Dream of Ding Village (16 page)

Further on, Grandpa came upon an even larger casket propped on two benches. Four engravers, one on each side of the casket, were embellishing the panels with scenes of ascending souls and heavenly greetings, as well as even more elaborate depictions of heavenly and earthly paradises. A team of artists was highlighting the scenes with generous amounts of silver and gold, giving the casket an even more sumptuous appearance. Yet another engraver had the casket lid propped against a wall, and was carving scenes of joyous feasts and glorious homecomings populated with an impressive multitude of children, grandchildren and other descendants and relations. The smiling children, handsome men, beautiful women and dignified elders were incredibly life-life, each tiny figure carved to perfection, down to the smallest detail. The dancing girls and maidservants that attended the occupant of the casket on the occasion of his glorious homecoming were lithe and sensuous, beautiful beyond description, like the palace women of some bygone imperial dynasty. The artisans displayed a solemn, almost pious, devotion to their work, as if the casket were not destined to be buried underground but placed on display in a museum
.

When Grandpa stepped forward for a closer look at the work of the five engravers, he was astonished to see that the casket was constructed entirely of cedar. Not only that, but cedar of the finest sort; each panel was a separate, seamless plank of wood. Grandpa stood silently before the casket, gazing in breathless wonder at the carvings of golden dragons and silver phoenixes, palatial gardens and pleasure palaces, villages and hamlets, luxuriant fields, flowing rivers and towering mountain ranges. One panel featured a carving of a heavenly banquet table complete with packets of Great China brand cigarettes, expensive bottles of Maotai liquor, whole roasted chickens and plates of the rarest fish to ever swim the Yellow River. There were mahjong tiles and decks of poker cards laid out, should the occupant of the casket fancy a game
of chance, and nubile servant girls and stout retainers standing by, should he prefer to be fanned or massaged
.

Even more oddly, the artisans who had carved this masterpiece, this vision of paradise, had filled it with a television set, washing machine, refrigerator and an array of gadgets and household appliances that my grandfather had never laid eyes on. Next to this wealth of modern conveniences was a traditional Chinese building, above whose half-moon door someone had inscribed the words ‘People’s Bank of China’
.

The engravers’ meticulous attention to detail and total devotion to their work made it seem as if they were crafting not a funeral casket, but an image of the Buddha. Fine beads of sweat clung to their foreheads; their eyes, distended from the constant strain on their vision, bulged slightly from their sockets. They wielded carving tools of various shapes: some were long, thin blades, while others were crescent-shaped or slightly angled, or looked very much like the razors used for scraping callouses off the bottom of one’s feet. The movement of their blades sent pale golden curlicues of cedar drifting through the air and fluttering to the ground. The floor was covered with a thick carpet of cedar shavings, as numerous as grains on a threshing room floor or petals in late spring. The fragrant scent of cedar swirled through the room and into the air outside. Grandpa wondered for whom the casket was being made. None of the sick villagers he knew could afford such a lavish casket, this burial fit for a king. Taking advantage of a brief lull in which one of the engravers stopped to sharpen his blade, Grandpa said: ‘It’s a beautiful casket.’

‘That’s our finest model, the Dragon,’ answered the man, looking up at Grandpa
.

‘Oh, it has a name?’ Grandpa glanced over at the casket made of pine. ‘What’s that one over there called, the one where people are being greeted into paradise?’

‘The Phoenix.’

‘
And the paulownia, with the carvings just on the ends?
’

‘
The Lion King.’

‘Oh, I see,’ said Grandpa, although he didn’t. ‘Who’s the Dragon casket being made for?’

The engraver raised his head impatiently and stared at Grandpa as if he’d asked a question he shouldn’t have. After loitering in silence for a little while longer, Grandpa decided to leave. As he exited the workshop, leaving behind those exotic caskets, he saw that the sun had already shifted to the west of the sand dunes. Despite the winter sunshine, there was now a distinct chill in the air. No longer did the black lacquered coffins – with their assigned ranks of A, B and C – seem like a dark and shining lake. They were more like a battle formation, a battalion of coffins
.

