Frog

I woke up late one night, Wang Gan said, and discovered that the master was not in bed. I immediately lit a lantern but didn’t find him at his workbench or in the yard. Where could he be? I broke out in a cold sweat, thinking that something had happened to him, and what a loss that would have been for Northeast Township. The county chief has brought the heads of the cultural and tourism bureaus here on three separate occasions. You know who the county chief is, don’t you? None other than the son of Yang Lin, the one-time county Party secretary who suffered so badly here and who had a tangled relationship with Gugu. Yang Xiong is a talented young man with penetrating eyes and neat white teeth, and who carries the smell of expensive cigarettes around on him. Word has it he studied in Germany. On his first visit he declared that the livestock-feeding building would not be torn down; the second time he invited the master to a banquet in town, but the master wrapped his arms around one of the tethering posts and held on like a man refusing to go in for a vasectomy; on the third visit, the county chief brought the master a plaque and a certificate proclaiming him to be a folk artist. Wang Gan reached into the cattle trough and brought out a gold-plated plaque and a certificate in a blue fleece cover to show us. Sure, he said, Hao Dashou has one of these plaques and a certificate, and the county chief also invited him to a banquet in town. He didn’t accept the invitation either. He wouldn’t have been Hao Dashou if he had. Well, these reactions had the county chief viewing the two Northeast Gaomi Township individuals in a new light. Wang Gan reached into his pocket for a stack of business cards, and selected three for us. See here, he said, he gives me one of these every time he visits. Lao Wang, he said to me, Northeast Gaomi Township has hidden talent just waiting to be discovered, and you’re part of that. I’m a down-and-outer, I said, with a notorious record. Outside of an infamous romantic escapade, I’ve been a complete cipher. These days I get by hawking somebody else’s clay dolls. Guess what he said to that? Anyone who can devote half a lifetime’s energy to the pursuit of a romantic vision is a legendary figure in his own right. Your township has produced its share of unusual and eccentric people, and you’re one of them. I tell you, the fellow’s part of a new breed of officials, nothing like the ones we used to know. I’ll bring you over to meet him the next time he comes to visit. He gave me the job of taking care of the master, responsible for safeguarding his welfare. So when I woke up in the middle of the night and couldn’t find him anywhere, I panicked. What would I say to the county chief if something happened to the master? I sat in a sort of trance in front of the stove until moonlight flowed into the room. A pair of chirping crickets behind the stove invested the room with a sense of foreboding. Then I heard some chilled laughter emerge from one of the horse troughs. I jumped to my feet and looked down into the trough, where the master was lying on his back staring into the sky. The trough was too short for him, so he had to curl his legs yoga-fashion, while his hands were folded on his chest. He wore a peaceful look and a broad smile. I could tell he was fast asleep; the laugh was part of his dream. I’m sure you know that these geniuses, the pride of the township, all suffer from debilitating insomnia, and though I’m only half a genius, I too suffer from insomnia. How about you two? Any sleep problems?

Little Lion and I exchanged a glance and shook our heads. No problems for us. We’re snoring away as soon as our heads touch the pillow. I guess that proves we’re not in the genius category.