Читать книгу Frontier - Can Xue - Страница 10

Chapter 1

LIUJIN

It was late. Liujin stood there, leaning against the wooden door. The ripe grapes hanging on the arbors flickered with a slight fluorescence in the moonlight. Blowing in the wind, the leaves of the old poplar tree sounded lovely. The voice of someone talking blended with the rustling of the poplar leaves. Liujin couldn’t hear what he was saying. She knew it was the man who had recently been coming here late every night and sitting on the stone bench near the courtyard gate. At first, this had frightened Liujin and she hadn’t dared to go outside. Time after time, she had peeped out the window. Later on, realizing that this bear-like old man was harmless, she worked up the courage to approach him. He had good eyesight: even in the dim light, his eyes were as penetrating as sharp glass. He was busying his hands twisting hemp. He didn’t like to talk with people; his answers to Liujin’s questions were always vague: “I’m not sure . . .” He wasn’t one of her neighbors; where did he come from? Although he didn’t talk with her, he seemed to enjoy talking to himself. His words kept time with the sound of the wind and the leaves. When the wind stopped, he stopped. This was really strange. Tonight, his voice was louder, and pricking up her ears, Liujin made out a few words: “At noon, in the market . . .” Liujin tried hard to imagine the scene in this indoor market: piece goods, gold and silver jewelry, raisins, tambourines, foreigners, and so on. But she had no clue what the old man meant. Even though it was late, a woman was actually singing piteously and plaintively on the other side of the street; the woman seemed to be young. Could she be singing for the old man? But he apparently wasn’t listening; he was talking to himself. These days, Liujin had grown accustomed to his voice. She thought the old man looked a little like the poplar tree in the courtyard. The poplar was old, and so this man must be old, too. Liujin asked: Are you twisting the hemp to sell it? He didn’t answer. Sleepy, Liujin went off to bed. Before she fell asleep, she heard the young woman’s song turn sad and shrill. When she arose in the morning, she saw that the old man had left without a trace—not even a bit of hemp had been dropped on the ground. He really was a strange person. When she inquired of the neighbors, they said they didn’t know of such a person. No one had seen him. This made sense, for people generally didn’t go out so late. Liujin knew that she went to bed later than anyone else in the little town: she had formed this habit a long time ago. Still, what about the young woman singing? Judging by the direction the voice came from, she seemed to be from Meng Yu’s family. That family bought sheep from the pastures, slaughtered them in the market, and sold the fresh meat. With the strange old man showing up in her yard, Liujin no longer felt desolate and lonely in the autumn nights. She felt a vague affection for him, but she preferred not to explore the nature of this emotion.

She had lived by herself in this small enclosed area for five years. Before she was born, her parents had moved here from a large industrial city in the interior. Five years ago, her elderly parents went back to their hometown with many others, but she didn’t. Why had she stayed? Why hadn’t she wanted to go to the big city? She had some impressions of the city from her father’s descriptions of it. These impressions were mostly misty, not very reliable; she had tried hard to synthesize them, but without success. And so when her parents packed their bags and prepared to leave this small frontier town to go back to their old home, she began to feel dizzy. She was even unsteady when she walked. Late at night, for several days before they left, she heard the cracking sound at the riverside: with her bizarre sense of hearing, she knew the sound came from the poplars. These explosions came at intervals until the wee hours. In response to this inauspicious sound, a vague notion gradually occurred to Liujin. When she suggested that she stay behind, her father merely raised his right eyebrow. This was the way he expressed himself whenever something confirmed what he thought. “You’re an adult. It’s your choice.” All of a sudden, Liujin realized that he and Mama had been waiting for her to suggest this: she really was an idiot. So she unpacked her suitcase and put everything back where it belonged. True, she was thirty years old: why did she have to live with her parents? When the train started, her parents didn’t lean out the window. She didn’t know what they were thinking about. But when the last car was about to vanish from view, she suddenly saw clearly the big city in the distance. To be precise, it wasn’t a city, but a large white cloud floating in midair, with mirages in the mist. She even saw the apartment in the tall building where her parents lived. She didn’t know why their window was so dark in the strong light. How had she recognized it? Because her mother’s old-style pleated skirt was hanging in front of the window. On her way back, she walked steadily. She was returning to the home that now belonged to her alone. She trembled a little in excitement.

At first, Liujin wasn’t used to living alone. She sold cloth at the market. Every day when she left the noisy market and returned to the isolated little house, it was dark. For several days in a row, a tiny white wagtail strode hurriedly into her house; the little thing cried out briefly and sharply, as if looking for its companion. After quickly patrolling around inside, it left with a despondent cry. Liujin heard it fly to a tree, where it continued chirping. Had it experienced some tragedy in its life? Sitting under the lamp, she thought about the man who had recently been coming often to the market. He wore glasses, and when he picked up the cloth to look at it, his glasses almost touched the material. Liujin found this amusing. He seemed out of place in the market. He wasn’t like the other shoppers, and he didn’t bring any shopping bags, either. He was dressed like a farmer from the frontier. Of course he wasn’t a farmer; one could see that from the expression in his eyes. He always looked at cloth, but never bought any. Nor did he glance at Liujin. The way he touched the homemade cloth brought about an almost physiological response in Liujin. What kind of person was he? “I’m just looking,” he said, as if imploring Liujin. “Go ahead and look as long as you like,” she replied stiffly. All of a sudden—she didn’t know why—she felt empty inside.

One day, although it was late, the white wagtail hadn’t returned to its nest. It was circling beside a thorny rose bush, singing sadly. Acting on a hunch that something had happened, Liujin walked into the courtyard. She saw the bespectacled man from the market talking with a young woman under the streetlight. Suddenly, the woman screamed and ran away. Looking dizzy, the man leaned against a power pole, closed his eyes, and rested. The wagtail sang even more sadly, as if it were a mother who had lost her daughter. Approaching the man, Liujin said softly, “Tomorrow, I’ll take out a few more bolts of new cloth with a snow lotus pattern. It’s like . . . snow lotus, and yet it isn’t.” When the man heard her talking to him, he relaxed a little and said “Hello.” He turned and looked at her courtyard. Just then, she noticed that the wagtail had disappeared. Without saying anything else, the man left. The way he walked was funny—a little like a horse. Liujin had heard others call him “Mr. Sherman.” Maybe her encounters with him at the market weren’t accidental. Otherwise, why had he appeared in front of her house today? She also remembered the way the young woman had stamped her feet impatiently; at that time, the wagtail was chirping non-stop. Later, Liujin ran into this man in front of her house several times and greeted him properly, calling him “Mr. Sherman.” He always stood there—a little as if he were waiting for someone, for he kept looking at his watch. Liujin wondered if he was waiting for the young woman. Why had he chosen this place? How strange.

