Chapter 80
After hearing Xia Juhua's question, Director Zheng smiled helplessly and said, "If his brother admits it, can Team Leader Lin still hide at home?"
To be honest, Xia Juhua felt that she should go and see Team Leader Lin - both in her personal life and in Ping An Village, she had received a lot of help from Director Lin. She couldn't pretend that she didn't know Director Lin just because he had been reported.
When Director Zheng was told this, he looked at Xia Juhua with some surprise and then said, "Although Team Leader Lin is not at work now, his home might have been watched by people from the Red Squad the other day. Why did you still go to see him?" Aren't you afraid of being mistaken for Director Lin's accomplice by the Red Squad?
Xia Juhua said frankly: "I'm not looking for Team Leader Lin to make a profit. I just came to the county to see someone I know. The Red Team has evidence that Team Leader Lin brought things for his brothers. I'll go and see what he's afraid of." Director Zheng had just said that if there was evidence, Team Leader Lin would just not be able to go to work, but would have to go to a study class.
Director Zheng nodded, then nodded again, and then said, "Okay, I'll have someone take you to their alley, but it's not convenient for people from our supply and marketing cooperative to go to Director Lin's house right now."
Xia Juhua knew without explanation that the people in the supply and marketing cooperative would have to avoid suspicion now, so she was very grateful to Director Zheng for having someone take her to the alley where Team Leader Lin lived. After thanking him, she followed the person to the entrance of the alley where Team Leader Lin's home was.
"The third door is Team Leader Lin's home." The man pointed to Xia Juhua and said with an embarrassed look on his face, "Our director can't help it either. Please go in and take Team Leader Lin home for us."
Xia Juhua politely smiled and thanked him, and then she pushed the car into the alley. At the entrance of the alley stood three or four young men wearing red armbands, staring at everyone who came in and out with a look of hostility.
After a while, someone at the door asked, "Who is it?"
"I'm from the Ping'anzhuang production team. Is this Team Leader Lin's home?" Xia Juhua heard a female voice and asked hurriedly for fear of scaring the person behind the door.
The door opened from the inside, and a 30-something female comrade looked Xia Juhua up and down. Although she was dressed in rural clothes, her clothes were brand new without a single patch on them. There was a bicycle parked behind her. Unable to figure out where she came from, she asked again, "What do you want to do with him?"
Xia Juhua glanced at the red armband who had already started to walk towards this side, and quickly explained her purpose: "We have prepared the mats for Ping An Village. I came to ask when Team Leader Lin will go to our production team to prepare the mats."
The red armband stopped, and the female comrade made way for Xia Juhua to push the bicycle into the yard. As soon as she entered the yard, Director Lin was standing in the middle of the field. He looked at Xia Juhua with a little surprise and said, "Captain Xia, it's really you. Why are you in the county?"
After asking, I realized that what I asked was nonsense. Xia Juhua had already told me the purpose of her visit. As I let Xia Juhua into the house, I said, "I have been so busy at home these past few days that I forgot that I should go to your production team to help."
Xia Juhua didn't come here for this. Even after entering the house, she kept her voice low: "I heard what Director Zheng said. I just wanted to ask you what your brother is selling and whether it has anything to do with you."
Director Lin looked at Xia Juhua in confusion, but he still explained to her, "I only knew he went to the black market after I heard he was caught by the Red Team. I had no idea what he was selling. I didn't even know what he was selling, so what did that have to do with me."
After many dealings, Xia Juhua's neighbor, Director Lin, was not a liar, so she said what Director Zheng and others had asked her to say and was about to leave. Director Lin said a little embarrassedly: "I should have invited you to have dinner, but now the situation at home is such that even when you go out to buy food, someone follows you, so I won't invite you to stay."
The most important thing now is to allow Director Lin to go to work normally. Xia Juhua would never pick on him for a meal, so she said with a smile: "Come on, you owe me this meal. Next time I come to the county, you have to treat me to a meal." Director Lin's wife also laughed.
