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Show Wang eyed the speaker quizzically. quizzical-ly. What was he talking about? Manchu .Tyranny? Victorious Republicans? Re-publicans? He edged closer. "The republican army is on its way to take this city!" Wang glanced at the tense faces about him. Did the others understand under-stand the things this man spoke? He tried to ask one near him and was hushed. He .shrugged his shoulders shoul-ders and started to break away. The speaker's naxt She tried to 'breakaway - nf the Groat House. LiKe maicn wood the gates crashed under the Ternlic impact. The rabble poured n o the coPurt. trampling down the euard surg ng onward like a ti-Sa. ti-Sa. wave, a thousand hoarse cr.e. silencing the thunder of gun3. Ootiyrlubt 19TJ Loew'a Inc. Chapter One THE FINDING OF THE PEARLS The wind bit thru the twine-woven twine-woven mat walls as Wang, wet and cold, crawled inside the hovel. He threw himself onto a pile of straw and lay there motionless. He sensed rather than saw O-lan's bent Ilgure at the make-shift stove. Old father, squatting nearby, mumbled to himself. The children hugged the ground, fatigue and hunger etched in every line of face and body-Wangs body-Wangs eyes closed in despair. "Do we have to steal or beg to live?" he criod. But the words choked him. For he had seen O-lan teach the children to beg in this very hut. ' So I begged," she had whispered, "when I was a child in tunes like these." He had beaten Elder Son for . stealing meat, the ilrst they had tasted in months. And. in his rage, he had hurled it the length of their been increasingly kind. Wang the poor farmer had grown to be Wang the rich farmer. O-lan the slave had buried her years of servitude beneath the quiet will with which she worked by his side, withjwhich she bore his two eons, with which she cared for Little Girl. But the famine had reduced them all to dust. The drought had killed the growing grow-ing things in his field; shriveled the rice and dried up the pools; caked the land in a hard crust that was barren even of roots they might eat. I W ang shivered in his tatters. Here in the city rain fell to make men cold and weary, to turn the streets to mud. In the North, where farm earth choked for water, none fell, and daily the sun baked the earth to clay. The famine had sapped Old Father of his strength. The famine had stunted the children- The famine had taken from Little Girl her will to talk or think. The famine had swept them cruelly into the haggard cue that wended its words rooted'him to the spot. "In spite of rains in the North, the Republican Re-publican army has been marching thirty miles a day.' Wangs lace glowed glow-ed with sudden light. ' Plains in the North! Its raining in the North!" he cried aloud. A great shout drowned his cry. "Soldiers! Soldiers!" The warning blasted t -w s xy --"r y w ' - a - ; i . - f --Trc-xrv - & , j u l J ' ' - - '-J' V . .t'i,;),',! 4 e 'i i ' - ' 1 ,t , r '7 f ' , X 4, I . s y . a r s i i ? e 4. - ,r, . r. f -y - - ' ' ' ')'', I Z 4 rVTl, - " '-2 ' y - It 'l'X -- ' - " You would sell, he Little Girl?" . ,", 5 I t V' W 4V' Wang asked. I,'" -V.f.f fr 1 Now the crow, eagea.n.pon.t. , t r ' - 0 J self and swayed, tightly-packed up -V 1 'M 4 W lv' f toCJTl the steps and into the house hands ,,. y 1 W" caching for whatever met eyes v v T ! ,i?V j. Js "v .j, , Vfj! , VT J Beggars8 peddlers, criminals Men, " ! rf-' fi ' I 1 4 M g 1 boys women. All struggled to keep fti 4 pJL-P X their footing and fought space with - ,r'Zr' x , J- Ir-I :,, their elbows ' , V ' 'a C 1 , V J Olan clung frantically to the rail I . V i . 'J ..s$S V I of the steps but the resistless power 6 V " - t f" i f ",YNl. ' V4 ', of the thiong canled her on The rf , , Zf i'V . ? - -W' --.-" 'it, J Impulse of the scieammg, protest- 7 i,i i ; ; S i' fc, 1 -k fVir ing mob thrust her thru the double ifi fi'- , 5 ' 1 1. doors into a vast chamber The 1" '? A '-,-'-( " r ' -rti i'"' "fij'i ciowd hesitated a rooment as if to ,, ..,,. In that second's hesitation O-lan litis is the revolution. . .. , ost the support of the jammed Now the crowd edged In upon Itself It-self and swayed, tightly-packed, up the steps and into the house, hands reaching for whatever met eyes. Beggars, peddlers, criminals. Men, boys, women. All struggled to keep their footing and fought space with their elbows. O-lan clung frantically to the rail of the steps but the resistless power of the throng carried her on. The impulse of the screaming, protesting protest-ing mob thrust her thru the double doors into a vast chamber. The crowd hesitated a moment as if to decide which way nfrt to turn. In that second's hesitation O-lan lost the support of the jammed filthy hut only to permit O-lan to retrieve it and then to partake of it as eagerly as did. the others. What aiore could this cursed famine do to him? "A man can't stand It here," he muttered, "with land of his own in the North " The