Man to Be Man to BeAt the Spring Festival Hao Nan was very happy, because a week ago he had been engaged to Soo Yan, one of the pretty girls in Flag Pole Village. She was tall and literate. By custom, the dowry would cost the Haos a fortune: eight silk quilts, four pairs of embroidered pillowcases, ten suits of outer clothes, five meters of woolen cloth, six pairs of leather shoes, four dozen nylon socks, a wristwatch, two thermos bottles, a sewing machine, a bicycle, a pair of hardwood chests. Yet Nan’s parents were pleased by the engagement, for the Soos were a rich family in the village and Yan was the only daughter. The wedding was scheduled to take place on the Moon Day the next fall. Though the Haos didn’t have much money left after the engagement feast, they were not worried. Since they had two marriageable daughters, they would be able to marry off at least one of them to get the cash for Nan’s wedding.
It was the third day of the Spring Festival. Nan and four other young men were on duty at the office of the village militia. Because the educated youths from Dalian had returned home to spend the holiday season with their families in the city, the young villagers had to cover all the shifts. It was a good way of making ten workpoints—a full day’s pay, so nobody complained. Besides, it was an easy job. For eight hours they didn’t have to do anything except stay in the office and make one round through the village.
Outside, a few snowflakes were swirling like duck down around the red lanterns hung at every gate. The smell of gunpowder and incense lingered in the air. Firecrackers exploded now and then, mingled with the music of a Beijing opera sent out by a loudspeaker. Inside the militia’s office, the five men were a little bored, though they had plenty of corn liquor, roasted sunflower seeds, and candies with which to while away the time. They had been playing the poker game called Beat the Queen. Liu Daiheng and Mu Bing wanted to stop to play chess by themselves, but the others wouldn’t let them. There was no fun if only three men drew the cards, and they wanted to crown two kings and beat two queens every time.
Slowly the door opened. To their surprise, Sang Zhu’s bald head emerged, and then in came his small body and bowlegs. “Hello, kk-Uncle Sang,” Nan said with a clumsy smile that revealed his canine teeth.
Without answering, Sang glared at Nan, who had almost blurted out his nickname, Cuckold Sang. People called him that because his young wife, Shuling, often had affairs. It was said that she was a fox spirit and always ready to seduce a man. People thought that Sang, already in his fifties and almost twice his wife’s age, must have been useless in bed. At least he didn’t have sperm, or else Shuling would have given him a baby.
Sang was holding his felt hat. He looked tipsy, his baggy eyes bloodshot. “Uncle Sang,” Wang Ming said, “take a seat.” Without a word, Sang sat down and put his elbows on the table.
They needed a sixth person to play the game One Hundred Points. “Want to join us?” Nan asked.
“No poker, boys,” Sang said. “Give me something to drink.”
Yang Wei poured him a mug of corn liquor. “Here you are,” he said, winking at the others.
“Good, this is what I need.” Sang raised the mug to his lips and almost emptied it in one gulp. “I came here for serious business tonight.”
“What is it?” Daiheng asked.
“I invite you boys over to screw my wife,” Sang said deliberately.
All the young men were taken aback, and the room suddenly turned quiet except for the sputtering of the coal stove. They looked at one another, not knowing how to respond.
“You’re kidding, Uncle Sang,” Daiheng said, after a short while.
“I mean it. She’s hot all the time. I want you to give it to her enough tonight.” Anger inflamed Sang’s eyes.
Silence again fell in the room.
“Afraid to come, huh?” Sang asked, his sparse brows puckered up. A smile crumpled his sallow face.
“Sure, we’d like to come. Who wouldn’t?” said Ming, who was a squad leader in the militia.
“Well, sometimes heaven does drop meat pies,” Bing said, as if to himself.
“No, we shouldn’t go,” Nan cut in, scanning the others’ faces with his narrow eyes gleaming. He turned to Sang and said, “It’s all right to do it to your wife, Uncle Sang, but that could be dangerous to us.” Turning to the others, he asked, “Remember what happened at the brickyard last summer? You fellas don’t want to get into that kind of trouble, do you?”
