Water Touching Stone by Eliot Pattison

place, that's all," he said enigmatically, then steered the conversation away from Lau and the dead boy, speaking instead as a host spoke to his guests, following the code of hospitality Shan had experienced in nomad tents in Tibet. He showed Shan how to twist the wooden plug off the skin and raise it to squirt into his mouth. Shan did so uncertainly, for he had not seen such skins in Tibet, then nearly choked as the acrid liquid hit his pallet.
     
     
Akzu grinned. "Fermented mare's milk," he explained, then accepted the skin back from Shan and took a long swallow of the pale white liquor. He sighed with satisfaction, then spoke of how the horses were growing heavy coats, the sign of a harsh season to come. After a quarter hour Jakli rose and stepped behind the carpet partition at the rear, triggering a hushed, excited chatter from the women behind it. After a few minutes she reappeared, flushed with color, as though embarrassed, then retrieved Shan's drawstring bag where it sat by the entrance. Shan offered his gratitude to Akzu's wife, then followed Jakli to the tent by the animals.
     
     
Malik appeared, holding the flap open as if he had been waiting for them. But Jakli lingered, looking toward the tent on the opposite side of the camp, then handed Shan's bag to the boy and silently moved into the third tent. Shan hesitated, wondering if Malik would explain. But the boy shrugged and moved back behind the flap. Shan followed Jakli and heard a strange, irregular clicking sound as he approached the third tent. Five faces looked up at him as he stepped inside. Jowa, Jakli, Fat Mao, and Akzu's sons.
     
     
Jakli sat with Jowa near a small smoldering brazier. The Uighur and the two Kazakh men were kneeling behind them, a sheen of excitement on their faces, looking at a small portable computer in Jowa's lap.
     
     
Jakli looked up, startled. "By the stable. There is a pallet for you in the tent with Lokesh."
     
     
But Shan stepped closer. One of the Kazakhs muttered a curse as he approached. Jowa seemed undisturbed. He glanced at Shan and kept working, tapping the keyboard, reading the screen with intense curiosity.
     
     
Jakli stood, uncertainty on her face. "It's only some records about agricultural production units. Jowa is helping with the computer."
     
     
Shan stepped to Jowa's side and studied the screen as the purba slowly scrolled through a computer file. The data was in Chinese, with the same heading on each screen, "Agricultural Production Inventories, Yoktian County." There were subheadings for cotton, wool, barley, and wheat, each with production records. Over seventy percent of the production was credited to the People's Construction and Development Corporation. Other, smaller entries, were for the patchwork of collectives and family enterprises comprising the remaining participants in the local industry.
     
     
Jowa stopped at the screen for wool production. One of the Kazakh men hovering over his shoulder pointed to an entry at the bottom of the screen. "Red Stone," it read. "That's us," the man said. "Red Stone Herding Enterprise. The clan enterprise."
     
     
Jowa highlighted the name and tapped a button. A five-year record of production from Red Stone appeared, with a graph at the bottom. The clan's wool production had steadily declined. Jowa tapped another button, producing a screen for five-year comparisons with others in Yoktian County. Red Stone had the lowest productivity in every year and by far the lowest cumulative total.
     
     
Jakli leaned over Jowa and translated what the screen said. While most of those present clearly understood Chinese, few, apparently, could read it. When she had finished, one of the Kazakh men spat a curse. "The Brigade," he said. "They beat us down for years, treat us like slaves in our own land, and still they are not satisfied."
     
     
"The People's Brigade, they call it," Jakli explained to Shan. "It was Beijing's first stage of settlement. Many of the soldiers