vision of his farm assailed him. He heard again the wind and rain singing thru his five great fields rich with ripe wheat. He felt again the rhythmic movement of his body and O-lan's as they worked, work-ed, handb tightly clasping sickles; as they tied the sheaves; as they loaded the ox-cart. In memory, the savory odor of O-lan's little colored cakes taptalized his nostrils; the New Year's cakes which they had carried to Old Mistress whose slave she had once been. "Sugar and lard!" Old Father had exclaimed as he reached for the cakes laying twr by two Iri thftr reed-skin basket. "There's no end to the money soent in this house!" O-lan had stopped his hand. "No," she admonished. "They are all for the Old Mistress. She must see how well we've done." Then O-lan, basket on arm, and Wang, carrying their first child, a man-child, had set out in pride for the Great House. It had been their day of triumph! For O-lan, because she was no longer a slave but the wife of a farmer, the mother of a aon. For Wang, because on that day he bought the first of his five fine fields. For eight years the Gods had way toward the great cities of the South. The famine had reduced him now to a thing of pain and unshed tears which huddled with cold and hunger in a filthy straw hut slung against the wall of the city's Great House. Only O-lan remained the same. "If I had anything to sell, I'd sell it and go back to the land." The words burst from Wang in anguish. O-lan picked up Little Girl and pressed her close. Her eyes met Wang's in a look of fear and resolution. reso-lution. "In tim'es like these," she said slowly, "my parents found a way to go back. They sold me to Old Mistress." Her words brought Wang to his feet. "You would sell the Little Girl?" he asked. "I'd sell her," answered O-lan "to take you back to the land." "If it weren't for me, you'd die before you'd sell her," he cried and turning abruptly, thrust himself thru the flap out into the street. Outside a great tumult -greeted him. He looked towards the sound of cheering and shouting, then made for a huge crowd surrounding a speaker who perched on a rough cart. "In a few days China will be a free country," the speaker shouted as Wang found a place on the fringe of the crowd. "The day of Manchu Tyranny is over. Their army is running from the victorious Republicans." the air. "Soldiers!" The mob hurled the word, as horses hooves pdunded the pavements" and shots rang out. In an instant the crowd took to its heels, propelling Wang with it, down the street, past the rows of hovels against the Great Wall, into the square, there dispersing wildly under an onslaught of bullets. Wang leaped toward a building and sought shelter behind a pillar. An aged peddler crouched nearby. "What is it!" whispered Wang. "The- revolution," answered the other. "China is a Republic." "What is a revolution. What is a republic?" The question rose and died in his throat as the cavalry rode perilously close, their grjns barking fire in every direction. The vision of O-lan, his father, the children chil-dren loomed up before Wang. Would the bullets reach them in the hut. His heart leaped sickeningly. In their hovel, Wang's family clung together in fear and trembling. trembl-ing. O-lan covered Old Father and the children with straw and then crept cautiously to the street. What was happening? Where was Wang? Seething, milling crowds rushed past engulfing her. "Where do we go?" she cried as she felt herself swept along in the mob. "To the Great House," answered someone. "You may have whatever you want there. The treasures in the Great House are ours. A man may take what he likes. This is the revolution . . ." throng. She tottered for an instant. A second wave of ragged humanity surged up behind her and threw her to the floor. She tried to rise, but the crowd rushed over her, forcing her prone. A heavy foot tread on her, violently, sickeningly. With a cry she bent double, falling upon her face. It was dark when she came to, to find herself alone in the great chamber. For a moment she lay quiet, uncertain of her whereabouts. She tried to move, but an agony of pain stayed her. With it came the return of memory. She dragged herself to a pillar for support. Slowly, gaspingly, she rose to a crouching position, her hand comforting com-forting her searing side. She stared about vaguely, her gaze encompassing encompass-ing the wrecked room. A curious awareness lighted hei eyes as they found a small leather pouch nearby. She reached for -it unsteadily. She thrust her hand tremblingly, inside it. She turned it upside down and into her lap poured pour-ed a stream of glittering jewels. Pearls. Diamonds. Rubies. Jade. Her voice was low and faltering as she whispered: "We can go back now to th land." O-lan has found the means to take Wang and her family back to ther farm . . . but what, meanwhile has happened to her dear onsf Don't mis.s the next chapter in this stirring story. |