Ah Q and Others/Our Story of Ah Q
FOR several years now I have been wanting to write "our story" of Ah Q. I am aware that this desire to write about such an insignificant person proves that I am not a man of immortal words, for from time immemorial immortal words have been used only to describe immortal personages, so that in the end it becomes impossible to tell whether the subject is immortalized by the writing or the writing by the subject. I have, nevertheless, undertaken to write about Ah Q, the devil knows why!
But at the very outset of this mortalescent piece, a thousand difficulties confront me. First, the choice of a title. This is a very important matter, for did not Confucius say, "If names are incorrectly defined, it will be impossible to attain truth"? There are all kinds of terms for biographical works: official biography, autobiography, "inner biography" and "outer biography," unofficial biography, family biography, short biography and so on.[1] But none of these seems appropriate for my purpose. Official biography? But this piece does not form part of the biographical section in any of the Dynastic Histories, which include only personages of more consequence than Ah Q. Autobiography? But I am certainly not Ah Q. Though there is nothing official about the so-called "outer biography," it is usually used when an earlier composition has preempted the term "inner biography," another type of informal writing about the life of an individual. "Inner biography" will not do either, since Ah Q was decidedly not an immortal; nor is unofficial biography appropriate since it is used in contradistinction to official biography and as far as I know there has been no Presidential decree commanding the Institute of National History to write an official biography of Ah Q. It is true that the great English writer A. Conan Doyle gave to one of his novels the title of "The Unofficial Biography of a Gambler"[2] when there is no official biography of the said gambler in the official history of England, but such licence is permissible only with great writers and not with us. Family biography, the next possible term, is also ruled out, for neither do I know whether Ah Q and I come from common ancestors nor have I been commissioned by his descendants to write his life. Short biography is also unsuitable since there does not exist any long biography from which it must be distinguished.
This piece may possibly be considered an official biography, but since it is written in the vulgar language of the street, I dare not usurp that title. I have, therefore, borrowed the term "our story" from the stock phrase of humble storytellers: "Let us be done with digressions and return to our story."
My second difficulty is with the established formula for writing biography, which calls for an opening sentence something like this: "So and so's derived name is such and such; he is a native of such and such a place." The fact is that I do not know the surname of Ah Q. At one time it appeared to have been Chao, but by the following day it had become a matter of uncertainty. This was at the time when the gong-beating messengers brought news that the son of His Honor Chao had passed his examination. Ah Q had just drunk two cups of wine and was feeling effusive. He announced excitedly that it was a great honor for him because he and His Honor Chao were kinsmen and that he, Ah Q, was, come to think of it, three generations higher than the new licentiate in the family tree. This made a great impression on some of the bystanders. But the next day the village constable summoned Ah Q to His Honor's house. At the sight of Ah Q, His Honor turned red with fury and thundered:
"Ah Q, you knave! Did you say that I am a kinsman of yours?"
Ah Q was silent.
This infuriated His Honor still more; he advanced a few steps, saying, "How dare you blab such nonsense. How could I have a kinsman like you? Is your surname Chao?"
Ah Q did not open his mouth; he considered a retreat. His Honor jumped up to him and slapped him in the face. "How could your name be Chao? You!"
Ah Q did not try to argue that his name was really Chao; he simply backed out with the constable, nursing his left cheek. Outside, the constable gave him a lecture and accepted two hundred cash from him for wine money. All those who heard about this incident agreed that Ah Q had invited the thrashing by his own impudence, that his surname was probably not Chao, and that even if it had been, he should not have been so presumptuous as to talk the way he did. His family background was never referred to again, and I never did find out just what his surname was.
In the third place, I do not know how Ah Q's name was written. While he was living, everyone called him Ah Quei;[3] but after his death he was promptly forgotten—it is not the lot of such as he to have his name "writ on bamboo and silk." This happens to be the first attempt of the sort and hence is the first to encounter this difficulty. I have often considered whether the quei in Ah Quei stands for quei meaning cassia or for quei meaning honor. If his derived name had been Yueh-t'ing [moon pavilion], or if he had celebrated his birthday during the month of the harvest moon, then it must have been quei meaning cassia, which legend associates with the moon. But he did not have any derived name as far as I know, nor did he ever send out invitations for birthday verses. It would be arbitrary to use quei meaning cassia. Again, if he had had a brother named Fu meaning wealth, then his name must have been quei meaning honor. But he did not have any brother and it would be groundless to write it quei meaning honor. Other characters with the sound of quei cannot possibly fit our requirement as they are all more or less obscure. I once consulted the licentiate, the son of His Honor Chao, but for all his learning he was not able to enlighten me. His conclusion was that the problem could no longer be solved because Ch'en Tu-hsiu's campaign in the magazine New Youth for the adoption of the Latin alphabet had destroyed our national culture.
As a last resort I asked a friend of mine back home to consult the official documents bearing on Ah Q's trial. Eight months later, the answer came saying that he could not locate any document involving anyone whose name approximated quei. I do not know whether there was really no record of Ah Q's trial or whether no search had been made, but I do know that I have done everything possible and that it has been of no use. As I am afraid that the national phonetic alphabet is not yet generally known, I have to resort to the use of Latin letters and spell his name Q-u-e-i, according to the system of transliteration current in the English speaking world,[4] and I have abbreviated this to Q. This smacks of blindly following the faddism of the New Youth, and I regret it myself, but what can I do since even the esteemed licentiate cannot throw any light on the subject?
The fourth difficulty is Ah Q's native place. If his name had been Chao, we could say that he was a native of T'ienshui in Lung-hsi, in accordance with the annotations of the Place Origins of Common Family Names. Unfortunately, as I have pointed out, we are not sure that this was his patronymic. True, he used to live in Wei village, but he had also lived elsewhere. Even though we disregard such niceties, "a native of the Wei village" somehow does not sound right according to the established usage of historical writing.
The only thing that comforts me is that the character Ah is indubitably authentic. There is no stretching the point or reading between the lines about it. As to the rest, it is beyond the capacities of an unlearned person like myself; we can only hope that some day the disciples of the historically minded Hu Shih[5] will take up the problem and throw some light on the various points now in doubt. Only I am afraid that by that time "Our Story of Ah Q" will have long since perished from people's memories.
Not only were Ah Q's name and origin unknown, but his "life and deeds" were likewise clothed in obscurity. The villagers of Wei were interested in Ah Q only when they needed an extra laborer, only as an object of jibes and practical jokes; no one paid any attention to his life and deeds. Ah Q himself did not throw any light on the subject. When engaged in quarrels he would sometimes allude to his past, saying, "We used to be much better off than you! Who do you think you are?"
Having no home, Ah Q lived in the village temple and worked for people by the day, harvesting wheat, husking rice, punting boats. When his work lasted for a period of time he stayed at his employer's house. So he was remembered only when extra hands were needed; but this was mere labor, not life and deeds. During the slack season, Ah Q himself was completely forgotten, to say nothing of his life and deeds. Once an old man praised him, saying, "What a hard worker Ah Q is!" At that moment Ah Q, stripped to the waist, was standing idle, doing nothing at all. Others were not sure whether the old man was sincere or sarcastic, but Ah Q, not being so precise, was greatly pleased.
Ah Q was very proud and held all the inhabitants of Wei in contempt, even to the extent of sneering at the two students. Now a student might one day pass his examination and become a licentiate. The reason Their Honors Chao and Chien were so esteemed by the villagers was that, besides their wealth, they were fathers of students. But in spirit Ah Q had no special regard for them. "My son would be much better than they," he would assure himself. The few trips that he had undertaken to the city naturally contributed to his pride, though he had no use for city folks either. For instance, to himself and the people of Wei a bench three feet long and three inches wide across the top was a ch'ang-teng, yet the city people called it t'iao-teng.[6] This was absurd and laughable, he thought. In frying fish, people in Wei used pieces of green onions half an inch in length, but in the city they cut the onion up in fine shreds. This too was absurd and laughable. But what ignorant country louts were the villagers of Wei! They had never seen how fish was fried in the city!
Once much better off, a man of wide experience, hard working—Ah Q would have been a perfect man but for some slight physical flaws. The most humiliating of these were some scars on his head from sores he had had he knew not when. Although these were his own scars Ah Q did not seem to be proud of them, for he avoided the use of the word sores and all its homophones. Later by extension he avoided the words shiny and bright, and still later even candle and lamp were taboo. Whenever these taboos were violated, intentionally or otherwise, Ah Q would become red in the face and would either curse or fight according to whether the offender was slow of words or weak of limb. For some reason or other Ah Q always came out the loser. He gradually changed his tactics and contented himself with an angry glare.
But the idlers of Wei only became more relentless after he adopted this new policy. As soon as they saw him, they would exclaim as though surprised, "Hey! how bright it has become all of a sudden!"
Ah Q glared.
"No wonder! We have a safety lamp hereabouts," someone else would remark, unimpressed by his glare.
