Sandalwood Death

CHAPTER TWO





Zhao Jia’s Ravings

The adage has it: By the Northern Dipper one is born, by the Southern Dipper a person dies; people follow the Kingly Way, wind blows where the grass lies. People’s hearts are iron, laws the crucible, and even the hardest stone under the hammer dies. (How true!) I served the Qing Court as its preeminent executioner, an enviable reputation in the Board of Punishments. (You can check with your own eyes!) A new minister was appointed each year, like a musical reprise. My appointment alone was secure, for I performed a great service by killing the nation’s enemies. (A beheading is like chopping greens; a flaying differs little from peeling an onion.) Cotton cannot contain fire; the dead cannot be buried in frozen ground. I poke a hole in the window paper to speak the truth and admonish, prick up your ears if you seek to be wise.

—Maoqiang Sandalwood Death. A galloping aria





1




My dear dissolute daughter-in-law, why do you glare like that? Do you not worry that your eyes will pop out of your head? Yes, that is my profession. From my seventeenth year, when I dissevered the body of a thieving clerk at the silver repository, to my sixtieth year, when I administered the lingering death to the would-be assassin of His Excellency Yuan Shikai, I earned my living at that calling for forty-four years. You still glare. Well, I have witnessed many glares in my life, some far more insistent than yours, the likes of which no one in all of Shandong Province, let alone you people, has ever seen. You need not even see them in person. Merely describing them could make you soil yourself out of fear.

In the tenth year of the Xianfeng Emperor, a eunuch called Little Insect audaciously pilfered His Majesty’s Seven Star fowling piece from the Imperial Armory, where he worked, and sold it. A tribute gift from the Russian Tsarina to the Emperor, it was no ordinary hunting rifle. It had a golden barrel, a silver trigger, and a sandalwood stock in which were inlaid seven diamonds, each the size of a peanut. It fired silver bullets that could bring down a phoenix from the sky and a unicorn on land. No fowling piece like it had graced the world since Pangu divided heaven from earth. The larcenous Little Insect, believing that the sickly Emperor was rapidly losing his faculties, impudently removed the piece from the armory and sold it for the reported price of three thousand silver ingots, which his father used to buy a tract of farmland. The poor delusional youngster forgot one basic principle: Anyone who becomes Emperor is, by definition, a dragon, a Son of Heaven. Has there even been a dragon, a Son of Heaven, who was not endowed with peerless wisdom? One who could not foretell everything under the sun? Emperor Xianfeng, a man of extraordinary mystical skills, could see and identify the tip of an animal’s autumn hair with dragon eyes that appeared normal during the day, but emitted such powerful rays of light when night fell that he needed no lamp to put brush to paper or to read a book. It was said that the Emperor planned a hunting expedition beyond the Great Wall and called for his Seven Star fowling piece. A panicky Little Insect made up bizarre explanations for why that was not possible: first an old fox with white fur had stolen it, then it was a magical hawk that had flown off with it. Emperor Xianfeng’s dragon mien turned red with anger, and He handed down an Imperial Edict, ordering that Little Insect be turned over to the Office of Palace Justice, which was responsible for disciplining eunuchs. The standard employment of interrogation tactics secured a confession from the miscreant, so angering His Majesty that golden flashes shot from His eyes. He jumped to His feet in the Hall of Golden Chimes and roared:

“Little Insect, We shit upon eight generations of your ancestors! Like the rat that licks the cat’s anus, you are an audacious fool. How dare you practice your thieving ways in Our home! If We do not make an example of you, We do not deserve to be Emperor!”

With that, Emperor Xianfeng decided that Little Insect would be subjected to a special punishment as a warning to all, and He called upon the Office of Palace Justice to read him a list, not unlike a menu for an Imperial meal. Officials presented all the punishments used in the past for the Emperor’s selection: flogging, crushing, suffocating, quartering, dismemberment, and more. After hearing them out, the Emperor shook His head and said, “Ordinary, too common. Like stale, spoiled leftovers. No,” He said, “you must seek advice from the experts in the Board of Punishments to provide an appropriate punishment.” On the very night that His Excellency, President of the Board of Punishments Wang, received the Imperial Edict, he went looking for Grandma Yu.

Who was Grandma Yu? you ask. My mentor, that’s who. A man, of course. So why do I call him Grandma? Listen, and I will tell you. It is a reference peculiar to our profession. Four executioners are listed in the Board of Punishments register. The oldest, most senior, and most accomplished among them is Grandma. Next in line, ranked by seniority and skills, are First Aunt, Second Aunt, and Young Aunt. During the busy months, when there is more work than they can handle, outside helpers are taken on, and they are called nephews. I started out as a nephew and gradually worked my way up to Grandma. Easy? No, by no means. I served the Board of Punishments as Grandma for thirty years. Presidents and Vice Presidents came and went, but only I remained as tall and sturdy as Mt. Tai. People may despise our profession, but once someone joins its ranks, he looks down on all people, in the same way that you look down on pigs and dogs.

To continue, His Excellency, Board President Wang, summoned Grandma Yu and me, your father, to his official document room. I, barely twenty that year, had been elevated from Second Aunt to First Aunt, an unprecedented promotion and a display of great Imperial favor.

“Xiaojiazi,” Grandma Yu said to me, “your shifu did not ascend to First Aunt until he was over forty, while you, young scamp that you are, have reached the plateau of First Aunt at the age of twenty. Like sorghum in the sixth month, you have shot upward.”

But that is talk for another time.

“His Imperial Majesty has issued an edict to the Board of Punishments to provide a special, even unique, punishment for a eunuch who stole a fowling piece,” Board President Wang said. “You are the experts, so give this your full attention. We do not want to disappoint His Imperial Majesty or show this Board in a bad light.”

A sound like a moan emerged from Grandma Yu’s mouth.

“Excellency,” he said after a moment, “your humble servant opines that His Imperial Majesty loathes Little Insect because he has eyes but does not see. We must therefore carry out the Emperor’s will.”

“How true,” Board President Wang said. “What do you have in mind? Tell me quick.”

“There is a punishment,” Grandma Yu said, “known as Yama’s Hoop, named after the doorway to the King of Hell’s realm. Another name for it is Two Dragons Sport with Pearls. I wonder if it might be appropriate.”

“Tell me about it.”

So Grandma Yu described Yama’s Hoop in detail, and when he was finished, His Excellency beamed in delight.

“Go make preparations,” he said, “while I seek permission from His Imperial Majesty.”

To which Grandma Yu replied, “The construction of Yama’s Hoop is a burdensome task. The iron hoop alone is a unique challenge. It can be neither very hard nor too soft. Only the finest wrought iron, repeatedly fired and hammered, will do, and there is no blacksmith anywhere in the capital who is up to the task. Will His Excellency approve a delay of several days, giving me and my apprentice time to make it ourselves? We of course have no adequate tools or facilities and must somehow make do. Will His Excellency favor us with a bit of silver to purchase what we need?”

