The Dragon's Village: An Autobiographical Novel of Revolutionary China Read online

  “I am either above politics or beyond … or perhaps they are beyond me,” he complained, buttonholing the stout man before him, a lethargic Guomindang minister. “My job is to build roads, and every country needs roads. I don’t see any reason why I can’t go on building roads here.”

  The minister had mastered the art of speaking in nothing but platitudes.

  “The people need your talents. Communism will reduce the country to chaos.”

  “But the Japanese have already done a pretty good job of roadbuilding in Taiwan.”

  “There is always room for improvement.”

  Finally, I stood beside Madame Lu. The lady with her had noticed me first. She looked me over as if I were some commodity at a sale, and, concluding that I was indeed marketable, she gave her appraisal: “You are a pretty girl.”

  Madame Lu thereupon gave me a rapturous embrace and having displayed her affection, turned back to Madame Gui who completed the sentence I had interrupted.

  “… and everybody says that if the Communists win, we will have to give away our wealth. Well, I don’t know how that will work. Would a peasant appreciate all this?” and she gestured all around the room at the fine rugs, the chandelier, the paintings, the bejeweled guests. “After all, it takes quite a while to cultivate taste.”

  Having done my duty, I wandered off to where our highway engineer was now engaged in earnest conversation with a dapper, youthful-looking officer, General Xu, and the banker Mr. Chang. I didn’t interrupt them, but listened intently.

  After greeting me with an amiable squeeze of my shoulder, Mr. Chang went on rolling a Cuban cigar gently between his palms. This was a habit he had learned on his foreign travels. It made the cigars draw better, he explained.

  “General, will the Communist army attack Shanghai soon?” the engineer asked.

  “Not much of a chance. They haven’t got the modern landing craft to cross the Yangzi River.”

  The general was handsome and he liked the ladies. He was also rich. Back in the thirties when Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek still admired Hitler, he had invited Nazi military advisers to help him in his campaign against the Communist Red Army, and he had sent a number of young officers, General Xu among them, to study military science in Germany. General Xu had returned every inch the Prussian officer. After the German debacle in the Second World War, however, Hitler and his military theories were no longer fashionable, and—so I was told—our general’s style underwent a subtle change. He still clicked his heels together when he bowed, but the click was not as resonant as before. In fact, it was almost inaudible. And now the bow had just a hint of a Viennese gallantry, especially when he wanted to flatter the fair sex, which he accomplished with considerable success.

  During the war against the Japanese invaders, our hero was one of those “running generals” who always managed to keep two steps ahead of the advancing enemy. He had never fired a shot in anger at the invaders, but he was never idle. When the battle lines became stabilized, he shifted his attention to the quartermaster’s office. He ran a black market route through the area of his command and also made a name for himself as a commander of dead souls: He drew rations and wages for thousands of nonexistent men in his army, dead or missing peasant lads who still remained on the army’s payroll.

  Mr. Chang was not impressed. I think he had better sources of information than the general, and, irritated by the general’s response, which he thought too crudely deceptive, he answered him with some acerbity.

  “Don’t be so optimistic. The Yangzi River won’t save us. Your soldiers are all peasants. In one way or another they have learned that their families in the Communist areas have been given land after the land reform there. If they fight hard and the Guomindang wins, they know the landlords will take back that land and cut off their relatives’ heads to boot. On the other hand, the Communist soldiers will fight to the death to defend the land their families have just gotten. You’ve lost more than half your armies to the Communists already.”

  “Don’t believe Communist propaganda!” retorted the general. “The peasants don’t want to steal land from the propertied classes. They want property themselves. Twenty years ago the Communists in South China instigated the peasants to take over the land, and the result was chaos and anarchy. They miscalculated and they failed, just as they will fail now. The peasants know their place and they respect the traditions which have held China together for over two thousand years. If you give them the freedom to choose, they will choose to support the system of private property. They don’t want Communism.”