"You haven't got it, anyway." This retort, which he finally hit upon, gave him some comfort, as though his scars were no longer shiny evidences of a by-gone affliction but something quite extraordinary, something to be envied.
As the idlers still would not let him alone, a fight usually followed. Ah Q inevitably lost and ended up by being held by the queue while his head was thumped noisily against the wall. This was of course only an outward defeat. After his adversary had gone with the laurels of victory. Ah Q would say to himself, "I have been beaten by my son. What a world we live in today!" and he too would go off satisfied and spiritually victorious.
At first he thought thus only to himself; later he got into the habit of saying it aloud. This method of securing spiritual victory became generally known, so that an idler, holding him by his queue, would say to him:
"Now Ah Q, this is not a case of a son beating his father, but a man beating a beast!"
Protecting his hair with his hands, Ah Q would plead:
"You are beating a worm. I am nothing but a worm. How is that? Now let me go!"
Even after this humiliating admission the idler would not let his victim go without first banging his head half a dozen times against something convenient. Surely Ah Q cannot claim a victory this time, the victor would think as he went away in triumph. But in less than ten seconds Ah Q would also go away in triumph, for he felt that surely he was the most self-deprecatory of men, and is not a superlative—the first or the most of anything—a distinction to be achieved and envied? Is not a chuang-yuan only the first in the ranks of the successful candidates in the triennial examinations? "So what are you, after all?"
After conquering his enemies by such ingenious means as these, Ah Q would go to the tavern, drink a few cups of wine, jest and quarrel a bit, and return, after scoring more victories, to the temple and would soon fall asleep with a light heart. If he happened to have any money, he would join the crowd of gamblers squatted around in a circle, his face streaming with sweat and his voice heard above every one else.
"Four hundred cash on the Black Dragon!"
"Hey! Here goes!" the dealer would shout as he uncovered the board, his face also streaming with sweat. "Here goes Heaven's Gate and Ah Q's money . . . No one seems to like Human Harmony."
"A hundred on Human Harmony! No, a hundred and fifty!"
Gradually Ah Q's money would find its way into the pockets of other perspiring gamblers. Obliged to withdraw from the inner circle, he would watch from the fringe, shouting and perspiring for the active participants. He could never tear himself away until the party broke up, when he would return to the temple with reluctant steps. The next day he would go to work with swollen eyes.
But "who knows that it is not a blessing for the Tartar to have lost his horse?" The only occasion on which Ah Q did win, he came near to tasting defeat. It happened during the village festival. There was as usual an open air theater and there were several gambling concessions near the stage. The gongs and drums sounded very faint in Ah Q's ears, as though miles away; he could hear only the barking of the dealer. He won and won, his coppers turning into dimes, dimes into silver dollars, silver dollars growing into a big pile. He was happy and excited.
"Two dollars on Heaven's Gate!" he shouted.
Suddenly a fight broke out, no one knew who against whom or why. When the commotion subsided and Ah Q crawled to his feet, the gambling concessions and the gamblers had all disappeared. He felt aches here and there, indicating that he must have received a few blows and kicks. People stared at him wonderingly. He went back to the temple with an air of preoccupation and after recovering his wits realized that he no longer had his pile of silver dollars. As most of the gamblers were from other villages, there was nothing that he could do.
A pile of bright, white silver dollars—and his at that—had all disappeared. He could not find any lasting satisfaction in saying to himself that his sons had robbed him, or in calling himself a worm. For the first time he felt something akin to the humiliation of defeat.
But again he turned defeat into victory. He raised his right hand and gave himself two good slaps in the face. This restored his humor, as if one Ah Q had struck another Ah Q, and, after a while, as if Ah Q had struck someone else—although it was his own face that tingled with pain. And so he lay down to sleep as victor, as pleased with himself as ever.
And he soon fell asleep.
Although Ah Q's list of victories was long and impressive, it was not until he was slapped by His Honor Chao that he became famous.
After paying the constable two hundred cash he went to his room in the temple and lay down with indignation in his heart. Then he thought, "What a world this is getting to be, a son striking his father." At the thought that His Honor Chao with all his power and prestige was now his son. Ah Q became quite pleased with himself. He got up and went to the tavern singing "The Little Widow at Her Husband's Grave" and feeling quite proud of His Honor Chao now that the latter had become his own son.
The strange thing was that people actually seemed to respect him more. Ah Q liked to think that it was because of the new status that he had conferred upon himself, but this was not the case. If Ah Seven should have a fight with Ah Eight or Li Four with Chang Three, the incident would pass unnoticed in Wei; in order to merit gossip the incident must be in some way connected with a personage such as His Honor Chao. Then by virtue of the fame of the chastizer the chastized would become famous, too. The victim's position was, in other words, analogous to that of the Great Offerings in the Confucian Temple, offerings which, though domestic beasts like other pigs and sheep, become sacred after the Sage has put his chopsticks to them. There was never any question that the fault lay with Ah Q. Wherefore? Because His Honor Chao could not be wrong. Then why was it that people respected him more than formerly? This is a little difficult to explain. Perhaps they were afraid that, even though he was slapped for it, there might be after all something to Ah Q's claim of kinship, and they felt it was better to be on the safe side.
Thus Ah Q basked in this reflected glory for many years.
One spring day as he was walking drunkenly on the street he espied Wang the Beard sitting against a wall in the sun, hunting for fleas in the coat that he had taken off. Ah Q felt an infectious itch. Now Wang was not only bearded but also mangy. Every one called him Mangy Beard Wang, but Ah Q dropped off the word mangy as it reminded him of his bygone affliction. He held the Beard in great contempt, feeling that the mange was nothing unusual, not like a swarthy, unsightly beard. Ah Q sat down beside him. If it had been someone else Ah Q might have hesitated, but he was not afraid of the Beard. In fact, he was conferring an honor upon the latter by sitting down beside him.
Ah Q also took off his ragged coat and searched it hopefully, but, either because it had been recently washed or because of his lack of thoroughness he caught only three or four fleas after a long search. In the meantime the Beard caught one after another, putting them in his mouth and crushing them with a crisp sound between his teeth. Ah Q felt only disappointment at first, but this feeling soon gave way to indignation. How humiliating that such a worthless fellow as the Beard should have caught so many while he so few! He wished to vindicate himself by finding a big one but after a great deal of trouble he succeeded in finding only a medium-sized one. He put it into his mouth and bit it with determination, but he did not make as much noise as the Beard.
His scars grew red. Throwing his coat on the ground he said, spitting with disgust, "The damned worm!"
"Whom are you cursing, scabby cur?" the Beard said raising his eyes contemptuously.
If the challenge had come from one of the idlers in whose hands he had suffered ignominious defeat, Ah Q, in spite of the distinction that he had recently won and the pride that he took in it, might have been more cautious about taking it up. But he did not feel any need for caution on this occasion; he felt very brave. How dare the hairy face talk to him like that?
"Whoever cares to take it," he said, standing up, his arms akimbo.
"Are your bones itching?" said the Beard, standing up and putting on his coat.
Ah Q thought that the Beard was going to run, so he rushed forward and struck with his fist. But the Beard caught hold of it and gave it a jerk. As Ah Q fell forward, the Beard had him by the queue and was about to bang his head against the wall.
"A gentleman argues with his tongue rather than his fists," Ah Q remonstrated.
The Beard did not seem to care whether he was a gentleman or not. Paying no heed to the remonstrance, he banged Ah Q's head against the wall five times, then gave him a push that sent him sprawling six feet away.
In Ah Q's memory this must have been the greatest humiliation of his life. Heretofore the Beard had been the butt of his scorn, never had he been the object of the Beard's jeers, much less his blows. Could it be true, as rumored on the street, that the Emperor had abolished the examinations, and no longer wanted any licentiates and graduates, so that the Chaos' prestige has been impaired and their kinsman might be treated with impudence?
As Ah Q stood and pondered on this inexplicable event, the eldest son of His Honor Chien, one of Ah Q's foes and abominations, approached from the distance. Young Chien had first gone to the city and entered one of those "foreign" schools and then he had for some reason gone to Japan. Half a year later he came back a different man: his legs had become straight and his queue was gone. His mother cried often and his wife tried to throw herself in the well no less than three times. Later his mother explained that Chien's queue had been cut off by some wicked people after they had made him drunk. "He was to have been appointed a big mandarin," she explained, "but now he must wait until his hair grows again."
Ah Q did not believe the explanations, insisted upon calling Chien a fake foreigner and a traitor, and would curse him under his breath whenever he saw him. What Ah Q hated most was the man's false queue, for surely one could not be said to be a man at all with a false queue, and his wife could not be a virtuous woman since she did not try the well a fourth time.
The fake foreigner drew near.
"Baldhead! Donkey!" Ah Q muttered aloud as his passion and his desire for revenge got the better of him.
The baldhead unexpectedly rushed at him with a yellow varnished stick—which Ah Q called the funeral stick—and instantly Ah Q realized that he was going to receive a thrashing. He tightened his muscles and hunched up his shoulders and waited. He heard a whack and realized that he must have gotten a blow on the head.
