最后我们被关了起来，写了很长时间的交待材料。	Finally we were taken into custody and forced to write confessions for a long time.
起初我是这么写的：我和陈清扬有不正当的关系。	At first I wrote the following: Chen Qingyang and I have an indecent relationship.
这就是全部。	That was all.
上面说，这样写太简单， 叫我重写。	But it came down from above that what I wrote was too simple, and they asked me to start over.
后来我写，我和陈清扬有不正当关系，我干了她很多回，她也乐意让我干。	Later on I wrote that Chen Qingyang and I had an indecent relationship, and that I had screwed her many times, and she liked being screwed by me.
上面说，这样写缺少细节。	This time the opinions from above said it needed more detail.
后来又加上了这样的细节：我们俩第四十次非法性交，地点是我在山上偷盖的草房。	So I added detail: The fortieth time that we made illegal love, the location was the thatched hut I secretly built on the mountain.
那天不是阴历十五就是阴历十六，反正月亮很亮。	It was either the fifteenth or the sixteenth by the lunar calendar—whatever the date, the moon shone brightly.
陈清扬坐在竹床上，月光从门里照进来，照在她身上。	Chen Qingyang sat on the bamboo bed, her body gleaming in the moonlight that shone through the door.
我站在地上，她用腿圈着我的腰。	I stood on the ground, and she locked her legs around my waist.
我们还聊了几句，我说她的乳房不但圆，而且长的很端正，脐窝不但圆，而且很浅。	We chatted for a while. I told her that her breasts were not just full, but also shapely; her navel not only round, but shallow too.
这些都很好。	All of this was very good.
她说是吗，我自己不知道。	She said, Really? I had no idea.
后来月光移走了，我点了一根烟，抽到一半她拿走了，接着吸了几口。	After a while the moonlight moved away. I lit a cigarette, but she took it from me after I finished half of it, taking several drags.
她还捏过我的鼻子，因为本地有一种说法，说童男的鼻子很硬，而纵欲过度行将死去的人鼻子很软。	She pinched my nose, for the locals believed that a virgin's nose would be very hard, and a man dying of too much sex would have a soft nose.
这些时候她懒懒地躺在床上，倚着竹板墙。 其它的时间她像澳大利亚考拉熊一样抱住我，往我脸上吹热气。	On some of these occasions she lazed on the bed, leaning against the bamboo wall; other times she held me like a koala bear, blowing warm breath on my face.
最后月亮从门对面的窗子里照进来。 这时我和她分开。	At last the moonlight shone through the window opposite the door and we were separate by then.
但是我写这些材料，不是给军代表看。 他那时早就不是军代表了，而且已经复员回家去。	However, I wrote these confessions not for the military deputy — he was no longer our military deputy, having been discharged from the army and gone back home.
他是不是代表不重要，反正犯了我们这种错误，总是要写交待材料。	It didn't matter whether he was our military deputy or not, we had to write confessions about our errors anyway.
我后来和我们学校人事科长关系不错。	Years later, I had a good relationship with the director of personnel at our school.
他说当人事干部最大的好处就是可以看到别人写的交待材料。 我想他说的包括了我写的交待材料。	He told me that the great thing about the job was that you could read other people's confessions, which I believe included mine.
我以为我的交待材料最有文彩。	I thought of all the confessions mine would be the richest and most vivid.
因为我写这些材料时住在招待所，没有别的事可干，就像专业作家一样。	That was because I wrote it in a hotel, with nothing else to do, like a professional writer.
我逃跑是晚上的事。	In the evening I made my escape.
那天上午，我找司务长请假，要到井坎镇买牙膏。	That morning, I asked the mess officer for a day off because I needed to go to Jingkan to buy toothpaste.
我归司务长领导，他还有监视我的任务。	I worked under the mess officer, who also had the task of watching me.
他应该随时随地看住我，可是天一黑我就不见了。	He was supposed to keep an eye on me every minute, but I disappeared as soon as it got dark.
早上我带给他很多酸琶果，都是好的。	In the morning I brought him a lot of loquats, all very good.
平原上的酸琶果都不能吃，因为里面是一窝蚂蚁。	The loquats growing on the plain aren't edible, because of the ant colonies in them.
只有山里的酸琶果才没蚂蚁。	Only the ones on the mountain don't have ants.
司务长说，他个人和我关系不坏，而且军代表不在。 他可以准我去买牙膏。	The mess officer said since we got along, and the military deputy wasn't around, he'd allow me to go buy toothpaste.
但是司务长又说，军代表随时会回来。	But he also said the military deputy might return any minute.
要是他回来时我不在，司务长也不能包庇我。	If I were not here by the time the military deputy returned, he couldn't cover for me.
我从队里出去，爬上十五队的后山，拿个镜片晃陈清扬的后窗。	I left my team and climbed to the fifteenth team's mountainside, holding a small piece of mirror to reflect light on Chen Qingyang's back window.
过一会儿，她到山上来，说是头两天人家把她盯得特紧，跑不出来。	After a while, she came up the mountain and told me that since people had been keeping a close eye on her for the past two days, she hadn't been able to get out.
而这几天她又来月经。	And right now she was having her period.
她说这没关系，干吧。	She said that shouldn't be a problem and we could still do it.
我说那不行。	I said that wasn't going to work.
分手时她硬要给我二百块钱。	When we said goodbye to each other, she insisted on giving me two hundred yuan.
起初我不要，后来还是收下了。	I refused at first, but then took it after a while.
