The Three-Body Problem

As soon as she climbed onto that small hillock, she saw the forest again. Because the trees had grown, it now seemed far denser, but Ye noticed that the forest had once been much bigger. Newer parts that had grown in the past few years had already been cut.

The logging was in full swing. In every direction, trees were falling. The entire forest seemed like a mulberry leaf being devoured by silkworms on all sides. At the current rate, it would disappear soon. The workers doing the logging came from two nearby villages. Using axes and saws, they cut down those barely grown trees one by one, and then dragged them off the hill using tractors and ox carts. There were many loggers, and fights frequently erupted among them.

The fall of each small tree didn’t make much sound, and there was no loud buzzing from chain saws, but the almost-familiar scene made Ye’s chest tighten.

Someone called out to her—that production team leader, now the village chief. He recognized Ye. When she asked him why they were cutting down the forest, he said, “This forest isn’t protected by law.”

“How can that be? The Forestry Law has just been promulgated.”

“But who ever gave Bethune permission to plant trees here? A foreigner coming here to plant trees without approval would not be protected by any law.”

“You can’t think that way. He was planting on the barren hills and didn’t take up any arable land. Also, back when he started, you didn’t object.”

“That’s true. The county actually gave him an award for planting the trees. The villagers originally planned to cut down the forest in a few more years—it’s best to wait until the pig is fat before slaughtering it, am I right? But those people from Nange Village can’t wait any longer, and if my village doesn’t join in, we won’t get any.”

“You must stop immediately. I will go to the government to report this!”

“There’s no need.” The village chief lit a cigarette and pointed to a truck loading the cut trees in the distance. “See that? That’s from the deputy secretary of the County Forestry Bureau. And there are also people here from the town police department. They’ve carried off more trees than anyone else! I told you, these trees have no status and aren’t protected. You’ll never find anyone who cares. Also, comrade, aren’t you a college professor? What does this have to do with you?”

The adobe hut looked the same, but Evans wasn’t inside. Ye found him in the woods holding an ax and carefully pruning a tree. He had obviously been at it for a while, his posture full of exhaustion.

“I don’t care if this is meaningless. I can’t stop. If I stop I’ll fall apart.” Evans cut down a crooked branch with a practiced swing.

“Let’s go together to the county government. If they won’t do anything, we’ll go up to the provincial government. Someone will stop them.” Ye looked at Evans with concern.

Evans stopped and stared at Ye in surprise. Light from the setting sun slanted through the trees and made his eyes sparkle. “Ye, do you really think I’m doing this because of this forest?” He laughed and shook his head, then dropped the ax. He sat down, his back against a tree. “If I want to stop them, it’d be easy. I just returned from America. My father died two months ago, and I inherited most of his money. My brother and sister only got five million each. This wasn’t what I expected at all. Maybe in his heart, he still respected me. Or maybe he respected my ideals. Not including fixed assets, do you know how much money I have at my disposal? About four point five billion dollars. I could easily ask them to stop and get them to plant more trees. I could make all the loess hills within sight be covered by quick-growth forest. But what would be the point?

“Everything you see before you is the result of poverty. But how are things any better in the wealthy countries? They protect their own environments, but then shift the heavily polluting industries to the poorer nations. You probably know that the American government just refused to sign the Kyoto Protocol.… The entire human race is the same. As long as civilization continues to develop, the swallows I want to save and all the other swallows will go extinct. It’s just a matter of time.”

Ye sat silently, gazing at the rays of light cast among the trees by the setting sun, listening to the noise from the loggers. Her thoughts returned to twenty years ago, to the forests of the Greater Khingan Mountains, where she had once had a similar conversation with another man.

“Do you know why I came here?” Evans continued. “The seeds of Pan-Species Communism had sprouted long ago in the ancient East.”

“You’re thinking of Buddhism?”

“Yes. The focus of Christianity is Man. Even though all the species were placed into Noah’s Ark, other species were never given the same status as humans. But Buddhism is focused on saving all life. That was why I came to the East. But … it’s obvious now that everywhere is the same.”

“Yes, that’s true. Everywhere, people are the same.”