Chapter 3

My mother gripped her chopsticks until her knuckles turned white.

Aloud, she said, “Yes. Why didn't I think of that? You're the clever one.”

He seemed to relish it. Raising his eyebrows smugly, he continued.

“Ruoxue's story gives me so much inspiration.

“I could turn it into a work of art.

“Motherhood, fate, hope, searching… Wonderful artistic elements, all of them.

“I already have seven or eight ideas. Tonight I'll think them through and choose the best one.

“The more people know my work, the more people will help you find her.”

He went on and on. My mother nodded, playing along with a few flattering remarks.

The word “work” made me shudder.

Clearly, he knew she believed he was involved in my disappearance.

He hadn't attacked because he was enjoying this.

During the six months I'd been missing, he had returned to this house from time to time to relive what had happened.

Now my mother had fallen into his trap.

She knew her enemy was right before her, but could find no chance to avenge me.

The pleasure of tormenting a victim's family must have been irresistible to him.

Silently, I prayed she would find a way out before he tired of the game.

Half an hour later, he finally finished eating and drinking.

Both plates of dumplings were empty. So was the Erguotou bottle.

He yawned.

“I'm going to sleep a little. Would you clear up?”

She answered and carried the dishes into the kitchen.

As she washed them, she kept glancing at the doorway, afraid he would suddenly burst in.

The two knives used for vegetables and meat lay beside her, ready to grab in self-defense.

Yet he didn't appear, even after she finished the last bowl.

Knife in hand, she crept to the doorway.

He was fast asleep.

He leaned back in his chair, his feet on another chair, his hands hanging naturally at his sides.

But I knew.

He was only pretending.

The sharpened steel spike was still hidden in his sleeve.

My mother stared at his throat, suppressing the urge to cut it open, then turned and went out into the yard.

The snow had stopped. The suburban night was frighteningly black.

It was reunion-dinner time. Distant fireworks were scattered, the firecrackers sparse.

She stood at the door and looked toward the well, hesitating.

He'd deliberately told her there was a cellar beside it, where he kept the bottled water.

But if she went looking, she would step into the animal traps and lose any ability to resist.

I watched her back in dread, helplessness rising again.

Suddenly, she crouched, took out her phone, and switched on its flashlight.

Several clear tracks sank into the snow.

Wide and deep.

His footprints.

She shone the phone around, reconstructing his movements from their direction and course.

Soon, her gaze shifted to another corner of the yard.

The real cellar was there.

Her steps grew lighter, her face full of excitement and hope.

Meanwhile, Wang Xiude, not drunk at all, clutched his phone with a twisted expression.

The pinhole camera by the cellar recorded her every move.

“Mrs. Feng… Where are you?”

Putting on his padded coat, he walked lightly and happily toward the cellar.

No answer.

A dark opening had appeared in the snow beside the boundary wall.

He was a little irritated.

When she opened the hatch, she had accidentally blocked the camera hidden in the wall.

Still, it didn't matter.

The trail of footprints beside the entrance was proof enough she'd gone down.

His mouth curved at the thought.

The cellar was a vertical shaft, its floor more than five meters below ground.

No one could climb out empty-handed.

The only way in or out was a removable rope ladder.

A few hours earlier, using the shopping trip as cover, he'd stopped at the cellar to lay traps.

He had greased the ladder and placed two animal traps at its foot.

If she entered, she would climb down it.

Then she would slip, fall into the traps, and be at his mercy.

He soon reached the entrance.

“Mrs. Feng! Are you down there?”

Still no answer.

He circled it, carefully studying the darkness below.

The steel spike remained clenched in his hand.

With a weapon and his powerful build, he knew he needn't fear an ambush.

Yet he was puzzled.

Why was there no sound?

Had Feng He abandoned revenge and left in the night?

On his second circuit, he spotted something glowing in a corner below.

Her phone's flashlight.

He relaxed completely, crouched at the opening, and called down.

“Feng He! If it hurts, scream! Why keep quiet?

“Your daughter's screams were beautiful. As her mother, you can't be much worse.

“Don't worry. I'll make you both into works of art unlike anything else in the world. I'll let you—”

Crack!

A fierce blow came from behind and struck the back of his head.

His vision went black. Losing his balance, he pitched headfirst into the cellar.

His screams rang out below, echoing into the night.

My mother stepped to the opening, rolling pin in hand, her face expressionless.

She had recognized the trap long before.

She'd left her phone's light on and thrown it into a corner below to distract him.

Then she'd hidden behind the wall beside the cellar, waiting.

The blow had initially knocked him unconscious.

Unfortunately for him, he landed in his own traps.

One crushed his left ankle.

The other broke his left knee.

Blood poured from wounds so deep the bone was visible.

Even then, my mother didn't lower her guard.

She took out the lighter and set fire to the oil-soaked ladder.

Flame ran down it, illuminating the cellar.

First came countless scratches crowded across the earth walls.

