Mo Yan - Red Sorghum

‘Horseshit!’ Granddad interrupted him. ‘I don’t believe a word of it. Join forces, you say? Where were you when we fought the Jap armoured troops? Where were you when they surrounded the village? My troops were wiped out, their blood forming a river across the land, and you come here talking about joining forces!’

He angrily kicked the yellow casing of a spent cartridge into the ditch. Blind Eye was still plucking his zither, the sound of raindrops in a tin bucket.

Jiang would not be put off, no matter how awkward Granddad’s harangue made him feel. ‘Commander Yu, please don’t disappoint us. And don’t underestimate our strength.’

‘Let’s open the skylight and let the sun shine in,’ Granddad said. ‘Just what do you have in mind?’

‘We want you to join the Jiao-Gao regiment.’

‘In other words, take orders from you,’ Granddad sneered.

‘You, sir, can be part of the regimental leadership.’

‘My title?’

‘Deputy regiment commander!’

‘Taking orders from you?’

‘We all take orders from the Binhai-area special committee.’

‘ I don’t take orders from anybody!’

‘Commander Yu, as the saying goes, “A great man understands the times, a smart bird chooses the tree where it roosts, and a clever man chooses the leader he’ll follow.” Don’t pass up this chance!’

‘Are you finished?’

Jiang laughed openly. ‘Commander Yu,’ he said, ‘you’re no fool. Look at my troops. They’re hot-blooded young men, but empty-handed for the most part. The weapons and ammo you’ve got here…’

‘Don’t even think it!’

‘We just want to borrow some. We’ll give them back as soon as you’ve formed your own army.’

‘Pah! Do you think Yu Zhan’ao’s a three-year-old child?’

‘Don’t get me wrong, Commander Yu. Where the fate of the nation is concerned, all people share responsibility. In this war of resistance against Japan, you contribute what you can — men for some, weapons for others. It would be a national disgrace to let those weapons and all that ammo lie there unused.’

‘I’ve heard enough! Don’t expect me to piss in your bottle. If you had any balls, you’d find your weapons in the hands of the Japanese!’

‘We fought them yesterday!’

‘And how many strings of firecrackers did you set off?’ Granddad asked sarcastically.

‘Not firecrackers — bullets and hand grenades. And we lost six of our comrades. We deserve at least half the weapons!’

‘I lost all my men at the bridgehead over the Black Water River, for one ancient machine gun!’

‘It was Pocky Leng’s troops who took everything else!’

‘And I suppose the eyes of Little Foot Jiang’s troops don’t light up just as bright when they see weapons? Well, this is one man you’re not going to sucker!’

‘I advise you to be careful, Commander Yu,’ Jiang warned Granddad. ‘My patience has limits.’

‘Are you threatening me?’ Granddad asked stiffly, resting his hand on the butt of his pistol.

Commander Jiang’s look of anger quickly gave way to a smile. ‘You’ve got me all wrong, Commander Yu. We’d never steal food from a friend’s bowl. Just because we can’t make a deal doesn’t mean we’re not on the same side.’

He turned to his troops and said, ‘Clean up the battlefield. Bury our fellow villagers, and don’t forget to pick up all the spent cartridge casings.’

The troops fanned out across the battlefield to search for cartridge casings. While they were burying the bodies, a battle between crazed dogs and the surviving humans resulted in the dismemberment of many of the corpses.

‘We’re in a terrible fix, Commander Yu,’ Jiang said. ‘We have no weapons or ammunition, and five out of every ten casings we take back to the munitions plant for recasting come out as duds. We’re caught between Pocky Leng, who squeezes us, and the puppet troops, who slaughter us, so you have to give us some of the weapons you’ve got here. Don’t treat the Jiao-Gao regiment with contempt.’

Granddad looked at the troops carrying the dead back and forth near the sorghum field and said, ‘You can have the sabres, and the “79” carbines, and the wooden-handled grenades.’

Jiang grabbed Granddad’s hand and exclaimed, ‘Commander Yu, you’re a true friend…. We make our own wooden-handled grenades, so how about this: you keep the grenades and give us some “38” rifles instead.’

‘No,’ Granddad said tersely.

‘Just five.’

‘No!’

‘Three, then. How’s that? Just three.’

‘I said no!’

‘Okay, two. You can part with at least two, can’t you?’

‘Shit!’ Granddad grumbled. ‘You’re like a damned livestock auctioneer.’

‘Squad One, get over here to pick up the weapons.’

‘Not so fast,’ Granddad said. ‘Stand over there.’

He personally handed out the twenty-four Czech ‘79’ rifles and the canvas cartridge belts, then hesitated for a moment before tossing in a ‘38’ repeater rifle.

‘That’s it,’ he said. ‘And we keep the sabres.’

‘Commander Yu,’ Jiang complained, ‘you agreed to give us two “38” rifles.’

‘If I hear another word from you,’ Granddad said testily, ‘you won’t even get one!’

‘Okay,’ Jiang said, throwing his hands up in front of him. ‘Don’t get mad!’

The Jiao-Gao soldiers who were given weapons grinned from ear to ear. One or two members of the burial detail stumbled upon additional weapons, and they also picked up the automatic pistol Granddad had tossed away and Father’s discarded Browning. Their pockets bulged with spent cartridge casings.

‘Comrades,’ Jiang said, ‘hurry up and get those bodies buried. We have to withdraw before the Japs come back for their dead.’

As the Jiao-Gao regiment was falling in beside the wall, a couple of dozen bicycles came flying down the road from the eastern tip of the village. Wheels glistened, spokes flashed. Commander Jiang barked out an order and the soldiers hit the ground, as the riders pedalled unsteadily up to Granddad.

It was Detachment Leader Leng’s mobile platoon, a crack group of riders armed with pistols. Dressed in neat grey uniforms, with leggings and cloth shoes, they were quite a sight. Pocky Leng was known as a first-rate cyclist who could ride on a single railway track for a mile and a half. Commander Jiang shouted another order, and the Jiao-Gao troops emerged from their hiding places among the trees, quickly forming up ranks behind Granddad.

Detachment Leader Leng’s soldiers dismounted and walked their bicycles the rest of the way along the top of the wall. Leng emerged from the crowd, surrounded by bodyguards.

The mere sight of Pocky Leng was enough to make Granddad reach for his pistol.

‘Take it easy, Commander Yu,’ Jiang cautioned him, ‘take it easy.’

The gloved Detachment Leader Leng, smiling broadly, came up and shook hands with Jiang without taking off his glove. Jiang smiled as he reached inside his pants and brought out a fat, light-brown louse, which he flipped into the ditch.

‘Your esteemed unit is still in the thick of things, I see,’ Detachment Leader Leng said to him.

‘We’ve been fighting since yesterday afternoon,’ Jiang said.

‘Ending in a brilliant victory, I assume?’

‘In cooperation with Commander Yu, we killed twenty-six Japanese and thirty-six puppet soldiers, plus four warhorses. Where were the crack guerrilla troops and fierce leaders of your esteemed unit yesterday?’

‘We were harassing the town of Pingdu and forcing the Japs to retreat in panic. You could call that the classic “Encircle the Wei to rescue the Zhao” ploy, wouldn’t you say, Commander Jiang?’