Chapter 116: Mrs. Zhang steals things
Cheng Wanwan's house is always lively.
In the backyard, five men were washing and cleaning the ice jelly, while three old women were helping to filter it.
A large pot was set up in the front yard, and villagers came continuously to boil lantana, chatting in groups of three or five.
Just then, seven or eight more women came in. Big Black and Little Black rushed over, sniffed around, and when they smelled the familiar scent, they relaxed their guard and ran around in the yard.
“Auntie Dashan, we’ve come to ask you something. How long will your Cheng family’s nephew stay in Dahe Village this time?”
Cheng Wanwan put down her work and said with a smile, "I can't say for sure about this either."
She originally planned for Cheng Zhao to stay with her for two years, until the money was paid off, before he left.
But now that she has spent time with Cheng Zhao, she knows what kind of person he is, and she doesn't want to ruin his bright future because of her own selfish desires.
If he can get through to the county magistrate, Cheng Zhao should be able to participate in next year's provincial examination. So he should start preparing for the provincial examination now.
She secretly wanted to keep Cheng Zhao for another month, so that he could at least teach the children to be more knowledgeable and make things easier for her in the future.
She paused for a moment and then said, "I should be able to stay for another month or so."
“A month is just right. Can I send my son here to learn to read with Si Dan and the others? He can’t live his whole life without even knowing his own name.”
“Cheng Zhao is a scholar. If my son can spend more time with him, he will definitely become a refined person in the future.”
"I dare not ask for anything else, I just hope to learn more characters so that I can be worthy of my ancestors."
Cheng Wanwan had previously mentioned the literacy class to Cheng Zhao. It was essentially a modern literacy class, focusing solely on teaching basic characters.
Modern literacy classes can be attended by people of all ages and genders. Students learn for one hour a day and can graduate in about two months. Literacy teaches students to recognize characters and, most importantly, broadens their horizons.
For so many years, Dahe Village has not produced a single scholar. If it can start from this generation, there will surely be a generation that can get an education and leave the village.
Cheng Zhao's success in controlling locusts gave him a chance to change his fate. Therefore, Cheng Zhao should indeed give the people of Dahe Village, generation after generation, a chance to study and go out into the world.
Cheng Wanwan casually asked around, and seven or eight women were willing to send their children to study. After the news spread, more women came over. In total, more than twenty households signed up, and a total of twenty-nine children were sent by their families to study and learn to read.
Although the autumn harvest is imminent, these teenagers don't have much strength. Rather than expecting them to harvest in the fields, it would be better to let them learn more characters from the scholars, which would be a great honor for the family.
As for the tuition fee, the villagers unanimously decided that after the autumn harvest, they would send at least ten kilograms of rice over.
Nowadays, the price of a pound of rice has soared to at least thirty coins, and ten pounds would cost three hundred coins, which is a huge sum of money for farming families.
When Cheng Zhao came back that evening, Cheng Wanwan told him about it.
Cheng Zhao naturally agreed. Teaching one person is the same as teaching twenty-nine people, but it would take time to create some sand table models.
Cheng Wanwan then asked about things in town.
"The magistrate has issued an order: each village must burn or boil lantana to kill the locusts. If any village uses artemisia to drive the locusts to other villages, the person who discovers it will be arrested and imprisoned," Cheng Zhao said. "This matter is urgent. In the next two days, the magistrate will send many yamen runners to each village to keep an eye on things, in order to prevent any unexpected problems. In addition, the magistrate has also had Master Yuan make several copies of the locust-killing methods and send them to several nearby towns..."
Cheng Wanwan nodded, agreeing that all towns should implement this measure together to completely eradicate the locusts.
At night, bonfires were still lit in the village to lure locusts, and the unpleasant smell floated in the air, masking the delicious aroma of chicken soup in Cheng Wanwan's courtyard.
She placed the four stewed pheasants in a wooden basin at the entrance of the yard, so that the four wolves could come and eat on their own in the middle of the night, and she would no longer need to get up in the middle of the night and be scared half to death.
Before the sun rises in the early morning.
The village of Dahe was still shrouded in the darkness of dawn, and even the most diligent farmers wouldn't get up this early.
But a figure came from the village entrance; it was Zhang Wulai's wife.
Last time, Granny Zhang had been thinking about arranging a marriage between her niece and the scholar from the Cheng family. She originally planned to do this after the autumn harvest, but yesterday she heard that Cheng Zhao wouldn't be staying in Dahe Village for long and might leave in a month or so... She had to hurry up and bring her niece over so she could spend more time with Cheng Zhao and eventually make it a done deal.
To get back to her parents' home, she walked along a small path at the back of the village, which happened to pass by her house in Chengwanwan.
She instinctively glanced over a few more times. The morning light was dim and she couldn't see clearly, but she smelled blood. She walked over involuntarily and saw, lo and behold, there were one, two, three... eight pheasants and two rabbits at the entrance of the yard!
These beasts all had bloody holes in their necks; they were as dead as could be.
Granny Zhang swallowed hard. She looked left and right, but no one passed by.
"Waaaaah..."
It sounded like something was calling out, but as long as it wasn't a person, none of that mattered.
She crouched down, picked up a pheasant and stuffed it into her bosom. She was about to leave, but she couldn't resist the temptation. She picked up two more pheasants, and still felt it wasn't enough, so she picked up a rabbit as well. Then she ran home.
When I ran back, it was still dark.
Zhang Wulai was woken up from his sleep and grumbled, "Weren't you going back to your parents' house? What are you doing back here? You're making so much noise."
"Dad, look! What's this?"
Granny Zhang took out her spoils: three chickens and a rabbit.
Zhang Wulai was instantly wide awake and jumped out of bed: "Where did you get so many prey, you woman? You didn't happen to be hooking up with Hunter Zhao, did you?"
"What nonsense are you spouting? Don't try to smear me!" Granny Zhang said smugly. "I just passed by Da Shan's house and saw that his doorstep was full of game. Good heavens, eight pheasants and two rabbits. I suspect that Da Shan's mother has started an affair with Hunter Zhao. Otherwise, why would Hunter Zhao give her so much game? And believe it or not, they've kept it a secret really well. Not a single person in the whole village guessed that the two of them were having an affair."
Zhang Wulai frowned: "I have never seen Hunter Zhao speak a single word to that woman Zhao Chengshi. You must be mistaken."
"Then we'll just wait and see," Zhang's wife sneered. "This game was secretly delivered by Hunter Zhao. Even if someone takes it, Da Shan's mother won't dare to say a word. We might as well eat it. You stay home and clean up these things. I need to hurry back to my parents' house before the sun comes up. I'm leaving now."
Zhang Wulai scratched his chin. He seemed to have heard the villagers talk about something strange a couple of days ago, something about prey. What was it again?
Never mind, let's hurry up and prepare the prey. This is meat! It's been so long since we've had a single bite of meat at home.
Zhang Wulai was usually incredibly lazy, but since there was meat to eat, he became anything but lazy, getting up to boil water and prepare the pheasants and rabbits...
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