The Golden Rat Read online

  “I know. I was there.”

  “But after Shen Manfong left, Father felt badly about the whole thing. He came up with an idea to help the man, and sent me to look for him—to offer him work running errands and cleaning up.” Hai Nan frowned. “But I couldn’t find him.

  “Weeks later—as Father and I were closing up—he came to the shop. We thought he’d come to ask for work or money. But before Father had a chance to tell him about the job, Shen Manfong offered himself in ka-di. Father jumped at the chance.” Hai Nan shrugged. “Linlin and Father—I think they’re both starting to see everything a lot more clearly, now.”

  “Where is Linlin?”

  “With us, and so is the boy.”

  “Linlin and Zhou are staying with you?”

  “Yes, in town.”

  “‘In town’?”

  “We’ve lost the house. We only have what remains of the business, and live on the second floor, above the shop. We’re trying to start over. Things have been hard—but that’s not why I’m here.”

  “Why, then?”

  “Your trial will be tomorrow.”

  “‘Tomorrow’?” said Baoliu, parroting his brother, feeling a sudden twinge of nervous fear and picturing the courtroom in his head.

  “I’ve been trying to see you for days, but they wouldn’t allow it. And Father was unable to come. He wanted to, but didn’t have the strength.”

  “Is something wrong with him? Is he sick?”

  “Yes. He has been ever since he learned you were in prison. But it’s you that I came to talk about. And I have no time. Only a moment—that’s all they’ve allowed me.” He looked back through the bars at the guard.

  “Did you say that Father wanted to see me? He’s forgiven me?”

  “It’s himself he can’t forgive.”

  “What? Why?”

  “The guilt he feels.”

  “About what?”

  “About everything that’s happened to you.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “He knows that you’re innocent.”

  Baoliu stared.

  “He knows, just like I do now, that you couldn’t have been the one who robbed and killed Jia Lam.”

  “What do you mean, you know? I don’t understand. What are you talking about?”

  “The day that you and Zhou came to the shop—afterward, Father and I began to talk. We talked again that night, and it came to us why you couldn’t have committed the crime. We told the magistrate, but he dismissed us. He simply listened to us and then told us he’d consider the matter. We’ve heard nothing from him since.”

  “What did you tell him?” urged Baoliu, his words obliterated by the guard rattling a club across the bars.

  “Come,” the guard ordered Hai Nan. “I’ve given you more time than I should.”

  “One more moment!” Hai Nan begged.

  “Now!”

  “Why? Why do you and Father believe I’m innocent?”

  “Because of the stolen jewelry.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Did you not hear me?” demanded the guard, his keys rattling in the lock.

  “The jewelry, it proves you’re innocent.”

  “What? How? How does it prove anything?”

  “It’s complicated. But trust me. It is proof!”

  “But it doesn’t matter anymore.” Baoliu shook his head. “It doesn’t matter what you say in court.”

  “What do you mean?” asked Hai Nan, as the guard stormed into the cell.

  “I’ve already confessed.”

  GUARDS CAME FOR him early the next morning. “It’s time, boy,” said one, opening the cell door. Another removed Baoliu’s leg shackles, and then led the way, down the corridor and across the main yard. Slaves opened a massive gate of bronze, and ahead loomed the House of Law, a four-story monolith of time-darkened stone.

  The Genggu, The Drum of Time, announced the seventh hour of the morning as Baoliu was escorted into a courtroom, one much larger than that in which he had been condemned to death three months earlier. At the bench sat the same judge—in black robes, one hand resting on an ivory cudgel as he pored over a document.

  Baoliu heard someone laugh, and wondered if it was at him. He wondered at the great number of people filling the place. Most of them looked poor. He tried to spot Linlin, but could not, and wondered if she was even there. He saw his father, and then Zhou and a woman he recognized from the ravine. He looked for others he knew, for family and friends, and then recoiled at the sight of the magistrate. In robes of peacock blue, seated apart from the others, he smiled imperiously as Baoliu passed.