After leaving the Lin family, the woman with the red armband was still watching at the entrance of the alley. After Xia Juhua said goodbye to Director Lin and his wife calmly, she got on her bicycle with one leg, rang the bell twice to alert the people at the entrance of the alley, and rode away quickly.
After closing the gate, Director Lin sighed, "I didn't expect Captain Xia to come all the way to see me."
His wife also nodded and said, "When you came back and told me how capable Captain Xia was, I thought you had never seen a female comrade as a production captain before. After meeting her today, I believe that such a person can definitely do anything well."
Director Lin wanted to laugh: "If you come to see me, I can do anything. If you don't come to see me, I will be nothing."
Director Lin's wife shook her head and said, "It's not that those who come to see you are good people, but now there are so many people who live far away from our home, and some even come to our house just to make fun of us. But I don't think Captain Xia is here to make fun of us, and I saw she wasn't that scared of those Red Teams just now." Ordinary rural women would have been so scared that they would have stayed away when they saw the Red Team.
Xia Juhua was not as Director Lin's wife appeared to be. She was not really afraid of the Red Team. Instead, she was worried about Qi Weidong, fearing that he would be captured by the Red Team like Director Lin's brothers, so she turned a blind eye to those people from the Red Team.
Fortunately, at the entrance of Qi Weidong's alley, there were no red armbands standing in public like in the alley where Director Lin lived. Even though Xia Juhua deliberately rode slower and looked around desperately, she only saw pedestrians hurrying by, and occasionally there was a person wearing a red armband who rode his bicycle faster than Xia Juhua.
Xia Juhua parked her bike and knocked on the door tentatively, but no one answered. She knocked twice more, but still no one answered. She couldn't help but feel a little nervous: Could it be that Qi Weidong was also captured by the Red Team, so there was no one at home?
Just as he was wondering whether to knock on the door again or go to the county revolutionary committee to ask Uncle Qi, Qi Weidong's voice came from behind him: "Auntie Xia, why are you here?"
When he turned around, he saw Qi Weidong standing behind him in high spirits, looking at him with a smile on his face.
"You kid, I knocked on the door and no one answered, I was so scared." Xia Juhua complained, making Qi Weidong's mouth grin even wider: "I didn't know you were coming, if I knew, why didn't I wait for you at home?"
As he said this, he pushed the door and it opened.
Xia Juhua asked in surprise: "Why didn't you lock the door when you went out?"
Qi Weidong said nonchalantly, "I don't know when Xie Hongbing and Li Lin came to sleep these past two days. I was too lazy to open the door for them, so I just left it unlocked."
As soon as he finished speaking, Xie Hongbing came out of the house with messy hair, yawning and asking, "Brother Qi, you're back. How's it going? Did the bastard give you the stuff?"
After asking, I found that it was not Qi Weidong who was standing alone in the yard. I looked closely and saw that it was Xia Juhua, who was grinning like Qi Weidong: "I said that I heard someone knocking on the door just now, and I was wondering who was so polite. It must be you, my auntie, who knocked."
"Listen to your aunt knocking on the door and open it quickly. She's almost gone." Qi Weidong stepped forward and gave Xie Hongbing a light kick, kicking him away to make way for Xia Juhua.
Xia Juhua went into the house and saw that nothing had changed. She was relieved and asked Qi Weidong, "What happened? Did the Red Team take away your things?"
Qi Weidong looked at Xia Juhua strangely and said, "Auntie, you are well-informed. How do you know about the Red Team's investigation of the black market?"
Xia Juhua told Qi Weidong that Director Lin's brother had been captured by the Red Team and that she was worried about him so she came to check on him.
After hearing this, Qi Weidong stroked his neatly parted hair and asked Xie Hongbing, who was brushing his teeth, "Is there a Lin in the black market? I don't remember him."
Xie Hongbing spat out a mouthful of toothpaste foam and said vaguely, "You forgot, there is a boy who has been carrying food on his back to sell these days. I asked around and it seems his last name is Lin. But he is quite sensible. Every time he listens to the price we ask for, he follows us and never lowers the price himself."
