Ma Jian - Beijing Coma

The crowd started pushing. If I hadn’t brought another fifty marshals over to strengthen the cordon, the tent would have got knocked to the ground.

‘Listen to the outcry!’ Old Fu cried from inside the tent. ‘We can’t end the hunger strike. There’ll be a riot.’

Lin Lu snatched the megaphone from Bai Ling’s hand and yelled, ‘Calm down, everyone! We need to change tactics. The army is preparing to enter the city. If we don’t stop the hunger strike, we won’t have the strength to defend ourselves.’

I stood up and surveyed the scene. Hunger strikers began drifting off to Qianmen market or going into quiet corners to have something to eat. Two ambulances became blocked by the moving crowds. Suddenly the feeling of common purpose in the Square seemed to dissolve.

Nuwa’s jaw dropped. ‘I’ve just realised there are three thousand hunger strikers who will want to eat now, but we haven’t got any food to give them! What are we going to do?’

‘Switch off the microphone and play some music,’ I said. Nuwa knew how to operate the equipment herself now.

‘This is too much!’ Mou Sen said. ‘Phone up the canteens of every Beijing university and ask them to bring us vats of dumplings and wonton soup.’

Old Fu looked outside and cried, ‘You’ve betrayed the hunger strikers! Look at the crowd. Everyone’s weeping.’

‘Last week you opposed the hunger strike, but now you don’t want us to end it,’ Mou Sen said angrily. ‘It’s too much!’

‘Listen to me, fellow students!’ Old Fu shouted, grabbing the microphone. ‘Ignore the announcement that Bai Ling just made. I now propose that we relaunch the hunger strike immediately.’

‘Don’t act like a despot, Old Fu!’ Bai Ling wheezed. Since she’d read out the announcement, she’d been lying down inside the tent, gasping for breath. She still hadn’t eaten anything. Old Fu’s intervention angered her so much, she burst into tears. Her small breasts trembled like tofu. The nervous doctor at her side urged her to stay calm.

‘You’ve destroyed this movement, Bai Ling!’ Old Fu spluttered.

Pu Wenhua and a couple of other hunger strikers from the Agricultural College staggered into the tent and shouted, ‘Now you’ve called off the hunger strike I suppose you’ll be resigning from your post, Bai Ling.’

The doctor stood in Pu Wenhua’s way and said, ‘She’s still on hunger strike. Don’t upset her.’ Pu Wenhua brushed him aside and lurched towards us. Lin Lu pounced on him while I wrestled with the other two.

‘I’ve got some inside information!’ Wang Fei said, rushing over. ‘It’s from Cao Ming’s military contacts. Apparently, if we continue the hunger strike for just one more day, the hardliners’ resolve might crack, and Zhao Ziyang could regain his authority. The reformist wing is in a precarious situation. Wan Li, the liberal chairman of the National People’s Congress, has been detained in Shanghai, and won’t be allowed to return to Beijing unless he supports the government’s hardline approach.’

‘We reached our decision through a democratic vote,’ Mou Sen said to Old Fu. ‘The minority should bow to the majority.’ Apart from Bai Ling, everyone was standing up now.

‘Why do you never broadcast any of the Agricultural College’s statements?’ Pu Wenhua said, pointing at Mou Sen.

‘I make the editorial decisions here,’ Mou Sen said sternly. ‘I don’t allow extremist statements to be broadcast.’

‘Well, we’ll have to take that power away from you, then!’ Pu Wenhua told his classmates to grab Lin Lu’s megaphone. Mou Sen and Old Fu tried to snatch it too, but Lin Lu swerved round and passed it to Bai Ling. Clutching it feebly to her chest, she went over to the camp bed and croaked, ‘As long as I’m still here, I will remain in charge of this broadcast station!’

‘We all know you’re a government agent, Lin Lu,’ Wang Fei said, pushing him back.

Pu Wenhua stumbled towards Bai Ling and tried to yank the megaphone from her. Too weak to fight back, Bai Ling sunk her teeth into his hand. Pu Wenhua was very frail too, so when Mou Sen gave him a light push, he fell flat on the ground. Mou Sen then slipped and tumbled on top of him, then Old Fu pounced on top of them both, and the three of them wrestled on the ground in a tangled heap.

I rushed over to the broadcasting area and switched off the microphone.

A large pack of foreign journalists waiting to interview Bai Ling were sitting outside among the baying crowds of students and residents. The doctors placed Bai Ling on a stretcher and carried her out of the tent.

‘Get out, Wang Fei!’ Nuwa spat, pushing him towards the door. ‘Just go away!’ Her face was red with fury.

‘You think you’re the stars of this movement,’ Pu Wenhua screeched as I dragged him out of the tent. ‘But just wait and see. Very soon I’ll be more famous than any of you!’

‘You haven’t eaten for seven days,’ the nurse shouted to Pu Wenhua. ‘Your heart’s very weak. If you don’t calm down, you’ll collapse and die.’ She followed him out and urged him to drink a bottle of royal jelly, but he pushed her away. She fell down and burst into tears. I’d heard that her son was on hunger strike too. He was an undergraduate at the Beijing Institute of Science and Technology.

‘It’s too much, Old Fu!’ Mou Sen said. ‘The majority voted to end the strike. You have no right to overturn that decision.’

Having heard the commotion, Han Dan and Cheng Bing rushed inside to see what was going on.

Lin Lu pulled his shirt straight and said, ‘Although I’m against ending the strike, the decision was reached through a democratic vote. What you’re attempting now is completely unconstitutional, Old Fu!’

‘We mustn’t lose sight of the big picture,’ Han Dan said calmly. ‘We’ve got to stop squabbling and put this movement back on track.’

‘Don’t you feel guilty about letting down the thousands of hunger strikers out there?’ Old Fu asked, still boiling with rage.

The doctors who were attempting to carry Bai Ling over to where she was planning to give her press conference were unable to squeeze through the crowd, so they brought her back into the tent to wait for things to calm down. I was glad to see that Bai Ling had a biscuit in her hand.

‘Everyone’s here now,’ Mou Sen said loudly. ‘We should start the press conference.’

Lin Lu and Han Dan agreed. Old Fu stormed out of the tent shouting, ‘There’s no need for you to sack me. I resign!’

‘Old Fu’s gone crazy!’ I said. ‘We must protect this broadcast station. If we lose this place, the Square will fall into chaos.’ I pushed the large colour television some Beijing residents had given us over to the door of the tent to stop anyone else coming in.

Nuwa had brushed her hair and was preparing an English translation of the Hunger Strike Termination Statement.

‘Apparently, a hunger striker who was taken to hospital had a stroke,’ Mou Sen said. ‘She’s a vegetable now.’ He took a handful of peanuts from his pocket and stuffed them ravenously into his mouth. I told him not to eat so fast. ‘There’s no more time to waste,’ he continued. ‘Ask the hunger strikers to sit down quietly, Lin Lu. And Nuwa, make an announcement telling the students that the doctors advise us to have wet towels and face masks at the ready in case the army use tear gas against us.’

‘Can the Voice of the Student Movement tell everyone to come to the Monument, Han Dan?’ Lin Lu asked. ‘Your loudspeakers are stronger than ours. Once the government declares martial law, we must all stay by the Monument.’ Lin Lu had already draped a wet flannel around his neck to protect him in the event of a tear-gas attack.