后来陈清扬告诉我，头两天人家没有把她盯得特紧，后来她也没有来月经。	Later Chen Qingyang told me that nobody had been keeping a close eye on her those two days, and she hadn't been having her period when she saw me.
事实上，十五队的人根本就不管她。	In fact, people in the fifteenth team didn't pay attention to her at all.
那里的人习惯于把一切不是破鞋的人说成破鞋，而对真的破鞋放任自流。	People there were used to accusing the innocent of being damaged goods, but as for real damaged goods, they just let them do whatever they wanted.
她之所以不肯上山来，让我空等了好几天，是因为对此事感到厌倦。	The reason that she didn't come up the mountain and kept me waiting for nothing was because she began to feel tired of it.
她总要等有了好心情才肯性交，不是只要性交就有好心情。	She couldn't do it unless she was in the right mood; having sex wouldn't necessarily put her in a good mood.
当然这样做了以后，她也不无内疚之心。	Of course, after her deception she felt guilty.
所以她给我二百块钱。	That was why she gave me two hundred yuan.
我想既然她有二百块钱花不掉，我就替她花。	I thought since she might have trouble spending the two hundred yuan, I wouldn't mind helping her.
所以我拿了那些钱到井坎镇上，买了一条双筒猎枪。	So I brought the money with me to Jingkan and bought a double-barreled shotgun for myself.
后来我写交待材料，双筒猎枪也是一个主题。	Later when I wrote my confessions, the double-barreled shotgun was also an issue.
人家怀疑我拿了它要打死谁。	They suspected that I might want to kill someone with it.
其实要打死人，用二百块钱的双筒猎枪和四十块钱的铜炮枪打都一样。	Actually, if I'd wanted to kill someone, it wouldn't have made any difference whether I used a two hundred-yuan double-barreled shotgun or a forty-yuan bronze-barreled gun.
那种枪是用来在水边打野鸭子的，在山里一点不实用，而且像死人一样沉。	A bronze-barreled gun, normally used to shoot wild ducks by the water, was not practical at all in the mountains; besides, it was as heavy as a corpse.
那天我到井坎街上时，已经是下午时分，又不是赶街的日子，所以只有一条空空落落的土路和几间空空落落的国营商店。	When I got to the street in Jingkan that day, it was already afternoon, and since it wasn't a market day, there was just a deserted dirt road and a few deserted state-run stores.
商店里有一个售货员在打瞌睡，还有很多苍蝇在飞。	Inside one store a saleswoman dozed while a swarm of flies circled around.
货架上写着“吕过吕乎”，放着铝锅铝壶。	The shelf display read "aloomenum wokk" and "aloomenum kittel," and underneath were aluminum woks and aluminum kettles.
我和那个胶东籍的售货员聊了一会天，她叫我到库房里看了看。	I chatted awhile with the saleswoman, who was from Shandong Province, and she let me go in their storeroom to look around myself.
在那儿我看见那条上海出的猎枪，就不顾它已经放了两年没卖出去的事实，把它买下了。	In there I saw a shotgun made in Shanghai. So I bought it even though it had sat there for nearly two years.
傍晚时我拿它到小河边试放，打死了一只鹭鸶。	At dusk I tested it on the riverbank and killed a heron.
这时军代表从场部回来，看见我手里有枪，很吃了一惊。	The military deputy happened to return from the farm headquarters right then and was shocked to see my shotgun.
他唠叨说，这件事很不对，不能什么人手里都有枪。 应该和队里说一下，把王二的枪没收掉。	He went on about how it was not right that everyone could have a gun, and that someone had to talk to the team leader and confiscate Wang Er's gun.
我听了这话，几乎要朝他肚子上打一枪。	When I heard this, I felt the urge to fire at his belly.
如果打了的话，恐怕会把他打死。	If I had, it would probably have killed him.
那样多半我也活不到现在了。	Then most likely I wouldn't be around today.
那天下午我从井坎回队的路上，涉水从田里经过，曾经在稻棵里站了一会。	On the way back from Jingkan that afternoon, I waded through the paddy field and stood among the rice seedlings for a while.
我看见很多蚂蝗像鱼一样游出来，叮上了我的腿。	I saw leeches swimming out like fish and sticking to my legs.
那时我光着膀子，衣服包了很多红糖馅的包子（镇上饭馆只卖这一种食品），双手提包子，背上还背了枪，很累赘。	I was naked to the waist then, because I had used my clothes to wrap brown sugar buns (the only kind of food sold in the town's restaurant), and with the buns in my hands and a gun slung over my back, I felt really loaded down.
所以我也没管那些蚂蝗。	So I ignored the leeches.
到了岸上我才把它们一条条揪下来用火烧死。	Only when I got up the bank did I start pulling them off one by one and burning them.
烧得它们一条条发软起泡。	They turned soft and blistery in the fire.
忽然间我感到很烦很累，不像二十一岁的人。	All of a sudden, I felt very frustrated and tired, nothing like a twenty-one-year-old.
我想，这样下去很快就会老了。	I realized I would get old quickly if things continued like this.
后来我遇上了勒都。 他告诉我说，他们把那条河岔里的鱼都捉到手了。	After a while, I ran into Le Du, who told me that they had caught all the fish at the fork of the rivers.
我那一份已经晒成了鱼干，在他姐姐手里。	My share had been dried into stockfish and stored at his sister's place.
他姐姐叫我去。	His sister wanted me to come get it.
他姐姐和我也很熟，是个微黑俏丽的小姑娘。	I knew his sister very well; she was a dark, pretty girl.