Broken pieces of fingernail were embedded in the soil, long furrows trailing behind them.

Large black stains covered the floor.

After six months, the bright blood had dried, oxidized, and faded to a terrifying black.

Now the man responsible for those stains was reddening them again with his own blood.

My mother crouched at the opening and looked at him without expression.

“Wang Xiude. A life for a life. Blood for blood. Surely I needn't explain.”

This time, he truly panicked.

“Listen to me! I didn't kill your daughter!

“Pull me up. I'll tell you where she is. You can take her home!”

She gave a desolate laugh.

“Do you really think I don't know where my daughter is?

“Do you think I've spent six months passing this house over and over in useless madness?”

She rose.

Her gaze passed over the old, crumbling house, the well, and the woodshed.

Then it settled on the snow-covered vegetable garden behind the house.

A ragged scarecrow stood in its center.

She looked at it with tenderness, sorrow, and despair.

Or rather…

She looked at me.

“For six months, I've walked this road more times than I can count.

“I memorized everything. Houses, households, where things were placed.

“The most suspicious place was this house that looked abandoned—and the man who appeared in it from time to time.

“You.”

She spoke slowly. I didn't know whether she was telling him or telling me.

“You came every month. Eleven times at most. Six at least.

“More suspicious still, whenever you were here, that scarecrow appeared in the garden.”

He no longer had the strength to scream.

“You've been watching me all this time… and I never knew…”

“Of course you didn't.”

She laughed coldly.

“You came to relive your perversions, then enjoyed watching me stumble about like a madwoman, as though you were visiting a zoo.”

He opened his mouth, hesitated, and said nothing.

“Do you want to know why your cameras were useless?”

She saw through him.

“You thought that if you hid them well enough, no one would find them.

“You never imagined there was such a thing as a wireless signal detector.

“Or that an old woman with one foot in the grave could learn to use a drone for aerial photographs.”

My mother had always been stubbornly old-fashioned. She wouldn't even learn pinyin.

To message me, she'd had to write each character by hand.

After I disappeared, unwilling to miss any clue, she'd begun using all kinds of technology.

He suddenly burst into grotesque laughter.

“Feng He, you're good! I admit defeat!

“But if you're so capable, can you work out how I turned your daughter into a scarecrow?”

One bloody, evil image after another emerged in his account from the cellar.

Her expression never changed.

“You want to use that to provoke me. Drive me mad with pain so I'll jump down and fight you. Don't you?

“It's useless.

“The moment I knew my daughter was gone, I went mad.”

He kept laughing wildly.

“Fine! You want blood for blood? Turn me into a scarecrow too!

“I'm an artist. Your daughter gave herself to art. Of course I can too!

“After I die, everyone who's ever seen my photograph will remember the works of art I invented!”

She froze.

Conflict appeared on her face.

For ten whole minutes, she struggled before deciding.

“Wang Xiude, I won't give you what you want.

“I'll keep you alive and watch you go to your execution.”

Then she moved the hatch cover into place, shutting his face entirely from view.

A light came on in the pitch-dark cellar.

Half sitting, half lying, he held his phone in his mouth for illumination and forced apart the trap gripping his leg.

“That old woman… incurably stupid.”

A survivor's smile curled his lips.

Bracing against the earth wall, he slowly stood, picked up one trap, and drove it into the soil.

Its sharp teeth bit deep.

A wall without handholds now had a foothold.

“Only five meters… Two traps should be enough…”

Dragging his broken leg, he climbed and calculated.

“The supermarket… five minutes there and back…

“Time for her to knock on the lid and explain… then call the police…

“Seven minutes. Enough to escape.”

One minute.

Three.

Five.

Five minutes and thirty seconds.

The heavy hatch lifted.

Half his head emerged. He greedily inhaled the air of freedom.

In the next instant, a rolling pin came down from above and struck the top of his head.

Unprepared, he fell backward to the cellar floor.

My mother held the hatch open with one hand and laughed coldly.

“Did you really think I'd gone to the supermarket to call the police?

“Let me be clear. I anticipated every part of your escape.

“A quick death? I'm not that merciful.

“To come within a hair of freedom, only to fail and face death…

“That's the ending a monster like you deserves.”

He looked up in despair.

A round gasoline drum appeared at the opening.

My mother kicked its lid aside.

The pungent fuel poured down.

“No!”

He climbed frantically, even forcing his broken leg to work.

But the gasoline-soaked wall was more slippery still.

However hard he tried, he couldn't climb out.

She silently watched his struggle against death, then slowly took out the lighter.

“Go to hell.”

Click.

Behind her, flames soared.

Above her lay the endless night.

She walked through the frozen snow toward me, step by step.

Only a dozen or so steps separated us, yet she seemed to travel half a lifetime.

At last she stood before me.

She raised her rough hands and wiped them hard against her clothes.

Then she opened her arms and gently embraced my ruined body.

“Ruoxue, Mommy's taking you home.”

The End.