"Does he carry a lot of food every day?" Xia Juhua asked immediately, as it was related to whether Director Lin could go back to work.
Qi Weidong shook his head and said, "It was only 20 to 30 kilograms, so I didn't take it seriously. If I were really caught by the Red Team, I would definitely not want to throw away the food and not run away."
You think everyone is as rich as you, and you can throw away 20 to 30 kilograms of food. Xia Juhua, an outsider, felt distressed when she heard it. Moreover, Director Lin's family looked like an ordinary citizen family. These 20 to 30 kilograms of food might be bought with all the money his brother had.
Seeing Xia Juhua frown, Qi Weidong turned around on the ground and explained to her: "If we just arrested him, it would be easy. We can just say that he went to the black market to buy things, and the Red Squad will just scold him and kick him and then let him go. But he was arrested with the things, so it's troublesome."
Xia Juhua knew that being caught by the Red Team would be troublesome, not to mention that Director Lin's brother was "captured", so she frowned unconsciously just now. Now she was explaining to Qi Weidong: "Director Lin is a good person. He has never taken advantage of Ping An Manor and has helped Ping An Manor a lot. Now he is in trouble, and I can't help him. I feel a little frustrated."
Qi Weidong, who really recognized Xia Juhua, felt uncomfortable when he heard Xia Juhua say that she was not motivated. "Don't worry, auntie. Those people said that Director Lin's brother's goods were all arranged by Director Lin. Now that we know that his brother was selling food, at least it can be said that it was not arranged by Director Lin. If Director Lin really helped his brother, his brother would not have brought only 20 or 30 gold grains each time. The Red Team would not be able to find Director Lin."
That's true, but if Director Lin really doesn't go to work all the time, I don't know if it will affect his future work. Xia Juhua couldn't help but say with some blame: "Why is his brother so troublesome? You city people have food supplies every month, why is he still selling food?"
Qi Weidong and Xie Hongbing were amused. Xie Hongbing, who had already washed up, smoothed his hair with his hands and said with a smile, "Auntie, then why do you think Brother Qi and I are also running the black market?"
He explained to Xia Juhua: "We are all capable men, so who would want to be supported by our parents every day? We have to find ways to make money. There are only a few people retiring each year in factories and other units, and they are all left for their children. If you don't want to go to the countryside, you have to find ways to make money. Now, besides working, the only way to make money is on the black market."
Xia Juhua also knew that her complaint was unreasonable. She was silent for a while and said, "It's a pity that Director Lin is such a good person. I'm afraid he will be implicated by his brother. He was finally transferred back to the county town and lived a good life with his wife, but now he may be sent back to the commune again."
Xie Hongbing squinted at Qi Weidong and said, "Brother Qi, what if that guy said that he picked up the food on the black market and thought he got a bargain, so he kept telling the Red Team that the food was his own, would that be okay?"
Xia Juhua thought that this idea was just a joke to the Red Team, but Qi Weidong slammed the table and said, "You are the one with the idea." His words seemed to indicate his agreement.
No way, even if you have Uncle Qi as your backer, you can't take the Red Team so lightly. If the person hadn't been arrested by the Red Team, you could still distinguish them. Now that the person has been captured, you tell the Red Team this. Is the Red Team in Pingde County in such a bad situation?
Qi Weidong saw that Xia Juhua disagreed, and said with his usual nonchalant smile: "Auntie Xia, I went there just to give the Red Team a plausible reason. Besides, the Red Team didn't take the twenty or thirty kilograms of food seriously. The reason they suddenly inspected the black market this time was..."
Qi Weidong shut up at this point, and Xia Juhua had no intention of asking - what's the point of knowing so much, it can't make it rain or make the water level of the Xihe River rise.
