In the Lap of the Gods Page 2

  Fei Fei’s mother was more discerning. No man could ever be quite good enough for her flesh and blood. Unlike the parents who prized only their male children, Fei Fei’s mother looked out for her daughter’s future as much as she did her son’s. Liu could never win the approval of her mother, but he was intent on winning Fei Fei’s hand, and that depended as much on her free-spirited ways as on his staying power.

  “I’ll run away with you, if she keeps refusing,” Fei Fei declared.

  And so it was that she chose to marry him, despite her mother’s fervent hope otherwise. They would have six peaceful years together, at least when her parents weren’t visiting, before she died. Marriage had rooted him, but Fei Fei’s untimely death cut his ties to Fengjie, the place where, for the first time in his life, he had truly found home.

  Old Wushan provided a brief respite from the memories. It was not so much a home as a roosting spot between Liu’s forays into abandoned villages. What he found in those peasant homes, baubles and household items and the occasional heirloom piece, did not fill his coffers or prop up his pillow at night. They merely gave him money for rent and his next meal at Tai’s. He would have been content to pitch a tarp of plastic and bamboo by the riverbank. But old Wushan was a lawless place, so he kept an apartment to store the goods before selling them.

  NOW THAT LIU WAS IN POSSESSION OF A BABY, HE FELT SOMEWHAT responsible for her. He couldn’t see treating her as salvaged goods, although she’d be worth something on the black market. But how could he possibly take care of her? Perhaps the child might afford him assistance for poor families. His friend Tai did say, though, that the government program wasn’t much help anyway.

  In the light of the day, the child appeared to be an apparition, a wild creature he’d encountered in the thick of night, that had somehow possessed him, snatched his trousers, and wrapped them around itself.

  “Little scarecrow, who’s gonna want you?” Liu sucked on his cigarette, the air hissing through a gap in his teeth. He wasn’t sure how he could give her up without arousing suspicion.

  He leaned his moped against the small spruce tree where the baby lay asleep, then walked a short distance to relieve himself in the brush. He felt a curious impulse toward modesty, which he’d reserved for his mother-in-law, who balked at the immodesty of coal porters and their kind.

  The baby stirred, a yelp escaping from her scabby lips. He had a little water, but nothing to feed her if she awoke. He’d have to get back to town. He lifted her by the folds of his trousers and settled her into the wooden crate hanging from the moped. And then his gaze alighted on the lacquered box.

  He fingered the embossed gold character on the lid. He could fetch perhaps 30 yuan for the box. Not bad, he thought. A good day’s work. Inside was a black and white photograph of a couple, and beneath that, an embroidered cloth pouch. The edges of the photo were scalloped and worn with age. The man was perhaps in his mid-thirties, about Liu’s age; the woman appeared to be younger. The man was dressed in a drab Mao jacket, but he conveyed a certain dignity in the way he held his chin and braced his legs. The woman had a broad face, and her hair was pulled sternly into a bun. In the blurred contours of black and gray, Liu could make out a pensive look in her eyes. The photograph seemed of a different era; there was a distinct rigidity in their stance, an air of hardship and forbearance.

  Liu fingered the faded print, wondering if the man and woman were still alive, if the mementos were indeed forgotten, or cast aside. And the baby—had she been too much trouble to keep? He wondered what kind of folks would leave a baby and a good chest by a rising river.

  Lifting the photo, Liu removed the pouch underneath. His pulse quickened in anticipation of a good find. It might be worth another month’s rent, and a round of drinks with his friend Tai to spare.

  When the clasp gave way, a gold chain fell into his hands. Etched on the thin pendant was a cluster of peaches. He took a deep breath, caressing its rounded surface. It reminded him of pictures of fat, cherubic boys bearing giant peaches who boded good luck and fortune for the New Year.

  Liu stuffed the chain back in the pouch, afraid that someone would be lurking in the bushes, ready to steal his good fortune. Sure, such discoveries were exciting, but Liu knew that whatever wealth one possessed could easily be taken away. He would take the gold chain to Ol’ Fang, who had brokered some of his more valuable finds.

  “No, I don’t really trust him,” he muttered. “Maybe I’ll ask Chen to appraise it.”

