elgstrand asked in a friendly tone.

‘I’ll make sure that’s done first thing tomorrow morning, before the visitors arrive.’

Elgstrand nodded, and San bowed. Elgstrand obviously considered Qi’s sin so serious that there was no redemption possible for her.

San simply could not understand that there were people who could never be granted the grace of God because they had committed the sin of loving another human being.

He watched Elgstrand and Lodin talking on the veranda outside the mission station’s office.

It was as if he were seeing them for the first time in their true light.

Two days later San received a message from one of his friends at the harbour. He hurried there. He had to elbow his way through a large crowd. Qi was lying on a plank. Despite the heavy iron chain around her waist, she had risen from the depths. The chain had become entangled with a rudder that raised the body to the surface. Her skin was bluish white, her eyes closed. San was the only one able to make out that her stomach contained a child.

Once again San was alone.

San gave money to the man who had sent the message to inform him of what had happened. It would be sufficient to have the body cremated. Two days later he buried the ashes in the same place Guo Si was already resting.

So this is what I’ve achieved in my life, he thought. I create and then fill my own cemetery. The spirits of four people are resting here already, one of whom was never even born.

He knelt down and hit his head over and over again on the ground. Sorrow swelled up inside him. He was unable to resist it. He howled like an animal. He had never felt as helpless as he did at this moment. He once felt capable of looking after his brothers: now he was a mere shadow of a man, crumbling away.

When he returned to the mission station late that evening he was told by the nightwatchman that Elgstrand had been looking for him. San knocked on the door of Elgstrand’s office, where the missionary was sitting at his desk, writing by lamplight.

‘I’ve missed you,’ said Elgstrand. ‘You’ve been away all day. I prayed to God and hoped that nothing had happened to you.’

‘Nothing has happened,’ said San, bowing. ‘It’s just that I had a bit of a toothache, which I cured with the aid of some herbs.’