Frontier. Can Xue

front of him. José thought, It’s got to be his memory of this romantic encounter that keeps him active and gives him a positive outlook.

      “My name is Qiming. You may call me old Qi,” he broke the silence abruptly.

      “I just want to ask: When the wind blows over the roof, why does it sound like someone pounding it with a wooden stick?”

      “Ah—good question. That’s how things are on the frontier—the intangible is tangible. I have to go to work now.”

      He got up and left.

      Nancy turned over in bed, and shouted, “I saw it!” José looked to see her pointing at the skylight. She looked straight ahead: Was she awake? José sighed inwardly: it was as if she were sleeping in outer space. In the past, when they lived in the interior, their bedroom was closed in: heavy drapes blocked the soot and the light. Back then, he had often joked that these deep blue velvet drapes were the “iron curtain.”

      José continued putting things in order. A picture frame accidentally fell from his hand and broke into pieces. It held their wedding photo. Now both their faces were a mess. From the other room Nancy asked:

      “Who’s here?”

      “No one. Go back to sleep.”

      “But I hear a man and a woman.”

      José hid the picture frame and turned around. Sure enough, a man and a woman were standing there. Evidently, everyone here was used to entering without knocking. He gave a slightly embarrassed smile and said, “Hello.” They smiled slightly, too, and said, “Hello,” introducing themselves as neighbors. They told him to call on them if he needed anything. Their home was to the east, three doors away. “These three apartments are empty, but you mustn’t open the doors by yourself,” the man added. José asked, “Why not?” The man frowned and thought for a while before finally answering, “No reason. It’s simply our custom here. Maybe because we’re afraid a wind will blow the door down.” José noticed a white flower of mourning on each of their chests. The man explained that their beloved dog was seriously ill and wouldn’t live long. José said, “But it hasn’t died yet.” The woman answered, “But it will die eventually. If not tomorrow, then next month.” They seemed critical of José’s attitude. They glared at him and then fell silent.

      Nancy had dressed and come to join them. She was wearing a necklace with a jade toad hanging from it. She invited them to sit down. The man and woman hesitated bashfully for a long time, and finally decided to leave. By then, José had almost finished dealing with their luggage and putting everything away. But Nancy didn’t seem to realize this. Holding her head and complaining of a headache, she paced back and forth. José asked her what she had seen when she was sleeping. She said she’d seen a crane flying up from the south and circling above the skylight. “Cranes live a long time,” she said.

      “I didn’t like their bravado.” She was suddenly infuriated. “Why white flowers? What for? No one wants to die, right?”

      “True. I don’t like them, either,” José chimed in.

      José admired his wife’s acuity. He thought that even in her dreams, she was aware of the essence of things. The day before they arrived, when they were sleeping in a room in midair wreathed in smoke, she’d said she heard a large bird flying past the window. Was it the same crane? She preferred long-lived animals, and she also raised a little black turtle in their room. But was the crane really long-lived?

      “I want to walk around. Let’s both go,” she suggested.

      The entrance to the staircase was to the east. When they got there, José kept staring at the locked door. He noticed his wife smiling a little. This building where they lived was in the middle of the poplar grove. Not far away was the small river, but perhaps it wasn’t the same small river? José lost all sense of direction. Nancy walked on the flagstone path beneath the poplars. She was composed, sometimes massaging her temples. Her headache seemed much better. What surprised José was that there wasn’t a ghost of a breeze. He recalled that he had heard a bizarre wind in the room, and he swept his eyes involuntarily over the steel-blue sky. But Nancy suddenly bent down, leaned over the grass, and placed one ear close to the ground.

      “Nancy, what are you doing?”

      “A large group of people is coming across from the snow mountain. José, this small town is going to be overcrowded. We’d better batten down the hatches.”

      As she spoke, her body writhed in anguish on the ground. Her movement was strange—as if the bones had been pulled out of her body. The weeds underneath her had been crushed and smashed into the ground. Looking at his wife, José felt growing doubts and suspicions. Was it really because of reading an advertisement that they had decided to come all the way out here? Had Nancy really known nothing about this little town before they decided to come here? If that wasn’t true, then what was? He sat down on the grass, too, but as soon as his butt touched the ground, he felt a kind of jumping—no, it was a knocking, just like the wind knocking the roof. He leapt to his feet, astonished, and turned to look at Nancy again. She was looking down and snickering.

      “What happened?”

      “Didn’t I tell you? A large group of people is on the way. You haven’t gotten hold of yourself yet. You have to stop being so wishy-washy right now.”

      In the distance, old Qi the janitor was standing in the river. This man seemed to like doing things in the river. He was probably observing them. Maybe this was a task that the institute had given him. José didn’t know why the institute would do this. Up to now, the only impression he had of the Design Institute was the white-haired woman director. Nancy wanted him to get hold of himself. What did she mean? He wanted to go and see the Design Institute, that place where he would work for a lifetime. It must be nearby. And so he hailed old Qi. When Nancy asked why, he said he wanted old Qi to take them to the Design Institute so they could look around. Standing up, Nancy brushed the dust from her clothes and whispered, “Hunh. You’re too impatient.”

      After a while, when old Qi showed up, José made his request.

      Puzzled, old Qi rolled his eyes. They didn’t know what he was thinking until he suddenly laughed and said, “Mr. José, you were there yesterday. It’s where the madman abandoned you.”

      “But I certainly didn’t see the Design Institute in that area. It was just a hill.”

      “You didn’t look closely. Actually, it’s not far from there. It has a gray arch, so it isn’t conspicuous. Lots of other people can’t find it, either. Do you still want me to take you there?”

      “Ah, no. I don’t want to go now, thank you. I’ll give it some more thought.”

      Nancy stared at him reproachfully and dragged him home. With an understanding smile, old Qi called after them, “That’s good.”

      When they got back to their building, Nancy wouldn’t go in. She said the apartment was “suffocating.” She’d rather walk around outside. To his surprise, Nancy said that when they were on the hill she had seen the buildings at the Design Institute; they were all unimposing, low, gray buildings. At the time, she hadn’t known it was the Design Institute, so she hadn’t said a word for fear of being mistaken again. She was right. If they had simply walked in there and found no one expecting them, it would have been embarrassing. As they walked around on the cobblestone path in front of the building, Nancy seemed agitated. Apparently she had something on her mind.

      “Nancy, what are you thinking about?” José asked uneasily.

      “I’m thinking—ah, José, I’m wondering what kind of people will live in Pebble Town forty years from now? When I think of these things, I get very excited.”

      “You’re looking far into the future. You’re like the geese that look down from above: will they be frightened into being unable to fly? I think of things like this only occasionally.”

      But José sensed distinctly that Nancy had some other idea—not what she had just spoken of. What