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

Zhao Gang wiped the desktop three times before Zhi Zi brought up the file box.

The lock on the tin box was rusted shut. Zhao Tieshan tried to loosen it with a wrench but couldn't. He cursed and finally managed to pry it open with a pipe wrench. When the lid was lifted, a musty smell mixed with the smell of ink rushed out. Zhi Zi wrinkled her nose, didn't say anything, and took the items out one by one according to their numbers.

A stack of radio transcripts. A stack of disciplinary records. A stack of lists of puppet troops. At the very bottom were more than twenty letters, the handwriting on the envelopes crooked and illegible, some ending abruptly halfway through writing.

Zhao Gang took the letter out separately and put it on the corner of the table.

"These are evidence. Whoever takes them back as bedtime reading, I'll stuff them in a suitcase and send them back to Taiyuan."

No one laughed. He spoke without expression, but the pencil in his hand had already pierced a piece of scrap paper on the table.

Duan Peng was squatting by the door picking his teeth, a straw stick between his teeth. When he heard this, he spat the straw stick onto the ground.

"Political Commissar, the way you're saying that sounds like you're delivering a eulogy."

Zhao Gang glanced at him.

"If you think reading the list is boring, go stand guard outside."

Duan Peng bent down to pick up the straw and then remained silent.

Someone in the interrogation shed next door cried out in pain. Yang Xiuqin pushed open the door and came in, her sleeves stained with medicine, and a cut on the web of her right hand, with beads of blood trickling down between her fingers. She slammed two registration forms on the table.

"Twenty-three wounds have been cleaned. Nine of them might not make it through tonight."

Zhao Gang looked up at her hand.

"You're bleeding."

"He won't die." Yang Xiuqin rubbed the back of her hand on her sleeve, leaving a bloody stain. "Check the list first. After he dies, don't tell anyone he was at the ambulance station."

Zhi Zi stopped translating the third letter.

There was no military intelligence in the letter. A soldier asked his mother if the roof had been repaired, saying he hadn't received a whole rice in two months. At the end, when she wrote about her sister's wedding, the ink suddenly stopped, leaving only half a line, as if she had been called away halfway through writing and never returned.

Gardenia put down her pen and rubbed her eyes.

Zhao Weiguo stood by the window, his back to the table.

Can it be broadcast?

Yes. It can only be translated verbatim.

Zhao Gang turned two pages of the translated manuscript and closed it.

"Homesickness is acceptable. Murder is also recorded. Don't erase the debt of aggression just because he wrote a comforting letter home."

The first broadcast list consisted of forty-seven people. Twenty-nine were confirmed dead, eleven captured, and seven seriously wounded. Each name was followed by its unit number, battle location, and verification source. Two people appeared only in the list of captured prisoners, but their testimonies did not match, so they were removed from the list.

For every letter intended for use, the date, location, and name of the person identifying the victim were written on the back of the envelope, and then a fingerprint was affixed. No matter how heartbreaking the letter, if the body was not identified or the names of those on the team were insufficiently documented, it would not be broadcast over the loudspeaker.

The loudspeaker was borrowed, and there were only three sets of batteries, each lasting forty minutes. Zhao Tieshan repaired an old generator, but the machine would shake as soon as it started, and someone had to hold down the fuel tank cap to prevent it from jumping all the way to the ground.

Zhao Tieshan squatted next to the generator, pressing the fuel tank cap while cursing.

"This piece of junk is even harder to take care of than my grandma's sewing machine."

Duan Peng overheard this as he passed by and laughed.

"Your grandma's sewing machine shakes too?"

"It doesn't shake. It just loses connection." Zhao Tieshan said without looking up. "If this thing shook, it could throw the battery right into the Japanese stronghold."

The first broadcasting station was set up at an abandoned kiln site west of Yangquan. The generator was buried deep inside the kiln, and even with two old cotton quilts blocking the entrance, the sputtering sound couldn't be suppressed.

Before the broadcast, Zhi Zi read out all forty-seven names again. The recorder checked them off one by one. The battery only lasted forty minutes; mispronouncing a name would waste more than just a bit of electricity.

Zhi Zi didn't preach any grand principles. She simply read out the names, unit numbers, and places where they were captured and where they died, as listed. When she read letters from home, she only translated the original text, without adding a single word of persuasion to surrender.

The opposing outpost opened fire with machine guns on the loudspeakers. Bullets struck the stone walls of the kiln entrance, sparks flying across half the wall. The broadcast team shrank back, but Zhi Zi didn't stop; her voice rose above the gunfire as she continued reading.

