The Courtyard House: The Little Red Devil Returning from the Peninsula

The outline of the Kitayama Road base emerged from the morning mist.

Nine bunkers. Lined up along both sides of the mountain road, like a row of toothless millstones, wedged in the mountain pass between Yangquan and Shouyang. Mist creeps along the ground, swallowing the lower half of the bunkers, leaving only the firing ports and concrete caps on top visible. The ports are pitch black, and no one can be seen, but the hum of generators can be heard, like someone pulling bellows underneath.

The engineering battalion commander crouched behind the ridge, his fingernails digging into the frozen earth. Four hundred men behind him had been lying prone all night. Six hundred kilograms of explosives, divided into nine groups, were buried at the base of the north wall and under the low walls on both sides. A fifty-meter-long fuse was attached, leading down the slope to the back of the ridge. They had been burying them from ten o'clock last night until two in the morning; the frozen earth was as hard as iron, and the pickaxes only left white marks when they struck it. Some men had their hands split open, blood mixing with the mud; they wiped it with their sleeves and continued digging.

Zhao Weiguo laid the map on his lap. Two stones were pressed against the map, frost seeping from their cracks. He drew a circle on each of the nine bunkers with a pencil and numbered them. Number one was on the left, number nine on the right, separated by a 400-meter mountain path and two low walls.

"Six mountain guns and two infantry guns. Eight guns against nine bunkers. Guns one through seven, each gun is assigned to one bunker. Gun number eight will fire on two bunkers, first targeting bunker number eight, then switching fire to bunker number nine."

Zhao Tieshan squatted behind the artillery positions, a whiteboard resting on his lap, a pencil tucked behind his ear. He glanced up at Zhao Weiguo, then looked down again to draw a map of the artillery positions on the whiteboard. The pencil was thin and the lines were straight, but when he reached a bend, his hand trembled, and the line went crooked. He erased it and redrawn it.

"Each cannon is allocated 35 rounds, with the mule train replenishing ammunition in two waves."

How many rounds are needed for a reload?

"Thirty shots. Eleven were left after the last battle, but nineteen were fired last night."

Zhao Weiguo paused briefly at the number "thirty" on his pencil. Thirty rounds, divided among eight cannons, less than four rounds per cannon. He put the pencil away and tucked it into his breast pocket.

"All thirty rounds were used for initial suppression. After that, we switched to captured ammunition."

Zhao Tieshan didn't say anything, but wrote "30" on the board, followed by parentheses that read "28 in, 2 off". He had already made a prediction before even playing.

Old Zhou crawled over from the First Battalion's position. His hat was covered in frost, and his eyebrows were also covered in a layer of white. He crawled to Zhao Weiguo's side and squatted down, his knees pressed against the frozen ground, in the exact same posture as yesterday outside the Shouyang East Outpost.

"What time will it detonate?"

"3:30."

"How long will the shelling last?"

"Three minutes."

"Three minutes? What's three minutes? I can get to the wall in two minutes with my men."

Zhao Gang peeked out from behind the telephone line. He clutched the receiver, the cord cutting through his fingers and making them numb with cold. He glanced at Lao Zhou, then at Zhao Weiguo, opened his mouth slightly, but didn't say anything.

Zhao Weiguo didn't look at Lao Zhou, he only looked at the map.

"Old Zhou, listen up. Yesterday in Shouyang East, as soon as the artillery stopped, you went up. Seven engineers haven't returned."

Old Zhou stiffened. He opened his mouth as if to protest, but then swallowed back down. He looked down at his hands. His fingers were still covered in black mud left from digging through frozen soil yesterday, the mud studded with gunpowder.

"Today," Zhao Weiguo pointed with his pencil at the gap in the north wall on the map, "no one is allowed to move until the gun flag falls."

What flag?

Zhao Weiguo took a piece of red cloth out of his backpack. The cloth was small, about the size of a palm, wrinkled, and the edges were frayed. He tied it to a bamboo pole, which was planted high up between the artillery position and the infantry position.

"As long as the red cloth is on, the cannons are firing. When the red cloth falls, the cannons stop firing, and then the people go back in. There's a one-minute interval in between."

