The Bone Hunters by Robert J. Mrazek

Wei remained undeterred. By then, she had acquired an inner strength to see her through any and every trial. It came down to one simple word.
    Faith.
    The holy man had arrived one night at her door in the midst of a fierce rainstorm.
    â€œI seek shelter, Shou Yu,” he said when she opened the door.
    â€œHow do you know my real name?” she asked. “Wei is my stage name.”
    â€œI know all about you, Little Jewel,” he replied. “I have journeyed far to come to this place.”
    In manner and dress, he looked like nothing more than a common beggar, wrinkled with age and dressed in a simple wool robe drawn at the waist by a sheep’s wool strap and black cotton slippers. His smiling face reminded her of an ancient monkey. Moved by his plight, sheinvited him to stay for the night, making him comfortable on her spare sleeping pallet in front of the fire. In the morning she asked if he had eaten recently, and he responded, “Not for a few days.”
    He ate like a ravenous bird, consuming four poached eggs with steamed corn bread and peanut milk. The holy man remained with her for a month, slowly rebuilding his strength. Each evening he would talk to her about his own life journey from the westernmost province of China, where he once fought alongside Mao Tse Tung against the Japanese invaders, but now devoted his life to sharing the word of the Ancient One.
    â€œI can see that you are eager to learn, Little Jewel,” he said, “and I will do my best to teach you.”
    He had come with a message, he said, and he wanted to share it with her. It was a message of hope along with the promise of eternal life and inner peace. The Son of the Universe had descended from heaven to save the entire Chinese race, he said. He had come to her because she had been chosen to play a special role in leading her people. She was set aside to serve.
    During the days and nights he stayed with her, he told her about the discovery of the bones of the Ancient One in 1926. He was the original man, he assured her, the Son of the Universe who taught the earliest Chinese people to live in accordance with the highest qualities of the universe—truthfulness, compassion, forbearance, labor, and love. Through the Ancient One, there was a chance for every man and woman to join in that spiritual journey.
    It all suddenly made sense to her. The meaning of life itself and her place in the great firmament, simply butmagically told. A week later, Wei asked the elders to introduce the holy man to the entire village.
    When he spoke to them that night bathed in the gentle glow of the oil lamps, the holy man’s words about the Ancient One’s power to heal the sick and finding a path to eternal life seemed to resonate with them all. What other hope did they have to survive the disaster looming in front of them, their drinking water poisoned, their babies dying, their crops withering in the sun? By the time the holy man had moved on a few weeks later, all but a handful of the villagers had embraced his truth.
    They would need allies, Wei decided, and she began trying to rally the farmers in the nearby villages to their cause. By then she had taken to wearing the same simple garb as the holy man. Her proselytizing of the faith began to find converts around the countryside. Many came to meet her and listen to the message of truth. A roving reporter at the provincial newspaper even wrote a story about her.
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    Zhou Shen Wui gazed out at the sun-splashed provincial countryside as it flashed past the bulletproof windows of the pressurized railroad car. With the train traveling at more than two hundred fifty miles an hour, the distant panorama sped past in lush copper brushstrokes. Whenever his eyes would lock on something closer to the train, the fleeting image of a horse or a tractor would disappear a millisecond later.
    Li Shen Wui bowed at the entrance to the dining compartment