"I was speaking of him," Ah Q protested, indicating a boy nearby.
Whack! Whack! Whack!
In Ah Q's memory this must have been the second greatest humiliation of his life. Fortunately the whack-whack seemed to give him a measure of relief, as though ending some suspense for him. Furthermore, forgetfulness, a treasured trait which he had inherited from his ancestors, came to his aid, and enabled him to regain his complacency by the time he reached the tavern.
Just then a little nun from the convent went by. Ah Q had never let her pass without hurling an insult at her, even when he was quite himself. Now all the resentment that he had felt for his recent defeats and indignities turned against the hapless nun.
"I have been wondering why I have been so unlucky all day, so it's because of you!" he thought.
He went up to her and spat in disgust. The nun walked on without paying the slightest attention to him. Ah Q approached her, thrust out his hand and stroked her clean-shaven head, saying with an idiotic grin, "Baldhead! Hurry home. The monk is waiting for you."
"What has possessed you that you dare to touch me!" the nun said hurrying on, her face flushed.
People in the tavern laughed. Encouraged by the general appreciation, Ah Q pinched her cheek, saying, "Since the monk can touch you, why not I?"
The tavern laughed again. Ah Q became more pleased with himself and gave the nun another pinch for the benefit of the onlookers.
This encounter drove out the memory of Wang the Beard and of the fake foreigner, and avenged all his adversities of the day. He felt more lighthearted than the whack-whack had made him, so lighthearted that he positively floated on air.
"May Ah Q never have any offspring," sounded the pitiful voice of the nun as she hurried off.
"Ha! ha! ha!" laughed Ah Q triumphantly.
"Ha! ha! ha!" echoed the tavern.
It is said that some conquerors must have foes like tigers and eagles in order to derive any satisfaction from their victories, that foes like lambs or chickens give them no pleasure in conquest. After their conquests are complete and their foes have been either put to the sword or brought under submission, conquerors like these often suffer from loneliness and regret: they find that their conquests have deprived them of worthy foes and outspoken friends and have left them with only abject slaves that chant the familiar refrain of "Your subject trembles and quakes because he knows that he deserves death." Our Ah Q was not afflicted with such flaws in his nature. He was always happy in his victories. Perhaps he was a living proof of the supremacy of the spiritual civilization of the Chinese.
Look at him, he is so pleased and lighthearted that he is positively floating on air!
His latest victory had an unusual effect upon Ah Q. Ordinarily he would begin to snore almost as soon as he lay down, but on this occasion, after floating about the village and finally back to the temple, he could not sleep. His thumb and second finger seemed different, seemed softer and smoother than usual. Had something greasy and smooth on the nun's face stuck to his finger or had his fingers become smooth from their contact with the nun?
"May Ah Q never have any offspring!" He recalled the voice. Yes, he must have a woman, he said to himself; without children there would be no one to make offerings to his spirit after he was dead. Moreover, "Of the three filial impieties, the greatest is to be without heirs." His desire, therefore, was strictly in accordance with the teachings of the sages. Ah Q could not banish these thoughts from his mind and we do not know how long it was before he began to snore.
From this we can see that women are harmful, evil things. Most Chinese men are potential sages but for the corruption of women. The Shang Dynasty perished because of Ta Chi; the Chou Dynasty because of Pao Ssu; the Ch'in Dynasty—although history is silent on this point, we cannot be far wrong if we assume that a woman was also the cause of its fall; and there is no question at all that Tung Cho died because of his passion for Tiao Ch'an.
Ah Q was a moral and upright man; he had always maintained a strict vigilance against contamination by woman, though he had never had any formal instruction in morals. Moreover, he showed a righteous wrath against all heterodoxy—such as that represented by nuns and fake foreigners. It was his firm belief that all nuns have illicit relations with monks, that a woman who is seen on the street must have come out for the express purpose of tempting and corrupting men; that when a man and woman are seen together they must be conspiring to commit adultery. To punish these people, he would glare at them wrathfully, make insinuating remarks, or throw pebbles at them—if he could do so safely.
Who would have thought that at the "age of moral independence"[7] he should succumb to the evil spell of a little nun? His state of mind was far from moral. Women are indeed evil things! If the nun's face had not been so smooth, or if it had been covered with a piece of cloth. Ah Q would not have been bewitched. Five or six years previously he had, standing in the crowd before the country stage, pinched a woman's thigh, but that was through a layer of cloth and the experience did not cause him a sleepless night. This was another proof that nuns and their kind were evil things.
He used to look attentively at the women that must be "out to corrupt men," but none of them smiled at him. He also used to listen attentively to women he chanced to speak with, but none of them ever touched upon the subject of adultery. This was only another hateful trait in women; they all pretend to be virtuous!
One day after supper Ah Q was sitting in the kitchen of His Honor Chao and smoking his pipe, having pounded rice all day. In another house a laborer would have gone home after supper but at His Honor's supper was early. The usual custom in that household was to go to bed immediately after supper so that no lamp need be lit; but there were a few exceptions: first, before His Honor's son passed his examinations he was allowed to read under lamplight; and second, when Ah Q came to pound rice, so that he might continue his work after supper. So Ah Q was still there, smoking his pipe.
Having washed the dishes, Wu-ma, the only maidservant in the house, sat on the bench and gossiped with Ah Q.
"Tai-tai has not touched food for two days, because His Honor is thinking of taking a little mistress."
"Women . . . Wu-ma . . . the young widow," Ah Q thought.
"Our shao nai nai will give birth to a child in the eighth moon."
"Women . . . ," Ah Q thought.
Ah Q put down his pipe and stood up.
"Our shao nai nai . . . ," Wu-ma was continuing.
"I'll sleep with you! I'll sleep with you!" Ah Q suddenly went up to her and knelt before her.
Instantly, silence fell.
"Ai ya!" Wu-ma suddenly trembled and rushed out shouting and wailing.
After staring stupidly at the wall for a moment, Ah Q slowly put his hands on the bench and raised himself to his feet, sensing that something was very much amiss. Hastily he stuck his pipe through his sash and started for the milling room. Bang! a heavy blow fell on his head. He turned around and found the licentiate standing before him with a heavy bamboo stick.
"You monster! Have you gone mad?"
The big bamboo stick fell again. Ah Q put up his hands to protect his head and received the blows on his finger joints. He dashed out of the kitchen, receiving another blow on his back.
"Wang-pa-tan!" the licentiate hurled after him the favorite epithet of the official world.
Ah Q fled into the milling room and stood there, nursing his aching fingers. Wang-pa-tan[8] kept ringing in his ears. This was an epithet which none of the villagers used but was only effected by their betters who hobnobbed with officials; for that reason it impressed him deeply and struck him with awe. He thought no more of women. Curiously enough the rebuke and beating seemed to have had a quieting effect on him and to have purged him of all anxieties. He set to work pounding rice. As he became warmer he stopped and took off his shirt.
Now the commotion without, which had been drowned out by his pounding, reached him. Being addicted to the excitement of crowds, Ah Q left the milling room and turned his steps in the direction of the noise, which led him to the inner court. In the twilight he could make out quite a number of people, including tai-tai who had not eaten for two days, Sister Taou Seven, and Chao the white-eyed and Chao the watchman, both authentic kin of His Honor Chao.
Shao nai nai was dragging Wu-ma from her room, saying, "Come out here! Don't hide in your room."
"Who does not know of your virtue . . . you must not think of suicide," Sister Taou said to her.
Wu-ma only cried, and murmured words that could not be clearly distinguished.
Ah Q thought, "Heng, what is the little widow up to now?" He approached the watchman to seek enlightenment, but caught sight of the licentiate rushing at him with the big bamboo stick and it suddenly came back to him that he had just received a beating and that he had something to do with what he was now watching with such detached interest. He turned around and started for the milling room. The bamboo stick barred the way; he turned again and sneaked out by the back door. Presently he was in the temple.
He sat for a while and began to feel a chill, for though it was spring, it was still cold at night, not suitable weather to go around bare to the waist. He remembered that he had left his shirt at the Chaos. He thought of going back for it, but was afraid of the licentiate's bamboo stick. The constable came in.
"Ah Q, your mother's . So you have gone so far as to try to seduce a servant of the Chaos! Have you no fear of the Emperor? You have made it necessary for me to get out of bed, your mother's ."
And so on and on the constable cursed and lectured him. Ah Q made, of course, no retort. Because he had caused the constable trouble late at night, he had to give him four hundred cash for wine money. As he had no money, he gave him his felt cap as security. Five conditions were imposed:
1. Ah Q was to go to the Chaos' house to apologize, bringing with him a pair of candles—weighing a pound each—and a package of incense sticks.
2. Ah Q was to foot the expenses incurred in exorcizing the evil spirits that might be trying to induce Wu-ma to commit suicide.
