Chapter 33 Wrongfully Accused
Under the watchful eyes of so many people, Cheng Ying calmly introduced herself to everyone, explained that Cheng Jiantong was no longer working as a postman, and then took out the mail packages belonging to Ma'anshan Village from the mailbag and solemnly handed them to each recipient one by one.
Many recipients tore open the letters or packages on the spot, showing them off to their children and relatives in front of the villagers. However, many families with literate children did not want the villagers to see their letters and packages, so they hurriedly left with them.
After all the recipients had received their mail packages, Cheng Ying was about to carry the mailbag back to the Chen family home with Chen Ding and his daughter when a thin, limping old man in his sixties with bulging eyes suddenly shouted at Cheng Ying, "Why is there no money in my letter? Did you take it for me?"
Cheng Ying and the villagers around her who were about to leave paused for a moment and turned to look at him.
He opened the envelope in his hand and kept frowning as he looked at it.
Cheng Ying stood under a dim streetlamp in the courtyard of the brigade headquarters, looking calmly at the old man named Ke Shangui. She said, “Grandpa Ke, we postmen would never embezzle any recipient’s money. From the time I received your letter at the post office until it reached you, the seal was intact. Please check the letter carefully and don’t make baseless accusations. Although I’m new and this is my first time delivering mail to you, I’m a retired female soldier, and my character is well-known in the army. If I were to embezzle your money, would I still be able to work as a postman? There’s no money in your envelope, which means the sender didn’t put any money in it. You should ask the sender, not immediately suspect me of embezzling your money.”
Her words were forceful and resonant, her eyes sharp and piercing. She wore a green post office uniform and a green peaked cap embroidered with a five-pointed red star, an outfit that resembled a military uniform. She stood ramrod straight in the courtyard, her expression calm and composed, showing no trace of anger or resentment. Standing there, she looked just like a soldier in the army, her calm and dignified military bearing making it impossible not to believe what she said.
“Grandpa Ke, you have to provide evidence when you speak. You can’t just slander someone because Sister Xiaoying is a woman.” Chen Ling was the first to speak up for Cheng Ying.
Chen Ding also said, "Uncle Ke, you should ask your third son to write a letter for you, or go to the town's post office to send a telegram to ask if your seventh son has sent you money before you make a decision. Xiao Cheng is a postman, and her father has been delivering mail in our village for over twenty years. If you don't trust her, don't you trust her father?"
Other villagers chimed in, "Yeah, Cheng just took office. She'd be crazy to embezzle your money. If she really did, how could she continue working as a postman?"
"Yes, Comrade Cheng has been delivering mail to our village for over twenty years without ever making a mistake. This girl came to our village once with her father when she was little. She was very clever and lovable. I believe she is not the kind of person who would embezzle money."
......
The crowd chimed in, their comments fueling Ke Shangui's anger. He retorted, "My seventh daughter is my most dutiful daughter. She's been married to someone in the county for fifteen years, and she sends me ten yuan every month. Back when Cheng Jiantong was the postman, my daughter would slip ten yuan into my letter along with her greetings. It was the same every year. Now that she's with someone else, the money's gone. Is it really okay for me to say she's embezzled my money?"
Upon hearing this, the villagers fell silent.
Indeed, Old Ke had a filial daughter. He and his wife had three daughters and four sons in total. Except for the second daughter and the fifth son, who starved to death due to the famine, they had two daughters and three sons left.
These children, except for the seventh child, have all started their own families and have a bunch of kids and grandchildren. They can't even take care of their own families, let alone support their two elderly parents.
Old Ke has been stubborn since he was young. When he and his wife reached the age where they needed to take care of themselves, their three sons all shirked their responsibilities and did not want to support them.
The eldest daughter married into Aimen Village and had a bunch of children to raise. The family's situation wasn't good, so she couldn't take care of the couple.
In a fit of anger, he took his elderly wife to live in a dilapidated mud house and made a scene at the village committee, demanding that each of his children give him money and food every month. The old couple cooked for themselves and took care of themselves, and they lived a pretty good life.
Of his children, the one who gave him the most money was his seventh daughter, who married into the county.
Back then, her daughter was lucky. She fell in love with a miner in the county, married him, and followed him to the county town. She found a temporary job as a stone sieve worker at the mine and lived a good life with a government-subsidized food supply.
From then on, his seventh daughter would send Old Ke a letter every month without fail, along with ten yuan. During holidays, she would bring her husband and children, carrying bags of gifts to visit Old Ke and his wife, which made many elders in the village envious.
You have to understand that back when it was still a collective system, everyone was toiling in the fields to earn work points, which they then exchanged for money and food. Many people worked hard all year, but by the end of the year, the work points they earned were only enough to feed their families, and the remaining work points couldn't be exchanged for much money at all.
After paying for the family's daily expenses, the children's tuition, snacks, clothes, shoes, and socks, there wasn't much money left.
Old Ke's youngest daughter sends ten yuan to the elderly couple every month, which is one hundred and twenty yuan a year. In the village, this is a considerable sum. Many villagers work hard all year round and can't even save twenty yuan.
Old Ke's other children couldn't give him that much money, so they gave him enough food each year as a living allowance. The old couple weren't too old to move around; they could still work and earn work points.
The couple had both money and food. Not only were the elderly in the village envious, but the young people were also quite envious. After all, who wouldn't want a child who gives a third of their salary to their parents every month so that the parents have money to spend?
The villagers thought about it and felt that what Old Ke said made some sense. Old Ke's youngest daughter had been sending him money for so many years without any problems. How could the money in Old Ke's envelopes disappear as soon as Cheng Ying took over as the postman? There must be something strange about this.
For a moment, the villagers looked at Cheng Ying with strange eyes.
