He thought my silence indicated that I had given a little convincing, so he let me go home: “It’s late, go back and think about what I said, and we’ll come back in two weeks to summon you for trial.”
After listening to my account, Mr. Hu was silent, when old Zhao came in and invited us to dinner. My cook had prepared several delicious Chinese dishes for us, as he knew that Mr. Hu did not like Western food. During the meal, we deliberately did not talk about such unpleasant matters as the Cultural Revolution, but only about our respective children. We were all proud and comforted by the fact that our children were doing well in socialist China, uninfluenced by their family origins, and that they were all very competitive.
We reentered the living room, and I told Mr. Hu, one by one, the few questions I had when the men had just tangled with me.
“They seem to think that it doesn’t matter as long as I confess my guilt, even if I make up nonsense. Is that what happened?”
“Yes. They don’t care what’s red or white; as long as they achieve the goal of getting you to confess.”
“But what good does that do? If everyone gives a false account, don’t they confuse themselves?” I was puzzled.
“They just want you to confess, that’s their duty. If you disobey them, it means you are not committed to the movement. So as a result, every time a political movement came, many people got involved and gave multiple confessions. When that chaos passed, they would review the material and some of the mishandling might be corrected.”
“How long will that take?” I asked.
“As little as two years, maybe a lifetime. At least three to five percent of each unit will be branded as class enemies. That’s the approved percentage in the document.”
“That’s terrible.” I exclaimed.
“Indeed, it is terrible. In fact, where are so many people among the people who oppose the government? In order to complete the percentage, certain leaders tend to make people they don’t like, such as those who usually have to whine and are untamed, as enemies. But no matter how much pressure is exerted, a person cannot always make a false account arbitrarily.” Mr. Hu said formally, gazing at me cautiously to add weight to his language, and when he was finished he added: “That is the principle I have pursued in all political campaigns.”
I then realized that this was the purpose of his trip, and that he had come to give me this advice. He just didn’t get right to the point: no matter what kind of pressure you are under, you must not just give an account. Because in the Chinese family, but all the trained servants, always waiting at the side of the hands, especially when there are guests to visit. He did not want Lao Zhao to hear his intentions. Mr. Hu has always been timid and cautious in everything, and guarded everywhere, not trusting anyone easily.
“People’s tolerance is sometimes limited. But one must not therefore easily, rightly or wrongly, write down something haphazardly to satisfy them in the hope of being freed from all their torments. This should never be done. They will never be satisfied with your confession. Once you start to explain, they will ask you to reveal more, even if it is false. As a result, you will be caught in the mud and cannot get out. I have seen such people too many times.” Mr. Hu said in a polite and subtle tone, he never said “how you should …… should not ……”
Mr. Hu’s admonition is both timely and valuable. I am very grateful to him for risking his life to give me this help out of love for his late friend. When he understood that I understood his intention, he told me some general knowledge about political movements. He told me that he was an “old athlete” and that he had experienced a lot of these political movements and thus had accumulated a set of experience in dealing with them.
“What do you think of the Central Committee’s communiqué?” I asked.
Mr. Hu shook his head and sighed, thought briefly, and said, “The initial stage of every movement is often the most frightening. This typhoon will gradually weaken after a few months, and after about a year, it will pass.”
“It will take a year! So long!” I said.
Mr. Hu smiled slightly at my rare and strange attitude and said, “What is a year to us Chinese? It’s just a moment in a few thousand years of history. Our concept of time is very different from that of Europeans. I’m sorry, I’m being a class act here, to the Europeans, you are much more familiar with them than I am!”
“They say I’m a dispatch agent just because they think that I’m familiar with the British.”
“They’re just fooling the common people with this stuff. It won’t take long for them to bring down everyone they don’t trust one by one. For the moment it is only directed at you.”
Mr. Hu got up and said goodbye. He told me to call him anytime to discuss. Before leaving, he gave me one last piece of advice: “Some grassroots leaders and cadres actually hold a sense of inferiority. Although they have power in their hands, but they always have an inferiority complex inside. This is very unfortunate, because these people, in order to maintain their own dignity, they use their power to make our lives uncomfortable, or to make all kinds of difficulties and insults to us. So when they interrogate you, you have to behave in an unassuming manner and never offend them. They are hard-hearted and will do anything.”
“I don’t flatter people, but I still say thank you very much for all the cautions you have given me, and I will remember them.” I said.
Because I had let myself get all mixed up, I then remembered that I had not asked about his condition and situation.
Mr. Hu spoke with an air of listening to God: “I have become a member of the working class, and another has taken over my past work. I sent my resignation application to our party committee, stating that as a private party member in the past, my class composition made me unfit to hold a section position any longer.”
I was astonished when I heard him say that he was now working as an ordinary worker in a factory he had opened himself. But he didn’t seem to be sad about it at all.
“We’re pretty good.” He said, “When the Bolsheviks established power in Russia, as far as I know, all the bourgeoisie were shot. But I am quite content to be alive now, and to live three generations together. I asked the party committee to let me do the hardest physical work. So I am now doing the hard work: carrying raw materials or pushing coal trucks. Because no one would be jealous of a hard worker. You know, when I took the initiative to ask the leader to assign myself to such menial work, the party secretary seemed to be very sympathetic to my move. We got along very well with each other.”
I recalled that my husband had told me that the reason why Mr. Hu still got along with his party secretary was that Mr. Hu put in the work and the party secretary was honored. Throughout the years, this factory has received advanced titles and excess red flags.
“Didn’t you also do a lot for your secretary in the past?”
“Just heh. I did most of the specific things in the factory. I really worked hard to start this factory. In 1930, when the factory was first established, I hired only a few workers. When I turned it over to the government in 1956, it had 5,000 workers. We also had a laboratory and a training center for young technicians.”
“Why do you have to be a handyman? With your education and experience, it’s more than enough to be an ordinary worker.”
He shook his hand and said, “In the current situation, being a handyman is not a bad thing. Even if something happens in the workshop, no one will pin the blame on me and slander me for sabotaging the machine. At the time of carrying out the operation, out of high sensitivity, a bourgeois element must be listed as the number one suspect.”
After giving this wise opinion, he took his leave. When he shook hands with me to say goodbye, he said, “Adapt to your environment and live. Only by striving to live may we still see our country rise to change.”
From the attitude held by the servants and the dishes they had prepared, I felt that they were very welcoming to Mr. Hu’s visit. When I went upstairs to my bedroom, Chen’s mother was already preparing my pajamas and slippers. She advised me to listen to Mr. Hu’s advice. She thought that Mr. Hu was a reliable friend and a good man.
It was a great comfort to have such a heart-to-heart talk with someone I knew. I have made up my mind not to write any false accounts to satisfy the radicals.
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