Free Frog by Mo Yan Page A

staying single was preferable to marrying a woman whose teeth showed when they talked – there was a gloomy cast in her eyes that sent chills down my back. I heard her say, How do you get off telling me what to do? You were still in nappies when I was in medical school!
    Gugu gave her tit for tat: Don’t think I don’t know that you, Huang Qiuya, are a capitalist’s daughter and were the campus queen in med school. Did you wave a flag to welcome the arrival of the Japanese into the city? Did you dance cheek to cheek with Japanese officers? Well, when you were dancing with them, I was in Pingdu engaged in a battle of wits with the Japanese commander there.
    The woman sneered. Got any witnesses? I’d like to know who saw you have your battle of wits with the commander.
    The mountains and rivers are my witnesses.
    I couldn’t, I mustn’t, under any circumstances let Gugu see that handbill, not now.
    What are you doing here? she asked unhappily. And what’s this?
    A reactionary handbill, one of the KMT’s reactionary handbills. My voice quavered with excitement.
    Gugu barely looked at it, but I saw her body tense, a spasm like she’d been shocked. Her eyes grew wide, the blood fled from her face. She flung the handbill away as if it were a snake – no, a frog.
    When she had regained her composure and bent down to retrieve it, she was too late.
    Huang Qiuya had already picked it up and examined it. She looked up, glanced at Gugu, and took another look at the handbill. A green glare emerged from behind those dark glasses. That was followed by an icy laugh.
    Gugu sprang at the woman to snatch the handbill back, but Huang spun around to prevent that. So Gugu grabbed the back of Huang’s smock and shouted, Give me that!
    Huang lurched forward to free herself, and we heard her smock rip, exposing her back, which was the white of a frog’s belly.
    I said give me that!
    Huang turned around, but held the handbill behind her back; she was shaking as she moved slowly towards the door.
    Give it back? she said with a sinister, smug look. Hah! You dog of a spy, defector’s woman. The defector took all he wanted from you, you slut! Scared, are you? Have you quit selling the stink of your so-called martyr’s descendant?
    Gugu, maddened by the comment, charged Huang.
    Huang ran into the corridor. We’ve got a spy! she cried. Come catch the spy!
    Gugu followed her into the corridor, where she grabbed her by the hair; even with her neck bent back, Huang thrust the handbill out in front, her cries even more shrill. Treatment rooms were in the front of the health centre, offices in the rear. Everyone heard her cries and came into the corridor to see what was happening. Gugu had by then pushed Huang to the floor and was straddling her as she fought to retrieve the handbill.
    The director, a bald, middle-aged man, ran up. He had bags under his long, narrow eyes and blindingly white false teeth. Stop that! he shouted. What’s going on?
    Gugu fought harder to pry open Huang’s fingers, apparently not hearing the director. By this time Huang Qiuya’s screams had turned into tearful wails.
    Stop that, Wan Xin! the director demanded angrily. And you people, he said loudly to the rubberneckers, have you all gone blind? Pull those two apart!
    Two male doctors went up and, with difficulty, pulled Gugu off Huang.
    Two female doctors picked Huang up off the floor.
    Huang’s dark glasses had fallen off and there was a trickle of blood from her gums. Cloudy tears poured from her sunken eyes. But she was still clutching the handbill. Director, she bellowed, you have to back me on this!
    Gugu’s clothes were pulled this way and that, and her face was ashen. A pair of bloody gouges marred her cheeks, obviously from Huang Qiuya’s nails.
    What’s this all about, Wan Xin?
    Gugu’s face wore a desolate smile; tears fell from her eyes. She threw the torn pieces of the handbill in her hand to the floor and, without a word, walked unsteadily back to