我说一时去不了。	I told him that I couldn't get there for a while.
我把那一包包子都给了勒都，叫他给我到十五队送个信，告诉陈清扬，我用她给我的钱买了一条枪。	I gave him all my brown sugar buns and asked him to take a message to the fifteenth team, telling Chen Qingyang that I'd bought a gun with her money.
勒都去了十五队，把这话告诉陈清扬，她听了很害怕，觉得我会把军代表打死。	Le Du went to the fifteenth team and told Chen Qingyang. She was afraid that I might shoot the military deputy.
这种想法也不是没有道理，傍晚时我就想打军代表一枪。	This concern was not completely unreasonable. By the evening I really began to consider taking a shot at the military deputy.
傍晚时分我在河边打鹭鸶，碰上了军代表。	At dusk, when I shot the heron by the river, I ran into the military deputy.
像往常一样，我一声不吭，他喋喋不休。	As usual, I stayed mute and he kept nagging at me.
我很愤怒，因为已经有半个多月了，他一直对我喋喋不休，说着同样的话：我很坏，需要思想改造。	I got really angry. For more than two weeks, he had been holding forth on the same subject over and over, that I was a bad person and needed thought reform.
对我一刻也不能放松。	People shouldn't let up on me for a minute.
这样的话我听了一辈子，从来没有像那天晚上那么火。	I'd been hearing that sort of thing all my life but never got angrier than that night.
后来他又说，今天他有一个特大好消息，要向大家公布。 但是他又不说是什么，只说我和我的“臭婊子”陈清扬今后的日子会很不好过。	After a while, he said he had wonderful good news to announce later that day, but wouldn't reveal what it was except that "the rotten whore" Chen Qingyang and I were going to have a really hard time from now on.
我听了这话格外恼火，想把他就地掐死，又想听他说出是什么好消息以后再下手。	Infuriated by what he said, I was tempted to choke him right on the spot, but my curiosity about the great news got the better of me.
他却不说，一直卖着关子，只说些没要紧的话，到了队里以后才说，晚上你来听会吧，会上我会宣布的。	However, he went on talking nonsense to keep me guessing. Not until we reached our team did he say, Come to the meeting tonight. I'll announce the news at the meeting.
晚上我没去听会，在屋里收拾东西，准备逃上山去。	But I didn't go to the meeting that evening. I packed my stuff, ready to flee back to the mountains.
我想一定发生了什么大事，以致军代表有了好办法来收拾我和陈清扬，至于是什么事我没想出来，那年头的事很难猜。	I believed that some major event must have happened to give the military deputy a way to take care of Chen Qingyang and me. As for what the event was, I couldn't figure it out—in those days anything could happen.
我甚至想到可能中国已经复辟了帝制，军代表已经当上了此地的土司。	I even imagined that the emperor had been restored and the military deputy had become the local chief.
他可以把我锤骟掉，再把陈清扬拉去当妃子。	He could castrate me with a hammer and then take Chen Qingyang as his concubine.
等我收拾好要出门，才知道没有那么严重。	By the time I finished my packing and was about to leave, I realized that things were not that bad.
因为会场上喊口号，我在屋里也能听见。	People were shouting slogans at the meeting that I could hear even from my room.
原来是此地将从国营农场改做军垦兵团。 军代表可能要当个团长。	It turned out that our state-run farm had been changed into an Army Production Corps, and the military deputy might be promoted to Regimental Commander.
不管怎么说，他不能把我阉掉，也不能把陈清扬拉走。	At any rate, he couldn't castrate me, or take Chen Qingyang as his concubine.
我犹豫了几分钟，还是把装好的东西背上了肩，还用砍刀把屋里的一切都砍坏，并且用木炭在墙上写了：“XXX（军代表名），操你妈！”	After a few minutes' hesitation, I slung the pack on my back. Then I hacked up everything in the place with a machete, found a piece of charcoal, and wrote "xxx (the military deputy's name), fuck your mother!" on the wall.
然后出了门，上山去了。	After that I left and headed up the mountain.
我从十四队逃跑的事就是这样。	That was how I ran away from the fourteenth team.
这些经过我也在交待材料里写了。	I also included these things in my confessions.
概括地说，是这样的：我和军代表有私仇，这私仇有两个方面：	To summarize, it went like this: The military deputy had a personal grudge against me, which was twofold.
一是我在慰问团面前说出了曾经被打晕的事，叫军代表很没面子；二是争风吃醋，所以他一直修理我。	Firstly, I told the relief delegation that I had been beaten unconscious, which made the military deputy lose face; secondly, he and I fought over a woman, which was why he was always trying to screw me.
当他要当团长时，我感到不堪忍受，逃到山上去了。	So, when I learned he was about to become Regimental Commander, I felt that I couldn't take it anymore and fled into the mountains.
我到现在还以为这是我逃上山的原因。	Even today I still believe that was the true reason for my escape.
但是人家说，军代表根本就没当上团长，我逃跑的理由不能成立。	But they said that the military deputy hadn't become Regimental Commander, so my explanation for running away wouldn't stand up.
所以人家说，这样的交待材料不可信。	So, they said my confessions were unconvincing.
可信的材料应该是，我和陈清扬有私情。	A convincing confession would be that Chen Qingyang and I were having a love affair.
俗话说，色胆包天，我们什么事都能干出来。 这话也有一点道理，可是我从队里逃出来时，原本不打算找陈清扬，打算一走算了。	As the saying goes: For sex, a man would dare anything. We would do anything for it — well, there's some truth to that. But when I ran away from our team, I didn't plan to see Chen Qingyang, thinking that I could just leave without telling anyone.
