and shouts angrily: ‘I warn you, if you petition the higher authorities we’ll bury you alive. We offered you land to build a new house on, a weekly allowance, but you turned it all down. You dare resist the edicts from the Party Central Committee?’
‘The land you offered was in the mountains, a hundred kilometres away,’ the owner says. ‘What would I do there? I’ve spent my life working on that river.’ He looks down over the compound wall. Although the view of the sky and river is intersected by tall emerald peaks, one can still sense the sweeping expanse beyond – the warmth of the sunlight on the boats and barges, the coolness at the base of the gorge, the giddiness one feels when disembarking onto the riverbanks.
‘Shut up and go, and take your parents with you,’ the team leader yells to the man. ‘There’s no need to worry about your future. The authorities are going to pay boat pullers like you to tug rafts up a tributary as a spectacle for foreign tourists.’ He then knocks off an elm door lintel carved with two dragons leaping through turbulent waves. After a brief glance at the intricate design, he stamps on it, breaking it in two. The two children squatting on a sofa cushion behind him look younger than Nannan.
Spluttering clouds of diesel fumes, the bulldozer knocks over the last section of wall, then trundles back and forth across the rubble, until all that remains of the house is a flat expanse of crushed wood, glass and brick. The old woman is cowering behind the toilet hut now, a finger in each ear. The heady fragrance of the lilac tree beside her scatters onto the ground.
Meili feels the fetus give a sharp kick and tug its umbilical cord. Afraid that someone might notice the juddering of her belly, she turns away and runs, forgetting for a moment Nannan, who was crouched at her feet playing idly with the dirty plastic duck.
AFTER DUSK HAS fallen the crowds and buildings disappear and the riverside becomes tranquil. Scraps of polystyrene criss-cross the dark green river like flecks on an antique mirror, making one forget the watery world that extends a hundred metres below the surface. A song drifts from a cassette player on a nearby boat: ‘I give you my love, but you always refuse it. Did my words sadden you that much? . . .’
At this moment, Meili feels happy, as though every part of her body were connected, from her toenails to the hairs on her scalp. A sense of contentment, long dormant, stirs within her. She knows that to remain happy, love is not enough: one must make a living, strive to accomplish something, find a sense of purpose. When she realised that Kongzi’s only aim in life was to impregnate her again and again until she produced a son, she feared that her road to happiness would be blocked for ever. But now she is confident that as long as she pursues goals of her own, however unachievable they may be, a happy life will be possible.
Only a few lights are still twinkling in the old town. Soon the mountains will merge into the dark sky, and everything will become quiet. Meili remembers opening a glossy magazine and seeing a fashion spread featuring a woman walking barefoot on a beach, her white dress fluttering in the wind. Not daring to let her gaze fall too long on the exposed legs and cleavage, she leafed through the other pages, mesmerised by the vibrant scarves and jewellery. She’d never seen such vivid colours before. As a child, she’d always loved the soft hues of the countryside: the dark greens and light greens, the pale yellow of celery shoots, the tender pink of peach blossom, the milky white of osmanthus blooms and the rusty orange of the wild chrysanthemums that grow at the margins of fields. But the colours in the magazine seemed to come from another world. She didn’t know where this world was, but sensed that its colours were infused with joy. She used to loathe blue. It was the colour she had to look up at every day when she worked on the fields. But the azure of the sea in the magazine transfixed her. If coffins were painted such a heavenly blue, she thought to herself, one could lie down inside one without fear. She was