Free Ocean of Words by Ha Jin Page B

return to their batteries and lead their men back to the village. “Tomorrow we’ll sum up our experiences and see if we can make it quicker,” I said.
    As I was speaking, Dragon Head and his men came running toward us. He came directly to me, bareheaded, puffing out warm breath and fanning himself with his hat. “All my men’re here. Are we leaving for the front now?”
    “No, these are exercises.” I glanced at Commissar Diao, whose face fell.
    “Exercises!” Dragon Head yelled, and he put his hands on the Mauser pistols. “Exercises at midnight? Why the hell didn’t you inform me before? Damn you both!”
    “Comrade Dragon Head,” Commissar Diao said, “please do not misunderstand us. Night fighting is our army’s tradition, you know that. We didn’t notify you beforehand because we didn’t want to disturb you. This is not a real action, and we just had the cannons pulled out. Please forgive us.”
    “Damn it, see what you’ve done.” He turned in the direction of the village, his hand pointing at the glimmering sky above the waves of the thatched roofs. “See, every family lit a fire for cooking, and I’ve ordered them to send the foodhere.” He raised his voice, shouting to the crowd of his men. “Hey, Ma Ding you run back to the village and tell them to stop, no more cooking, and no more killing sheep and pigs.”
    I felt awful. But it was not our fault. Even all of our platoon leaders had not been told of the muster in advance; why should we inform the militia? Dragon Head had made the mess himself; yet it would be senseless to blame him. “Dragon Head,” I said, “we apologize. I mean it sincerely. Tomorrow I’ll go with you to apologize to the people, home by home.”
    “Drop your apology. Who wants it! We take you fellas as our own army. Then you have your secret plans and make asses of us all. We’ve been wronged, you know. You treat us as outsiders.”
    “Comrade Dragon Head,” Commissar Diao said loudly, “you’re mistaken. I swear by my Communist Party membership that we always regard your company as our own troops. Your company is our infantry force, but you see tonight we have purely artillery exercises. Even so, we should indeed have notified you in advance. Please accept our sincere apology and pass it on to the villagers. I promise, from now on, we will let you know all our plans of action.”
    “You always speak well, Commissar.” Dragon Head looked somewhat pacified. “All right, it’s not a big thing. Nobody’s lost his head yet. I’ll talk to them and they’ll understand. But no second time.”
    “You have my word,” Diao assured him.
    After Dragon Head led his men away, Diao turned to me and said, “It’s negligence on our part.”
    “Why? I don’t think so. The exercises are a military action; how come we have to tell him beforehand?”
    “Old Gao, you forgot the action is also political. It coulddamage the relationship between the army and the people if it’s not done appropriately.”
    “I agree, my comrade commissar. Only because we live here, we have to share everything with him. Fine, it’s all right with me. I must say, it’s a pity that those sheep and pigs were not butchered for a holiday. Next time I’ll order Dragon Head’s company to make a forced night march to Hutou Town. See how he’ll enjoy that.” We both laughed.
    Although I said that, we dared not have another emergency muster for the rest of the winter. It would be unwise to wake up the whole village at night without giving a genuine reason. Besides, if we had done it too often, the villagers would have got used to it; when a real emergency arose, they might have ignored it as exercises. So we wouldn’t try again. Dragon Head had our promise that he would always be informed. All right, he could have our word, but there was no need for us to carry it out.
2
    Spring came, and the Wusuli River thawed. The tension on the border eased up. Since the deep water could obstruct the