Mr. Chiu and his bride were having lunch in the square before Muji Train Station.
The opening line effectively misdirects the reader from the narrative to follow. In point of fact, Mrs. Chiu—who is only ever referred to as his bride and not by name—is effectively marginalized as being important to the story only in a negative aspect. She is important not so much for what she does, but for what she fails to do and the fact that she is Mr. Chiu’s wife is essentially meaningless.
During the two weeks' vacation, he had been worried about his liver because three months ago he had suffered from acute hepatitis; he was afraid he might have a relapse.
This line is of far greater import. The information about the serious health issue Mr. Chiu is facing is appropriately understated as foreshadowing while it also quickly points out what will become a recurring theme: Mr. Chiu is far more concerned with things extraneous to his marriage than to the marriage itself.
As they were talking, the stout policeman at the next table stood up and threw a bowl of tea in their direction. Both Mr. Chiu's and his bride's sandals were wet instantly.
In the world of literary analysis, the description of events delineated here is the turning point. Whatever else may have mattered to this couple up to this moment is now in the past. Everything that happens from the moment in which the policemen throws tea toward them will now become the defining moment of their lives and everything that occurred before this moment will be judged in relation to the succeeding events radiating outward from this point in time.
“I'm a scholar, a philosopher, and an expert in dialectical materialism.”
Mr. Chiu, in other words, is an ideal representative of the communist state of China. He is not just educated, but especially educated in the ideological theory which is the philosophical underpinning communism. If anyone should be protected against the abuses of the authoritarian legal system of the state, it would likely be someone like Mr. Chiu. But within this complaint lies a greater truth: Mr. Chiu lives within the sphere of theory. Totalitarian rule is never mentioned once by Karl Marx as a necessity to implementing the dialectical materialist theories which is profession of innocence imply. Mr. Chiu is about to meet the ugly truth behind what happens when pure theory is stripped of its beauty by those with an agenda applied to concrete practice.
More amazing now, he felt he didn't miss his bride a lot. He even enjoyed sleeping alone, perhaps because the honeymoon had tired him out and he needed more rest.
The misdirection of the opening rears its ugly head. What at first seemed like it might be a story about a newly wedded couple very quick is revealed to be a story in which at least one half of that union may as well not even have bothered with the ceremony. This musing of Mr. Chiu while imprisoned still might, however, turn out to have a happy ending in which the young wife comes to rescue at the end. Don’t hold your breath, however.
If he were able to, he would have razed the entire police station and eliminated all their families. Though he knew he could do nothing like that, he made up his mind to do something.
Mr. Chiu has finally consented to sign a confession of his crimes that he still insists he never committed. He made this concession on the promise that in doing so not only would he be immediately released, but a young legal student sent to help with his case who had instead been arrested and tortured would also instantly be freed. The torture Mr. Chiu suffered was more psychological than that of the younger man, but clearly had a far more deleterious effect. The Mr. Chiu who leaves prison is profoundly and irrevocably changed man. He retains enough of his former self to recognize he will never be the man capable of carrying out his dreams of vengeance, but revenge he will have in a way that pays off the understated first references to illness in a way few readers likely ever saw coming.
