Gold Mountain Blues - Ling Zhang [226]
Ah-Yuen had woken up from his nap and lay in bed staring at the ceiling. His eyes were rheumy and as milky as a puddle after rain. Mr. Auyung sat down on the edge of the bed, wiped a few crumbs from the old man’s mouth and said: “Did you have a good lunch today, Great-uncle Ah-Yuen?” Ah-Yuen’s eyes flickered and he answered forcefully: “I ate a bowl of rice and crapped a bowl of stones.” The old man had lost his own teeth long ago, and the false teeth he wore clattered as he spoke as if he had a mouthful of marbles.
Mr. Auyung laughed and pulled a bottle from his pocket. “Constipation’s the biggest nuisance when you get old. This is foreign medicine. Mix a spoonful in a glass of cold water every day and drink it. It tastes like orange juice and it’ll cure your constipation.” Ah-Yuen ignored the bottle and gripped Mr. Auyung’s hand: “When you talk, you sound just like your old granddad when he was young,” he said. “Great-uncle Ah-Yuen, I’m over fifty!” protested Mr. Auyung. “I’m not young any more!” The old man had his hand in a viselike grip, the veins standing out purplish. “I should have gone away with your granddad all those years ago.”
Mr. Auyung helped him sit upright and Ah-Yuen caught sight of Amy standing in the doorway. He pushed Mr. Auyung away. “You’ve brought that half-breed, haven’t you?” “She’s your wife’s great-niece,” said Mr. Auyung. “The only Fong left. She’s flown all the way from Canada to see you. Don’t make such a scene!”
“Huh! Don’t talk to me about the Fongs. There’s not a single one of them that can be trusted.” The old man was so enraged that a vein started to pulse on his forehead. Mr. Auyung patted his shoulder. “Don’t talk nonsense, Great-uncle Ah-Yuen. The Gold Mountain government wouldn’t let any more Chinese in. What were they supposed to do? When the ban was lifted, your brother-in-law Kam Shan wrote and asked Kam Sau if she wanted to join him in Gold Mountain, didn’t he? But you had your head stuffed full of revolution in those days and you refused the offer. You’ve only got yourself to blame.”
Ah-Yuen leaned back against the headboard, gasping for breath, but eventually he became calm.
After a pause, he said dully: “You tell her to give me my Kam Sau and Wai Heung back.”
Mr. Auyung gestured to Amy. “She really has brought them back.” Amy took a cloth bag out of her purse and knelt down by the bed. “Great-uncle,” she said respectfully, “before I left, my mother asked me to bring you this. It doesn’t belong to her. My grandfather gave it to her before he died. He told her that whoever came back to Hoi Ping should bring it with them.”
Amy opened the bag. It contained some photographs, yellowed with age, and a small metal box. The top of the box was decorated with the head of a beautiful woman and the words “Almond Chocolates.” The manufacturer’s name was written underneath. The paint had partly rubbed off and there were rust marks on the woman’s face.
Amy opened the box and took out a piece of folded cloth. She opened the folds to reveal a lock of hair tied with red ribbon. She supposed it must have been red once, though now it had faded to a dun colour. A scrap of paper was tucked under the lock. Written in faded ink were the words “A memento of Wai Kwok’s first birthday.”
There were three photographs. One was of Ah-Yuen and Kam Sau’s wedding and had a stamp on the left-hand corner which read: “Hoi Wo Photographic Studio (Canton), Year twenty-two of the Republic.” There was a close-up of Wai Heung wearing an embroidered tunic, with “Wai Heung’s first birthday party” written on the back. Then there was another of the whole family with Six Fingers in the centre, Kam Sau with Wai Heung in her arms on the left, and Ah-Yuen holding Wai Kwok by the hand on the right. There was no inscription either on the front or the back, but Wai Heung was still just a baby, no more than a few months old.
Ah-Yuen’s hand began to shake and the photographs fluttered onto the bedsheets.