One day, Kai Jing told the girls how humans grew to be different from monkeys: "Ancient Peking Man could stand up and walk. We see this by the way his bones are formed, the footprints he left in the mud. He used tools. We see this by the bones and rocks he shaped to cut and smash. And Peking Man probably also began to speak in words. At least his brain was capable of forming a language."

Kai Jing laughed. "No, no, theyre not real." He tapped one. They were the painted-over theater of hell, now converted to Merry Christmas.

We held them in Teacher Pans sitting room. GaoLing and Sister Yu always joined us, as did the scientists—Dong, the older man with a gentle smile, and Chao, the tall young one whose thick hair hung in front of his face. When we were pouring the tea, Teacher Pan would wind his phonograph. And as we savored our treats, we listened to a song by Rach maninoff called "Oriental Dance." I can still see Teacher Pan, waving his hand like a conductor, telling the invisible pianist and cello players where to quiet down, where to come back with full feeling. At the end of the party, he would lie on the cushioned bench, close his eyes, and sigh, grateful for the food, Rachmaninoff, his son, his daughter-in-law, his dear old friends. "This is the truest meaning of happiness," he would tell us. Then Kai Jing and I would go for an evening stroll before we returned to our own room, grateful ourselves for the joy that exists only between two people.

"This is terrible to hear." Though this was the same Mother who had kicked me out, I took no pleasure in hearing about her difficulties. Perhaps a little bit of me still thought of Mother and Father as my parents.

"I typed the words," Sister Yu boasted.

"Still eating the opium?"

Every evening after dinner, Kai Jing and I paid a visit to his father. I loved to sit in his rooms, knowing this was my family home, too. The furnishings were plain, old, and honest, and everything had its place and purpose. Against the west wall, Teacher Pan had placed a cushioned bench that was his bed, and above that, he had hung three scrolls of calligraphy, one hundred characters each, as if done in one breath, one inspiration. By the south-facing window, he kept a pot of flowers in season, bright color that drew the eye away from shadows. Against the east wall were a simple desk and a chair of dark polished wood, a good place for thought. And on the desk were precious scholar-objects arranged like a still-life painting: a lacquered leather box, ivory brush holders, and an inkstone of duan, the best kind of stone, his most valuable possession, a gift from an old missionary who had taught him in his boyhood.

A girl asked, "What words? Were they Chinese?"

When I found Kai Jing, we walked out the gate and around the back wall of the orphanage to snuggle. And then I told him my complaints about Sister Yu.

"Not a wail or a whimper, which is strange, since that Catcher of Ghosts turned out to be a fake, not a monk at all. He had a wife and three brats, one of whom was the assistant. They were using the same vinegar jar to catch other ghosts, just opened the lid, sealed it up, over and over. They caught a lot of foolish customers that way. When Father heard this, he wanted to stuff the crook in the jar and plug it up with pony dung. I said to him, If Precious Aunties ghost never came back, what does it matter? But ever since, hes been muttering about the two ingots he lost, tallying their worth, while according to him was enough to purchase the sky."

GaoLing shook her fist and said: "The morals of a maggot."

"Were scientists not soldiers," Kai Jing explained. He started to tell them about the work with Peking Man, but one of the soldiers cut him off: "No work has been going on here in months."

For all these years, I had bitten back my tongue when Sister Yu was bossy. I had shown her respect when I felt none. And even though I was now a teacher, I still did not know how to argue with her. "You talk about kindness, you say we should have pity"—and before I could tell her what I really thought of her, I said, "and now you want to send my sister back to an opium addict?"

"She was self-taught, exposed to only the old ideas. She had no chance to learn about science, to go to a university like me."

The leader waved for him to be quiet. He turned to Kai Jing. "Were asking all men in the villages we defend to help us. You dont need to fight. You can cook or clean or do repairs." When no one said anything, he added in a less friendly voice: "This isnt a request, its a requirement. Your village owes us this. We order you. If you dont come along as patriots, well take you as cowards."

"Wife to Chang Fu Nan. Six years already, hard to believe."

"Why didnt you come see me then?"

And GaoLing acted honored, not insulted at all. "If only I could be as brave and uncomplaining."

