Mo Yan - Sandalwood Death

“That’s your uncle, son.”

I spun around. There was nothing behind me but the same old gray wall, not a trace of your grandmother. But I knew that her spirit had spoken to me. So I shouted out, “Uncle!” at the same time that someone behind me—or so I thought—shoved me up close to the prison van.

I had no idea what I was doing, but the procession—officials, cavalrymen, everyone—froze. A horse reared up with a loud whinny and threw its rider. I ran up to the swordsmen in black and called out, “Uncle, at last I’ve found you!” All the bitterness and sorrow I’d experienced over the years came pouring out in a cascade of tears. The two men in black were dumbstruck, their mouths hanging open as they exchanged surprised looks, as if to say:

“Are you that beggar’s uncle?”

But before they could gather their wits, soldiers came riding up from front and back, shouting and brandishing their swords until I was hemmed in. I felt a cold shadow settle above my head and immediately felt an enormous hand close around my neck. Whoever it was lifted me off the ground, and I thought he was going to break my neck. With my arms and legs flailing in the air, I kept shouting “Uncle! Uncle!” Until whoever it was flung me to the ground, where, with a splat, I crushed a frog in the road. Worst of all, my face landed in a pile of still-warm horse manure.

A fat, dark-faced man on an enormous roan charger behind the prison van wore a robe with a white leopard embroidered on the chest and a plumed hat studded with crystalline blue gems. One look told me that he was a high official. The soldier got down on one knee and, in a resounding voice, announced:

“Excellency, it is a little beggar.”

Two of the soldiers dragged me up in front of the official, where one of them jerked my head back by my hair to give the man on horseback a good look at me. He barely glanced at me. With a heavy sigh, he cursed:

“The little prick has a death wish! Toss him off the road!”

“Sir!” the soldiers barked in unison as they picked me up by my arms, dragged me to the side of the road, and flung me into the air with a “Fuck off!”

Accompanied by their curse, I landed headfirst in the thick mud of the ditch.

Climbing out of that ditch was no easy feat, especially because I couldn’t see a thing. By groping my way along, I got my hands on some weeds, with which I managed to clean the muck from my face, just in time to see that the execution procession was heading south, raising clouds of dust on the road. My mind was a blank as I sat there staring at the horses and their riders. But then your grandmother’s voice sounded in my ear:

“Go watch them, son; he is your uncle.”

I looked around, trying to find your grandmother, but all I saw was the dirt road, some steaming horse manure, and a bunch of sparrows, their heads cocked, their beady black eyes searching for undigested food in the manure. There was no sign of your grandmother. “Niang!” I felt so bad I started to cry, my wails stretching out longer than the ditch I was sitting in. Oh, how I missed your grandmother, and how she disappointed me. You told me to go up to my uncle, Niang, but which one was he? They picked your son up like a dead cat or a rotting dog and flung him into a filthy roadside ditch. I’m lucky I wasn’t killed. You must have seen what happened. If your spirit has the power, Niang, light up my path ahead so I can find my way out of this sea of bitterness. If it does not, then please do not talk to me anymore, and stop interfering in my life. Let me live or die, with my little pecker pointing to heaven, on my own. But she ignored my plea. The sound of her aged voice kept swirling inside my head, over and over:

“Go watch them, son; he is your uncle… he is your uncle…”

So I ran like a maniac to catch up with the procession. One of the benefits of running fast was that your grandmother’s voice was stilled. But as soon as I slowed down, that maddening, nagging voice found its way back into my ears. Running like a madman was the only way I could escape the mutterings of her floating spirit, even if it meant getting flung into another foul ditch by soldiers in their red-tasseled straw hats. I fell in behind the procession as it passed through Xuanwu Gate and headed down the narrow, bumpy road on its way to the execution ground by the open-air market. It was my first time on this infamous road. By now there are layers of my footprints on it. The scenery outside the wall had a more desolate feel than inside. Dark green vegetable plots separating the squat houses on both sides of the road were planted with cabbages, turnips, and beans on trellises, the leaves now withered, the vines all jumbled. People working plots had little or no interest in the raucous procession passing in front of them. A few cast stony glances behind them, but most went on about their business without looking up.

As the procession neared its destination, the twisting road opened out onto a broad execution ground in which a pack of bored observers were milling around a raised platform. There were several beggars, including the one-eyed dragon who had beaten me. This was obviously his territory. The mounted soldiers spurred their horses on to form a line. The pair of magnificent executioners opened the cage and pulled the prisoner out. His legs must have been broken by the way they dragged him along the ground. The useless limbs reminded me of wilted onions. They carried him up onto the execution platform, where he crumpled to the floor as soon as they let go. He was all flesh and no bones. The onlookers began to make noise, shouting their disapproval of the condemned man’s poor showing. “Coward!” “Softy!” “Get up!” “Sing a line of opera!” The shouts seemed to have an effect on the man, who began to stir, a little bit at a time, flesh and bones, with painful slowness, but enough to earn him a round of applause and shouts of encouragement. He pushed himself up onto his knees as best he could. The crowd demanded more:

“Good man, show some bravado! Say something. How about ‘Take off my head and leave a bowl-sized scar!’ or ‘I’ll be back in twenty years, better than ever!’”

The man’s mouth twisted as he cried out tearfully:

“Heaven is my witness, I am innocent!”

The spectators gazed at the man in stunned silence. The two executioners were impassive, as always. And then your grandmother’s spirit spoke to me from behind.

“Shout, son, be a good boy and shout. Call to them. He’s your uncle!”

There was a sense of urgency in her voice, as the pitch rose and grew increasingly shrill. Cold, shuddering blasts of air hit the nape of my neck. If I hadn’t shouted, she’d have throttled me. There was no way out, so, risking retaliation from one of the fierce sword-wielding soldiers, I cried out in a choked voice:

“Uncle—”

Every eye in the crowd was on me in an instant—the official witnesses, the soldiers, the beggars, though I’ve forgotten what the looks in those eyes were like. But not those of the prisoner; I’ll never forget the look in his eyes. His blood-encrusted head jerked upward as he opened his bloodshot eyes and looked straight at me; I fell backward as if I’d been struck by red-tipped arrows. The next thing I heard was the voice of the dark, fat official in charge:

“It’s time—”

Trumpets blared, and the soldiers pursed their lips to make mournful sounds as one of the executioners grabbed the prisoner’s queue and pulled his head forward to expose the scruff of his neck for the other man, who raised his sword, turned slightly to the right, then handsomely to the left, and— swish —the glinting blade arced downward, truncating a scream of tragic innocence. The man in front was already holding aloft the severed head. He and the other man now stood shoulder to shoulder, faced the witnessing official, and shouted in unison: