Mountain Girl River Girl Page 8

  But they seemed to draw strength from each other’s stories, agreeing that neither should go back to her old life in the mountains or on the rivers.

  “Not until I have found a job and made something of myself,” Shui-lian said determinedly. “Something other than a river ku-li.”

  “So why not come to Beijing with me? We can look for work together,” Pan-pan replied, a smile appearing on her face as she set down her empty glass.

  “Why don’t you come with me to Shanghai?” Shui-lian countered.

  “Beijing is the capital, so it’s better.”

  “How do you know? You’ve never been there,” Shui-lian demanded, her voice rising. “I heard that Shanghai is bigger and has a lot more people than Beijing—which to me means more factories and more job opportunities.”

  “Maybe so, but large or small, you don’t know anyone there, while I have a connection in Beijing. Remember I told you about Sun Ming, the girl from Beijing, who was sent down to my village and lived with my family before she returned home? I have her address. We can look for her when we get to the capital, and she can help us find work.”

  Shui-lian burst out laughing. “You also told me all that happened about thirty years ago. Even if this Sun Ming still lives there, she may have forgotten your family. She certainly won’t know you. You weren’t even born yet!”

  “That’s true,” Pan-pan answered calmly. “But, still, it’s something. More than you’ve got in Shanghai.”

  Shui-lian fell quiet, avoiding Pan-pan’s eyes as she thought for a moment. “It’s not just that. I asked Jin-lin to tell my mother I was heading to Shanghai. What if—” She stopped, biting her lip.

  “Sorry, I forgot that part. As far as my family knows, I’m already in Beijing,” Pan-pan said bitterly. “Look at us: two warriors wounded already, before the battle is launched. Anyway, even if I was willing to go to Shanghai with you, I don’t have the money for a train ticket.” She pulled some money from her pocket. “This is all I have left, and it belongs to Lao Zhang. My taxi fare. Lao Ma’s explained to me that I have two options. One, to accept a free ticket to Beijing; the other, to let them pay my way back home. You know what, Shui-lian? Either way is a sort of dead end because I have no money. It was all stolen. What will I do if I can’t find Sun Ming in Beijing? I’ll be totally alone in a strange city.”

  “You’re not backing out, taking their offer, are you?” Shui-lian sounded more worried than alarmed. She had been talking tough, making it seem that her mind was made up about Pan-pan going to Shanghai with her. The truth was that, after her short encounter with Pan-pan, she didn’t just like this easygoing and level-headed young woman—who was, Shui-lian thought, the kind of daughter her own mother would have wished for—Shui-lian felt she could trust Pan-pan. She knew she had found a friend in this young woman from a neighbouring province. Of course, she would never share everything with her as she did with Jin-lin, she cautioned herself, especially the account of her rape on that horrible night. She would tell Pan-pan about being abducted by a gang that sold women into forced marriages, and about being arrested and released, but no more.

  “No, I’m not backing out,” Pan-pan assured Shui-lian but without much conviction. Time was running out, she reminded herself. She had to make a decision one way or the other, and soon.

  After the food stall owner glowered at them again and shooed them away, Pan-pan suggested they walk and talk some more to clear their heads. “But let’s avoid the area around the train station,” she added. “Lao Ma must be looking for me by now. He and his wife are probably worried that something has happened to me.” She then stopped, lowering her head as if making a confession. “I’m grateful for their help, but I can’t deliver what they want.” She straightened the criss-cross tie on her bedroll before slinging it onto her back. “I feel like if I refuse to go home as they wish, I’ll be throwing ashes in their faces in return for the sack of coal they gave me to save me from freezing to death. You understand what I’m saying, don’t you?”

  “Of course I do. I went to school too, you know,” Shui-lian said defensively as she picked up Pan-pan’s bag. Although she didn’t quite get the ashes and coal part, the meaning was clear. Listening to Pan-pan talk about Lao Ma and Lao Zhang and their kindness toward her, a stranger, Shui-lian couldn’t help feeling a little envious.

  “I bet Comrade Guo was disappointed as well when she returned to the inn and found out that I’d left on my own despite her advice. She offered to buy me a train ticket home. Probably also express class,” Shui-lian felt compelled to say. Yet, in spite of Guo and her sympathetic words, Shui-lian didn’t share Pan-pan’s belief in the essential kindness of people. Da-Ge and the men who had raped her, Jin-lin, and the others had made that impossible.