3. Ah Q was never to cross Chao's gate again.
4. Ah Q was to be held responsible if anything should happen to Wu-ma in spite of the exorcism.
5. Ah Q was not to demand his wages and his shirt.
Ah Q, needless to say, agreed to all these conditions, but he had no money. Fortunately it was spring and as he had no immediate use for his quilt he pawned it for two thousand cash and carried out the terms. He actually had a few cash left after he went to the Chaos and kowtowed. However, he did not redeem his cap but spent the rest of the money all on drinking. The Chaos did not engage any exorcist but saved the candles and incense for future occasions when the mistress made offerings to Buddha. Ah Q's shirt was cut up; the larger pieces were used as diapers for the baby that the young mistress bore in the eighth moon, the smaller patches went to make soles for Wu-ma's shoes.
That evening, as the sun went down. Ah Q began to feel that something was definitely wrong with the world. After a careful analysis he came to the conclusion that it was because he had nothing on above his waist. He remembered that he still had his lined shirt. He put it on and lay down. When he opened his eyes the sun was again shining on the west wall. He sat up, muttering, "Their mothers' ."
He wandered about the street as usual and soon sensed that there was something else wrong with the world, though this was not quite so poignantly felt as the need for raiment. It appeared that the women of Wei had suddenly become very shy, retreating behind their gates as soon as they saw him coming, so much so that even Sister Tsou, who was almost fifty years old, hid herself with the rest, calling in her eleven-year-old daughter. Ah Q was mystified. "Trying to imitate the young ladies: the harlots!"
What made the world seem amiss more than anything else was a development of some days later. First, the tavern would extend him no more credit; second, the old attendant of the temple mumbled at him, as though wishing to get rid of him; third, for many days, though he could not tell just how many, no one had offered him work. He could abstain from drinking to meet the denial of credit at the tavern; mumble excuses to put off the temple attendant; but when no one offered him work it had the positive effect of making him feel a gnawing hunger, a state of affairs to call forth many a "Their mothers' ."
He could endure it no longer. He made the rounds of his old employers—excepting the Chaos—and asked about odd jobs. He was received in a different manner from formerly: invariably a male came out with annoyance in his face and waved his hands as though dismissing a beggar—"Nothing here! Go away!"
Ah Q was completely mystified. They used to have a lot of work to be done, he thought, how could they have suddenly ceased to have any work at all? There must be something behind this state of affairs. He made inquiries and found that they now gave all their work to little Don.[9] Now this little Don was a poor wretch, skinny and weak, who occupied in Ah Q's eyes a position even beneath that of the Beard. And yet this little thing had taken his rice bowl away from him. Great was Ah Q's indignation. As he walked fuming with rage, he suddenly raised his hand and sang, "With my steel whip I shall smite thee!"
A few days later he encountered little Don in front of His Honor Chien's house. "Foes have a sharp eye for each other," so when Ah Q went toward him, little Don stopped.
"Beast!" Ah Q glared at him, foaming at the mouth.
"I am only a worm. Does that suit you better?" little Don said.
This humility had the effect of further enraging Ah Q. As he had really no steel whip in his hand, he had to content himself with throwing himself at little Don and seizing him by the queue. Little Don, protecting the roots of his hair with one hand, seized Ah Q's queue with the other, thus forcing Ah Q to protect his own hair with his free hand. Ah Q used to consider little Don beneath his notice, but hunger had weakened him and made him just about a match for little Don; and so for more than half an hour the two adversaries were deadlocked and formed a bluish arc against the white wall, with four hands upon two heads and their bodies bent low.
"That will do, that will do," some onlookers said, trying to stop them.
"Bravo! Bravo!" said others, in such a way that it was difficult to tell whether they were trying to stop the fight, to applaud it, or to further incite the fighters.
But the combatants paid no heed to them. As Ah Q advanced three steps, little Don would retreat three. After a brief pause, Ah Q would retreat three steps while little Don advanced, and again there would be a pause. Thus they lumbered back and forth, for about half an hour—there being no clock in the village, it was impossible to tell exactly, perhaps it was twenty minutes—their hair steaming, their foreheads covered with sweat. When Ah Q finally relaxed his hold, little Don immediately relaxed his also. They both stood up straight, backed away and edged out through the crowd.
"Look out next time, your mother's ," Ah Q said, turning around to give little Don a menacing look.
"Your mother's look out next time," Little Don retorted.
Thus this "strife betwixt dragon and tiger" ended without deciding the issue, without, perhaps, giving the onlookers their time's worth, though no one complained or made any comments.
Still no one came to offer him work.
One day it was very warm; the caressing breeze had with it a suggestion of summer. In spite of this, Ah Q felt chilly. This he could bear, but his hunger was more difficult. His quilt, felt cap, and shirt had gone long before; more recently he had sold his padded winter coat. He could not possibly sell the trousers he had on, though they were his; nor would his tattered lined shirt bring anything—it was only good to be given away, or to be cut up and glued together for soles. He dreamed of picking up some money on the street, but such luck persistently eluded him; he fancied coming upon some money in his room, looked sharply as if startled by silver pieces dancing on the floor, but the room was bare and had not even obscure corners to prolong his illusions. He decided to go out and seek food.
As he walked along the street, he saw the familiar tavern, the familiar steamed rolls. He passed them by, without even thinking about them or stopping before them, for somehow he knew that these were not for him, though he did not know what exactly he was looking for.
Wei was not a large village and Ah Q soon left it behind and found himself among the fresh green of the rice fields, relieved here and there by moving black dots, which were, of course, peasants at work. Ah Q did not stop to examine this picture of rural bliss, for he instinctively felt that it had no direct bearing upon his immediate need. Finally he found himself outside the walls of the nunnery.
It was also surrounded by rice fields, its white walls rising sheer above the fresh green fields. In the rear, a low mud wall protected a vegetable garden. Ah Q hesitated, looked around, and having made sure that no one was looking, climbed up on the wall, steadying himself by holding on to some vines. His legs shook and loosened some dirt from the wall. Then he caught hold of a mulberry branch and swung himself to the ground. Inside the walls, greenery again greeted him, but no wine or steamed rolls or any other form of eatables. Along the western wall in the bamboo grove there were new shoots but they had to be cooked before eating. The rape had gone to seed, the mustard was in bloom, and the cabbage, too, was getting tough.
Ah Q felt as misused and wronged as a student who fails his examinations. As he approached the garden gate he suddenly came upon a few furrows of large radishes. He squatted down and started to pull up some. A head, very smooth and round, stuck out through the gate, but it was immediately withdrawn. It belonged to the little nun. Ordinarily Ah Q had no fear of such as she, but in the present situation he decided it would pay to be careful. Hastily he pulled up four radishes and put them in the apron of his coat. In spite of his haste, the old nun was already on the scene.
"Amitofo! Ah Q, how could you have come to steal radishes from people like us? It is a great sin, a great sin, Amito Buddha!"
"When did I steal your radishes?" Ah Q said as he walked away.
"Are those not our radishes there?" the nun said pointing to his loot.
"Are they really yours? Then call to them and see if they'll answer you."
He darted off before he finished speaking, followed by a huge black dog, which had somehow turned up in the garden though its usual post was at the front gate. The dog growled and was almost near enough to snap at Ah Q's legs when a radish dropped and scared it. As the dog stopped to sniff at the radish Ah Q climbed up the mulberry tree, thence to the wall and rolled down, radishes and all, on the other side, leaving the dog barking up the empty tree and the old nun invoking the name of Buddha.
Still apprehensive of the dog, Ah Q hurried off with his radishes, picking up pieces of rocks and broken bricks as he went. But the dog did not follow him. Ah Q threw away his missiles and walked on, eating his radishes and thinking the while that he had better try his luck in the city as there was nothing for him in the village.
By the time he had finished the three radishes, his mind was made up.
When Ah Q reappeared in Wei shortly after the festival of the Harvest Moon, the villagers were first surprised and then began to wonder where he had been; for Ah Q had not told any one of his impending visit to the city, as he used to do with great pride and gusto, and no one had noticed his disappearance. He might have told the old attendant of the temple; but the latter had not taken the trouble to broadcast the information and the village had no way of knowing. In Wei it was considered an event only when Their Honors Chao and Chien and the licentiate went to the city; even the fake foreigner's visit went unnoticed, to say nothing of the absence of Ah Q.
The manner in which Ah Q returned was different from former times and truly merited astonishment and wonder. He appeared in the tavern at dusk, with sleepy eyes; he approached the counter, reached his hand around his waist, took out some copper and silver coins, slapped them on the counter, and shouted, "No credit, this time! Give me wine!" He wore a new, lined coat and hanging from his waist cord was a big wallet sagging from the weight of its contents. In Wei it was the general policy to honor anyone who appeared as though he might be somebody. Though they knew that this was only Ah Q, yet they realized that this was not the old Ah Q of the tattered coat, and they were reminded of the ancient saying that a man should be looked upon with different eyes though he has been away only three days. Consequently, the waiter, the proprietor, the patrons and the passers-by all manifested a deferential wonder. The proprietor nodded to him and engaged him in conversation.
