The next evening, Old Wu arrived with men and materials.
Lamp oil, a full bowl, bought on credit from the village shop. Incense ash, scraped fresh from the shrine. The pine pyre had been rebuilt in the hollow behind the village, larger than before. Four able-bodied men waited outside the Chen house, their faces grim. Chen Dazhu crouched against the wall, chain-smoking, his hands trembling worse than his pipe.
He had not slept. Every time he closed his eyes, he saw Nian'an squatting beneath the old locust tree. He had held that boy as an infant. At Nian'an's one-month celebration, Chen Dazhu had brought two jin of brown sugar as a gift. Now they were asking him to carry that same child onto a pyre.
Xiulan stood in the doorway, Nian'an in her arms.
The boy was still asleep. His breathing was steady, his color normal. The new nail on his left pinky gleamed faintly pink in the daylight, tender as a bamboo shoot just peeled. The red thread still drifted from his nail bed, impossibly fine, pointing toward the old locust tree.
"Step aside." Old Wu's voice came from behind the crowd.
He wore the same faded gray robe, the black prayer beads clicking in his hand. Sunset carved his wrinkles into deep trenches. The beads were clearer now in daylight—each one curved, thin at the edges, thicker at the base. Exactly like human fingernails.
Xiulan did not move. She stared at Old Wu, her gaze traveling from his face to his left hand, to the string of beads.
"Ninety-eight beads," she said.
Old Wu's fingers paused on the beads. The pause was so brief no one else noticed. But Xiulan saw his eyelid twitch, saw something flicker in those murky eyes.
"Your prayer beads. Ninety-eight of them." Xiulan's voice was flat. "Each one is a child's nail. For fifty years, you have collected ninety-eight nails for her. Nian'an is the ninety-ninth."
The air in the courtyard froze. Chen Wangtian stood behind Xiulan, his fists clenched so tight his knuckles cracked.
Old Wu was silent for a long moment. "Who told you?"
"The madwoman. She said ninety-eight already. One more to go."
Old Wu's mouth twitched. "You believe a madwoman? She is insane."
"She is insane, but her words are true." Xiulan held Nian'an tighter. "Just as you are not insane, but what you have done is a hundred times more terrible."
Old Wu glanced at the horizon. The sun was now only a sliver above the ridge. "Lift the boy."
Two laborers stepped forward. Chen Dazhu did not move.
"Who dares?" Xiulan's voice was not loud, but every word struck like a nail. She looked at each person in turn. "You all have children. Today it is my son. Tomorrow it could be yours. Chen Dazhu, your daughter is four. Zhang Laosi, your son is six. Li Mancang, your grandson just turned three—"
"Enough!" Old Wu's voice cracked. The beads stopped moving, crushed together in his grip.
Xiulan looked at him, and the faintest smile touched her lips. "You are afraid. Afraid that if I finish speaking, they will refuse to carry the child for you. For fifty years, you have collected ninety-eight nails for the Nail Borrower. Every time, you did this—arrived with lamp oil and incense ash, convinced everyone with 'village rules,' lifted someone else's child onto the pyre, and burned them. Then you plucked the nail from the ashes and strung it onto your beads. Ninety-eight times."
Old Wu's face turned ashen. "You are right. Ninety-eight times. I have done this ninety-eight times."