  “If you are so certain of that, General, then why don’t you give them the vote?” Mr. Chang chuckled. The smoke from his cigar went down the wrong way and he coughed. Pretending not to hear Mr. Chang’s last remark, General Xu turned to smile at my aunt, who now approached us.

  Following my aunt’s whispered instructions, Mr. Chang, talented man of money that he was, seated himself at the piano and, with a series of running chords and a glissando, brought everyone to attention. Lily, myself, and some other chosen ones arranged ourselves around the piano and my aunt announced that we would sing my uncle’s latest poem, entitled the “New Marseillaise,” set to music by Mr. Chang. We sang with spirit right down to the rousing finale:

  We may waver, we may falter, yet we march against the foe. Glory to the people armed with pick and hoe!

  We were given a round of applause, and when Mr. Chang cleverly shifted the music into a cheerful dance rhythm everyone began to dance. I found myself in the arms of the general until the highway engineer cut in.

  I had completely forgotten my tryst with young Mr. Lu until my aunt asked me why I wasn’t dancing with him. I ran to the small study. He was there pacing anxiously.

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Ling-ling, I want to tell you something.” These words came out automatically. He must have rehearsed them again and again.

  “Yes?”

  He knelt down on one knee.

  “Are you going to propose to me?” I asked him, sitting down with my hands demurely folded in my lap.

  “Yes,” he stammered, somewhat put out.

  “Then kneel down properly on both knees.” I could see my aunt’s face beaming with joy when she listened to my report about my conquest.

  Towards eleven, when the party was at its height, I saw my aunt get a whispered word from a servant. She drew herself up, her eyes sparkling, the mistress of the house. She sought out my uncle, and with an air of great importance and suppressed urgency the two of them went out into the hall. Soon they reappeared ushering in the mayor and his wife. Suddenly there was a great flurry and to-do in the drawing room as everyone tried to show that he or she was well acquainted with the great man and his lady.

  In the midst of this decorous confusion, the mayor smiled owlishly through his tortoiseshell glasses. A genial man, he had acted this role of the social lion so many times that it was now second nature to him. My uncle told me that the mayor was considered a sort of liberal. Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek couldn’t possibly trust a man like the mayor, but neither could he dispense with him. With the regime crumbling all around him, it was good public relations to maintain some semblance of democracy and freedom before the foreigners and foreign correspondents in cities like Shanghai. This was the cosmetic role assigned to the complaisant mayor. That was why in Shanghai, on the one hand, you could hear all sorts of opinions voiced by vociferous pseudo-liberals, while on the other hand real revolutionaries or people the secret service did not like disappeared without a trace.

  Timed by the mayor’s efficient secretary, the ceremonial visit lasted exactly fifteen minutes. Yet brief though it was, the mayor’s appearance ensured the success of my aunt’s party.

  After midnight, the departing guests tipsily complimented my aunt as they left. “A charming evening. Such fun.”

  My aunt answered modestly, “Thank you. It was so nice to have you. We must do it again.” She reserved a particularly f
riendly good-bye for a tall man with a charming manner and a spring in his step. Later I learned from my aunt that he was a Communist go-between. She hoped he had been suitably impressed with the “New Marseillaise” and the presence of the mayor.

  2

  A Glimpse of the Other Side

  “Marseillaise” or no “Marseillaise,” my uncle was a practical man. He soon put aside lyric poetry—or even revolutionary poetry, for that matter—and made ready to move the family out of Shanghai and down to the British colony of Hong Kong where a house by the sea awaited us. He had already transferred funds there and most of his milling interests. In the meantime the truce talks broke down. The Communist army poured across the Yangzi and within days had occupied Nanking, the capital of the Guomindang government. While others carried on the government from Canton, the city in the South an hour or so by train from Hong Kong, Chiang Kai-shek himself disappeared. We heard that he was going to make a last stand with his picked troops on Taiwan island, a hundred miles off the southern coast.

