Chapter 47 Father and Son Argument
Du Li opened the gate to the cattle pen, and the chickens, ducks, and geese inside rushed towards him. He grabbed his whip and drove them out.
"Brother-in-law, are these all your pets?" Meng Chun came over to help.
Du Li grunted in response. He watched as the poultry ran out of the cattle pen and immediately began searching for food in the grass, looking extremely hungry. He asked angrily, "Dad, didn't you help me feed them?"
"Why didn't you feed them? You did, your sister-in-law fed them for you. She probably didn't feed them enough. You have so many, feeding them all would take a lot of food, she probably didn't want to waste any." Father Du knew his eldest daughter-in-law's character well. He glanced west; Du Min was almost out of the village. He was losing patience and urged, "Go see what your wife is doing, why hasn't she come out yet? Maybe she should stay home, I'll go with your father-in-law's family first."
"What's the rush? Qingniang has a child to take care of." Meng's father was displeased.
“There are insects in the mulberry field. It’s best if she takes the child and doesn’t go there, lest the child get bitten by the insects,” Mr. Du explained.
Meng's father ignored him, and he also busied himself helping Du Li herd chickens, ducks, and geese.
When the four geese saw the stranger, they spread their wings, raised their necks, and charged at him menacingly, showing no fear whatsoever, their calls growing louder and louder with each honking.
“These geese are pretty fierce.” Meng Chun was pinched, and he picked up a goose by the neck and threw it away.
"Go away, go away." Du Li came over and shooed him away, laughing as he said, "I specifically chose to raise geese with fierce temperaments. There are no snakes where there are geese. I raise them to keep snakes away."
In the south room next to the cowshed, Wang Zhou heard the goose calling. He straightened up and looked up sideways.
Meng Qing suppressed a laugh, silently letting him stare at her.
"Hey, hey, hey! Where do you think you're going?" Meng's mother chased a goose into the yard, and the loud "Goose, goose, goose—" sound clearly entered the house.
Wang Zhou stopped eating. He struggled to sit up, gripping Meng Qing's collar tightly with both hands, and turned his head to stare at the door in horror.
Meng Qing straightened her clothes, picked up the child, and went out the door. As soon as she opened the door, Wang Zhou peeked out to look for her, just in time to see Meng Chun playfully grabbing the goose by the neck and throwing it away. The goose became even more aggressive, getting up and rushing towards Meng Chun with loud cries.
Upon hearing the familiar call, Wang Zhou suddenly shuddered and turned to look at Meng Qing.
Meng Qing gazed at him with a smile, then deliberately made a "goose" sound. The next moment, Wang Zhou's eyes widened as he stared intently at her. Suddenly, he burst into tears.
Meng Qing laughed loudly, "You ignorant coward, hahaha."
"Why are you crying?" Meng's mother came over and said, "Your father-in-law is urging us to hurry up. Let's go, don't delay."
Wang Zhou burst into tears, turning around and opening his arms for his mother to hug him.
"My dear grandson, why are you crying?" Meng's mother couldn't understand. She took the child and saw Meng Qing smiling. She asked suspiciously, "Did you bully him?"
"No," Meng Qing said innocently. "He was probably scared by the goose."
The mention of geese made Wang Zhou cry even louder.
"Don't be afraid, don't be afraid. The goose won't bully you. If it dares to, your father will break its neck." Meng's mother picked up Wangzhou and laughed, "Why are you still afraid of geese? Have you never seen them before?"
Wang Zhou didn't listen. His eyes were brimming with tears as he cautiously peered behind him.
Meng Qing laughed loudly, "You fool."
"What's wrong?" Du Li asked.
"I'm afraid of geese." Mencius' mother laughed. "Come on, you all drive the geese ahead."
Du Li went to pick up the five live chickens he had caught from the Meng family and called to Meng Qing, "Come on, what are you grinning about all by yourself for?"
“You don’t understand.” Meng Qing didn’t tell anyone. She followed behind with her hands behind her back, leisurely walking at the back. When Wang Zhou looked at her, she grinned at him.
"Brother-in-law, how much did you pay for these four geese?" Meng Chun asked.
“These are one-year-old geese. Live geese cost 18 coins per catty, and each one costs around 130 or 140 coins. The largest one costs 150 coins,” Du Li said. “Why are you asking this? Do you also want to buy geese? Two- or three-year-old geese are more expensive.”