"One minute is enough for the Japanese to climb back to the firing port."

"So after the gun flag falls, the cannons will fire two more rounds of calibration shots. Then you go in."

Old Zhou swallowed hard. His Adam's apple bobbed. He glanced at the red cloth, then at the men lying prone on the battalion's position. They were packed tightly together, their faces buried in the frozen earth, their cotton-padded coats whitened by frost. His lips moved slightly.

"I've got it."

Zhao Gang held the microphone to his ear. The other end of the line led to Zhao Tieshan's artillery position. The only sounds coming from the microphone were static and the muffled crackling of the frozen ground in the distance.

3:30 a.m.

The engineering battalion commander gripped the end of the fuse tightly. His hands trembled; they were cold. The chill from the frozen ground seeped up the fuse and into his fingers. He glanced back over the ridge. He couldn't see anything, only the figures of people lying prone and the fog.

He pulled.

The fuse hissed, and sparks shot down the reverse slope as fast as a fiery snake. Three seconds later, the base of the north wall exploded.

A beam of white light arrived first, blindingly bright, splitting the mist in two. The sound was a dull thud, like someone smashing an empty wooden crate with a hammer. The ground trembled, the frozen earth pushed upwards from the soles of our feet, and our knees jolted.

The north wall collapsed. The gap was about eight meters wide. Broken bricks and clods of frozen soil flew up, drawing an arc in the fog, before crashing down, hitting the engineers' hiding place with a thud. A broken brick hit a helmet, denting it, but the man was unharmed, though his ears rang for a long time.

The red cloth pole stands upright. The cannon flag is there.

Zhao Tieshan shouted from behind the artillery position. Half of his voice was swallowed by the fog, and only the word "Fire!" reached the infantry position. All eight cannons opened fire simultaneously.

The No. 1 cannon fired at the No. 1 bunker. The first reloaded shell pierced the top edge of the firing port, spraying brick fragments outwards. The second shell missed by half a foot and struck the base of the wall. Zhao Tieshan wrote on the board, "No. 1, two shots, one hit and one miss." He wrote quickly, the strokes were crooked, but each number was clear.

Gun number two fired at bunker number two. One shot hit. A crater was blasted open on the top of the bunker, the concrete cap cracked, and the steel bars protruded like broken ribs.

Number three, number four, number five. The cannon fire was so dense it sounded like a series of muffled thunderclaps. With each shot, Zhao Tieshan made a note. The spent cartridge cases, red-hot, rolled on the frozen ground, turning the frost into white steam.

The first shot from gun number six went astray. The shell landed on a sloping hill ten meters to the right of the bunker, creating a crater. Zhao Tieshan roared, "Correct!" The gunner adjusted the sights, and the second shot went into the firing port.

Bunkers No. 7 and No. 8 were hit by cannon No. 8. First, fire at No. 7, two shots hit. Switch to No. 8, the first shot was too low and hit the wall. The second shot went into the firing port, silencing the machine gun inside.

Bunker No. 9 was located at the eastern end of the mountain path, the furthest point. Zhao Weiguo reserved it for two infantry guns. The infantry guns had small calibers and couldn't penetrate the thick walls. Two shots were fired, and the bunker only suffered a corner blown off. Zhao Tieshan glanced at it and wrote on the board, "Bunker No. 9, two shots from the infantry guns were ineffective; use the mountain guns to finish."

The No. 6 mountain gun switched fire. One shot hit. The side of the No. 9 bunker cracked, and sandbags squeezed out of the crack, spilling out like intestines.

Thirty shots were fired. Twenty-eight hit, two missed. Zhao Tieshan remembered it clearly on his board. He placed the pencil on the board, the pencil rolled slightly, and he caught it.

The cannon flag fell.

Old Zhou's hand reached for the gun handle. He raised his hand halfway.

Zhao Gang's voice came through the phone line, unhurried and clear: "Old Zhou, the third wave of observers hasn't returned yet. Wait."