"Back, eh, Ah Q?"
"Fatsai, fatsai.[10] Where . . . ?"
"I have been to the city."
By the following day the news had spread through the entire village and had become a matter of absorbing interest. Every scrap of information that could be gathered in the tavern and teahouse and under the gate of the temple was sifted and pieced together, and as a result of this coöperative effort the history of the renascence of Ah Q with his heavy wallet and new coat came to be known in detail and gave Ah Q a new prestige.
According to his own story Ah Q had worked in the house of His Honor the provincial graduate. This announcement immediately raised his status in the villagers' eyes. His Honor's patronymic was Pai, but as he was the only graduate in the whole district, it was unnecessary to prefix his name to the title. This was not only true in Wei but true everywhere within a radius of a hundred li from the city, so much so that people almost began to think that His Honor the Graduate was the man's name. It was naturally a great honor to work in such a man's house. But Ah Q had quit his job because he said the graduate was entirely too much his mother's such and such. The announcement brought forth a general sigh of regret and satisfaction; satisfaction because after all Ah Q was hardly worthy of the honor and regret because it was a great pity to throw up such a fine job.
Another reason why Ah Q had returned to Wei was because he had become dissatisfied with city people's ways. The first complaint he had against them was an old one: they called a bench t'iao teng instead of ch'ang teng and used shredded onion instead of big sections of it in frying fish. The second complaint he had was the mincing gait of city women, which he had noticed on his last visit and which he found very offensive to his taste. There were, however, things to be said for city folks. For instance, in Wei they played only a game of dominoes of thirty-two pieces; the only exception was the fake foreigner, who could play mah-jong: but in the city even the little turtles working in the brothels could play mah-jong well. The fake foreigner might be very proud of himself, but when matched against a small turtle in his teens, he would fare no better than would a little demon in the hands of the King of Hell. The listeners were duly impressed by these pronouncements.
"And have any of you seen a decapitation?" Ah Q suddenly asked. "Hai, a grand sight it is to watch the beheading of the revolutionaries. Hai, a grand sight, really a grand sight!" He shook his head appreciatively and sputtered saliva in Chao the watchman's face. In the awed silence that followed, Ah Q looked around and suddenly raised his right hand and struck Wang the Beard on the back of his neck as the latter craned forward in his eagerness not to miss anything, and said, "Zip! like this."
The Beard jumped and withdrew his head like lightning, much to the amusement of the awed listeners. For several days after this he acted as though he had actually lost his head and kept a respectful distance from Ah Q as did everyone else.
Though it could not be said that the position which Ah Q now occupied in the village surpassed that of His Honor Chao, there is little danger of overstatement in saying that it was about the same.
Presently Ah Q's fame invaded the "inner apartments" of Wei. The term may sound somewhat pretentious as only the Chaos and Chiens had homes of any size to speak of, while the rest of the villagers had only what might be called women's corners. But women do have a world of their own and it was strange that Ah Q's fame should have penetrated therein. Whenever women met, they all talked about the blue silk shirt which Sister Tsou had bought from Ah Q. It was secondhand, to be sure, but then she paid only nine dimes for it. Another fortunate woman was the mother of Chao the white-eyed—one report had it as the mother of Chao the watchman, a matter that needs further investigation—who bought from him a boy's red muslin gown, seventy percent new, for only three hundred cash, ninety-two to the hundred.[11] As a consequence, the women of Wei were all eager to see Ah Q. Instead of hiding from him as they had done for a while, they ran after him, and stopped him to ask:
"Ah Q, have you got any more silk shirts? No? How about a muslin gown? Surely you have a few more things to sell, haven't you?"
His fame was carried from the women's corners to the deeper inner apartments, largely through Sister Tsou, who had displayed her proud acquisition to Chao tai-tai and the latter had in turn remarked about it to His Honor. At supper that evening His Honor discussed the matter with his heir the licentiate, suggesting that there was something suspicious about Ah Q and that they had better look after their doors and windows. But the things that Ah Q had to sell were all right and he might have a few more good bargains. Moreover, Chao tai-tai was contemplating the purchase of a good but inexpensive fur vest. It was decided at this family conference to send Sister Tsou to look for Ah Q without delay and it was further decided that they would light the lamp for this special occasion.
The level of the oil burned down quite perceptibly, and still Ah Q did not appear. The entire Chao household was in a state of anxiety; some complained of Ah Q's uncertain whereabouts, some charged Sister Tsou with laxity, while all yawned because of the unaccustomed lateness of the hour. Tai-tai thought Ah Q might be afraid to come because of the conditions imposed upon him that spring, but His Honor reassured her, saying, "I have sent for him, you know." Indeed his honor was right, presently Ah Q came in with Sister Tsou.
"He insisted that he has no more, but I said to him you go and tell His Honor that yourself. He still insists that he has no more, but I told him . . . ," Sister Tsou said, panting.
"Your Honor!" Ah Q said with a half-smile, stopping under the eaves.
"Ah Q, I am told that you have prospered while you were away," His Honor said, surveying Ah Q from head to foot. "That's very good, very good. Now . . . I am told that you have some old articles. You may bring them and let me see everything—there is no other reason, I only want to take a look."
"I have told Sister Tsou. They are all gone."
"All gone?" His Honor could not suppress his disappointment. "How could they have gone so fast?"
"They were things belonging to a friend. There were not many in the first place."
"You must have something left."
"I have only a cloth door curtain left."
"Then let us have a look at that," tai-tai hastened to say, hopefully.
"In that case, bring it around tomorrow," His Honor stated, with less eagerness. "Now, Ah Q, if you should come by anything later on, show it to us first."
"We shan't pay you less than anyone else," the licentiate added.
Shao-nai-nai cast a glance at Ah Q to see if he had been favorably impressed by the reassurance.
"I want a fur vest," tai-tai said.
Ah Q muttered his consent and walked away with a care less air from which it was impossible to tell whether the interview had made any impression on him. This nonchalance disappointed, irritated and worried His Honor to such an extent that he stopped yawning. The licentiate was indignant, too, and said that the wang-pa-tan would bear watching and that they should perhaps have the constable banish him from the village. But His Honor vetoed this, saying that there was no sense in making enemies, that those engaged in such a line of business did not, as a rule, operate near their own nests, and that, therefore, they need not worry very much in Ah Q's own village, though it was never amiss to be a little careful. With this "family instruction" the licentiate was in complete accord; he withdrew his proposal and, moreover, cautioned Sister Tsou not to tell any one that such a proposal had been made.
But just the same Sister Tsou, on her way to the dyer's to have her blue skirt died black, broadcasted the family's suspicions about Ah Q, though she did take care not to mention the licentiate's proposal to have him banished. The consequence of these revelations was definitely prejudicial to Ah Q. First the constable came to see him and took away the curtain; he ignored Ah Q's professions of innocence and said that he was going to speak to him later on about hush money. Then there was a noticeable change in the attitude of the villagers toward him. It was true that they were still wary of him and did not dare to take any liberties with him, but it was also clear that the reason back of this wariness was different from that which kept them at a distance after he "zipped" the Beard's head.
The interest of the idlers in his exploits persisted, however, and Ah Q was not reluctant to satisfy their curiosity. They learned then that Ah Q played only a minor role in these exploits; he climbed no walls, crawled through no breaches, but only stood on the outside and waited for things to be passed to him. One night as he was waiting expectantly after he had already received one bundle, he heard a commotion inside the house. Thereupon he ran away as fast as he could, climbed over the city wall and fled back to Wei, and had not dared to venture forth again. This confession hurt Ah Q's prestige even more than Sister Tsou's revelations. The villagers had been wary of him because they were afraid of antagonizing a dangerous character; they had not expected to find that he was not only a petty thief but a reformed one at that. Of such a person one needs to have no fear.
On the fourteenth day of the ninth month, the third year of the reign of Hsuan T'ung—that is, the day on which Ah Q sold his wallet to Chao the white-eyed—at the fourth beat of the third watch, a big, covered boat stopped at the Chaos' landing. In the darkness of the night while the villagers were sound asleep, its arrival had not been noticed; but as it was almost dawn when the boat left, its departure was witnessed by several early risers. It was soon established that the boat belonged to no less a personage than His Honor the graduate.
The boat brought with it uneasiness to Wei, an uneasiness which reached almost panic proportions by noon. The Chaos had kept the mission of the boat a secret, but it was said in the teahouse and the tavern that the revolutionaries were about to occupy the city and that His Honor had come to take refuge in the country. Sister Tsou, however, thought otherwise, saying that the boat had only brought a few old trunks, which the graduate wished to store with the Chaos, but that his honor Chao had refused to take them. The truth was that His Honor the graduate and the licentiate were not on good terms, and the latter's family was not, therefore, obliged to share their "vicissitudes and afflictions" in a time like this. Sister Tsou must have been right, as she was a neighbor of the Chao family and was close to what happened in that household.