With Mr. Sherman showing up, Liujin had more energy. She worked hard tending her garden. Whenever she had a day off, she went into full swing. She planted many chrysanthemums and salvia along the wall—near the thorny rose bushes that were already there. There were still two poplars, one in the front and one in the back of the courtyard. Now she planted a few sandthorn trees: she liked plain trees like this. She also fertilized the grapes. On one of her days off, Mr. Sherman entered her courtyard. Liujin invited him to sit under the grape arbor. She brought out a tea table and placed a tea set on it. Just as they were about to drink tea, the wagtail appeared. It walked quickly back and forth, its tail jumping with each step. It kept chirping. Mr. Sherman paled and craned his neck like a horse and looked out. Finally, without drinking his tea, he apologized and took his leave. Liujin was very puzzled. It was this bird—perhaps it was two or three birds, all of them alike—that particularly puzzled her. Liujin realized she hadn’t seen the young woman again. What was going on between her and Mr. Sherman? Just now as he was sitting here, she had noticed that his right index finger was hurt and was wrapped in a thick bandage. He was dexterous in picking up his teacup with his left hand. Maybe he was left-handed.

By and large, Liujin’s life consisted of going from her home to the market and from the market to her home. On an impulse one night, she walked out and took the street to the riverside. The water level was low, and the small river would soon dry up. The sky was high. She walked along the river in the moonlight. There, she saw the corpses of poplars. She didn’t know if the four or five poplars had died of old age or if they had died unexpectedly. Their tall, straight trunks were ghostly. At first sight, her heart beat quickly. It was hard to muster the nerve to walk over to them. She startled a few willow warblers: their sharp cries made her legs quiver. She turned around and left, walking until she was sweating all over; then finally she looked back. How could the dead poplar trees still be right before her? A shadow emerged from the poplar grove and said, “Ah, are you here, too?” The sound startled her and almost made her faint. Luckily, she recognized her neighbor’s voice. The neighbor wasn’t alone. Behind him was another shadow. It was Mr. Sherman, and he was laughing. As he approached, Mr. Sherman said to Liujin, “When one sees dead trees like this, one shouldn’t run away. If you do, they’ll chase right after you.” The neighbor chimed in, “Mr. Sherman’s telling the truth, Liujin. You haven’t experienced this before, have you?” Even though she was standing in the shadows, Liujin felt her face turn fiery red. Had these two been hiding here long? How had she happened to come here just now? She recalled sitting at the table earlier writing her mother a letter, and being unable to go on writing because her mother’s words kept reverberating in her ears: “. . . Liujin, Liujin. There’s no way for you to come back to us. You’d better take good care of yourself.” Did Mama want her back after so long? She stood up and listened closely for a while to the wagtail’s lonely singing in the courtyard. When she had rushed out the gate, she forgot to close it. Perhaps these two men came here often to study these dead trees, but it was the first time she had ever come here.

“Look, the others are flourishing. It’s only these few trees: Did they commit collective suicide?”

When Mr. Sherman spoke again, his glasses were flashing with light. Liujin looked over at the trees and saw the moon brighten. The other poplars were so beautiful and vivacious that they seemed on the verge of speaking. Only the few dead ones were spooky. Her neighbor, old Song Feiyuan, rammed a shovel against a dead poplar trunk. Liujin noticed that the tree trunk remained absolutely still. Old Song chucked the shovel away and stood dazed in front of the trunk. Mr. Sherman laughed a little drily. Liujin suddenly recalled how wild this neighbor was when he was home. That autumn, this old man had gone crazy and dismantled the rear wall of his house. Luckily, the roof was covered with light couch grass, so the house didn’t collapse. In the winter, he warded off the cold north wind with oilcloth.

“Brother Feiyuan, what are you doing? These trees are dead,” Liujin tried to calm him down. A sound came from the river, as if a large fish had jumped up out of the water.

Liujin was three meters away from the men as she spoke to them. She wanted to get a little closer, but whenever she took a step, they backed up. When she straightened again after bending down to free a grain of sand from her shoe, they had disappeared into the woods. A gust of wind blew over her, and Liujin felt afraid. She turned around to leave, but bumped into a dead tree. After taking a few steps around the dead tree, she bumped into another one. She saw stars and shouted “Ouch!” She looked up and saw that the dead tree trunks, standing close together, were like a wall bending around her and enclosing her. Apart from the sky above, she could see only the dark wall of trees. Frustrated, she sat down on the ground, feeling that the end of the world was approaching. It was really absurd: How had she come here? Fish were still jumping in the little river, but the sound of the water was far away. She buried her head in her hands. She didn’t want to see the tree trunks. She thought it might be her neighbor Song Feiyuan playing tricks. This had to be an illusion, yet how had he and Mr. Sherman caused her to produce such an illusion? She strained to consider this question, but she was too anxious and couldn’t reach a conclusion. Suddenly aware of a strong light, she moved her hands and saw lightning—one bolt after another lit up her surroundings until they shone snow-bright. The dead trees that had closed up around her had now retreated far into the distance. The branches danced solemnly and wildly in the lightning. She stood up and ran home without stopping.

