Opportunity for redemption
Starting from the first slope, go straight and then turn left for about two kilometers, then go down another slope; on the right side of the road in the middle of the slope, there is a house, a detached two-story bungalow, without much villa decoration, just a rough exterior wall with tiles.
The tricycle was parked on the cement ground next to the villa, and several cows went into the cowshed on the other side of the small house.
The old woman carrying the feed bucket to the cowshed had her sleeves rolled up to her forearms, and with her other hand she was pulling a cart loaded with hay and roughage.
Upon arriving at the cowshed, the first thing poured in was a paste-like substance mixed with the feed bucket. Wen Dai had been following her around like a shadow, feeling embarrassed to eat for free without doing any work. She tried to help pour in the hay and roughage, but the old woman did it first.
The old woman who had brought the trailer over poured the grain into the cowshed. She turned her head and glanced at Wen Dai, then grinned and said, "We don't let the guests do the work! This kind of hard and dirty work is fine for pretty young ladies to just watch from the side."
After the old woman finished her work, Wen Dai, who had been awkwardly watching, followed her and squeezed through the flock of chickens with red ropes hanging from their feet back into the house.
After washing her hands, the old woman brought over a cup of water and handed it to Wen Dai, pointing to the bamboo bed against the wall with her still-dampened hand, "Sit down, sit down."
Holding her water cup, Wen Dai sat down on the bamboo bed. With her other hand, she reached for her backpack, which she had placed on it. She rummaged through the backpack pocket, pulled out her wallet, took out all the red bills inside, and handed it to the old woman who had moved a stool over and was sitting in front of her.
"I'm afraid I can't achieve my goal of coming here without your help, Auntie. I'll have to eat and stay at your house, which is really embarrassing. Please keep this money for now... If you accept online transfers, I can transfer you some more money."
The habit of carrying cash while going to the countryside was forced upon Xicheng Puleiti by his group. Furthermore, many villagers who live far from the city prefer cash that they can hold in their hands to the ethereal numbers on their mobile phones.
I thought the old lady would play a game of "Oh no, no" with her next move, but instead of the mutual pushing and shoving, the old lady's clear black pupils visibly shone.
She accepted the money Wen Dai handed her without ceremony, counted the money in front of Wen Dai, then held it up and turned her upper body to look at the bills in the light from outside the door.
"Alright, then Auntie won't stand on ceremony with you. Just tell me what you need. Although we live in a remote, rural area, Auntie will make sure you're comfortable." The old lady stuffed the money into her pocket, her smile as wide as a statue, looking at Wen Dai with a beaming grin.
Wen Dai felt even more at ease knowing that she was willing to accept the money.
Returning a smile to the kind-hearted old woman in front of her, Wen Dai told the truth: "Actually, I came here this time because I have a case to deal with. I have a younger sister who is fourteen years old this year. She was abducted by human traffickers and has been missing for three days. I came here because I personally suspect that she is in this place."
“You definitely know better than I do what happened here. I don’t know much about it, and I’m not trying to smear this place. It’s just that this place is located at the border of Lizhou and Ercheng. The investigators couldn’t find any clues in the city. Do you understand what I mean?”
Her words were a mix of truth and falsehood. She was indeed her younger sister, but not her biological sister. She came here not because of any doubt, but simply because she had divined her way here and ended up here herself.
As Wen Dai narrated, the old woman's expression gradually changed. She lowered her head, rested her elbows on her knees, and touched her chin with her fingers. After a moment of silence, she finally spoke: "Your suspicions are correct, and I don't think you're slandering our place. You don't need to explain that. Is the place you want to go that faraway corner?"
She lifted her face, stretched out one arm, and pointed to her left.
Judging from the direction the village was in, it was indeed the direction she pointed out.
Seeing Wen Dai nod her head, the old woman's smiling face fell with heaviness. She covered her mouth and nose with her hand, sniffed, and then lowered her hand, as if she had truly come back to her senses from her thoughts. "I used to be from that village. There were indeed human trafficking cases there."
"However, most of the people staying in that village are human traffickers. The abducted people will stay there for a period of time, usually two weeks. During this time, they call it 'inspection.' I left that village a long time ago, so don't worry. My parents told me all this. They still live in that village, after all, it's where our ancestors lived for generations."
