Big Breasts and Wide Hips (38 page)

The white goat put up a feeble struggle when Niandi grabbed it by the horns. Shengli rushed up, flopped over beneath the animal, and strained to turn her head so she could take the nipple into her mouth as she kicked the goat's belly with both feet. Niandi rubbed the goat's ears; it wagged its tail docilely. Mournful feelings flooded my mind. It was clear that my days of relying on mother's milk were coming to an end. So before that happened, I would have to find a substitute. The first thing that came to mind was those long, wiggly noodles. But that thought brought me disgust. And dry heaves. Niandi looked up and gave me a skeptical look. “What's wrong with you?” she asked in a tone that showed how repugnant she thought I was. I waved her off to show I couldn't answer. More dry heaves. She let go of the goat. “Jintong,” she said, “what do you think you're going to be like when you grow up?”

I wasn't sure what she was getting at. “Why don't you try goat's milk?” she said. The sight of Shengli greedily feeding under her goat made an impression on me. “Are you determined to be the cause of Mother's death?” She shook me by the shoulders. “Do you know where milk comes from? That's Mother's blood you're drinking. So listen to me and start drinking goat's milk.”

I nodded reluctantly.

So she reached out and grabbed the mute's black goat. “Come here,” she said to me as she calmed the goat down by stroking its back. “I said, come here.” Encouraged by the look of kindness, I took a tentative step toward her. Then another. “Lie down under its belly. See how she does it?”

I lay down on the grass and scooted along on my back. “Big Mute, back up a little,” she said as she pushed the black goat backward. I looked up into the dazzling blue Northeast Gaomi sky. Golden birds were flying through the silvery air, soaring on the wind currents and trailing sweet-sounding cries. But my view was quickly blocked by the goat's udder, which hung over my face. Two large insectlike nipples quivered as they sought out my mouth. They rubbed up against my lips, and when they did, the quivering increased, as if they were trying to pry my lips open. They tickled my lips, like tiny charges of electricity, and I was immersed in a flood of what seemed like joy. I'd assumed that goats' teats were soft, not elastic at all, sort of cottony, and that they'd lose their shape as soon as they entered my mouth. Now I knew they were actually pliable and tough, quite springy, and in no way inferior to Mother's. As they rubbed my lips, I detected something hot and liquid. It had a muttony taste that quickly turned sweet, the flavor of buttery grass and daisies. My determination weakened, I unclenched my teeth, my lips parted, and the goat's teat rushed into my mouth, where it vibrated excitedly and released powerful spurts of liquid, some of it hitting the sides of my mouth, the remainder squirting straight down my throat. I nearly choked. I spit out the teat, but a second, more aggressive one quickly took its place.

With a flick of its tail, the goat walked away casually. Tears gushed from my eyes. My mouth was filled with a muttony taste, and I felt like throwing up. But my mouth was also filled with the taste of buttery grass and daisies, and so I stopped feeling like throwing up. Sixth Sister pulled me to my feet and ran in a circle with me in her arms. I saw freckles pop up all over her face; her eyes were like black stones dredged up from the bottom of a river, clean and bright. “My foolish little brother,” she said excitedly, “this will be your salvation …”

“Mother,” Sixth Sister shouted, “Mother, Jintong drank goat's milk! He drank goat's milk!”

The sound of clapping emerged from inside.

Mother tossed the blood-stained rolling pin down next to the wok, opened her mouth wide, and gasped for breath, her chest rising and falling violently. Shangguan Lü lay beside the haystack, a crack in her skull looking like a walnut. Eighth Sister, Yunü, was huddled near the stove, a piece of her ear missing, seemingly gnawed off by a rat, and still oozing blood. The blood stained her cheek and her neck. She was bawling loudly, a steady flow of tears emerging from her sightless eyes.

“Mother, you killed Grandma!” Sixth Sister shrieked in horror.

Mother reached out and touched Grandma's wound with her fingers, and then, as if given an electric shock, sat down hard on the ground.

As specially invited guests, we climbed the southeastern edge of the grassy slope on Reclining Ox Mountain to watch a demonstration by Commander Sima Ku and the young American Babbitt. A southeastern wind swept past under sunny skies as Laidi and I rode a single donkey up the mountain; Zhaodi and Sima Liang shared another one. I sat in front of Laidi, who held me from behind. Zhaodi sat in front of Sima Liang, who merely held on to her clothes, since he couldn't wrap his arms around her belly, in which the next generation of Simas was growing. Our contingent skirted the ox's tail and gradually climbed onto the ox's back, where needle-sharp grass dotted with yellow dandelions grew. Even with us on their backs, the donkeys climbed effortlessly.