Recalling these events, Liujin felt it was quite natural that the old man had come to her small courtyard. Perhaps it was time for—for what? She wasn’t sure; she only felt vaguely that it had something to do with her parents who were far away. She remembered that the year before he left, her father had also twisted hemp. In the winter, he had sat on the bare courtyard wall: he had watched the activity on the street while twisting hemp. Not many people were on the road then, and there were even fewer vehicles. Father twisted the hemp unhurriedly, and—a hint of a smile floating on his face—gazed at the people passing by. “Dad, do you see someone you know?” Liujin asked. “Ah, no one is a stranger. This is a small town.” Liujin thought to herself, Since every person was familiar, then Father must be taking note of something. What was it? Liujin walked into the courtyard and went over to the wall where her father had often sat. Just then, she heard the sorrowful singing of a bird. The bird was in a nearby nest; perhaps it had lost its children, or perhaps it was hurt, or perhaps nothing had happened. Or was it a pessimist by nature? From its voice, she could tell that the bird was no longer young. Maybe, back then, Father had sat here in order to listen to it. This seemed to be the only spot where one could hear it. What kind of bird was it? She guessed that the nest was built in the poplar tree in back, but when she walked a few steps away, she couldn’t hear the bird. When she returned to her original spot, she could hear it again. If Father had made a companion of it in the winter, it must be a local bird. Could it be an injured goose? If a wild goose had been injured, how could it build a nest in a poplar tree? It did sound a little like a goose. Geese flying south sometimes sounded like this. Whenever Liujin heard geese at night, she couldn’t hold back her tears. It was clearly a cry of freedom, but it sounded to her like the dread that precedes execution. “The sound is directional. You can’t hear it unless you’re in just the right place,” the old man addressed her suddenly and quite distinctly. The hemp in his hands gave off soft silver-white light. “Where did you come from?” Liujin walked over to him. He lowered his head and mumbled, “I can’t remember . . . Look, I am . . .” He broke off. Liujin thought, What kind of person has no memory? Is there a category of people like this? He is . . . who is he? She wanted to move closer to him, but she felt something pull at her right foot and nearly fell down. She was greatly surprised. After regaining her balance, she thought she would try once more—but this time with her left foot. She staggered and ended up sitting on the ground. The old man sat there twisting hemp, as if he hadn’t noticed. Liujin heard herself shout at him angrily, “Who are you?!”

Though it was late at night, a column of horse-drawn carts ran past. This hadn’t happened for years. Liujin had heard that the city was growing, but she’d had no interest in looking at those places. She heard it was expanding toward the east, but the snow mountain was to the east. How could the city expand there? Had a corner of the snow mountain been chopped off? Or were houses being built halfway up the mountain? Liujin had seen snow leopards squatting on a large rock halfway up the mountain: they were graceful and mighty—like the god of the snow mountain. Later, she had dreamed several times of the snow leopards roaring, and at the time, rumbling thunder had echoed from the earth. But even now, she wasn’t sure what snow leopards sounded like. Because it was the weekend, she resolved to watch the old man all night, and find out when he left and where he went. After the sound of the horse-carts disappeared, he stood up. From behind, he looked like a brown bear. He crossed the street and headed for Meng Yu’s home. Meng Yu’s window was lit up. After the old man went in, the young woman, who was singing again, began to wail sadly and shrilly. Liujin heard loud noises coming from the house: Was something going to happen? But after a while it grew quiet and the lamp was also extinguished. After standing there a little longer, she went back to her house and fell asleep. She didn’t know when daylight came. The night seemed long, very long.

What had happened that night in Meng Yu’s home? Liujin couldn’t see any clues. She walked over to his courtyard and saw the filthy sheep. Meng Yu, who was old, was repairing his boots. He was wearing glasses and absorbed in hammering; sweat seeped from his forehead.

“Sir, was the person who went to your home last night looking for a place to stay?” Liujin sat down on a stone stool beside him.

Meng Yu looked up at her and shook his head. He put down his boot-repairing tools and sighed deeply. The young woman’s silhouette paused briefly in the doorway, and then she went back inside. She did odd jobs for Meng Yu’s family.

“As soon as he arrived, it was as if Amy was possessed,” he said.

Amy was the young woman’s nickname. What was the old man’s connection to her? Meng Yu said, “Maybe they’re from the same town.” Liujin had rarely gotten a good look at Amy’s face because she always worked with her head lowered. Even at the market, she was immersed in the flock of sheep, as if she, too, were a sheep waiting to be slaughtered. She liked to wear a red skirt. Liujin thought of her as a rare beauty. So, where had the old man gone that night? She had distinctly seen him go through the gate of Meng Yu’s home, and then Amy had sadly and shrilly cried out in fear.

Liujin glanced sideways at the sheep. She couldn’t bear the doleful expression in their eyes. She couldn’t figure out, either, how they had gotten so dirty: it was as though they had rolled around in the mud. This made her hate Meng Yu; she thought he was heartless. He had likely lied to her; probably the old man who twisted hemp was hiding in his home and came out only at night. Maybe he was Amy’s father. But everyone said Amy was an orphan. The sheep were still looking at her without making a sound. Liujin thought it would be much better if they bleated.

“Liujin, look, has any unknown person ever come here?”

As Meng Yu spoke, he was looking down, oiling his boots. Liujin thought and thought, and then said, “No.”

“Hey, then he must be somebody from somewhere. Let’s go inside and sit down, okay?”

When she went through the courtyard and into the house with Meng Yu, the sheep turned around and headed toward them. She held up her hand to ward off their pitiful eyes. His small house was in the old style. Because it was mostly empty, it looked spacious. He didn’t ask her to be seated. He was standing, too. Facing the courtyard, Liujin saw a red skirt appear in the flock of sheep: the sheep were surrounding her and starting to utter sorrowful cries. It was wondrous.

“How’s everything with you and Mr. Sherman?” the old man asked, turning his attention to her.

“It hasn’t made any headway. I don’t understand him.” Liujin was staring blankly.

“Hunh. You need to be patient.”

Liujin didn’t know why he said she needed to be patient. Or why he had spoken so assuredly of “everything with you and Mr. Sherman.” There was nothing between her and Mr. Sherman. He went to her courtyard now and then for some tea, that’s all there was to it. But it was hard to say: maybe there really was something between them. Was Mr. Sherman a bachelor? Liujin couldn’t say. Feeling ill at ease in this empty house, she took her leave. When she went out, she noticed the old man staring sharply at the woman clad in the red skirt in the courtyard, and she sensed the strained atmosphere in this neighbor’s home. When she reached the courtyard gate and turned around, Amy was pointing toward a sheep with a knife. Liujin didn’t dare look and took off hurriedly. Liujin recalled that this family had had a tough time of it. On the outside, they looked docile, even a little weak. She couldn’t imagine that they could be so brave inside. Apparently they weren’t going to tell her anything. She’d have to wait until late at night and ask the old man.

