Tie Ning - The Bathing Women

“No, I don’t hate her.”

“Then why did you hate Quan?”

Suddenly she felt ashamed, more ashamed than she was at admitting to murder. But she had already made up her mind to bring everything out into the open, so she said, “Because Quan was the child of Wu and Fei’s uncle.”

“So that’s why Fei also got involved in the incident, right?”

Tiao didn’t understand Chen Zai. “No, Fei just told me of her suspicion.”

Chen Zai said, “I also remember something from long ago. It was in the same year, the night before Quan’s death, my mother had a heart attack and I took her to the hospital and then came back to fetch a basin and thermos. When I entered the front gate on my bicycle, I saw someone riding a bicycle in front of me who looked very much like Fei. It was pretty late by then, almost twelve. I wondered why Fei had come at that hour. She could only be there to see you, but why so late? Had anything happened to your family? My concern for you made me curious, so I followed her in secret and, sure enough, she stopped in front of your building. I didn’t want her to see me, so I pushed my bicycle to the side of the road, in behind a row of hollies. She didn’t lock her bicycle and go upstairs. Hesitating for a while, she held her bicycle and then turned back to the small road. Next, she stopped at a particular spot. Now she had me really curious, so I left my bicycle leaning against the hollies and worked my way closer to her. Finally, I saw what she was doing: she stood by the manhole and looked at it blankly. She stared for a while and then looked around. When she saw no one, she pulled out an iron hook from her bicycle, the kind we used to pick up the lid of the stove. She grabbed the iron hook and started to pry up the manhole cover. She panted and huffed quite a bit and finally opened the cover. Then she strained to push it aside and revealed the dark hole. I was hoping that she was not trying to jump into the hole to kill herself, but I dismissed the idea immediately. Manholes are very shallow and that fall couldn’t kill her. Maybe she was looking for something, something she had lost in the hole. Before I could give it any more thought, she had already got on her bicycle and ridden away. It looked as though she were just leaving temporarily to get some tools or find a helper. After she was completely out of sight, I walked over to the manhole. The hole was a bit smelly, and the cover was moved aside, only touching the edge of the manhole. The iron hook was gone, too. I didn’t understand what was going on, but I had no time to figure it out. My mother was still in the hospital. So I went home, got money, basin, and thermos, and rode back to the hospital. I stayed at the hospital to keep my mother company for the night. When I went home the next day at noon, I heard that a child had fallen into the manhole. I immediately thought about Fei, who hadn’t opened the manhole to search for anything. Her purpose was to open the manhole. At the time, I didn’t know her name was Fei, only that she was your best friend; you see how I was back then. I remembered all your girlfriends just because I liked you. Many, many years later, when we grew up and you introduced Fei to me, I still believed without a doubt that she was the one who opened the manhole. It was always a mystery to me. I didn’t understand why your good friend would open the manhole and let your sister fall into it. Now that I know why, I feel guilty beyond words: because I was the only one who saw the cover was off, but I didn’t put it back …”

Tiao seemed to understand everything. She was willing to trust Chen Zai’s memory, even though Fei had already died and nothing could be confirmed. Maybe it was because there was no proof that everything could appear so clear. Maybe Fei wanted to tell her this in the last moments of her life, but the cancer took away her courage. So she could only leave her confessing lips on Tiao’s face.

“I feel lucky that I can tell everything to you,” Tiao said.

“I also feel lucky that I could tell everything to you.”

“You want to say that it’s not only my responsibility.”

“Yes, it’s three people’s business.”

“But you’re innocent.”

“No, one can’t be innocent if he feels guilty.”

“My courage came too late.”

“But you have more courage than I do. There seems to be a disagreement between you and me. If you hadn’t opened your mouth, I wouldn’t have had the courage to talk about that night.”

She arose from the sofa and walked to Chen Zai. She knelt and buried her head in his lap and said, “I love you, Chen Zai.”

He picked her up and sat her on his lap. “I love you, Tiao.”

“I love you. Nothing can stop me from loving you.”

“I love you. Nothing can stop me from loving you, either.”

They held each other and fell asleep. Next morning, when she went to take a shower in the bathroom and looked at her face in the mirror, to her surprise she found the pink lipstick print was gone. Her cheek was smooth and clean.

The shower last night was as unreal as a dream, and was also so real that it didn’t feel like a dream.

4

It wasn’t too difficult for Tiao to get to know Vice Governor Yu Dasheng, but she didn’t want to do it artificially, as most people did when they needed to ask a favour from a governor, through connections or networking. Most of the time people would get stuck with the secretary, sometimes not even with the main secretary, but some secretary on duty who would get rid of them easily. Tiao didn’t have any favour to ask, so she didn’t have to use that approach. She just wanted to talk with Yu Dasheng about Fei. It was Fei’s final wish and she’d made a promise to her, even though she thought it was absurd.

So she felt it was even more urgent to get to know him naturally.

She was looking for an opportunity, and then the opportunity came to her. One day the Publishing House received a notice informing them that Vice Governor Yu Dasheng was going to accompany a visiting group from Seoul on a tour of Fuan Children’s Publishing House. In addition to making arrangements for the reception at the Publishing House, Tiao also rearranged her office in a special way. She found a picture of her and Fei at home, taken a few years earlier by Chen Zai. In the picture, Fei had on a loose black pullover, with her hair cascading like a waterfall. Her expression was a bit flirtatious, but charming. Tiao sat with her, shoulder to shoulder, and looked very serious. She framed the picture and deliberately placed it on the most visible spot of her desk. She was thinking she would definitely try to get Governor Yu and his guests to her office.

The visitors came, and after a brief colloquium and a book-giving ceremony from the Publishing House, Tiao proposed that they could take a look at the editors’ working environment. The director’s office was the closest to the conference room, and next was the vice director’s office.

With things arranged this way, Yu Dasheng finally walked into Tiao’s office. He caught sight of the framed picture as soon as he stepped in. Tiao felt that Yu Dasheng was paying attention to the framed picture, and she must seize the moment while he was staring at it to strike up a conversation. She said, “Governor Yu, you must know the person in this picture.”

Yu Dasheng hesitated for a moment, a very small moment of hesitation that normally would have gone unnoticed, and then said, “Yes, yes, I know her. She looks like a worker in a factory where I used to work. Her name is …” He looked like he was trying very hard to recall her name.

“Fei.”

“Yes, Fei,” he said, no longer looking at the framed picture. He commented on how modern and pretty the office equipment looked and then left. Tiao followed him into the hallway and then took her chance to say, “Governor Yu, Fei is my friend. I need to talk about her with you.”