But rumors were rife, the one having the widest currency being that although the graduate did not call in person, he sent a long letter to the Chao family and established, by following the ramifications of their family trees, some sort of remote kinship with them; that His Honor Chao had, after considering the question from all angles, come to the conclusion that he could not possibly come to any harm because of it; that His Honor had accordingly taken the trunks, which were at that moment reposing under tai-tai's bed. As to the revolutionaries, some said they had entered the city that very night, all wearing white helmets and white armor as a sign of mourning for the last emperor of the Ming Dynasty.
Ah Q had long ago heard about the revolutionaries and had seen the decapitation of one during his last venture into the city. Somehow he had come by a violent prejudice against them, regarding them as rebels and therefore his natural enemies. But now he could not help regarding them in a more favorable light since they were able to inspire terror in such a personage as His Honor the graduate; and he relished the plight that they had caused the accursed men and women of Wei.
"Revolution may be a good thing after all," Ah Q thought. We'll revolutionize them all, their mothers' , the detestable, loathsome things! I wouldn't mind joining the revolutionaries."
Ah Q had been very hard put to it recently and felt a grudge against the world. Furthermore, he had just drunk two cups of wine on an empty stomach and was feeling its effects. He walked on and thought about the revolutionaries, and was again sailing on airy feet. By some curious process of reasoning he came to feel that he was, indeed, one of the dreaded revolutionaries and that the villagers were his prisoners. In this state of mind he could not help shouting:
"Revolution! Revolution!"
The villagers looked at him with wonder and fear, and Ah Q, not used to the important role that he suddenly found himself in, relished it as one relishes an iced drink on a hot summer day. He shouted more lustily, mixing stray bits from popular theatrical pieces with his revolutionary slogans:
"Yes, Revolution! I'll take what I want and do whatever I like with anyone . . . "
"Da-da-dee-da, tong-tong . . . "
"'I regret having executed my good brother Cheng while I was drunk . . . I much regret, ah, ah, ah!'
"Da-da tong tong, da, tong-ling-tong!
"'With the steel whip in my hand I shall smite thee . . . "
Standing at their gate, the two male members of the Chao household were also discussing the revolution with their two authentic kinsmen. Ah Q did not see them and passed by them singing.
"Q-lao,"[12] His Honor greeted him timidly.
"Da-da tong-tong, da, tong, tong-ling-tong, tong," Ah Q continued, never suspecting that any one would link his name with the honorific lao.
"Lao-Q!"
"'I much regret . . . '"
"Ah Q," the licentiate at last called him by his familiar name.
Only then did Ah Q stop and ask, half turning around, "What is it?"
"Lao-Q, now . . . ," His Honor did not know how to put it. "Now—you are doing well?"
"Doing well? Of course. I'll take what I want . . . "
Ah—Brother Q, I suppose poor people like us are all right?" Chao the white-eyed asked timidly, seeking to discover the attitude of the revolution towards himself.
"Poor people? You got more money than I anyway," Ah Q said as he walked away.
They all felt uneasy. His Honor and his son went home and discussed the matter until after dark. Chao the white-eyed went home and gave his wallet to his woman to put at the bottom of the chest.
After fluttering about the village Ah Q returned to the temple where he found the old attendant unexpectedly affable. The latter treated him to tea and produced, upon Ah Q's demand, two rolls. After eating these Ah Q extracted from him a partly used four-ounce candle and a candlestick. He lit the candle and the unaccustomed luxury gave him an indescribable feeling of well being. The candle flame danced with a festive air and his thoughts danced with it.
Revolution was a great thing, he decided. He saw the revolutionaries pass by the temple in white helmets and white armor, holding broadswords, steel whips, bombs, cannons, spears, and halberts, and he heard them call to him, "Come with us, Ah Q!" In his imagination he went with them.
What a pitiable lot were these cursed villagers! They all knelt before him, whimpering, "Ah Q, spare us!" He would not relent. First little Don and His Honor Chao must go, and the licentiate and the fake foreigner . . . Should he spare any? Wang the Beard might have been spared, but not now after his impudent behavior.
And the things he would help himself to! He would go straight in and open up the chests—silver ingots, dollar pieces, a muslin gown . . . He would first bring to the temple the Nanking bed that formed part of the dowry of the licentiate's wife, and then provide himself with tables and chairs from the Chiens—maybe he would take the Chaos' while he was at it. He would not bestir himself about these things. Little Don would be told to do it and he had better be quick about it if he did not want to get slapped . . .
The sister of Chao the white-eyed was too ugly. Sister Tsou's daughter? She was a mere child as yet. The fake foreigner's wife? Bah! She was no good since she had slept with a man without a queue. The licentiate's wife had a scar on her eyelid . . . Where had Wu-ma been keeping herself?—her feet were a bit too large anyway.
But before he was able to make up his mind, Ah Q had already begun to snore, while the flickering candle, which had burned down only about half an inch, lighted up his open mouth.
Suddenly he started up, looked around the room in fright, but the sight of the four-ounce candle reassured him and he fell back to sleep.
The next day he rose very late. On the street he found everything much the same as before. He felt hunger no less keenly. For a while he did not know what to do, then suddenly he made up his mind and started in the direction of the convent.
The convent, with its white walls and black gate, was as quiet as in the spring. After some hesitation, he knocked and was immediately answered by the menacing barks of the dog. Hastily arming himself with some broken bricks, he knocked again, a little more vigorously. But no one came to open it until he had made quite a number of pockmarks on the black door.
Hastily he got the bricks ready, assumed a fighting position, and prepared for the dog. The door opened only a crack, through which he saw the old nun. No dog rushed out.
"What have you come for?" she asked in astonishment.
"The revolution! Don't you know that?" Ah Q replied cryptically.
"Revolution, revolution! But we have had one already. How many times must you revolutionize us?" the old nun said pitifully.
"What did you say?" Ah Q was surprised in his turn.
"Don't you know that they have already been here and revolutionized us?"
"Who?" Ah Q was more surprised than ever.
"The licentiate and the foreigner."
Ah Q was paralyzed by the unexpectedness of this answer. Emboldened by his irresolution, the old nun shut the door in his face. It was bolted when Ah Q pushed against it, and when he knocked again there came no reply.
The robbing of the convent had occurred in the morning. The licentiate Chao was better informed than most people in the village, and as soon as he learned that the revolutionaries had actually entered the city during the night, he wound up his queue under his cap and went to call upon the fake foreigner, whom he had up to that time avoided. But a new epoch had just dawned and the two men found themselves completely in accord and became fast comrades in a common cause. For a while they did not know what their immediate mission should be. Finally, after a long conference and much exchange of views, they recalled the votive tablet in the convent bearing the legend, "Long live the Emperor, ten thousand years, ten thousand times ten thousand years!" This, they decided, must be revolutionized without any delay. Being true revolutionaries, they had set out immediately for their objective. Because the nun had dared to hinder the course of the revolution, they immediately declared her the personification of the Manchu Government itself and had fearlessly given her several whacks on her smooth-shaven head. After the departure of the revolutionary heroes, the nun carefully examined the place and found that besides the broken votive tablet, an incense burner, dating from the reign of one of the early Ming emperors, had disappeared from the altar before Kuanyin.
Ah Q regretted oversleeping that morning and felt offended that he had not been called upon to join the expedition. Then he comforted himself with the thought that they were perhaps not yet aware that he had entered the service of the revolution.
Little by little normal conditions returned to Wei. It was learned that although the revolutionaries had occupied the city, there had been no untoward changes. The magistrate from the old regime kept his post under a new name; the graduate also became some sort of official, the correct name of which the villagers could not comprehend. The local garrison remained under the command of the same captain. The only outrages were perpetrated by the bad element among the revolutionaries, who started to forcibly cut off queues. It was reliably reported that the boatman Seven Pounds from a neighboring village fell victim to this outrage and was now without the mark that distinguished man from beast. This did not terrify the villagers, however; since they seldom went into the city, they were not exposed to the danger. Those who had intended to go changed their minds. Among them was Ah Q, who gave up the idea of visiting an old friend in the city.
It could not be said exactly that there was no change in Wei, for the number of those who knotted up their queues increased day by day. The first was, as we have already observed, the licentiate, followed by Chao the watchman and Chao the white-eyed, and finally Ah Q. If this had happened during the summer it would not have been conspicuous, but since it was late autumn, the queue-knotters could not be said to lack courage, nor could it be said that the village of Wei was insensitive to the spirit of change that characterized the times.
When Chao the watchman walked down the street with nothing dangling from his head people shouted: "There goes a revolutionary!"
Ah Q envied him. He had heard about the licentiate's knotted queue but had not thought that he could follow so illustrious an example. The watchman was, however, not beyond his emulation and he now made up his mind; with a chopstick he secured his queue on top of his head and after some hesitation went out boldly on the street.
