47: The Path Alone

The first day on the road alone was the strangest day Heizi had walked in his life.

It was strange because, for the first time in five months, the small daily shape of the road was — at every quarter hour — a shape of one.

He woke alone in the small dry hollow under a stand of pines two *li* south of the camp, where he had stopped at the second hour of the dusk on the first evening. He laid alone, at the second cock, the small banked fire's morning kindling. He drew alone, from a small thin trickle of an unnamed spring at the foot of the slope, the morning's water. He cooked alone the small portion of millet with a small slice of dried hare. He ate alone, with the small wooden bowl from Wei Da-niang's hand on his knee and the small twist of grey salt at his elbow.

He listened, while he ate, for the small specific sounds of three other people moving at the small flat place behind the long low ridge, fifteen *li* north.

He could not, at fifteen *li*, hear them. He could only — by the small specific way of the past three months at the small flat place — fill the silence with the small specific sounds he had memorized: the small even breath of Tie-zhu at the slab; the small slow careful movement of An Ashi at the morning fire; the small steady weight of Wang Er at the back of the lean-to. The small specific sounds were, on this morning, in his head only. The country around him — the upper-hills slope, the small thin pines, the small thin frost at the brush — was the country of one.

He filed it.

He set off at the third hour of the dawn.

He walked at the small specific pace of a young man on a winter road who had — by the lame boy's small specific reading at the dusk — perhaps two weeks before the storm, and ten days for a trip, and one day already walked. He walked steadily. The small bundle on his back was light. The small wadded second-layer coat the lame boy had made him held against the small specific cold of the morning. The small carved horse in the inner pocket of his shirt pressed against his ribs.

By the noon, he had come past the small flat hollow where the second-day camp had been, on his outbound route in the second moon — back when there had been three brothers and the bandit-band's distant sound at the saddle of the third ridge east had not yet been imagined. The small flat hollow was, on this winter day, a small bowl of clean snow with a small thin layer of ice on the small still pool at the center. It was empty. There were no fresh tracks at any of its quadrants.

He went past it.

By the dusk of the second day, he was at the lip of the descent into the small flat hollow at the foot of the bear-back.

The bear-back stood, in the small late grey light, in its small specific shape. The bald grey rock of its eastern face was — at this season — half-covered by a small steady winter snow. The long slow western slope, with its small old pine and oak coming down through the brush, was the same long slow western slope it had been at the second moon. The grove of twelve pines on the small terrace at the foot of the bear-back's western face stood in the small specific cluster Heizi remembered.

There was a small thin column of smoke rising from the grove.

He stopped at the lip.

He watched.

The smoke was the small banked smoke of an old man's evening fire. It was thinner than it had been at the noon of his departure three months ago. It was — by the small specific reading of the wind angle and the small wisp of grey at the small thin column — the kind of smoke an old man laid when the small banking was being done by hands that had — at this season, in this cold — been at the banking many years.

Lao Wen was alive.

Heizi let the small thin column sit in his eye for a long beat.

He came down off the lip slowly.

He came across the small flat hollow at the foot — where, three months ago, three boys had camped at the southern edge for two nights, watching for a man who had not, in those two nights, come down — to the foot of the small old herder's path.

The small flat stone at the foot of the path was where it had been. There was, on it, no small folded paper. There was, on it, no small piece of jade. There was, on it, the small thin layer of winter snow.

He stopped at the foot of the path.

He looked up.

He could see, perhaps three hundred paces above him, the small dark cluster of the grove of twelve pines, half-hidden behind the small low brush of the lower terrace's edge. He could not see, at this distance and through the brush, the hut. He could see only, at the small thin gap between two of the pines, a small slow drift of grey from the small banked fire's smoke.

He thought.

He thought about whether to go up.

He thought about the lame boy at the slab, with the smith's son still on his back at the eastern wall, and the boy at the small fire, doing the small specific arithmetic in the small thin firelight. He thought about the eight days he had ahead of him — south to Lu Wen-han, the trade, north back to the camp. He thought about the storm, perhaps two weeks off, perhaps less.

He thought about the small specific weight he had, on this evening at the foot of the path, for the small interval that going up might cost him: perhaps a quarter day; perhaps a half day; perhaps — if the old scholar received him this evening — a night.

