17

The thunderstorms and gusty winds of summer were the greatest upset I had expected in bucolic Beidaihe. Instead, Mao turned against me in a sudden fit of anger. Fu Lianzhang was to blame.

Shortly after we returned to Beijing in July 1956, Fu Lianzhang had asked me to brief him on the Chairman's health. Fu's intrusive interest in Mao's well-being continued, and he had written Mao a letter that he wanted me to deliver. He wanted Mao to try a new barbiturate from West Germany called Phanodorm, and he wanted a team of physicians to give Mao a thorough physical examination.

I bridled at Fu's suggestions. Mao's insomnia had improved since I had changed his medication, and so long as he continued averaging six to eight hours of sleep a day, I saw no reason to experiment with new drugs. And Fu should have known better than anyone else that Mao would not take kindly to a physical exam. Fu himself had told me how angry Mao had been with the Soviet doctors who had examined him in 1951 and had cautioned me about how much he disliked physical exams.

I explained my objections to Fu.

Fu agreed not to raise the question of new sleeping pills, but he insisted I encourage Mao to have the exam. He had followed the Chairman since the 1930s, Fu said, and Mao had always trusted him. “Just tell him that I made the suggestion,” Fu said. He named two specialists in internal medicine at Peking Union Medical College who could administer the exam. I was about to reiterate my objections when he stopped me with an icy look. “Come on,” he said. “Cut the excuses. It's settled.”

Fu Lianzhang put me in a difficult position. Technically, he was still my superior, and I could not easily refuse his request. But I knew that Mao would resent Fu's suggestions and that I, as his messenger, would take the brunt of Mao's ire. I was reluctant to raise the issue.

Two days went by. Fu called to complain about my delay and urged me again to give the letter to Mao.

I could not refuse. I went to see Mao immediately.

The Chairman had just finished swimming and was sunbathing by the pool. “Why haven't you been swimming lately?” he wanted to know. “Doctors should watch out for their health.”

I changed into swimming trunks and went into the pool.

“Try for endurance. Don't worry about speed,” Mao coached me from the side.

“I still haven't mastered the Chairman's style of swimming,” I responded. “I need more practice.”

He motioned me closer so he could demonstrate his style. “You look very healthy,” he encouraged me.

This was my cue. “When we were in Wuhan,” I said, “the Chairman went swimming in the Yangtze River, two hours each time. The Chairman's heart and circulation are much better than average.”

“You are flattering me again,” he smiled.

“No, I'm telling the truth. Many people much younger than you cannot swim that long. One sailor swimming with us went into shock.”

“Why didn't I know about it then?”

“There were so many people around, and Comrade Wang Renzhong was afraid they would be upset if they found out.”

“It's nothing to get upset about,” Mao responded. “Everyone has a different constitution.”

“It would be a good idea for the Chairman to have a physical exam while he is still in excellent health,” I suggested. “This would give us a baseline for comparison later.” I did not mention Fu Lianzhang yet, not wanting Mao to accuse me of listening to Fu without taking responsibility myself.

Mao looked at me and shook his head. “That's just doctor talk,” he said. “When rural folk get sick, they do nothing. Even when they are seriously ill they often don't see a doctor. Medicine is good for curable diseases, not for incurable ones. Is your medicine really good for everything? Take cancer, for instance. Can a doctor cure cancer? I don't think so.”

I explained that cancer could be cured in its early stages if it had not metastasized. I argued for the benefits of surgery. “But without a checkup, cancer in its early stages cannot be detected,” I continued.

“Give me some examples,” Mao challenged.

Most of the top communist leaders were relatively young and healthy then. None of them could serve as an example. I mentioned a few cases where breast cancer had been successfully cured.

Mao smiled. I had just proved his point. “Breast cancer is just on the surface of the body,” he said. “It's relatively easy to detect and cure. What you should say is that some types of cancer can be cured with early detection. It isn't true for every type of cancer.” He paused. “Are you telling me you want me to have a physical checkup?”