Sima Ku and Babbitt rode past us on horseback, excitement showing on their faces. Sima Ku waved a fist at us as he passed. At the crest of the mountain, a group of yellow-skinned people shouted down the mountain. Sima Ku raised his riding crop and smacked the rump of his horse. The horse responded by climbing even faster, with Babbitt's horse following close behind. He rode horses the same way he rode camels, his upper body straight no matter how much he swayed from side to side. His legs were so long that his stirrups nearly touched the ground, and his horse was both to be pitied and laughed at; but it galloped along nonetheless.

“Let's speed up a bit,” Second Sister said as she dug her heels into the donkey's midsection. She was the head of our delegation, the esteemed wife of the commander, and no one dared disobey her. Representatives of the masses and some local celebrities followed without a word of complaint, though they were out of breath from the climb. The donkey carrying Laidi and me was right on the tail of the one carrying Zhaodi and Sima Liang; Laidi's nipples rubbed against my back through the black cloth of her dress, which took me back to the episode in the feeding trough, and brought me great pleasure.

The wind on the mountaintop was stronger than lower down, so strong in fact that the windsock snapped loudly, its red and yellow silk ribbons dancing wildly, like a pheasant's tail feathers. A dozen or so soldiers were unloading things from the backs of camels, scowling beasts whose tails and rear leg joints were soiled by dried excrement. The rich pastureland of Northeast Gaomi had fattened up Commander Sima's horses and donkeys and the locals' cows and goats, but had had the opposite effect on the dozen or so pitiful camels, who were slow to acclimate to the place; their rumps seemed chiseled by awls, their legs were like kindling; their normally tall and angular humps looked like empty sacks hanging to one side, about to fall to the ground.

The soldiers unrolled an enormous carpet and laid it on the grass. “Lift the commander's wife down off her donkey!” Sima Ku ordered. Soldiers ran up and lifted the pregnant Zhaodi off her donkey, and then helped Sima Liang down. After that it was the commander's sister-in-law, Laidi, his brother-in-law, Jintong, and his younger sister-in-law, Yunii. As honored guests, we sat on the carpet. Everyone else stood behind us. The Bird Fairy tried to hide in the crowd, and when Second Sister signaled her to come over, she hid her face behind Sima Ting and stood behind us. Sima Ting, who was suffering from a toothache, stood there covering his swollen cheek with his hand.

The spot where we sat corresponded to the ox's head, the face directly in front of us. The ox made a point of sticking its mouth up against the chest. Its face was a hanging cliff well over a thousand feet above sea level. Winds swept over our heads on their way to the village, above which misty clouds floated like puffs of smoke. I tried to locate our house, but what I spotted was Sima Ku's neatly laid-out compound, with its seven entrances. The church bell tower and the wooden watchtower appeared small and fragile. The plain, the river, the lake, and the pastureland were ringed by a dozen or more ponds and populated by a herd of horses the size of goats and donkeys as small as dogs; they were the Sima Battalion mounts. There were six milk goats the size of rabbits, and those were our goats — the big white one was mine. Mother had requested it from Second Sister, who had requested it from her husband's aide-de-camp, who had sent someone to the Yi-Meng mountain district to buy it. A little girl stood next to my goat; her head looked like a little ball. But I knew it was a young woman, not a little girl, and that her head was actually a lot bigger than a little ball, because it was Sixth Sister, Niandi. She had taken the goats out to pasture, not for their benefit, but because she wanted to see the demonstration too.

Sima Ku and Babbitt had dismounted; their squat horses were roaming around the ox's head, searching for wild alfalfa, with its purple flowers. Babbitt walked up to the ledge and leaned over to look down, as if gauging its height. Then he looked up into the sky — nothing but blue as far as the eye could see, so no problem there. He squinted and raised a hand, apparently checking the force of the wind, even though the flag was snapping, our clothes billowed, and a hawk was being tossed around in the air like a dead leaf. Sima Ku was behind him, exaggeratedly repeating all his moves. He had the same serious look on his face, but I sensed it was all for show.

