Fortune Is a Woman - Elizabeth Adler [219]
“Someone came toward her and took her hand, Mayling could scarcely see her it was so dark, and though the girl’s hand felt rough her voice was gentle. ‘But you are so small,’ she exclaimed, ‘and still with a pigtail. You are only a child.’
“‘I am thirteen years,’ Mayling admitted, clinging to the girl’s work-roughened hand.
“She heard her sigh. ‘I myself am fifteen,’ she replied quietly. ‘I was abducted from my village. And the other girls, too, though some were lured away from the rice fields with promises of employment as servants in rich households in the city, and some were sold by their fathers because they did not want to pay for a dowry and a wedding feast. We are all worthless females and now who knows what is to become of us?’
“She took Mayling to sit beside her and offered her rice from a small bowl. Despite Mayling’s despair and her aching head she craved food, but she knew it was all the girl had and she politely took only one mouthful. The other girls generously offered her their bowls and from each one she took a single mouthful, bowing respectfully and thanking them. Then exhaustion overcame her and she lay down with her head in the older girl’s lap and slept.
“They were awakened by men brandishing whips, commanding them to get on their feet and go outside. Mayling followed the others. It was dusk and a cold half-moon peeked over the straggling trees that ringed the small town, glinting on the smooth, deep, dark river that flowed nearby. The men ordered them to remove their smocks, but the girls hung their heads and refused until they felt the lash of the whips and then, screaming, they did as they were told. The men prodded them into line, laughing mockingly at their shame as they tried to cover their nakedness. They twisted their arms behind their backs and tied their wrists so tightly that the slightest movement cut deep into the flesh. Then the evil old one hung a placard with her price around each girl’s neck, and urged on by the whips, they forced them down the road to the village.
“Mayling walked last in the line, her head bowed and tears stinging her eyes, grateful for the darkness that hid her nakedness. But the road outside the village was brightly lit with a dozen lanterns. A stall had been set up selling rice wine, and groups of men, already half-drunk, turned to stare as they approached. The girls stumbled and hesitated but the stinging lash sent them forward again, down the middle of the road, past the silent gaping men. Then with a sudden guttural roar of lust they lunged at the screaming girls. Those who tried to run were lashed unmercifully and they stood, trembling, while the men examined them.
“Mayling wanted to run and hide, too, but like an animal at the slaughterhouse she was rooted to the spot with fear. Men walked past her, eyeing her naked immature body and laughing. They pinched her flesh and felt her most secret places with their dirty hands, checking on her virtue, spitting contemptuously into the dust at her feet as they haggled furiously over her price. Mayling’s head sank onto her chest, her shame was so deep she wanted to die. A tear trickled down her cheek into the corner of her mouth and it tasted as bitter as she felt. A filthy middle-aged Hakka peasant bargained shrilly for her, laughing toothlessly as he made his deal.
“Mayling’s eyes met her new friend’s for a second before she was dragged away. The girl’s eyes were dark with sympathy, expressing the pain and sorrow of women who for centuries had been subservient to men, to be used and abused, to be bought or to be sold. She shook her head and whispered good-bye as the Hakka dragged Mayling away. He threw her still naked into the back of his bullock-cart, covering her with filthy straw. Then he drove her to his wooden hut in the fields.
“The Hakka was a cruel, ignorant peasant, his body stank and his teeth were rotting in his mouth. He took her as he