Old Zhou's hand hung in mid-air. His fingers gripped the gun handle, his knuckles white. He stared at the fallen bamboo pole, the red cloth hanging from it on the frozen ground, stained grayish-red by the gunfire ash.

He put his hand down.

Zhao Weiguo glanced at Zhao Gang. Zhao Gang didn't look at him, only staring at his watch. The watch face was covered with a layer of gunpowder, which he wiped with his sleeve, but it wasn't completely clean.

"Artillery, fire two more rounds of calibration shots. One minute interval."

Zhao Tieshan changed to captured ammunition. The cartridge cases were a different color, a darker brass, and the primers were older. The first shot went to the left. He adjusted the sights, and the second shot hit. A minute later, two more shots were fired in a second volley. The guns inside the bunker fell completely silent.

The cannon flag fell for the second time.

This time, no one stopped them. Old Zhou led his battalion of eight hundred men through the gap. The soles of their boots burned their feet on the hot brick mortar. The smell of gunpowder stung their lungs. Some men coughed all the way, bending over from the effort, and were pushed forward by those behind them, staggering as they ran.

Duan Peng's Third Battalion descended from the east ridge. The eight hundred men split into two groups: one blocked the retreat route towards Shouyang, and the other cut off the communications room. Inside the communications room, two Japanese soldiers were ringing the telephone, but no one answered after a long time. When the door was kicked open, one of the Japanese soldiers grabbed the receiver and threw it at Duan Peng's shoulder. Duan Peng knocked him down with the butt of his rifle.

Li Dazhu's Second Battalion was on the north slope. A reserve of six hundred men awaited reinforcements coming from Yangquan. The reinforcements never arrived. Only a few scattered gunshots rang out from the direction of Yangquan, like probing shots or accidental discharges, before silence fell.

Six hours.

Nine pillboxes were taken down one by one, from number one to number nine. Some were repaired by infantry rushing in after artillery shells had collapsed them. A few shells hadn't penetrated, so infantry carried demolition charges up, stuffed them into the firing ports, retreated, and the walls collapsed. In one pillbox, only three Japanese soldiers remained, retreating into the basement and refusing to come out. Old Zhou had half a barrel of gasoline poured into the ventilation shaft and set it on fire. Smoke billowed from the firing ports, black as smoke. The three Japanese soldiers, choking, crawled out of the basement, their hands raised, their faces blackened by the smoke, coughing so hard they couldn't straighten up.

The shooting stopped at 3:30 p.m.

Zhao Gang squatted at the base of the broken wall, keeping accounts. The pencil tip broke three times; he sharpened it with a knife, but when it got too short to hold with his fingers, he tied a twig to the end. The writing in the notebook was crooked, but the numbers were written clearly, stroke by stroke.

"The enemy was killed 408, captured 167, and escaped 45. We seized over 300 rifles, 8 light machine guns, 4 mortars, and 6 grenade launchers. The warehouse contained enough food for half a month and 36 boxes of ammunition."

He turned a page, then paused. The pencil tip hovered on the paper.

"Forty-three killed in action. Thirty-one seriously wounded, sixty-five lightly wounded."

He didn't continue writing immediately. A gust of wind blew through the gap in the broken wall, turning a page of his notebook. He pressed it down with his knee and added a line: "Nine engineers killed. Two from the seventh group were hit by stray bullets while planting explosives and died en route to the rear."

"How many are on the payroll?" Zhao Weiguo asked.

"Seven thousand three hundred. The county brigade received three hundred reinforcements the day before yesterday, and eleven wounded returned to the unit; they're all being used for supplies and medical duties." Zhao Gang turned back to the previous page, pointing to another line of numbers. "Forty-three dead have been deducted from the existing roster; we'll discuss replacements tomorrow."

Zhao Weiguo stood on the breach in the north wall. The broken bricks beside the breach were still warm, sharp and uncomfortable to walk on. He looked down. The bunkers on both sides of the mountain path had all collapsed, scattered and broken like teeth that had been pried open. Smoke, grayish-white, billowed from the ruins and was blown into the ravine by the wind. In the distance, a section of the railway track gleamed in the sunlight.

