Chapter 7 A Copper Coin
The mountain road is difficult to walk on, and there are many thorny bushes on both sides of the path.
Chen Yao held the tiger bone knife at her waist, raised her head and looked at the "V-shaped" geese flying overhead, and breathed a sigh of relief.
The three of them walked out of the mountain stream and arrived at Shahe Township. The cries of hawkers, one louder than the other, spread into the countryside.
Yang Wenying was in charge of guarding the load under the willow tree. She watched Chen Yao and Huang Dongsheng running around in the fields asking questions, and hurriedly took out jars and bowls of water from the basket.
Over here, Chen Yao went to the fields to help an old man pull out wheat stalks in order to sell tofu. "Sir, do you want tofu? I just made it this morning. You can mix it with some green onions and drizzle it with sesame oil at noon. It's both refreshing and goes well with rice."
"Two cents a piece?"
Chen Yao was delighted when she heard this and said with a smile: "Sir, one penny is enough. We are from the same village. You can also ask your family to exchange needles, thread, cloth, soybeans and vegetable seeds."
It was noon at this time, and everyone was busy in the fields, sweating profusely. Suddenly, a stranger came and said he was selling tofu. They enthusiastically helped them with some farm work. No matter what, they would not directly chase him away.
The old man took off his straw hat and fanned himself. He glanced at the wheat stalks in Chen Yao's hand and said to his eldest son who was following him, "Go home and ask your mother for a penny."
"I understand, Dad." The man ran back home.
When he returned to the field, he was followed by an old woman who was holding a basket and asked Chen Yao, "Where is the tofu?"
"It's right there with the big willow tree." Chen Yao pointed and continued to pull out the wheat stubble in the field.
"Okay, go ask other people's fields. It's time for us to take a break." The old man asked his family to leave and go to the slope on the ridge of the field.
Chen Yao saw that most of the farmers had already started to take a break for lunch, so she called Huang Dongsheng back and said, "Cousin, let's go after they finish their meal and take a break. Don't lose heart."
Huang Dongsheng wiped the sweat from his forehead and walked side by side with his cousin: "Sister, Shahe Township is richer than our village."
"Huh? How did you know that?" Chen Yao just walked under the big willow tree when she saw the old lady taking the bowl away. She greeted her face and said, "Auntie, we'll have dried bean curd sheets for sale next time you come."
The old lady rolled her eyes at Chen Yao.
"Sister, she treated you like that, and you still smiled?" Huang Dongsheng couldn't laugh. He had been talking in the field for a long time but no one paid attention to him.
Yang Wenying watched the two people approaching and hurriedly picked up a pitcher of water to pour for them to drink. "Look what this is?"
Yang Wenying took out something mysteriously from his waist.
A copper coin!
Chen Yao wasn't surprised when she saw the copper coin. Instead, Huang Dongsheng choked on his water and said, "I actually managed to get some money!"
Chen Yao tutted, "Cousin, we are doing serious business, how can we be so coaxing?"
Yang Wenying handed the penny to Chen Yao and quickly agreed: "Don't talk nonsense, someone who doesn't know will think there's something wrong with our tofu."
As soon as she finished speaking, Chen Yao and Huang Dongsheng looked at her in unison.
Yang Wenying quickly turned around and explained, "That's not what I meant. I meant that there will definitely be no problem with our deal."
After saying that, he took out the bean curd dregs pancake that Chen Yao had made that morning from the basket and handed it over.
Under the big willow tree, the three of them ate a mouthful of bean curd cake and drank a sip of cold water, and finally filled their stomachs half full.
Huang Dongsheng looked at the remaining three pieces of tofu in the basket with a worried look on his face. After eating, he asked Chen Yao for advice on how to coax people, no, how to make people willingly buy their tofu.
Chen Yao looked at the people eating on the ridges of the fields and asked, "What kind of people would be willing to pay for our tofu?"
"Of course they are rich people. In fact, our tofu is not expensive at one cent." Yang Wenying sat upright and followed Chen Yao's gaze. He didn't know what was so good about those farmers.
"Cousin, the people in Shahe Township are rich. I saw that they all wore cloth shoes when they went to the fields. They didn't even wear straw sandals outside, but..." Huang Dongsheng couldn't understand. Since they had money, why didn't they buy some?