His words dampened the heat in the air. For a moment even the squad leader Wang Ming and Liu Daiheng, the oldest of them, didn’t know what to say. Everybody remained silent. What Nan had referred to was a case in which a prostitute had been screwed to death by a bunch of brick makers. Of course, prostitution was banned in the New China, but there were always women selling their flesh on the sly. The woman had gone to the brickyard once a month and asked for five yuan a customer, which was a big price, equal to two days’ pay earned by a brick maker. That was why the men wouldn’t let her off easily. They gave her the money but forced her to work without a stop. As they had planned, they kept her busy throughout the night, and even after she lost consciousness they went on mounting her. She died the next day. Then the police came and arrested the men. Later three of them were sentenced to eight years in prison.
“Nan’s right. I don’t think we should go,” Wei said at last.
“You’re no man,” Sang said with a sneer, stroking his beardless chin. “I invite you boys to share my wife, free of charge, but none of you dare come. Chickens!”
“Uncle Sang, if you want us to come,” Daiheng said, “you ought to write a pledge.”
“But I don’t know how to write.”
“Good idea. We can help you with that,” Ming said.
“All right, you write and I’ll put in my thumbprint.”
Ming went to the desk, pulled a drawer, and took out a pen and a piece of paper. He sat down to work on the pledge.
Nan felt uneasy about the whole thing. How could a husband invite other men to have sex with his wife? he asked himself. I wouldn’t. Never. Shuling must’ve had an affair with someone lately and have been caught by Cuckold Sang. They must’ve had a big fight today.
Sang was dragging at his pipe silently. Sitting beside him, Bing was putting the poker cards back into the box.
“Here,” Ming said, walking over with the paper, “listen carefully, Uncle Sang.” Then he read aloud with his eyebrows flapping up like a pair of beetle wings:
On the third eve of the Spring Festival, I, Sang Zhu, came to the Militia’s Office and invited five young militiamen—Hao Nan, Liu Daiheng, Yang Wei, Mu Bing, and Wang Ming—to have sex with my wife Niu Shuling. By doing this, I mean to teach her a lesson so she will stop seducing other men and be a chaste woman in the future. If any physical damage is done to her in the process of the activity, none of the young men shall be responsible. I, Sang Zhu, the husband, will bear all consequences.
The Pledger:
Sang Zhu
Wei placed the ink-paste box on the desk. “Put in your thumbprint if you agree, Uncle Sang.”
“All right.” Sang pressed his ringworm-nailed thumb into the ink, took it out, blew on its pad, and stamped a scarlet smudge under his name. He wiped off the ink on the leg of his cotton-padded trousers, which were black but shiny with grease stains. Turning away from the table, he blew his nose; two lines of mucus landed on the dusty floor.
“Now, let’s go,” Ming said, and motioned to the others as though they were going off to bag a homeless dog, which they often did on night patrol.
Nan felt unhappy about the pledge because Ming, the son of a bitch, had put Nan’s name first and his own name last among the group, as if Nan had led them in this business. At least, it read that way on paper. He was merely a soldier, whereas Ming was a squad leader.
The snow had stopped, and the west wind was blowing and would have chilled them to the bones if they had not drunk a lot of liquor. Each of them was carrying a long flashlight, whose beam now stabbed into the darkness and now hit a treetop, sending sleeping birds on the wing. They were eager to reach the Sangs’, get hold of that loose woman, and overturn the rivers and seas in her. In raptures they couldn’t help singing. They sang “I Am a Soldier,” “Return to My Mother’s,” “Our Navigation Depends on the Great Helmsman,” “Without the Communist Party There Would Be No New China.” In the distance, soundless firecrackers bloomed in the sky over Sea-Watch Village. The white hills and fields seemed vaster than they were in daylight. The first quarter of the moon wandered slowly through clouds among a few stars. The night was clear and quiet except for the men’s hoarse voices vibrating.
