The Last Paradise

by Ling Yaozhong

translated by John Haymaker

part 1

“They just walk around like that every day?”

“That’s right.”

“So this is what polygamy’s about.”

“That’s right.”

“But invariably there comes a day, I mean, when a man can’t go on. What then?”

“The question is very simple. If you were a young woman, I’d answer more subtly, but as we’re an older gentleman and an older lady, I’ll say that when a man’s body no longer exudes the passion, he calls a halt.”

The woman’s face reddened a little.

The gentleman was fifty-five, the lady forty-nine. They wore light clothing and reclined on wicker chairs alongside a river, their eyes drawn to the people on the opposite bank.

The river was the Pala, a tributary of the Lancang. It was wild without a trace of tenderness, one murky wave giving way to another. This ferment had its beauty, though. On the opposite bank the polygamous men of the Suomo tribe followed along the beach briskly. The Suomo men’s torsos were bare, and a few had only a white loincloth around them. They went about their own business and paid no attention to each other, singing a few notes in a masculine voice.

“I understand now. This is communal marriage, a last vestige of matriarchal society.”

“That’s right. History texts say as much.”

“Well, I’m not altogether clear on it. Have they no jealousy? I mean between man and woman.”

“It seems not, at least from what I’ve heard. To be a Suomo man is quite satisfying, I think. He has neither the time for nor the need of jealousy. He never knows who his father is, which is a terrific benefit for a child. Take the case of a severe father. Quite possibly, the child would over a lifetime receive not a little castigation, a circumstance I have felt keenly myself. The last time I took a beating from my father, I was thirty. He said he hit me to love me more thoroughly. He had seen that you and I were involved and that there was an immediate danger that we would share a bed. The old fellow alternately wept and instructed me: ‘She is a dancer, a harlot as shallow as she is heartless, my son, who will bring you a lifetime of tears.’”

The lady couldn’t help laughing. “Which unfortunately for you was the truth.”

“Let me finish about the jealousy. The birthplace of the Suomo man is his mother’s home. All his life he will work to support it. At night, work over, he must leave; he must not pass the night there. This means that he must go to a woman; otherwise, he will have no place to put up for the night.”

“Surely that is where the problem might arise, at least if there were already a man there. Isn’t that the stuff of jealousy? There would be room for profound secret competition.”

“There you are wrong again. If there is already a man there, the last to arrive must immediately leave and continue along until he finds somewhere else. I’ve yet to hear of two men coming to blows over it.”

“So much for the complexities of jealousy, but when he is old and must call a halt” — the lady’s face reddened again — “who cares for him then?”

“Simple. He returns to his mother’s home. Of course, younger ones wait upon and take care of those in their declining years. Only at this time can the Suomo man return and live at his mother’s home, until at last he seeks out... well, death. Is there anything else you want to know about their movements?” His eyes had already withdrawn from the flesh on the opposite bank. He mused on something else.

The lady was remorsefully apologetic. “I’ve made you uncomfortable. I am terribly sorry.”

The golden rays of the setting sun gouged and flayed the fishtails the women were chopping off and cast female silhouettes on the water. The river reeled a little. The setting sun ever more fawningly licked at the trees on the distant mountain peak. The tropical cicada, unlike its northern relative, twittered perfunctorily and listlessly. A boat, not risking the waves midstream, hugged the bank, stealthily rowing on, looking from a distance like a drifting, irresolute olive. Above their heads on the gourd trellis ash-coloured monkeys — now solemn, now teasing, now grabbing ears and now scratching cheeks — emulated humour. A boar imperatively climbed onto a sow to do his business, but the sow had no such inclination and immediately threw him to the ground and, not in the least flustered, scorned him with a switch of her tail. A huge mango smashed to the ground, and fermented juice seeped through the broken peel. And an overheated brown dog vigorously rubbed its fur against a tree, obviously wishing to be done with the sweltering weather.

“The strange thing is that since you arrived yesterday, I haven’t felt the least pain.”

“Good. I’ve said before you would slowly get better.” The lady spoke warmly.

The gentleman gave a wry laugh. “Myself, I’m quite sure that this is the last hurrah. In any case, I shall have Zhang the Carpenter haul that Nanmu log down in the next few days. I told him where it was wedged in a crevice of the mountain crater. It’s more than enough for a coffin, and his skills are renowned along the Pala.”