His appearance attracted some attention but caused no comment. This neglect at first chagrined and then angered him. He had become dissatisfied and irritable of late—though his problem of living was no more difficult than before the revolution, though people were courteous to him, and though the tavernkeeper did not refuse him credit. He felt that the revolution should not be so prosaic and colorless. One day his ire was fanned to the exploding point when he encountered little Don.
For little Don's queue was also knotted on his head and secured with a bamboo chopstick. Ah Q never thought that little Don would be so brazen, and never would have permitted it if he had had his way. For what was little Don? He wished to seize the impudent pretender, break his chopstick in two, let down his queue for him, and to slap him as a punishment for forgetting his birth, for the crime of daring to become a revolutionary. But with magnanimity and restraint he let little Don off and only glared at him and spat in token of his contempt.
The fake foreigner was the only one who did dare to venture into the city. The licentiate had contemplated making a call upon His Honor the graduate for haying stored the trunks, but thought better of it in view of the danger to his queue. Instead he sent a very ingratiating letter to His Honor through the fake foreigner, whom he also prevailed upon to propose his name for membership in the Freedom Party. Upon reimbursing the latter four dollars when he returned from the city, the licentiate received a peachlike ornament made of silver which he pinned to his breast. This inspired awe and admiration in the villagers, who divined that with the Shih Yu Tang[13] (Persimmon Oil Party) it was the equivalent of the mandarin's official button, almost the equivalent of a hanlin. His Honor Chao's prestige soared, soared infinitely higher than when his son passed his examination. He was so proud that he had no use for any one, including the very estimable Ah Q.
It then dawned upon Ah Q why he had been neglected: he realized that it was not enough to say that he had joined the revolutionaries, or to knot his queue on top of his head; it was necessary to make the acquaintance of the revolutionaries. He knew of only two: the one in the city had long ago been—zip!—beheaded; there remained only the fake foreigner. There was but one way out of Ah Q's neglected position; he must immediately discuss matters with the fake foreigner.
The gate of the Chien house was open. Ah Q edged in timidly. Inside, the fake foreigner was standing in the courtyard, dressed in a black outfit that must have been a foreign costume, a silver peach pinned to his breast, holding in his hand the stick with which Ah Q had already had some encounters; his growing queue was untied and hanging loose over his shoulder as in representations of the Taoist immortal Liu Hai. Around him were Chao the white-eyed and three idlers listening reverently and attentively to his discourse.
Ah Q tiptoed in and stood behind Chao the white-eyed. He wanted to greet the speaker, but did not know what form of address to use. "Fake foreigner" certainly would not do; "foreigner" was none too appropriate; "revolutionary" did not seem appropriate either; perhaps he should address him "Mr. Foreigner."
Mr. Foreigner did not notice the newcomer, being in the midst of an exciting chapter of the revolution.
"I have always been hot-tempered, you know. So when we met I always said to him, 'Brother Hung,'[14] let us strike now!' But he always said, 'No!'—which of course you will not understand as it is in the foreign language. Otherwise we would have succeeded long ago. But from this you will see how cautious and careful he is. He has asked me to go to Hupeh several times, but I have not yet consented. Of course I would not think of accepting a post in a little district city like ours . . . "
"Hem, er," Ah Q tried to begin during this pause, forget ting to address him as Mr. Foreigner.
The four listeners turned around and looked at him in astonishment; Mr. Foreigner also noticed him.
"What do you want?"
"I . . . "
"Get out!"
"I want to join . . . "
"Get out!" Mr. Foreigner raised his funeral stick.
Chao the white-eyed and the other listeners shouted, "The gentleman tells you to get out. Can't you hear?"
Instinctively Ah Q raised his hands to protect his head as he turned and fled. Mr. Foreigner did not give chase. Ah Q slackened his gait to a walk, his heart filled with a melancholy despair. The fake foreigner, his only entree to the revolutionary party, had forbidden him to revolt; thenceforward he could no longer expect revolutionaries in white helmets and white armor to summon him to action—his talents, aspirations, hopes, and his career were all destroyed by the prohibition. In the face of these blasted hopes, the ridicule of such people as little Don and Wang the Beard, who would soon hear of it from the idle witnesses, seemed nothing.
Never before had he experienced such frustration, never before such a feeling of futility. His coiled queue seemed somewhat absurd even to himself. He began to despise it and he thought of letting it down to show how little he cared, but he did not do so. He wandered about until evening and then went to the tavern and gulped down two cups of wine, on credit. Gradually his spirits were restored and in his fertile imagination there again appeared fragments of shattered white helmets and white armor.
One day he had lingered in the tavern until closing time as usual and was on his way to the temple with slow heavy steps.
Bang! bang!
He suddenly heard a strange sound, like and yet unlike firecrackers. Always curious. Ah Q felt his way along in the darkness in the direction of the sound. He heard footsteps, and as he stopped to listen a man rushed by, as though fleeing from something. Ah Q turned around and fled after him. The man turned a corner; Ah Q turned also. The man stopped and Ah Q stopped, too. He looked back and found no danger threatening from behind; he looked at his man and found it was only little Don.
"What is up?" Ah Q said, somewhat annoyed.
"The Chaos . . . they have been robbed!" little Don said panting.
Ah Q's heart jumped. Little Don moved on, but Ah Q vacillated. After all he had been in "that line" and was on that account bolder than most people. He emerged from around the corner and listened attentively. He seemed to hear sounds. He looked and fancied he saw people in white helmets and white armor, carrying out chests, furniture—including the Nanking bed of the licentiate's wife—but he could not see very clearly in the darkness. He thought of going up nearer, but his legs would not move.
It was a moonless night. Wei village lay in peaceful quiet such as prevailed in the primeval days of Fu Hsi. Ah Q stood and watched until he began to feel weary of the endless procession of chests, tables, Nanking beds that he fancied he saw, and until he began to doubt the trustworthiness of his own eyes. He decided to return to the temple.
The temple was even darker than the streets. He closed the gate after him and stumbled into his own room. Lying in bed he turned the matter over in his mind; the men in white helmets and white armor had been here, no more doubt of that, and they had not asked him to join them. They had carried off a lot of things and he had not gotten his share of the loot. It was all the fault of the fake foreigner, who forbade him the revolution, otherwise, he thought, how could he have been denied his share? The more he thought about it the more indignant he became, until his heart was filled with hatred and bitterness, and he said, nodding his head with grim determination: "No revolution for me, eh? but only for yourself, eh? Fake foreigner, your mother's ! All right, revolt all you like: the punishment for revolt is death, sure. I shall inform the authorities, I shall see you arrested and dragged into the city, I shall see you beheaded—you and all your family—zip! zip! zip!"
The robbing of the Chaos caused in the villagers a mixed feeling of pleasure and uneasiness; and it produced the same sort of feeling in Ah Q. Four days later he was arrested during the night, without warning, and taken into the city. It was a dark night. A squad each of regulars, militiamen, and armed police, and five detectives, entered Wei, surrounded the temple under cover of darkness and trained a machine gun on the gate. But Ah Q did not rush the siege as anticipated. After a while the commander of the expedition became impatient and offered a reward of twenty thousand cash, whereupon two militiamen volunteered to dare and die. They climbed over the wall and opened the gate. The expeditionary force rushed in and dragged out the sleeping Ah Q, who did not fully wake up or realize what had happened until he had been placed beside the machine gun.
It was noon when the triumphant expedition entered the city. Ah Q was dragged into a dilapidated yamen, marched through several compounds and then thrust into a cell. The heavy grilled door closed after him as he stumbled in. He was surrounded by solid walls on the other three sides. Looking around carefully, he discovered two other men in the cell.
Although somewhat frightened, Ah Q was by no means distressed by his new surroundings, for his room in the temple was no more sumptuous than this one. The other prisoners looked like villagers, and as they got to talking one said he was being held for back rent that his grandfather had owed to His Honor the graduate, the other said that he did not know what he was held for. They asked Ah Q and Ah Q answered proudly and unhesitatingly:
"Because I want to revolt."
In the afternoon he was taken out of the cell and marched to the judgment hall. Behind a table in the center sat an oldish man with a clean-shaven head. Ah Q at first thought that he was a Buddhist monk, but when he observed the squad of soldiers standing below and the group of some ten personages in long gowns on either side—some with clean-shaven heads like the oldish man, some with hair about a foot long hanging down their shoulders like the fake foreigner, all with fierce features and staring at him menacingly—he decided that there must be something to that oldish man and his knee joints thereupon loosened and he knelt down.
"Stand up! Don't kneel!" shouted the personages in long gowns. Ah Q, though he appeared to have understood the command, was unable to maintain a standing posture, his knees failed him, he sagged down and again lapsed into his kneeling position.
"Slave habit!" The personages in long gowns grunted with contempt, but did not insist on his standing up.
"You might as well confess the truth so as to avoid unnecessary pain. I know everything already. Confess and you will be set free." The oldish man with the clean-shaven head said very firmly and deliberately, his eyes fixed searchingly upon Ah Q.
