The Year of the Dragon
As a personal injury lawyer, the first thing I noticed about China was that the whole country was one big lawsuit waiting to happen.
The steps at the Great Wall were uneven. The doorways in the Forbidden City were raised just enough to trip the unwary. The pedestrian underpass at Tiananmen Square was slippery and utterly devoid of handrails.
Worst of all were the sidewalks. On my first day I saw no less than three unblocked openings and four unflagged pieces of metal sticking up out of the walkway as though someone had planted ballbearings in the cracks and the menace had flourished.
I asked our national guide why the dangers were unmarked.
She appeared perplexed. "Did you not see them?"
"Yes."
"Then they were not a danger."
"But what if I hadn't seen them?"
She laughed as if in answer to my question and then turned away. "To the bus everybody. We leave in five minutes."
I hung back as the rest of the tour group escaped the jade factory for the familiarity of the bus. Now that the crowd was gone I could finally examine the jade dragon more closely.
The shelf the dragon sat on abutted a glass wall. In the room behind sat a Chinese woman who could have been a hundred, grinding a piece of jade against a hunk of machinery that could have been even older. During the hour we'd been here—urged to buy jade bracelets, jade figurines, and jade pillows that simply had to involve risk—she had not once glanced up from the spinning wheel to the foreigners staring at her, the foreigners blocking my view of the jade dragon.
I dropped my gaze to the work of art. In a room filled with jade, one dragon among hundreds, this particular carving was unique. No more than one inch wide and two inches long, the exquisite detail almost hurt my eyes.
One of the uniformed salesgirls appeared at my shoulder. "Very lucky."
Virtually everything in China was considered lucky. I should have been surprised when our national guide didn't tell me breaking a toe on a protruding piece of metal was considered lucky. "Very beautiful."
The salesgirl pointed at the chop of the artist as though I could read Chinese. "He only produces one jade every twelve years."
"This must be expensive."
"For you, twenty-percent discount."
Lifting the price tag, I quickly converted to American dollars. "Too rich for my blood."
"Twenty-five percent."
"Sorry, the bus is leaving. I have to go." Behind the glass I saw the old Chinese woman look up and take my measure. I felt her judgment pass over me and I suddenly realized I had no choice in the matter. "I'll take it."
The salesgirl ran off with the dragon and the old woman returned to her grinding.
I rubbed a bead of sweat from my left eyebrow. Once I was back in the States I would have the dragon appraised. Then I'd find a collector and try to turn a tidy profit. Whatever urged me to buy the jade, there was no way I could afford to keep it for myself.
The salesgirl returned with a wooden box which she opened to show me the dragon packed in shredded paper. Then she handed me a slip and pointed at the register.
After a last look at the Chinese woman behind the glass, I walked to the register and passed the slip and my charge card to the uniformed girl behind the counter.
It was the same in restaurants. While there might be a single older woman supervisor, the rest of the staff were young girls in matching uniforms. Where were all the woman between thirty and fifty? Where were all the men?
"Doesn't work."
"Excuse me?"
She handed me my card. "It doesn't work."
I pulled out my wallet and gave her another, making a mental note to call the company once I was at the hotel. "I didn't have a chance to tell them all I was leaving the country."
She stared at me while she swiped.
Unable to maintain eye contact, I glanced down at the jade figurines imprisoned in the counter's glass display case. "How come there are glasses of water in each corner?"
"Jade is alive." She placed a charge card slip on the counter and handed me a pen.
"I just bought a jade dragon." I signed my name. "Should I place it near a glass of water?"
"That jade dragon will find water on its own."
I nodded as if I understood, grabbed the box and started outside even though there was no rush. The bus that was going to leave in ten minutes would sit there for another fifteen while the passengers were counted two or three times.
Perhaps if I were paying for the trip I would have minded but this all-expense-paid extravaganza was a gift from a client who owned a travel agency until I won him the settlement. Nothing ventured meant everything gained.
When I got outside, the bus was gone.
They'd be back once someone realized I was missing.
In China it was considered very lucky to turn the bus around. That was the only way to explain why it happened so often. Counted or not, one of the group was always left behind.
It would be amazing if we all made the return flight.
I wandered across the parking lot to the street, examining the sky. Winter in China was not unlike winter in New England. I'd been here three days and hadn't yet seen the sun.
Though it was cold with a biting wind, at least it wasn't snowing. Back home they'd received three inches while I'd been here and cars were sliding out of control to generate all manner of neck and back injury.
The clients would wait until I finished my vacation, would be impressed by my strange adventure.
Unable to stop myself, I lifted the lid off the box.
I parted the shredded paper and lifted the jade dragon, fumbled the sculpture when a sharp edge drew blood, leapt forward to catch my purchase but it bounced off the sidewalk and disappeared into one of those unblocked openings.
This country was a klutz's nightmare.
Dropping to one knee, I prayed the workers hadn't been digging a hole to the States or else I was out a fistful of money with no way to recoup my loss.
The jade had landed on a ledge instead of falling down what appeared to be a bottomless well, the dragon's head just visible jutting out from dark shadow.
I reached in, stretching towards the open mouth.
The jade dragon leapt, clamped onto my middle finger and pulled, actually started dragging me into the hole.
My free hand scrambled for a purchase, searched for some protruding piece of metal, grabbed for the edge of the hole, followed me down inside.
I could feel the dragon's hot breath on my hand, could see the jade glowing pale in the darkness.
The finger between its teeth had gone numb. The rest of my hand and arm were aflame.
The jade dragon dragged me down curved passageways barely bigger than my body. I kicked to no avail, scratched at the earthen walls with my left hand, screamed to convince myself this was really happening.
Dust and dirt stung my eyes, crawled between my teeth, coated my lungs.
The tunnel opened into a large empty chamber and the dragon pulled me to the middle of the room before finally letting go. The delicate jade flapped its wings, soared over me with an ear-splitting shriek, and then disappeared the way we had come.
Jamming the wounded finger under the opposite arm, I struggled to a sitting position. I didn't care what the national guide said, there was no way this experience could be classed as lucky.
"But you are alive."
I twisted to see an old man standing against the wall, brown and gray the both of them as if they had been one and the same and perhaps still were.
"What happened to me?"
"You were chosen."
My head began to throb. "The piece of jade I bought. It came alive and attacked me. I don't understand."
"You bought nothing."
"I have the credit card receipt." I suddenly remembered leaving the shop without one.
"The jade dragon was not there and you did not buy it."
I struggled to my feet. "Just what the hell is going on?"
"It is enough for you to know that the human body, when prepared correctly, will last for twelve years."
"Prepared?" The fish at lunch must not have agreed with me. I'd stumbled and fallen into some underground sewer system and this bitter old man was using the opportunity to frighten a westerner.
"Yes, prepared." He smiled, his red silk slippers making tiny steps towards me as I backed away. "Even a jade master has to eat."
-END-