He had — at the lame boy's small specific instruction at the slab the night before yesterday — eight days for the trip.

He had, on this evening, used two of the eight to come this far. The fastest pace south to Lu Wen-han was two more days. A trade and a return — four more days. A buffer of one for any small specific bad weather. Eight in total.

A half day at the grove was a half day he did not have.

But — but the lame boy had also said, at the slab: *bring it back.* The lame boy had given him the small carved horse. The lame boy had laid one hand once on the top of his head, in the small specific small-old-man's gesture. The lame boy had — by the small specific way the household was in the third week of the ninth moon — sent him with the household's small specific weight on his back.

The grove — at this evening, with its small thin column of smoke rising from a small banked fire — was, in some small specific way, a small place that was not — at this evening — at the household's weight.

It was — by the small honest measure — a small place at the country's weight.

Heizi did not — at the foot of the path, on this evening — go up.

He laid, at the small flat stone at the foot, a small new folded paper. He had brought one. He had — at the morning of departure, in the lean-to in the dim grey, before the brothers were yet up — taken from the inside of his coat a small new scrap of pine bark and had inscribed on it, in the small thin charcoal of the dawn fire, two of the small specific characters An Ashi had taught him in the past three weeks.

The two characters were *四* and *人*.

*Four. People.*

*Four people.*

He had not — at the morning of departure — thought of bringing the paper for any small specific reason. He had brought it because he had thought — without quite naming it as a thought — that he might, in passing the foot of the path, want to leave a small new note for the old scholar; that the old scholar might, by the small specific reading of the small thin smoke column at the noon three months ago, have been waiting for some small new word.

He had not — at the morning — known whether he would lay the paper.

He laid it now.

He laid it on the small flat stone where, three months ago, he had laid the small dark jade and then the small folded *北* paper. He weighted it with a small flat pebble from the streamside.

He stepped back.

He looked up at the grove.

He bowed, very slightly, in the direction of the small dark cluster of the twelve pines.

He turned and went on south, on the small old herders' path, in the small last grey light of the evening.

Behind him, at the small flat stone at the foot of the path, the small folded paper with the two characters *四 人* sat in the small thin winter cold, weighted by the small flat pebble. The small thin column of smoke from the grove of twelve pines continued, in its small banked patient way, to rise into the small clear winter sky.

Heizi did not, on the path, look back.

He walked.

He camped, at the second hour of the dusk, in a small dry place at the foot of the next small ridge south, perhaps two *li* past the foot of the path. He laid a small banked fire. He cooked a small portion. He ate. He took a single watch — the small specific watch a young man on a winter road took at the small dim grey of the late evening — sitting at the small fire with his back against the small rock face of the next ridge.

He thought.

He thought, for the first time in three months, about the small specific possibility that he had been wrong, at the third week of the ninth moon, about coming this way alone.

He thought: *the lame boy is right, by the small specific reading of the wind, that the storm is two weeks off perhaps. But the lame boy also said perhaps three, perhaps four, perhaps less than two. The lame boy is — by the small honest measure of his own saying — not a perfect reader. The storm could be a week off. The storm could, in some small specific worst case, be three days off. I am — at this evening — perhaps four days from Lu Wen-han's hamlet. I will be six days from the camp. If the storm comes in three days, I will be on the road for it. I will need to find — find the eastern-pine hermit's hut, perhaps the cold-spring lean-to, perhaps the small old shrine in the narrow draw of two valleys south of the bear-back, where the small old shrine is sheltered between two outcrops of grey rock and would, in a small specific snow, hold a single body.*

He thought: *I have — I have ways through.*

He thought: *the country has been keeping me. The small old men — Cao Ergou, the eastern-pine hermit, the widow Shen, Wei Lao-han, Lu Wen-han, the lame brother who is now small and old — have been laying their small specific instructions in my head for five months. The country, by the small specific way of the small old ledgers, will — perhaps — keep me through.*

He thought, finally: *I will know, in three days, whether the country is keeping or whether it is not.*

He filed it.

He laid the small banked fire down to a small live coal under the ash. He went into the small dry place under the rock face. He pulled the wadded coat around himself. He laid the small carved horse out of his inner pocket and set it beside him on the dry needles, where the small charcoal-eye and the small dark ribbon were close enough to his face that, if he opened his eyes in the night, he would see them.

