spotted the catfight between two women—one of them his wife—he shouted, threw down his basket, sending the pots and pans crashing loudly to the ground, and joined the fray, fists and feet. But his blows were seriously off target, and he wound up kicking his wife in the buttocks and punching her in the shoulder.
A relative of Fan Zhaoxia's ran up to even the odds, quickly driving his shoulder into Huang Biao. One of the strongest porters at the train station, the man had muscles like steel and shoulders that could carry five hundred pounds. His shove sent Huang Biao stumbling backward, until he sat down hard next to his basket. Infuriated, he began hurling plates and bowls, filling the air with flying porcelain, some thudding into the wall, some landing amid the crowds of people, some shattering and some rolling across the ground. My kind of fun!
Lao Lan appeared at that moment. ‘Stop it,’ he said, ‘all of you!’
Like a hawk flying into the forest and quieting the birds or a tiger leaving its den and sending animals into hiding, one shout from him was all it took. ‘Are you people here to help me,’ he asked hoarsely, ‘or to take advantage of a bad situation? Do you really think you've seen the last of Lao Lan?’
With that, he turned and left. The two scuffling women stopped fighting and merely glared at each with loathing. They both needed to catch their breath and nurse their wounds. Fan Zhaoxia was missing a handful of hair and a piece of her scalp. Huang Biao's wife's robe was missing its buttons; it lay open like a torn flag, exposing the tops of her scratched breasts.
Mother entered. ‘All right,’ she said to the women in icy tones, ‘you can leave now.’
Out in the yard, the monks—seven altogether—and the musicians—also seven—took their places, like competing teams, under the direction of their leaders. The monks took seats at the table to the west, on which they laid their wooden fish, their chimes and their cymbals. The musicians took seats at the other table, on which they laid their horns, their suonas and their eighteen-holed flutes. The leading monk wore a saffron cassock, the others grey. The musicians’ clothes were so tattered that we could see the abdomens of at least three of them. When the large wooden bell in Lao Lan's house was struck three times, Mother turned to Yao Qi. ‘Begin,’ she said.
From his position between the two tables, Yao Qi raised his arms like a conductor. ‘Begin, Shifu!’ he announced as he dropped his arms flamboyantly, thoroughly enjoying his moment as the centre of attention. It should have been me out there, but I was stuck inside, acting the dutiful son at the head of the coffin. Shit!
At Yao Qi's signal, two kinds of music erupted across the yard. On this side, the clap-clap of wooden fish and the clang of chimes and cymbals and the drone of chanted sutras. Along with that, a dirge with horns and woodwinds and flutes. A mournful sound indeed. As a murky dusk settled outside, the room grew dark, the only light a green sparkle from the bean-oil. I saw a woman's face in that light, and after staring at it for a few moments, I recognized it as Lao Lan's wife. Ghostly pale and bleeding from every orifice. ‘Look, Tiangua!’ I whispered, scared witless.
But she had dozed off, her head slumped onto her chest, like a chick resting against a wall. A chill ran down my spine, my hairs stood on end and my bladder threatened to burst, all good reasons to leave my post at the bier. Wetting my pants would surely be disrespectful towards the deceased! So I grabbed a handful of paper, threw it into the pot, jumped to my feet and ran out into the yard where I breathed in the fresh air before heading to the latrine next to the kennel and opening the floodgates with a shudder. The leaves on the plane tree quivered in the wind, but I could hear neither the wind nor the leaves, for both were drowned by the music and the chants. I watched the reporter taking shot after shot of the musicians and the monks.
‘Put some oomph into it, gentlemen!’ Yao Qi shouted. ‘Your host will show his gratitude later.’
Yao Qi's loathsome face glowed, a petty man intoxicated by his perceived glory. The same man who had once approached my father with a plan