Wang sneered.

“Don’t you receive enough income by selling cured human flesh for medicinal purposes?”

Grandma Yu fell to his knees, and naturally I, your father, followed.

“Nothing escapes His Excellency’s eyes,” Grandma Yu said. “But constructing Yama’s Hoop serves the public good . . .”

“Get up,” Wang said. “I’ll see that you are given two hundred ounces of silver, one hundred for each—master and apprentice—but you must spare no effort in the service of perfection. I will tolerate no shoddy work. Throughout history, from dynasty to dynasty, generation upon generation, the discipline and punishment of eunuchs has been the responsibility of the Office of Palace Justice. For the Emperor to deliver this case to the Board of Punishments is unprecedented, a manifestation of the trust and high regard His Imperial Majesty has in us. We could ask no higher honor! It is incumbent upon you to take great care in this enterprise. If it is performed well enough to please the Emperor, our future is bright. If not, if His Imperial Majesty is displeased, our Board will be in for bad times, and that will provide a moment for your dog heads to find a new place to perch.”

Grandma Yu and I accepted this glorious task with trepidation, though we were delighted to receive the silver, which we took to Smithy Lane south of the Temple of National Protection in search of a shop capable of fabricating a hoop to our specifications. Once that was done, we went to Mule Avenue, where we bought several untanned cowhides and hired someone to turn them into leather straps to affix to the iron hoop. In all, we spent a grand total of four ounces of silver, with a hundred ninety-six ounces left over, twenty ounces of which we used to buy a gold bracelet for Board President Wang’s concubine, whom he had installed in Jingling Lane. From the remaining one hundred seventy-six ounces, we gave six each to Second Aunt and Third Aunt. We kept the rest, a hundred for Grandma and seventy for me, your father. I brought that back to our hometown and bought this house, marrying your mother while I was at it. If the eunuch Little Insect had not stolen the Emperor’s fowling piece, I would never have had enough to buy a house or get married. And without a wife, you would not have been born. And if I had missed out on the opportunity to have a son, there would never be a daughter-in-law in this house. Now you understand why I feel it is important to tell you about the Little Insect affair. There are root causes for everything that happens. The theft of a fowling piece by Little Insect is the root cause of your existence.

Excellency Wang, who was on pins and needles the day before the punishment was to be carried out, ordered that a prisoner awaiting decapitation be taken from the condemned cell and brought to his audience hall as a subject on whom we were to practice our technique. We did as we were told, affixing the iron hoop over the poor man’s head.

“Laoye!” the man screamed. “Laoye, I did not commit the unforgivable act of retracting my confession, I did not. Why are you doing this to me?”

“All for the sake of the Emperor,” Excellency Wang declared. “Begin!”

From start to finish, the punishment lasted no longer than it takes to smoke a pipeful of tobacco. The man’s head split open, and he died as his brains spilled out.

“That was impressive,” Wang declared, “but he died too quickly. His Imperial Majesty went to the trouble of allowing us to choose a method of execution that will inflict maximum suffering on Little Insect. A death of utter anguish will serve as a trenchant warning to all palace eunuchs. So what do we get from you? You placed the hoop on the man’s head, tightened it, and poof, it was over. Strangling a rabbit takes more time than that. Is that the best you can manage? I demand that you slow the process down, make it last at least two hours. It must be more enjoyable than a stage play. You know that the palace supports troupes that employ thousands of actors who have performed every play in existence. I expect Little Insect’s body to be drained of fluids and for you two to work up a mighty sweat in the process. That is the only way this Board and the punishment you call Yama’s Hoop can gain the reputation they deserve.”

Excellency Wang then ordered that a second condemned prisoner be brought over for us to practice on. The head of this particular man was the size of a willow basket, almost too big for the hoop, which we struggled to affix to his head, inept like coopers, greatly displeasing His Excellency.

“That little toy is what I get for two hundred ounces of silver?”

Sweat oozed from my pores at his comment. But Grandma Yu appeared not to let it bother him, although he later told me he was quaking from fear. Our performance this time was a distinct improvement, as we drew it out for a full two hours, inflicting untold anguish on the pitiful man with the big head before he died. That earned a smile from His Excellency. With an eye on the two corpses laid out in the center of the audience hall, he said:

“Go ahead, get everything ready. Replace the bloodstained leather straps, clean the hoop, and add a coat of varnish. Be sure to clean the garments you plan to wear, so His Majesty and His court followers will see that the executioners attached to the Board of Punishments are a refined lot. There may be many ways of putting it, but in simplest terms, only success matters. You will not fail! If there is the slightest flaw in your performance, casting the Board in a poor light, you will experience Yama’s Hoop from a more personal angle.”

We rose at second cockcrow the next morning and set to making our preparations. Our minds were filled with the gravity of performing a palace execution, making sleep impossible. Even Grandma Yu, who had weathered many storms, tossed and turned all night, getting out of bed every hour or so to take the urinal down from the windowsill and empty his bladder, then sitting down to smoke. Second and Third Aunts busied themselves lighting the stove and preparing breakfast, while I concentrated on subjecting Yama’s Hoop to a meticulous inspection. After convincing myself that it was in flawless condition, I handed it to Grandma Yu for one final inspection. He rubbed his hand over every inch of the device, nodded his approval, and wrapped it in a three-foot length of red silk before reverently laying it on the Patriarch’s altar. The Patriarch of our profession is Gao Tao, a sagely eminence from the period of the Three Kings and Five Emperors, who nearly succeeded the legendary Yu on the Imperial Throne. Many of the punishments in use and the penal codes honored today originated with him. My shifu told me that our Patriarch needed no knife to dispatch a victim—by staring at the victim’s neck and slowly rolling his eyes, he could make the man’s head fall to the ground on its own. Ancestor Gao Tao had phoenix eyes, brows like reclining silkworms, a face the color of a jujube, eyes as bright as stars, and three handsome tufts of whiskers on his chin. He bore an uncanny resemblance to the warrior Guan Gong of the Three Kingdoms period. “The truth is,” Grandma Yu said, “Guan Gong was a reincarnation of Gao Tao.”

Following a hurried breakfast, we rinsed our mouths, cleaned our teeth, and washed our faces. Second and Third Aunts helped us into our new court attire and placed red felt caps on our heads.

“Shifu, Elder Apprentice, you look like bridegrooms,” Third Aunt complimented us.

Grandma Yu gave him a stern look, showing his displeasure with the comment. One of the conventions of our profession is a proscription against silly or foolish words before or during an execution. Any violation of that taboo can summon the ghosts of wronged victims or evil spirits. You often see little spinning dust devils in the marketplace. What do you think they are? They are caused not by wind, but by the spirits of those who were put to death unjustly.