  A MAN’S VOICE came out of nowhere as Pan-pan and Shui-lian were about to cross a busy intersection. “Are you looking for work, young misses?”

  Shui-lian started, panic in her eyes. Pan-pan quickly reached out to catch Shui-lian by the arm before her friend lurched into the path of an oncoming truck. Pan-pan was still laughing at Shui-lian’s reaction when she turned around to see the man who was the cause of the commotion. She looked up into a pair of friendly eyes behind thick spectacles.

  “I’m very sorry if I startled you,” the man apologized, smiling and revealing gaps between his upper teeth, which explained the hissing sound like leaking valves that Pan-pan had heard when he spoke. His politeness and gentle voice put Pan-pan at ease right away. He was about Ah-Po’s age, tall, lanky, and slightly stooped, and his face was a map of folds and creases.

  “Old Uncle, were you talking to us?” she asked.

  “Don’t say anything to him!” Shui-lian insisted. “And don’t call him ‘uncle’! He’s a wolf in a lamb’s coat! Let’s go!” She grabbed Pan-pan’s arm.

  “Stop! You’re hurting me!” Pan-pan protested loudly, struggling to free herself. “What’s the matter with you, Shui-lian? I want to hear what he has to say. For heaven’s sake, what are you afraid of? It’s broad daylight and there are hundreds of people on the street. Besides, there are two of us. He can’t eat us alive, can he?”

  “You’re making a mistake, Pan-pan. You can’t get ivory from the mouth of a dog. Men are all the same. All they do is tell lies and trick you,” Shui-lian grumbled, reluctantly releasing Pan-pan’s arm. “A pig’s fart will smell a hundred times better than whatever comes out of his mouth!”

  “What a temper! What a way to talk!” The old man said in a trembling voice, visibly shaken. “Why don’t you listen to what I have to say before you run out of animals to insult me with?”

  Shui-lian glared at him, her chest heaving.

  “I don’t like to chase after strangers on the street, especially young women, but I’m just doing my job.”

  He took off his khaki cap, using his open palm to smooth a head of white hair. “I recruit workers for a shoe factory on the northern outskirts of Bengbu. The factory won’t hire me to work there because I’m too old to be productive. My hands are slow and my eyesight is poor. It’s only interested in young people, young women in particular. And only non-locals.”

  “I’ve never made shoes,” Pan-pan answered, her voice trailing. Turning to Shui-lian she said behind her hand, “Remember what we’ve talked about? We need money.” Back to the old man, she patted the bedroll on her back and the bag slung across Shui-lian’s shoulder and added, “You can see yourself that we’re not locals. Will you hire us?”

  “Don’t listen to him!” Shui-lian jerked her head, facing Pan-pan, her voice cracking and pleading. “That’s how they all start, making job offers because that’s what you want to hear. I know what I’m talking about. They’ll promise you the moon and the sun, anything to hook you.”

  She swung around to challenge the old man, her eyes boring into his. “If you want us to believe you, you’d better take us to the factory yourself.”

  To Shui-lian’s surprise, a smile reappeared on the old man’s face
, bringing more creases around his eyes. “I’m happy to oblige your request. But first, let’s find a quiet place to sit down so that I can tell you more about it. I’ve been on my feet since the crack of dawn. Please keep in mind,” he paused, casting a long glance of disfavour at Shui-lian, “I’m going to ask you some questions, and I have to be satisfied with the answers before I can sign you up for the job.”

  AN HOUR LATER, the interview, held in a snack bar over bottles of orange pop for Pan-pan and Shui-lian and a glass of beer for himself, was concluded. Forms had been filled in and, most important, Shui-lian’s doubts and fears had been calmed by the old man’s reassurances, and by the fact that they would be travelling to the factory on a public bus, with other passengers. The recruiter, who asked the girls to call him Lao Zhou, walked Pan-pan and Shui-lian to the city’s long-distance bus station and waited in line with them for tickets. Outside there was a constant coming and going of vehicles, and jostling crowds. Tickets in hand, Shui-lian and Pan-pan joined another line in a sheltered area. Lao Zhou, who, it turned out, was a retired middle-school history teacher, motioned Shui-lian aside, out of earshot of the other passengers.

