The Dragon's Village: An Autobiographical Novel of Revolutionary China (8 page)

And then there was that other, so much smaller group of faceless strangers—the feudal landlords. The men now termed feudal landlords had been chosen by the former Guomindang government, just as they had been by the emperors for centuries past, to run the show in the rural areas. They were the gentry, the literates, lording it over the vast mass of the illiterate. They rented out land at exorbitant rents, charged high interest rates on loans, and in especially backward areas were real rural despots, using their power to amass wealth by every means. Now they and their families would have to atone for these sins.

And yet, although there were indeed some very large landowners, the material difference between the good poor and the bad rich was often no more than 180
mu
or about thirty acres a family. Some tyrannous landlords abused their power and position and deserved punishment, but it seemed harsh to me that because of some small difference in wealth, a small landlord family should be assailed and its children stigmatized as members of an “exploiting class.” It seemed unfair too that the really big landlords had been able to flee the country, leaving behind their puppets, these millions of little landlords, to deal with the consequences. Then I thought of Madame Lu. But it was hard to picture my erstwhile proposed mother-in-law as a “feudal landlord,” or, as I now learned to categorize her, “part feudal landlord, part capitalist,” who would be slated to lose her land but not her bourgeois capital.

Between these clearly “good” and “evil” classes were two more groups, and here it wasn't always easy to draw distinct lines. The largest group between the two extremes—and our greatest hope for allies—were the “middle
peasants.” Where the poor peasant was always on the verge of sliding down into the abyss because of drought or flood or unpayable debts, the middle peasant could just about make do. Then came the much smaller group of “rich peasants.” These relatively well-to-do farmers had more land than they could till themselves so they hired laborers or rented out a portion to tenants or sharecroppers. They were closer in spirit and interests to landlords, though not as established in wealth and power. We were warned in our preparatory classes to keep a wary eye on them while avoiding action that would force them over to the side of the landlords.

At the bottom of the social scale were millions of rural dispossessed—beggars and bandits.

I might have been able to grasp everything more clearly at that time if I'd had more time to study all the documents we were given and listened more attentively to the lectures. But because of the Korean War there was a special urgency about the land reform. Unless the peasants were able to begin tilling their own land by the time the spring sowing started in February or March, there would be a national disaster. That left only about four months in which to accomplish the task for the year. What remained to be done would have to be completed in the next winter lull in farming. The leaders were therefore anxious to have us on the road as soon as possible. But after the lectures we still had to shop and make the warm clothes needed in the remoteness of Gansu Province where the weather was much colder than in temperate Shanghai. All this barely left time for even basic orientation courses.

When I met Wang Sha to discuss my application he joked with me. “I thought you would choose Gansu, where the Silk Road goes and the Great Wall ends. You have romantic ideas. Well, I'll approve your application, but don't blame me if you find it too tough.” Despite his words, there was a hint of tenderness in his teasing. I didn't answer, but just watched the way he ran his fingers through his tousled hair as he left the room.

Two weeks later, we gathered in the early morning at the theater to start our journey to the Northwest. Two buses and a truck were soon filled with the seventy of us and our belongings, and we were off to the railroad station. The lead driver took us by way of the Bund, the riverside embankment road, to give us a last look at the Huangpu and its shipping. “You won't see a river like that for a long time,” he told us. “The place you're going to is a real desert.”

Even at that early hour the river was alive with activity. Big ships swung at anchor from the buoys in midstream. Scurrying launches set junks and sampans bobbing in their wakes. On the far side Pudong was shrouded in morning mist that made its smoking factory chimneys seem like silent, stiff sea wraiths with gently waving hair. We passed the skyscraper banks and hotels and then turned away from the river up teeming Nanking Road with its many-floored offices and department stores with their glittering window displays. It would be five months at least before we saw such sights again. The part of Gansu Province we had been assigned to was more than one thousand miles away, three hundred miles beyond the railhead west of Xian. There was little chance of returning from there on leave. I turned my head back for a last look at the broad river before it was lost to sight amid the traffic and the throng of pedestrians in the morning rush to work.