Nan followed the other men, singing, and he couldn’t help imagining what it would feel like to embrace a woman and have her body under his own. He thought of girls in the village, and also of Soo Yan. Though they were engaged, he had never touched her, not even her hand. This was an opportunity to learn how to handle a woman.
They entered Sang’s yard. A dark shadow lashed about on the moonlit ground and startled Ming and Daiheng, who were at the front of the group. Then a wolfhound burst out barking at them. “Stop it!” Sang shouted. “You beast that doesn’t know who owns you. Stop it!”
The dog ran away toward the haystack, scared by the beams of the flashlights scraping its body. The yard was almost empty except for a line of colorful washing, frozen and sheeny, swaying in the wind like landed kites tied up by children. Ming tapped on a pink shirt, which was apparently Shuling’s, and said, “It smells so delicious. Why no red on this, Old Sang? She’s too young for menopause, isn’t she?”
They broke out laughing.
Sang’s little stone house had a thatched roof. Entering it, they put their two rifles behind the door. An oil lamp was burning on the dining table on the brick bed, but nobody was in. Finding no woman, the men began swearing and said they were disappointed. Sang searched everywhere in the house, but there was no trace of his wife. “Shu—ling—” he cried to the outside. Only the hiss of the wind answered.
“Old Sang, what does this mean?” Daiheng asked. “What do you have in mind exactly?”
“I want you to do it to my wife.”
“But where is she?” Bing asked.
“I don’t know. You boys wait. I’m sure she’ll be back soon.”
Sang’s eyes were filled with rage. Obviously he didn’t expect to see an empty house either. He took a large bowl of boiled pork and a platter of stewed turnips from the kitchen and placed them on the table. They climbed on the brick bed and started eating the dishes and drinking the liquor they had brought along.
“It’s too cold,” Wei said, referring to the food.
“Yes,” Ming said. “Let’s have something warm, Old Sang. We have work to do.”
“You must treat us well,” Bing said, “or else we won’t leave tonight. This is our home now.”
“All right, all right, you boys don’t go crazy. I’m going to cook you a soup, a good one.”
Sang and Daiheng went to the kitchen, lighting the stove and cutting pickled cabbages and fat pork. In the village Daiheng was well known as a good cook, so he did the work naturally.
“Don’t be stingy. Put in some dried shrimps,” Wei shouted at the men in the kitchen.
“All right, we will,” Sang yelled back.
Nan remained silent meanwhile. He didn’t like the tasteless meat and just kept smoking Sang’s Glory cigarettes and cracking roasted melon seeds. In the kitchen the bellows started squeaking.
Ming and Wei were playing a finger-guessing game, which Nan and Bing didn’t know how to play but were eager to learn. Nan moved closer, watching their hands changing shapes deftly under the oil lamp and listening to them chanting:
A small chair has square legs,
A little myna has a pointed bill.
It’s time you eat spider eggs,
Drink pee and gulp swill.
Five heads,
Six fortunes,
Three stars,
Eight gods,
Nine cups—
“Got you!” Ming yelled at Wei. Pointing at a mug filled with liquor, he ordered, “Drink this.”
They hadn’t finished the second round when Daiheng and Sang rushed in. “She’s here, she’s here,” Daiheng whispered, his voice in a flutter.
Before they could straighten up, Shuling stepped in, wearing a red scarf and puffing out warm air. She whisked the snowflakes off her shoulder with a pair of mittens and greeted the men. “Welcome,” she said. She looked so fresh with her pink cheeks and permed hair. Her plump body swayed a little against the white door curtain, as if she didn’t know whether she should stay in or go out.
“Well, well, well,” Ming hummed.
“Where have you been?” Sang asked sharply, then went up to her and grabbed the front of her sky-blue jacket.
“I, I—let me go.” She was struggling to free herself.
“I know where you were. With that pale-faced man again. Tell me, is that true or not?” Sang pulled her closer to himself. He referred to a young cadre on the work team which was investigating the graft and bribery among the leaders of the production brigade. Nan remembered seeing the man and Shuling together in the grocery store once.