Grandma Yu took a bundle of prized sandalwood incense from a willow case, gently extracted three sticks, lit them from the flickering candle on the Patriarch’s altar, and inserted them into the incense burner. He went down on his knees, followed hastily by his three assistants. Grandma began muttering softly:

“Patriarch, Patriarch, today we will carry out our task in the palace, with enormous consequences. Your offspring ask for your protection and guidance in the proper performance of our duties, and for that we kowtow to you.”

Grandma Yu banged his head loudly against the brick floor. We did the same. Our Patriarch’s face glowed red in the candlelight. Altogether we each kowtowed nine times before standing up, starting with Grandma Yu, and stepping back three paces. Second Aunt went outside to fetch a celadon bowl; Third Aunt went outside and returned with a white rooster with a black comb. Second Aunt placed the bowl in front of the Patriarch’s altar and stepped aside, going down on his knees. Third Aunt knelt directly in front of the altar and held the rooster by the neck with one hand and by the feet with the other, stretching it out horizontal. Second Aunt then took a dagger out of the bowl and neatly sliced the rooster’s neck. For a moment no blood appeared—our hearts nearly stopped, for killing a rooster and drawing no blood augured a botched execution. But then the blood—so red it was almost black—spurted from the wound and into the bowl. Blood surges through the veins of roosters with white feathers and black combs, and killing one before an execution is for us an essential ritual. Once all the blood had drained out of the rooster, the two aunts placed the bowl on the altar, kowtowed again, and backed away, bent at the waist. Grandma Yu and I stepped forward, fell to our knees, and kowtowed three times. Then I followed his lead by sticking the first two fingers of my left hand into the bowl and painting my face with the rooster’s blood, like an actor applying stage paint. The warm blood made the tips of my fingers tingle. There was enough to paint both our faces, and a bit left over to turn all four hands red. Now our faces, mine and Grandma Yu’s, were the same color as the face of the Patriarch. Why had we used rooster blood? To unite us with the Patriarch, but also to notify those spirits of the wrongly executed and evil spirits that we were descendants of Master Gao Tao, and that when we put someone to death, we were gods, not humans. We were the law of the land. With our hands and faces painted red, Grandma Yu and I sat peacefully on stools to await the official summons from the Imperial Palace.

As the red sun wheeled into the sky, crows in scholar trees set up a racket of caws. A woman was keening in the Imperial Dungeon. Condemned to die for killing her husband, she keened like that every day—for heaven, for earth, and for her children. By now she had descended into madness. Your dieh, I, being young, soon began to fidget and could not sit still. I stole a glance at Grandma Yu, who sat straight and unmoving as an iron bell, and I followed his lead by holding my breath to calm myself. The blood-paint had dried and become stiff, turning our faces into something resembling sugarcoated berries, and I strained to experience the feeling of armor covering my skin. Little by little my thoughts blurred, and a hazy picture formed in my mind of me following Grandma Yu down a deep, dark trench, walking on and on without ever reaching the end.

The Office of Palace Justice Director, Eminence Cao, led us up to a pair of small, blue-curtained palanquins and gestured for us to climb in. This sudden and unexpected indulgence nearly unnerved me, for I had never ridden in a palanquin before. I glanced at Grandma Yu, who, to my surprise, stood without moving, open-mouthed, as if he were about to cry or sneeze. A eunuch with a double chin standing beside the palanquins said in a throaty voice:

“What’s the matter, chairs too small for you?”

Still, neither Grandma Yu nor I was willing to climb in. Our eyes were fixed on Eminence Cao, who said:

“These are not intended as a show of respect, but to keep you from attracting too much attention. What are you waiting for? Get in! It is true, you cannot put a dog’s head on a golden platter.”

The four bearers, all unwhiskered eunuchs, stood in front of the chairs, their hands tucked into their sleeves, looks of disdain on their faces. That actually emboldened me. Stinking castrati, f*ck you and your mothers. Thanks to your Little Insect, I am going to ride on the shoulders of you two-legged beasts today. I stepped up to a chair, pulled the curtain aside, and climbed in. Grandma Yu did the same.

Our transports left the ground and began the bumpy ride to the Imperial Palace. I heard the hoarse grumbling of one of the eunuchs:

“This executioner is heavy, dead weight, probably from drinking all that human blood!”

These men, who normally carried the Empress or one of the Imperial Consorts, had never imagined that they would one day carry an executioner, not in their worst nightmare. That made me so proud that I began to rock back and forth to make the trip harder on those stinking castrati. But before we’d even left the Board of Punishments compound, Young Aunt shouted from behind:

“Grandma, Grandma, you forgot Yama’s Hoop!”

An explosion went off in my head; I saw stars; sweat seeped from my pores and rained to the ground as I tumbled out of the chair and took the red-wrapped Yama’s Hoop from Young Aunt. I cannot describe what I felt at that moment. Grandma Yu had also gotten out of his chair, I saw, his face similarly beaded with sweat, his legs quaking. If not for Young Aunt’s quick thinking, we would have been in very hot water that day.

“Your mother be f*cked!” Eminence Cao cursed. “Can an official misplace his official seal? Does a tailor lose his scissors?”

I was all set to enjoy the privilege of riding in a palanquin, but this turn of events soured my mood. I crawled back in and sat quietly, making no more trouble for the eunuchs.

I don’t know how long we had been riding when my chair abruptly landed with a thud and I emerged, confused and disoriented, nearly blinded by my resplendent surroundings. Holding on to Yama’s Hoop, my back bent slightly, I followed Grandma Yu, who was being led into the palace by a eunuch, down one winding corridor after another, until we emerged into a large courtyard in which a line of men with no whiskers on their faces and dressed in tan clothing with black skullcaps were kneeling in the dirt. Little Insect, the fowling piece thief, was already bound to a post. He was a good-looking youngster with delicate features, so daintily demure he could easily have passed for a girl, especially his beautiful eyes—double-fold lids, long lashes, and moist pupils that looked like grapes. What a shame! I had to sigh over such a fine specimen, a good-looking boy brought into the palace only to be castrated and made to serve as a eunuch. What kind of parents could do that to their own son?

A temporary viewing stand had been erected in front of the post on which Little Insect was bound. A row of carved sandalwood chairs had been placed on the viewing stand, the central one larger than the others. That particular chair had a yellow cushion embroidered with a golden dragon. His Imperial Majesty’s Dragon Seat, no doubt. Already present were Excellency Wang, the President of the Board of Punishments; his deputy, Eminence Tie; and, standing in front of them, a host of other officials, all in caps inlaid with jade or coral, officials from the various boards and bureaus. None of them dared even cough. This was, after all, the Imperial Palace, with an atmosphere that set it apart from all other places: silent, hushed, so quiet I could hear my own heartbeat. Only the sparrows nesting beneath the glazed roof tiles did not know enough to keep silent, as they chirped insistently. Suddenly, without warning, a white-haired, red-faced old eunuch on the platform sang out smoothly, letting each syllable hang in the air:

“His Majesty the Emperor!”