The machine guns stopped. Another loudspeaker was set up on the other side, claiming that Major General Ohno was still in command and that Monkey Ridge was only temporarily out of contact.

The broadcasting team didn't join in the noise.

A captured military medic described three distinctive features of Ōno's body: a missing little finger on his left hand, black thread wrapped around the hilt of his sword, and stomach medicine in a medicine box he kept close to his body. All three were listed in the body registration, and the Japanese soldiers themselves knew the truth.

Gardenia read the three sentences aloud in Japanese, speaking slowly and pronouncing each word clearly.

The loudspeaker across the street stopped.

It rang again after a long time, and the message only contained military discipline and the Emperor; it no longer mentioned that Ohno was alive.

That blank period lasted seven minutes. The recorder stared at his pocket watch, his pencil hovering over the paper. The generator was still shaking, and the first set of batteries was already more than half used up. No one knew whether the person on the other end was changing words or someone was checking the list one by one.

Gardenia didn't take the opportunity to say anything more, but simply put the next letter aside and waited for the loudspeaker to start again.

No one cheered inside the abandoned kiln. The soldier who had been holding the fuel tank cap switched hands; his palm was already numb from the vibrations.

Duan Peng smoked half a cigarette outside the kiln entrance and stomped the cigarette butt on the ground.

"Seven minutes. Seven minutes is enough for a company to check the roster twice."

Zhao Gang poked his head out of the cave dwelling.

"Are you done smoking? Come in and get the batteries."

Duan Peng picked up the cigarette butt and put it in his pocket, then bent down to move the battery box.

"Political Commissar, do you think they won't be able to sleep tonight?"

Zhao Gang did not turn around.

"It's good that I can't sleep. Because when I can't sleep, I think. And when I think, I run away."

That night, the scouts retrieved three crumpled leaflets from outside the drainage ditch. One of them had two names written on the back, requesting confirmation of their fate during the next broadcast.

Zhao Gang flattened the paper and read it twice.

"Check first. If you can't find it, just say you can't find it."

The following night, two Japanese soldiers sneaked outside the cordon.

The wooden sign only reads three things: Put down your weapons, raise your hands above your head, walk along the white cloth strip, and do not leave the route.

The two men lay prone a hundred paces away for half the night. As dawn approached, one pushed out a rifle, while the other carried the wounded soldier forward. The guard platoon didn't rush in; they first made the soldiers kick away the guns, then sent two men to search the soldiers, and finally took them to the prisoner-of-war station for interrogation.

The man carrying the person reached the middle of the white cloth strip, his legs gave way, and both of them collapsed to the ground. The guards still didn't cross the line to help them up, but simply pushed the stretcher along the designated route. Only after the body search was completed did the medic take over.

The rules may be slower, but they will let the next group of people who come up with them know that the three lines on the wooden sign really count.

They confessed that people had escaped from the stronghold for three consecutive days, but the squad leader had been suppressing the reports, and the military police had just arrested four people.

The two statements were written separately, and the interrogators were also separated. Escape, arrest, and homesickness each occupied a separate column, and no one combined them into "the stronghold is about to collapse".

On the same day, the puppet troops in Yangquan also sent a message: both sides want to leave a way out.

Inside the city were two companies of puppet troops, totaling about 360 men, while outside were about 80 Japanese military police. The company commanders dared not show themselves, sending only a cart driver who delivered vegetables to the camp to relay a message.

Gardenia did not see him.

She first asked the courier three questions: how many guns each team had, where the military police lived, and when the troop rotation password would be changed.

The driver answered the number of guns, but the number of military police was more than a dozen fewer.

Gardenia placed the note on the table.

"Go back and ask again."

The courier hesitated for a moment.

"They were pressing me quite urgently, saying the military police had been checking things up really hard lately."

"Their urgency is their problem. If the numbers don't match, we won't discuss anything else. Send it back."

The second time, the other party sent a sketch drawn on the back of a package in a pharmacy. It showed two machine gun positions, an ammunition shed, the back gate of the military police headquarters, and an abandoned well outside the back gate. The sketch was not to scale, but the abandoned well could be seen from a high point outside the city, and a corner of the machine gun positions was also visible.

Gardenia still didn't agree.

"The third time, have the southeast corner patrol arrive fifteen minutes earlier. We won't enter the city; we'll just observe from the outside. Once the time, number of personnel, and the leaders are all confirmed, we can discuss further."

Zhao Gang stood to the side, listening without interrupting. He only spoke after the courier left.

"You're even more difficult to deal with than I am."

