Chapter 45 Renting an Oxcart
Feng Lan's eyes welled up. She stood up and bowed deeply to her daughters. "My children, I'm so sorry. From now on, I will make up for what I owe you."
The daughters looked at their parents, unable to hold back their tears any longer, and they began to shed them. They were not sad, but the grievances they had felt for so long were finally released at this moment.
"Dad, Mom..." Daya choked up, picked up the meat in the bowl, and handed it to Feng Lan's mouth, "Mom, you eat first."
The family had this meal with laughter and tears, but it was extremely sweet.
On the other side of the wall, the scene was completely different. The old Chen couple and the members of the second and third branches munched on dry, hard multi-grain cakes, washed down with a bowl of bland pickled vegetable soup. The aroma of meat wafting from the east courtyard tickled their hearts and infiltrated their nostrils like tiny hands, making the half-grown children drool and cry for more meat. The distraught Liu and Qian slapped them, making their cries even louder.
The old lady of the Chen family listened to the laughter coming from the east and smelled the overbearing aroma of meat. She was so angry that she broke the pancake in her hand into pieces and kept cursing Feng Lan, calling her a "jinx" and a "ungrateful person."
No words were spoken that night.
The next day, Chen Kangbo and Feng Lan rose at dawn. The division document clearly stated that the Chen family's 15 acres of prime paddy fields now belonged to them. The autumn harvest was approaching, and that would provide their family with food for the entire year. They had to go and check on it quickly.
The couple walked to the edge of the fields outside the village, full of hope for the future. But the scene before them was like a thunderbolt, and their blood ran cold.
The fifteen acres of rice fields, nearly ripe, lay in a shambles, as if trampled by hundreds of horses and cattle. The golden ears of rice, which should have been bent with weight, were now broken in half, toppling over and over in the muddy water. The plump grains were trampled into a pulp, mingling with the mud, their original appearance unrecognizable.
It's over.
This season's harvest is all gone.
This means that their family of seven will have no food to eat for the entire next year.
"It's them...it must be them!" Feng Lan was so angry that her whole body was shaking and her teeth were chattering.
Chen Kangbo squatted down and grabbed a handful of mud mixed with grains. Veins popped out on the back of his hand. His red eyes stared fixedly at the half of his own courtyard wall not far away. A surging hatred threatened to ignite his entire being.
At this moment, a gloating laugh was heard from the other side of the ridge.
Chen Kangzhong and Chen Kangshu, carrying hoes, walked over leisurely. They looked at the miserable situation in the fields with undisguised pride on their faces.
"Hey, brother, sister-in-law, you're up so early?" Chen Kangzhong said sarcastically, "Are you here to see your land? Tsk tsk, what a pity! Such good crops, how could they... suffer a natural disaster?"
"That's right!" Chen Kangshu also echoed, "Brother, I think your luck is bad! You just separated from the family, and God doesn't give you food to eat! What should we do? Don't worry, when those girls in your family are starving, you can come to us for help. Maybe we two brothers will be soft-hearted and give you a bite of food!"
"You!" Chen Kangbo stood up suddenly, like an enraged lion, and was about to rush forward.
"Kang Bo!" Feng Lan held him tightly. She knew that if she took action now, she would be the only one to suffer.
Just as the two sides were deadlocked, a figure in a long gown slowly approached from the village entrance. He was about seventeen or eighteen years old, with a fair complexion, a slender figure, and a scholar's arrogance between his brows.
It was Chen Kangnian, the sixth son of the Chen family who had been studying in the town school and was highly regarded by the old lady.
"Brother, sister-in-law." Chen Kangnian walked closer and first took a look at the tragic situation in the fields. A hint of imperceptible satisfaction flashed across his face, and then it changed into a look of compassion. "It is unfortunate for our family to have such a thing happen. The fields are destroyed. I am sure brother and sister-in-law must be extremely anxious."
His hypocritical appearance is more disgusting than the direct provocation of Chen Kangzhong and Chen Kangshu.
"But don't worry, big brother." Chen Kangnian changed the subject, revealing his true intention. "I just received a batch of grain from a classmate a few days ago. I wanted to wait for the price to go up before selling it. Since my family is in trouble, I, as a younger brother, can't just stand by and watch them die."
He stretched out five fingers and waved them in front of Chen Kangbo.
"Well, for the sake of our family, I won't ask for more. The market price is fifty wen a dou of rice, and I'll sell it to you for two hundred and fifty wen. Take the several dozen taels of silver you got from the division of the family property and exchange them for my grain. It will be enough for your family to eat until the beginning of next spring. What do you think? I've done my utmost."
Five times the market price!
This is not helping at all, this is clearly taking advantage of the situation and looting, sucking the marrow out of the bones!
"You...get out!" Chen Kangbo squeezed out a word from between his teeth.
Chen Kangnian wasn't angry, he just shook his head, looking regretful, as if to say, "I cared about you, but you didn't appreciate it." "Brother, good words can't persuade a damned ghost. When the time comes, don't blame me, your younger brother, for not helping you."
After saying this, he turned around and left with Chen Kangzhong and Chen Kangshu, chatting and laughing.
Watching their receding backs, Chen Kangbo was so angry that he punched the edge of the field.
Feng Lan, however, remained remarkably calm. She helped her husband up and brushed the dirt off his hands. Her eyes were not filled with despair, but rather with a burning fighting spirit.
"Comber, let's go home."
When they got home, Feng Lan took out a cloth bag from the most secret corner under the bed without saying a word. Inside was all their belongings, more than 40 taels of silver.
She counted out thirty taels and handed it to Chen Kangbo: "Go to town and rent an ox cart."
Then, she put the remaining dozen taels of silver into her arms and said to her daughters, "Come on, follow me to the market!"
The Chen family thought that without the harvest, Feng Lan's family would soon be destitute and would then beg them on their knees. They were waiting to see them make a fool of themselves, waiting to see Feng Lan's family trampled into the mud again.
However, that evening, a fully loaded ox cart stopped at the east gate of the Chen family compound.
The things Feng Lan and her daughters unloaded from the car shocked all the peepers.
Bags of snow-white high-quality flour, bags of crystal-clear Jiangnan rice, a whole leg of fat pork, two clucking fat hens, a large bundle of emerald green vegetables, and even a small jar of mellow rice wine!
Feng Lan didn't rush to move the things into the house, but deliberately let the ox cart stop at the door for a while. She even generously gave the cart driver a handful of copper coins as a reward, and the sound was so loud that half of the village could hear it.
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