But never mind who took who, or which way they skinned the cat; Uncle "did" what needed to be done. In the ten long years after their marriage, Wu Yuhua gave birth to five children, and three survived. That was another reason why his life went from bad to worse.
Through three hard years, faced with the endless ridicule of the women, Uncle could endure, but Wu Yuhua couldn't.
One night she said pleasantly to him, "I heard Old Hu was demoted to the town commune. You fought together, why not go and talk to him?"
Uncle had fallen so far, he barely had any male dignity left. He could only answer with one word: "No."
Then they both turned their heads away, and lay back to back, without another word.
Apparently Wu Yuhua wept all night. The next day when she got up, she snapped her wooden comb in her hair, and then leapt up and ran all the way to the commune.
After just a few years' work in Wuliang, Wu Yuhua had worn away all of her beauty. She was so thin, she looked like a preying mantis. Nothing was left but a pair of long poles for legs.
That day when she suddenly picked those long pole legs up and ran down to the commune, she had a real fit, crying and screaming. She said Old Hu was a cheat, no better than her husband (he was the head of the county armed forces, who had lent Uncle the Jeep). She even lay in the doorway of the commune, and trampled a pair of trousers into the floor. Finally she made enough of a scene that Old Hu, the demoted army head, came out, and the veins were standing out on his face. Her tantrum won a victory for Uncle.
Afterwards, thanks to the work of Old Hu, Uncle was treated as a disabled veteran (he had seven wounds), and every month he was given a Wounded and Disabled Subsidy of seven yuan.
Uncle was both my benefactor and my enemy.
Seven days after I was born, he stood in the middle of the village under a locust tree covered in Chinese New Year flowers, and held me high up in a cloth bundle. "From now on," he said, "This child belongs to the whole village."
Of course this was after he became the village Party secretary.
He became Party secretary four years after moving into Wu Yuhua's home. It was after the Great Leap Forward, when the previous secretary was dismissed on the charge of "private embezzlement and concealed production" . As a man who had rendered meritorious service, Uncle became the new secretary. It was winter, and only carrots were left in the earth. The afore-mentioned "concealed production" was concealed carrots. After Uncle became secretary, he continued to conceal production, and what he concealed was also none other than carrots. The only difference was, he didn't take the carrots back to his own house. He just got others to cut all the leaves off the carrots in the ground, to give the commune cadres the impression that the area was spotless and clear. Then in the middle of the night he would lead a group to harvest the carrots, bit by bit, just taking what they would eat that same day, not leaving even a fart behind.
But Uncle's private embezzlement and concealed production were discovered. The head of the commune armed forces, Old Hu, led a working group to visit the village. His face stern and his tone harsh, he told Uncle, "You're this close mate. You're walking on a minefield!"
Uncle played dumb. "A minefield? Laid by the Americans?"
"Listen, if you're guilty of private embezzlement and concealed production, you'll be dismissed, investigated and dealt with accordingly!"
"Fuck you. You gonna investigate me? I introduced you to the Party."
"Did you do it then? Will you say?"
"You want the truth?"
"I don't have all day. Wanna keep talking bullshit?"
Uncle glanced behind him at the villagers. They were silent as the grave, and all had a fire raging in their eyes, like hungry ghosts. "I didn't," said Uncle, "I'm spotless and clear."
"Mate, I came here under instructions," said Hu, "Give me an easy way out of this …"
Uncle leaned into his ear, and whispered, "Alright—you want me to say yes? Yes. I did it. A few plots of carrots, five hundred kilos."
"Where?"
Uncle patted his stomach. "In here."
"If I investigate?"
Uncle slapped his chest. "Search me. If you find them, fire me!"
The villagers say that with these eloquent words, and a supreme cover-up effort from Old Hu, Uncle braved a great danger. He got away with a "severe warning" , and in one fell swoop saved several acres of carrots.
That year, everyone ate boiled carrots for six months on end. Eventually the carrots in the ground sprouted mould. The people eating them had diarrhoea, vomiting and acid reflux. Everyone hated carrots then. Everyone suffered from carrots.
It was carrots that saved their lives, and indirectly, carrots that saved me.
Not long after I was born, Uncle took me from house to house to find me milk to drink. He carried me from one house to another, going in to say, "Give him some milk."
In those days the women didn't have much milk in their breasts to start with. It wasn't easy to suck the milk out, and it tasted like sour carrots. Only now do I know that sour milk is really yoghurt. Yoghurt full of carotene and vitamin C.
The thing I hate most in this life is carrots. The smell of carrots permeated my entire childhood. My every hiccup smelt of carrot. Excess carotene and vitamin C flowed straight out of my bottom. And as I shamelessly drank in gulp after gulp of carrot-smelling milk, the women of Wuliang fixed their eyes on me like the barrels of guns, their gaze dripping with poison. They ground their teeth with hatred. But the status of Party secretary was like a special permit, allowing Uncle to carry me from one house to another, proudly and fearlessly telling each woman, "Give him some milk."
Yes, women hate me. Back then, when the women of Wuliang saw me it was as if they had seen a wolf cub. Although they opened up their blouses with a kindly manner, every single one of them gnashed their teeth as they stared at me, because I had bitten their nipples so many times before.