The lines of red caps sank to the ground, the only sound the swish of their wide sleeves; and faster than it takes to tell, officials from the Six Boards, palace women, and eunuchs were all kneeling in the dirt. I was about to fall to my knees when something stomped on my foot. I looked up and was pinned by the blazing glare in Grandma Yu’s eyes as he stood beside the post, head up, motionless as a stone carving. That jogged my memory: for generations, one of the conventions associated with our profession has been that an executioner whose face is smeared with chicken blood is no longer a person, but has become the sacred and somber symbol of the Law. We are not required to kneel, not even in the presence of the Emperor. And so, following Grandma’s lead, I threw out my chest, sucked in my gut, and stood as motionless as a stone carving. I tell you, son, such unprecedented glory had never before been bequeathed to a third person here in Gaomi County, or in all of Shandong, or for that matter in any of the territory belonging to the Great Qing Empire.

At that moment, the toots and whistles of pipes and flutes drew near; behind the languishing musical notes, His Majesty’s procession appeared between two high walls. A pair of tan-clad eunuchs led the way, carrying incense burners in the shape of auspicious creatures, from whose mouths emerged clouds of dark green smoke, so fragrant that it penetrated my brain, sharpening my senses one moment and dulling them the next. On the heels of the two eunuchs came the Imperial Musicians, followed by two columns of eunuchs carrying flags, banners, umbrellas, and fans, all in reds and yellows. Next came the Imperial Bodyguard, armed with golden battleaxes, brass spears, and silver lances, marching ahead of a bright yellow palanquin carried on the shoulders of two powerful eunuchs; in it sat the Manchu Emperor, protected from the sun’s rays by an oversized peacock fan held by a pair of palace women. That was followed by dozens of resplendently attired women of great beauty, the Imperial Harem, of course, all riding in palanquins and forming a florid array of colors. A long tail constituted the end of the procession. Grandma Yu told me later that since all of this was taking place within the palace grounds, the Imperial Procession was greatly simplified. If it had occurred outside, it would have been so long that the head would have passed long before the tail appeared. The Emperor’s palanquin alone would have been carried by sixty-four men.

The eunuchs were so well trained that everything was quickly in place. His Majesty and His consorts were seated in the viewing stand. Emperor Xianfeng, in yellow robes and a golden crown, sat no more than ten feet from me. I stared with rapt attention, taking in all the royal features. He had a gaunt face around a nose with a high bridge. His left eye was a bit bigger than the right. A large mouth, white teeth. A neatly divided moustache adorned his upper lip, a goatee his chin. His cheeks were dotted with white pockmarks. Bothered by a persistent cough, he made liberal use of a glittering spittoon held for him by a serving girl. He was sandwiched between a dozen or more palace ladies, creating the image of a phoenix with spread wings. Their towering coiffures were adorned with brightly colored red flowers, from which silk tassels dangled, the sort of decoration you see on stage actresses. Every one of the palace ladies was a striking beauty; their bodies emitted bewitching perfumes. The woman to the Emperor’s immediate right, powdered and rouged, had the appearance of a celestial maiden come down to earth. Know who she was? You’ll shudder when I tell you. The one we now call Cixi, the Empress Dowager.

Taking advantage of the Emperor’s turn to use his spittoon, the imposing old eunuch lightly swished his horsetail whisk as if it were a flyswatter, a sign for the ministers and officials, as well as the dark-haired lines of eunuchs and palace ladies, to shout at the top of their lungs:

“Long live Our Imperial Majesty! May He live forever and ever!”

That is when I discovered that, far from keeping their heads down so as not to look up, they were all sneaking peeks at the viewing stand. Between coughs, the Emperor declared:

“Worthy ministers, you may rise.”

To which they responded with a kowtow and a shout in unison:

“Praise His Majesty’s generosity!”

Another kowtow, a flicking of wide sleeves, and they rose to their feet, before, bent at the waist, retreating to the periphery. The President of the Board of Punishments, Excellency Wang, emerged from the cluster of officials, flicked his sleeves, and fell to his knees to kowtow once more.

“Your loyal servant Wang Rui, President of the Board of Punishments, in compliance with the Imperial Edict, has ordered the fabrication of Yama’s Hoop and has selected two eminently qualified executioners to bring their equipment into the Palace to carry out the execution. May it please His Majesty.”

“Yes, We know. You may rise.”

Excellency Wang kowtowed yet again, thanked the Emperor for His favor, and retreated to one side. The Emperor said something, but it was so garbled I couldn’t make out what it was. Obviously, in the throes of consumption, He was short of breath. The old eunuch made another announcement, drawing out each syllable like an operatic aria:

“His Majesty decrees that President of the Board of Punishments Wang present Yama’s Hoop for his inspection——”

Wang scurried over to where I stood and snatched the red silk bundle in which Yama’s Hoop was wrapped out of my hand. He returned to the viewing stand, holding the bundle gently in both hands, as if it were a steaming-hot pot. There he went down on his knees and raised his hands above his head, offering up Yama’s Hoop. The old eunuch walked up, bent down, and took the proffered bundle, which he carried up to the Emperor, laid it gently on a table, and slowly unwrapped the red silk until the object itself was in full view. It glistened in all its terrifying grandeur. It had not cost much to make, but I had put considerable effort into it. When first produced, it was an ugly black thing, but I’d rubbed and scoured it for three days to make it shine. I’d earned every one of those seventy ounces of silver.

His Majesty reached out with one sallow hand and tapped the object tentatively with the long, yellowed nail of His index finger. Whether it felt too hot or too cold was impossible to gauge, but the golden finger jerked backward almost immediately, and I heard the aging ruler mumble something. Knowing what that something was, the old eunuch stepped up, retrieved the object, and carried it down the line to let the members of the Imperial Harem have a look at it. They each followed the Emperor’s lead by touching it tentatively with index fingers shaped like jade bamboo shoots. Some put on a show of terror, quickly turning their heads away; others simply stared at the thing with no discernible expression. When he had finished, the old eunuch returned the object to Excellency Wang, who was still on his knees; accepting it with deference, he stood up and, walking backward, bent at the waist, returned to where I was standing and handed it to me.

Up on the reviewing stand, the old eunuch bent to whisper something in the Emperor’s ear. I saw His Majesty nod. The old eunuch stepped up to the front of the reviewing stand and announced in a singsong cadence:

“His Majesty decrees: Carry out the punishment of the monstrous offender Little Insect—”

That elicited a howl from the pole-bound Little Insect:

“Your Majesty,” he wailed, “Your Majesty, be merciful and spare the life of this dog of a slave . . . your slave will never again . . .”

