狗腿子 (gǒutuǐzi): henchman

Strongly pejorative — calling someone a 狗腿子 is a serious insult. Common in older socialist-era literature and revolutionary films to describe collaborators of landlords, Japanese occupiers, or warlords. Modern speech still uses it for "toady / yes-man / bully's sidekick."

memory

Literally "dog's leg + 子 (noun suffix)." The image: a leg attached to a dog (i.e. you're not the master, you're just a limb the master orders around). Compares to English "lapdog" or "flunky."

culture

Iconic in revolutionary-era Chinese fiction — landlords (地主) and their 狗腿子 are stock villains in the 白毛女 (The White-Haired Girl) tradition of class-struggle narrative.