Just now, when the old geezer Meng Yu mentioned Mr. Sherman, Liujin had felt a little rush of emotion. Over the last several years, she had been involved with all kinds of men. When her parents were still here, she didn’t want these men to come to her home; instead, she used to meet them at the Snow Mountain Hotel in the foothills of the mountain. Standing on the balcony, she and her lover could sometimes see the snow leopards drinking from the small brook halfway up the mountain. That was the main reason she chose this place. Once, she and her boyfriend (a geography teacher) went to the wild animal preserve. It was almost dark, and she said to the geography teacher, “I’d really like to be friends with the snow leopards. I get excited when I think of their massive claws. You can leave, I’m staying.” The geography teacher then dragged her forcibly out of the wild animal preserve. As soon as they got back to the hotel, she felt a nameless anger rising from the bottom of her heart, and the next day she broke up with him. They left the hotel separately. She had a romantic memory, too: it was about the wild geese. Liujin told her boyfriend, “Most of all, I like listening to geese honking on a clear night.” They didn’t know whether the geese would pass through here, so they walked to the distant fields and waited. As they walked and walked, Liujin felt that she and her boyfriend had merged into one person. The first few times, they encountered only desert birds. Later, when they were paying no attention, a leisurely cry came from high above. The two of them embraced tightly and shed tears. That man was a stone carver with a wife and two children. It had been years since Liujin had gone to the Snow Mountain Hotel. She imagined that she had become a snow leopard squatting on the large rock.

Snow Mountain Hotel was well-known locally. To attract business, it later placed a cage in the lobby; the cage held a young snow leopard. Although it wasn’t large, it looked fierce. Guests passing by the cage were a little afraid. They didn’t understand why the hotel owners thought this would attract them. Liujin had also stopped next to the cage and exchanged glances with the young snow leopard. She discovered that communicating with it was impossible because of its vacant eyes. It seemed it couldn’t see the people surrounding it. One couldn’t be sure what it was looking at. The last time Liujin went there, she found the large hotel had disappeared without a trace. A skating rink had been built where it once stood, but the skating rink had no ice, and the main entrance was closed. She and her boyfriend had to stay in a small hotel at the edge of the city. In those days, whenever she mentioned Snow Mountain Hotel, the person with whom she was talking hemmed and hawed and changed the subject. “Snow Mountain Hotel—did such a hotel actually exist? That’s a weird name.” Liujin was puzzled; she suspected there was something fishy about this hotel’s disappearance. She got in touch with her ex-boyfriend to discuss it with him, but he avoided the subject, too, saying, “Recently, I haven’t given much thought to those times.” She thought: she wasn’t suggesting resuming their old affair. Not at all. Why was he being so touchy? Or perhaps he wasn’t touchy: maybe he was simply afraid of talking about the hotel. Had there been a major homicide case there, and the hotel was then destroyed? This speculation horrified her. Once, back then, someone had attacked her in the carpeted corridor in the hotel. He had pretended to spray her in the face with gas. But she didn’t fall down; she was just dazed for a second. When she came to, the perpetrator had disappeared. She had told her boyfriend. He said he’d seen this from a distance and had run along the corridor to save her, but when he’d made it only halfway, the bad guy disappeared. Perhaps there was a secret passageway in the middle of the corridor. That night, the two of them held each other tightly, trembling. They couldn’t sleep. Snow Mountain Hotel gradually faded from their memories, but the mystery had never been solved.

“May I ask your name, sir?” Liujin asked the old man sitting at the courtyard gate.

The old man mumbled for a while, and then spat out several distinct words: “My name is Meng. Meng Yu.”

“How can you be Meng Yu? That’s the name of the old man across the street.”

“Hunh. That is I.”

Liujin recalled that Meng Yu seemed to know something about this man’s background. Apparently he was watching out for him. Was he a ghost from Meng Yu’s past life? Why did he have the same name? Liujin didn’t believe him. She thought this man might be a little crazy. He wasn’t twisting hemp tonight. In the moonlight, he was weaving a purse out of colored ribbons. He was good at two crafts. He could weave without looking. Liujin imagined that he was a huge silkworm spinning its own beautiful cocoon.

“So, Uncle Meng Yu, where do you live?” She wasn’t giving up.

The words he spat out next became indistinct again. In the distance, Liujin heard a wolf cub trying out its voice. It was a little hoarse and a little hesitant. Inwardly, she cheered it on. All at once, she had an idea: were these two persons actually one person? Right! She had never seen them at the same time. But that one was a wizened old geezer, and this one was strong and stocky. They had nothing in common except for their name. Anyhow, it was hard to say. She hadn’t gotten a good look at the old man at the gate, had she? He might have been disguised. She’d heard that the wolf that had disappeared for years was once more active around here. Wolves frequently showed up in this little town. Uncle Meng Yu walked around late at night. Wasn’t he afraid? “Wolves,” Liujin couldn’t help saying. Glancing sharply at her, the old geezer said, “Hunh.”

Liujin saw Meng Yu’s wife—the woman other people called “Mrs.”—pass by. What was she doing here in the middle of the night? She was carrying a bamboo basket filled with fried bread. After setting the basket down next to this geezer’s feet, she glided away. Liujin withdrew to the back of the grape arbor and sat down amid the irises. Just then, the old woman reappeared at the door. She yelled, “She’s Mr. Sherman’s woman. What are you thinking?” The bear-like old uncle stood up and snarled at the old woman. Although Liujin couldn’t understand a word he said, her heart was thumping like a drum. It was really scary: she had been trapped by the hunter, and however hard she struggled, she couldn’t break free without losing an arm or a leg. How could this old uncle, whom she had never met before, yet felt some affection for, have such a complicated relationship with Meng Yu’s family? She wanted to shout at him: “WHERE DO YOU COME FROM?” But many wolves began howling at once. And then the “Mrs.” disappeared. Some raindrops were falling from the clear sky. The old uncle staggered to his feet and headed out. Liujin noticed that he wasn’t going to Meng Yu’s home. He walked east down the middle of the street. He moved like a sleepwalker. The moon was bright, and another flock of geese flew past. The sounds reverberating in the sky made her think of her parents in the tall building in the industrial city. The letter she received from her mother the day before had said marriage was predestined. Was she hinting about this Mr. Sherman? But Liujin wasn’t sure what Mr. Sherman was really like. What impressed her most about him was the way he touched the cloth at the market. That made her speculate that this kind of man must be deeply interested in making love. But her general impression of him was vague: he wasn’t like the geography teacher, nor was he like the stonecutter. Liujin didn’t know what to think of him; she wasn’t at all sure of her feelings. God knows, she had never thought of him in a romantic way. Why did the people around her assume she did? And did this man really think of her in that way?