"Confess!" the personages in long gowns echoed.
"I had intended to come and . . . ," Ah Q said after revolving the situation in his confused mind.
"Then, why did you not come?" the oldish man asked benignantly.
"The fake foreigner would not let me!"
"Nonsense! It is too late to say that you had intended to come. Now where are your accomplices?"
"What?"
"The men who robbed the Chao family that night, where are they?"
"They did not come for me. They carried off the things themselves," Ah Q said vehemently.
"Where did they go? You will be set free if you tell." The oldish man was more benign than ever.
"I do not know . . . they did not come for me."
At a glance from the oldish man Ah Q was again seized and thrust into the cell. When he was dragged out of the grilled door for the second time it was the forenoon of the second day.
Things were the same in the great hall. The oldish man again sat behind the table and again Ah Q knelt down.
The oldish man asked benignantly, "Have you anything else to say?"
Ah Q could not think of anything, so he answered, "Nothing."
Thereupon a personage in a long gown approached Ah Q with a sheet of paper and a writing brush which he was about to put into Ah Q's hand. At this Ah Q became confused, nay terrified out of his wits, for this was the first time that he had ever come into such proximity with a writing brush. He was pondering how it should be held, when the man pointed to a place on the sheet of paper and told him to sign.
"I—I—cannot read," Ah Q said with terror and shame as he grasped the brush in his hand.
"We'll let you off easily. You can just draw a circle."
Ah Q was willing but in spite of himself the brush shook in his hand. The man spread the paper on the ground. Ah Q stooped over and tried with all his might to make the circle as directed. But the mischievous brush was not only heavy but also unruly. Just as he was about to close the circle with his trembling hand, it jerked with a centrifugal motion with the result that the circle was shaped like a melon seed.
Ah Q felt humiliated that he had not made a good round circle, but the man assisting took the paper without finding fault with it. Ah Q was then taken behind the grilled door for a third time.
He did not feel particularly distressed. He probably thought that in a man's life there must be times when he would be seized and thrust behind grilled doors, and be required to make a circle on a sheet of paper. But he did feel keenly the blot on his "life and deeds" because he could not make a truly round circle. The last thought, however, troubled him only for a brief moment, for he soon decided that no decent man could draw a perfect circle anyway. He fell asleep.
Strangely enough His Honor the graduate could not sleep that night. He had had a disagreement with the captain; for he had held that the recovery of the loot was the most important thing while the captain, who had become very insolent of late, had insisted that the most important thing was to make an example of the prisoner. Pounding loudly on the conference table, the captain had shouted: "We must punish him as a warning to others. Look, more than ten robberies have occurred during the less than twenty days since I became a revolutionary. No arrests have been made until now. What is to become of my prestige? Now that I have made an arrest, you try to block me. It won't do. This is within my jurisdiction." The graduate had been greatly embarrassed but he stood his ground and threatened to resign his chairmanship of the citizens' revolutionary committee if the prisoner was not spared for the moment, so that he could lead to the recovery of the loot. At this the captain had only retorted, "Do as you like." As a result His Honor could not sleep that night. However, he did not resign the next day.
On the morning following His Honor's sleepless night Ah Q was again taken out through the grilled door. In the great hall the oldish man with the clean-shaven head sat as before and as before Ah Q knelt down.
"Have you anything more to say?" the oldish man asked benignantly.
Ah Q thought for a moment, found nothing to say, and so answered very candidly, "Nothing."
Thereupon personages in long gowns and others in short coats put a white vest on him, on which were written some characters. Ah Q was distressed by this, for white was the color of mourning and mourning was an unlucky thing. His hands were tied behind his back and he was taken out of the yamen.
Ah Q was then hoisted into an open cart, several short-coated personages sat down beside him, and the cart immediately started, preceded by a squad of soldiers and militiamen carrying foreign guns, flanked by numerous open-mouthed spectators, and brought up in the rear by—but Ah Q could not see that.
Suddenly the realization came upon him: was he not going to have his head cut off? His eyes went blank, his ears buzzed with a ringing sound, he felt faint. But he did not really faint away. He felt an acute distress at one moment but in another moment he was at peace with the world, probably feeling that it was in the nature of things that some people should be unlucky enough to have their heads cut off.
Why were they not heading him directly toward the execution ground? Ah Q had not lost his bearings, but he did not know that he was being paraded through the streets as a warning. If he had known, it would have only occurred to him that that, too, was in the nature of things.
Finally he realized that he was being taken to the execution ground in a roundabout way, that there was no question that he was going to have his head—zip!—cut off. Indifferently he looked to the right and left and was dimly conscious of crowds of people like ants. Then his eyes fell upon Wu-ma, whom he had not seen for a long time as she had in the meantime found work in the city. Suddenly he felt ashamed of himself because of his tameness, because he had not sung a few sentences from the plays to show how little he cared. Feverishly he considered his stock: "The Little Widow at Her Husband's Grave" was not dignified enough for the occasion; he had already done to death the song beginning with "I regret . . . " in the play Struggle between Dragon and Tiger; perhaps he had best sing "With the steel whip in my hand I shall smite thee." He thought of raising his right hand for effect, but suddenly realized that his hands were tied behind his back. He had to give up that, too, as he was something of a perfectionist.
"In twenty years I'll be here again . . . ,"[15] Ah Q suddenly blurted out this immemorial defiance, which he had never heard said, in which he had never been coached, and which, therefore, he must have arrived at independently and instinctively in the crisis.
"Bravo!!!" a howl like that of wolves and jackals rose from the multitude.
As the cart rolled on amidst the applause. Ah Q cast another glance at Wu-ma. She did not appear to have seen him at all, but was lost in gazing at the guns carried by the soldiers.
Ah Q turned his glance upon the applauders.
Suddenly a scene from the past flashed through his mind. Four years ago he had met a famished wolf at the foot of the hills; it had followed him with dogged persistence, never too near and never too far, its mouth watering for his flesh. He was scared to death, but fortunately he had with him a woodcutter's axe and with it he was able to keep off the wolf and reach home. But he could never forget those eyes of the famished wolf, fierce and yet slinking, weird and hair-raising like jack-o-lanterns, as though piercing right through his skin and flesh. Now he beheld eyes even more horrible than those of the wolf. These were dull and lusterless eyes that yet seemed to glint with greediness, to relish his bravado and to be waiting for something that they would relish even more; and like the wolf they followed him, never too near, and never too far.
The myriad eyes seemed to merge into one, boring and gnawing relentlessly at his soul.
"Help!"
But before he had time to utter the word, all became black before his eyes, his ears rang, and his body seemed to break into tiny specks of dust.
The aftermath of the incident was felt more poignantly in the house of His Honor the graduate; the loot had not been recovered and his household was rent with lamentations. Next in order came the house of Chao, for not only was the licentiate's queue cut off by the more radical element of the revolutionaries, when he went into the city to report the case, but they had to pay the twenty-thousand cash reward. That household was, therefore, also rent with lamentations. From that time on they gradually began to manifest the symptoms of a man who has seen better days.
As to public opinion in Wei, there was no dissent from the natural conclusion that Ah Q must have been a bad character: the fact that he was shot was proof enough for anyone—otherwise, how could he have been shot? Public opinion in the city, however, was outraged and dissatisfied; most people contended that shooting was not as good a spectacle as beheading. And what a stupid and spiritless prisoner—not a single tune out of him all the time he was being paraded through the street! They had followed the procession for nothing.
- ↑ All these terms are two-syllable compounds in the original, with chuan (story, record, biography) forming the second syllable. It has been necessary to insert a few transitional phrases in this paragraph as without them it would be difficult to convey facetious effects quite obvious in the original.
- ↑ The title by which the Chinese version of "Rodney Stone" is known. Lusin attributed the novel to Dickens.
- ↑ In Latin letters in the original text.
- ↑ The Wade system, standard for the English speaking world, calls for Kuei.
- ↑ The chief exponent of the Literary Revolution and present Chinese Ambassador at Washington.
- ↑ "Long bench" and "a strip of a bench" respectively.
- ↑ That is, thirty, at which Confucius was said to have achieved this state.
- ↑ Literally, turtle egg; son of a prostitute or a cuckold.
- ↑ The name is so spelled in Latin letters in the original.
- ↑ May you grow rich.
- ↑ It was customary to allow a certain percentage for the cost of the string with which the cash coins were strung together. The custom persisted even after the ten-cash copper supplanted the cash, though the new coin has no holes and is not strung together with strings.
- ↑ Lao (old) is honorific as suffix, familiar as prefix.
- ↑ Tzu-yu (freedom), being a new term, is corrupted by the illiterate peasantry into Shih-yu because of the similarity in sound.
- ↑ Li Yuan-hung, commander of the revolutionary forces.
- ↑ Common formula of defiance used by desperadoes on their way to the execution ground and signifying a sure return, in another incarnation, to carry on where they left off.