The New Dominion

The following is a serial translation of Abdurehim Ötkür’s 1985 historical novel Oyghanghan Zemin, Chapter One, pp. 20-24. New readers are encouraged to start from the beginning, Chapter One, Part One. This translation is presented for information and entertainment purposes only. It is also a work in progress — comments are welcome, especially on the (questionable) quality of the translation.

In Chapter One, Part Three, the progressive official Fan Yaonan succeeded in his plan to overthrow Yang Zengxin. We last left him and his party making their way to the General’s yamen…

3

The General’s yamen was not very far from the scene of the incident. Fan Yaonan forced his way into the Military Office, located in the yamen’s third hall. He retrieved Yang Zengxin’s name stamp, wrapped in yellow cloth, from its case, and abruptly called high-level officials to a meeting, sending messengers with the urgent news.

Chief of Bureaucratic Affairs Jin Shuren had left that ceremony with a craving for opium, lying down under the “shisha dome”. When he read the urgent news brought by a messenger, he was momentarily dumbfounded, then got up from the kang and began to pace back and forth. Previously, since he had, with his submissive and obedient nature, served his master, looking upon Yang Zengxin’s face and being seen warmly in his eyes, he had been moved from the Ambal of Ürümchi to his present position. “What must be done?” he found himself thinking feverishly.

At that moment, the son of that military officer who had eaten fire together with Yang Zengxin, Regiment Commander Du Gaoji, entered in a panic and asked Jin Shuren, invoking protection on the basis of their being of the same geographical extraction, for help in taking revenge on Fan Yaonan in the name of his father. Right behind him, another old compatriot of Fan Yaonan’s, the military officer Zhang Peiyuan, came in and said that he had mobilized an entire battalion of soldiers to punish Fan Yaonan. Just then, Jin Shuren, as though having located some new intelligence, became filled with energy and left the room in the manner of a commander-in-chief of all the forces gathered to exact General Yang’s revenge. Shortly, several hundred rabble soldiers came to action and surrounded Fan Yaonan’s party.

After an exchange of fire lasting more than an hour, Fan Yaonan, whose companions had all perished, desired to shoot himself, but, as all of the ammunition in every pair of Mausers was depleted, he came to be taken alive by his enemies.

The “victors” had tied him to a pillar, and they were forcing him to give the names of his collaborators. As for him, as though taking no notice of the continuously-striking whip, clubs, and hard fists, he held his head high and his lips tightly closed, saying nothing. Even his sparse moustache was pulled out. His entire body was drenched with blood. Again, he brought no one’s name to his tongue.

Finally, Jin Shuren burst in and began to pull off his flesh from his thin body, piece by piece, with pliers. At that moment, Fan Yaonan spat, hard, at Jin Shuren. A piece of flesh mixed with blood connected with Jin Shuren’s face. This was his chewed-off tongue. Du Guoji pulled out his sword and plucked out both of his eyes. After this, realizing the uselessness of interrogating him, Jin Shuren shot him dead by his own hand. Soldiers threw his body from the top of the yamen wall to the street. That night, a middle-aged woman who worked as a servant in Fan Yaonan’s house and that yellow-bearded carriage driver found a carriage and took his body away to a cemetery in Liudaowan.

Hence, two great characters on Xinjiang’s political stage disappeared in the one same day. Headmaster Zhang Zhongshi had met with tragedy in that firefight. The official who had given the general’s seal to Fan Yaonan was likewise shot dead that day.

The next day (the Eighth of July), notice papers, impressed with the great four-cornered red stamp, were stuck up at every bend in Ürümchi’s roads. These notices were written in Chinese and Uyghur, and Jin Shuren had declared himself the Xinjiang government’s provisional Chairman and commander. That night, martial law was declared in the city, and arrests began. Among the arrested were the young man called Yunusbäg and that yellow-bearded carriage driver.

The carriage driver was interrogated that very night. An officer, fat like a wineskin, with uncreased eyelids, questioned him with the help of a mouse-moustached man with hands and feet fine like those of a mantis.

“Who sent you to bury the body of the rebel Fan Yaonan?”

“I went under my own volition.”

“What do you mean, you went under your own volition? Hadn’t you heard that he had shot General Yang?”

“I had heard,” said the carriage driver, clanging the shackles on his feet.

“Then, why did you show favor to that rebel, why do you mourn for him?”

“Mr. Fan was a dishonest, but also a compassionate and gentle man. For so many years I have driven for him, and he never one gave me grief.”

“Save your words. Recently, whose houses did he go to?”

“I don’t remember!”

“Speak kindly. Whose houses did he go to?”

“Whose do I remember? Wherever he said to go, I would drive him there in my carriage.”

“In that case, it seems we will have to cure your forgetful disease,” said the interrogator, jumping to his feet.

Four soldiers with their sleeves rolled up to their shoulders burst in like bullets and stripped the carriage driver.

>> Read Chapter 2, Part 1…