“Vice-Minister Fu has written Chairman a letter,” I responded. “Please take a look.”

Mao read the letter. “That Fu Lianzhang,” he said, exasperated. “He just doesn't have anything else to do. I don't have time for a checkup now. Let's wait till we go to Beidaihe.”

We agreed that the doctors Fu had suggested would go to Beidaihe to administer the exam there.

Fu Lianzhang was delighted with the news. “Didn't I tell you?” he said. “I knew if you said the suggestion had come from me the Chairman would certainly agree.” Fu was out of touch with Mao. He had completely misunderstood.

Both Mao and Jiang Qing were scheduled for physical exams at Beidaihe. Doctors Zhang Xiaoqian and Deng Jiadong from Peking Union Medical College would examine Mao, and doctors Lin Qiaozhi and Yu Aifeng would examine Jiang Qing. Jiang Qing's examination was completed without delay, but the doctors scheduled to examine Mao waited for two weeks and still Mao's summons did not come. Mao was busy, and I hesitated to press him. Finally, Fu Lianzhang called me to complain. The doctors were needed in Beijing, he insisted. He wanted me to see that the exam was carried out.

It was a simple matter, I thought. Mao had already agreed to have the physical exam, and we needed only to set a convenient time. Trying to be casual, I raised the question with him during our English lesson the next day, explaining that the doctors had been waiting for a couple of weeks and inquiring about when he would have the checkup.

“Let them stay here and relax for a while,” Mao responded.

“What should I tell them?” I wanted to know.

“About what?” Mao asked.

“Aren't we talking about your checkup?” I inquired.

Mao turned sullen. “Who said I will have a checkup?”

“Didn't Chairman say before we left Beijing that he would have a checkup in Beidaihe?” I reminded him.

Suddenly, Mao lost his temper. “Can't I change my mind?” he yelled. “Even the decisions of the politburo—I can change those, too. That bastard Wang Dongxing must be behind all this. I will not have a checkup. Tell him to get out of here.”

I had no idea what had sent Mao into such a rage, nor did I know to whom he was referring when he said to get “him” out of here.

“It was Vice-Minister Fu Lianzhang who suggested the checkup, not Wang Dongxing,” I responded awkwardly.

“Then get the bastard Fu Lianzhang out of here, too,” Mao yelled.

“But he's not even here,” I muttered weakly. I assured Mao nonetheless that I would cancel the plans for his physical.

I was shaken. Mao had no reason to be angry with me. A physical exam was a perfectly natural thing for a doctor to suggest, and certainly I had meant no harm. If Mao had not wanted the physical, he could have declined it—politely.

“Chairman is not really upset with you,” Li Yinqiao tried to explain when I emerged from Mao's room. No conversation with Mao was private. Li Yinqiao and bodyguard Xiao Zhang had been listening at the door. “The politburo has met several times in the past couple of days, and there have been meetings with ministers in the State Council and with party secretaries from the provinces. Lots of issues are being discussed, and the Chairman has said some nasty things about his security arrangements. He thinks there are too many guards on his special train. He's complaining about some of the arrangements for his swim in the Yangtze. I'm not sure what's going on.”

So perhaps Mao was not really angry with me. Maybe he was angry with people in the party leadership and was taking it out on me.

“If the Chairman doesn't explain to you tomorrow, Jiang Qing will,” Li encouraged me. “Don't let this upset you. Don't even think about it.”

But all I could think about was Mao's outburst. I had seen him lose his temper and had watched his rudeness toward others, but this was the first time he had been furious with me or had used such crude language toward me. I was extremely upset. How could I work for such a difficult, unpredictable, and hot-tempered man? Suddenly the job seemed too difficult, too dangerous. I wanted to leave. I wanted to work in a hospital.

I returned to my room to reflect and began to blame myself. I knew Mao did not want a physical exam. He had not wanted one when I raised the subject in Beijing. I had had to persuade him. He agreed only to placate me, shut me up. Since I was still trying to stay away from politics, I knew little of his activities in Beidaihe. I had proposed the physical exam without knowing what else might be bothering him. How simpleminded I was!