  The Guomindang generals left in charge of Shanghai declared that they would defend the city to the death. Their army dug itself into trenches before the city. Inside the city, police and army patrols kept order and a curfew was imposed from dark to early dawn.

  Some of our family friends had already left Shanghai for various refuges abroad, Taiwan, Hong Kong, or even further afield in Singapore or America, but quite a number were doing the same as my uncle: getting ready to flee but still waiting to see if it would be at all possible to remain in the different China that would emerge when the Communist Party took over.

  Even as the fighting continued, peace talks and negotiations went on. We watched to see who went over to the Communist side and what official positions they took. If a sufficient number of “responsible leaders” joined the coalition government being put together by the Communists, my uncle would stay. Otherwise we would leave for Hong Kong.

  While my uncle made the big decision my aunt and I simply waited to be told what to do. Auntie had perfect confidence in his good sense and ability to fix things up, and I had no say in such matters one way or the other. It never occurred to me to question my uncle’s decisions.

  I found myself on holiday when the nuns who ran my high school, St. Ursula’s, closed down that fashionable missionary establishment because they did not want to be responsible for the fate of the students at such a time. At first it was like a relaxing vacation. I got up late and spent hours in my bathroom and before my mirror admiring myself. I went window shopping, picking up small bargains at knockdown prices from merchants anxious to sell out. I read interminably, whiling away the time as we waited to leave or rearrange things and stay.

  After a few days, this idleness palled. Outings, parties, dances were infrequent now and not many new movies were being shown. I grew bored. Evenings were the worst. In bed, I lay tense and still, scared of the darkness engulfing me. I associated death with darkness. I often imagined that my dead parents were out there somewhere in the dark. I thought of death as a physical transformation that would separate me from my loved ones. It would keep me silent in eternal darkness. Yet somehow I would know what was going on in the world and, like other spirits, sometimes take a hand in it too until I would utterly fade away.

  Then one evening an unexpected telephone call roused me out of myself. Ma Li, my old school friend whom I had not seen for more than a year, asked me to meet her in half an hour at the Plum Blossom Cafe on the Avenue Joffre.

  I softly closed the front door, hurried through our little garden into the street, and with a few more steps was lost to view among the budding elms. It was mid-spring, but the evening air was dank and cold. Dark clouds hung low and, drifting slowly, hid the rising moon. I hurried to reach the main avenue where the lights were brighter.

  At the crossroads by the Cathay Cinema, a Guomindang soldier struggled desultorily to shore up one side of the nest of sandbags that was his makeshift defense post. I could see a pair of feet in worn khaki sneakers comfortably crossed atop the other side of the sandbag “fort.” Beyond this post the bright lights of the French Circle Sportif sparkled amid its lawns and garden trees. A huge cutout of Lana Turner sprawled voluptuously above the marquee of the Cathay Cinema. Two policemen stood together on the corner. The French Concession had been ceded to France about a hundred years ago, but it had been returned to China after World War Two. It was a favorite residential area for many affluent Chinese families and had retained something of a French character. It was always well patrolled and I felt sure it was safe to go on. The curfew recently imposed for the emergency did not start for another hour or so.

  When I turned into the broader avenue on the main thoroughfare, the Avenue Joffre, the air curled cold around my neck and I snuggled into the collar of my jacket. It was only half past seven, but some apprehensive shop owners were closing and shuttering their places early. Others carried on business as usual, and their show windows were brightly lit as if defying the misty twilight outside. But there was no doubt that unease was in the air. Few people were on the usually busy avenue. I quickened my pace, hurried past the row of small boutiques, and two blocks down I entered the Plum Blossom Cafe.

  The sweet aroma of coffee filled the snug room. The lights were dim beneath pink shades. There were a few customers, mostly teenagers like myself, and they sat in the little side cubicles in couples with their heads close together. I glanced around quickly. Ma Li was sitting alone. The last time I had seen her she was fresh-faced and without makeup. Now she wore rouge and lipstick, but her face, framed in a bob of glossy black hair, seemed unusually pale. She wore a well-cut black velvet dress.

