Ma Jian - Red Dust

‘This city is a furnace,’ I say, walking back into the room. ‘The bed is too hot. I’ll sit on the stool.’

‘So tell us about your adventures. Everyone wants to travel now that things are loosening up. I’ve always longed to go to Tibet, just never had the time.’ Wu Jian has a beer in one hand and a cigarette in the other. He works in the propaganda department of a heavy machinery plant. He joined five years ago, straight from university.

‘Beijing felt like a prison. When I escaped I wanted to go as far away as possible, scatter myself across the wilds, spend all my new-found freedom. I didn’t care where I went, as long as I hadn’t been there before. I needed to empty my mind.’ My words embarrass me. I turn to Yang Ming and say, ‘How is your poetry going? Are there many writers in Chengdu? I hear there’s an English Corner now in the People’s Park.’

‘Yes, hundreds of students visit to practise their English. They all want to go abroad.’

‘There will be private English schools opening next.’

‘Well, there is a private ballroom already. It’s open for three hours every Saturday evening. Costs five mao to get in.’

‘Really? We must go. The cities have changed so much in the last six months. When I left Beijing we weren’t even allowed to dance in our own homes. They said things would change, but I didn’t realise it would happen this fast.’

After supper, Wu Jian walks me to Wang Qi’s flat in the staff compound of Sichuan University. Wang Qi edits the university newspaper, his wife is a nurse in the hospital’s orthopaedic department. They look like brother and sister — even their expressions are the same. Their flat has two bedrooms and space enough in the sitting room for a table and four chairs. It is much cooler than Yang Ming’s room.

Wang Qi and I talk late into the night. We keep popping to the bathroom. I go not to use the toilet, but to splash my face with water to keep myself awake. I am used to sleeping at dusk and waking at dawn. It is hard to readjust to the rhythm of the city. He reads me his poem (’My stranger’s teeth/ Chewing at my soft tongue. .’) and talks about Chengdu poets and the underground journal they publish. He asks me about life on the road. I tell him about my trek to Sugan Lake. I must have romanticised it, because the story seems to excite him. ‘Yes, yes,’ he says, ‘you have to reach despair before you can see any hope. Life should be dangerous and full of constant challenge.’ Then he leans over and whispers, ‘I can’t stand this life any longer. I must leave. .’

There is no need to whisper. Our voices are drowned by the whirr of the fan and his wife is sound asleep in the bedroom next door. She could not have heard his treacherous words. Each time I pass on the way to the bathroom, I glimpse the curve of her bare legs.

‘Travelling is hard work,’ I tell him. ‘Danger is not exciting, it’s just proof of your incompetence. Besides, the biggest danger anyone can face is a life behind the Iron Curtain. You have a nice home, a pretty wife. I had nothing. That’s why I left. It was an admission of failure. But now I know that nature is as cruel and heartless as the cities I ran away from. It can eat you up from inside. .’

I want to dissuade this man from leaving home, but I am drowsy with drink and can barely hear my words, and my body is sinking deeper and deeper into the sofa.

‘No, I need to change my life. Always the same three men in the editorial department. We’re proof-readers, not editors. The university vice-president makes all the decisions beforehand. I spend the mornings longing for lunch break, and the afternoons longing to go home. When I do get home I have supper and wonder what exactly I have done with the day, and realise the only thing I have done is fill my stomach with green tea. I wish I could do what you did — leave it all behind. That takes real courage.’

I watch his pale hands twirl the glass of beer and, thinking how those same hands can stroke the woman in the bedroom next door, I slowly drift into sleep.

When I wake it is morning already. I can hear the wife in the bathroom telling her son to lift his feet, and a spoon scraping against the wok in the kitchen. Smells of warm tofu milk waft into the stale air of the sitting room. I am not in the mood for polite conversation, so I keep my eyes shut and pretend to be asleep.

As soon as they close the front door, I crawl off the sofa, change into the trousers Wu Jian has lent me, dunk my dirty clothes into a bowl of boiling water, then return to the sofa to open my post.

The first letter has a Beijing postmark. It is dated 1 July. I recognise Li Tao’s handwriting.

Had to wait four months for a letter from you, you bastard. I took out my map to try and get a sense of your journey but all I saw were some unfamiliar place names. It disturbs me to hear that children run away and cry at the sight of your haggard figure. But I am sure that your mind is calm and detached, and I envy you.

Life in Beijing is dull and uneventful. I’ve finished the novella I told you about. Harvest will run it in December. They rejected your poem — said it was too abstruse — so I passed it on to Northern Literature. . Mimi has closed the restaurant and decided to go and try her luck in Shenzhen. She doesn’t seem to need me any more. I have applied for a job at Shenzhen University, and am still waiting to hear back from them. . Sometimes I want to give everything up — women included, but I know I can’t of course. . Why don’t we meet up over Spring Festival? I need to get away.

I’ve been keeping an eye on Nanxiao Lane for you. I’ve paid your water and electricity bills. Sometimes when I sit by your easel and look at your paintings, strange thoughts come to mind, frightening even, but as soon as I pick up a pen my mind goes blank. . It’s your birthday again soon. I’ve enclosed 20 yuan. Go to a restaurant and have a good meal. This letter came for you. Take care of yourself, dear friend.

The letter he enclosed is from Wang Ping.

. . Very upset to hear you’ve been targeted in the Campaign Against Spiritual Pollution. But this is your fate, accept it quietly and try to control your temper. . One of the many men chasing me is a Party cadre who lectures on the evils of Spiritual Pollution, of all things. What a strange world. . Anything exciting happening in Beijing? Hangzhou’s cold and gloom deadens the soul. . As you know, Hangzhou Daily was planning to send me abroad this year, but the head of the local tourist department demanded his daughter go instead, so that was the end of that. I’m not giving up though. I’ve applied to do an MA in the States. I’m taking the TOEFL exam in November. I’m bound to do well. I have a degree in English literature, after all. I will keep this to myself though for the time being, just in case. .

I remember you saying you needed a break. Why not visit me in Hangzhou? I’ll show you the sites. If you do come, make sure you bring a copy of The Van Gogh Story, or any other foreign book you can find in Beijing.

The letter is dated 19 February. Since her work unit is attached to mine I did not contact her before I left in case she would be compromised. Besides, I thought she had gone abroad. From the tone of the letter, it seems she likes me.

Hu Sha writes from Beijing.

I warn you, Ma Jian, loneliness is inevitable, it hides within us like death. But art can transform our loneliness into a tree, and from its high branches we can study the crowds below. . Don’t forget, this is a ruthless society. We must unite and build a force for change. . Fan Cheng and I are busy editing our next edition of The New Era. Your poem is too long, I can only use a few verses. . Held another secret reading last month. That Czech girl came again, we get on very well. Problem is we’re both trying to free ourselves from the yoke of political oppression, so it’s clear from the start we have no future together. .