Chapter 5

Several times, half asleep, I saw a pair of old eyes through the window crack.

Grandfather's.

Soon afterward, Grandmother would call me to sleep in her room.

Only after he died did she stop beating and cursing me.

When Officer Zhou heard the whole story, he opened his mouth several times without finding words.

Throughout the investigation, he had insisted on “respecting spirits without falling into superstition.”

In the end, all he managed was:

“Karma.”

Later, after the massacre of my family, distant relatives adopted my baby brother.

I was older, a girl, and heir to a substantial fortune. Several relatives with less than kind intentions repeatedly urged me to live with them.

I refused.

I went to an orphanage.

Not long afterward, the policewoman who had cared for me that day adopted me.

Her surname was Jiang.

I took it too, and became Jiang Mingzhu.

“No more Zhaodi,” she said.

“You're my precious pearl.”

I went to school in the city.

Got into university.

After graduation, I became a reporter.

When I was old enough to control Grandmother's estate, I donated half of it.

Then I returned to the village.

It was nearly dark when I arrived.

The old pagoda tree still stood at the entrance.

Its trunk was hollow.

A great strip of bark hung loose, like a peeling face.

Most houses had collapsed.

Weeds covered the courtyard walls.

The young and able-bodied had all left.

Only a few homes were still lit, mostly belonging to old people who couldn't bear to leave.

I parked by the road and knocked on the first door.

An old woman answered, so bent that her chin nearly touched her chest.

She squinted.

“Who's there?”

“I'd like to ask you a few things.”

I took out a black-and-white photograph of Grandmother, clipped from an old newspaper report of the case.

“Do you know this woman?

“Madam Li of the Zhang family.”

The old woman held it close to the lamp and looked for a long time.

Then she exclaimed.

“Isn't that the wife the Zhangs brought from elsewhere decades ago?

“Very capable.

“They said she'd gone to school before she married. Even knew a foreign language.

“Then she had four sons, one after another.

“Every woman in the village envied her.

“If she hadn't fallen ill and stopped being able to have children, old Zhang would have wanted more.”

I frowned slightly.

“Do you know what happened to the family later?”

She sat on a bamboo chair outside.

“The Zhangs…

“Something uncanny about them.

“Once, Madam Li died.

“The whole village went to the funeral feast.

“They'd even carried the coffin out.

“The next morning, there she was at the village entrance, perfectly well. Talking to us. She even borrowed my comb.

“Later, people said the family used some forbidden ritual to bring her back.”

“What ritual?”

She suddenly looked up.

“Why are you asking?”

“Just curious.”

She smiled.

A few teeth remained in a mouth like a black hole.

“Curiosity killed the cat.”

She called over an old man.

He was a little deaf, but his voice was strong.

I asked why the Zhangs had insisted on bringing Madam Li back.

“There used to be a temple on the mountain,” he said.

“Later, it was damaged.

“Wandering ghosts took over the statues.

“No one dared make offerings anymore.

“But people said—

“Worship the ghosts, and they'd grant wishes.

“That's what Madam Li did.

“Overnight, those useless sons of hers became rich.”

“If it was such a good thing, why didn't anyone else do it?”

He slapped his thigh.

“They were ghosts!

“Ghosts demand a price!

“All the old people here knew.

“Only Madam Li was an outsider. She knew nothing.

“Old Zhang must have tricked her into taking the burden for him.

“You think a wish costs only a few years of life?

“Nothing so simple.

“The one who prays gets haunted.

“Can't sleep at night.

“Their temperament changes.

“They're tormented until they're neither human nor ghost.

“She died and came back so many times.

“Her resentment must have been stronger than the ghosts'.”

He raised his cloudy eyes to mine.

“Those unfilial sons…

“They kept sacrificing their own mother.

“All for wealth and status.”

Once I understood, I went up the mountain alone.

The path remained, but it was much narrower.

Bushes grew taller than a person on either side.

Branches brushed my arms, leaving red marks.

After more than ten years of weather, the ruined temple had finally collapsed.

The roof was gone.

Only broken, moss-covered walls remained.

Shattered tiles lay scattered, more than half hidden by weeds.

Strangely, the statues still stood.

Gray.

Mottled.

Eyes lowered.

Mouths faintly curved.

Exactly as before.

As if nothing had happened.

I took incense and fruit from my bag and arranged them on the altar.

The table had almost rotted away, but still barely held.

It took several matches to light the incense.

The instant its tip glowed, the wind stopped.

The entire valley fell silent.

I knelt.

Bowed three times.

The statues didn't ask what I wanted.

They only sat there, eyes lowered, smiling.

Ordinary clay statues.

I thought—

Perhaps the voice that year hadn't come from them.

It had been Mother's.

She really had saved me.

She bought time and stopped Father from killing me.

And she returned to claim the lives of those who had harmed her.

After all these years, the temple was still eerie and dark.

But I wasn't afraid anymore.

I understood.

People could be more frightening than ghosts.

When the incense was lit, I turned and left without looking back.

Mother stood at the foot of the mountain.

Still in her old flowered blouse.

Her hair moved in the wind.

A gentle smile rested on her lips.

“Mingzhu.”

Her voice was as soft as ever.

“This is as far as I can go with you.”

“Mom…”

Tears spilled down my face.

“It's time for me to leave.”

She reached to stroke my cheek.

Halfway, her hand quietly fell.

“Mom…

“Please don't go…”

She shook her head and smiled.

Tiny lights shimmered in her eyes.

“You're grown now.

“You don't need me beside you anymore.”

I followed her gaze.

Grandmother stood nearby.

No frightening, wrinkled, blue-gray face.

She was young.

Two black braids.

A clean indigo blouse.

Like a faded photograph.

She stood quietly, without coming closer.

Her lips moved.

I couldn't hear.

But I thought—

Perhaps she was saying:

“I'm sorry.”

Mother turned and went to her.

They stood side by side, smiling and waving.

Then their figures slowly faded.

Like ink spreading into rice paper.

A gust of wind—

And they were gone.