The Emperor’s bodyguard snapped to attention. Little Insect, his face waxen, his lips bloodless, and his eyes blinking fiercely, stopped shouting as he wet himself. Turning to us, he whispered:

“Laoye, Shaoye, do your job quickly, and when I’m down in the bowels of Hell, I will be forever grateful for your kindness . . .”

Listening to him rant was the furthest thing from our minds. It would have taken more courage than we possessed to listen to him. We could have made things easy on him by looping a rope around his neck and strangling him, but that would have been the beginning of our downfall. Even if the Emperor had granted us forgiveness, Board President Wang would not have been so charitable. We hurriedly unwrapped the instrument of torture. Grandma Yu and I held it between us—it seemed considerably heftier after passing through the hands of the Emperor and His harem—each holding one of the leather straps, and carried out our rehearsed routine: first we displayed it to the Emperor and His harem, then to Board President Wang and the other officials, and lastly to the gathering of eunuchs and palace ladies, like actors. The Head of the Office of Palace Justice, Eunuch Chen, and Board President Wang exchanged glances before calling out in unison:

“Let the execution begin!”

It was as if the heavens had eyes—the gleaming iron hoop might as well have been made for Little Insect’s head. With hardly any effort, it fit perfectly. His fetching eyes peered out from two holes in the device. Once it was in place, Grandma Yu and I, your dieh, took two steps backward and gripped the leather straps firmly. Little Insect was still muttering:

“Laoye . . . Shaoye . . . make it quick . . .”

At a time like that, who cared what he wanted? I glanced at Grandma Yu; he returned the glance. I knew what to do, and I was ready. We nodded, and I saw the beginning of a smile on Grandma Yu’s lips, the old master’s customary expression when he was working, for he was an urbane executioner. That smile was my signal to begin, so I flexed my muscles and pulled at half strength, and then quickly let up—anyone not of our profession could not detect the alternating tightening and loosening, and saw only that the leather straps were pulled taut . . . But Little Insect released a tortured cry, shrill and forceful, one that would have put the howl of a wolf in the zoological garden to shame. Knowing that this was a sound the Emperor and His women loved to hear, we kept it up, subtly tightening and loosening—no longer involved in putting a man to death, we had become conductors producing exquisite music.

That day, as it turned out, was the Autumn Equinox: the sky was blue, and the sun shone down bright, causing the red walls and glazed tiles on the roofs around us to shimmer in the light, like little reflecting mirrors. All of a sudden a terrible smell filled the air, and I knew at once that the little bastard had shit his pants. I sneaked a look at the viewing stand, where the Emperor sat staring at the scene, His face a rich golden color. Some of His consorts were ashen-faced; others looked on with the black holes of their mouths in full view. The ministers and other officials stood ramrod straight, their arms at their sides, barely able to breathe. Eunuchs and serving girls were banging their heads on the ground as if they were crushing cloves of garlic; the weakest among them had already fainted. I looked over at Grandma Yu and knew he shared my view that the results so far were about what we had expected. The time had come; Little Insect had suffered enough, and we knew that we must not let his stink reach the nostrils of the Emperor and His women. By then, some of the consorts were already covering their mouths with silk hankies. Their sense of smell was keener than the Emperor’s, who had abused His nose with snuff until it barely functioned. We needed to put an end to this quickly. If a wayward breeze rose up and carried the stink of Little Insect’s shit into the Emperor’s nose, and His Majesty was looking to place the blame somewhere, we would get more than we bargained for. Little Insect’s innards had probably turned to mush by now anyway, and that stench, which went straight to the brain, was decidedly non-human. It took all my willpower to keep from running to one side to throw up—needless to say, that was out of the question. If Grandma Yu and I had been unable to keep from retching, the impulse would have quickly spread to the viewing stand, with disaster the inevitable result. The sacrifice of our lives—Grandma Yu’s and mine—would have been inconsequential, as would the stripping of Board President Wang’s official standing. All that mattered was the health and well being of His Imperial Majesty. That thought had already entered my mind. Grandma Yu’s, too. It was time for the performance to come to an end. So, on a secret signal, we pulled the straps with all our might, squeezing the iron hoop tighter. Little by little, poor Little Insect’s head began to look like a narrow-waisted bottle gourd. The last drop of his sweat had long since left his body, and what came out of him now was a glistening, sticky, foul-smelling grease, reeking nearly as badly as the rancid crotch odor. His howls at this point used up what little of his strength remained and made my flesh crawl, despite my familiarity with killing. No one, not even someone made of iron or steel, could bear up under Yama’s Hoop. Why, not even Sun Wukong, the all but indestructible magic monkey who was tempered for forty-nine days in the Jade Emperor’s hexagram crucible without capitulating, could endure the pressure of the iron hoop placed on his head by the monk Tripitaka.

The real genius of Yama’s Hoop manifested itself in the victim’s eyes. As Grandma Yu and I slowly leaned back, the tremors of Little Insect’s body traveled through the leather straps and affected our arms. What a pity, those lovely eyes, so expressive, capable of capturing the souls of pretty maidens, slowly began to bulge in the holes of Yama’s Hoop. Black, white, streaks of red. Bigger and bigger, like eggs emerging from the backsides of mother hens, little by little, until . . . pop. Then another—pop—and Little Insect’s eyes were hanging by threads on the edge of Yama’s Hoop. That, of course, is what Grandma Yu and I had hoped would happen. We followed our planned course of action, at a snail’s pace, increasing pressure bit by bit, like inserting a carrot up a bunghole, to narrow the gourd’s waist. And when the fateful moment was at hand, we pulled the straps with one final jerk, producing a crunch. Finally, after all that time, Grandma Yu and I released loud sighs. At some point during the process, rivulets of sweat had soaked our backs, while streaks of dried chicken blood had run onto our necks; to the unfocused eye, that made us appear to be bleeding. I knew how I looked by what I saw on Grandma Yu’s face.

Little Insect was still alive, but no longer conscious and clearly on the verge of death. Brain matter and blood seeped out through the cracks in his skull. I heard the sound of women vomiting up on the viewing stand, and saw that an elderly, red-capped man had crumpled to the ground, his cap rolling off in the dirt. The moment had arrived:

“The sentence has been carried out!” we shouted in unison. “May it please Your Excellency!”

Board President Wang looked at us over the sleeve covering the lower half of his face, then turned to the viewing stand, assumed a respectful rigid stance, raised his hand, and, with a flicking of his sleeve, knelt in the dirt.

“The sentence has been carried out!” he announced. “May it please Your Majesty!”

Following a prolonged fit of coughing, His Imperial Majesty announced to the assemblage:

“You all saw that, yes? Let him be an example to you!”