He slept.

He slept the small thin sleep of a young man on a winter road alone.

He woke at the second cock.

The country, in the dim grey of the morning, was the country of one. The wind was steady. The cold was — by the small specific reading the lame boy had taught him — perhaps a fraction colder than yesterday's morning. The small thin layer of frost at the brush around his small dry place was a small fraction thicker.

He rose. He laid the small fire's morning kindling. He cooked. He ate.

He set off.

By the noon of the third day, he was at the small narrow draw between two outcrops of grey rock where, two months and a season ago, on his outbound, the small old shrine had been.

He stopped at the mouth of the draw.

The mouth of the draw was, in winter, narrower than it had been in spring. The brush at the entrance had laid down with the cold; the small heavier branches had snapped under the small accumulating snow; the gap of about a hand-and-a-half between the two outcrops at the highest point was — by the small thin layer of snow — even narrower.

He went in slowly.

The draw narrowed. The walls of grey rock rose perhaps three men's heights at the inner end. The bottom of the draw was, in winter, a small thin layer of clean snow over the small flat earth.

The small old shrine stood at the foot of the moss-streaked face.

He came up to it.

The small house of three stones was unchanged. The small carved Buddhist figure on the back wall was unchanged.

The offerings on the small flat offering plate had — in the past two months — changed.

The single small dried plum was no longer there. The small fingernail-square of red cloth was no longer there. The small dark first-month bead was no longer there. The small lock of dark hair he himself had laid at the second moon was no longer there.

In the place of all of these, on the offering plate — laid, by some hand, in the small thin layer of snow on the plate — was a single small new offering.

It was a small folded square of white cloth.

The cloth was — by the small specific look of it — winter cloth; a piece of an old hempen robe, perhaps, that the unfound woman had cut from the inner lining of an old garment and folded carefully and laid here, at the offering plate, perhaps in the past two weeks.

Heizi knelt at the plate.

He looked at the small folded square of white cloth.

He understood, slowly: *the woman has been here. The woman has come, perhaps in the past month, and has — by the small specific cleaning of the offering plate — taken the old offerings and the small lock of dark hair I laid at the second moon, into her small private keeping, in the small specific way of an upper-hills shrine-keeper. She has laid in their place a small new winter offering — a small folded square of white cloth, perhaps from the same garment that the small fingernail-square of red was. She is — she is well enough, at this winter, to have come.*

He understood, also, the small specific shape of the gesture.

The woman had — by the small specific clean of the offering plate — taken the offerings he had laid there as offerings she had received.

The unfound woman, in her unfound house, in some unfound valley of the upper hills, had — by the small specific way of the small old country's small old running of small ledgers — *received* the small lock of his sister's hair.

His sister's hair was, somewhere, in the woman's small specific keeping.

The woman was — somewhere, at her small specific work of the autumn and the winter — looking at the small lock of dark hair, perhaps, every several days, and was holding, in her small private register, the small unknown name of the giver and the small unknown name of the woman the hair had belonged to.

Heizi closed his eyes for the space of one breath.

He opened them.

He took, from the inner pocket of his shirt, the small twist of paper that the eastern-pine hermit had pressed into his palm at the door three months ago. He unwrapped it. He took out the single thin stick of incense.

He laid the stick of incense on the offering plate beside the small folded square of white cloth.

He bowed once.

He stood up.

The small old shrine, in the small narrow draw, held its small specific quiet.

Heizi, at the foot of the moss-streaked face, said in the small low voice that had — at the past five months — become his small specific noticing-voice for any small specific thing the country was telling him:

"Grandmother. I do not know your name. You do not know mine. I have laid, at this small offering plate at the second moon, a small lock of dark hair from a small folded indigo pouch my sister Mei-er gave me at her last morning. She is dead. She was sixteen. She would have been — by the small specific way of the country — a woman in your small unfound house this winter, perhaps. Thank you for receiving her."

He paused.

"I have laid, on this evening, a small thin stick of incense from an old monk at the eastern pine, who said *for the small old shrine in the narrow draw, when you come back this way.* I am coming back this way. I am laying it. He is — he was — old. He may, by my passing back at the eastern pine in three days, be still alive. He may not. The incense is for you to lay at the next morning of your visit, against him. He — he is on your road also."

