Becoming Madame Mao - Anchee Min [70]
The goat-beard man pauses, looks around and is pleased with his effectiveness—the way he confuses. To tighten the screw, he gives a final twist. Therefore, to trust the result of the Party's investigation is to trust Comrade Jiang Ching. To trust Comrade Jiang Ching is to trust the Party and Communism itself. Any doubts based upon assumptions abuse an individual's rights, which would be a reactionary act and evidence of right-wing activity, implying sympathy with Wang Ming's gang and the ultimate enemy.
The lips are clamped and the voices are silenced. The interrogation stops. I am sure this will get me through this crisis, although not necessarily the next. There are questions hanging on those people's faces. Why is Kang Sheng aggressive and merciless in handling other cases while spoiling this one?
***
Kang Sheng intimidates and never worries about how anyone thinks of him except Mao. And Mao keeps promoting him. In her marriage she discovers that only when she follows Kang Sheng's advice does she succeed. Kang Sheng is her education.
In the future there will be one secret Madame Mao and Kang Sheng never discuss but share knowingly. It is what makes them partners, rivals and enemies at the same time. Count every member of the Communist Party—no one has ever dared to think about surpassing Mao and taking over China but Kang Sheng and Jiang Ching.
***
Chiang Kai-shek's military equipment is supplied by Americans and is the most advanced in the world. Mao, on the other hand, works with primitive weapons. It is the end of World War II and the beginning of China's civil war. On the international front, Stalin has proposed a negotiation between Mao and Chiang Kai-shek. For Stalin, a united China is more powerful. Stalin sees China as a potential ally with which to oppose the Americans. To show broad-mindedness, my husband takes the risk and accepts Chiang's invitation to Chong-Qin—the capital city of Chiang's government—for a peace talk. Although his colleagues and aides suspect a conspiracy, my husband insists on going.
Midsummer Chong-Qin is a bathhouse. With an American diplomat as a host, Mao Tse-tung and Chiang Kai-shek shake hands in front of the cameras. Next they perform an agreement-signing ceremony. Mao is in his shapeless white cotton uniform while Chiang is in a starched Western-inspired suit with rows of medals glistening over his shoulders and across his chest.
There will not be two suns shining above the sky of China, Mao says to me on our flight back to Yenan. He sees civil war as unavoidable. I tell him that I admire his bravery. He says, Darling, it is the fear, the blindness toward death that drives me to win.
Angry, Chiang Kai-shek begins to drop his bombs over our roof again. Mao orders the famous Yenan evacuation. The Red Army soldiers and peasants are mobilized to move into remote mountain areas. Mao refuses to see anyone who complains about the abandonment of their homeland. To turn people away he invites Fairlynn to the cave for a discussion and chat.
My husband has been meeting with Fairlynn since the early morning. They chat from politics to literature, from ancient bronze to poetry. Bowl to bowl and pack to pack, the two toast in rice wine and smoke cigarettes. The room is a chimney.
After I put Nah to sleep I come out, making my presence a protest against the intruder. I sit next to my husband.
Fairlynn's spirit is fueled by alcohol. Under Mao's encouragement she is argumentative. She scratches her hair with her fingers. Her Shakespeare hairdo is now a bird's-nest. Her eyes are bloody red. She laughs with all her teeth showing.
Inhaling, Mao stretches out his legs, crossing one foot over another.
The history of China is the history of yin, he argues loudly as he pushes the ashtray toward Fairlynn. He then pushes his tea mug. He likes to share tea with women. He did it with Kai-hui, Zi-zhen, Jiang Ching and now Fairlynn. He adds water to the mug, then goes on. Our ancestors invented ammunition to use only for festival decorations. Our fathers