A large truck parked to one side was loaded with a mountain of black coffins. Several workers were carefully balancing the last few on top. Down below, a supervisor shouted instructions to the men who were loading the truck, telling them to make sure the coffins didn’t bump or scrape each other, and watching to see that they wrapped each one in straw matting before it was loaded on to the truck. The supervisor, dressed in a short blue-padded coat with a collar of fake fur, gesticulated wildly as he barked orders to his men. His speech was crude and loud. Grandpa thought his voice oddly familiar, the sort of voice that he might hear at home in Ding Village
.

Curious to find out who was speaking, Grandpa turned around to look. Sure enough, it was a familiar voice from home. The supervisor was none other than my father, Ding Hui. After a moment of shock, Grandpa began wading through the sea of coffins towards his son. By now, the men had finished loading the coffins on to the truck and securing them with rope. They and my father hopped into the truck just as the driver started the engine. With a burst of exhaust, the truck rumbled through the factory gate, leaving my grandfather far behind
.

Grandpa stood on the exact spot where the truck had just been parked. As he watched it disappear, he shouted his son’s name. ‘Hui
…
Come back, son! Hui
…
!’

*

Then Grandpa was awake.

When he woke from his dream, Grandpa was surprised to see my father standing at the foot of his bed, whispering, ‘Dad? Dad?’

He told Grandpa about his visit to the county, and explained how the director of education in charge of rural development and poverty alleviation had been promoted to deputy governor in charge of the county task force on HIV and AIDS. He told him how the deputy governor had asked him to pass on his warmest wishes to Grandpa, and how he’d also promised to provide every fever patient in Ding Village with a bottle of cooking oil and a string of firecrackers so that they could enjoy Chinese New Year in style.

Grandpa sat dazed on the edge of his bed, staring at my father and remembering his dream. He felt as if he were still in the coffin factory, still immersed in a dream.

Chinese New Year came and went.

There was the usual big celebration on the first day of the lunar year, and the usual smaller celebration on the fifth day.

Then something unusual happened. Something unexpected.

Over New Year, many people had gone to visit relatives living outside the village. In the course of these visits, they had learned that the Wei county government was providing free black-lacquered coffins to the families of people dying of the fever. They also learned that these coffins were being manufactured in a special factory somewhere on the outskirts of the county capital. They lived in the same county, they had the same disease … So why, the residents of Ding Village wondered, should they settle for a cheap bottle of cooking oil and a few firecrackers, when other people were getting coffins worth hundreds of yuan?

It was a good question. They decided to ask my dad. He’d negotiated the deal, so he seemed like the one to ask.

A few weeks after New Year, Zhao Xiuqin and Ding Yuejin went to see my dad. When they arrived, just after breakfast, my dad was digging up the soil in a corner of our courtyard. It was the same corner where our chicken coop and pig pen used to stand; that is, until the villagers poisoned our chickens and pig. Now that he had no animals left to feed, Dad had decided to tear down the walls, dig up the soil and turn it into a vegetable patch where he could plant spicy mustard greens. Beside a mound of broken bricks, the newly turned soil was dark and muddy, a rich black muck created from years of chicken and pig droppings. You couldn’t ask for a better place to plant mustard greens. The soil had the warm familiar stink of a well-fertilized field or vegetable garden. Having stripped off his cotton jacket, my dad was hard at work turning the soil when Zhao Xiuqin, Ding Yuejin and some other villagers arrived at his gate, clamouring to know why sick people in other villages got fancy coffins, when all they got was a bottle of lousy cooking oil.

Leaving aside his work, my dad went over to meet them at the gate. ‘If it hadn’t been for all my hard work,’ he told them, ‘you wouldn’t even have cooking oil.’