  Absentmindedly, the judge pounded his cudgel against the floor, but didn’t look up as the court fell silent and Baoliu was led to stand before him. Instead, he continued reading, thumbing through a clutter of documents spread before him.

  “Tang Baoliu,” he finally muttered. “On behalf of the office of the magistrate,” he said, “and in accordance with imperial law, you have been charged with attacking a constable in the lawful performance of his duties, seditious conduct, and abetting the flight of a fugitive, one Shen Linlin. Do you contest these charges?”

  Baoliu swallowed hard. “No, I do not,” he said, a sudden uproar of protest and disbelief swelling the courtroom.

  “Silence!” the judge demanded, pounding with his ivory cudgel—his gaze traveling over the audience as the din subsided.

  A clerk in a red skullcap quietly placed additional documents on the table.

  The judge nodded to the man and then returned his attention to Baoliu. “You acknowledge your guilt?”

  Baoliu looked at the magistrate. And then looked back at his father and brother, and saw Zhou and Linlin, too.

  “Do you or do you not acknowledge your guilt?” demanded the judge.

  Baoliu clenched his jaw. “Yes.”

  “Your plea will be noted; however, information has been received by this court contradicting a verdict of guilty. Though noted, your plea is rejected; by order of the provincial governor, the charges are dismissed.”

  “What? Why?” Baoliu stared, his mouth agape.

  “No evidence of seditious conduct has been found. As to abetting the flight of a fugitive: quite simply, one cannot do so if that person is not by law a fugitive. I speak of Shen Linlin. Since no charges had been filed against her at the time she was pursued, her conduct was not unlawful, and therefore, neither was yours. And finally, as to the charge of assault: testimony taken from those in attendance at the funerary gathering indicates that the constable exceeded his authority; his use of force was illegitimate and malicious, and he has been taken into custody.”

  “If he is found guilty of wrongdoing, I hope he shall be dealt with most harshly!” announced the magistrate, rising to his feet. “And so, too, should any others who may have conducted themselves improperly!”

  The judge looked at him impassively, and then addressed Baoliu: “By virtue of dismissal of these charges,” continued the judge, “there are no new bad acts on your part to warrant retrial on the charge of murder—of one Tang Jia Lam. However, in that you have confessed in writing to these charges, no new bad acts are required to proceed with retrial. By the power of these courts, your confession is hereby accepted, your former conviction noted, and I again find you guilty of this crime.”

  Baoliu slowly turned and looked at the magistrate, and in that moment understood what the man had done to him, and how he had been fooled by him.

  “And now I know,” he blurted out, “why you needed my confession! Without it, I would have been freed!”

  The magistrate smiled, smoothing his blue silk robe.

  “Do you wish to make a statement?” asked the judge. “Do you wish to withdraw your confession?”

  “Withdraw it!” Zhou called out.

  “Be silent!” the judge demanded, and then repeated his question. “Tang Baoliu, do you wish to reconsider your confession?”

  He shook his head. “I canno
t,” he said.

  “‘Cannot’?” asked the judge, his gaze traveling from Baoliu to the magistrate.

  “No, I do not withdraw my confession.”

  “Very well, then, in that your guilt has been confirmed, I now address those assembled and ask if anyone wishes to speak in defense of Tang Baoliu. Are any so inclined?”

  It was his father’s voice that Baoliu heard next.

  “I am so inclined!”

  Baoliu looked back, and saw his father stand, and saw how gray he had become and how old he now looked.

  “My son could not have committed this crime,” he said, his words loud but tremulous. “It is not possible!”

  “How so?” asked the judge.

  “The stolen jewelry is itself the proof.”

  “I fail to understand.”

  “Seven pieces of jewelry were stolen and never recovered. On the night of the crime, Baoliu was found unconscious in the house, outside the sleeping quarters of Jia Lam. If he never left the house, how did he manage at the same time to get away with the seven pieces of jewelry? How?”