His Majesty’s voice was not loud, but each word was clear as a bell to the people on and below the viewing stand. While His words were intended for the ears of the eunuchs and palace girls, every leader of the Six Boards, every member of the royal family, and all the ranking officials fell to their knees as if their legs had been snapped. Amid the thumping of heads on the ground, shouts of “Long live His Imperial Majesty, may He live forever!” “This unworthy official deserves a cruel death!” and “Undying gratitude to the Imperial Dragon!” vied in the air like chicken clucks and duck quacks, and that told me, your dieh, and Grandma Yu everything we needed to know about these so-called men of power.

His Majesty stood up. The old eunuch intoned:

“Return to the Palace!”

The Emperor was carried away.

Followed by His royal consorts.

And the palace eunuchs.

Only a clutch of snot-worthy officials and Little Insect, who had died like a tiger, remained.

My legs were so rubbery I could barely stand, and golden stars danced before my eyes. If Grandma Yu had not reached out to hold me up, I would have crumpled to the ground next to Little Insect’s corpse before the royal procession had left the site.





2




How dare you glare at me like that!

I’ve nearly talked myself out, and by now you should understand why I had the nerve to rage against those yayi. If an insignificant County Magistrate, an official about as important as a sesame seed, thinks he can summon me by sending a pair of lackeys to my house, he has too high an opinion of himself. In the presence of the Xianfeng Emperor and the consort who would one day become the Empress Dowager, I, your dieh, had done something that would make your knees buckle before I’d reached my twentieth birthday. When it was all over, word came from the palace that His Imperial Majesty, He with the mouth of gold and speech of jade, had said:

“The executioners from the Board of Punishments performed their task well—methodical, cadenced, and measured. We were treated to a fine performance!”

Justice Board President Wang was granted the title of Junior Guardian to the Crown Prince and was promoted in the official hierarchy. To show his appreciation for this happy turn of events, he presented each of us with two pieces of red silk. Now go ask that Qian fellow if he has ever laid eyes on the Xianfeng Emperor. The answer will be no. Why, he has never even been in the presence of the current occupant of the Dragon Throne, the Guangxu Emperor. How about the Empress Dowager, has he ever seen Her face? Again, no. Not even Her back. And that is why I, your dieh, am not afraid to assume superior airs with him.

I believe that Qian Ding, the Gaomi County Magistrate, will personally come with an invitation, not because he wants to, but at the behest of Governor Yuan. His Excellency and I have met on several occasions. I once did a job for him and did it well, so well, in fact, that he rewarded me with a box of Tianjin’s Eighteenth Street Crullers. I know you think that since I have barely stepped out of the house in all the months I have been back, I am little more than a rotting log. Well, for your information, I am being clever by acting dumb. There is a mirror inside me that lets me see the world for exactly what it is. My dear daughter-in-law, do you believe that I do not know what you have been up to? My son is an idiot, so I cannot blame you for sneaking around the way you have been doing. You are a woman, a young woman, and there is nothing wrong with being hot-blooded in ways that involve men. I know that your dieh nearly turned the world upside down and that he is now rotting in prison. The Germans demanded his arrest by name, and not a soul in this county, or for that matter all of Shandong, would dare set him free. He will not escape death. Excellency Yuan Shikai is ruthless. To him, killing a man is no different than squashing a bedbug. He is a man so favored by the foreigners that even the Empress Dowager must rely upon him to get things done. The way I see it, your dieh’s life is a pawn in Excellency Yuan’s plans. He wants to show not only the Germans, but the people of Gaomi County and all of Shandong the benefits of being law-abiding citizens and the cost of murder, arson, and banditry. The Imperial Court has given the Germans permission to build their railroad, and that has nothing to do with your dieh. He is like a carpenter locked in stocks of his own creation, a victim of his own actions. You cannot save him, and neither can that Qian fellow of yours. Son, the time has come for you and me to act. It was my wish to, as they say, wash my hands in the golden basin, to keep a low profile and end my days in my country home. But the powers that be have decreed otherwise. This morning, these hands of mine began to itch and grow hot, and I now know that my work is not yet finished. It is heaven’s will, from which there is no escape. As for you, daughter-in-law, you accomplish nothing by weeping or venting your loathing. I was the recipient of the Empress Dowager’s magnanimity, and will do nothing to displease or dishonor the Court. If I do not kill your dieh, someone else will, and he will be better off in my hands than at the mercy of a butcher, what we call a three-legged cat. There is a popular adage that goes, “If you’re kin, you’re family.” I will do everything in my power to ensure that his is a spectacular death, one that will go down in history. Son, I am going to help you make a name for yourself that will open the eyes of your neighbors. They find us beneath them, do they not? Well and good, we will show them that what is known as “execution” is an art, one that a good man will not do and anyone who is not a good man cannot do. Executioner is an occupation that represents the heart and soul of the Imperial Court. When the calling flourishes, the Imperial Court prospers. But when it languishes, the Imperial Court nears its fated end.

Son, I am using the time before Eminence Qian’s palanquin arrives to fill you in on family affairs. I was afraid that if I did not say this to you today, there might not be another chance.





3




Your grandfather contracted cholera when I, your dieh, was ten years old. The sickness took hold in the morning, and by noon he was dead. Every family in Gaomi County lost someone to the disease that year, and no house was spared the sound of wailing. People were too busy burying their own to give thought to their neighbors’ troubles. Your grandmother and I—I know this sounds terrible—dragged your grandfather like a dead dog over to the nearest potter’s field and buried him in a makeshift grave. We had no sooner turned to head back home than a pack of wild dogs ran over and dug him up out of the ground. I picked up a piece of broken brick and went after those dogs with carnage on my mind. But they just glared at me through bloodshot eyes, baring their fangs and baying. They feasted on the dead until their whiskers were slick with grease, their bodies sleek and powerful. Fierce as a pack of little tigers, they were a fearful enemy. Your grandmother pulled me away.

“Your grandfather isn’t the only one, boy,” she said, “so let them go ahead and eat.”

Knowing that I had no chance to ward off those crazed dogs, I backed off and watched as they tore the clothes off your grandfather and sank their fangs into his body. They went first to the internal organs and finished by gnawing at his bones.

Five years later, typhoid fever came to Gaomi County and carried off your grandmother, who, like her husband, fell ill in the morning and was dead by noon. But this time I dragged the corpse over to a haystack and cremated it. Now I was on my own, all alone. All day long I roamed the land with a stick in one hand and a wooden ladle in the other, begging for food. At night I slept anywhere I could, staying warm in a haystack or by the lingering heat from a stove frame. Back then, there were lots of young beggars like me, and that made survival especially hard. On some days I knocked on hundreds of doors without getting even the scrapings of a sweet potato for my effort. I was on the verge of starvation when I recalled something your grandmother had told me about a cousin who lived and worked in a yamen in the capital. Life was so good for him, he often sent gifts of silver back home. I decided on the spot what to do. Off to the capital.