“What nonsense you do talk!” said the lady compassionately. “You’ll soon recoup your health, just you see.”

The gentleman laughed again, quite cheerlessly. “I begin to doubt your sincerity again. Surely you haven’t come all the way from Shanghai just to play the anaesthetist, to tell him he’ll get better, better and better until he’s as robust as a Suomo? You’ll give me a physique like a polygamist?”

The lady entreated him with her eyes.

“Let me tell you, that’s not friendship. I’ll give you two examples of friendship. You’re familiar with one of them: Dr. Lu of Kunming Hospital, who also came out here from Shanghai. We’ve been friends now for only three years. He checked the diagnosis I brought from Beijing and then gave me two bottles of Maotai and said eat what you like, whatever you please. I asked him how long I had. He looked down and said not very long, enough to put the funeral arrangements in order. I suddenly felt quite ashamed of having asked him, when I already had the diagnosis from Beijing. I am a coward. And then there’s Zhang the Carpenter. He gave me a pot of black lacquer, to use on the coffin, you understand. He would seem to rate as a friend, too.”

Tears formed in her eyes, but the lady remained silent.

He suddenly became excited. “I adore to see you like this. You were always so lovely when you were sincere.” He exerted himself to stand, and she rushed to support him.

“I think we ought to prepare for dinner,” he said.

* * *

The servant provided for him by the tropical research station carried out a dining table, spread out a tablecloth and laid out a few simple dishes. The servant was an exceptionally gentle and ripely pretty girl of twenty, whose best feature was her mouth.

The servant smiled at them and then went off.

He watched her until she disappeared into the shadows of a banana grove.

“Everyday she attends to my meals and cleaning. She is immaculate, and I must say it is not unpleasing to have a young girl bustling around.”

She had to laugh at him. She served him a little coriander and noticed a moment of excitement in him that she felt would not have been there five years before.

He went into the hut, brought out a bottle of wine and poured her a glass, then went back inside and returned with two more, white this time.

“I think you’d do best not to drink,” said the lady.

“I rather think you’d do best to join me, given that days like this are numbered.”

“Cheers!” She raised her glass and drained it first.

He tapped his with a fingernail and stared fixedly at her. “Five years on the border have made me wonder idly at times whether I should have divorced you just like that, releasing you to seek the happy life.”

“So you released me, did you? You’re confused. We each released ourselves, or more accurately, we were a man and a woman tied face to face and bored stiff. I loosened my rope first and then turned to yours. I think in fact you relied on me to do so, didn’t you?”

He laughed and refilled her glass tossing the empty bottle at the river.

They finished their drinks. “You’re thinking again.”

“That’s right.”

“Probably scolding me all over again,” the lady said.

“Ever so faintly. Still, it’s passed,” he said.

A breeze started up. A fishy smell came off the Pala, and to those breathing it, it seemed as if they held fish scales in their palms. The waves raged devilishly, only to meet the embankment with apparent grace. A bird, lost to the flock and obviously quite happy in its rejection of parental love, flew as the mood took it or perched in the fork of a mango tree to twitter in fine regard for itself.

Night fell. The mountains on three sides threw the couple into shadowy ambiguity, making them feel as though a profound force lay within the shadow. It was calm except for the sound of water, which touched everything. Slowly across the river appeared two droplets of dim green flame, following steadily along the bank with blood-sweet, steadfast joy, always turned across the river, stirring languidly to and fro. Then they stopped and for a long while stared out from one place.

“What’s that, the men on their rounds again?”

“No.” He was perspiring heavily and mopped himself. “A leopard.”

She cried out in alarm and inched the wicker chair backwards with her hips.

He closed his eyes. “It’s related to the Bengal leopard and as large as the South China tiger. The local people call it a Bengali.”

“Might it come across? I’ve — heard leopards can swim.”

“Who knows? But I shouldn’t think it will just yet a while.”

“It might, though. It frightens me.”

He opened his eyes, chuckled and closed them again. “Me too. But I don’t care any more. You know, it has crouched there every day for a month. It’s a quiet fellow, quieter than a tiger. It hasn’t growled. It began showing up about a week after I came back from Beijing terminally ill, and every night since it has come without fail.”

Her pupils dilated with fear, and he saw that she didn’t dare look directly at the distant flames.

“He thinks to befriend me, that’s all.” The gentleman turned a jocular eye to the lights on the opposite bank.

* * *

Proceed to part 2...