After the divorce, Shuyu didn't return to the country. She moved into another room in the same dormitory house. From now on she cooked her own meals and lived by herself. A young officer was assigned by the Political Department to deal with the district police in charge of residential registry and with the Splendor Match Plant, which was asked to employ Hua.

It occurred to Lin that his daughter might refuse to come to the city, because she must have been angry with him. When he returned home in the past few years, he had tried to talk with her and find out how she felt about his divorcing her mother, but she had always avoided being with him, saying she had to feed the pigs or go wash clothes in the creek. She seemed to have grown more and more remote from him. So now he decided to write a letter begging her to come to Muji.

At night when he sat at the table holding his Gold Dragon fountain pen, he was overwhelmed by the realization that this was the first time he had written to his daughter. What an awful father he was! Why had he been so absentminded all these years that he had never thought Hua might like to hear from him? No wonder she had been resentful.

He wrote:

Uncertain whether she could be persuaded only by his words, he wrote another letter to Bensheng, asking him to urge Hua not to miss this opportunity.

Putting down the pen, he yawned, interlaced his fingers, and stretched his arms above his head until two of his knuckles cracked. He enjoyed the peaceful night and felt his mind was more alert when he was alone. A rustle of tree leaves attracted his attention to the window, whose panes were blurred with dewdrops at their corners. Outside a few maple leaves were falling. He stood up, wiped his face with a wet towel, then went to bed.

Some officers asked Lin when they could eat his wedding candies; he said it would be in a few months. Manna and he agreed that they should wait a while so as to prevent others from talking about their building a happy nest on the ex-wife's miseries.

Within two weeks Shuyu's residential status was changed, and all the procedures for Hua's employment were carried through. But Lin hadn't heard from his daughter yet and was worried.

Then, as he feared, her letter came, saying she was not interested in living in "an overpopulated city." She claimed that because the working class consisted of both peasants and workers, she decided to stay in the country as "a socialist peasant of the new type." Lin could tell that was a phrase she had picked up from a newspaper, and he was angry, but he didn't know what to do. Not having heard a word from Bensheng, he suspected that his brother-in-law must have played a negative role in this matter – trying to hold Hua back and keep her working for him. Even Shuyu couldn't help calling their daughter "a stupid egg."

When Lin talked with Manna about this impasse, she suggested he go and fetch his daughter personally. It seemed to be a good idea, because he also needed to sell the country property to get the cash for the wedding. So in the early fall he took annual leave and went back to Goose Village.

3

A dozen people were gathered in his yard when Lin arrived home. The afternoon heat had subsided, but flies were still droning madly. On the ground, near the wattle gate of the vegetable garden, was spread a bloody donkey's hide. It was almost covered up by dead greenheads. Judging by the sweetish odor still emanating from the skin, a lot of dichlorvos had been sprayed on it to prevent maggots. The air also smelled meaty and spicy, with a touch of cumin, prickly ash, and magnolia-vine. Hua, a violet towel covering her hair, was stirring something in a cauldron set on a makeshift fireplace built of rocks. Against a blue wheelbarrow leaned a signboard that carried these words in black ink: "The Best Delicacy – Donkey Meat on Earth like Dragon Meat in Heaven! Two-Fifty a Pound!"

At the sight of her father, Hua put down the shovel and went up to him. With a grin she said, "I'm so glad you're back, Dad." She took the duffel bag from his hand.

"What are you doing? Why are so many people here?"

"Uncle Bensheng's donkey died. I'm cooking five-flavored donkey meat for him. They're waiting to buy some."

"Where is he?"

"He's in our house talking with somebody. Let's go in now." She turned and put the wooden lid on the cauldron, but left a crack between the lid and the rim.

Lin wasn't happy about the scene, wondering why Bensheng had not used his own yard as a meat shop. What a greedy devil, he thought. He always tries to profit at others' expense. If I had come back a few days later, he'd have turned this home into his own.

Bensheng's only donkey had died two days ago. It had run out of its shed after midnight, gotten into a meadow, and then broken into a vegetable garden, where it ate a lot of alfalfa and beans without drinking any water. As a result it became too bloated to stay on its feet. A boy saw it lying behind the village's millhouse the next morning, and he ran to inform its owner. When Bensheng arrived to help the animal, it was breathing its last, its stomach burst. Ben-sheng was very upset, because he had depended on the donkey to transport groceries from Six Stars. All he could do now was sell its meat to get some money back. Though a few villagers wanted to buy raw donkey meat, he would only sell it cooked, figuring that in this way he could make more money. He told them, "I don't deal in raw material, only the finished product."

As Lin entered the house, he heard Bensheng speaking to someone in the main room. "I'll give you the donkey's hide, okay?"

Lin and Hua stopped to listen. Another voice countered loudly, " No, that won't do. Your beast destroyed my garden. I don't want its skin. What can I do with it? I can't even sell it at the salvage station."

"You can make a mattress out of it, can't you?"

"No. Who wants to sleep on a stinking ass? If it were a roe deer, I would take it."

"Some people don't even deserve the company of a dead donkey. "

"I just don't want to have anything to do with it."

Lin stepped into the room, but the men didn't notice him. He recognized the other man as a neighbor, Uncle Sun. Bensheng said to the old man, "How about eight pounds of donkey meat, braised?"

"No, ten pounds."

"Nine."

"Damn it, I say ten!"

"Nine and a half. "

"Ten!"

"All right, I'll let you have that much, Uncle Sun, only because I respect your old face."

Hua interrupted them by saying, "Uncle, my dad is home."

Both men turned to Lin. The old man looked a little embarrassed, flashing a toothless smile, and then said to Bensheng, "I must be going. I'll send my grandson over for the meat." He clasped his hands behind him and strode out with measured steps. A tuft of white hair peeked through a hole at the top of his felt skullcap.