I survived the trip by begging or doing occasional odd jobs for people. And so it went, breaking up the journey by staying in a place long enough to earn a little travel money, my progress slow but steady—hungry one day, full the next—until I reached my destination. Joining a bunch of liquor traders, I entered Peking through Chongwen Gate. I vaguely recalled your grandmother’s telling me that her cousin worked at the Board of Punishments; by asking along the way, I made it to the Six Boards District, where I walked up to one of the two hard-looking soldier-types who guarded the Board of Punishments gate and was sent flying by the back of his sword. A setback, to be sure, but not nearly enough for me to abandon my plan, not after traveling all that distance. All I could do was hang around the Board, pacing back and forth until my luck changed. The street was fronted by restaurants with fancy entrances, places with names like “Where Immortals Gather” and “The Inn of Sages,” all bustling with hungry customers whose carriages and other conveyances interrupted the flow of traffic. The air was heavy with the smells of cooked meat, fish, and poultry. The street was also home to nameless food stands where stuffed buns, wheat cakes, flatbreads, bean curd, and other treats were sold . . . who could have guessed that there could be so many good things to eat in Peking? No wonder people flocked to the city. I’ve been a survivor all my life, and have enviable judgment. I do not let opportunities pass me by. I did odd jobs for the restaurants, working for leftovers, and since Peking was so big, begging was easier than here in Gaomi. Rich diners would order a table filled with meat or fish or poultry, take a few bites, and leave the rest, which made it possible for me to keep my belly full without spending anything. Then, after filling up with someone’s leftovers, I’d find a quiet spot out of the elements and sleep. In the warmth of the sun’s rays, I heard my skeleton creak and pop as it grew bigger and stronger. By my second year in Peking, I was a head taller than when I’d arrived. I was like a thirsty rice shoot after a spring rain.

But then, just when I had settled into a carefree life with plenty of food, a gang of beggars attacked me and beat me half to death. The leader, a scary-looking one-eyed man with a knife scar on his cheek, fixed his good eye on me and said:

“You little bastard, what rock did you crawl out from under? Who said you could fill your belly with food in my territory? If I ever see you around here again, I’ll break your dog legs and gouge out your dog eyes!”

Sometime in the middle of the night, I crawled out of a foul-smelling ditch and curled up beside a wall, hurting all over, shivering, and hungry. I thought I was going to die. But then, through a haze, I saw your grandmother standing in front of me.

“Don’t let this get you down, son,” she said. “You are about to enjoy a stroke of good luck.”

My eyes snapped open—there was nothing there but the autumn wind making the tips of tree branches moan, nothing but the last chirps of some half-dead crickets in the rotting weeds, that and a sky full of winking stars. But when I closed my eyes again, your grandmother was still there, telling me that my luck was about to change. I opened my eyes, and she was gone. Early the next morning, the sun rose round and red in the eastern sky, making the dew on dead grass shimmer beautifully. A flock of crows flew by, trailing caws behind them on their way to the south side of the city, for what reason I could not say. I would later learn the reason. I was so hungry I could barely stand, and I contemplated going over to beg for something to eat from one of the food stands. What held me back was the fear that I would run into that one-eyed beggar dragon. But then I spotted a piece of cabbage in a little pile of charcoal. I ran over, grabbed it, and carried it back to my spot beside the wall, where I took big crunching bites, just as mounted soldiers in gray uniforms with red borders and hats with red tassels emerged from the Board of Punishments and broke into a trot down the street, newly smoothed over with yellow earth. They had swords on their hips and whips in their hands. Every human who got in their way tasted the whips, as did the dogs. The street was swept clean of obstacles in no time. A few moments later, a prison van rolled out through the gate, pulled by a scrawny mule whose protruding backbone was as sharp as a knife and whose legs looked like spindles. I could not make out the features of the shaggy-haired prisoner standing in the caged wagon, whose ungreased axles creaked as it rolled along, swaying from side to side. The way ahead was led by the horsemen, who had ridden up and back earlier and were followed by a dozen or so men blowing horns, making a noise that could have been mistaken for weeping cattle. A clutch of officials on horseback came next, all in fancy court attire. In the middle was a rotund man with a thin moustache that looked as if it were pasted on. Another ten or fifteen mounted soldiers brought up the rear. Two men in black, with sashes around their waists and red caps on their heads, walked alongside the prison van, each holding a broadsword. They appeared to have ruddy complexions—at the time, I was not aware that they had smeared rooster blood on their faces. They had a spring in their steps, but their footfalls made no noise. I could not take my eyes off them. Fascinated by their impressive bearing, I wondered if I would ever get a chance to learn how to walk that way, like a big black cat. All of a sudden, I heard your grandmother say from behind me:

“That’s your uncle, son.”

I spun around. There was nothing behind me but the same old gray wall, not a trace of your grandmother. But I knew that her spirit had spoken to me. So I shouted out, “Uncle!” at the same time that someone behind me—or so I thought—shoved me up close to the prison van.

I had no idea what I was doing, but the procession—officials, cavalrymen, everyone—froze. A horse reared up with a loud whinny and threw its rider. I ran up to the swordsmen in black and called out, “Uncle, at last I’ve found you!” All the bitterness and sorrow I’d experienced over the years came pouring out in a cascade of tears. The two men in black were dumbstruck, their mouths hanging open as they exchanged surprised looks, as if to say:

“Are you that beggar’s uncle?”

But before they could gather their wits, soldiers came riding up from front and back, shouting and brandishing their swords until I was hemmed in. I felt a cold shadow settle above my head and immediately felt an enormous hand close around my neck. Whoever it was lifted me off the ground, and I thought he was going to break my neck. With my arms and legs flailing in the air, I kept shouting “Uncle! Uncle!” Until whoever it was flung me to the ground, where, with a splat, I crushed a frog in the road. Worst of all, my face landed in a pile of still-warm horse manure.

A fat, dark-faced man on an enormous roan charger behind the prison van wore a robe with a white leopard embroidered on the chest and a plumed hat studded with crystalline blue gems. One look told me that he was a high official. The soldier got down on one knee and, in a resounding voice, announced:

“Excellency, it is a little beggar.”

Two of the soldiers dragged me up in front of the official, where one of them jerked my head back by my hair to give the man on horseback a good look at me. He barely glanced at me. With a heavy sigh, he cursed:

“The little prick has a death wish! Toss him off the road!”

“Sir!” the soldiers barked in unison as they picked me up by my arms, dragged me to the side of the road, and flung me into the air with a “F*ck off!”

Accompanied by their curse, I landed headfirst in the thick mud of the ditch.

Climbing out of that ditch was no easy feat, especially because I couldn’t see a thing. By groping my way along, I got my hands on some weeds, with which I managed to clean the muck from my face, just in time to see that the execution procession was heading south, raising clouds of dust on the road. My mind was a blank as I sat there staring at the horses and their riders. But then your grandmother’s voice sounded in my ear:

“Go watch them, son; he is your uncle.”