走到山边上才想到，不管怎样，陈是我的一个朋友，该去告别。	When I reached the edge of the mountains I realized that after all Chen Qingyang was a friend of mine and I should go back to say goodbye to her.
谁知陈清扬说，她要和我一起逃跑。	I hadn't expected Chen Qingyang to say she wanted to run away with me.
她还说，假如这种事她不加入，那伟大友谊岂不是喂了狗。	She said if she didn't join me in such an adventure, we would throw our great friendship to the dogs.
于是她匆匆忙忙收拾了一些东西跟我走了。	So she packed some stuff in a hurry and took off with me.
假如没有她和她收拾的东西，我一定会病死在山上。	Without her and what she packed, I would have gotten sick and died on the mountain for sure.
那些东西里有很多治疟疾的药，还有大量的大号避孕套。	The supplies she packed included lots of malaria medicine, and plenty of jumbo-sized condoms.
我和陈清扬逃上山以后，农场很惊慌了一阵。	After Chen Qingyang and I escaped to the mountains, the farm panicked for a while.
他们以为我们跑到缅甸去了。	They believed we had run off to Burma.
这件事传出去对谁都没好处，所以就没向上报告，只是在农场内部通缉王二和陈清扬。	It wouldn't have been good for any of us if that news had gotten out. So they didn't report us, only issued a wanted poster on the farm.
我们的样子很好认，还带了一条别人没有的双筒猎枪，很容易被人发现，可是一直没人找到我们。 直到半年后以后，我们自己回到农场来，各回各的队，又过了一个多月，才被人保组叫去写交待。	Both Chen Qingyang and I were easily recognized, and, besides, the double-barreled shotgun we brought along was hard to hide. But for some reason nobody found us until half a year later when each of us returned to our own teams. And then after another month, the public security section summoned us to write our confessions.
也是我们流年不利，碰上了一个运动，被人揭发了出来。	It was our bad luck to be the victims of a new political campaign and have someone inform on us.
人保组的房子在场部的路口上，是一座孤零零的土坯房。	The office of public security was located at the entrance to our farm's headquarters. It was a lonely mud-brick house.
你从很远的地方就能看见，因为它粉刷得很白，还因为它在高岗上。	You could see it from far off, because it was whitewashed and set on a hill.
大家到场部赶街，老远就看见那间房子。	When people went to the market at headquarters, they could see it from a distance.
它周围是一片剑麻地，剑麻总是睛绿色，剑麻下的土总是鲜红色。	A patch of sisal hemp, a perennial dark green in color, surrounded the house, but the clay underneath was red.
我在那里交待问题，把什么都交待了。	I confessed my errors there, making a clean breast of everything.
我们上了山，先在十五队后山上种玉米，那里土不好，玉米有一半没出苗。	We went up the mountains, and first we planted some corn on the back slope of the fifteenth team. The soil there was poor, and half the corn didn't grow.
我们就离开，昼伏夜行，找别的地方定居。	And then we left, sleeping in the daytime and walking at night, looking for other places to settle.
最后想起山上有个废水碾，那里有很大一片丢荒了的好地。	Finally we remembered an abandoned mill on the mountain, where there was a large, deserted area of fertile ground.
水碾里住了一个麻疯寨跑出来的刘大爹。 谁也不到那里去，只有陈清扬有一回想起自己是大夫，去看过一回。	Since an escapee from the leper colony, whom people called Grandpa Liu, lived there, no one visited except Chen Qingyang, prompted by her sense of duty as a doctor.
我们最后去了刘大爹那里，住在水碾背后的山洼里，陈清扬给刘大爹看病，我给刘大爹种地。	We finally went there for shelter, living in the valley behind the mill. Chen Qingyang treated Grandpa Liu's leprosy, and I tended the land for him.
过了一些时候，我到清平赶街，遇上了同学。	After a while, I traveled to the market in Qingping and ran into some classmates.
他们说，军代表调走了，没人记着我们的事。	They told me that the military deputy had been transferred someplace else and nobody remembered our affair anymore.
我们就回来。	So we came back.
整个事情就是这样的。	That was how the whole business went.
我在人保组里呆了很长时间。	I remained in the public security section for a long time.
有一段时间，气氛还好，人家说，问题清楚了，你准备写材料。	For a while the atmosphere was not bad. They said my problem was pretty clear and all I needed to do was to write confessions.
后来忽然又严重起来，怀疑我们去了境外，勾结了敌对势力，领了任务回来。	But after a while the situation turned more serious; they suspected that we had gone abroad, colluded with the enemy, and come back on a mission.
于是他们把陈清扬也叫到人保组，严加审讯。	So they took Chen Qingyang to the office, interrogating her severely.
问她时，我往窗外看。 天上有很多云。	While they interrogated her, I looked out the window—the sky was filled with clouds.
人家叫我交待偷越国境的事。	They wanted me to confess how I had slipped across the border.
其实这件事上，我也不是清白无辜。	As far as border-crossing went, I wasn't completely innocent.
我确实去过境外。	I did cross the border.
我曾经打扮成老傣的模样，到对面赶过街。	I disguised myself as a Thai to go to the market on the other side.
我在那里买了些火柴和盐。	I bought a few boxes of matches and salt.
但是这没有必要说出来。	But it was unnecessary to tell them about this.
