Becoming Madame Mao - Anchee Min [129]
He throws her a mysterious smile and then goes on to comment on the wine. She is having a hard time following him—on one hand he tries to generate a conversation, on the other, he is not listening. It is the first time she plays a role without knowing that she is even on a stage.
The group keeps drinking. Don't expect too much. The truth is, no cripple will lend you his stick. In between sips and toasts Mao throws comments as if drunk. The mouse's greatest happiness is to steal away a fistful of grain.
***
Oh look, the host exclaims, I totally forget the time. We should do this more often, right? Premier Zhou? Jiang Ching, are you full?
I look at my watch. It is ten-thirty. I get up. Mao comes over and gives me a comrade-style handshake.
What am I supposed to say? Thank you for dinner? I leave silently.
We'll leave with Comrade Jiang Ching. Premier Zhou and his wife get up.
We will too. The Lins follow.
Mao holds up his hand to Lin. No, do stay at least for another half-hour. We haven't really gotten a chance to talk yet.
When the Lins sit back down Mao chats freely. He asks about Lin's family and health and suggests places for him to vacation. He listens tentatively and recommends to Lin his own herb doctor. He then asks Ye about her dream for their son "Tiger." Ye is flattered and starts to babble about Tiger's achievement.
Your son is talented and deserves a high position in the army. Mao lights up a cigarette. The people need him. Listen, Lin Biao, have you ever thought of promoting your son as the commander in chief of the entire army? That way you can free yourself to take up my job.
Well, Tiger is only twenty-six ...
If you are not going to do it, I will. He owes the people his gift.
At ten fifty-four the Lins bid farewell.
Allow me to walk you to the door, Mao offers. I'd like to see you off personally.
At midnight, the phone at the Garden of Stillness rings. Jiang Ching picks up the receiver half asleep. It is Kang Sheng.
The Lins are dead, he reports. The mission was completed neatly and quietly within the compound of the Forbidden City.
To hide her shock Madame Mao asks Kang Sheng for the details of the execution.
One of Mao's table servants is a transportation expert, and another an explosives expert. Aren't you glad?
She is, but she is also scared—again, will Mao do the same to her one day?
How are you going to break the news to the world? she asks, barely controlling her voice.
Here, I've just finished my draft: September 15, 1971, from New China News Agency: People's enemy Lin Biao was caught in an action attempting to murder Chairman Mao. Lin took a small plane and flew to Russia after his evil plan was exposed. Lin's plane crashed in Mongolia when the fuel ran out.
***
With Lin Biao out, Premier Zhou and I have become the only rivals for the position as Mao's successor. I must hurry. I must battle against Premier Zhou's men as well as my own husband.
I am anxious and can hardly sit still. In my dreams I hear steps. I get nervous going near closets. I fear assassins are behind the clothes. I skip meals to reduce the chances of being food-poisoned. I change my secretaries, bodyguards and servants once every two weeks. But the new faces frighten me even more. I know it's foolish but I can't help suspecting these people as Premier Zhou's spies.
The golden autumn views of the Forbidden City and Summer Palace no longer interest me. I used to love walking across the five-hundred-stone dragon bridge, but now I fear that a mysterious hand will come out of the water to pull me down.
I decide to go to Shanghai where my friend Chun-qiao has become the head Party secretary of the southern states. I have come to depend on Chun-qiao. We select my future cabinet members together. Again he recommends his faithful disciple, now the famous "Marshal of Pens," Yao Wen-yuan, and two other men of talent. One is Wang Hong-wen, a handsome thirty-eight-year-old, who very much resembles Mao's late son, Anyin. Wang is the chief of the Shanghai Workers