Chapter 44 Twenty-two, the death of Guo Shiying

It was a Sunday, and I went to Guo's house at night, but the guard said Guo Shiying was not at home and wouldn't let me in.This is very abnormal. In the past, regardless of whether Shiying was at home or not, the guards would let me through.I had no choice but to ask Guo Shuying, the guard called, and Guo Shuying came out and took me in.As soon as I arrived at the inner courtyard, I found that the whole family was in a state of bewilderment and panic.Two days ago, that is, on Friday, Shiying was detained by the gang from the Agricultural University.He made a quick trip back that day, taking letters from his friends, and was seen only by the guards.Afterwards, a group of people from the Agricultural University rushed in aggressively, demanded people from Mr. Guo and Yu Liqun, and then rushed away.They went straight to the middle school where Xiao Xiao attended. She was in the school that day, and the concierge told her that Guo Shiying had been there before and was stopped by students from the Agricultural University at the school gate.This is all that is known.Xiao Xiao seemed to know more inside information, but she remained silent.When I left, she followed me and called me to a halt.Under the dark eaves, she asked me if I knew Cao Qiuchi's address, which made me feel that Cao had something to do with what happened.I anxiously asked her why Mr. Guo didn't show up. She said that Mr. Guo had just written a letter to Premier Zhou.

Early the next morning, I rushed to the Agricultural University and wandered aimlessly around the campus, trying in vain to hear about Shiying.I called Guo's house and dialed the number again and again, but the receiver always received a sharp busy signal.I stood in front of his house and rang the bell, and the small window on the vermilion gate opened, revealing the expressionless face of the doorman, who shook his head and closed the small window again.I ran around all day and found nothing.In the evening, I dragged Xiaozao to Lin Mingshu's home. Aunt Lin opened the door, looked at me with dazed eyes, and said, "Guo Shiying committed suicide!" I sat paralyzed on the bed, my mind went blank, and weeping endlessly. .

Guo Shiying died on April 22, 1968 at the age of twenty-six.This time the Agricultural University student took action against him. It is said that the direct cause was that he used English when he called Xiao Xiao, and his classmates overheard him, accusing him of having a foreign connection.He must have escaped from the school immediately and planned to take Xiao Xiaoyuan away, but was unfortunately caught.While in custody, he also tried to escape and hid on top of a partition in a toilet in the corridor, only to be discovered, leading to even more brutal abuse.The tragedy happened in the early morning of this day. He fell from the window of the room on the fourth floor of the student dormitory that was used as a prison cell.After the incident, the thugs informed Guo Lao's secretary that Guo Shiying had committed suicide by the people, and the secretary took Pingying and Xiao Xiao to the school to deal with the funeral.The corpses they saw were covered in bruises, with flesh and blood ripped from the strangle marks on the wrists and ankles.The body was cremated the next day. After hearing the news, Lin Mingshu and I rushed to the crematorium. On the way, we learned that the cremation had ended and we were unable to see each other for the last time.

Whether Shiying committed suicide or homicide has become an eternal mystery.The only testimony about the truth of the matter comes from the murderer. It is said that Shiying asked the classmate who was acting as a guard for water. When the guard came back, he had jumped off the building.This was an almost impossible and difficult action, because the screen window was closed at that time, and the position of the latch was quite high. It was no easy task to reach the latch with a paralyzed hand tied behind the back for many days, let alone in a short period of time. Unplugged it.In terms of motivation, Shiying also did not want to die, as evidenced by his attempt to escape.Before escaping, he left behind a suicide note, with Dou Da’s characters written on two pieces of thin paper, to the effect that he wanted to join the unprecedented Cultural Revolution, but it was impossible. In this case, he might as well die.Of course, this was just a cover-up to escape, but maybe it was this failed trick that murdered him. With extremely strong self-esteem, he would never make the enemy a laughing stock, so he fulfilled the lie with his life.Therefore, the motive for suicide is not completely unfounded.The only thing that is certain is that he died when he did not want to die.After the incident, I went to the Agricultural University with Pingying, Xiao Xiao, and Xiaozao to find a classmate in Shiying's class and ask him about the situation on the day of the incident.That classmate had been to Guo's house once, and was perhaps the only sympathizer for Guo in the class.He said that in the early morning of that day, he wandered in the open space, looked upstairs, and saw Guo Shiying's motionless figure imprinted in the dimly lit window from a distance.At the last moment, Shiying stared at the world outside the window for a long time through the screen window. He must have been thinking a lot, but we will never know what he was thinking.

Lin Mingshu and I went to Guo's house again on the third day after the tragedy happened.Yu Liqun was crying all the time, shouting some unintelligible words while crying.Seeing us, she burst into tears, and I heard her say intermittently: "I'm sorry for you, Shiying is just you two good friends, why are friends together like a reactionary clique, they are the real anti-Mao Zedong Thought..." Then she Swear a bunch of foul words.At this time Jianying walked into the living room and called me to a small room next door.The light in the room was dim, and I sat in a daze, while he was fiddling with the camera, aiming at me and pressing the shutter. "I'll do an experiment, Gate B, without a tripod." The fifteen-year-old boy bit his lip, making a resolute look.Through the window, I saw Mr. Guo alone in the yard, bent over, cutting homemade soap with butter.I went out to help him hold the enamel dish with the soap, and he nodded silently to me.Shiying's bedroom is still the same as before. I saw two thick volumes of Ehrenburg's "The Tempest" on the bookshelf, sandwiched between other books, which he borrowed from me a week before his death.Of course, I left everything as it was, until some day an extraneous hand came and disturbed them.In the evening, I went to the living room to say goodbye to Yu Liqun. She was still crying, and Pingying squatted beside her, beating her mother's back while raising her face and looking at me sadly.Walking down the street, Lin Mingshu and I were silent.After walking side by side for a while, he suddenly yelled: "This guy is really despicable, he has made us suffer so much!"

During Shiying's detention, Mr. Guo had a chance to meet Zhou Enlai, and planned to tell Zhou about it in advance.If he had said so, and Zhou himself had intervened, Shiying might have been able to be saved.However, Guo Lao saw that the Prime Minister was so busy and tired, so he didn't have the heart to say that he was blamed by Yu Liqun for being emotional after returning home.At that time, Mr. Guo said in a trembling voice: "I am also for the good of China..." and couldn't continue.It is conceivable how guilty the old man felt when Shiying's death ensued.He is very fond of Shiying, who is bright and lively. In order to sustenance and relieve his grief, for several months, he sat at the desk every day, copied Shiying's diary and family letters during the farm period with a brush, and bound them into eight volumes. Neatly placed on the window sill at the head of his bed.Hearing Xiao Xiaoping and Pingying talk about these situations, I couldn't help feeling sad.

I have never been able to accept the fact that Shiying is dead, and dreamed of him countless times.Whenever I dreamed of him, he was still alive, so I said to myself that he was still alive, but as soon as I thought about it, I saw at once that he was dead.Thirty years later, I still have this dream.In this life, the person I dream of the most is Shiying. In June 1980, when I was a postgraduate student, the National Agricultural University task force sent a decision to rehabilitate Guo Shiying to my unit. The political officer in the department read the full text to me. Very well, the original Cultural Revolution group at the Agricultural University knew that the Prime Minister personally dealt with Guo's problem, but they still held on to him and brutally persecuted him.After Guo's death, the Prime Minister pointed out: "The spearhead was pointed at me." Guo died unjustly due to persecution, and all slanderous and false statements such as the so-called current counter-revolutionary were overthrown.The political officer said that the department would clean up the relevant files for me.All I feel is sorrow for this belated justice.