  Liu shook his head. Chen would ask questions. He was a nosy fellow who would divulge secrets to a local Party leader in exchange for a tax break or kickback.

  Grabbing his knapsack, Liu climbed onto his moped with the baby in the back. In his distracted state, he’d forgotten he was partly naked, wearing only a pair of briefs, stained by dirt and the morning dew. He grabbed the tattered cotton pants he’d unwrapped from the infant the night before. They felt a little snug, and the stitching barely held together between the patchwork of holes. But he didn’t want to take back his own trousers, lest he awaken her into a crying spell.

  Setting off for Wushan, he pondered his next move, where to take the baby. She rocked in her makeshift cradle as the moped skidded over rocks and bumps on the mountainside trail. Liu made his way to the main road, going more slowly than usual. Old trucks and construction vehicles shared the road, but they did not seem to notice him.

  The wind whipped through Liu’s hair, still tangled with brush and burrs from the night before. The barrel-tiled roofs of farm-houses flew past against the jagged outlines of the deep gorges. Barking dogs guarded the growing fields of wheat and corn, while sun-browned men struck the earth with plows, and elderly women hunched under the weight of babies on their backs. Liu felt a sense of ease as he sailed through the countryside. In these moments, little weighed him down. Old memories and longings retreated like shadows.

  He gunned the bike to pass a slow-moving truck, sending up a wave of dust behind his rear wheels. The baby stirred a bit, but remained asleep in sun-induced stupor. Absorbed in the motions of life swirling by, the sensation of moving through space, Liu’s ruminations ceased. He knew what he needed to do.

  He’d keep the gold chain for now, and take the baby to Ol’ Fang. The old broker had connections, even if he couldn’t be completely trusted.

  3

  FANG SHUPING OWNED A ONE-STORY BRICK HOUSE ON THE outskirts of Wushan. He lived a rather reclusive life when he wasn’t making deals for his clients. When the new town of Wushan rose up above the old, Fang had pulled strings with county officials to get a fairly nice house away from the hubbub and chaos.

  He had been the son of a Shanghai tycoon, but the gods of fate had treated him unkindly, reducing him to a jack-of-all-trades. Whenever he could find an opportunity to broker a deal, Fang would seize it.The old businessman knew most of the merchants in town. If a tobacco shop owner complained about the cost of goods from Hong Kong, Ol’ Fang could get him a better deal from Nanjing. He knew what came into the city and what went out.

  Because of Fang’s connections outside of town, small-time businessmen in Wushan agreed to the premium he extracted for his services. He knew port authorities in Shanghai, hoteliers in Chongqing, factory owners in Wuhan and Wanzhou, and he even had connections to a Communist Party leader in Beijing, hundreds of miles to the north.

  “The sky is high and the emperor is far away,” his father used to say. Fang stood by the old adage. For dealers like him in the vast interior of the country, the authorities were far enough away that they could keep out of trouble, but close enough to call on when a client got into a pinch.

  Liu didn’t exactly enjoy doing business with Ol’ Fang, but he had few connections himself. Now that he was engaged in scavenging, he needed somebody above ground to find buyers for the goods. He had enlisted Ol’ Fang’s services half a dozen times. The broker had gotten him a price of 150 yuan for a pair of jade bracelets. Liu suspected, however, that Ol’ Fang made a handso
me profit from the deal. A ceramic bowl he salvaged turned out to be an artifact from the late Qing Dynasty. Ol’ Fang insisted that this was a national treasure, and had to be turned over to the authorities. Liu didn’t get a single fen for the piece, but he wondered if Fang was really telling the truth. He had an unsettling feeling that Fang had taken advantage of his ignorance.

  Still, Liu had to rely on the old broker. Fang boasted of his dealings with commercial boaters, retailers, medicinal shop owners, as well as brothels in old Wushan, and orphanages in Chongqing city. Those babies abandoned by market stalls and roadsides often did find a new home, thanks to people like Fang.

  IT WAS MIDMORNING WHEN LIU ARRIVED WITH THE BABY AT Ol’ Fang’s house. He eyed the peephole, wishing he could peer inside, into the old man’s brain. What was Fang really thinking when he made his deals? With some hesitation, Liu knocked. No answer. Liu shifted the baby’s weight in his arms. She was getting restless. Her small body seemed heavy as lead, although Liu had carried her up a steep mountain path the night before.