Mao summoned me the next evening. He smiled as soon as I walked into his room. “It's not so easy to work for me, is it?” he said. I smiled too. “Getting upset is just one of my weapons,” he told me. “When they force me to do something I don't want to do, I get upset. Then I don't have to do it. I got upset so I wouldn't have to have the physical. Don't worry about my temper tantrum. I've always thought we should criticize both each other and ourselves. If I do anything wrong in the future, tell me. Just don't talk behind my back. What I don't like is people talking behind my back.”

“Chairman,” I responded. “I was impetuous to suggest a checkup.”

“I have lots to do in Beidaihe,” Mao explained. He said that the Eighth Congress of the Chinese Communist party would be convened in a few weeks, and he was busy preparing. He did not have time for a checkup. “Tell the doctors I'm too busy,” he said. “We'll have the checkup later.” He paused. Then he continued soothingly. “Take good care of the doctors. If they like, they can stay here a while longer. Dr. Zhang Xiaoqian is a fellow Hunanese. Maybe I'll have a chat with him.”

I still knew little about the political situation, but I knew then that the Chairman was angry with someone besides me.

Mao became conciliatory after that. His confidence in me seemed to return. We met every day to study English, and often when he was unable to sleep he called me in for late-night chats. He talked mostly about his disaffection with the Soviet Union and the need for China to learn from the West. He worried about China's cultural stagnation and thought Western ideas would reinvigorate China. He wanted to borrow from the West without becoming subordinate to it, to create something new that was neither Chinese nor Western but a hybrid. When I pointed out the vast differences between the two cultures, he accused me of being unimaginative, lacking the spirit of adventure. It was the same accusation he was making against the party leaders.

It was around this time, in the late summer of 1956, that Mao first told me he was planning to resign as chairman of the republic. I did not believe him. I had yet to understand that Mao never engaged in idle talk. Sometimes it was months or years before I fully understood the importance of our conversations, and he often used them to help think things through. His intention to resign was still a secret when he first told me, though it was under discussion among the top party leadership. Only three years later, in 1959, did the resignation become public and take effect. Mao's health and his desire to retreat to the “second line,” where he could focus on important matters and be free from petty detail, were offered as reasons. The truth was somewhat more complex.

Mao's health was one factor. He never slept well before the Tiananmen celebrations and sometimes did not sleep at all, so often after the ceremony he would catch colds, which would sometimes linger and become bronchitis. Mao did not like wasting time being sick.

Mao's dislike of formality was another factor in his resignation. The position of chief of state was ceremonial, and he hated to dress up. Accepting credentials from foreign ambassadors and meeting with them on state occasions was a waste of time. By 1956, even the luster of the Tiananmen celebrations had worn thin.

But I later understood that Mao's resignation was also a political tactic to test the loyalty of other ranking party leaders—especially men like Liu Shaoqi and Deng Xiaoping—of whom he was already suspicious. Khrushchev's speech attacking Stalin had put Mao on the defensive, and the response of Chinese party leaders—their initial support of Khrushchev, their affirmation of the need for collective leadership, and their criticisms of Mao's adventurism—had called their loyalty into question. By letting his intention to resign circulate secretly within the party, Mao was offering the party leadership a chance to prove its loyalty by begging him to stay on. When they did not, he devised other means to retain his power. By withdrawing from the battle, leaving Beijing for his long trip south early in the summer, Mao could observe the political maneuverings from afar. He had no intention of relinquishing power. In fact, he wanted more power rather than less. If he wanted to rid himself of petty detail it was only to ensure the supremacy of his rule and to devote himself to the more important matter of transforming China.

In his test of the party leadership, Mao did not have long to wait. The Eighth Party Congress, convened in September 1956, confirmed Mao's worst suspicions of both Liu Shaoqi and Deng Xiaoping.