  In a hushed voice he reminded her that at no time should she tell anyone in the factory that she was from Sichuan. She and Pan-pan must pretend to be cousins, on her mother’s side, as he’d written on their employment forms. Earlier, during the interview, Lao Zhou had emphasized that the owner of the factory, a wealthy businesswoman from Taiwan who now lived in the United States with her American husband, was said to dislike Sichuan natives. One rumour had it that her discontent was rooted in her unhappy family history. Another claimed that years ago she had had a similar factory outside the city of Suzhou but had shut it down because of, in her words, “the high cost of land and taxes and dwindling profits.” The truth was, Lao Zhou whispered, the workers there had tried to organize a union, demanding higher pay and benefits.

  “Benefits?” Shui-lian had asked, frowning. “What are they? The workers were paid, weren’t they? What else did they want that made the boss so mad she closed the factory?”

  “I’m not sure about the details. The reason I’m bringing it up is that the labour dispute was initiated by a group of migrant workers from Sichuan. Before you knew it, everyone came on board. As a group they requested better living and working conditions, and some medical coverage. As you may know, the once-proud universal medicare run by our government went down the drain long ago. The owner accused the workers of getting fancy ideas from the West.” Lao Zhou raised one of his eyebrows, producing a funny face. “Did I tell you that every pair of shoes made in the factory is for foreign markets only? Anyway, I’m not allowed to sign on any workers from Sichuan Province.”

  He looked straight at Shui-lian, who stared back at him as she wiped cookie crumbs off her lips. He then wiggled his first finger at her. “After what I’ve experienced today, I can’t blame her too much, can I?” Not waiting for an answer, he threw back his head and let out a heartfelt laugh. “Little Sichuan, you sure are a firecracker.”

  As the last of the passengers rushed to take their seats, Lao Zhou stood on his toes on the platform so he was at eye level with Pan-pan and Shui-lian, who had taken seats next to an open window. He lowered his voice, giving them his final advice. “Look out for yourself and for each other when you are there. Watch what you say, and stay out of trouble. China may still call itself a socialist country, ruled by the Communist Party, but it’s capitalism inside the factory walls. Remember: When you live in someone else’s house, bend your head if the ceiling is lower than what you’re used to.”

  His last words released a gush of homesickness in Shui-lian. Her mother had often used the same saying. For the past two days, ever since she had left Jin-lin and the other women at the inn, she had been up with the rising sun, walking and begging all day, sleeping in shabby hostels, where she paid three yuan a night for a top bunk. For two days she had thought about nothing but her destination—Shanghai—and starting a new life there. It had been hard to keep her mind off her mother and her family, the rivers and mountains of Sichuan, but she knew she had to, otherwise her will might soften, and she might break down right in the middle of road and give up her plan.

  As the bus rumbled out of the station, Shui-lian wondered where Jin-lin was. She found herself choked with emotions she thought she had lost forever after that horrible night. Quickly she turned her head aside, away from the window. She didn’t want Pan-pan to see her tears.

  Chapter Twelve

  The bus rattled and grumbled, heading north. Pan-pan sat quietly, a ten-yuan note crumpled in her fist. She had tried to push the money into Lao Zhou’s hand when he shook hands with her before the bus pulled out of the station, but failed. She knew it would cover only part of the bus fare, but it was all the money she had left. Ordinarily, the workers bought their own tickets and were repaid by the factory once they passed their three-month probation. But Lao Zhou was kind enough to buy her and Shui-lian’s tickets for them. Pan-pan stared down at the wrinkled note in her hand, feeling a thickness in her throat. She wondered whether by the end of the day, week, or month, the old man would ever break even, never mind earning money as he hoped, if he kept helping out people like her and Shui-lian.

  Next to her, Shui-lian, gazing at the back of the seat in front of her, spoke quietly. “I never said goodbye to my family, nor did I wave at anyone during the entire trip, even though we were constantly in and out of trains and on and off buses.” She looked out the window as if retracing her journey. “But saying goodbye to Lao Zhou, someone I had just met, made me sad. It’s very strange, but you know what? I kind of like it—it’s a good sad-feeling.”