“Let me tell you about ‘tasting goods’. The ‘tasting’ in ‘taste’ is the one with three mouths; the ‘goods’ in ‘goods’ means the same as ‘goods’. They don’t treat the people they kidnap as people, they treat them as goods. If something is particularly beautiful, they will try it themselves first, that’s called ‘tasting’. Then they will let others try it. If everyone thinks it’s good, they will put it online to find buyers.”
"I heard that there are special group chats where there are plenty of people buying; they won't sell someone as beautiful as me to a bachelor without a wife. Back when I hadn't left the village, they could sell people directly abroad, but they sold them all over the country more often."
The more I listened, the colder my heart became.
The old woman crossed her arms across her chest, supporting her upper body as she leaned forward. Her eyes, unfocused, were on her upturned face, suggesting she was lost in thought.
“Back in the beginning…it’s been about thirty years now. That was the scariest time. In the village, they would sell any pretty girl, male or female, as long as your parents were willing and they paid enough money. They started by selling girls from their own village. I couldn’t stand it, so my husband and I moved out of that village and built a house here to live in.”
With disdain on her face and her still unfocused eyes, the old woman shook her head and said, "You can't imagine. They're not human. Even animals wouldn't do such a thing."
"Thirty years ago, they were already selling people abroad. Think about it. Back then, there were people who would come to pick them up. I don't know how they got in touch, but back then, everyone in the village went out to travel all over the country. I guess that's how they met. Snakes and rats are all in the same nest. It's amazing that this group of people could make connections."
She reached into her pocket and touched the money Wen Dai had given her. Her face, which had been lowered, remained down, and her movements seemed frozen. Her tongue lingered for a moment before returning to its place: "Thirty years ago, they would also appraise goods, but not like they do now. They wouldn't start taking action before selling anything. Back then, people were very picky."
"The times have opened up now, which has benefited them. The money you gave me, well, it's not exactly a bad deal."
"Do you think I gave too much? It's okay..." Wen Dai raised her hand and waved it twice.
Unexpectedly, the old woman immediately interrupted her: "I think you gave too little. This is a very dangerous matter. If I help you find their hideout and they find out, I will be much more unlucky than you. I still have my parents living in the village. What if they bully my parents? Those people are not afraid of killing people."
She glanced at Wen Dai with disapproval in her eyes, wearing an expression as if she had been taken advantage of.
Then the old woman changed her tone and sighed, "But it can't be considered a losing deal. Do you know why I say that? Actually, I feel a little guilty myself."
She raised her hand and bent her thumb, the knuckle of her thumb striking her heart.
“I always see those cars roaring past outside. I know perfectly well that there are people inside. I know that many of them have been abducted, and I know that many of them have met a pitiful end. But I can't help them. I have to protect my own home first! So, I'm still willing to help you. You're already in front of me. I guess this is my chance to atone for my sins.”
The old woman described the scene vividly, raising her arm and gesturing, before finally pointing to the Buddha statue placed in the center against the wall, saying, "Look, look there."
Wen Dai followed her gaze and looked over. The Buddha statue on the shelf seemed to be Guanyin Bodhisattva, standing on a lotus flower, serenely making an eternal gesture, her lowered eyes also seeming eternal. Can you see it?
A question arose out of nowhere. Wen Dai stared at the Buddha statue and pondered: Could Guanyin Bodhisattva secretly raise her eyes in the statue and see those people who were asking for help from heaven among the "goods" that were being transported in? And did those who committed sins also have a Buddha statue or many other gods enshrined in their homes?
“Your appearance must be the Bodhisattva asking me to atone for my sins. I will help you. This is a good deal.” The old woman was also lost in her own world. She muttered to herself as she got up from the stool and walked briskly to the front of the Buddha statue.
She opened the cabinet at the bottom, took out a bundle of incense sticks, and pulled out three sticks. She held the incense sticks close to the burning candle to rub them together. After she finished her devout standing prayer, she put the incense sticks, which were gradually emitting smoke, into the incense burner.
Then three more incense sticks were taken out, and the old woman beckoned to Wen Dai, who was sitting on the bamboo bed in a daze, "Come, come quickly, offer incense to the Bodhisattva and ask the Bodhisattva to protect us. It's dangerous there."
Once she snapped back to reality, Wen Dai's body moved faster than her mind. She took a few steps toward the old woman and, in the blink of an eye, she had already grabbed the three incense sticks that the old woman had handed her.
"Hey, come on, let's have a fire first. Okay, head down—bend over—good, let's do it again."
