Beating People

ON THE BOND, I saw a policeman beating someone for no reason save his own momentary whim. The person being beaten was a fifteen- or sixteenyear-old boy, neatly attired in a padded cotton robe and vest, with a sash around his waist. I could not see very clearly what the policeman was using to beat him, but it looked like the knotted rope attached to the end of his baton. There was a whistling sound as he bore down, striking again and again until the boy was forced back against a wall. The boy certainly could have tried to make a run for it, but he did not run, gazing instead at the policeman with a furrowed brow and squinty eyes, like a peasant in the fields who cannot quite force open his eyes against the glare of the sun. There was something like a little smile on his face. Everything had happened much too suddenly. Often, people without any acting experience cannot adjust their expressions with the necessary quickness and dexterity.
I almost never have feelings of righteous indignation. If I do not want to see something, I have a talent for not seeing it. This time, though, I kept turning back to look, with a suffocating feeling in my chest, and, with each blow, my heart seemed to recoil. When the policeman was done beating the boy, he strode in my direction, and I fixed him with a fierce and cutting stare, hoping that looks could kill and that I would be able thereby to give adequate expression to my contempt and fury, my utter abhorrence for such a leprous character. But what he noticed was only that someone had taken notice of him, and, with an exultant air, he adjusted the leather belt cinched
 around his waist. He was a northerner with a long face and a full mouth, and not unattractive.
He swaggered over to the entrance to the public toilet and grabbed hold of a man with a destitute air in a long robe. He refrained from beating him immediately, preferring instead to glare menacingly as he brandished his baton in one hand. Despite his surprise and fear, the man was still able to crack a joke: "Is it because I was going to take a shit, sir?"
Perhaps it was because I've never undergone any proper ideological training that the notion of class warfare never once crossed my mind, even at a time like this. In the fury of the moment, all I wanted was to become a government official or the First Lady. That way, I could march over and slap the policeman across the face without so much as a by-your-leave.
If this story had taken place in the fictional world of the early Republican-period writer Li Hanqiu, a western missionary with justice on his side would have sallied forth at just this moment, or, better yet, the mistress of the police chief (who would inevitably be revealed as the bosom friend of the heroine and the hero's sweetheart from bygone days).' Once in a while, a touch of naiveté goes a long way, but that kind of systematic naiveté ultimately leaves a lot to be desired.
'Li Hanqiu (1873-1923) was known primarily for popular fiction in the Mandarin Ducks and Butterflies mode. The author of over thirty novels, his most widely read work is Guangling chao (The tides of Guangling).