Zhao Tieshan was dismantling armored vehicles. The outer track pin of vehicle number three was broken; the break was fresh, the metal shavings gleaming. He wrote the word "Repair" next to it. The right front wheel hub of vehicle number one was overheating again, and a crack had appeared in the riveting seam of the steel plate. He circled the crack with chalk. Nearby, the recoil spring of a mountain gun was not strong enough, and the breechblock was not retracting properly. He noted this down and added it to the repair list.

Old Zhou sat atop the ruins of the bunker, clutching a piece of red cloth in his hand. The cloth, torn from a gun flag, was scorched at the edges. He folded it twice and stuffed it into his breast pocket. He didn't look up when Zhao Gang approached.

"You stopped me that time," Old Zhou said. His voice was hoarse, as if he had a mouthful of sand.

"The observation time for the third wave wasn't enough." Zhao Gang squatted down next to Lao Zhou, opened his notebook, and pointed to that line of text. "Forty-three people. Yesterday, Shouyang East had eighteen. Today it's double that. If you had rushed in two minutes earlier, how many more would you have?"

Old Zhou didn't say a word. He looked down at his boots. The boots were covered in mud and blood, making it impossible to tell whose they were. After a long while, he squeezed out a sentence through gritted teeth: "Next time I'll keep watch on the flag."

"Not just watching the flag." Zhao Weiguo's voice came through the gap, torn apart by the wind. "Write it into the order."

Zhao Gang looked up. Zhao Weiguo stood above the gap, backlit, his shadow falling on the broken bricks.

"From today onwards, infantry are not permitted to cross the line until artillery has completed its calibration. Signatures must be sent to the battalion level. The interval between two assaults must be at least one minute. This must be written into the battle order."

Zhao Gang wrote those words down in his notebook. After finishing, he signed his name and handed it to Lao Zhou. Lao Zhou took the pencil and drew a circle next to his name. The circle was crooked, and his hand was still trembling. Zhao Gang added a line: "Political Commissar, Zhao Gang."

Zhao Weiguo jumped down from the gap. The broken bricks were slippery under his feet, so he made sure he was on firm footing before taking a step.

The monk ran out of the outpost warehouse, carrying a tin box. The box wasn't heavy, and it was locked. He smashed the lock with the butt of his rifle, and inside was a stack of papers. The top one was printed with Japanese and Chinese text side by side, and the title read "Heisonggou Station Shift Schedule".

"I scraped it out of a crack in the stationmaster's office wall." The monk handed over the box, his hands covered in dust and cobwebs. "There was also a note with the word 'mountain cherry' written on it."

Zhao Weiguo took the note. It was about the size of a palm, with frayed edges. There were only two words on it, written in pencil, the handwriting crooked, as if hastily written.

"Mountain Cherry." He read it aloud. "And the reply?"

"No." The monk scratched the back of his head, his fingernails scraping against his hair with a rustling sound. "He has the command, but he can't match the response."

Zhao Weiguo folded the note and shift schedule together and stuffed them into his breast pocket. He also carried the shell recording sheet Zhao Tieshan had given him, its corner digging into his ribs. He looked east. Beyond the eastern mountain pass, the Zhengtai Railway stretched along the mountainside. The rails gleamed, like a silver thread.

"The password is 'mountain cherry blossoms'," he said. "The reply is in the mouths of the puppet troops."

Zhi Zi appeared behind him at some point. She didn't speak, but simply extended her hand. Zhao Weiguo handed her the note. She took it, her fingertips lingering on the words "mountain cherry blossoms."

"I'll go get it."

Zhao Weiguo glanced at her. Her face was expressionless, but her fingers were gripping the edge of the paper so tightly that the corner curled up.

"Depart before dark. Bring back the return order."

Gardenia carefully tucked the note into her chest, then turned and left. She walked silently, her cotton shoes clattering on the broken bricks without making a sound.

Zhao Weiguo stood before the breach. The wind rushed in through the gap, whipping his clothes. He looked at the section of railway track in the distance, which gleamed blindingly in the sunlight.

"A night raid on the station," he said, his voice low, as if speaking to himself.

"Completely block the boy line."