  “Hi,” I greeted her quietly and, as she had instructed me over the phone, without using her name. “How have you been?”

  “I’ve no complaints.”

  “It’s been such a long time—are you enjoying your new life?”

  “My theater troupe has been on tour and I’ve been to a lot of places. You know I love to travel.”

  “How I envy you,” I exclaimed, and then I caught the half-humorous look in her eyes and the quizzical tone in her voice.

  “What will you have? Coffee?” she asked as the waitress approached.

  “No. Cocoa, please,” I said. “I haven’t learned to drink coffee yet.”

  “How have you been?”

  “As usual,” I replied with a shrug. I faced the French windows which opened onto a small garden. Plum blossoms gleamed misty white on a background of dark pine trees. A miniature red-roofed pavilion stood by a wooden bridge over an artificial stream. “Perhaps that’s not quite so. My uncle had a poetic plan for us all to go down to Hangzhou this spring and drink Dragon Well tea. That exotic tea would be made with fresh-picked leaves brewed in snow water melted from off the plum blossoms. But that plan fell through.”

  “You sound cynical,” Ma Li commented, looking at me with a steady gaze.

  “Do I? My aunt has been bemoaning the thwarting of our Hangzhou plan for the last three days. So that is naturally what I thought of first when you asked me what we’ve been doing.”

  Ma Li drank her coffee in silence for a minute. “Don’t you want to ask me something?”

  “Why did you suddenly call me up?”

  “Because I need a favor. Can you put me up for the night?”

  “Of course.” I said this without thinking. It was so natural, but then I asked a bit tentatively, “What’s the trouble?”

  Ma Li was what my uncle in his most scathing tone dismissed as “radical.” He usually ended his tirades against such people with a warning that they caused young people “to lose their bearings.” Ma Li, in fact, was always in the middle of some patriotic campaign or other. First it had been “Let’s have peace,” then “Yanks get out.” Once I had stood on a street corner and seen her go by with a crowd of students demonstrating against the government’s corruption. Afterwards I had heard that two of them had been shot and a lot of them injured. As for her
theater, most of their plays were about social problems and other controversial subjects that embarrassed the Guomindang government.

  She noticed my hesitation and said, “You don’t have to if it’s not convenient.”

  I glimpsed a strange man looking at me over the top of his glasses. To cover my confusion I motioned with my hand to a phonograph on a little table. “I’ll put some music on.”

  As I picked up a record, I raised my eyes and looked out through the glass door. Three men were walking towards a parked car, but the man in the middle seemed to be supported by the other two. He walked with bent head and bowed shoulders as if a heavy weight were hung around his neck. He made a sudden movement and almost immediately one of his companions brought an arm crashing onto the back of his neck and he went limp. They dragged him to the waiting car. It had all happened so quickly that it was almost unnoticeable. I had not uttered a sound, but I stood paralyzed beside the phonograph. Ma Li’s soft voice beside me brought me back to action. “Don’t worry what the record is. It doesn’t matter. Put it on.”

  We returned to our seats. Soft, inane music filled the room and I wondered if what I had just seen had really happened.

  “I don’t dare go home,” Ma Li whispered. “They’re on the watch for me there. You can still change your mind if you like.”

  I shook my head. “Let’s finish our drinks and then we’ll go home together.” I spoke firmly. Inside, doubts might grow, but I was determined to be a faithful friend.

  I opened the front door of our house, paused, and listened. From the living room came a hum of conversation. In the hallway, safe amid familiar things, I heaved a sigh of relief.

  “Ma Li, sneak upstairs. Remember, my bedroom’s the last one on the left.” I gestured to the door of the living room. “Go to bed, and I’ll tell my aunt. She won’t drive you out.”