Chapter 56
This turmoil did not come quietly.
In fact, Yunshui County has not been peaceful since the beginning of winter.
1958 was indeed a turbulent year. Natural disasters and man-made disasters continued throughout the year. First, floods in several northern provinces in the summer caused the summer grain harvest to fail, and grain from the south was transported to the north for disaster relief. Later, China and the Soviet Union fell out, the Soviet Union evacuated experts, and the two countries deployed troops to confront each other at the border. Now, tens of thousands of disaster victims have fled south to escape famine.
Yunshui County is adjacent to the north, not to mention the southern region. In the past half month, the number of disaster victims in the county has increased instead of decreased. Ragged victims hold bowls and basins and beg on the street. The children in the victims' arms are skinny and their faces are black. Passersby are uncomfortable watching them. There is nothing
they can do. The kind ones take out a few notes and hand them over, while those without money just walk away.
These days, everyone is having a hard time. It is not easy to take care of their own family and have enough food and drink. There is no extra food to help the disaster victims.
The county leaders were also troubled by this matter. Although the county had a public security bureau, armed forces and militia, the disaster victims were forced to leave their hometowns and seek a living outside. If they really couldn't survive, who would be willing to leave their hometowns and go to a strange county to beg for food without dignity?
In the words of an old disaster victim, he had a house and land in the countryside, and supported his family with his hard work. Now he is in his fifties or sixties, and has become a beggar. Outsiders cannot understand the bitterness and pain in his heart.
When the first few batches of disaster victims came to the county, the county was able to find food. They set up a porridge shed at the entrance of the station, set up a big pot, and cooked a pot of hot wild vegetable porridge. The disaster victims had a bowl each, which warmed their stomachs. people were having a hard time. If the comrades could not get food here, they should go home first, and they were sent to board the train back home.
Now Yunshui County is short of food, and there is no food in hand. The disaster victims are so hungry that they can't walk, so they are even more reluctant to leave.
The Public Security Bureau and the Armed Forces have increased their patrols recently. Yunshui County is not small, and there are countless alleys and lanes. Even local residents can get lost if they walk around in unfamiliar places. Moreover, the Public Security Bureau and the
Armed Forces only have a few dozen people in total, and including the county militia, there are only more than a hundred people. With more than a hundred people working in three shifts, even the most stringent defense can still be negligent.
Last Friday, the old Gu family encountered something that made people's hearts tremble.
Last Thursday night, Yunshui County had its first snow of the year. It snowed heavily for most of the night, and the heavy snow did not stop on Friday morning. Gu Chunmei could not ride a bicycle to work. She would stumble every time she rode, and she would fall on her buttocks if she didn't do it.
Gu Chunmei was carrying a shoulder bag, wrapped up tightly, wearing black rubber shoes, and was about to go out.
Father Xu and his son had already gone to the police station. Mother Xu was alone at home, and she was worried and followed her out.
"Chunmei, it's snowing so heavily outside. You can't take a day off today and don't go to work."
Gu Chunmei said that the supply and marketing cooperative didn't have a phone, and she had to go to the director in person to ask for leave. It was too troublesome to go back and forth, so it would be better to go to work directly. Maybe the snow would melt when the sun came out in the afternoon.
Most of the streets in Yunshui County are bluestone slabs. Even if the snow melted, it would be the same as in the countryside. You still have to wade through the mud to go out.
Mother Xu thought about it and nodded.
Who knew that the snow would not stop until the afternoon when she got off work? Gu Chunmei bought two cans of maltose at the company at the internal price, one for her mother-in-law to replenish her body, and one for her parents.
Maltose was a rare commodity in the 1950s. In that era, most people would only buy a can during festivals to show off.
The Xu family was well-off, and Xu's mother stayed at home to take care of her body. She drank more maltose, basically one can a month.
Gu Chunmei was an employee of the supply and marketing cooperative, and it was much more affordable to buy goods at the internal price than to buy from outsiders.
She couldn't fit two cans of maltose in her bag, so the big sister of the supply and marketing cooperative handed her a straw basket and asked Gu Chunmei to use it first and bring it back when she went to work the next day.
It was not worth taking back a straw basket, so Gu Chunmei just paid for it.
The elder sister teased her for being generous.
When it was time to get off work, Gu Chunmei carried a straw basket and a bag on her back and walked towards Guihua Hutong.
The supply and marketing cooperative was in the north of the city, and Guihua Hutong was in the south. It would take half an hour to walk back, and it would be even more strenuous on a snowy day.
Gu Chunmei walked and stopped along the way, and when she arrived at the County Cultural Bureau, she chose a shortcut home. Behind the County Cultural Bureau, there was a small alley that was only big enough for a donkey cart to pass through. After passing through the alley, it was the old street, and it was much more convenient to go back to Guihua Hutong.
It was the time for people to get off work in the county. Workers and students were coming and going on the road. Even the disaster victims at the bus station were walking here in groups of three or five. In the middle of winter, they had nothing to eat or drink, and it was so cold. The county leaders persuaded them again and again, and several groups of disaster victims left. The remaining group was the shameless kind, and they relied on the county government for food and drink.
Gu Chunmei often met these disaster victims on her way home from work. Some of them looked honest, which was the most reassuring. Some were different. The older ones were better, but the young ones who were idle and lazy must be careful.
Gu Chunmei subconsciously covered the maltose in the straw basket and hurried into the crowd.