I looked around, trying to find your grandmother, but all I saw was the dirt road, some steaming horse manure, and a bunch of sparrows, their heads cocked, their beady black eyes searching for undigested food in the manure. There was no sign of your grandmother. “Niang!” I felt so bad I started to cry, my wails stretching out longer than the ditch I was sitting in. Oh, how I missed your grandmother, and how she disappointed me. You told me to go up to my uncle, Niang, but which one was he? They picked your son up like a dead cat or a rotting dog and flung him into a filthy roadside ditch. I’m lucky I wasn’t killed. You must have seen what happened. If your spirit has the power, Niang, light up my path ahead so I can find my way out of this sea of bitterness. If it does not, then please do not talk to me anymore, and stop interfering in my life. Let me live or die, with my little pecker pointing to heaven, on my own. But she ignored my plea. The sound of her aged voice kept swirling inside my head, over and over:

“Go watch them, son; he is your uncle . . . he is your uncle . . .”

So I ran like a maniac to catch up with the procession. One of the benefits of running fast was that your grandmother’s voice was stilled. But as soon as I slowed down, that maddening, nagging voice found its way back into my ears. Running like a madman was the only way I could escape the mutterings of her floating spirit, even if it meant getting flung into another foul ditch by soldiers in their red-tasseled straw hats. I fell in behind the procession as it passed through Xuanwu Gate and headed down the narrow, bumpy road on its way to the execution ground by the open-air market. It was my first time on this infamous road. By now there are layers of my footprints on it. The scenery outside the wall had a more desolate feel than inside. Dark green vegetable plots separating the squat houses on both sides of the road were planted with cabbages, turnips, and beans on trellises, the leaves now withered, the vines all jumbled. People working plots had little or no interest in the raucous procession passing in front of them. A few cast stony glances behind them, but most went on about their business without looking up.

As the procession neared its destination, the twisting road opened out onto a broad execution ground in which a pack of bored observers were milling around a raised platform. There were several beggars, including the one-eyed dragon who had beaten me. This was obviously his territory. The mounted soldiers spurred their horses on to form a line. The pair of magnificent executioners opened the cage and pulled the prisoner out. His legs must have been broken by the way they dragged him along the ground. The useless limbs reminded me of wilted onions. They carried him up onto the execution platform, where he crumpled to the floor as soon as they let go. He was all flesh and no bones. The onlookers began to make noise, shouting their disapproval of the condemned man’s poor showing. “Coward!” “Softy!” “Get up!” “Sing a line of opera!” The shouts seemed to have an effect on the man, who began to stir, a little bit at a time, flesh and bones, with painful slowness, but enough to earn him a round of applause and shouts of encouragement. He pushed himself up onto his knees as best he could. The crowd demanded more:

“Good man, show some bravado! Say something. How about ‘Take off my head and leave a bowl-sized scar!’ or ‘I’ll be back in twenty years, better than ever!’”

The man’s mouth twisted as he cried out tearfully:

“Heaven is my witness, I am innocent!”

The spectators gazed at the man in stunned silence. The two executioners were impassive, as always. And then your grandmother’s spirit spoke to me from behind.

“Shout, son, be a good boy and shout. Call to them. He’s your uncle!”

There was a sense of urgency in her voice, as the pitch rose and grew increasingly shrill. Cold, shuddering blasts of air hit the nape of my neck. If I hadn’t shouted, she’d have throttled me. There was no way out, so, risking retaliation from one of the fierce sword-wielding soldiers, I cried out in a choked voice:

“Uncle—”

Every eye in the crowd was on me in an instant—the official witnesses, the soldiers, the beggars, though I’ve forgotten what the looks in those eyes were like. But not those of the prisoner; I’ll never forget the look in his eyes. His blood-encrusted head jerked upward as he opened his bloodshot eyes and looked straight at me; I fell backward as if I’d been struck by red-tipped arrows. The next thing I heard was the voice of the dark, fat official in charge:

“It’s time—”

Trumpets blared, and the soldiers pursed their lips to make mournful sounds as one of the executioners grabbed the prisoner’s queue and pulled his head forward to expose the scruff of his neck for the other man, who raised his sword, turned slightly to the right, then handsomely to the left, and—swish—the glinting blade arced downward, truncating a scream of tragic innocence. The man in front was already holding aloft the severed head. He and the other man now stood shoulder to shoulder, faced the witnessing official, and shouted in unison:

“May it please Your Excellency, the sentence has been carried out!”

The dark, fat official, who was still sitting astride his horse, waved his hand in the direction of the severed head, as if seeing off an old friend, then reined his horse around and clip-clopped away from the execution ground. Whoops of excitement burst from the crowd of onlookers, as the beggars boldly rushed up to the stand to await the moment when they could climb up and strip the man’s clothing off. Blood was still pumping from the corpse, which had pitched forward and was resting on the stump of its neck, conjuring up the image of an overturned liquor vat.

That was the moment everything became clear. The official witness to the execution was not my uncle, nor were the executioners or any of the soldiers. My uncle was the man whose head had just been lopped off.

That night I went looking for a willow tree with a low-hanging branch, and when I found it, I took the sash from around my waist, made a noose, tossed it over the branch, and stuck my head in. Dieh was dead, and so was Niang; and now my uncle, the only family member I had left, had just been beheaded. There wasn’t another soul in this world I could turn to. Ending my life now was the only answer. But at the very moment I was about to rub noses with King Yama of the Underworld, a huge hand grabbed me by the seat of my pants.

It was the man who had just beheaded my uncle.

He took me to a restaurant called The Casserole, where he ordered a plate of bean curd and fish heads. While I was eating—just me—he sat watching me. He didn’t even touch the tea the waiter had brought him. When I finished with a loud belch, he said:

“I was your uncle’s good friend, and if you are willing, you can be my apprentice.”

The impressive image he’d created earlier that day reappeared: standing tall and unmoving, then quickly turning slightly to the right, his right arm circling the air like a crescent moon, and swish—my uncle’s head was raised high in the air, accompanied by his scream of innocence . . . your grandmother’s voice sounded again in my ear, but now it was uncommonly gentle, and the sense of gratitude she felt was clear and sustaining.

“My dear son,” she said, “get down on your knees and kowtow to your shifu.”

I did that, and with tears in my eyes, though if you want to know the truth, my uncle’s death meant nothing to me. I was concerned only about myself. The cause of those hot tears was the realization that my daydream was about to come true. I wanted nothing more than to become a man who could lop off someone’s head without blinking. Those two men’s carriage and icy demeanor lit up my dreams.

Son, your dieh’s shifu was the man I’ve mentioned to you hundreds of times—Grandma Yu. He later told me that he had been sworn brothers with my jailer uncle, who had committed a capital crime, and that it had been his good fortune to die by his hand. Swish, faster than the wind. Grandma said that when his sword severed my uncle’s head, he heard it say:

“That is my nephew, Elder Brother. Watch over him for me!”