  Today, he was anxious to let go of the baby. When he’d found her, it had seemed natural to pick her up and take her away to higher ground. She had been crying. She was a living creature, left alone by a rising river. Now he thought about the fact that she was worth something.

  In Tai’s noodle shop, Liu once overheard a mother talking with an American tourist, who was journeying upriver to the big city of Chongqing. The foreigner, in halting Chinese, explained that she had come to adopt a baby girl. The mother, strapped with a wan-faced girl at her side, asked how much people paid the orphanage for healthy children. The girl’s eyes darted nervously from her mother to the stranger.

  There was a market for abandoned infants because people from faraway lands would pay to adopt a child. Liu was puzzled by the tourist’s motives, but like the mother, he had begun to wonder how much a human life could be worth.

  He braced himself, then knocked again, this time a little louder. Fang would try to take the lion’s share of the profits, but Liu wasn’t going to let him have the upper hand.

  Not this time.

  Ol’ Fang opened the door and greeted Liu with a hearty pat on the shoulder. “My friend, what brings you here?” He stared at the baby bundle, nudging Liu with an elbow. “Been busy, eh?”

  Liu stepped inside and set the squirming baby down in the sitting room. She had wet his old pants, but he couldn’t blame her for the sour smell on his hands. Those pants were worse than soiled diapers, after his forays in the flooded villages.

  “Where’d you find this one?” Ol’ Fang asked. He wrinkled his nose, and promptly dug out a handkerchief from the pocket of his wool vest.

  “Suchien Village,” Liu replied. He leaned over the infant, and a spark from his cigarette fell on the dimple in her little elbow. Her cries reached a piercing crescendo, her thin arms flailing about. Her torso threatened to burst out of the swaddling cloths. Liu grabbed her arms with a callused hand, stroked her forehead with the other. The infant wriggled like a trapped rabbit. But Liu would win this battle of wills, calming the creature until her cries subsided into a whimper.

  “She was left by the river,” Liu continued. “The last of the villagers took off yesterday. The crops were already under water when I got there in the afternoon.”

  “She’s a skinny one,” Fang said, pinching the creature’s flesh. “Starved little rascal. Folks would have let her die anyway, dam or no dam.”

  Liu batted the old man’s hands away. “Hey, don’t make her start bawling again.”

  “Bring her in here,” Fang said. They headed into a smaller room where a large portrait of Fang’s ancestors graced the walls. Laid out on a pinewood cot were three other infants fast asleep. Only their heads poked out from the edges of a wool blanket.

  “Where’d they come from?” Liu asked.

  “Mrs. Lung brought them over. Folks left these two girls at the market. Refugees lightening their load,” Fang mused. “The boy’s parents knew she took care of unwanted babies, had a soft spot for them. All of ’em were howling like wolves when she got here. I put a bit of rice wine in their gruel. It works wonders. Good for this old louse, too.”

  “Hasn’t dulled your wits, Ol’ Fang,” Liu remarked. “How much do you fetch for the healthy ones anyway?”

  Fang lit his pipe, ignoring the probe. “Any good loot in the houses?”

  “Nope, not really. Just found the youngster. She must be worth something.”

  Liu flicked his cigarette up and down in his mouth as the infant’s eyes followed his movements. He was not going to let Fang have the pendant. “There was an old chest. Too big to carry. And uh . . . a mah jong set. I’ll take that to Big Chen.”

  “His store is full of cheap bric-a-brac. That stingy bastard won’t give you anywhere near market value.” Fang waved his pipe in an arc, creating a contrail of gray smoke.

  “Well, sir, I wonder sometimes if you do.” Liu stared directly into Fang’s placid eyes.

  “My good man, have I ever given you a bad deal?” The broker rose from his chair. “Look, I’ll give you 80 yuan for her. She’s skinnier than the rest.” He gestured toward the sleeping infants. The male had a hawkish countenance while the twin girls had more rounded faces, but all were less gaunt than the new arrival.