  Pan-pan didn’t reply.

  According to Lao Zhou, the bus ride to the factory was about three hours. It would take them to the north shore of the Hui River and onto the North China Plain, where Anhui Province bordered Henan Province. Although the factory was less than a year old, Lao Zhou said, a bus stop had already been set up and named after it. “A stone’s throw from the factory,” he assured them. “Trust me, you won’t miss it.”

  It turned out that six other young women on the bus were heading for the same destination. “The new shoemakers,” the driver had called them.

  The bus was jammed full. Every seat was taken, including the flip-downs that blocked the centre aisle. Bags and parcels filled up the remaining space—piled on the overhead racks, heaped on raised knees, and enclosed by anxious arms. Two galvanized-wire cages sat on top of the engine cover. One held half a dozen scrawny chickens, the other a pair of ducks that seemed in better spirits than the chickens, quacking and flapping their wings each time the bus horn sounded.

  As the sun slanted down the western sky, Pan-pan and Shui-lian experienced their first traffic jam while the bus fought its way out of Bengbu. They laughed at the chaos outside the window, the noise, the tangled disorder among the vehicles, cyclists, and pedestrians, and the loud curses from their driver. When the bus finally reached the countryside, the daylight was fading and the relative calm seemed to bring quiet among the riders. Animated conversations, carried on in several dialects, each louder than the other, had diminished to hushed murmurs and soft snores.

  Shui-lian dozed off, her head on the bedroll Pan-pan had placed on her knees. It’s probably the first time she’s had a decent rest since she left her family’s boat more than a week ago, Pan-pan thought as she watched a trickle of saliva gather at the corner of Shui-lian’s mouth. Shui-lian had told her about Da-Ge’s lies and betrayal, her troubled journey, that she had almost been sold as a wife to a stranger. Pan-pan couldn’t have imagined that such terrible things happened. Listening to Shui-lian’s story, Pan-pan had felt guilty about her own so-called adversity. She wondered if she would have chosen to return home like the rest of the women Shui-lian had travelled with. Shui-lian was so brave, Pan-pan admitted. Yet taking off without telling her family was something she herself would never do.

  With Shu
i-lian sleeping soundly, Pan-pan leaned closer to examine her face in the dim light. Although Pan-pan was four months younger and less experienced, she concluded that the bruises on Shui-lian’s face were definitely not from falling down the stairs as Shui-lian had claimed. More likely she had been punched. Did something else happen during her trip that Shui-lian didn’t want to tell me? Pan-pan asked herself. If so, does it cancel out my not revealing my fox smell? No wonder Lao Zhou called us nan-jie-nan-mei—suffering sisters—after he finished listening to the edited version of our stories.

  Pan-pan knew that the popular expression was actually nan-xiong-nan-di—suffering brothers. Whoever came up with that old proverb seemed to imply that misery falls only on males. Xin-Ma would have said that was because it was always men who made up words and phrases. Then again, Lao Zhou used to be a teacher. He knew how to reinvent phrases. Is that why he took pity on us, two suffering young women, and signed us on by lying about Shui-lian’s birthplace and paying for our tickets? As soon as they, especially Shui-lian, were convinced that Lao Zhou wasn’t a phoney and his job offer was real, they had both tried to persuade, even pleaded for, the old man to hire them. No matter how tough the job turned out to be, they promised not to complain. Anything would be better than the situation back at home, and working in a factory seemed the only way for them to escape poverty and humiliation.

  The bus rolled along in the twilight, letting passengers off and taking more on board. Pan-pan closed her eyes, trying to imagine what her worker’s life would be like. She had never made shoes for herself. How could she make shoes for foreigners? She’d be able to support herself, although Lao Zhou didn’t know exactly how much she’d earn. He did mention that the cost of water, electricity, and living quarters, including the rental of bunk beds, would be deducted from their monthly pay. And the workers were responsible for their own meals. If expenses were too high, maybe she and Shui-lian could share one bed. Instinctively, Pan-pan pressed her arms tight against her side. On second thought, it would be better if she slept by herself. Maybe she could save money on food instead.