Over the next two months, I grew thin. GaoLing had to force me to eat, and even then I could not taste anything. I could not stop thinking of the curse from the Monkeys Jaw, and I told GaoLing this, though no one else. Sister Yu held Praying for a Miracle meetings, asking that the Communists defeat the Japanese soon, so that Kai Jing, Dong, and Chao could return to us quickly. And Teacher Pan wandered the courtyards, his eyes misty with cataracts. Miss Grutoff and Miss Towler would not allow the girls to go outside the compound anymore, even though the fighting took place in other areas of the hills. They had heard terrible stories of Japanese soldiers raping girls. They found a large American flag and hung this over the gateway, as if this were a charm that would protect them from evil.

"What? Is moss growing on your brain? If we are at war, everyone will soon ask. Think about this: Our school is run by the Americans. The Americans are neutral on the Japanese. They are neutral on the Nationalists and the Communists. Here you dont have to worry which side wins or loses from day to day. You can just watch. Thats what it means to be neutral."

Only two of the scientists, Dong and Chao, came to our party. Because of the war, it was too dangerous for anyone to work in the quarry anymore. Most of the scientists had fled for Peking, leaving behind almost everything except the relics of the past. Twenty-six of the local workers stayed, as did Kai Jing, Dong, and Chao, who also lived on the former monastery grounds. Someone needed to keep an eye on the quarry, Kai Jing reasoned. What if the Japanese decided to blow up the hill? What if the Communists used the quarry as a machine-gun trench? "Even if they used it as an open pit toilet," I said to him, "how can you stop them?" I was not arguing that he and I should run to Peking as well. I knew he would never separate from his old father, and his old father would never separate from the school and the orphan girls. But I did not want my husband to go into the quarry rｅaｄ.９9ｃsｗ.ｃomas hero and come out as martyr. So much was uncertain. So many had already gone away. And many of us felt left behind. As a result, our wedding banquet was like the celebration of a sad victory.

"But perhaps she was not entirely dead and she climbed back up. Why else didnt I find her? I searched for hours, from side to side and top to bottom."

Then Sister Yu laughed. "I hate that man to the very marrow of my bones!"

When I returned to my room, I was startled to see Sister Yu there, shouting at GaoLing: "As hollow as a worm-eaten tree trunk!"

Yet Kai Jing and his colleagues still went to the quarry, and this made me crazy with anxiety. "Dont go," I always begged him. "Those old bones have been there for a million years. They can wait until after the war." That quarry was the only reason we had arguments, and sometimes when I remember this, I think I should have argued more, argued until he stopped going. Then I think, no, I should have argued less, or not at all. Then maybe his last memories of me would not have been those of a complaining wife.

Those were the small rituals we had, what comforted us, what we loved, what we could look forward to, what we could be thankful for and remember afterward.

The next day, we were supposed to visit the houses of our in-laws. So we went to the two rooms at the other end of the corridor, where Teacher Pan lived. I bowed and served him tea, calling him "Baba," and we all laughed over this formality. Then Kai Jing and I went to a little altar I had made with the picture of Precious Auntie in a frame. We poured tea for her as well, then lighted the incense, and Kai Jing called her "Mama" and promised he would take care of my entire family, including the ancestors who had come before me. "I am your family now, too," he said.

"Thats his life. Without it, hes a rabid dog. So I went to Wanping, and sure enough, the trains stopped and went no further. All the passengers got off and milled around like sheep and ducks. We had soldiers poking us to keep moving. They herded us into a field, and I was certain we were going to be executed. But then we heard pau-pau-pau, more shooting, and the soldiers ran off and left us there. For a minute, we were too afraid to move. The next I thought, Why should I wait for them to come back and kill me? They can chase me. So I ran away. And soon everyone did, scattering every which way. I must have walked for twelve hours."

GaoLing nodded. "Exactly my feeling, too."

"More than six hundred years ago," Miss Grutoff said, "when Marco Polo first admired it." And as everyone continued to talk about the war, I was wondering why no one in our village knew the bridge had changed its name so long before. "Which way are the Japanese advancing?" I asked. "North to Peking or south to here?"

GaoLing covered her mouth and laughed. "Careful what you say, or the Japanese and Nationalists will take turns whacking off your head."

"I also told Mother and Father that I ran into you at the railway station at the Mouth of the Mountain," GaoLing said. "I bragged you were an intellectual, working side by side with the scientists—and youd soon be married to one."

"I need to go back and find her bones. I want to bury them in a proper place."

"But why did the way of heaven lead to these things?"