Then he told them that there was one village of only 200 people that had lost half its population in less than a year. By comparison, Ding Village was lucky. Did they really want to make a big fuss about coffins, when there were people who needed them more?

Then he told them about another village where 300 of the 500 residents had the fever. Did they really want to take coffins from people like that?

The villagers couldn’t argue.

Seeing that they had nothing more to say, my dad left them standing at the gate and resumed his digging. Winter would soon end; spring was on its way: when it came to planting spicy mustard greens, all you had to do was wait for the first day of spring, scatter the seeds on the ground, and water them every two days. Within a week, you would have sprouts. Within a fortnight, you’d have tiny little pale, blue-green
plants that filled the air with their pungent scent.

Just about the time my dad was planting his mustard greens, there was another death in the village. The man who had died was not yet thirty, and his family couldn’t afford to pay for his coffin. This was a topic of much conversation and gossip among the villagers. Finally, one of the man’s relatives came to see my father.

‘Ding Hui,’ he said. ‘We’re all brothers here. Can’t you ask the higher-ups to give us a coffin?’

‘If I could have got coffins,’ my father said awkwardly, ‘don’t you think I would have asked for them? I managed to get you cooking oil and firecrackers for New Year, didn’t I?’

Realising that my father would do no more for him, the man left.

Soon, the mustard greens my father had planted were coming up strong, filling our courtyard with their pungent scent. The butterflies came. They landed briefly then fluttered away. So did the bees. Mustard greens were far too spicy to attract the butterflies and not nearly sweet enough to tempt the bees.

But in the end, our little vegetable patch would prove to be seductive
.

Before long, our family would enjoy all the sweet delights of spring
.

New Year passed. One by one, the days of the first lunar month went by. The first, the fifth, the fifteenth … each day had been and gone, but nothing much had changed. The sun shone warm, the winds blew cold. Medicinal herbs were boiled and drunk. People sickened, died and were buried.

The burials were a reminder of the good old days in the school, days of talk and laughter. The sick living together as a community, in good company and good cheer. Since the sick villagers had gone home for New Year, to their lonely rooms and silent courtyards, the mild cases had become serious, the serious cases terminal, and the terminal cases had passed away. Everyone wanted to resume their communal life in the school, but after the spat with my dad about coffins – during which some nasty things were said – they were embarrassed to face Grandpa. After all, the man they had cursed was still Grandpa’s son, his flesh and blood.

One day after breakfast, Zhao Dequan, Ding Yuejin, Jia Genzhu, Ding Zhuxi, Zhao Xiuqin and some of the others were outside, enjoying the sunshine. The sun hung overhead, warming the village. Uncle and Lingling were there as well, standing apart from the group, gazing into one another’s eyes like lovers. Or like thieves, thieves of love.

Their stolen moment was interrupted by someone saying: ‘Who is going to tell Professor Ding that we want to move back into the school?’

Uncle laughed and turned to face the others. ‘I’ll go,’ he volunteered. There was a round of murmurs as everyone agreed that, of course, Uncle was the perfect man for the job.

‘But who’s going to go with me?’

Before anyone could answer, Uncle said: ‘How about you, Lingling?’

Lingling seemed hesitant, but Zhao Xiuqin urged her. ‘Yes, Lingling, you go. You’re not that sick, and your legs are still strong.’

And so Uncle and Lingling left the village together and walked towards the school.

It wasn’t a long walk. The fields on both sides of the road were a sea of green, and the mossy scent of newly sprouted wheat drifted through the sunlit air. The weather was clear and cloudless, the air above the plain fresh and intoxicating. Beneath the empty sky, the distant villages of Willow Hamlet, Yellow Creek and Two-Li crouched like shadows on the horizon. Lingling and Uncle were on the outskirts of the village. Although they were not far from the nearest houses there seemed to be no one else around. At this hour, most people were gathered in the village centre, eating and sunning themselves. Walking shoulder to shoulder with Lingling, uncle glanced around carefully before taking her hand.