Chronicle of a Blood Merchant by Yu Hua, Andrew F. Jones Read Free Book Online

enjoy myself? To punish you. You made a serious mistake. You slept with that bastard He Xiaoyong behind my back. What’s even worse is that he knocked you up with Yile. It makes me angry just to think about it. You want me to go buy you rice? Dream on.”
    Xu Yulan said, “I can’t lift one hundred pounds of rice by myself.”
    Xu Sanguan said, “Then get fifty.”
    “I can’t handle fifty pounds either.”
    “Try twenty-five.”
    XU YULAN said, “Xu Sanguan, I’m going to wash the sheets. Will you help me move the trunk? I can’t move it by myself.”
    Xu Sanguan said, “Nothing doing. I’m sitting back in my chair and enjoying myself.”
    XU YULAN said, “Xu Sanguan, time to eat.”
    Xu Sanguan replied, “Bring me my bowl. I’ll sit in my chair and eat.”
    XU YULAN asked, “Xu Sanguan, are you done enjoying yourself yet? I can’t keep my eyes open much longer, so when you’re finished enjoying yourself, get your ass out of that chair and come to bed.”
    Xu Sanguan said, “I’ll be right there.”

CHAPTER SEVEN
    One good thing about working at the silk factory was that Xu Sanguan was given a new pair of white work gloves every month. When the women on the factory floor saw them, they would always ask with envy in their voices, “Xu Sanguan, how many more years until you decide to switch to a new pair of gloves?”
    Xu Sanguan lifted up his hands to show them his tattered old gloves. When he waved his hands, loose threads swung back and forth like so many pendulums from the places where they’d already worn through. “I’ve worn this pair for three years now.”
    They said, “You call those things gloves? We can see your fingers sticking out from all the way across the factory floor.”
    Xu Sanguan said, “They’re new the first year, and old for the next two years. After two years I’ll mend them. That way I’ll be able to use this pair for at least three more years.”
    They said, “Xu Sanguan, if you wear the same pair of gloves for six years and the factory gives you a new pair every month, what does that get you? Six years of gloves comes to seventy-two pairs. What are you going to do with the seventy-one pairs that you
don’t
wear? What’s the point of hoarding that many gloves? Why don’t you give some of them to us? We only get a new pair every six months.”
    Xu Sanguan carefully folded his new gloves, placed them in his pocket, and smilingly made his way home. When he arrived, he took the gloves from his pocket and presented them to Xu Yulan. Xu Yulan took them and immediately walked over to the window, lifting the gloves to the light to see if they were sewn of coarse or fine cotton thread.
    “Aiya!”
    Her exclamations always scared Xu Sanguan into thinking she had discovered that this month’s gloves were moth-eaten.
    “They’re the good kind.”
    There were two days every month when Xu Yulan would stick out her hands and say to Xu Sanguan as he got home from work, “Hand it over.” The first day was payday and the other was when the factory distributed new gloves.
    Xu Yulan stored the gloves at the bottom of the trunk. When she saved up four pairs of gloves, she could use them to make a sweater for Sanle. With six pairs she could make one for Erle. Once she had eight or nine, she could sew a sweater for Yile.
    But it would take more than twenty pairs to make Xu Sanguan a new sweater, which gave her pause. She would often say to Xu Sanguan, “Your arms are getting bigger, there’s more meat around your waist, and you’re putting a little weight on your stomach. Now even twenty pairs of gloves won’t be enough.”
    Xu Sanguan said, “Then why don’t you just make something for yourself?”
    Xu Yulan said, “I’ll wait and see.”
    Xu Yulan didn’t sew anything for herself until she had collected seventeen or eighteen pairs of the finer quality gloves. And Xu Sanguan only brought home three or four pairs of the fine cotton gloves every year. After nine years of