I was not there when this happened, yet I saw it. The only way I could push it out of my mind was to go into my memory. And there in that safe place, I was with him, and he was kissing me when he told me, "We are divine, unchanged by time."

"Oh, she died for sure. I saw Old Cook throw her body in the End of the World."

"Not a great beauty, but fair," Sister Yu answered. "Actually, you remind me of her—the same broad face and large lips."

"Its very realistic," I told them. "My heart went peng-peng-peng when I read it."

"Its not the way of heaven. There is no reason."

After the banquet, the students and friends carried us to our bedchamber. It was the same storeroom where Kai Jing and I had gone for that disaster of a first night. But now the place was clean: no rats, no urine, no ticks or straw. The week before, the students had painted the walls yellow, the beams red. They had pushed the statues to one side. And to keep the Three Wise Men from watching us, I had made a partition of ropes and cloth. On our wedding night, the students remained outside our door for many hours, joking and teasing, laughing and setting off firecrackers. Finally they tired and left, and for the first time Kai Jing and I were alone as husband and wife. That night, nothing was forbidden, and our joy was effortless.

The dew turned to frost, and that winter we had two kinds of weddings, American and Chinese. For the American part, Miss Grutoff gave me a long white dress she had made for her own wedding but never wore. Her sweetheart died in the Great War, so it was a bad-luck dress. But she had such happy tears when she gave me the gown, how could I refuse? For the Chinese banquet, I wore a red wedding skirt and head scarf that GaoLing had embroidered.

One spring afternoon, the students were performing a play. I remember it well, a scene from The Merchant of Venice, which Miss Towler had translated into Chinese. "Fall down on your knees and pray," they were chanting. And right then, my life changed. Teacher Pan burst into the hall, panting and shouting, "Theyve seized them."

My mind was a sandstorm: If the monk was a fake, did that mean Precious Auntie had escaped? Or was she never put in the jar? And then I had another thought.

"If youve worked to preserve the past," the leader said, trying to be more cordial, "surely you can work to create the future. Besides, what past will you save if the Japanese destroy China?"

Much had changed, and I wished Precious Auntie could see how good my life was. I was a teacher and a married woman. I had both a husband and a father. And they were good people, unlike GaoLings in-laws, the Changs. My new family was genuine and sincere to others, the same inside as they showed outside. Precious Auntie had taught me that was important. Good manners are not enough, she had said, they are not the same as a good heart. Though Precious Auntie had been gone for all these years, I still heard her words, in happy and sad times, when it was important.

"I prefer a woman with ticks on her pretty bottom."

"We dont know for certain," Kai Jing said, "because you cannot leave behind spoken words. There was no writing in those days. That happened only thousands of years ago. But if there was a language, it was an ancient one that likely existed only in that time. And we can only guess what Peking Man tried to say. What does a person need to say? What man, woman, or child does he need to say it to? What do you think was the very first sound to become a word, a九_九_藏_書 meaning?"

"No food, no coal, no clothes in winter. We had to huddle so tightly together we looked like one long caterpillar."

After the Japanese attacked the Mouth of the Mountain, GaoLing and I climbed to the hilltop whenever we heard distant gunfire. We looked for the direction of the puffs of smoke. We noticed which way the carts and trucks were moving along the roads. GaoLing joked that we brought news faster than the ham radio that Kai Jing and Miss Grutoff sat in front of for half the day, hoping to hear a word from the scientists who had gone to Peking. I did not understand why they wanted the radio to talk back to them. It spoke only about bad things—which port city was taken, how nearly everyone in this or that town was killed to teach the dead people a lesson not to fight against the Japanese.

"Ha! They were proud," GaoLing said. "Mother said, I always knew we did well by her. Now you see the result."

"You think my husband gives me permission to take a holiday when I want? I had to wait for the way of heaven to throw me a chance. And then it came at the worst time. Yesterday Fu Nan told me to go to Immortal Heart village to beg more money from his father. I said to him, Didnt you hear? The Japanese are parading their army along the railway. Fff. He didnt care. His greed for opium is greater than any fear that his wife could be run through with a bayonet."

"What about Precious Aunties ghost? Did she ever come back?"

"She is still a mouth to feed. And if we allow one exception, then others will want an exception, too. In Teacher Wangs family alone, there are ten people. And what about the former students and their families? Should we let them in as well?"

