underground casino in the next village
Hu Qinghai had no money of his own, so he could only watch others gamble.
One of them won nearly 100 yuan in three hours, which made Hu Qinghai very envious.
While watching, he kept rubbing his hands together, thinking that if he had enough capital, he could have won just as much.
Ultimately, unable to resist the immense temptation of winning money, he decided to exchange the jade pendant at home for money and gamble it out himself.
He quietly returned home and went to Hu Qingquan's room.
Whether it was divine intervention or not, the jade pendant was lying on the blanket covering Hu Qingquan. He guessed that Hu Qingquan had fallen asleep while playing with the jade pendant that night.
After taking the jade pendant, he went back to his room.
It was already past midnight. He waited at home for two hours before setting off for the county town.
Because the black market in the county town had already started operating at this time, he could pawn the jade pendant on the black market, get money, and then go to the casino to have fun.
After walking for an hour, he arrived at the county's black market and pawned the jade pendant to a man who was blind in one eye. This man's usual nickname was One-Eyed Dragon, and One-Eyed Dragon gave him one hundred yuan.
If he can repay the 100 yuan within seven days, plus 7 yuan in interest, the jade pendant can be returned to him.
If the jade pendant is redeemed within seven or fifteen days, an interest of twenty yuan will be charged. However, the one-eyed dragon has the right to sell the jade pendant at any time. In other words, Hu Qinghai only has the opportunity to redeem the jade pendant at a high price if it has not been sold.
After receiving the money, Hu Qinghai was full of confidence, believing that he could win double or even several times the amount and then redeem the jade pendant. He thought that even if his family found out that he had stolen it, they would not blame him.
But now, fearing that his family would question him about the lost jade pendant if he went back, he decided not to go back for the time being, and to wait until he won some money before going back to tell them the good news.
He found a dilapidated house in a village on the outskirts of the county town and lay down to rest on the scattered thatch on the ground.
Mopantun Village, Hu Family
Early in the morning, Mr. and Mrs. Hu were awakened by Hu Qingquan's ghostly screams.
"Waaaaah, my jade pendant, where is my jade pendant? The jade pendant I used to marry my wife, the jade pendant is gone, and my wife is gone too. Waaaaah, my jade pendant, my wife."
When Mr. and Mrs. Hu heard their son looking for the jade pendant in the other room, they immediately realized something was wrong.
"What's wrong with my son? Could it be that his jade pendant is gone?"
"They probably can't find it now. He was still holding it when we went to sleep yesterday. Maybe we'll find it again in a little while."
The elderly couple lay down and dozed off for a while, but their son's anxious voices not only didn't stop, but actually grew louder.
"My jade pendant, my jade pendant! How can I marry Shen Zhiqing without my jade pendant?"
Their door was pushed open, and Hu Haiquan appeared in the doorway, his face contorted with worry.
"Father, Mother, do you know where my jade pendant is? I can't find it, what should I do? Shen Zhiqing came to our house today to look at the jade pendant. Now that it's gone, what can we show it to her?"
"I really can't find it!"
Hu's mother sat up abruptly, then realized she wasn't dressed and quickly lay back down.
"Qingquan, didn't you take it last night? How come it's gone after just one night? Did a thief break into our house?"
“Mother, I was holding that jade pendant in my hand when I went to sleep yesterday.”
"Could it have been dragged away by a rat?"
Hu Qingquan scratched his head. "Then I'll look around the house again. Maybe it really was a mouse that pooped into its hole."
With a "nothing to lose" attitude, he went back into the house and started rummaging through things again.
"Old man, let's get up quickly and help our son look for him."
"Okay, okay, get up now."
Hu Qingquan had already turned his kang (a heated brick bed) over once, because after listening to his parents, he went to dig out the rat holes in the house.
Their houses were all made of adobe, and the floors inside were just yellow earth, which made it very easy for rats to dig holes, so there were many rat holes.
Especially in the most remote and inconspicuous places, rats are rampant, digging holes large enough to fit an adult's fist.
Hu Qingquan was searching through the rat hole when his parents arrived and joined him in the search.
However, even after searching through all the rat holes in the house, they still couldn't find the jade pendant.
"We can't just dig up all these rat holes, can we? These holes are very deep. If we dig them up, we probably won't be able to save our house," Mrs. Hu said worriedly.
"Look around the kang again; perhaps Qingquan didn't look carefully enough earlier."
As a result, they searched Hu Haiquan's kang (a heated brick bed) three times and shook out the bedding several times, but they couldn't find the jade pendant, nor could they find it on the kang.
"What's going on? Could it be that a thief really broke into our house yesterday? The thief came in without making a sound, Qingquan, you really didn't hear anything?"
Hu Qingquan scratched his head: "Mother, I didn't hear anything. If I had heard something, I would have woken up naturally. Would I have let him take the jade pendant away?"
"That makes sense," Mrs. Hu pondered. "Are we really going to dig a mouse hole?"
She looked up at the dilapidated roof beams covered in cobwebs, and a voice in her heart said: "Don't dig, don't dig, if you dig, you'll have nowhere to live."
At this moment, Hu Qingquan came in with a shovel.
"Mom, let's dig around and see."
Hu's mother quickly stopped him: "Qingquan, stop digging. If we can't find the jade pendant, at worst we won't be able to find wives. But if we dig the house down, we won't even have a place to live."
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