Seeing that Xia Juhua didn't ask, Qi Weidong was slightly relieved and asked Xie Hongbing to talk to Xia Juhua while he was going to the Red Team right away. Xie Hongbing was still thinking about the vermicelli from Ping'an Village and asked Xia Juhua how much vermicelli their production team had missed in the end. Then he complained to her, "Auntie, if you hadn't given Brother Qi half a pound of profit from your last 100,000 kilograms of sweet potatoes, we would have worked for nothing for half a month."
It was Uncle Qi who decided that the work was in vain. Xia Juhua couldn't say anything wrong about him, so she just smiled and said nothing - it was Xia Juhua's own principle not to let Qi Weidong suffer any loss, and she was also thinking about borrowing Qi Weidong's wind when the spring breeze blew.
They were chatting like this, and less than an hour later, Qi Weidong pushed the door open again, followed by a tall young man who kept thanking Qi Weidong.
Qi Weidong said impatiently, "You don't have to thank me. If you want to thank someone, thank Aunt Xia. If Aunt Xia hadn't thought your brother was a good man and came to me for help, who would I know you?"
This is how Qi Weidong usually interacts with people, Xia Juhua thought, it seems that this boy is always polite to me. After listening to Qi Weidong, the young man bowed repeatedly to Xia Juhua, the only person in the room who could be called auntie: "Auntie, I am sorry to cause you so much trouble. If it weren't for you, I would have to die in the Red Team."
"Come on, Auntie is an honest person, don't say anything that Auntie can't understand." Qi Weidong could look down on Director Lin's brother, but Xia Juhua couldn't. She smiled and nodded to him and said, "I only know that you are Director Lin's brother, but I don't know your name. How old are you this year? Why don't you go to the countryside?"
The young man heard Xia Juhua speak in a gentle manner. When she spoke, Qi Weidong and Xie Hongbing did not interrupt her. In his heart, his opinion of Xia Juhua was improved by several levels, and he spoke respectfully:
"Auntie, my brother's name is Lin Shuliang, and I am Lin Shuming after him. I just graduated from high school last year, and I didn't sign up to go to the countryside at the end of the year. I thought I could make a living in the county."
Xia Juhua didn't want to check the person's household registration, but she thought that since Qi Weidong had rescued the person from the Red Team, why should he keep a cold face and make people feel uncomfortable? Seeing that Lin Shuliang's words were more slick than Director Lin, she smiled at him and said, "You haven't gone home yet, go home and check on them, so that your brother and others won't worry."
Lin Shuliang smiled at Xia Juhua and looked at Qi Weidong. Qi Weidong was smart and understood Xia Juhua's meaning immediately. He grinned at him and said, "Auntie Xia is right. You should be careful not to get caught again. I'll save my face once. If you do it again, people won't piss on me."
After Lin Shuliang left, Xia Juhua said to Qi Weidong apologetically, "Xiao Qi, I'm sorry for making things difficult for you today."
Qi Weidong still looked nonchalant and said, "It's just a small matter. Xie Hongbing can go to the Red Team and get the people back. It just so happened that some of my things were also taken away by the Red Team. I wanted to ask when they could get them back, so I went there on my own."
After saying that, he smiled and whispered to Xia Juhua, "My uncle didn't know that you, Aunt Xia, have such a good relationship with Director Lin. If he knew, he would have told the Red Team to release the man a long time ago." In his uncle's heart, Xia Juhua was a great contributor to the entire Pingde County. Even if his uncle couldn't tell others about his contribution now, he still kept it in his heart.
All right, you uncle and nephew have always been so awesome. Seeing that Qi Weidong was afraid of having a psychological burden, Xia Juhua did not say much about this matter. She asked Qi Weidong if there was anything that needed to be done at Pinganzhuang, and then rode her bicycle back to Pinganzhuang to arrange for tomorrow's banquet.
The next day, Director Lin was the one who came to the supply and marketing cooperative to collect the food. He didn't bring anything with him, and he didn't explain why he was the one who collected the food. When he saw Xia Juhua, he just said, "Captain Xia, everything I say now is empty. If you need me to do anything in the future, just ask. I will do it for you even if I have to dig a hole in the door and steal."