And GaoLing put her hand over Sister Yus mouth. "Are all Christians as stupid as you are?" They were freely insulting each other, as only good friends can.

I was glad she had said this. "Were they sorry about what they did to me?"

"North of here, in Wanping," Miss Grutoff said, "close to the railway station."

"But thats the Reed Moat Bridge, forty-six kilometers from my village," I said. "When did they start calling it something else?"

"Dont be stupid. They all dyed their hair—Great-Granny, the aunts. But these days Mother doesnt care what she looks like. She claims she hasnt slept in two years. Shes convinced the tenants are stealing from us at night and rearranging the furniture. And she also believes Great-Grannys ghost has returned to the latrine. She hasnt had a bowel movement bigger than a bean sprout in months. The shits hardened to mortar, she says, thats why shes distended like a summer gourd."

GaoLing slapped my arm. "You melonhead, read more."

The leader of the soldiers approached them. He asked Kai Jing, "Hey, why havent you joined us?"

"There are no such things as curses," Kai Jing later told me. "Those are superstitions, and a superstition is a needless fear. The only curses are worries you cant get rid of."

"You tell me, comrade," the leader said. "How long will it take to drive out the Japanese?"

"And I carved the seals," GaoLing said.

Even in wartime and poverty, people must have plays and opera. "They are the speech and music of the soul," Kai Jing told me. Every Sunday afternoon, the students performed for us, and they were very enthusiastic. But to be honest, the acting and music were not very good, painful sometimes to listen to and see, and we had to be very good actors ourselves to pretend this was enjoyment beyond compare. Teacher Pan told me that the plays were just as bad when I was a student and performed in them. How long ago that seemed. Now Miss Towler was bent over with old age, almost as short as Sister Yu. When she played the piano, her nose nearly touched the keys. Teacher Pan had cataracts and worried that soon he would not be able to paint anymore.

"Some."

Everyone stopped talking at once. A woman stood in the doorway. With the bright sun behind her, she was a shadow, and I could not make out who she was, only that she wore a dress. "Is Liu LuLing still living here?" I heard her say. I squinted. Who was asking this? I was already confused about so many things, now this as well. As I walked toward her, my confusion turned into a guess, then the guess into a certainty. Precious Auntie. I had often dreamed that her ghost would come back. As in dreams, she could talk and her face was whole, and as in dreams, I rushed toward her. And at last, this time she did not push me away. She threw open her arms and cried: "So you still recognize your own sister!"

The Japanese came for Kai Jing, Dong, and Chao that evening. Miss Grutoff was brave and declared that she was an American and they had no right to enter the orphanage. They paid no attention to her, and when they started to walk toward the rooms where the girls were hiding under their beds, Kai Jing and the other men came forward and said they did not need to look any further. I tried to follow.

The next morning, I felt like a different person, happy but also worried. Sister Yu had once said that you could tell which girls in the lanes were prostitutes because they had eyes like chickens. What she meant by this, I didnt know. Did the eyes become redder or smaller? Would others see in my eyes that I had a new kind of knowledge? When I arrived in the main hall for breakfast, I saw that almost everyone was there, gathered in a circle, talking in serious voices. As I walked in, it seemed that all the teachers lifted their eyes to stare at me, shocked and sad. Then Kai Jing shook his head. "Bad news," he said, and the blood drained from my limbs so that even if I had wanted to run away I was too weak to do so. Would I be kicked out? Had Kai Jings father refused to let him marry me? But how did they know? Who told? Who saw? Who heard? Kai Jing pointed to the shortwave radio that belonged to the scientists, and the others turned back to listen. And I wondered: Now the radio is announcing what we did? In English?

A few days after this, I found the two of them sitting in the courtyard before dinner, reminiscing like comrades stuck together through the ages like glue and lacquer. GaoLing waved me over to show me a letter with a red seal mark and the emblem of the rising sun. It was from the "Japanese Provisional Military Police."

"Whack away," Sister Yu said. "What I say, I mean. The Communists are closer to God, even though they dont believe in Him. Share the fish and loaves, thats what they believe. Its true, Communists are like Christians. Maybe they should form a united front with Jesus worshippers rather than with the Nationalists."

I slapped his hands away. "You mean to be loyal," he went on. "She means to be practical. Dont fight differences of meaning. Find where you mean the same. Or simply do nothing for now. Wait and see." I can honestly say I admired Kai Jing as九*九*藏*書 much as I loved him. He was kind and sensible. If he had a fault, it was his foolishness in loving me. And as my head floated in the pleasure of this mystery and his caresses, I forgot about big wars and small battles.