没必要说的话就不说。	Things unnecessary to say shouldn't be said.
后来我带人保组的人到我们住过的地方去勘查。	Later I led those security people to our place to investigate.
我在十五队后山上搭的小草房已经漏了顶，玉米地招来很多鸟。 草房后面有很多用过的避孕套，这是我们在此住过的铁证。	The thatched hut that I built on the back slope of the fifteenth team had leaks in the roof, the cornfield attracted many birds, and the heap of used condoms behind our hut supplied ironclad evidence of our former occupancy.
当地人不喜欢避孕套，说那东西阻断了阴阳交流，会使人一天天弱下去。	The locals didn't like to use condoms, holding that condoms block exchange between yin and yang and gradually weaken people.
其实当地那种避孕套，比我后来用过的任何一种都好。	Actually, those local condoms were better than any other ones I used later.
那是百分之百的天然橡胶。	They were made of 100 percent natural rubber.
后来我再不肯带他们去那些地方看，反正我说我没去国外，他们不信。	Afterward I refused to take them there again. Anyway, I told them I had never crossed the border, and they didn't believe me;
带他们去看了，他们还是不信。	I showed them the place, but they still didn't believe me.
没必要做的事就别做。	Things unnecessary to do shouldn't be done.
我整天一声不吭。 陈清扬也一声不吭。	I stayed mute all day long, and so did Chen Qingyang.
问案的人开头还在问，后来也懒得吭声。	The investigators asked us questions at first, but got lazy after a while.
街子天里有好多老傣、老景颇背着新鲜的水果蔬菜走过，问案的人也越来越少。	On market day, many Thais and Jingpos came by, carrying fresh fruits and vegetables on their backs, and our interrogators got fewer and fewer.
最后只剩了一个人。	Finally there was only one person left.
他也想去赶街，可是不到放我们回去的时候，让我们呆在这里无人看管，又不合规定。	He also wanted to go to the market, but it wasn't time to release us yet and leaving us unattended was against the rules.
他就到门口去喊人，叫过路的大嫂站住。	So he went outside to call someone. He ordered a few passing women to stop.
但是人家经常不肯站住，而是加快了脚步。	They didn't stop but sped up.
见到这种情况，我们就笑起来。	We smiled when we saw this.
人保组的同志终于叫住了一个大嫂。	The security comrade finally stopped a woman.
陈清扬站起来，整理好头发，把衬衣领子折起来，然后背过手去。	Chen Qingyang rose to her feet, smoothed out her hair, straightened the collar of her shirt, and then turned around, putting her hands behind her back.
那位大嫂就把她捆起来，先捆紧双手，再把绳子在脖子和胳膊上扣住。	The woman tied her up, starting from her hands and then running the rope over her neck and arms to make a knot.
那大嫂抱歉地说，捆人我不会啦。	She apologized, I'm just hopeless at tying people up.
人保组的同志说，可以了。	The security comrade said, That's good enough.
然后他再把我捆起来，让我们在两张椅子上背靠背坐好，用绳子拦腰捆上一道，然后他锁上门，也去赶集。	Then he tied me up, sat us back-to-back in two separate chairs, and roped the whole thing together. He locked the door and went to the market.
过了好半天他才回来，到办公桌里拿东西，问道：要不要上厕所？	After a long time, he came back to get something from the office desk. He asked, Want to go to the bathroom?
时间还早，一会回来放你们。	It's still early. I'll come back after a while and then let you two leave.
然后又出去。	Then he went out again.
到他最后来放开我们的时候，陈清扬活动一下手指，整理好头发，把身上的灰土掸干净，我们俩回招待所去。	When he finally came to set us free, Chen Qingyang wiggled her fingers, smoothed her hair, and brushed the dust from her clothes. Then we returned to our hotel room.
我们每天都到人保组去，每到街子天就被捆起来，除此之外，有时还和别人一道到各队去挨斗。	We went to the public security section every day and would be tied up every market day. Beyond that, we had to go to every team to accept public denouncement with other bad elements.
他们还一再威胁说，要对我们采取其它专政手段——我们受审查的事就是这样的。	They threatened, more than once, to use other methods of the proletarian dictatorship on us—that was how our investigation went.
后来人家又不怀疑我们去了国外，开始对她比较客气，经常叫她到医院去，给参谋长看前列腺炎。	Later on they stopped suspecting we had gone abroad. They began to deal with Chen Qingyang in a more civilized way, often asking her to go to the hospital and treat the prostatitis of the chief of staff.
那时我们农场来了一大批军队下来的老干部，很多人有前列腺炎。	At that time, our farm had admitted a large number of retired army cadres, many of whom suffered from prostatitis.
经过调查，发现整个农场只有陈清扬知道人身上还有前列腺。	Through the investigation, they found that Chen Qingyang was the only one on our entire farm who knew there was such a thing as a prostate gland in a human.
人保组的同志说，要我们交待男女关系问题。	The security comrades told us to confess our love affair.
我说，你怎知我们有男女关系问题？	I said, How do you know we had a love affair?
你看见了吗？	Did you see it?
他们说，那你就交待投机倒把问题。	They said, Then confess your speculation problem.
我又说，你怎知我有投机倒把问题？	Again I asked, How do you know I had a speculation problem?
他们说，那你还是交待投敌叛变的问题。	They said, A traitorship problem would do.
反正要交待问题，具体交待什么，你们自己去商量。	Anyway, you have to confess something. As far as what specific problem you want to confess, that's up to you.
要是什么都不交待，就不放你。	If you confess nothing, we won't release you.