She hurriedly walked home, but she was still targeted.
The ones who targeted her were two young victims in their early twenties, one of whom was lame and the other was skinny and came with the group of victims just now. The skinny
The young man was wearing a locomotive hat tilted on his head and looked shabby. He stared at Gu Chunmei closely, with a greedy look in his eyes as if he was staring at his prey.
The lame man was a coward. The man in the locomotive hat grumbled to him for a long time, but the lame young man didn't dare to rob. The man
in the locomotive hat was so angry that he cursed him, "You bastard."
If you don't dare, I'll do it myself!
The man in the locomotive hat followed Gu Chunmei all the way, wanting to find a secluded place to make his move.
It gets dark early in winter. It was already dark after five o'clock. Gu Chunmei had already sensed the danger behind her and trotted all the way to the compound. The man in the locomotive hat cursed and chased after her.
Fortunately, Lin Yao was craving for tofu pudding, and Gu Shi'an was not at home.
She called Dongzi to go with her, and the two of them went to the supply and marketing cooperative to buy tofu pudding with umbrellas and flashlights. As soon as they came out of the alley, they bumped into Gu Chunmei.
Gu Chunmei didn't see clearly who she bumped into, so she said sorry and wanted to run again.
Lin Yao quickly grabbed her, "Sister Chunmei, why are you running?"
Gu Chunmei's face turned pale, and she said anxiously, "Yaoyao, someone is chasing me! They've been chasing me all the way!"
Lin Yao and the other person's expressions changed.
The guy with the locomotive hat was also a reckless guy. When he saw the extremely pretty Lin Yao and the little kid Dongzi who was not to be feared, evil thoughts flashed through his eyes. He licked his lips and came over to pull Gu Chunmei and the other girl apart.
Lin Yao got angry and picked up the flashlight, shone it on the train driver's head and hit him on the face.
Flashlights these days are all those old-fashioned ones made of pure iron. They feel heavy and bulky in the hand, and they hurt a lot when they hit people.
Gu Shidong also pulled his sister over to finish him off. The three of them beat the guy with the locomotive hat so hard that he screamed and screamed, and he had no power to fight back at all.
The neighbors of the steel plant came out to see what was
happening. Lin Yao kept talking. Hu Tou's father, a big and strong man, was immediately furious. He slapped the locomotive driver's hat twice and sent him to the police station. Zhang Cuilan and her husband were scared when they heard about this. They were grateful for Yao Yao's courage and Dong Zi's bravery. Otherwise, it's hard to say what would happen to the three children.
The world is really unsafe now.
The locomotive driver was locked in the interrogation room with his hands burning. Facing the police's interrogation, he still wanted to play rogue and said it was just a misunderstanding and he was just passing by. He should not be accused of anything just because he was a refugee from the famine.
The young police officer was not angry, but smiled and said, "If you don't accept my toast, you will be punished. You asked for it yourself, don't blame others."
Then he left the interrogation room.
The man in the locomotive hat shuddered, feeling as if he had done something wrong, and that an inexplicable danger was coming... The man
in the locomotive hat was terrified. Snowflakes were flying outside, and suddenly the door of the interrogation room opened, and a tall young man walked in. The light in the interrogation room was too dim, so he couldn't see the man's face at all. He only saw a pair of water drops on the man's dark hair, and his handsome eyebrows were cold, like a layer of winter frost. The man
in the locomotive hat didn't know what was going on, and he shivered in his chair for no reason.
"......."
When the incident with the locomotive hat came up, Xu Xiangqian, who was always good-tempered, was as gloomy as water and gave the locomotive hat a good scolding.
From then on, no matter how busy Xu Xiangqian was, he would always take time to pick up and drop off Gu Chunmei when she went to and from work.
As for the delicate Lin Yao, if Deputy Director Gu didn't pick her up on time one day, she would
get angry and scold him directly. Deputy Director Gu was scolded, but he still had to coax her in a gentle voice.
The old Gu family thought that this matter would be over.
Unexpectedly, three days before the Laba Festival, the disaster victims in Yunshui County were hungry and cold. A leader was misleading and led a group of disaster victims to smash the door of the Laojie Supply and Marketing Cooperative, looted all the goods in the supply and marketing cooperative, and relied on their numbers to injure the patrol militia.
The militia had guns in their hands, but they could not just start looting. When the county leaders learned about this, they were furious. The saying that poor mountains and bad waters produce unruly people is not without reason.
county leaders felt that the disaster victims were also helpless and did not order severe beatings. Now it seems that being soft-hearted will only cause more harm. Moreover, the so-called disaster victims robbed and injured people in a serious manner, and not beating them severely is not enough to appease the people!
Since then, Yunshui County's vigorous and swift “anti-gangster campaign” has begun. The county public security bureau acted quickly, and in less than one night, they caught those suspects who were roaming the streets.
Several waves of suspects fled overnight, but were caught in the dragnet set up by the public security bureau. Gu Shi'an came back at night with a chill all over his body.
Lin Yao had already closed her eyes and lay down obediently, hoping to sleep well tonight.
You know, someone hasn't eaten her for several days.
In the morning, Lin Yao teased Deputy Director Gu, bit his ear, and deliberately bullied him.
As a result, as soon as Gu Shi'an got into bed at night, he grabbed the little girl and "bullied" her, making her beg for mercy.
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