"Remember how black her hair used to be? Now its like an old mans beard, white and wiry. She no longer dyes it."

"Maybe there never was a ghost because she never died," I said to GaoLing.

He kissed my eyes, one at a time. "This is beauty, and this is beauty, and you are beauty, and love is beauty and we are beauty. We are divine, unchanged by time." He said this until I promised I believed him, until I agreed it was enough.

All at once, a cold breath poured down my neck. Why? I thought of our ancestor who died in the Monkeys Jaw. Was that the reason? I remembered the bones that were never brought back, the curse. What was the meaning of this memory?

What could I do except insist four times that she stay with me? And what could she do except insist three times that she did not want to be a burden? Finally, I took her to my room. She wiped her face and neck with a wet cloth, then lay on my cot with a sigh, and fell asleep.

While water couldnt run uphill, money did. All kinds of vendors from down below sneaked past the barricades and brought their goods up the mountain so that people from the hill towns could spend their money before they were killed. GaoLing, Kai Jing, and I would walk along the ridge road to buy luxuries. Sometimes I filled my tin with shaoping, the savory flaky buns coated with sesame seeds that I knew Teacher Pan loved so much. Other days I bought fried peanuts, dried mushrooms, or candied melon. There were many shortages during wartime, so any delicacies we could find were always an excuse for little parties.

"Then why did my father die? Why did Precious Auntie die?"

Between broken breaths, he told us that Kai Jing and his friends had gone to the quarry for their usual inspection. Teacher Pan had gone along for the fresh air and small talk. At the quarry they found soldiers waiting. They were Communists, and since they were not Japanese, the men were not concerned.

"Theyre like an audience at a bad opera," I said, "not so pleased." There was Mother Mary with a screaming mouth, the sheepherders with pointed heads, and Baby Jesus, whose eyes stuck out like a frogs. Kai Jing draped my blouse over the head of Mary. He covered Joseph with my skirt, while Baby Jesus received my slip. Then Kai Jing put his own clothes over the Three Wise Men and turned the sheepherders around. When all their eyes faced the wall, Kai Jing guided me to lie down in the straw, and once more we became shadows.

"You may not think so, but she really does have a good heart," he said. "Ive known her since we were children together."

And I mourned uselessly: "If only you had come and told me sooner."

Later that night, GaoLing said to me, "That Sister Yu is very wise, also a lot of fun." I said nothing. She would soon learn this woman could also be like a stinging wasp.

When Kai Jing was not at the quarry, he taught the girls in my class about geology. He told them stories about ancient earth and ancient man, and I listened, too. He drew pictures on the chalkboard of icy floods and fiery explosions from underneath, of the skull of Peking Man and how it was different from a monkeys, higher in the forehead, more room for his changing brain. If Miss Towler or Miss Grutoff were listening, Kai Jing did not draw the monkey or talk about the ages of the earth. He knew that his ideas about life before and everlasting were different from theirs.

When winter came, we heard that many of the Communist soldiers were falling sick and dying of diseases before they had a chance to fire a single bullet. The Japanese had more medicine, warmer clothes, and they took food and supplies from whatever villages they occupied. With fewer Communist troops to defend the hills, the Japanese were crawling up, and with each step, they chopped down trees so no one could hide and escape. Because they were coming closer, we could no longer safely walk the ridge road to buy food.

"The Japanese wont win here," GaoLing would say in the evenings. "They may be fast in the sea, but here in the mountains theyre like fish flopping on the sand. Our men, on the other hand, are like goats." Every night she said this to convince herself it was true. And for a while, it was true. The Japanese soldiers could not push their way up the mountain.

"Its your duty to join us," another soldier grumbled. "Here we are spilling our own blood to protect your damn village."

Since GaoLing had already told Mother and Father I was to be married, I invited them out of politeness. I hoped they would use the convenient excuse of war to not come. But Mother and Father did come, as did the aunts and uncles, big and little cousins, nephews and nieces. No one talked of the great embarrassment of what we all knew. It was very awkward. I introduced Mother and Father as my aunt and uncle, which would have been a true fact if I had not been a love child without proper claim to any family. And most everyone at the school acted politely toward them. Sister Yu, however, gave them critical stares. She muttered to GaoLing, loud enough for Mother to hear: "They threw her away, and now they stuff their mouths at her table." All day long, I felt confused—happy in love, angry with my family, yet strangely glad that they were there. And I was also worried about the white wedding dress, thinking this was a sign that my happiness would not last for long.