  “A fascinating point,” said the judge. “Fascinating indeed!”

  “May I be heard?” asked the magistrate, and then continued without awaiting a response. “There could be numerous explanations. For one, the boy may well have had an accomplice, and this person—or persons—escaped with the jewelry.”

  “There was no accomplice!” shouted Baoliu’s father. “That is absurd!”

  “Is it?” asked the magistrate insouciantly. “Then might I submit yet another explanation for your consideration—that the items were pilfered by persons unknown during the confusion following the murder? Is that not possible?”

  Baoliu’s father said nothing.

  “Or perhaps the boy took these pieces prior to the night of the murder, and not until then was it discovered that they were missing.” He sighed affectedly. “What became of the jewelry is of no significance. And—”

  “Enough!” said the judge, interrupting him. “Your point has been made.” Exhaling wearily, he looked out at the courtroom. “Are there any others who care to speak on behalf of the accused?”

  “I would,” said someone from the back of the room.

  Baoliu turned at the sound of the familiar voice, and his heart raced as Linlin rose to her feet.

  “Guards!” snarled the magistrate. “Seize that girl! She is the seditionist we have been pursuing! Seize her!”

  “Let her speak!” Spectators rose to their feet and shouted—the shout becoming a chant. “Let her speak!”

  “Guards! Do your duty!” ordered the magistrate.

  The guards hesitated, and looked from the magistrate to the judge, unsure of what to do.

  “Stand down!” thundered the judge. “She will be heard!”

  “I protest!” exclaimed the magistrate.

  “Ni jiang guo duole!” “Enough from you!” snapped the judge, pointing his cudgel at the magistrate. “Your authority does not extend to the House of Law!”

  “Linlin,” Baoliu murmured under his breath as she approached the judge.

  “Who are you, young lady?” asked the judge.

  “I am Shen Linlin, the daughter of Shen Manfong, who was executed in ka-di, in place of Baoliu.”

  “And you wish to speak on his behalf?”

  “Yes.”

  “In defense of one whose life continued at the cost of your own father’s?”

  “I do.”

  “And what is it you wish to say?”

  “That Tang Baoliu is innocent—that he did not kill the woman.”

  “And why do you believe this?”

  “Because I know who did.”

  The judge laced his fingers together. “And who is that?”

  Linlin hesitated.

  “Who killed her?”

  “My father.”

  “YOUR FATHER MURDERED Jia Lam?” the judge exclaimed, his words muted by an excited drone from the crowd. He pounded for quiet, and as the babble subsided, repeated the question.

  “My father was employed by the father of Tang Baoliu for more than twenty years. When he was crippled while working, Baoliu’s father—or so we believed—turned his back on us. We ran out of money and then out of food, and there was no work of any kind. We were starving. We had nothing—while his employer had far more than he needed.

  “One night my father slipped away without telling anyone; when he returned, just before sunrise, he was covered in blood, and then he showed us—my grandfather and me—the jewelry. And he wept as he told us what he’d done, that he’d killed someone, a woman.”

  “Jia Lam?” asked the judge.

  “Yes.”

  “Please, go on.”

  “He didn’t mean to. He startled her from her sleep, and when she tried to scream he put his hand over her mouth. There were sewing shears. She tried to stab him with them, and when he grabbed her arm, the shears hit her in the throat.

  “When my father learned that Baoliu, his employer’s son, was to be executed for the crime, he was distraught. He said that he was going to confess. But then he thought of ka-di—a way to save the boy, and to save his family, at the same time.”

  “What became of the jewelry?” asked the judge.

  “Before offering himself in ka-di, my father used it to buy a potter’s shop—for me, my grandfather, and for the rest of the family. The magistrate found out about the purchase, and that the jewelry bore the design of the house of Tang Qin. He realized it was the stolen jewelry.”

  “The magistrate knew this before the accord?” asked the judge.

  “Yes.”

  “Who has the jewelry now?”

  “The magistrate. He confiscated it.”