  “That one’s got a harelip,” said Liu, pointing at the boy.

  Fang walked over to the cot, took the pipe out of his mouth and stuck it into the fleshy gap beneath the boy’s nostrils. The creature wriggled and sputtered, then fell back into a fitful slumber. The two flaps of his upper lip curled, as if remembering the warm flesh of a mother’s breast.

  “He’ll fetch 70 yuan,” Fang said. He drew a long puff from his pipe. “Who would have guessed that girls would be worth more than boys?” The old man glanced at Liu, then lowered his voice to a soft growl. “I tell you, there are young women in the city who think they’re good as the men, with their college education. They don’t know what it’s like to eat bitterness. Their flesh is soft, just right for a man’s hands, but not for hard labor.”

  Liu nodded. Perhaps life had indeed gotten easier for the younger generation. In hushed tones, Fang had once told him that he’d been sent to the countryside as a young man to be reeducated. He had borne the stain of a capitalist background during the Cultural Revolution. After his affair with the daughter of a high-ranking leader, he had been flogged and publicly ridiculed. Somehow, his life was spared. The girl must have pleaded with her father—nothing had happened, really, and they had a reputation to maintain, just send him far away from the commune. And so, Fang took flight to Badong, deep in the Yangtze’s Three Gorges, to labor in a munitions factory. Down by the harbor, he remembered watching the trackers along the Yangtze’s riverbank, dozens, sometimes hundreds of men yoked to barges like oxen, pulling the boats through treacherous rapids. More than once, he had seen the lines break, and several men would be swept away like flotsam. But now, even the great river would be tamed by man. As the Yangtze’s banks rose steadily, swallowing the sweat and blood of a bygone revolution, it too would become soft and flaccid.

  “Yes, they’re soft nowadays,” Liu agreed. “Except for this one.” He pointed to the new arrival, now sedated by the slumber of her companions. “I tell you, old man, she’s scrappier than a stray dog.”

  “All right, 90 yuan for this little pup,” said Fang.

  “My friend, that’s a pittance for found treasure. Fatten her up, and she’s worth much more than that.” Liu stroked the black wisps on his chin. “I even fancied keeping her for myself.”

  “Hah! Why taken an abandoned pup when you’ve fathered more than a few little bastards in the shed?” Fang snorted. “Why, I’ve seen a youngster or two in the village upriver with a big Western nose like yours. Little Liu, I call ’em. Liu’s little pups!” The old man slapped his thighs, howling with laughter.

  Liu dug his heels into the floor. “Mr. Fang,” he said evenly, “we have done business, you and I
, for some time now. A little respect for your comrade, please.”

  “Of course, of course, my friend! You deserve no less.” The old man chuckled. “Why, you’re the best scavenger of them all. Not just for heirloom chests and the like. That’s dead, heavy stuff. These ten-kilo gems are worth more than their weight in gold. You know where to find the live treasure.”

  “Then pay me what she’s worth,” Liu replied in a steely voice. The old man claimed they were business partners, but he always seemed to have the upper hand.

  Fang stroked his pipe. “All right then. You want a fair cut? I’ll tell you what, you come with me to Chongqing. That’s right, my friend, I’ll take you to the orphanage, and we’ll get a good rate for these pups.”

  “What’s in it for you?” Liu furrowed his brow.

  “Simple, Mr. Liu,” the old broker replied. “You keep me supplied, and I keep your trust.” He patted his partner on the back. “Trust. Now that’s hard to keep around nowadays, even harder than pocket money.”

  The two stepped outside to where Fang’s vehicle was parked next to his neighbor’s chicken yard. The late afternoon light played against its metal hull. The lettering on the side looked like chicken scratches in the dirt. “What does that say?” Liu asked.

  “Chongqing Taxi and Transport.” The old broker smiled. “At your service. I bought it from a cabbie who’s doing a little time in jail.”

  For what, Liu wondered, but dared not ask.

  Fang opened the door on the passenger’s side. An odor reminiscent of pickled cabbage wafted out. Liu stared at the seat, the stains on its fuzzy fabric. This would be his first trip to the big city of Chongqing. It’ll be an adventure, he decided. Even more than wading through half-drowned homes for treasure.