"Not bad. You look modern, no longer the country girl."

"And Mother, hows her health?"

"The Japanese now occupy the hills," he told us. "They drove off our troops." That was how Sister Yu learned that the other half of her miracle prayer had not come true. "Theyll come looking for us."

When Kai Jing finally told me, I didnt have even one moment to be relieved that the bad news was not about me. "The Japanese attacked last night," he said, "close to Peking, and everyone is saying it is war for sure."

"What a pity, I know. I didnt think youd still be here. If it werent for Mr. Weis gossipy wife, I wouldnt have known you were a teacher here. She told me when I came home for a visit during Spring Festival."

As we quickly dressed, Kai Jing and I were too embarrassed to talk. He also said nothing as he walked me to my room. But at the door, he told me, "Im sorry. I should have controlled myself." My heart hurt. I didnt want to hear his apology, his regrets. I heard him add: "I should have waited until were married." And then I gasped and began to cry, and he embraced me and uttered promises that we would be lovers for ten thousand lifetimes, and I vowed the same, until we heard a loud "Shhhh!" Even after we quieted, Sister Yu, whose room was next to mine, kept grumbling: "No consideratiｈｔtｐｓ://rｅａｄ•９9ｃｓw•coｍon for others. Worse than roosters . . ."

And then I realized what the first word must have been: ma, the sound of a baby smacking its lips in search of her mothers breast. For a long time, that was the only word the baby needed. Ma, ma, ma. Then the mother decided that was her name and she began to speak, too. She taught the baby to be careful: sky, fire, tiger. A mother is always the beginning. She is how things begin.

"The Nationalists conscripted First Brother five years ago. All the boys his age had to go. And Second Brother ran off to join the Communists two years after that. Big Uncles sons followed, then Big Uncle cursed that all three should never come back. Mother didnt speak to him until the United Front was formed and Uncle apologized, saying now it didnt matter which side they were on."

"I didnt know until Old Cook died, two years after Precious Auntie. His wife told me. She said he did good deeds that no one even knew about."

"What? I thought it was naturally black from working with the ink."

"But whats happened to you? You look terrible."

GaoLing looked away. "What a terrible day that was for you. . . . You didnt find her, but she was there. Old Cook felt sorry that Precious Auntie didnt get a proper burial. He pitied her. When Mother wasnt looking, he went down there and piled rocks on top of the body."

Two months after the men disappeared, Sister Yus prayers were half answered. Three men walked through the gateway early in the morning, and Miss Grutoff beat the gong of the Buddhas Ear. Soon everyone was shouting that Kai Jing, Dong, and Chao had returned. I ran so fast across the courtyard I tripped and nearly broke my ankle. Kai Jing and I grabbed each other and gave in to happy sobs. His face was thinner and very brown; his hair and skin smelled of smoke. And his eyes—they were different. I remember thinking that at the time. They were faded, and I now think some part of his life force had already gone.

"But theyre not asking to come here."

The first night Kai Jing and I tried forbidden joy, it was summertime, a bright-moon night. We had slipped into a dark storage room at the abandoned end of a corridor, far from the eyes and ears of others. I had no shame, no guilty feelings. I felt wild and new, as though I could swim the heavens and fly through waves. And if this was bad fate, let it be. I was the daughter of Precious Auntie, a woman who also could not control her desires, who then gave birth to me. How could this be bad when the skin on Kai Jings back was so smooth, so warm, so fragrant? Was it also fate to feel his lips on my neck? When he unbuttoned the back of my blouse and it fell to the floor, I was ruined, and I was glad. Then the rest of my clothing slipped off, piece by piece, and I felt I was growing lighter and darker. He and I were two shadows, black and airy, folding and blending, weak yet fierce, weightless, mindless of others—until I opened my eyes and saw that a dozen people were watching us.

"But wont Mother and Father be in agony when they hear youre missing?"

"My eldest sister also had to live with one," she replied. "When her lungs were bleeding, her husband refused to buy any medicine. He bought opium for himself instead. Thats why shes dead—gone forever, the only person with deep feeling for me." It was no use. Sister Yu had found yet another misery to compare as greater than anyone elses. I watched her hobble out of the room.

