Rickshaw Boy: A Novel by She Lao Page A

repeated. But when Xiangzi stood up, she saw his bloody face. “Oh, my, you’ll be the death of me! What happened to you? Get that taken care of right away, before you get a case of lockjaw! Get a move on! The master has medicine that’ll take care of it!”
    Xiangzi walked into the study, Gao Ma behind him, grumbling the whole way. Mrs. Cao was wrapping her husband’s hand when she saw Xiangzi. She uttered a cry of alarm.
    “He’s taken a nasty fall, mistress,” Gao Ma said, as if Mrs. Cao could not see for herself. After busying herself filling a basin with cool water, she chattered on: “I knew something like this would happen sooner or later, the way he runs, like a man with a death wish. And I was right. What are you waiting for? Wash that face so we can put some medicine on it. I’m telling you!”
    Xiangzi stood motionless, gripping his right elbow. With blood all over his face, he felt out of place in such a clean, refined study. And he wasn’t alone; the others, even Gao Ma, uncharacteristically silent, could sense that something was not right.
    “Sir.” Xiangzi broke the silence, head bowed, his voice barely audible but surprisingly strong.
    “You’d better find someone else. You can hold back this month’s wages to fix the broken shaft and the cracked lantern on the left side. Nothing else was broken.”
    “We’ll talk about that after you wash up and put on some medicine,” Mr. Cao said as he watched his wife wrap his injured hand.
    “Now wash up!” Gao Ma said, having regained her voice.
    “The master has said nothing, so don’t get ahead of yourself.”
    He still didn’t move. “I don’t need to wash up. I’ll be fine in a minute. A monthly hire who injures his employer and damages his rickshaw no longer has the face to…” Words failed him, but he was obviously on the verge of tears. Giving up his job and forfeiting his wages nearly amounted to suicide in Xiangzi’s eyes. But at a time like this, duty and face were more important than life, because the person he’d injured was Mr. Cao, not just anybody. If he’d thrown Mrs. Yang, for instance, so what! It would have served her right. He could have dealt with her like a street fighter; since she had never treated him like a man, there was no need to be considerate. Money was everything; face meant nothing, let alone rules of behavior. But Mr. Cao was not like that, and Xiangzi needed to sacrifice money to preserve his self-respect. If there was anyone or anything to hate, it was his fate, and he had just about decided that after leaving the Cao home he’d give up life as a rickshaw man. Since his life was worth practically nothing, he could throw it away if he wanted. But he couldn’t be so cavalier when it came to other people. What if he actually killed someone? That thought had never occurred to him in the past, but the accident with Mr. Cao changed that. All right, then, he’d forget the money and take up a new line of work, one that didn’t put other people at risk. And yet, since pulling a rickshaw had always been his ideal trade, giving it up meant abandoning hope. He would just muddle his way through life from now on and forget his dream of being a model rickshaw man. But what a waste of such a carefully developed physique! Back when he was picking up passengers on the street, he was sometimes cursed for stealing fares from other men, a shameless act he justified by his desire to better himself and buy his own rickshaw; he had no trouble absolving himself. But now he had a monthly hire and what happened? He had an accident. If word got around that Xiangzi had bungled a monthly hire by throwing his employer and banging up his rickshaw, he’d be laughed out of the ranks. He had no choice. He must quit before Mr. Cao fired him.
    “Xiangzi,” said Mr. Cao, whose hand was neatly bandaged.
    “Go wash up. I don’t want to hear any more talk about quitting. It wasn’t your fault. They should have put a red lantern by the