She bent down and picked up the basket of fried bread and threw it into the trash can. After a few seconds, she even threw the basket in. She was afraid of such things and afraid of everything connected with that family. Could Uncle Meng Yu and the old man Meng Yu really be the same person? How ridiculous. That courtyard was always crowded with sheep and goats. If you wanted to see anyone in the family, you had to squeeze past these dirty animals. And the people in the family seemed to always know all the secrets in this little town. Although they were very quiet, Liujin didn’t think the tension in the courtyard had ever relaxed. The house was gloomy inside. She recalled the encounter that night in the poplar grove: What kind of hatred did Song Feiyuan feel for the dead trees?

She returned to her room, where—under the lamplight—she saw her father looking seriously at her from his photograph on the wall. A little animal had stopped on the glass on the left side of his face, so his face appeared to have a dark scar. Oh, it was a little gecko! Liujin loathed mosquitoes and flies, but loved geckoes. Sometimes, she caught geckoes in the garden and brought them back to her room. She called them “the insect cleaners.” But tonight, this small thing made her father’s face look a little fierce. She whisked the small critter with a feather duster several times, but it didn’t move! Such an obstinate little creature. When she sat down, her father was still staring at her. She hadn’t looked at this photo for such a long time that she had almost forgotten it. So, had her father not forgotten her, or had she subconsciously not forgotten her father? In the few days before leaving, Father had frequently looked at the garden in a daze, but he hadn’t even glanced at her. It was as though he’d forgotten he was leaving Pebble Town. A few days later, he had left without looking back. He hadn’t turned around to look at her when boarding the train, either. Liujin thought she must have inherited her father’s disposition, so she shouldn’t expect—what on earth had she ever expected? “Dad, Dad,” she cried out in her mind, a little absently, a little sentimentally. In the blink of an eye, the small gecko dropped to the floor. She walked over quickly, bent down, and picked it up. But it was dead. When Liujin looked up at her father once more, his eyes had clouded over.

She walked into the courtyard again and buried the gecko under the irises. It was after midnight when she finished, yet she was still fully awake. She spied the shadows of several people on the ground. Who were they? Who was standing next to the poplar? No one. There was no one at all. But then whose shadows were they? Several shadows were next to the steps at the entrance, too. In the bright moonlight, the edges of the shadows were sharply focused. How strange. Looking toward the right, she found several more at the courtyard entrance—and they were moving inside. Liujin rushed back to the house and closed and bolted the door. She leaned against the door, shut her eyes, and recalled the scene just now. Then she lay down, but she didn’t dare turn the light off. She kept watching the window, waiting and waiting. Those things made no noise. She didn’t believe in ghosts. Then what were these shadows? Could shadows exist by themselves? Thinking about these gloomy topics, she felt that the deeper she went, the less control she had. Finally, she could only drop into a whirling abyss.

Holding up the piece of homemade cloth, Mr. Sherman smelled it and then smelled it again, as though he were going to devour it. Liujin noticed that one of his ears was moving. “This design is not readily available. People say that the printing and dyeing process is difficult,” Liujin commented.

“Ah, I know. My family does this kind of work!” He laughed, and his glasses flashed with light.

“Oh, I see. You’re a professional.”

Mr. Sherman was embarrassed. He put the cloth down and hurriedly departed, saying he had to buy groceries. Liujin wondered if she’d said something wrong. He didn’t really seem interested in her, so how had the old man Meng Yu reached his conclusion? There was a commotion in the market, and some people surged toward the exit. A child said, “Wolf!” and an adult covered the child’s mouth. How could wolves come to such a populated place? What nonsense! Liujin had thought for years that people coming to this market tended to rush around impulsively. Once—no one knew who had spread this rumor—it was said that a certain stall was handing out free soda pop, and people had hustled over there. Many people collapsed from heatstroke, and one person was actually trampled to death by people squeezing past. All day long that day, Liujin smelled disinfectant. Her nausea made her hiccup. When Liujin sold cloth, she usually didn’t dare look at her customers. She thought the customers in this market were too mean, and she’d better keep her distance. Now, when she looked up, the market was deserted. A large pool of blood had formed in the circle of chairs in the center of the market where people took their breaks. She didn’t know if it was animal blood or human blood. Or was there really a wolf?! Her boss was smoking non-stop. He was in low spirits as he said, “There won’t be any more business today. These hooligans!” “Who’s a hooligan?” “Who? The people who start rumors!” “What’s that blood?” “It isn’t blood. It’s fake!” He raised his voice sharply and angrily. The shopkeepers on either side of him craned their necks uneasily to look at him. He sat down again dejectedly, and complained to Liujin, “People are sneaky! You might as well go home now.”

Liujin had no sooner left the market than she noticed that the people hadn’t gone far. They were congregated next to the square, looking on. She was disgusted with their behavior. Among them were many regular customers who came here every day. Why were they so harebrained today? Did they really believe the wolves had come here? Impossible! She deliberately walked into their midst to find out what they were saying. But they weren’t saying anything; they just silently made way for her. Wherever she walked, people got out of the way. A little girl called to her.

“Sister Liujin, someone asked me how to get to your house. I told him.” This was Xiyu, a harelipped child.

“What did he look like? How old was he?”

“He . . . I’m not sure. He isn’t from around here. He kept looking back while he was walking.”

Liujin’s heart leapt. Could this be a messenger from her father?

The person looked comical. He wore green canvas pants, and a “shirt” plaited from elm leaves. He appeared to be only about sixteen years old. Just now, he’d been squatting in the salvia. If you glanced at him quickly, you might take him for a shrub.

“Who are your parents? Your clothes are really funny!” Liujin said good-naturedly.

“I’m not a child, sister Liujin,” he said seriously, and then all of a sudden he smiled, revealing small, white, protruding canine teeth. “As for my clothes, I traded with someone at the foot of the snow mountain. I gave him all of my bricks of tea—a full load of tea. I came here from the interior to sell tea.”

“My god. What will you tell your parents when you go home?” Liujin wrinkled her eyebrows.

“I like it here so much that I’m not going back.”

“How did you know my name?”

“It’s a secret. But don’t worry. I won’t bother you. I just came to take a look at you. Goodbye!”

When he walked off, the elm leaves rustled. He looked really funny. Liujin followed him and watched from the gate: he crossed the street to Meng Yu’s home. Was it a coincidence that he also went to Meng Yu’s? Five or six cellophane candy wrappers littered the area near the salvia. Liujin thought, This kid really likes candy!

