Mountain Girl River Girl (7 page)

Chapter
Ten

When Pan-pan came to, she found herself stretched out on a wooden bench. Slowly she sat up, rubbing her eyes. Her head ached. She touched a sore spot on her forehead and winced. Licking her dry, swollen lips, she tasted blood. Her feet were bare and sore; they felt to Pan-pan like they had been pounded with a hammer.

Confused, Pan-pan looked around, scanning the faces of people seated on the benches across from her. The place was too noisy to be a hospital. It was only when her wandering eyes noticed piles of luggage between the aisles that she realized she was in the waiting room of a railway station.

Hobbling to the window, she stared out at the empty tracks. There was no train. She looked about her but didn’t see her bag and bedroll. When she reached for her money pouch, she remembered what had happened. Pan-pan groaned in despair and sank back onto the bench. Everything—her money, her bedroll and bag—were gone. Even the train had left without her. She covered her face with her hands and sobbed.

Footsteps approached and stopped. A tall middle-aged man wearing a railway uniform and cap stood before her, holding her shoes. He sat down and introduced himself. Lao Ma told Pan-pan in a hushed voice that a horse-cart driver had discovered her lying on the sidewalk and brought her back to the train station after finding a cancelled train ticket in her shoulder bag.

“What are you going to do?” Lao Ma asked after Pan-pan told him who she was and where she was bound. “I’ll try to get you onto the next train to Beijing, but that won’t be until tomorrow afternoon. As for your luggage, let’s hope someone on the train turns it in to the authorities in Beijing. But I wouldn’t count on it.”

His caution made Pan-pan cry harder. All she had now was her shoulder bag and the soiled clothes on her back.

“I have no money for another ticket,” she sobbed.

“You won’t have to pay,” Lao Ma replied. “I’ll look after it. But you can’t stay here all night. You need some rest. Why not come home with me after I finish my shift? My wife will be happy to meet you.”

The stranger’s kindness brought more tears to Pan-pan’s eyes.

Lao Ma’s wife, Lao Zhang, was waiting for them when they arrived at his home long after dark. Their two young sons had gone to bed. Pan-pan’s head still ached, and her limbs were heavy with exhaustion. She had no appetite but, to be polite, she forced down the food she was served. At the end of the meal, Lao Zhang left the room, returning with a stack of clean garments and a towel.

“Have a soak in the tub if you like. It will make you feel better. There is plenty of hot water in the Thermos bottles. Use it all up,” she suggested, pointing to a shed in the courtyard.

Pan-pan nodded and thanked Lao Zhang, then went out to the courtyard. The dimly lit bathroom closet had a squat toilet at one end and a brick sink at the other. A large wooden tub stood on its edge next to the sink. Pan-pan lowered the tub to the floor, pushed it under the tap, and turned on the water before pouring the hot water into it. As she began to unbutton her shirt, the familiarity of the routine reminded her of home—the tiny kitchen and … “and the powder,” she hissed, turning to pick up her shoulder bag. Hastily rummaging through the bag, she found an unopened tin of powder, next to a half-empty bag of dried bread.

Pan-pan tested the bath water with her toe, and stepped into the tub. What a joke, she thought, shaking her head and staring into the rising steam. Of all the things she had once possessed, only the powder tin remained, like a faithful companion. But almost immediately she realized that she should be grateful, if not thankful, for having the powder with her. She would need it because she was about to spend the night with total strangers.

After she had bathed, Pan-pan put on the clothes Lao Zhang had lent her. The pants were the right length but the waist was far too large, so Pan-pan secured it with her own belt. The socks turned out to be brand new, thick at the bottom and soft against her bruised soles. But as she reached for the folded blouse, her hand stopped in midair. “I can’t wear this,” she said to herself. The constant warnings of Xin-Ma and Ah-Po rang in her ears. She might pass her fox smell to Lao Zhang. “It’s just another silly old wives’ tale,” her father had said to her before she left home. But at the same time, both Ah-Po and Xin-Ma had sounded so certain of it. “No wind, no waves,” Xin-Ma had argued. No matter what, Pan-pan concluded, she couldn’t risk offending the woman who was being so kind to her.