‘Okay,” Babbitt said stiffly, “we can begin.”

“Okay,” Sima Ku said in the same tone. “We can begin.”

The soldiers brought up two bundles and opened one of them. Inside was a sheet of white silk that seemed bigger than the sky itself; attached to it were some white cords. Babbitt signaled the soldiers to tie the cords around Sima Ku's hips and chest. Once that was done, he tugged at them to make sure they were well fastened. He then shook out the white silk and had the soldiers stretch it out as far as it would go. As a gust of wind caught it, the soldiers let go, and it billowed out into a sweeping arc, pulling all the cords taut and dragging Sima Ku along the ground. He tried to stand, but couldn't, and began rolling along the ground like a newborn donkey. Babbitt ran up behind him and grabbed the cord around his back. “Grab it,” he shouted stiffly, “grab the control cord.” Sima Ku, apparently coming to his senses, cursed, “Babbitt, you fucking assassin —”

Second Sister jumped up from the carpet and ran after Sima Ku. But she hadn't gone more than a few steps before he was swept over the ledge, bringing an abrupt end to his curses. Babbitt roared, “Pull the cord on your left! Pull it, stupid!”

We ran over to the ledge, even Eighth Sister, who stumbled in the general direction until First Sister grabbed her. The sheet of silk by then had been transformed into a puffy white cloud, drifting along at an angle, with Sima Ku hanging beneath it, twisting and turning like a fish on a hook.

Babbitt roared, “Steady, stupid, steady! Get yourself ready to touch down!”

The cloud drifted along with the wind, descending slowly until it came to earth on a distant grassy spot, where it was transformed into a dazzling white cover over the green grass.

All that time, we stood on the edge holding our breath, mouths open, as we followed the white sheet with our eyes until it touched the ground; then we closed our mouths and recommenced breathing. But we quickly tensed up as we became aware that Second Sister was crying. It suddenly occurred to me that the commander had fallen to his death. Everyone's eyes were riveted on the patch of white, waiting for a miracle. Which is what we got: the sheet stirred and began to rise; a black object squirmed out from under it and stood up. He waved his arms; his excited shouts reached us on the mountaintop. A roar went up from the ledge.

Babbitt's face was bright red; the tip of his nose shone, as if smeared with oil. After tying his cords around him and strapping the bundle onto his back, he stood, limbered up his arms, and walked slowly backward. We couldn't take our eyes off him, but he was oblivious to his surroundings, eyes straight ahead. After he'd backed up a dozen yards or more, he stopped and closed his eyes; his lips were moving, as if he were uttering a charm. The charm completed, he opened his eyes and took off running. When he reached the spot where we were standing, he dove into the air, body straight, and began falling like a stone. For a moment, I was caught up in the illusion that he wasn't falling, but that the ledge was actually rising, along with the ground below. Then, all of a sudden, a pure white flower, the largest I'd ever seen, blossomed in the blue sky over the green grass. A roar greeted this big white flower as it drifted along, with Babbitt hanging steadily beneath it, like the weight on a scale. He hit the ground in a matter of seconds, right in the middle of our little herd of goats, which fled in all directions, like frightened rabbits. Suddenly, the big white flower collapsed in on itself, like a bubble, covering Babbitt and the shepherdess Niandi.

Sixth Sister shrieked in alarm as a layer of white closed in around her. When her goats fled in all directions, she gazed up into the pink face of Babbitt, as he hung beneath the white cloud. He was smiling. A god descending to the land of mortals! Or so she thought. As if in a trance, she watched him fall rapidly toward her, her heart filling with reverence and ardent love for him.

The rest of us stuck our heads out over the ledge to see what was going on down below. “This has sure been an eye-opener,” said Huang Tianfu, who ran the coffin shop. “A god. I've lived seventy years, and I've finally seen a god descend to the land of mortals.” Mr. Qin the Second, who taught at the local school, stroked his goatee and sighed. “There was something special about Commander Sima the day he was born. When he was my student, I knew he was headed for big things.” Mr. Qin and Proprietor Huang were surrounded by township elders, all of whom were praising Sima Ku in similar language but different tones of voice and marveling over the eye-popping miracle that had just occurred. “You folks cannot imagine how many ways he differed from the others,” Mr. Qin said loudly to drown out the discussion around him and make a show of his special relationship with Sima Ku, a man who could fly like a bird.