It was just a banquet, something everyone had experience with, so there was no need for Director Lin to dig a hole in the door. Xia Juhua took him to the yard, counted the goods, settled the money, and then sent him away.
At this time, Xia Juhua didn't know that because she found Qi Weidong to rescue Lin Shuliang from the Red Team, she had recruited a loyal talent for her future cooperative in advance.
What Xia Juhua needs to worry about right now is planting the sweet potatoes in the ground, because the vines grown by Lin Technician are already one meter long and have become old vines. It is time to cut the seedlings and plant them.
The job of cutting the sweet potato vines to the right length and leaving enough to bury in the soil was handed over to the women who no longer made mats. Zhao Xianzhi was still the team leader, walking back and forth to check whether everyone's cutting was up to standard:
"Watch it carefully, you can't cut it straight, you have to leave four or five leaves." She shouted at the person who cut it incorrectly: "Why did you cut the vines so straight? Didn't you hear the forest technician say to cut it diagonally?"
The four production team leaders all came with their members to pick sweet potato seedlings. When they saw Ping An Zhuang putting a bunch of cut vines into the basket for himself, they all looked suspicious. However, the production team leaders had seen Xia Juhua's fighting ability and did not dare to question whether Ping An Zhuang was teasing the four production teams. They all looked at Li Changshun.
Technician Lin had explained it to Li Changshun several times, so Li Changshun was able to keep his composure. Seeing that there was no problem with the seedling division, he shouted at the four production team leaders: "Did you remember what Technician Lin said just now? The first batch of water must be watered thoroughly. If it is not watered thoroughly, the seedlings will not survive, and it is your own fault."
Li Daniu asked the members of his team to line up. While everyone's eyes were on the sweet potato vines, he quietly came to the sweet potato field in Ping'an Village and found that the ridges had been made long ago. Many members were squatting on the ground, carefully and obliquely placing the sweet potato vines, which were the same as those of other production teams, into the dug small holes, leaving only a few leaves on the top outside.
As soon as the soil was buried, the person behind poured water down with a bucket, and the person in front had already planted the second sweet potato seedling. There were two people working together on each ridge, and they didn't say anything, but the progress was very fast.
The forest technician next to them kept reminding them: "Remember, first plant, then lie down, then raise your head. Don't make any mistakes in this step. Don't be stingy with water. If you water thoroughly the first time, the roots will take root in three to five days. If you don't water thoroughly, it will take another ten days to plant seedlings."
Li Daniu thought it was good news that more seedlings could be planted. This way he wouldn't have to worry about his production team not operating well and delaying the land due to a shortage of seedlings.
After a while, Wu Ye and Li Changshun also appeared at the edge of the field with their hands behind their backs. Neither of them looked at Li Daniu, but only talked about their own things: "Is it okay to plant like this? If it really works, then we would have wasted so many sweet potato seeds in vain?" The person asking this was Li Changshun.
Wu Ye was more confident: "A few days ago, the forest technician taught Da Xi and his team to try it out in my backyard. The weather was even colder when they planted it. Yesterday I pulled one out and saw that it really started to grow roots."
Li Changshun was still a little unconvinced: "This ridge seems to be denser than in previous years, is it possible?"
The Fifth Master was not sure: "It should be possible. Technician Lin is a very learned man. Together with Technician Xue, they can turn the soil for the entire production team."
That's because they have a tractor, right? Li Daniu felt that Master Wu had a blind trust in Technician Lin, but when he heard him say that he had sweet potatoes that had already taken root in his backyard, he finally felt a little relieved.
Apart from Lin the technician, the person who felt most confident was Xia Juhua. She and the members of Ping'an Village spent three days distributing the seedlings to each production team. By the time Ping'an Village had finished planting half of the 300 acres of sweet potatoes it had planned to plant.
Chen Qiusheng discussed with Xia Juhua: "Technician Lin happens to be free, can we ask him to show us how to drain the water if the ground is flooded?"
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