He paused once more.

"And — and I am, on this evening, asking the small specific shrine to keep — if it will — the small specific weight on my back for a small unknown future. I am carrying — I am carrying a small specific instruction from three different voices, about a small specific thing called *living anyway.* I am, on this evening, alone on a winter road south. The lame brother of my household has put into my hand a small carved horse with the small charcoal eye and the small dark ribbon, and has said *bring it back.* I am, by the small specific reading of the wind, perhaps two weeks from a true winter storm and perhaps less. If — if the small specific shrine, by the small unhurried way it has of keeping things, will hold — will hold the bringing back — for the unfound woman's small specific keeping — I will — "

He paused.

He understood, kneeling at the small old shrine, that he had been saying things he had not, until this moment, allowed himself to say.

He understood that he had been saying them aloud, in the small narrow draw, to a Buddhist figure with a worn face and to a small folded square of white cloth left by a woman he had never seen.

He filed it.

He bowed once more. He stood up.

He stepped back. He went out of the draw, slowly, in the small thin winter light.

He continued south.

By the dusk of the fourth day, he came in sight of the small flat place beside the eastern pine.

There was no smoke rising from the small clay-pot chimney at the back of the southern wall.

He walked toward the hut at the small steady pace.

He came up to the door.

The hide flap was closed. There was no fire at the slab outside. The small flat stone where the small clay pot of *yu-ma* soup had warmed at the dusk three months ago was, in this winter, a small flat layer of clean snow.

He called, low: *grandfather, we are travelers.*

There was no answer.

He called again, low: *grandfather. It is the lad who came in the second moon. From Old Zhang's house. The four lads. Three of us are alive. I am alone tonight. Grandfather. Are you — are you within.*

There was no answer.

He stepped to the door. He laid one finger, very gently, against the hide flap. The flap was, by the small specific cold of it under his hand, the cold of a flap that had not been opened in some weeks.

He pushed the flap aside.

He looked in.

The small one-room hut was — at the dim grey of the evening — empty. The small low cot at the back wall was — at the small thin look of it — covered with a small layer of dust on the folded blanket. The small altar at the back, with the small carved Buddhist figure, was — in the dim grey — undisturbed; the small clay cup of fresh water before the figure had a small thin layer of ice at its rim. The small low fire at the southern wall was a small ring of cold ash.

The old monk was no longer at this hut.

He had — by the small specific reading of the dust on the blanket and the small thin ice at the cup's rim — been gone perhaps three weeks. Perhaps a month. He had not — by the small specific look of any of the small interior arrangements — left in flight or in alarm; he had — by the small careful folding of the blanket on the cot — left in his own small specific way.

He had, perhaps, walked out one morning to die in some small specific place of his own choosing, in the small old way of an old man who had been keeping the door of his hut for nineteen winters.

He had asked Heizi, three months ago, not to bury him. He had said *the country will bury me, if there is anything left to bury.*

The country had taken him.

Heizi stood at the open door of the empty hut for a long beat.

He stepped inside.

He went to the small low altar. He laid one hand, very briefly, on the small carved Buddhist figure — the small carved figure whose features had, three months ago, been clear, and which had — by the small thin layer of the autumn's dust — taken on the small thin patina of an old shrine no longer being kept.

He bowed once.

He stepped back. He went out. He pulled the hide flap closed behind him.

Outside, in the small dim grey, he stood at the small flat stone where, three months ago, the old man had washed his hands at first cock with the small wooden dipper.

He laid, on the small flat stone, a small portion of the dried hare from his pack.

He bowed once toward the hut.

He went on.

The eastern-pine hermit had — by the small specific way of the country — gone.

The small old hut would, perhaps, by the spring, be taken by the country also.

Heizi did not weep.

He filed it.

He camped that night two *li* further south, in a small dry place at the foot of a small low ridge.

In the morning, before the second cock, he set off again.

The small carved horse pressed, at his ribs, against the small finished indigo pouch and the small dark jade and the wrapped jade with his foster mother's hair.

He had — by the small specific reading of the wind on the dawn — perhaps eleven or twelve days before the storm.

He walked.