我和陈清扬商量以后，决定交待男女关系问题。	After discussing it, Chen Qingyang and I decided to confess our love affair.
她说，做了的事就不怕交待。	She said, Things we actually did we shouldn't be afraid to confess.
于是我就像作家一样写起交待材料来。	That was how I got started writing confessions like a writer.
首先交待的就是逃跑上山那天晚上的事。	The first thing I confessed was what happened the night we ran away.
写了好几遍，终于写出陈清扬像考拉熊。	After a few drafts, I finally wrote that Chen Qingyang looked like a koala bear.
她承认她那天心情非常激动，确实像考拉熊。	She admitted that she was very excited that night and really felt like a koala bear.
因为她终于有了机会，来实践她的伟大友谊。	She finally had a chance to fulfill her great friendship.
于是她腿圈住我的腰，手抓住我的肩膀，把我想像成一棵大树，几次想爬上去。	So she locked her legs around my waist, grabbed my shoulder with her hands, and imagining that I was a tall tree, tried to climb up several times.
后来我又见到陈清扬，已经到了九十年代。	When I saw Chen Qingyang again, it was already the nineties.
她说她离了婚和女儿住在上海，到北京出差。	She told me that she had divorced her husband and was now living with her daughter in Shanghai. She came to Beijing on a business trip.
到了北京就想到，王二在这里，也许能见到。	As soon as she got to Beijing, she began to recall that Wang Er lived here and she might be able to see me.
结果真的在龙潭湖庙会上见到了我。	Subsequently, she did run into me at Dragon-Lair Lake Temple Fair.
我还是老样子，饿纹入嘴，眼窝下乌青，穿过了时的棉袄，蹲在地上吃不登大雅之堂的卤煮火烧。	I had the same old look—deep wrinkles stretching toward my mouth, dark circles under my eyes, and I wore an old-fashioned cotton jacket. Squatting on the ground, I was eating spiced giblets and baked pancakes that fancy places wouldn't serve.
唯一和过去不同的是手上被硝酸染得焦黄。	The only difference was that my fingers had been burned yellow by nitric acid.
陈清扬的样子变了不少，她穿着薄呢子大衣，花格呢裙子，高跟皮靴，戴金丝眼镜，像个公司的公关职员，她不叫我，我绝不敢认。	Chen Qingyang had changed a lot. She wore a thin beige coat, a tweed skirt, high-heeled leather boots and a pair of goldrimmed glasses, like a public relations person in a big company. If she hadn't called my name, I wouldn't have recognized her.
于是我想到每个人都有自己的本质，放到合适的地方就大放光彩。	At that moment it dawned on me that everyone had his own essence, which would shine in the right setting.
我的本质是流氓土匪一类，现在做个城里的市民，学校的教员，就很不像样。	I was essentially a rascal or bandit. Now that I was a city dweller and a schoolteacher, mine didn't look quite right.
陈清扬说，她女儿已经上了大二，最近知道了我们的事，很想见我。	Chen Qingyang said her daughter had gone into her sophomore year at the university. Recently she found out about our affair and wanted to meet me.
这事的起因是这样的：她们医院想提拔她，发现她档案里还有一堆东西。	What occasioned this was: Her hospital wanted to promote Chen Qingyang, but they found this pile of confessions in her dossier.
领导上讨论之后，认为是文革时整人的材料，应予撤销。	After a discussion, the leaders decided they were persecutory materials from the Cultural Revolution and should be discarded.
于是派人到云南外调，花了一万元差旅费，终于把它拿了出来。	So they sent someone to Yunnan to investigate her case, spent over ten thousand yuan on the trip, and finally removed all the confessions from the file.
因为是本人写的，交还本人。	Since she was the author, they returned them to her.
她把它拿回家去放着，被女儿看见了。	She brought them home and stashed them somewhere, and her daughter found them.
该女儿说，好哇，你们原来是这么造的我！	Her daughter said, Wow! So that's how the two of you made me.
其实我和她女儿没有任何关系。	Actually, I had nothing to do with her daughter.
她女儿产生时，我已经离开云南了。	When her daughter was conceived, I had already left Yunnan.
陈清扬也是这么解释的，可是那女孩说，我可以把精液放到试管里，寄到云南让陈清扬人工授精。	Chen Qingyang explained things to her daughter that way, too. But the girl said I could have put my sperm in a test tube and mailed it to Chen Qingyang, who was still in Yunnan at that time, for artificial insemination.
用她原话来说就是：你们两个混蛋什么干不出来。	In her words, "There's nothing you pair of jerks wouldn't do."
我们逃进山里的第一个夜晚，陈清扬兴奋得很。	The first night we escaped to the mountains, Chen Qingyang was very aroused.
天明时我睡着了，她又把我叫起来，那时节大雾正从墙缝里流进来。	When I finally got to sleep at daybreak, she woke me again. At that time fog was pouring through the crack in the wall.
她让我再干那件事，别戴那捞什子。	She wanted me to do it again, telling me not to wear the rubber thing.
她要给我生一窝小崽子，过几年就耷拉到这里。	She was going to have a brood of babies with me. Let them hang down to here in a few years.
同时她揪住乳头往下拉，以示耷拉之状。	Meanwhile, she pulled her breasts down by the nipples to show me where they would reach.
我觉得耷拉不好看，就说，咱们还是想想办法，别叫它耷拉。	But I didn't like the idea that her breasts would droop and said, Let's think of a way to keep them from drooping.