While she was deep in thought under the grape arbor, Mr. Sherman entered the courtyard with a basket of groceries. Liujin thought back to the commotion at the market and tried to guess where he had gone then. Mr. Sherman sat down, took off his glasses, and wiped them with a handkerchief. Because he was very nearsighted, Liujin assumed he couldn’t see anything without his glasses, but—pointing at the candy wrappers—he asked who had thrown them there. Liujin told him it was a kid whom she didn’t know, probably an outsider.

“An outsider?” Mr. Sherman’s voice became sharp and unpleasant. “I’m an outsider, too.”

Liujin thought this was ridiculous. What was wrong with Mr. Sherman?

“I used to live on the other side of the snow mountain.” His voice softened. “Our family dyed cloth. We didn’t have a dye-works business. It was only a hobby. Do you understand?”

He put on his glasses and watched Liujin’s reaction.

Liujin nodded her head vigorously and said, “I think I understand. I sold out of the cloth you were looking at in no time. What kind of blue was it? I can’t remember the word. You must know.”

A frog jumped a few times in his grocery basket, then leapt out and away. It had never crossed Liujin’s mind that such a gentle man would eat frogs—how strange, how barbaric. As the two of them sat in silence, the wagtail that she hadn’t seen for a long time reappeared. Taking small swift strides, it shuttled through the flowers, but it didn’t sing. Liujin felt awkward and impolite, so she forced herself to say something, “Your frog . . .”

“Did it run off?” A smile floated on his face. “Then water is flowing underground here. It heard it. Frogs are very intelligent.”

He slammed the basket upside down on the ground, and all the frogs struggled to free themselves and hopped off. They were everywhere. He laughed innocently. Liujin felt tense.

“I hear that you not only sell cloth, but help your boss stock it—that you know a lot about the merchandise. The snow mountain has been melting slowly for years. On clear days, I can see the snow mountain better by taking off my glasses. I wonder what sort of myopia I have.”

Liujin hadn’t realized that this person had paid so much attention to her, and so her heart fluttered a little. His protruding eyes were really a little unearthly. He seemed able to see some things, and was blind to other things. What sort of person was he? Was the young woman—the one who had quarreled with him—his lover? It seemed so. So why did he come here? Maybe he was lonely and just wanted someone to talk with. Just then, the wagtail ran up next to her feet, and Mr. Sherman enjoyed this scene from behind his thick lenses. Liujin even felt love radiating from his eyes, but she warned herself: this can’t be true!

He bent over, picked up the basket, and said he must go. “Your courtyard is really nice.” He looked greatly refreshed.

After he left, Liujin wanted to find the frogs, but she couldn’t, not even one. They were hiding. Liujin envisioned the chorus in this courtyard on a rainy day: she was enchanted by this image. Did his behavior suggest affection, or was this a prank? Liujin could never distinguish between the two. It was like the night in the poplar grove. Mr. Sherman was an unusual person. He said the snow mountain was melting; this was probably true. The climate was certainly getting warmer and the environment was becoming polluted. In the market, she always smelled the rotting corpses of animals. Once, in a corner, someone had swept out a large nest of dead rats. No one had poisoned them; they had simply died. It was scary. Liujin felt that everyone smelled of corpses.

Liujin missed Mr. Sherman. She hadn’t thought of him before, though she had known him for a long time. Although she tried hard, she could only recall the twinkling gaze behind his thick lenses. Sometimes, when she came upon Mr. Sherman abruptly, she felt he was ugly and unbearably vulgar. Sometimes, she felt he was manly, gritty, and decisive—making him attractive in an unusual way. Outside the window, the wagtail resumed singing. Liujin thought, This little bird is a messenger between us. The scene under the grape arbor just now had struck her heart like a warm current. The woman who did odd jobs for the Meng Yu family started to sing again: “Snow lotus blossoms, the snow lotus blossoms that open deep in the mountains . . .” Her hoarse voice was an inauspicious omen. Where had this beautiful woman come from? Had both of the Meng Yu geezers fallen in love with her? Did both of them want to control her? One day the year before, Liujin saw her appear silently in the flock of sheep in Meng Yu’s courtyard. She had thought she was a visiting relative of the family. Somehow, Liujin felt that Pebble Town had a big heart. All kinds of strange people could find places to fit in. Liujin, who had been brought up here, didn’t know whether other cities (for example, her parents’ large city) were the same. Was this a virtue? Perhaps it was—if she could solve the puzzle about those people.

Liujin bent down next to the girl and asked, “What are you looking at, Xiyu?”

“Your courtyard wall. You don’t know that someone has made a hole on it, do you? It was that boy.”

“I know. Don’t worry about it. I’ll give you some grapes to take back with you.”

“Thank you, sister Liujin.”

The little girl hopped when she walked, much like a frog. The frogs had disappeared from the courtyard without a trace. Or maybe they had gone into the groundwater that Mr. Sherman had mentioned. When the girl reached the gate, she turned around and stood there looking at her. When Liujin asked her what she was looking at, she said someone was standing behind Liujin.

“Xiyu, your imagination is running wild. Who do you see?”

“I don’t see. I hear him.”

Frowning, Liujin thought this over. When she was about to ask her again, the child had already walked away. She started examining the courtyard wall, looking at it section by section, but she didn’t notice anything suspicious. The little girl must have been teasing her. What did she think of Liujin? In her eyes, a thirty-five-year-old single woman must be much too odd. She went back to the house, picked up a pen, and wrote to her mother. After she’d written of some ordinary household matters, she couldn’t go on writing. She looked up to see rain beating against the window. Outside, the gorgeous sun shone high in the sky. Where had the rain come from? She walked outside and discovered that the young boy wearing leaves was pouring water on her window with a watering can.

Liujin was both annoyed and amused. She charged up, grabbed his watering can, and berated him: “You aren’t selling tea leaves. You’ve come here to make trouble. Where do you live? What’s your name?” The kid didn’t answer; he was still staring at the old-fashioned watering can. A mischievous idea struck Liujin. She raised the watering can and poured water over the boy’s head. He stood there, unmoving, as she watered him thoroughly. He mopped his wet face with his hand, and looked curiously at the furnishings in her house.

“Go in and change your clothes.”

Taking the boy’s hand, Liujin went inside with him.

She told him to go to the bathroom and take a bath. She got out her father’s old shirt and a pair of underpants for him.

But the child bathed for a long time without emerging. Suspicious, Liujin knocked on the door. There was no answer. She opened the door: he had left, maybe by climbing out the window. The old clothes were still lying on the chair.