Then another thought occurred to her. If she appeared in front of Lao Ma, Lao Zhang, and their sons the next day still wearing her own soggy, bloodstained shirt, she might as well have the words
fox smell
written on her forehead. How on earth could she avoid them asking questions? The agony of indecision was splitting her head into halves. She wished her mother were there, or even Xin-Ma, with her quick decisiveness.

Pressing her lips together, Pan-pan picked up the blouse. She would wash her own clothes first thing in the morning, at dawn. When they were dry, she would then wash Lao Zhang’s garments and hope that her brief contact wouldn’t contaminate them.

Later, lying alone on a cot in a small spare room, Pan-pan wished for the first time that she was back in her own bed, sharing the room with Ah-Po, with Xin-Ma and Gui-yang next door. But how would I tell them about the stolen money and the new clothes and the quilt I lost? she thought before falling into a troubled asleep.

W
HEN PAN-PAN WOKE UP,
it was almost noon, and the first thing that came to her mind was her unwashed laundry. Now what could she do? The house and the courtyard were quiet, so she got out of bed, put on her borrowed clothes, and entered the kitchen, where she found Lao Zhang seated at the table, a newspaper open before her.

“There you are,” Lao Zhang said cheerily, taking off her glasses. “My goodness! Look at you. I had no idea I’d grown so big. My pants look like a skirt on you.” She laughed, pointing toward the courtyard. “But don’t worry. Your clothes were nearly dry last time I checked. Are you feeling a bit better today?”

“My clothes?” Pan-pan repeated silently, missing Lao Zhang’s question. She stared out at the clothes hanging on a line in the sun and her eyes froze on her shirt whipping in the wind. She glanced at Lao Zhang, searching for any sign that she had noticed anything out of the ordinary when she washed Pan-pan’s clothes.

“How are you feeling today?” Lao Zhang asked again.

“Oh, much better, I think. I’m sorry I slept in. You shouldn’t have—” She stopped, pointing at the laundry.

“Don’t mention it. I’ve got nothing else to do. You had a rough day. I’ll get you some tea, then we’ll eat.”

Over a bowl of dumplings filled with stir-fried eggs and minced cabbage, Lao Zhang told Pan-pan that she had taken a day off from her new job as a thief-catcher in a nearby supermarket. “It was the only kind of work I could find after being laid off from the steel factory where I’d been a bookkeeper for over twenty years,” she said bitterly. “The state-owned mill went bankrupt and closed down because of the government’s new economic policies. So all of us workers have been thrown out on the street, jobless and penniless.” According to Lao Zhang, the steel mill was once the pride of the city and the largest employer in the region. Not long ago, a wealthy businessman from Hong Kong had bought it and turned it into a recreation centre.

“Palace of Eternal Delight,” Lao Zhang went on, shaking her head. “Who would have thought it? Where the furnaces used to stand, there’s now a dance hall and bowling alleys. Where the steel was made and shaped, people now sing karaoke every night. I won’t last at this new job. It requires someone who has a heart of stone. I’ve been there for less than a month and already I’ve lost two days’ pay for failing to report shoplifters. They were jamming food into their mouths—blackened bananas and stale buns—the kind of things most people wouldn’t buy anyway. They were so desperate, in their shabby clothes, that I couldn’t bring myself to stop them.”

Wrapping her hands around her tea glass, Pan-pan sat gazing at the tabletop, listening to Lao Zhang out of politeness. She didn’t understand some of the words and phrases and wondered why Lao Zhang was telling all this to a young woman she didn’t even know. At first Pan-pan had thought the kindly woman might just be lonely. But it soon became clear that Lao Zhang had her own agenda. Sharing the worries and anxieties she had harboured for some time was her method of dissuading Pan-pan from continuing her trip to Beijing.

“Pan-pan, we’d be more than happy to buy you a ticket home,” she said abruptly, and quickly added, “express class.”

“Why would you want to do that, Lao Zhang? We’re not even related.”

