The Traitor Within

by Alexander Cordell

Genres: YA Historical Fiction

Synopsis

A fourteen-year-old Chinese boy struggles to prove his loyalty and courage to his commune and country in the face of his fear of a predicted attack on his village by the Taiwanese enemy.

Release date: August 7, 2014

Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton

Print pages: 128

Sample

Chapter 1

The dungeon of fear

It was the day the enemy parachutists dropped on my village that Bigba, my water-buffalo friend, showed his wisdom despite his ignorance of the destructive powers of high explosives.

It was also the day that I came face to face with fear.

Fear, my father used to say, is the traitor within.

For years now, these paratroopers from Taiwan had been a great worry to my little Chinese village of East Flower. Looking back for almost as long as I can remember, I can see their aeroplanes sweeping in over the sea from Chiang Kai-shek’s island fortress. And the saboteurs would spill out in their scores, cascading out of the sky on their coloured parachutes, their sub-machine-guns spitting fire at us even as they descended. Hitting the ground, they would roll, fling off the harness and deploy; within minutes our roads would be blown up, our power-lines cut and our bridges demolished. Then they would carry out a fighting retreat to the sea, wading into the surf and clambering into their speedboats under cover of an aerial attack, and their jet fighters would dive over the little commune, strafing everything that moved. After they had returned to Taiwan, our thatched hutments would be blazing and a black cloud of foul smoke mushrooming into the summer sky.

Once, I remember, my mother wept. ‘Oh, Ling,’ she said, ‘it is so terrible! Why do men always want to destroy?’

I bowed my head before her. ‘They have destroyed our new bridge this time,’ I replied bitterly.

The loss of our new bridge over the river had upset me particularly. It was a magnificent bridge; we had built it with commune skills and without help from the Peking engineers, and it had taken us five months of sweated labour. Now it was a tangled mass of steel and debris. But Mr Din, our commune Director, was not in the slightest dismayed.

‘Come, come, good people,’ he cried, ‘Where is your courage? Under the guidance of our great Chairman Mao we will build an even better bridge. We have the plans, we have the tools, and we will start first thing in the morning,’ which was all right for him, I reflected. It is easy to build bridges sitting in an office.

Without exception, the villagers of East Flower were disheartened by these continuous raids, and, astonishingly, Bigba my buffalo was more angry and disheartened than most, which was strange. Dumb animals usually accept the stupidity and brutality of humans. He made a great show of impatience, I remember, stamping round and putting his nose up and snorting his disgust every time we passed the wrecked bridge. He said nothing, of course, though the elders of my village insist that he often holds long conversations with people over seventy. He never lowers himself to speak to me, for I am only fourteen.

‘Look,’ said my little sister, Pei, ‘they have caught two prisoners!’

I was taking Bigba to the water-pump in the fields outside the village when the captured paratroopers were marched off to the station. One was young, I remember, only a few years older than me. He was bare-headed and proud, and although his hands were tied he walked with dignity, and I envied him his courage.

‘What will happen to them, Ling?’ asked Pei, her face alight.

I did not answer, but bowed my head. I would have given my soul to possess such arrogance in the face of such defeat. This, my father once said, is the difference between the brave man and the coward.

‘Is he a brave man, Bigba?’ I asked at the water-pump, ‘or is he a fool? Is it so terrible to be a coward, as I, Bigba?’

I wiped the sweat from my face as I asked this. I think I knew I was wasting my time, for, as usual, he made no reply. Unfortunately, it is believed in China that in order to prove one’s wisdom it is necessary to make a speech, but I am beginning to doubt the old scholars. For instance, the wise old men of my village are talking all the time, but we young Red Guards are beginning to doubt if they have an ounce of brains between them. Bigba’s brain, however, must weigh several pounds, yet he plainly finds discussion most exhausting and prefers to concentrate on action. And so, if I ever have a problem, I would not go to the elders for advice, nor would I take it to my mother, for although she is the most beautiful young widow in East Flower, she is still a woman, therefore her brain is inferior. I would not talk to my Uncle Soon about it since he drinks too much rice wine for intelligence, and my paternal grandfather is so deaf I would have to shout my business all over the village.

No. If ever I have a particularly difficult decision to make, I discuss it with Bigba, my water-buffalo, who was old in wisdom before I was born.

I have done this all my life and he has not put a hoof wrong yet.

 

It was less than a month after the calamitous attack on our bridge that a warning arrived from Central Intelligence in Peking of another impending assault by the Taiwan rebels.

I was continually amazed that Peking, over a thousand miles to the north, was so aware of the enemy’s intentions. Indeed, so precise and detailed was their order that we could often draw our rifles from the armoury and march down to the beach and be at the guns hours before they arrived. Shooting the paratroopers out of the sky was rather like shooting at summer flowers, but it was tragic when they landed and lay still, and some, as I have said, were impossibly young. Wong the Hooligan, my friend who lives in the hut next door, says they deserve to die because they are rebels fighting under the traitor Chiang Kai-shek, but I do not agree. I fight for Chairman Mao, they fight for General Chiang, and we both think we are right. The terrible thing about it, as my mother says, is that brother Chinese are killing each other. I was thinking this as I trudged in from the muddy rice-fields of Sun Commune. My seven-year-old sister Pei was struggling with her homework as I entered our hut, flinging off my shirt in preparation for a wash.

‘Oh, I cannot do it!’ she announced, sucking the end of her pencil.

Unlike my mother, she was as plain as a cow’s tail, but I was proud of her.

‘Where’s Mother?’ I asked.

‘At the hospital.’

I remembered then that it was a Saturday – four days before the expected attack. Like the other young village women, my mother took her turn at the hospital where she worked as a midwife. Pei said:

‘Have you any homework, Ling?’

‘Only one English paper. I did it in the fields with Bigba.’

‘Did he help you?’

‘Do not be ridiculous.’ I splashed and bubbled in the wash-bowl.

‘I think he’d be better at this than me,’ she said, dejectedly. ‘Oh, Ling, help me with it!’

I shook my head. ‘That has been the trouble – I have done too much of your homework.’

‘I’ll get the cane tomorrow, and then you’ll be sorry.’

Hanging up the towel, I went to the door, but her eyes, large and shining with unshed tears, made me pause.

‘All right, all right,’ I said. ‘What is the trouble?’

She smiled brightly and her teeth were missing in front, and said, ‘You know the paratroopers keep coming to shoot us . . .?’

I nodded.
. . .