Shanghai people, like no others in China, know how to make an “occasion” of an event. The station was filled with a hurrying, jostling throng of cadres and their relatives and friends come to see them off. As more and more buses rolled up with groups from other organizations and districts, the noise and commotion reached a peak. To avoid being separated we formed a tight phalanx and pushed our way through to our train. Wang Sha had been appointed to lead our group of seventy going to the Northwest, and we found him waiting for us on the platform, holding up a card on a tall stick with the name of our destination—Gansu—written on it. A score of posters with other names cataloged the many other destinations
of land reform workers that day. Writers, musicians, film workers, dancers, singers, artists, producers, scholars, and a sprinkling of office workers and veteran cadres like Wang Sha moved along the platforms to their trains. The director of our theater and the heads of many departments and organizations of Shanghai were there to wish us well. There was even a band of our orchestral musicians tuning up for a farewell song.

Wang Sha called the roll—still a few missing—and then in a moment of immense confusion we piled into the train with our belongings, trying to find our compartments and places. Like soldiers we had little baggage. We had been told, “Only essentials; no luxuries, please.” Like most, I carried a backpack of a bedding roll and a change of clothes, wrapped in a piece of oilcloth or raincoat, with an enamel basin tied to the outside and an extra pair of cotton shoes or sneakers. In practical fashion, we girls all wore cadres' uniforms: trousers and soldier-style jackets of blue, grey, or khaki. We tied our enamel drinking mugs or bowls to our leather belts. A couple of notebooks, a pen, an extra sweater, little bags and baskets of goodies for the journey, and that was all. It was autumn and we could travel light. Our bundles of warm cotton or floss-padded coats and jackets and trousers and winter underwear had been sent to the baggage wagons. Everything else we possessed we had left with our families or stored with our organizations.

Ma Li wore a floppy soldier's cap pushed back on her head, the cardboard peak forming a halo over her thick bobbed hair. Now she was a girl soldier like those we had seen in the propaganda pictures. I had changed my long pageboy hairdo to a straight bob cut just below my ears. It seemed more appropriate to life in a farming village.

A bell clanged a warning to us all to take our seats. For one awkward moment, all the good-byes said, there was nothing more to say. Anyway, I had no one special to say good-bye to except office friends. My uncle had already left Shanghai. Impatient to leave, we kept eyeing the station clock. Two minutes. One minute. The first whistle. There was a wave of movement across the platform as a
late arrival pushed his way through the crowd. Of course it was our amateur archaeologist, Hu, late as usual. We shouted and beckoned him to hurry, but with packets and bags big and small under both arms threatening to slip down at any moment he could only jog along, body swaying like a duckling waddling to a pond. The guard bundled Hu aboard and slammed the carriage door shut just as the final whistle blew. People took out pocket handkerchiefs, shouted last messages. Mothers wept and waved. A bedlam of good-byes. With the loudspeakers playing a sprightly folk song, we were off.

The train moved slowly at first through the railway yards and past the factories that crowded down the railroad tracks, picking up speed beyond the sheds and hovels of the suburban slum, and finally racing as we got out into the countryside.

As the morning wore on, and the excitement of leaving wore off, conversation in our compartment flagged. I watched the lush landscape pass by. Here in the “Land of Rice and Fish,” south of the Yangzi River, every inch of rich black soil was neatly cultivated up to the very verge of the narrow footpath. The square sails of a junk moved above the tops of the mulberry trees and seemed to be sailing on land.

Ma Li, curled up in one corner, dozed. The troupe's soprano, in the seat opposite me, gazed silently out of the window. Chu Hua, a pretty ballerina, dexterously knitted a winter sweater.

Someone peered into our compartment.

“Is this seat occupied?”

It was Cheng, the comedian. We had recently seen him playing the steward Malvolio in Shakespeare's
Twelfth Night
. His performance was superb. He gave a sensitive and convincing portrayal of the buffoon in love with his high-born mistress. When he spoke about his unrequited love with anguished tears in his eyes, the audience was moved in spite of the fact that he was clowning. Even I had found myself wishing that Olivia would return his
love, although she, fine lady, would never even dream of being loved by such a clownish inferior. After that performance the nickname “Malvolio” had stuck permanently.

“There's plenty of room. Sit here,” Ma Li answered, inviting him to take the empty seat between us.