“Let me go. You’re hurting me,” she begged, and turned to the others, her round eyes flashing with fear.
“You stinking skunk, always have an itch in your cunt!” Sang bellowed. “I want you to have it enough today, as a present for the Spring Festival. See, I have five men for you here. Every one of them is strong as a bull.” His head tilted to the militia.
“No, don’t. Please don’t,” she moaned with her hands held together before her chest.
“What are you waiting for, boys?” Sang shouted at the young men.
They all jumped up and went to hold her. “Brothers, don’t do this to me,” she wailed.
“Do it to her! Teach her a good lesson,” her husband yelled.
They grabbed her and carried her onto the brick bed. She struggled and even tried to kick and hit them, but like a tied sheep she couldn’t move her legs and arms. Daiheng pinched her thigh as Ming was rubbing her breasts. “Not bad,” Ming said, “not flabby at all.”
“Oh, you hooligans. Let your grandma go. Ouch!”
With laughter, they placed her on the hard bed. She never stopped cursing. “All your ancestors will go to hell. Sons of asses … I’ll tell your parents. Your houses will be struck by thunderbolts! You’ll die without a son …”
Her curses only incensed the men. Bing rolled one end of her woolen scarf into a ball and thrust it into her mouth. Instantly she stopped making noises. Then Sang produced some ropes and tied her hands to the legs of the dining table. Meanwhile Wei and Nan did as they were told by Ming, binding her feet to the beam that formed the edge of the bed.
They slipped their hands underneath her underclothes, kneading her breasts and rubbing her crotch. Then they ripped open her jacket, shirts, pants, and panties. Her partly naked body was squirming helplessly in the coppery light.
Daiheng took out five poker cards, from the ace to the “5,” mixed them, and then put them on the bed. By turns they picked the cards. Wei had “5,” Nan “4,” Bing “3,” Daiheng “2.” As Ming got the ace, he was to go first.
“All right,” Sang said calmly, “everything is fine. Now you boys enjoy yourselves.” He raised the door curtain and went out.
Ming began to mount Shuling, saying, “I’ve good luck this year. Nan, little bridegroom, watch your elder brother carefully and learn how to do it.”
Nan was wondering whether Daiheng had contrived a trick in dealing out those cards. How come both Ming and Daiheng had gotten ahead of the three younger men? But he didn’t attend to his doubt for long, because soon Ming’s lean body was wriggling violently on Shuling’s. Having never seen such a scene, Nan felt giddy and short of breath, but he was also eager to experience it. They all watched intently. Meanwhile the woman kept her face away from them.
While Daiheng was on Shuling, biting her shoulders and making happy noises, Sang came in with a small enamel bowl in his hand. He climbed on the bed and placed it beside his wife’s head. He clutched her hair and pulled her face over, and said, “Look at what’s in the bowl.” He picked up a bit of the red stuff with three fingers and let it trickle back into the bowl. “Chili powder. I’ll give it to you. Wait, after they are done with you, I’ll stuff you with it, to cure the itch in there for good.”
His wife closed her eyes and shook her head slightly.
Bing, who was the third, obviously had no experience with a woman before. No sooner had he gotten on top of her than he came and gave up. He held his pants, looking pained, as though he had just swallowed a bowl of bitter medicine. He coughed and blew his nose.
Now it was Nan’s turn. He seemed bashful as he moved to Shuling. Though this was his first time, he felt confident as he straddled her and started unbuckling his pants. He looked down at her body, which reminded him of a huge frog, tied up, waiting to be skinned for its legs. Looking up, he noticed that her ear was small and delicate. He grabbed her hair and pulled her face over to see closely what she looked like. She opened her eyes, which were full of sparkling tears and staring at him. He was surprised by the fierce eyes but could not help observing them. Somehow her eyes were changing—the hatred and the fear were fading, and beneath their blurred surfaces loomed a kind of beauty and sadness that was bottomless. Nan started to fantasize, thinking of Soo Yan and other pretty girls in the village. Unconsciously he bent down and intended to kiss that pale face, which turned aside and spilled the tears. His head began swelling.