The old woman next to her became the incense-offering guide, occasionally helping out by first pulling Wen Dai's hand and guiding the incense to the candle to ignite, and then pressing down on her shoulders while she prayed.
After bowing three times, Wen Dai was finally able to stand up straight. Like a puppet, she obediently held the three incense sticks in her hand and inserted them as the old woman asked.
She looked up, and Guanyin, who was slightly taller than her, seemed to be looking back at her with her eyes lowered.
I hope that what you ask for will be granted, and that it won't just be for her.
She pulled her hand back into her pocket, revealing her phone screen which displayed the recording duration. She pressed the button below the duration.
A soft rustling sound of shoes scraping the ground came from behind. Wen Dai turned around. At first, the person in her field of vision was a dark figure, but as her eyes gradually adjusted, she could make out his shape.
Her hair, which was tied in clumps, had curls at the front that flew up to the top of her head, while the hair on the top of her head stuck out to the sides. Her face, tanned and weathered like an old woman's, was deeply lined with wrinkles.
He wasn't very tall, but judging from the part of his arm that was sticking out, he was quite strong.
The man probably hadn't expected there to be a stranger in the house. After putting his tools in the corner, he tugged at the side of his shirt that was casually tucked into his waistband.
He glanced at Wen Dai briefly, then pursed his lips at the old woman and asked, "What's this?"
"The young lady we met on the road asked us for help... Hey, let me tell you about it." Seeing that he still looked blank and confused, the old lady sighed and went forward to explain to him.
After recounting the whole story in detail, the old woman suddenly grabbed the man's clothes, her brows furrowed, and asked, "You went to the city to find work with that old man again? I've told you so many times—those people will rip you off. They're all getting paid to recruit you. You'll work yourself to the bone, and they'll still earn more than you..."
Being grabbed by the clothes and subjected to a barrage of insults, the man glanced at Wen Dai, who was awkwardly watching from the sidelines. He nudged the old woman's shoulder and impatiently interrupted, "Talk, talk, talk so much. Did you make money or did I? Money is money, so what? You want our customers to watch us argue?"
He took a jianbing guozi (Chinese crepe) wrapped in a transparent plastic bag out of his pants pocket and handed it to the old lady.
The old lady's attitude softened abruptly as she took the jianbing (Chinese crepe), and she beamed as she leaned forward in front of the man, saying, "Oh dear, you remembered I wanted to eat this? I couldn't find anyone selling it when I went out earlier, and you managed to buy it for me!"
Seemingly uncomfortable interacting like this in front of strangers, the man nudged her arm with "Hey, hey," turned to look at Wen Dai, took a few steps, and stopped in front of her.
"Don't worry, I'll help with this. How many families don't have daughters? Even if they don't have daughters, they still have mothers and mothers-in-law. I know how despicable that is. Will this involve dealing with the investigators?"
Meeting the man's bright eyes, Wen Dai hesitated for a moment before saying, "I think so."
The man's eyes shone even brighter, and his slightly creased eyelids lifted even higher. He suppressed his excitement and exhilaration, revealing a youthful mentality beyond his years.
"My childhood dream was to be a police officer and rid the people of evil, right? I never had the chance, but now I can finally make a name for myself." He chuckled, shaking his shoulders with laughter.
Looking at the old man and woman with a complicated expression, Wen Dai felt inexplicably uneasy. Why did these two seem so unreliable?
One couldn't stop smiling, his thoughts written all over his face, while the other was happily eating a jianbing guozi (Chinese crepe).
Bandits marrying each other, bandits marrying each other. Wen Dai brainwashed herself.
The dinner was cooked by the old man and woman together. Since they hadn't bought any meat, the two of them almost killed a chicken. Luckily, Wen Dai heard the chicken squawking and discovered it in time.
The dishes on the table were almost all green: stir-fried garlic sprouts, stir-fried greens, and dry-fried green beans. The only dish that changed color was stir-fried eggs with chili peppers.
"I'm so sorry, I didn't expect to have guests at home. I didn't go to the town to buy groceries today. Do you want some meat? If you do, we can make some spicy chicken now. We have to get up very early tomorrow, so some meat will give us some energy. We can't be late, or it will be bad if we don't make it by 5 a.m.."
The old man, carrying a bowl of rice, stepped over the bench and sat down. He held his chopsticks and turned to look at Wen Dai.
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