He rubbed the top of his head and sat down obediently. His head was oddly shaped: a narrow forehead but broad in the chin. He dressed untidily no matter what he wore. Even his best clothes seemed wasted on him. It was the way he wore them on his ungainly body. He was always playacting. Now he looked like a farmer with his sturdy neck and broad back dressed in an old peasant jacket, a perfect picture of a country bumpkin traveling by train for the first time, sitting straight up on the edge of his seat, a bamboo basket covered with a piece of white cloth balanced on his knees.

The train attendant, making his rounds with a huge tin kettle, filled our mugs and bowls with tea. I took one sip, frowned, and put my mug down. It was strong red tea such as northern Chinese like; we southern Chinese, especially Shanghai people, love our delicate green teas. Malvolio Cheng, after swallowing down a mouthful, held his mug as embarrassed as though it were he who had poured out the wrong tea and now did not know what to do. At last he put down his mug as I had done.

“Pfui,” exclaimed Chu Hua, the young ballet dancer, making a comic grimace. “That red tea is so bitter!”

“Yes, it's too bad,” commiserated Malvolio Cheng. “I'll get you something better.” Without waiting for a reply, he left the compartment and soon returned with a thermos bottle of hot chocolate which he shared out among us. It was an unexpected treat.

Encouraged by our response, he diffidently held out his bamboo basket to us, looking from one to another. Ma Li lifted the square of white cloth and exposed a basketful of delicious food: pieces of smoked chicken, preserved duck, fancy sweets. We could not restrain our cries of surprise and delight as we sampled his delicacies and came back
for more. His eyes moved merrily from one mouth to another.

Liao, a dancer from Chu Hua's troupe, looked in to find us all munching away at Malvolio Cheng's food. “What a feast!” he exclaimed.

“I'm afraid you've come too late,” I apologized.

“There's one chicken wing left,” Cheng said, peering into the basket and fishing it out.

Ma Li passed it to Liao, inviting him in. When he had picked the bones clean, he wiped his fingers, stretched his long legs out under the opposite seat, crossed his arms over his chest, and closed his eyes in an exaggerated expression of bliss. Ma Li was wiping her hands on a towel. Suddenly she turned to Malvolio Cheng with a look of dismay on her face:

“But you haven't eaten anything!”

Chu Hua threw her head back and laughed. “We completely forgot about him!” Malvolio Cheng himself seemed delighted and laughed with us.

I noticed the admiring glance that Liao gave Chu Hua before he shyly turned away. With Liao sitting beside her, Chu Hua grew light-headed and giggled all the time like the teenager she was. Her gaiety was contagious. Liao hummed a lively tune and our soprano joined in.

In sight of the huge grim battlements surrounding Nanking, the “southern capital,” our train was ferried across the mile-wide Yangzi River. The rice fields of the South were left behind, as we rattled north across the central wheat and millet plains. The harvests were in, and the dry, brown, stubbled fields were bare. The only spots of color were the orange-yellow corncobs drying on the roofs of the cottages. At the big junction of Xuzhou we turned due west, making for the ancient heartland of China in the valley of the Yellow River. Here and there through gaps in the hills we caught sight of the river's turbid, cocoa-brown waters, heavy with the silt which it carried to the estuary far to the east, into the Yellow Sea.

The day passed quickly. From time to time Wang Sha dropped in to see us. The long train ride gave him a chance to relax a bit after the hectic organizing to get together the work teams in Shanghai. He was in a genial mood. As he sat by the window, a beam of afternoon sunlight lit up his face. The color of his eyes changed from dark brown to lighter brown, giving them a milder look.

Malvolio Cheng too was a welcome visitor, and when we were all together we joked and fooled around. Our jokes drew disapproving frowns from one of our companions, Dai Shi, the girl who had tried to stop me from applauding Mao Dun at the first discussion meeting in our theater. Dissatisfied with the people in her own compartment, she had taken to visiting ours. She was young and not bad-looking, and when in a good mood she even looked pretty. She chased after men indomitably, but her sharp tongue and mischievous gossip frightened them away. Now, unable to reach the grapes, she decided that they were sour. Unhappy, she poked her nose into other girls' affairs. Offering caustic comments, with the air of a moralist, she criticized “loose behavior,” and now, to cap it all, she assumed an unbearable air of superior revolutionary fervor. I once heard her proclaim in a strident voice: “The best way to deal with these liberal dissidents is to give them a good blow to sober them up.”