  “‘Confiscated it’?” asked the judge. He looked at the magistrate, jotted down a note, and then returned his attention to Linlin.

  “The shop you purchased—what became of it?”

  “It was also confiscated by the magistrate.”

  “What did you do with the money from the ka-di?”

  “We never received any of it.”

  “Why?”

  “The magistrate threatened to reveal what my father had done, and that he was, as he said, a thief and a murderer, not the hero that others believed him to be. He said it would be at the cost of my father’s reputation that I would be paid the two thousand.”

  “‘Two thousand’?” asked the judge, writing as he spoke. “What do you mean?”

  “The two thousand we had been promised for the ka-di.”

  “You were to have been paid four thousand, not two,” he said, and then looked at the magistrate. “Or am I mistaken?”

  “I will have the matter looked into,” he said fawningly. “Perhaps there was a mistake, a misunderstanding.”

  “Go on,” the judge told Linlin.

  “When the magistrate threatened to expose my father, I threatened to expose the magistrate—not just for what he did to me, but for what he does to everybody. I told him I was going to go to his superiors. When I said that, he sent constables—”

  “I will hear no more of this!” The magistrate rose. “I must—”

  “Be seated,” said the judge. “That is what you must do.”

  He sat, and crossed his arms as a child might do, and glowered, petulantly.

  Linlin aimed a finger at him. “What the magistrate has done to my family is only one small instance of what he does to the people of Yongjia every day. He is, to my mind, the most dangerous criminal in the city.”

  “I protest this vicious slander!” yelled the magistrate, again on his feet.

  “I think you waste your time protesting to me,” said the judge. And then he smiled. “Instead, I believe you will be protesting your innocence to the judiciary in Hangzhou.”

  “How dare you threaten me?”

  “Guards,” ordered the judge, “take the magistrate into custody.”

  Howls of outrage were drowned out by howls of laughter as a
peacock-blue figure ran—then slapped and kicked as a guard grabbed him. “I am the magistrate!” he squealed. And started to announce himself again as another guard shoved a leather gag into his mouth.

  “Remove him,” said the judge, and then he watched as the magistrate was dragged kicking and writhing from the courtroom.

  The spectators cheered.

  The judge turned to Linlin. “There is still one thing I do not understand,” he said. “You hold your father’s name and reputation in high regard. And yet you risked sullying his name for the sake of Tang Baoliu? Why?”

  “To save one who is innocent, and one whom I have come to know and to admire.”

  “Or perhaps you have concocted a story—simply trying to save someone you have come to care for? Moreover, despite your testimony, considerable evidence of Tang Baoliu’s guilt was presented at the first trial and must be restudied. Finally, there is a significant amount of money involved here, and how it has affected both your declaration and that of Tang Qin must also be taken into consideration.”

  The judge looked at Linlin and Baoliu and then out at the gallery. “There will be a short recess before I render my verdict.”

  BAOLIU WAS TAKEN to the guards’ changing room and told to sit in a corner on a stack of sleeping mats. A young guard, a heavyset boy not much older than Baoliu, locked Baoliu’s wrist and ankle chains together.

  “Could you do me a favor?” asked Baoliu, as the guard finished up. “Could you give someone a message for me?”

  “Sure. No problem,” said the guard.

  “Thank you,” said Baoliu.

  “Who’s the message for and what do you want me to say?”

  “My father. He’s the gray-haired man who spoke for me.”

  “I remember him.”

  “Tell him that Mother’s things are in the cypress tree,” said Baoliu, and then repeated the message. “He’ll understand,” he said, and looked up as his father and brother stepped into the room.

  “It seems you can tell him yourself,” said the guard, getting up and stepping aside.

  Baoliu looked up at his father, not sure of where to begin. “The things I took long ago, after Mother died, are in a crevice in the largest of the cypress trees,” he said.

  “Thank you, Baoliu. But they are your things now. I want you to have them—as soon as the trial is over.” He smiled nervously, unconvincingly. “You’ll see. You will be cleared!”