"She should have complained," Sister Yu said. "You, too. Why must those who suffer also be quiet? Why accept fate? Thats why I agree with the Communists! We have to struggle to claim our worth. We cant stay mired in the past, worshipping the dead."

The next day, I found them seated together in the teachers dining room. Sister Yu was talking in a quiet voice, and I heard GaoLing answer her, "This is unbearable to even hear. Was your sister pretty as well as kind?"

"Before she escaped from the detention center, where she was awaiting execution," the letter said, "Liu GaoLing confessed that it was her husband, Chang Fu Nan, who sent her to the railway station to conduct her illegal mission. For this reason, the Japanese agents in Peking wish to speak to Chang Fu Nan of his involvement in her spying activities. We will be coming soon to Chang Fu Nans residence to discuss the matter."

Because I loved my husband very much, I tried to abide by the new ideas: no curses, no bad luck, no good luck, either. When I worried over dark clouds, I said there was no reason. When wind and water changed places, I tried to convince myself that there was no reason for this as well. For a while, I had a happy life, not too many worries.

Sister Yu was the only one who objected to GaoLings living with me at the school. "Were not a refugee camp," she argued. "As it is, we have no cots to take any more children."

"I havent eaten since yesterday."

A few days later, I heard wailing in the main hall. When GaoLing came to me with red eyes, I stopped her from saying what I already knew. For a month more, I tried to keep Kai Jing alive in my heart and mind. For a while longer, I tried so much to believe what he had said: "There is no curse." And then finally I let GaoLing say the words.

And now I pictured Precious Auntie struggling up the ravine, a rock rolling toward her, striking her, then another and another, as she tumbled back down. "Why didnt you tell me this sooner?"

After a while, I understood that they were not fighting with each other but in a contest to name the worst insult for the devils who had wronged them. For the next two hours, they tallied their grievances. "The desk that was in my fathers family for nine generations," GaoLing said, "gone in exchange for a few hours of pleasure."

Two Japanese officers questioned the men day and night, tried to force them to say where the Communist troops had gone. On the third day, they lined them up, Kai Jing, Dong, and Chao, as well as thirty other villagers. A soldier stood nearby with a bayonet. The Japanese officer said he would ask them once again, one at a time. And one by one, they shook their heads, one by one they fell. In my mind, sometimes Kai Jing was first, sometimes he was last, sometimes he was in between.

"Do you like it?"

Maku polo this, maku polo that, I heard the radio voice say. I asked: "What is this maku thing?"

And thats what GaoLing did, went to Immortal Heart, where she discovered that Fu Nan had told no one about the letter. About a month later, she returned to the school as Sister Yus helper. "Mother and Father knew only what the Chang father told him," she reported. "That husband of yours, Father said to me. I thought he was all boast and no backbone. And then we hear hes joined the army—didnt even wait to be forced to go."

"Only a teacher. And you, are you still—"

It was GaoLing. We spun each other around, danced and slapped each otheread.99csw.comrs arms, taking turns to cry, "Look at you." I had not heard from her since she wrote me the letter four or five years before. In minutes, we were treating each other like sisters once again. "Whats happened to your hair?" I joked, grabbing her messy curls. "Was it an accident, or did you do this on purpose?"

That night, when Kai Jing was already asleep, I was still thinking about these questions. I imagined two people without words, unable to speak to each other. I imagined the need: The color of the sky that meant "storm." The smell of fire that meant "Flee." The sound of a tiger about to pounce. Who would worry about such things?

"Your father died because of an accident. Precious Auntie killed herself. You said so yourself."

I heated water, made a bath, and washed his body with a cloth as he sat in the narrow wooden tub. And then we went to our bedchamber and I pinned a cloth over the lattice window so it would be dark. We lay down, and as he rocked me, he talked to me in soft murmurs, and it took all of my senses to realize that I was in his arms, that his eyes were looking at mine. "There is no curse," he said. I was listening hard, trying to believe that I would always hear him speak. "And you are brave, you are strong," he went on. I wanted to protest that I didnt want to be strong, but I was crying too much to speak. "You cannot change this," he said. "This is your character."

"Then you know that the Changs own the business, our family owns only the debt. Father and our uncles are back in Immortal Heart village, churning out ink till it sweats from their pores. And now that theyre home all the time, they have bad tempers and argue constantly among themselves about who is to blame for this, that, and the weather."