“Because,” Lao Zhang answered, lowering her eyes to her tea, “because I want you to set an example for my sons. They’re only ten and twelve and already they’ve been talking about leaving Bengbu to work and live in larger cities.”

“But I’ve never even spoken to your kids,” Pan-pan said wearily. “It’s not my fault if they want to go away.”

“Of course not.” Lao Zhang softened her voice, but kept frowning. “But it’s madness again. You see, when I was a bit older than you are now, the government
forced
me to leave home, to live and work among total strangers. To be re-educated, as they called it, by peasants. I hated every minute of it. Now everyone, especially the younger ones, is eager to head for the cities. They think they can get rich there. But they’ll all end up being as exploited and as lonely as I was.”

As Lao Zhang clattered on, Pan-pan’s mind drifted back to the sights at the train stations she had passed—the throngs of travellers, the different dialects humming inside the cars and outside on the platform, and, always, people seeing someone off or waiting to be taken somewhere. It seemed the entire population was on the move.

Now Lao Zhang was trying to talk her into abandoning her plan and returning home. Yet listening to what she had been saying only made Pan-pan realize that she had already missed plenty of opportunities and lagged far behind the rest of the country. Even Lao Zhang’s young sons want to be part of the excitement, she reminded herself. I should at least give it a try. But how am I going to explain that to her? It will only disappoint her—and she’s been treating me like her own child. As soon as Pan-pan heard Lao Ma’s voice, she rushed out to greet him.

“Good news,” he called out as he entered the courtyard.

Pan-pan followed him back inside.

“First things first,” Lao Ma said, looking in a mirror to adjust his white cloth cap on his head. “Someone turned in your luggage to the station manager in Beijing. Second, I reported your situation to my leader. He’s agreed to let you complete your journey without extra cost. That is, if you still want to.” He glanced at his wife. “Or you can forget the whole thing. I’ll arrange to have your luggage sent back here, and we’ll be very glad to buy you a ticket home.”

“Express class,” Lao Zhang repeated, beaming.

“Thank you so much,” said Pan-pan, her throat thick with emotion, “but—” She stopped, and her head bowed low before she looked up again. “But I have come this far already. On top of that, if Lao Zhang, Sun Ming, and millions of kids my age did what they had to years ago, travelling hundreds, even thousands, of kilometres away from home, I’d like to give it a try too.”

“But it was different then, Pan-pan,” Lao Zhang interrupted. “We were forced to go! We had no choice. But you do.”

Choice.
The word struck Pan-pan’s ears like a beating gong. The last time she’d heard the same word spoken was in that bitter argument between her parents years ago. Mom had used it to rationalize her trip to Tongren, the trip that killed her. Was it really a good thing to have more than one choice? Pan-pan wondered, momentarily doubting herself.

“How about letting me get your luggage back here first,” Lao Ma suggested. “It will take only a day or two. Meantime, you’re welcome to stay with us and have more time to think the whole thing over. This afternoon, we can all go watch a soccer match at our sons’ school. That’s why I’m home early. The boys would love to meet you. What do you think?”

Suddenly, Pan-pan’s throbbing head seemed worse, and she felt tired again. “All right. I’ll think about it while my luggage is being returned. But if you don’t mind, I’d like to lie down a bit and skip the game as well,” she said weakly.

The next day, Pan-pan’s headache was almost gone, and her customary energy had returned. After seeing her sons off to school, Lao Zhang insisted on taking Pan-pan sightseeing. Bengbu—the city of Clam Wharf—built on the south shore of the Hui River, turned out to be much bigger, noisier, and crowded than Tongren. Pan-pan was amazed to see that shops and restaurants lined both sides of the main downtown street. Half the goods displayed in the store windows she couldn’t identify, especially the items covered with shiny buttons and keys, blinking and twinkling and glittering in broad daylight. There were stylish clothes in every direction she turned: dashing, colourful, but, most of all, strange. The prosperity and progress were a huge contrast to the life she had known. As she tagged along, at times lagging behind, she couldn’t help wondering why Lao Zhang’s sons wanted to go somewhere else.