Mo Yan - Sandalwood Death

With his gloomy, grim laughter as a backdrop, dizzying whiffs of sandalwood abruptly emerged from my gongdieh’s armchair, and the prayer beads in his hand and made my heart flutter. He was unmoved by my dieh’s plight, and my flirtatious moves were wasted on him. He stood up on shaky legs and tossed away the prayer beads that virtually never left his hand, star-like flashes of light bursting from his eyes, a sign that something had either pleased him or struck fear in his heart. Those demonic small hands of his reached out to me as he muttered something under his breath, a look of deep anxiety in his eyes. The ferocity of his gaze was gone, completely gone.

“Wash my hands,” he pleaded, “I need to wash my hands…”

I ladled cold water from the vat into our brass basin and watched as he thrust his hands into it. A hissing sound escaped from between his lips, but he gave no hint of what that meant. His hands were as red as hot cinders, his delicate fingers curling inward like the feet of a young red-legged rooster. I was struck by the image of fingers of molten metal, underscored by the sizzle of the water in the basin, which had begun to bubble and steam. I had never seen anything like it, and did not expect to ever see it again. Immersing his feverish hands in cold water obviously brought soothing comfort to him, since he seemed to sag and go limp all over; his eyes were slitted, and every intake of air whistled through his teeth. The way he held his breath each time was the sign of an opium addiction, the sort of otherworldly languor that only an old donkey like him could manage. It all seemed quite sinister, and unexpected. He was, it was now clear, the embodiment of an evil spirit, a worrisome old degenerate.

Once his self-indulgence had run its course, he took his red hands out of the water and returned to his chair without drying them off. Now, however, instead of shutting his eyes, he kept them wide open and fixed on his hands to watch drops of water slide down his fingers to the ground. He was relaxed almost to the point of lethargy, physically spent but luxuriantly content… like my gandieh when he climbs off my body…

That was before I knew that he was a renowned executioner, and when all I could think about were the silver certificates tucked into his clothes. “Gongdieh, I said in as solicitous a tone as I could manage, “it seems I’ve made you comfortable. Well, I expect my dieh’s life to end either tonight or tomorrow morning, and given our family connection, won’t you help me think of something? Mull that over while I go inside and prepare a bowl of congee with forbidden rice and pig’s blood.”

I felt empty inside as I washed rice at the well. When I looked up, I saw the flying eaves of the towering City God Temple, where pigeons were cooing and crowding together, and I wondered what they found so interesting. The crisp clack of horse hooves resounded on the cobblestone road beyond the gate. Some German devils were riding by, their tall, rounded, feathered hats visible above the wall. The sight made my heart pound, since I was sure that my dieh was what was on their minds. Xiaojia, who by then had sharpened his butcher knife and readied the necessary tools, picked up a hooked Chinese ash pole and went into the sty, where he selected a black pig and quickly hooked it under the chin. Squeals tore from its mouth, and the bristles on its neck stood straight as it struggled to back up, its hind legs and rump flat on the ground, blood seeming to seep from its eyes. It was no match for Xiaojia, who hunkered down and pulled so hard that his feet sank at least three inches into the dirt, like a pair of hoes, as he backed up, one powerful step at a time, pulling the pig along like a plow, its feet digging furrows in the sty. In less time than it takes to tell, Xiaojia had pulled the pig up to the killing rack. Then, gripping the hooked pole in one hand and the pig’s tail in the other, he straightened up and, with a loud grunt, lifted a creature weighing two hundred jin up onto the rack, so disorienting it that it forgot to struggle—but not to squeal. Now that all four legs were sticking straight up, Xiaojia removed the hook from the pig’s chin and tossed it to the side, picking his razor-sharp butcher knife out of the blood trough in the same motion. Then—slurp—with the sort of casual indifference of slicing bean curd, he plunged his knife high in the pig’s chest. A second push and it was buried deep inside the animal, bringing an end to the squeals, which were replaced by moans that lasted only a moment. Now all that remained were the twitches—legs, skin, even the bristles. Xiaojia pulled the knife out and turned the pig over to let its blood spill into the trough below. Great quantities of bright, hot blood the color of red silk pulsed into the waiting trough.

The stench of fresh blood hung over the half acre of our courtyard, which was big enough to accommodate dog pens and pigsties, Chinese roses and peonies, plus a rack for curing meat, vats to hold fermented drink, and an open-air cook pit. The odor attracted blood-drinking bluebottle flies that danced in the air, a testament to their keen sense of smell.

Two yayi, attired in soft red leather caps, black livery secured around the middle with dark cloth sashes, and soft-soled boots with ridges down the middle, swords in scabbards on their hips, opened the gate. I knew they were constables, fast yayi from the yamen who tracked down criminals, but I did not know their names. Feeling a lack of self-assurance, since my dieh was in their jail, I smiled. Normally I would not have deigned to look their way, not at contemptuous toadying jackasses who were a scourge of the people. They returned my courtesy with nods and tiny smiles squeezed out of their fiendish faces. But only for a second. One of them reached under his tunic and pulled out a black bamboo tally, which he waved in the air and intoned somberly:

“We bring orders from His Eminence the County Magistrate to escort Zhao Jia to the yamen for questioning.”

Xiaojia came running up, bent humbly at the waist, still gripping his bloody butcher knife, and, with a bow, asked:

“What is it, Your Honors?”

With frosty looks, the yayi asked:

“Are you Zhao Jia?”

“I am Xiaojia; Zhao Jia is my dieh.”

“Where is your dieh?” one of the puffed-up yayi demanded.

“In the house.”

“Inform him that he is to accompany us to the yamen.”

I had taken all I was about to take from this pair of nasty dogs.

“My gongdieh never goes anywhere,” I said angrily. “What offense has he committed?”

My display of temper was not lost on them.

“Mistress of the Zhao home, we merely follow orders,” they said, looking for sympathy. “And we are only messengers. If he is guilty of an offense, we do not know what it is.”

“One moment, good sirs. Are you inviting my dieh to the yamen for a social visit?” Xiaojia asked, his curiosity bubbling over.

“How should we know?” the yayi said with a shake of his head and an enigmatic grin. “Maybe he’ll be treated to some nice dog meat and millet spirits.”

Of course I knew exactly what kind of dog filth and cow crap had come out of the little mutt’s yap: a not so subtle hint at what went on between Magistrate Qian and me. Xiaojia? How could a blubber-head like him have any idea what this was all about? He was only too happy to run inside.

I followed him in.

Qian Ding, you fucking dog, what are you up to? You arrest my dieh, but hide from me. Then early this morning, two of your lackeys show up to take my gongdieh away. The plot certainly thickens. First my own dieh, then my husband’s dieh, and now my gandieh, three diehs coming together in the Great Hall. I’ve sung the aria “Three Judges at Court,” but this is the first time I’ve heard of “Three Diehs at Court.” I doubt that you can stand being away from me for the rest of your life, damn you, and the next time I see you, I’m going to find out what you have in your bag of tricks.