“What are you doing?” Daiheng shouted at Nan.
Suddenly a burst of barking broke out beyond the window. The wolfhound must have been chasing a fox or a leopard cat that had come to steal chickens. Wild growls and yelps filled the yard all at once.
“Oh!” Nan cried out. Something snapped in his body; a numbing pain passed along his spine and forced him off her. By instinct, he managed to get to his feet and rushed to the door, holding his pants with both hands. Cold sweat was dripping from his face.
Once in the outer room he dropped to his knees and began vomiting. In addition to the smell of the half-cooked cabbage soup in the caldron, the room was instantly filled with the odor of alcohol, sour food, fermented candies, roasted melon seeds. His new cotton-padded shoes and new dacron jacket and trousers were wet and soiled.
“Little Nan, come on!” Daiheng said. Putting his hand on Nan’s head, he shook him twice.
“I’m scared. No more,” Nan moaned, buckling his belt.
“Scared by a dog? Useless,” Sang said, and restrained himself from giving Nan a kick.
“Come on, Nan. You must do it,” Ming said. “You just lost your Yang. Go get on her and have it back, or you’ve lost it for good. Don’t you know that?”
“No, no, I don’t want to.” Nan shook his head, groaning. “Leave me alone. I’m sick.” He rubbed his eyes to get rid of the mist caused by the dizziness. His hands were slimy.
“Let that wimp do what he wants. Come back in,” Sang said aloud, straddling the threshold.
They went in to enjoy themselves. “Ridiculous, scared by a dog,” Wei said, giggling and scratching his scalp.
Holding the corner of the cauldron range in the dark, Nan managed to stand up, and he staggered out into the windy night.
As Ming said, Nan lost his potency altogether. In fact, he lay in bed for two days after that night when he walked home bareheaded through the flying snow. At first, he dared not tell his parents what had happened, but within a week the entire village knew Nan had been frightened by Sang’s dog and had lost his Yang. His father scolded him a few times, while his mother wept in secret.
Two weeks later the Soos returned to the Haos the Shanghai wristwatch and the Flying Pigeon bicycle, two major items of the dowry already in Yan’s hands, saying Nan was no longer a normal man, so they wouldn’t marry their daughter to him. Despite Mrs. Hao’s imploring, the Soos refused to keep the expensive gifts. However, they did say that if Nan recovered within half a year they might reconsider the engagement.
For four months Nan had seen several doctors of Chinese medicine in town. They prescribed a number of things to restore his manhood: ginseng roots, sea horses, angelica, gum dragon, deer antler, tiger bones, royal jelly, even a buck’s penis, but nothing worked. His mother killed two old hens and stewed them with ginseng roots. Nan ate the powerful but almost inedible dish; the next day he had a bleeding nose and soon began losing his hair. His father cursed him, saying the Hao clan had never had such a nuisance. Indeed, after eating two or three slices of buck’s penis, a normal man wouldn’t be able to go out because of the erection, but nothing could help Nan. There was no remedy for such a jellyfish.
By now the villagers no longer counted Nan as a man. Children called out, “Dog-Scared,” when they ran into him. Though quite a few matchmakers visited the Haos, they all came for his sisters. Among all the unfilial things, the worst is childlessness. But what could Nan do? He had once thought of poisoning Sang’s wolfhound, but even that idea didn’t interest him anymore. One afternoon when he was on his way to the pig farm, the dog came to him, lashing its tail and wagging its tongue. He wanted to give it a kick, but he noticed Soo Yan walking two hundred meters away along the edge of the spinach field; so instead he threw his half-eaten corn cake to the dog, who picked it up and ran away. Nan watched the profile of that girl. She wore cream-colored clothes, her fiery gauze scarf waving in the breeze. With a short hoe on her shoulder, she looked like a red-crowned crane moving against the green field.