Gardenia folded the sketch and stuffed it into the file bag.

"Those who are difficult to deal with live long. Those who are easy to talk to are already long gone, their graves overgrown with weeds."

Zhao Gang paused for a moment, then laughed.

"Okay. You're in charge."

On the night of October 2nd, the patrol indeed began ahead of schedule.

The team was two people shorter than usual, and the leader was the puppet army platoon leader marked on the sketch. Passing the abandoned well, he coughed three times and tossed a box of matches onto the well's edge.

It has been verified for the third time.

One of the couriers returned, but one was missing.

The intelligence agent on the second contact line was intercepted by the military police outside the city. He threw the sole of his shoe containing the list into a ditch and never returned. The next day, a notice was posted on the city gate announcing the arrest of two puppet army informants on charges of colluding with the enemy.

Yang Xiuqin wrote the names of the fallen intelligence officers into the list of martyrs.

Gardenia stood by the table for a long time, then picked up her pen and crossed out the original set of codes from beginning to end.

She had created that code herself. Several seemingly casual coughs, matchbox placements, and delivery times took her over a month to complete. When the red pen crossed them out, the paper was torn in two places by the tip. She replaced the paper, rewrote the names that were still usable, leaving the line for the victims undeleted, only adding the date at the end.

Zhao Gang asked, "What about the two people who were arrested?"

"First, find out where they're being held. If you're not sure, don't rob them."

"Are the two squadrons still negotiating?"

"Let's discuss it. The people, the location, and the time will all be rescheduled. Anyone urging us to enter the city immediately should be investigated as a suspect in a sting operation."

Zhao Weiguo entrusted the defection line to Zhi Zi independently, and the frontline commanders were not allowed to temporarily transfer her people. In any case, personnel must first be disarmed, then screened, registered, isolated for investigation, and retrained; they could not simply change their armbands at the city gate and be considered members of the Independent Regiment.

Zhao Gang added a few more rules: officers and soldiers should be separated; blood debts, extortion, and murder should be investigated separately; providing intelligence does not guarantee immunity; ordinary soldiers should be admitted to labor and training teams first; family members should not be used to coerce others.

After hearing these points, Duan Peng clicked his tongue.

"Political Commissar, the rules you've set are thicker than the Japanese 'Infantry Drill Manual'."

Zhao Gang put down his pen.

"The Japanese military manual teaches how to kill. My rules teach how not to kill the wrong person."

Duan Peng remained silent.

The mimeograph machine ran for three days.

During the day, they checked the lists and cut stencils; at night, they broadcast and monitored patrols. After the incident on the second communication line, all the pre-printed code pages were discarded, and the names to be checked were copied onto the back.

There wasn't enough paper or batteries, so leaflets were only delivered to isolated outposts and puppet army garrisons, and broadcasts were made in batches according to the verified lists. Someone suggested printing "Daye is dead" all over the page, but Zhao Gang didn't agree.

"One death is enough. The rest of the space, print the names of their own people."

Ink smeared the entire room. Even after the soldier responsible for cranking the machine fell asleep, his right hand remained in the gripping position. Zhao Gang picked out a piece of a smeared leaflet; writing could still be done on the back, so he told the recorder to take it and copy down the names to be verified for the next batch.

On the evening of October 3, Yangquan sent out the third sketch.

The military police's backyard, telephone booth, two machine gun positions, and the barracks doors controlled by two puppet army companies were all drawn on the paper. A note was left on the corner of the paper: "Send a message the night before the attack on the city. First, cut off the telephone, then seize the machine guns."

The locations of the two machine guns have been verified, but the people who came into contact with them have not yet been checked.

Gardenia only gave the next coded message, without providing a date.

Zhao Weiguo put the twenty-odd original letters back into the tin box and sealed it together with the list of the dead and the confessions of the prisoners. The letters were neither burned nor sent back to the stronghold.

Duan Peng looked at the tin box and suddenly asked a question.

"Will those letters be returned to their families later?"

Zhao Weiguo fastened the box without looking up.

"We'll talk about it after the war is over."

"What if we can't finish the game?"

Zhao Weiguo pushed the tin box under the table.

"Then keep it. As long as the faith exists, the person exists. Even if the person is gone, the faith still exists."

Duan Peng didn't ask any more questions.

Outside the window, the broadcasting team was loading loudspeakers and batteries onto the mule cart. The roster for the next outpost had been checked up to the sixty-seventh person.

People in Yangquan City began to pass things out through the cracks in their doors.

But we'll have to check your hand again before we can open the door.