所以我还是戴着那捞什子。	That was why I continued to wear the rubber thing.
以后她对这件事就失去了兴趣。	After that she lost interest in making love to me.
后来我再见陈清扬时，问道，怎么样，耷拉了吧？	When I saw Chen Qingyang all those years later, I asked, How are they? Did they droop?
她说可不是，耷拉得一塌糊涂。	She said, You bet they did. They're as droopy as hell.
你想不想看看有多耷拉。	Want to see the droop?
后来我看见了，并没有一蹋糊涂。	I got to see them shortly after—they weren't that bad.
不过她说，早晚要一塌糊涂，没有别的出路。	But she said, They will be that bad sooner or later. There's no way out.
我写了这篇交待材料交上去，领导上很欣赏。	When I turned in this confession, the leaders really liked it.
有个大头儿，不是团参谋长就是政委，接见了我们，说我们的态度很好。	One big shot, either the chief of staff or the commissar, received us and praised our attitudes.
领导上相信我们没有投敌叛变。 今后主要的任务就是交待男女关系问题。	They believed that we hadn't thrown ourselves into the enemy's embrace and betrayed our country, and our task in the future was to confess our illicit love affair.
假如交待得好，就让我们结婚。	If we confessed well, they would allow us to get married.
但是我们并不想结婚。	But we didn't want to get married.
后来又说，交待得好，就让我调回内地。 陈清扬也可以调上级医院。	So later they said if we confessed well, they would let me go back to civilization, and Chen Qingyang would get to work in a bigger hospital.
所以我在招待所写了一个多月交待材料，除了出公差，没人打搅，我用复写纸写，正本是我的，副本是她的。	So I stayed in my hotel room and wrote confessions for over a month. Nothing interrupted me except the government business that I had to perform. I used carbon copies; the originals I kept, the duplicates I gave to her.
我们有一模一样的交待材料。	We used exactly the same confessions.
后来人保组的同志找我商量，说是要开个大的批斗会。	After a while, the security comrades came to talk to me, telling me about the big denouncement meeting they were going to hold.
所有在人保组受过审查的人都要参加，包括投机倒把分子，贪污犯，以及各种坏人。	All the people who had been investigated by the public security section would have to attend, including speculators, grafters, and all kinds of bad elements.
我们本该属于同一类，可是团领导说了，我们年轻，交待问题的态度好，所以又可以不参加。	We belonged in the group, but the regimental leaders said that since we were young people, and had good attitudes, we didn't have to go.
但是有人攀我们，说都受审查，他们为什么不参加。	But people compared their situation with ours, and asked, if everyone who'd been investigated had to be there, why were we being let off?
人保组也难办。	The security comrades were in a fix.
所以我们必须参加。	So we would have to take part in the meeting.
最后的决定是来做工作，动员我们参加。	Finally they decided to work on mobilizing us to take part.
据说受受批斗，思想上有了震动，以后可以少犯错误。	They told us that public denouncing had an impact on a person's mind, which could prevent us from committing errors in the future.
既然有这样的好处，为什么不参加。	Since there was such an advantage, how could we miss the opportunity?
到了开会的日子，场部和附近生产队来了好几千人。	When the meeting day came, several thousand people flooded in from the farm headquarters and the nearby production teams.
我们和好多别的人站到台上去。	We stood on the stage with many others.
等了好半天，听了好几篇批判稿，才轮到我们王陈二犯。	After waiting a long time and hearing quite a few articles of denouncement read, our turn, convicts Wang and Chen, finally came.
原来我们的问题是思想淫乱，作风腐败，为了逃避思想改造，逃到山里去。	It turned out that we were loose in morals and corrupted in lifestyle, and what was more, in order to evade thought reform, we had fled into the mountains.
后来在党的政策感召下，下山弃暗投明。	Only under the influence of our party's policy did we come down the mountain to abandon darkness for sunlight.
听了这样的评价，我们心情激动，和大家一起振臂高呼：打倒王二！	Hearing comments like this, our emotions were stirred up, too. So we raised our arms and shouted out the slogans: Down with Wang Er!
打倒陈清扬！	Down with Chen Qingyang!
斗过这一台，我们就算没事了。	After this round of public denouncement, we thought we were done with it.
但是还得写交待，因为团领导要看。	But we still had to write confessions because the leaders wanted to read them.
在十五队后山上，陈清扬有一回很冲动，要给我生一群小崽子，我没要。	On the back slope of the fifteenth team, Chen Qingyang, seized with an impulse once, said she was going to bear a litter of young for me, but I wasn't interested.
后来我想，生生也不妨，再跟她说，她却不肯生了。	Later I thought having babies wasn't a bad idea. But when I mentioned it to her, she changed her mind.
而且她总是理解成我要干那件事。	And she always thought that it was me who wanted to have sex.
她说，要干就干，没什么关系。	She said, If you feel like it, just do it. I don't care.
我想纯粹为我，这样太自私了，所以就很少干。	I thought it would be too selfish if it were only for me. So I rarely asked for it.
何况开荒很累，没力气干。	Besides, cultivating the wilderness was very tiring and I didn't have the energy for it.
我所能交待的事就是在地头休息时摸她的乳房。	What I could confess was that I fondled her breasts when we rested at the edge of the field.
旱季里开荒时，到处是热风，身上没有汗，可是肌肉干疼。	When we cultivated the wilderness in the dry season, hot air was all around. We didn't sweat at all, but our muscles felt dry and painful.
