The Girl Who Played Go

82

A woman is bathing in thermal springs, her body glistening under the water where it writhes and twists like a slender leaf. Beside the pool a blue cotton kimono hangs from a branch, fluttering delicately in the breeze.

The strident wail of the bugle pierces my dream, and I reach mechanically for the folded clothes on top of my shoes at the foot of the bed. I heave on my backpack and hurry outside.

As the troops file in, orders whistle from every direction. The regiment sets off, then from the head of the formation comes the command to run. The barrack gates draw open and the guards salute us. Then the gates of the town open and the chill, gloomy air of the countryside whips my face.

I am already drenched with sweat, but instead of diving into the woods as we have done on our previous exercises, we continue along the main road. I choke with apprehension when I realize: we are heading for Peking.

When the sun appears on the horizon we are already far from the town. I struggle to ready myself, to see myself in battle. I call on Death to give me strength. Curiously, instead of fortifying me as it always has before, the prayer makes me only more nervous.

The warm, easy months I have spent in the garrison evaporate in a flash. Did the town of A Thousand Winds really exist? And what about the girl who played go, was she only the heroine in some wonderful vision? Life seems an infernal loop in which the day before yesterday has joined with today, and yesterday has been jettisoned. We think we move forward in time, but we are always prisoners of the past. To leave… that is always a good thing: to have remained in the Square of a Thousand Winds would be to court destruction by the most tenacious of instincts: to love, to live, to bring forth children.

I hear the whistle signal to halt the march, and our platoon bunches together like an accordion as we stop to catch our breath. I take my flask off my pack and pour the sun-warmed water down my throat.

A new order comes through: about face, the rear formation becomes the head of the column. We are going back to the town. Cries of joy run up along the line as we set off again. I abandon myself, carried along on this wave.