The letter was to Chang Fu Nan, announcing that his wife, Liu GaoLing, had been arrested at Wanping as an anti-Japanese spy. "You were arrested?" I cried.

"I think a person should always say her prayers to God," another girl said. "She should say thank you to those who are nice to her."

Sister Yu said, "The Maku Polo Bridge. The island dwarves have captured it." I was surprised to hear her use this slur for the Japanese. In the school, she was the one who taught the girls not to use bad names, even for those we hated. Sister Yu went on: "Shot their rifles in the air—just for practice, they said. So our army shot back to teach the liars a lesson. And now one of the dwarves is missing. Probably the coward ran away, but the Japanese are saying one missing man is enough reason to declare war." With Sister Yu translating the English into Chinese, it was hard to tell which was the news and which were her opinions.

But what happened after that was not like a poem or a painting of the fourth level. We were not like nature, as beautifully harmonious as a leafy tree against the sky. We had expected all these things. But the straw made us itch and the floor stank of urine. A rat stumbled out of its nest, and this caused Kai Jing to roll off me and knock Baby Jesus out of his crib. The frog-eyed monster lay next to us, as if it were our love child. Then Kai Jing stood up and lighted a match, searching for the rat. And when I looked at Kai Jings private parts, I saw he was no longer possessed. I also saw he had ticks on his thigh. A moment later, he pointed out three on my bottom. I jumped up and was dancing to shake them off. I had to try very hard not to laugh and cry as Kai Jing turned me around and inspected me, then burned off the ticks with the tip of a match. When I took back my blouse from Marys head, she looked glad that I was ashamed, even though we had not fulfilled our desires.

"This Maku Polo Bridge," I said, "how far away is it?"

"Ill go see them next week if the roads are safe."

GaoLing took off her shoes. The heels were broken, the sides were split, and her soles had bleeding blisters. "My feet hurt so much I thought they would kill me with the pain." She snorted. "Maybe I should let Fu Nan think I was killed. Yes, make him feel he is to blame. Though probably hed feel nothing. Hed just go back to his cloudy dreams. Every day is the same to him, war or no war, wife or no wife." She laughed, ready to cry. "So Big Sister, what do you say? Should I go back to him?"

"She can live in my room, stay in my bed."

It happened that quickly, Teacher Pan said. The soldiers would have taken him as well, but they decided an old man who was nearly blind was more trouble than help. As the soldiers led the men away, Teacher Pan called out, "How long will they be gone?"

"Youll never find them," GaoLing said. "The cliff broke off again last year during the rainstorms, a ledge the length of five men. Collapsed all at once and buried everything along that side of the ravine with rocks and dirt three stories deep. Our house will be the next to go."

I jumped up, went to the kitchen, and brought her back a bowl of mil let porridge, some pickles and steamed peanuts, and little cold dishes. We sat in a corner of the hall, away from news of the war, she eating with much noise and speed. "Weve been living in Peking, Fu Nan and I, no children," she said between thick mouthfuls. "We have the back rooms of the ink shop. Everythings been rebuilt. Did I tell you this in my letter?"

One night Teacher Pan gave me that duan inkstone. I was about to protest, but then I realized that he was my father now, and I could accept it openly with my heart. I held that circle of duan and ran my ringers over its silky smoothness. I had admired that inkstone since the days when I first came to the school as his helper. He had brought it to class once to show to the students. "When you grind ink against stone you change its character, from ungiving to giving, from a single hard form to many flowing forms. But once you put the ink to paper, it becomes unforgiving again. You cant change it back. If you make a mistake, the only remedy is to throw away the whole thing." Precious Auntie had once said words that were similar. You should think about your character. Know where you are changing, how you will be changed, what cannot be changed back again. She said that when I first learned to grind ink. She also said this when she was angry with me, during the last days we were together. And when I heard Teacher Pan talking about this same thing, I promised myself I would change and become a better daughter.

"But Precious Auntie told me this, and she was very smart."

"What about First Brother and Second Brother?" I asked. "Home, too?"

"Read it," Sister Yu said.

"Maybe you should marry her, then."

"No flies circling your head, either. I heard rumors youre now a high-and-mighty intellectual."

"Fu Nan will think firecrackers have exploded in his chest," said GaoLing. She and Sister Yu squealed like schoolgirls.