最热时，只能躺在树下睡觉。 枕着竹筒，睡在棕皮蓑衣上。	On the hottest days, we could only sleep under a tree, with heads pillowed on bamboo stalks and bodies lying on palmbark rain capes.
我奇怪为什么没人让我交待蓑衣的事。 那是农场的劳保用品，非常贵。	I wondered why nobody asked me to confess about the palm-bark rain cape, one of the labor-protection supplies for our farm, and very expensive.
我带进山两件，一件是我的，一件是从别人门口顺手拿来的。	I brought two along; one was mine, the other one I picked up conveniently from someone's doorway.
一件也没拿回来。	I returned neither of them to the farm.
一直到我离开云南，也没人让我交还蓑衣。	Even when I left Yunnan, no one asked me to return the palm-bark rain capes.
我们在地头休息时，陈清扬拿斗笠盖住脸，敞开衬衣的领口，马上就睡着了。	During our break at the edge of the field, Chen Qingyang covered her face with a bamboo hat, opened her shirt collar, and immediately fell asleep.
我把手伸进去，有很优美的浑圆的感觉。	I reached in, feeling the beautiful curves.
后来我把扣子又解开几个，看见她的皮肤是浅红色。	After a while, I unbuttoned a few more buttons, seeing that her skin was pink.
虽然她总穿着衣服干活，可是阳光透过了薄薄的布料。	Even though she always worked with her clothes on, the sunshine still got through the thin fabric.
至于我，总是光膀子，已经黑得像鬼一样。	As for me, working bare to the waist, I had turned as black as a devil.
陈清扬的乳房是很结实的两块，躺着的时候给人这样的感觉。	Chen Qingyang's breasts were two firm scoops, even when she lay back.
但是其它地方很纤细。	But the other parts of her body were very slender.
过了二十多年，大模样没怎么变，只是乳头变得有点大，有点黑。	She hadn't changed much in twenty years, except that her nipples had grown a little bit bigger and darker.
她说这是女儿做的孽。	She said the culprit was her daughter.
那孩子刚出世，像个粉红色的小猪，闭着眼一口叼住她那个地方狠命地吃，一直把她吃成个老太太，自己却长成个漂亮大姑娘，和她当年一样。	When the child was a newborn, she looked like a pink baby pig. With eyes closed, she swooped down on her mother's nipples sucking with all her might, until her mother became an old woman and she a beautiful young woman, a young version of her mother.
年纪大了，陈清扬变得有点敏感。	An older woman now, Chen Qingyang had become more sensitive.
我和她在饭店里重温旧情，说到这类话题，她就有恐慌之感。	When we relived our old days in the hotel, she seemed nervous about such subjects.
当年不是这样。	She hadn't been that way before.
那时候在交待材料里写到她的乳房，我还有点犹豫。 她说，就这么写。	Back when I hesitated to mention her breasts in the confessions, she said, Just write it down.
我说，这样你就暴露了。	I said, You'd be exposed then.
她说，暴露就暴露，我不怕！	She said, Let me be exposed. I don't care.
她还说是自然长成这样，又不是她捣了鬼。	She also said her breasts were made this way. It wasn't like she had done something to fake them.
至于别人听说了有什么想法，不是她的问题。	As for what other people thought when they heard about them, it wasn't her problem.
过了这么多年我才发现，陈清扬是我的前妻哩。	After all those years, I just discovered that Chen Qingyang was actually my ex-wife.
交待完问题人家叫我们结婚。	After we finished our confessions, they wanted us to get married.
我觉得没什么必要了。	I thought it was unnecessary.
可是领导上说，不结婚影响太坏，非叫去登记不可。	But the leaders said that not getting married would have a very bad influence and insisted that we register.
上午登记结婚，下午离婚。	So we registered to get married in the morning and divorced in the afternoon.
我以为不算呢。	I thought it hadn't counted.
乱秧秧的，人家忘了把发的结婚证要回去。 结果陈清扬留了一张。	In the confusion they forgot to take our marriage certificate back, and so Chen Qingyang kept one for herself.
我们拿这二十年前发的破纸头登记了一间双人房。	We used this shabby certificate issued to us twenty years ago to get a double room.
要是没有这东西，就不许住在一间房子里。	Without this, we wouldn't be allowed to stay in the same room.
二十年前不这样。	It was different twenty years ago.
二十年前他们让我们住在一间房子里写交待材料，当时也没这个东西。	Twenty years ago they let us stay in the same hotel room to write our confessions, and back then we didn't even have the marriage certificate.
我写了我们住在后山上的事。	I wrote about what we had done on the back slope.
团领导要人保组的人带话说，枝节问题不要讲太多，交待下一个案子罢。	But the regional leaders asked the security comrades to pass on a message to me, saying that I could skip over the irrelevant details. Just move on to the next case.
听了这话，我发了犟驴脾气：妈妈的，这是案子吗？	Hearing this, I lost my stubborn-as-amule temper: The motherfuckers! Is this a case?
陈清扬开导我说：这世界上有多少人，每天要干多少这种事，又有几个有资格成为案子。	Chen Qingyang tried to help me understand: How many people are there in the world? How many times do people do it every day? And how many of them are important enough to be called cases?
我说其实这都是案子，只不过领导上查不过来。	I said actually they were all cases. It was just that the leaders couldn't check on them all.
她说既然如此，你就交待罢。	She said, Well then, just confess.
所以我交待道：那天夜里，我们离开了后山，向做案现场进发。	So I confessed: That night, we left the back slope and returned to the scene of the crime.