Cheng Ying didn't argue much, but pointed to the envelope in Old Ke's hand and said, "Grandpa Ke, would you like to see what your daughter said in the letter?"
"What can we say? It's just the same as usual. They ask me and her mother if we are in good health, and if her brothers are good to us. They also tell us about her children."
Ke Shangui impatiently tossed the envelope around. "Don't try to change the subject. The money in this envelope is gone. If you don't give me the money back, I'll go to your post office and demand an explanation from your superiors, then go to the police station and find the officers to arrest you, you thief!"
"Who are you calling a thief! Don't think that just because you're old, you can act like an old man and slander people!" Chen Ling angrily reached for the letter in Old Ke's hand. "Sister Xiao Ying said you should read what your seventh daughter said in the letter first!"
Chen Ling has always had a fiery personality since childhood. This is mainly because her parents are honest people who have been bullied by her grandparents and uncles all their lives. Like Cheng Ying, she has no choice but to stand up for herself and be fiery, otherwise her whole family would be completely controlled by her uncles.
Because of her fiery temper since childhood, the villagers were used to it.
When she reached out to snatch the letter from Old Ke's hand, the villagers didn't react much. Instead, they kept urging Old Ke to read what his daughter had to say in the letter first.
Old Ke was furious when Chen Ling snatched the letter from his hand. He tried to grab it back, but Chen Ling nimbly dodged his hand, took the letter out of the envelope, and loudly read it aloud in front of everyone: "Father, Mother, Greetings! It's been a month. How are you both doing...?"
The letter contained the same information Old Ke had given. It began with greetings to the elderly couple, followed by inquiries about whether their three older brothers had delivered their grain on time and whether they had helped the couple. It also mentioned what had happened in Ke Laoqi's family.
Ke Laoqi said that the county's high schools are about to start. Her eldest child has been admitted to high school and will be going to study there. Her two younger children are in junior high school and elementary school, respectively, and they will have to pay a lot of tuition fees.
Her husband was working at the mine last month when he was hit in the leg and waist by ore. He was seriously injured and can't go to work for the time being. She also has to pay a huge sum of money for his medical treatment.
In addition, her father-in-law is in poor health and has been taking medicine for many years. Her mother-in-law is focused on her youngest son and doesn't support her husband, which is very unreliable. She works alone to support the whole family and really doesn't have any extra money to send home.
She felt that she had been filial to Old Man Ke for fifteen years and had given Old Man Ke and his wife nearly two thousand yuan in alimony, which was already fulfilling her duty as a daughter. Now that she was going through a difficult time, she did not borrow money from her parents to get through the crisis, which was already showing her consideration for them.
She decided to stop sending money to the elderly couple. They had three sons and an older daughter, all of whom were like brothers and sisters. She couldn't just give them a little food and call it a day. If the elderly couple needed money in the future, they could ask their three sons and one daughter for it. She would no longer give them money, mainly because she herself was struggling financially.
In the end, the villagers fell silent. Their gazes toward Old Ke were a mixture of sympathy, schadenfreude, envy, jealousy, and even ill intent.
The villagers knew that Old Ke sent money to Old Ke every July and every year. They never expected that it would continue for fifteen years, with over a thousand yuan sent. In those days, this amount of money was definitely a huge sum of money.
Given how stingy and frugal Old Ke and his wife were, they rarely spent money and wouldn't give it to their ungrateful sons. They mostly saved it. It's just unknown whether the couple kept the money at home or in the town's bank.
Some ignorant and incompetent people began to have their minds set on doing something.
Old Ke was illiterate, so he usually asked the village secretary or other cadres to read letters to him behind everyone else's back.
Now that Chen Ling had read the letter aloud in front of so many people in the village, revealing his wealth, he no longer cared about wronging Cheng Ying. Holding the letter, he glared at Chen Ling fiercely, scolded her for meddling, and quickly slunk away with his old wife back home.
Seeing his hurried departure, everyone guessed that he probably kept the money at home, and now that his wealth had been exposed, he was definitely going to find a new place to hide it to prevent it from being stolen.
After Cheng Ying's name was cleared, the villagers gradually dispersed after saying some gossip about Old Man Ke and his wife.
Cheng Ying followed Chen Ding and his daughter back to the Chen family home. On the way, she thanked Chen Ling, saying, "Lingling, thank you for speaking up for me and helping me out of that predicament."
"Hey, it's alright. That old Ke wronged you without even asking what happened, so I'll definitely say a few words of justice for you," Chen Ling said casually as she walked alongside her.
“You read his daughter’s letter aloud in front of everyone, letting everyone know that he’s rich. If his money is stolen by someone else, won’t he blame you and hate you?” Cheng Ying asked with a worried expression.
“It’s definitely strange, but Old Ke isn’t stupid. Now that his money has been exposed, he definitely won’t hide it at home anymore and let thieves have their eyes on it.” Chen Ding said. “You’ll see, tomorrow morning, he’ll definitely find the village officials and have them go with him and his wife to the bank in town to deposit the money. He won’t let anyone steal it, nor will his three sons take it away, and he certainly won’t lend money to relatives, friends, or villagers. That old man is very shrewd.”
Chen Ling nodded, "My dad's right. Old Ke values money more than his own life. He wouldn't spend a penny more than his sons and grandsons, he's incredibly stingy. That's why his three sons fell out with him, wanted to separate from the family, and started their own households, none of them willing to support them. His three sons all wanted to take the money his youngest daughter sent him every month, but he refused, so they all broke off relations. Apart from the support obligations arranged by the village officials, his three sons barely bothered to look at him. A man as greedy as him would never let those good-for-nothings in the village have a chance to steal his money."
Hearing them say that put Cheng Ying at ease. Otherwise, if Old Ke's money had been exposed and stolen because of her, she would have felt uneasy.
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