His question was also what Yang Wenying was confused about.
They both looked at Chen Yao at the same time, waiting for her to clarify.
"Tofu isn't meat. Even though we have money, we're just ordinary people. We eat whatever we want. If you want to sell it, you have to tell people how to eat it."
"How else can you eat tofu?" Huang Dongsheng came from a poor family and had limited knowledge. Chen Yao's words did not enlighten him.
Yang Wenying, however, reacted and said after thinking for a while, "I have eaten two dishes before. One is tofu stuffed with meatballs. It should be tofu and minced meat pounded into balls. The meatballs are tender and chewy. The other is tofu soup. The tofu is cut into thin strands like hair, and the broth made from sea cucumber is poured over the tofu shreds. The soup is delicious."
Huang Dongsheng was drooling as he listened.
"You feel like eating it after hearing that, right?" Chen Yao teased him.
Huang Dongsheng turned his face away in shame, then turned back to look at Chen Yao: "Cousin, what she said is not something that people like us can afford, right?"
He knew minced meat, which was pork chopped into paste, but what was sea cucumber?
Chen Yao felt a little sad when she heard this.
"You just need to treat her words as a gimmick to sell tofu. Think about it, the tofu that rich families eat is also available to ordinary people like us. And it only costs one penny, or you can buy it by exchanging something. If you were in my shoes, would you buy it?"
Huang Dongsheng suddenly came to his senses and approached Chen Yao: "Cousin, I understand. We have to compete with each other to sell our tofu. It's cheaper than in Qingfeng Town, so we should sell it in the village. This way, they won't be taken advantage of. Is that right?"
The words may be rough, but the logic is sound.
Rich farmers also broke a copper coin into two halves to spend. They all made a living by working in the fields. No one's money came from the wind.
Chen Yao stood up, patted the two on the shoulders and said confidently: "Don't worry, work hard, and we can also eat tofu stuffed meatballs and tofu soup."
"Sister, I believe you." Huang Dongsheng rubbed his hands and worked hard.
After a short rest, the two men introduced their own tofu to the people of Shahe Township again.
While Huang Dongsheng and Shen Yao were praising the tofu to the skies, Yang Wenying had already sold out a whole rack.
Yang Wenying sighed as she looked at the sack of soybeans and a pile of hemp ropes scattered in the basket. Only today did she realize how difficult it was to earn a penny.
If I continue like this, I don’t know when I can redeem my brother.
"Hey, I'm talking to you. Can you exchange these vegetable seeds for tofu?" The lady standing next to the carrying pole took out a square piece of cloth, which contained several different vegetable seeds.
Yang Wenying's thoughts were interrupted. She took a look and didn't recognize the person. She was afraid that the person was trying to trick her with grass seeds, so she called Chen Yao back.
"Auntie, can I take a look at the vegetable seeds you brought?"
"Look, these are the seeds saved this year. I guarantee they will sprout when you take them home and plant them." The old lady handed the piece of cloth to Chen Yao and let her look at it.
Chen Yao lowered her head and used her fingers to move the seeds mixed together: mostly pumpkin, cabbage and radish seeds, with only ten kidney beans, each of which was plump.
"You can exchange these seeds for two yuan." Chen Yao poured the seeds into a small storage bag, returned the cloth to the old lady, and signaled Yang Wenying to serve the tofu.
The old lady looked at the two pieces of tofu stacked in the bowl and smiled like a wild flower ruffled by the wind: "Just these few seeds can be exchanged for two pieces?"
"If you have other vegetable seeds at home, you can exchange them later."
Hearing this, the old lady slapped her thigh, her face full of regret. "The chives in my vegetable garden will be ready for harvest soon. In previous years, the chickens have eaten them all. This year, I have to save them to exchange for your tofu. I just don't know when you will come."
"As long as the weather is fine, we will come with our loads on our shoulders."
"That's great! I'll keep it for you." The old lady happily returned home carrying the tofu.
As the sun was setting, the three of them walked out of Shahe Township and headed home.
On the way back, Huang Dongsheng was listlessly hanging at the back of the team with his load on his shoulder.