Liujin sat down, stupefied, at the desk, and said to the wall in front of her, “Look at how lonely I am.” But without knowing why, she wrote in the letter, “. . . Mama, life here is rich and colorful!” She’d been writing that letter for a long time, and she kept feeling she couldn’t go on writing. She couldn’t picture her mother’s face. Who was she really writing to? Had her mother really written back, ever? Inside Liujin’s drawer were many letters from her mother. She was convinced that the words didn’t convey her mother’s ideas, but were from the dark shadow behind her mother—her father—because her mother had never paid attention to her. But the letters were actually in her mother’s writing. For the most part, the letters didn’t ask about her life, but simply described Father’s and her hopes for old age. “Your father and I hope to walk around the city on a rainy day.” “We hope to come back to the snow mountain and talk with the snow leopards.” “We hope we can melt into a wisp of black smoke in this smoky city.” “Today we swam in the river. We wanted to be able to walk on water through exercising.” “We . . . we will not vanish, not ever.” But words like these were inserted into much longer letters, in the middle of confused descriptions of the city. Only someone like Liujin could extract their meaning. Now and then, she would ask herself: What is this correspondence for? Her parents didn’t seem to think of her at all, nor did they care whether or not she married: they hadn’t even asked about this. However, another kind of concern showed up between the lines or in ambiguous expressions. Then after all, they still thought about this daughter. What was it that they were concerned about? Liujin couldn’t figure it out; she just felt bewildered. So when she took up her pen, she wrote strange words. When she wrote them, what she thought of were the poplar grove, the filthy sheep, the mysterious woman in the red skirt, and the old man twisting hemp in the starlight. “Mama, I, I am not one person!” Not one person? How many persons was she? She remembered an adventure from her childhood. She and her father had gone to the Gobi Desert. The whole time, they had walked along the periphery of the Gobi. Suddenly, dozens of sand birds dropped from the sky and fell onto their heads, shoulders, and next to their feet. The little things chirped, and pecked their heads and clothes, as if they had a grievance against them. Liujin noticed that in the blink of an eye the golden-red sun had darkened and the wind had picked up. Many people were shouting her and her father’s names. That was the first time that she, at the age of twelve, had found herself surrounded by a lot of invisible people. Waving her hands, she vigorously drove the birds away. She felt completely at a loss. As for her father, he unexpectedly left her and walked alone toward the west. An inner darkness struck her: she thought she was going to be abandoned in this rough, barren land. The birds had arrived suddenly, and they vanished just as suddenly. “Hey—” she shouted desperately. Thank God, Father reappeared before long: hands behind him, he walked calmly toward her, as though nothing had happened. Now, as she wrote this sentence, she heard a reverberation at the earth’s core. She felt that Pebble Town was a slumbering city. Every day, some people and things were revived in the wind. They came to life suddenly and unexpectedly. That’s right. Liujin recalled her neighbors, she recalled her several lovers who were struggling in loneliness, she recalled Mr. Sherman whom she hadn’t known long. It was as though each of them had emerged from the earth’s core: they came with some features of old times that were incomprehensible to her. Thinking of these enigmas, she didn’t know how to go on writing her letter. “The wind blows as usual, the sun rises as usual.” As if in a fit of pique, she wrote, “How many more things will emerge from the grottoes in the snow mountain?” With this inexplicable question, she ended the letter. Someone entered the room. It was the girl Xiyu. In profile, there was nothing wrong with Xiyu’s lips. How come? And looking again from the front, you still didn’t notice anything wrong until she started talking.

“Sister Liujin, have you ever seen Mongolian wolves?”

Liujin noticed the dark hole in her little mouth and turned her head away so that she wouldn’t have to see it.

“I, I have to go to the post office,” she said as she tidied the desk.

Xiyu climbed onto the desk, and turned her mouth toward Liujin again, as though forcing her to look at it.

“A Mongolian wolf carried my little brother off in its mouth.”

“You’re hallucinating.” Liujin glanced at her and went on, “There aren’t any Mongolian wolves here. Mongolia is far away. As for your little brother, I saw him this morning. He was nursing at your mother’s breast.”

“He was nursing? I was thinking just now that a wolf had carried him off.”

She dangled her two thin legs from the desk, and cupped her chin in her hands and worried. Earlier, Liujin had wanted to ask her about the boy wearing leaves. Looking at her now, she gave up that idea.

What immense, weighty worries were packed into this little girl’s heart? How did she get through each day? But Liujin also felt that the little girl wasn’t pessimistic.

“Oh, sister Liujin, I saw them. A lot of them are in your house!”

“Who?”

“Mongolian wolves. Their shadows are all over the wall on this side. One is really large. It’s like a hill squatting there.”

“I have to go to the post office.”

The girl jumped down and ran out. Lost in thought, Liujin sealed the letter and stamped it, but she didn’t feel like going out to mail it. This little imp Xiyu had reminded her of something. Liujin had never seen Mongolian wolves, but as a child, she had heard many legends about them—most about carrying off children and bringing them up in a pack of wolves. She wondered if the wolves seen recently in the market had been Mongolian wolves. Had they crossed the snow mountain and come here? The children of Pebble Town were always fooling around on the streets, even late at night. So it wouldn’t be surprising if they had been carried off by wolves. Perhaps the older children had been eaten, and the little ones had become wolf children. Liujin found these thoughts fascinating and began imagining the lives of the wolf children.

The letter lay conspicuously on the table. Looking at it, Liujin started connecting it with the wolves. In her imagination, Mongolian wolves also showed up in Smoke City. What fun it would be if her wizened father galloped on a wolf’s back. “Dad, Dad, you mustn’t get down!” she shouted to herself. This vision gave Liujin some faith in the letter she had just written. She slipped it into her handbag and made up her mind to go to the post office. When she locked the door, something stirred inside the house. No matter, she thought. Without turning around, she went out to the street.

After dropping the letter into the mailbox, she ran into a neighbor, Auntie Lu. Auntie Lu was her mother’s good friend.

“Why do I always think your mother has come back?” As she talked, Auntie Lu massaged her swollen eyes, as if she wasn’t awake.

“She hasn’t. Auntie Lu, where are you going?”

“Me? I’m walking all around to have a look. I’m thinking of these children’s problems. Those wolves really did come in the night. My granddaughter didn’t come home all night. This morning, she rushed in and yelled that she was hungry!”

