Gu Family Estate Case: The Truth Fund
As the bronze doors of the courthouse slowly closed behind her, Ah Yu instinctively gripped Zhong Hua's wrist. The April wind swirled plane tree fluff across the steps. She had just removed the brace from her right arm, and the bruise under her sleeve still tinged with a bluish-purple—it was from when she was pushed and shoved by the remnants of the Gu family on the day of the press conference.
“The judgment states on page 17,” Zhong Hua’s voice, still hoarse from surgery but unusually clear, “that Gu Yanting’s illegally transferred overseas assets will be compensated proportionally to the victims of his work-related injuries over the past three years.” Her fingertips traced the edge of the document, where Ah Yu had drawn lines for her with a pen while she was in the ICU.
Ah Yu gazed at the reporters gathered across the street. The two men in their lenses looked as if they had just emerged from the smoke of battle: Zhong Hua's short hair hadn't even grown past his earlobes, and the scar on his left eyebrow gleamed pale pink in the sunlight; his own shirt sleeves were rolled up to his elbows, revealing the scrapes he'd sustained in the snow-covered mountains the previous week. The two men who had dragged each other across the brink of death in a mudslide three months ago now stood on the line between law and humanity, clutching a belated justice in their hands.
"The total is twenty-seven million." The lawyer's briefcase was placed on the stone table on the court steps, the metal clasp reflecting a blinding light. "After deducting the part that must be paid, there is still four million three hundred thousand left for you to use—Gu Yanting specifically stipulated in his will that this money should be used for 'things that can stop Zhong Hua from having nightmares'."
Zhong Hua suddenly lowered his head and laughed, the sound so loud it made his chest ache. Ah Yu remembered her worst nightmare in the ICU, her body covered in cold sweat as she grabbed his hand and cried out, "The fire is cold!" At that time, Gu Yanting's arson video was still locked in the lawyer's safe, and the whole world thought the man who perished in the fire was the culprit. It wasn't until an encrypted USB drive fell out of the international package Lin Wanqing sent from Paris that they saw the woman in red high heels in the blind spot of the surveillance cameras—Gu Yanting's secretary, who had used an accelerant to disguise the appearance of aging circuitry.
“I want to set up a fund,” Zhong Hua said, her fingers tapping lightly on the documents. “It’s specifically for those who are silenced by capital.” When she looked up, A Yu saw the light in her eyes, exactly the same as when she was taking pictures of the sunset in Montmartre last year. Back then, she had just escaped the media storm surrounding the Gu family, and the sunset in her lens burned brighter than the flames at the arson site. But when she turned around, she also framed his shadow in the viewfinder.
In the first month of raising funds, the owner of the guesthouse where they had stayed during their recuperation in Tibet called. Zhuoma's voice carried the warmth of butter tea: "The red rope on the prayer wheel was broken by the wind, so I tied it back to be two zhang long for you." Ah Yu looked at the world map on the office wall, with dried lavender flowers sent by Lin Wanqing pasted on the location of Paris, and two intertwined red rope knots drawn next to the mark of Tibet.
“I need a name.” Zhong Hua spread her notebook on the table, which contained the names of twenty-seven victims. On the last page was a simple scale, with “Truth” written on the left and three little figures drawn on the right—she always liked to record important things in this childlike way. Ah Yu remembered the words in Gu Yanting’s suicide note: “Capital may rot, but the truth will always have weight.”
“Let’s call it the ‘Truth Foundation’.” He wrote this on a sticky note and stuck it next to Zhong Hua’s interview notebook. The edge of the sticky note perfectly overlapped with the scale line she had drawn, like an invisible talisman.
The launch ceremony was scheduled for the day the Gu's Building was auctioned. Zhong Hua wore an indigo dress that Lin Wanqing had sent from Africa, with a batik pattern on the hem depicting three figures holding hands. As Ah Yu stood behind her adjusting the microphone cord, she noticed that Zhong Hua still had a red string tied to her ankle under the hem of her dress, a string she had secretly tied beside the prayer wheel on the snow-capped mountain.
“The first request for help we received came from a retired firefighter.” Zhong Hua’s voice echoed across the square through the speakers. In the photo she held up, a man in a firefighter’s uniform was carrying a child as he rushed out of a fire. The background was the Gu’s warehouse, which had been burned down three years ago. “He was fired for refusing to give false testimony and now he has pneumoconiosis but cannot get a work injury assessment.”
A commotion suddenly arose in the crowd. Ah Yu turned her head and saw an old man in a faded suit, trembling as he held up a yellowed pay slip—it was the former factory director of Gu's Textile Factory, who, when security escorted him out of the press conference last year, had a petition signed by more than twenty workers in his pocket. At this moment, he squeezed to the front row and stuffed the crumpled piece of paper into Zhong Hua's hand. On it, written in red pen, was written: "I know that a white truck passed through the back door before the warehouse fire."
As the ceremony ended, Ah Yu's phone vibrated. Lin Wanqing sent a photo: under the starry sky of the African savanna, she shone a flashlight on a wooden sign with four crookedly carved Chinese characters that read "Truth Foundation." The caption was just one sentence: "You plant trees on earth, I water them in heaven."
He looked up at Zhong Hua, who was handing out registration forms to the victims who were queuing up. Sunlight filtered through her hair, casting dappled patterns on the forms. A little girl ran up to her with a crayon drawing. It depicted three little people holding hands under a rainbow, each with a cloud above their head—one with the word "Ah" written on it, one with the word "Zhong" written on it, and the other an airplane with the lingering sound of the word "Lin" on its tail.
“Among Gu Yanting’s inheritance, there is a batch of uncontaminated fabric.” Ayu walked to Zhong Hua’s side and showed her the photos on her phone. “Zhuoma said it can be sent to Tibet so that the herders can make tents.” Zhong Hua’s fingertip gently tapped the starry sky on the screen. The stars there were as bright as the green light dancing on an ICU monitor, like the sparks in the fireplace of their Provence guesthouse during the first snow, like all the light that finally pierced through the thorns of fate.
While organizing documents in the evening, Ah Yu found a line of small print on the last page of the foundation's articles of association. It was Zhong Hua's handwriting, written in pencil, almost illegible: "The so-called truth is not about making anyone atone for their sins, but about enabling the living to walk with their heads held high." The setting sun outside the window was falling on the ruins of the Gu's Building. Those glass curtain walls that once symbolized power were now shattered into gold leaf scattered on the ground, like a warm scab covering this land.
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