Ocean of Words by Ha Jin Page B

would be dealt with as a crime. Because every piece of arms had been listed and numbered, each militiaman had no choice but to hand in whatever happened to be in his hands. Even a dagger or an ammunition belt had to go. At once, Dragon Head’s company was disarmed.
    “In a way, I feel sorry for them,” I told Commissar Diao one day. “They have had guns for quite a few years, then suddenly everything is gone.”
    “You have a good heart, Old Gao,” Diao said, laughing.
    I laughed too. “It must feel like you had a tidy sum in the bank yesterday, then overnight you’re penniless.” Although I said this, I did believe it had to be done that way. It was not safe to have so many civilians armed with guns when the Russians didn’t seem eager to attack anymore.
    The disarmament delivered a considerable blow to Dragon Head. A month later I ran into him in Guanmen Village, where I had my leather shoes repaired. I stood at the door of the cobbler’s shop, watching with amusement a group of kids forcing a bear cub to climb to the top of a flagpole that rose in the middle of the village square. “Up, up,” they shouted. Two long bamboo poles were poking the young animal from beneath. A boy catapulted a pebble at the rump of the bear, which at once sprang up two meters.
    Here came Dragon Head. He walked alone, his feet kicking away horse droppings now and then. His head drooped forward, as though he were watching his own shadow. The front of his gray jacket was open, revealing a large red character “Loyalty” on his white undershirt. He saw me standing by and turned his head away. His right hand moved unconsciously to his flank, which one of the Mausers used to occupy.
    “Dragon Head, how are you doing?” I walked up to him, holding out my hand.
    “Not bad, still alive,” he muttered. We shook hands. His large face was expressionless, and his eyes were ringed with yellow.
    I felt somewhat uneasy and managed to ask, “When will I drink your wedding wine? You’re going to get married soon, aren’t you?”
    “Not soon.” He shook his head. “Maybe at the Spring Festival. I don’t know.”
    “Don’t forget to invite me, and we’ll have a few.”
    “Sure, I’ll have you over.” He smiled, his large eyes glittering a little.
    “Anything I can do for you, please let me know, all right?”
    “Sure. Thank you for saying that, Commander Gao.”
    Although I had said that, I had no idea how I could help him. In fact, I could not, because what he really needed was nothing but weapons, without which he could not be the former Dragon Head again. Since the disarmament, the militia company had been literally disbanded. Now Dragon Head’s men would be carrying hoes and spades to the fields instead of riding with arms to the river.
    Fall came. We were busy getting in crops, felling trees for fuel, and digging vegetable cellars. For a month the three batteries had not taken the canvas covers off their cannons.Everybody worked hard; even the cooks could not go to bed until midnight, because they had to pickle a lot of vegetables — cabbages, turnips, eggplants, green peppers, garlic, and the like. By the end of September, we had finished most of the preparations for the winter. Now we could spare some men and sent them to help the villagers in Guanmen with their harvest and their threshing and winnowing.
    On the evening of October 1, National Day, right after the holiday feast, the leader of the mess squad, Mu Lin, burst into the Battalion Headquarters. At the sight of Diao and me, he cried, “Our guns are stolen!”
    “What?” I jumped to my feet. “What guns? How many?”
    “Two semiautomatic rifles,” he said, panting hard. “They just disappeared this afternoon, when we were busy cooking the dinner.”
    “Damn it, it must be Dragon Head again. Let’s go.” I put on my pistol and went out with Mu. Commissar Diao and Scribe Niu came along with us, but they didn’t wear their pistols.
    No trace of the crime