This time, the three of them only earned a copper coin, and there were still 18 blocks of tofu left in their carrying poles that had not been sold. At this moment, they were as worried as little old men.
Looking at my cousin again, she actually had the mind to take Yang Wenying to squat on the roadside to dig wild onions.
"Brother Dongsheng, are you tired? Let me carry the burden for a while." Chen Yao put the wild onions in the basket, patted the dirt on her hands, and was about to take the burden from Huang Dongsheng's shoulders.
Huang Dongsheng shook his head like a rattle: "I'm not tired, cousin, let's not go to my aunt's house. If Brother Baolai sees that we still have so much tofu left, he'll probably laugh at us."
After thinking for a moment, Chen Yao asked, "Do you feel ashamed that you haven't sold all the tofu, or do you think what I said before was just empty talk?"
Huang Dongsheng carried the load on his shoulder and didn't dare to say a word. He felt that he couldn't even exchange all the tofu today, so this deal was definitely not going to work, let alone bringing Brother Baolai and the others to do it in the future.
The air around them condensed instantly, making people feel suffocated.
This atmosphere made Yang Wenying a little nervous. She stood there holding the wild onion in her hand and didn't dare to walk towards the two of them.
Chen Yao took the load off Huang Dongsheng's shoulders and walked forward without saying a word.
"Sister Yao! Cousin!" Huang Dongsheng chased after her and shouted at her, wanting to apologize. He shouldn't have embarrassed his cousin in front of outsiders.
Chen Yao held the hemp rope with both hands and carried the load, walking in front without responding.
When they arrived at Shanghe Village, they greeted their aunt's family who were busy in the fields with a smile, left six blocks of tofu, and then the three of them arrived at the Shen family.
"Mom and Dad, we are back." Chen Yao put down the burden, opened the lid of the water tank, scooped up some water with a ladle and drank it.
Shen Qingshan couldn't move in the main house. He could only respond loudly and call for the child's mother to come out quickly.
Huang Xing came out of the kitchen after hearing the noise. Seeing the three children safely home, she felt relieved. "I don't need to worry about getting stomach upset even if I drink raw water."
"Second uncle, cousin, I'll go home first." Huang Dongsheng was covered in dust and didn't dare to look at Chen Yao. He said goodbye to Huang Xing and was about to run away.
Chen Yao grabbed the man and said, "Stop, we haven't settled the bill yet."
"Cousin, let's not divide these. I..." Huang Dongsheng looked at the worthless soybeans and coarse cloth in the basket. His cousin's family needed these more.
If he brings it home, his mother will definitely beat him for being ignorant.
"Wenying, bring the sand table and things to the main house." Chen Yao dragged Huang Dongsheng into the house, not allowing him to escape.
Yang Wenying didn't dare to provoke Chen Yao now, and just did whatever she was told. On the way back to the village, she found that if Chen Yao didn't speak and had a cold face, she looked quite intimidating.
Shen Qingshan saw that the three children had strange expressions on their faces, so he winked at his wife and asked what was going on.
Huang Xing sat on the edge of the bed and shook her head, indicating that she didn't know either.
"Cousin, I should go back." Huang Dongsheng felt uneasy and stood up from the bench.
Chen Yao counted the number of hemp ropes and coarse cloth, and asked Yang Wenying to count them on the sand table. She glanced at Huang Dongsheng lightly, and just one glance scared him so much that he immediately sat down obediently.
"Ayao, what happened to you?"
"Mom, cousin Dongsheng thinks our business has no future and wants to disband." Chen Yao put down the weight and looked up at Huang Dongsheng. "Am I right, cousin?"
Huang Dongsheng was young after all, and when provoked by Chen Yao's words, he spoke out his true feelings: "Second uncle, second aunt, my cousin is right, I just don't want to do this anymore."
Huang Xing stood up and went over to try to reconcile: "Good boy, if you have anything to say, let's sit down and talk slowly."
Huang Dongsheng turned around and complained to his second aunt: "Today we only earned one penny and carried back 18 blocks of tofu. Aunt, why are we still doing this unprofitable business?"
"Who told you that we lost money in this business?" Chen Yao met everyone's gaze calmly.
No loss?
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