Gold Mountain Blues - Ling Zhang [69]
“Ah-Fat, if you really want to leave, I can’t stop you, but at least wait until Six Fingers is buried,” she shouted hoarsely after him.
In the middle of the night, Auntie Cheung Tai went to relieve herself in the backyard and heard a strange sound. It was something like a draught whistling through cracks in the wall or the earth drinking in a fine drizzle. She looked up at the frangipani tree but it was not moving; she felt its trunk but it was not wet. It was a dry, still night. Holding up her trousers, she groped her way to where the sound was coming from—and arrived at Six Fingers’ bed.
“Porridge … porridge.…” the girl mumbled.
2004
Hoi Ping County, Guangdong Province
In the morning, Amy was woken by the phone. Confused about where she was, she sat up and opened her eyes. White spots like flowers or butterflies seemed to be dancing on the walls. She finally realized it was the sun’s rays filtering in through the curtains.
She had a splitting headache, and the relentless ringing of the telephone seemed to hammer away at the cracks in her skull, pounding tiny sparks from it.
“How’s the hangover?” asked a man’s voice.
Amy had no idea who it was.
“This is Auyung from the Office for Overseas Chinese Affairs. We met yesterday,” he said.
Amy began dimly to recall the previous evening.
“Did I have a lot to drink?” she asked.
“You could say that! Not to put too fine a point on it, you got blind drunk.”
Amy jumped out of bed. “Impossible!” she exclaimed. “I never drink with strangers.”
“Then maybe you don’t regard me as a stranger,” said Auyung with chuckle.
“Maybe not. But how are you going to make me believe that I got really drunk?”
“You sang a song. In English. Over and over again.”
“No!” yelled Amy. “Impossible! I never sing. Certainly not in public.”
“It’s a wonderful thing, alcohol,” said Auyung. “In vino veritas, as they say. The song was ‘Moonlight on the River Colorado.’ In English. Shall I sing a bit?”
Amy said nothing. She used to sing that song a lot when she was student at Berkeley. She had not done a lot of studying in those days. In fact, she had spent most of her time on sit-ins in City Hall Square with her friends. All kinds of sit-ins, pro or anti one thing or another: anti-war, antidiscrimination, anti-exploitation. Pro-women’s rights, pro-draft dodgers, pro-gays. Sometimes, after a day sitting in the town square, she had forgotten why she was there. When she and her fellow students got bored, someone would strum a few chords on the guitar and they would all sing. The most popular song was “Moonlight on the River Colorado.”
That was all such a long time ago. How strange that a bottle of liquor should unlock those long-repressed memories.
“I must have made a horrible noise. When I was a kid, I only had to open my mouth and my mother would yell at me for singing out of tune.”
“It depends what you’re comparing it with. Compared to me, it was music to the ears.”
“What other embarrassing things did I do? Better have it all out in one go. It’s less scary than finding out in bits and pieces.”
“Actually I think you should have it in instalments. Otherwise, seeing me might send you right over the edge.”
Amy burst out laughing. Under that droopy exterior, Auyung was quite a character, she thought.
“So, Mr. Auyung, did you get drunk too?”
“I certainly felt like drinking, if I hadn’t had today’s duties ahead of me.…”
“What duties? Surely not another evening’s drinking with your bosses?”
“That’s only one duty. There are lots of others, for instance clearing all the remaining antiques out of the Fongs’ diulau with you, and persuading you to put your signature on the trusteeship document. Of course, the most urgent problem facing me right now is getting you up and dressed so we can go and have breakfast. The hotel stops serving breakfast in half an hour.”
“Ten minutes … give me ten minutes.”
Amy hurriedly showered—then discovered there was no hair dryer. No iron either. She rifled through her suitcase looking for the painkillers, but in vain.