Auntie Lu disappeared around the corner, and all at once Liujin felt empty. Auntie Lu seemed to think that her mother still showed up frequently. Liujin didn’t know what Auntie Lu, who was a local, thought of Mother. The sight of Mother and Auntie Lu wearing headscarves and walking together to work flashed out from Liujin’s memory. Back then, Auntie Lu was a little neurotic: she kept turning back to see what was behind her. Why did this old auntie feel that Mother had come back? Was it . . . She didn’t dare continue this thought. She felt her words were incomprehensible. She wanted to recall what she had written to her mother, but she couldn’t remember a single sentence.

When she was almost home, Liujin saw the woman from Meng Yu’s staring idiotically at the passersby on the street. This didn’t happen often, since she ordinarily did all she could to avoid other people. Curious, Liujin walked over at once to greet her. “Are you homesick?” Surprised by her own words, Liujin felt awkward. With a slight smile, Amy shook her head. “No.” Liujin thought that Amy’s Mona Lisa smile could easily captivate men. She asked, “Where is your home?” She was surprised that the woman wasn’t evasive and talked on and on. She said her home was on the other side of the snow mountain, and that she had a father and brother. Her home wasn’t a regular house, but just a few thatched rooms. The family cut firewood for a living. Woodcutters had nearly disappeared now, but her father and brother loved working deep in the mountain and didn’t want to give it up. Back then, her mother worried every day at dusk, for she was afraid that the snow leopards had attacked father and son. It was difficult to imagine how impoverished her family was. Sometimes they couldn’t even afford lamp oil. For years, she had thought of coming out to see the world, but she was afraid. This went on until one day Uncle Meng Yu had come to her home, and brought her here.

“You’re lonely here, aren’t you?”

“No, no!” she vehemently retorted. “I like this place best of all!”

Amy’s eyes opened like two flowers, and Liujin saw purity surging up in them. Remembering her shrill sad singing at night, Liujin sensed an even more immense enigma. She didn’t know what to talk about, so she said goodbye and left. The whole time, Amy was smiling slightly—a smile with the faint scent of pine trees after rain. Liujin felt that she herself had acted like an idiot.

For no reason, Liujin thought that Mr. Sherman would come, and so she tidied the flower garden. It was odd that she didn’t find even one frog. Now she recognized that Mr. Sherman’s letting the frogs out was premeditated. Even though they were already good friends and the two of them had drunk tea together many times in her garden, Liujin still didn’t have one solid feeling about this man who attracted her. Nor had she dreamed of him. She took note of one thing: whenever guests sat in her cane chair, the chair creaked for a long time. The heavier the person was, the more the chair creaked. But Mr. Sherman was different: when he sat down, he and the chair fused into one. The old, old chair just groaned a little and then fell silent. He harmonized so perfectly with it that it was as though this burly middle-aged man had grown into the chair. Because of this, Liujin couldn’t help the deepening affection she felt for him. The grapes had almost all been picked, summer was drawing to a close, and Liujin felt on edge somewhere deep in her soul. But Mr. Sherman didn’t come that day. He didn’t come until the next day. When Liujin saw him appear at the courtyard gate, she was like the saying “Dry Mother Earth is thirsting for rain.” She actually blushed.

“The frogs have gone underground, Liujin.” When he talked, a hint of absentmindedness skimmed over his face.

“Really? Here?” Liujin’s voice was merry.

“Really. Right under your courtyard. Otherwise, why would I have set them free here?”

“Then, do you know where they come out? What’s it like underground?”

“No. I don’t know. Maybe from the vent under your house? I’m not sure.”

He continued to stand, and so Liujin had to stand, too. They listened to the frogs in their imaginations. As the sky gradually darkened, Mr. Sherman’s face blurred. She felt that his arm resting on the courtyard wall was unusually long—like a gibbon’s. Suddenly, Liujin thought of her faraway parents, and yearning welled up in her heart. The air vent? A very long time ago, at night, she and her father had actually squatted at the vent under the house and listened; back then, however, it was just like now—they didn’t hear anything. Yet, it wasn’t that they heard nothing: she and her father heard her mother talking nonsense in the house. Her mother kept stupidly imitating a crowing rooster. Whenever she heard it, she wanted to laugh. Her father was critical of her attitude. Mr. Sherman really wasn’t sure where the frogs were. What made him think the frogs were underground? He must have experienced many things that Liujin hadn’t come in contact with. She had encountered his unearthliness in the poplar grove. At the time, she had felt that he came and went mysteriously, and that he was very shrewd. Perhaps it was just because of his shrewdness that it was a long time before she felt affection for him. She was a little afraid and meant to keep her distance.

“I really want a garden of my own.” As Mr. Sherman talked, he removed his thick glasses and wiped them. The two lenses swayed in the moonlight, gleaming like bewitching mirrors. Seeing this, Liujin’s passion for him waned. How could she fathom the ideas of a person like this? Just then, Mr. Sherman laughed softly.

“What are you laughing at?” Liujin was a little annoyed.

“I’m remembering that when I was a child I went barefoot chasing frogs. Frogs were my good friends, but they always teased me.”

Then he put on his glasses and took his leave. Liujin remembered that she had forgotten to even give him the tea that she had prepared. What did she know of this man? Only that his family dyed cloth and lived on the other side of the snow mountain. That’s what he had told her. Liujin went back to sit under the grape arbor, and finished the cup of cold tea. For a moment, she seemed to hear the sound of water, but it was merely an illusion. Turning around, she saw the light on in her house. Had she turned it on earlier, or had it gone on automatically? She definitely hadn’t turned it on, and at the time it wasn’t dark yet. She didn’t want to think about these things. She was too tired. Maybe she should think of some happy, tangible things. Then, what was tangible? It seemed that the beautiful woman in Meng Yu’s home was. That red skirt was so gorgeous, as was that delicate, dreamlike face. That was beauty. And her midnight singing. That, too, was beauty. The magpies and the wagtails weren’t out yet; the courtyard was so quiet that it made her nervous. She decided that she would ask Amy some questions next time. Would Amy let her get close? She was so beautiful that she didn’t seem like a person of this world. Besides, the murderous-looking atmosphere in Meng Yu’s courtyard deliberately kept people away . . . Neighbors, neighbors: What kind of people are you? She felt weary again. The light in the house wasn’t terribly bright. It seemed to be covered with a layer of gauze. Liujin assumed some little insects were flying in the lamplight, as usual, and the gecko had probably also emerged. It was another world inside.