Meng Chun turned to Meng Qing and asked, "Sister, how about we buy two geese and raise them at the paper craft shop? Geese make a lot of noise and can also guard the door."
"Didn't you say you wanted to get a dog?" Meng Qing asked. "Let's get a dog instead. Geese eat and poop a lot, they're more troublesome than chickens."
“Yes, geese are fine to raise in the countryside. There’s water and grass, and they can find their own food. But if you raise them in the city, you have to feed them a pound or two of grain every day,” Du Li said. “If you want to raise dogs to guard the house, I can find you two puppies in the countryside.”
“Okay.” Meng Chun quickly changed his attitude. He had only gotten into it on a whim. He thought geese were fun to raise, and they could also lay eggs.
Wang Zhou listened to them talking, his head bobbing back and forth. After holding it in for a while, he suddenly let out a "goose" sound.
"Oh! He can imitate a goose's call now!" Mencius' mother heard this.
Wang Zhou called out again, straightened his back and looked back, reaching out to ask Meng Qing to hug him again.
"What? Did you find out your mother is a human and not a goose? Or did you find out you're a goose too?" Meng Qing quickened her pace to catch up with him and teased him. She slapped his hand away and called him a silly boy.
Mencius' mother finally understood. "Did you do something to scare him to tears? I remember now, you used to make 'goose, goose, goose' noises before. No wonder he was afraid of geese."
Meng Qing laughed again, and everyone else laughed too, except for Du's father, who looked annoyed. He kept looking ahead and finally spotted Du Min by the river at the end of the village.
Du Min didn't know where Du Li's mulberry fields were. He could only wait by the river after leaving the village. As he stayed alone, his anger gradually subsided.
When the Meng family members came over laughing, he asked curiously, "What are you laughing at?"
“Your second sister-in-law imitated a goose’s call and scared Wang Zhou. That silly child has never seen a goose in the city, he has only heard his mother imitate a goose’s call. Today, when he suddenly saw a goose, he was so scared that he wouldn’t let his mother hold him,” said Meng’s mother.
Du Min smiled. "My second sister-in-law deliberately scared him? She's still like this?"
Du Laoding stared at Du Min, and now he was certain that Du Min's attitude had truly changed; he was quite close to the Meng family.
Du Min was annoyed by the scrutinizing gazes directed at him. He turned his head to look back and asked directly, "What are you looking at me for?"
Du Laoding looked away and turned to Meng's father, saying, "My dear in-laws, my son has gained a lot of weight thanks to your care. He looks quite energetic."
Meng's father thought to himself, "You've thanked the wrong person. He never worried about Du Min at all. The one who should be thanked is Du Li, who brought Du Min nourishing soups and broths every single day during the sweltering summer."
"We're all family, it's only right," Meng's father mumbled in response.
Mr. Du's expression changed. These words sounded harsh to him. Who was he related to?
After walking along the river for about the time it takes to burn an incense stick, the terrain rises to the northwest. At the bend in the river, there is a dry paddy field, which is connected to a large mulberry field with sturdy trees growing in it.
"Son-in-law, is this the mulberry field under your name?" Meng's father asked.
“No, this mulberry field is mine. My mulberry field was only allocated last year, and the mulberry, jujube, and elm trees were also planted last year. They are short and sparse.” Du Li drove the chickens, ducks, and geese into the mulberry field and left them to their own devices, letting them scavenge for grass and insects in other people’s mulberry fields. He patted a thick elm tree and said, “This big elm tree is at least seven or eight years old.”
Meng Qing saw a grove of jujube trees, each tree was ten feet tall, but there were no jujubes on them anymore.
“My dear in-law, the trees you planted in your mulberry fields are quite tall, aren’t they? If you haven’t sold them, they must be twenty or thirty years old,” Meng’s father asked.
Old Du nodded, "We'll see which year Du Min takes the imperial examination. When that time comes, I'll sell all the jujube and elm trees in the mulberry field. I can get at least thirty or forty strings of cash."
Du Min glanced at it.
"Father, have you sold the dates from your mulberry field?" Meng Qing asked.
"They're all sold. The brokers came to buy them," said Old Ding Du. "You want to eat some, right? Tell me earlier next year, and I'll save some dates from one tree."
“I have some,” Du Li told Meng Qing. “I transplanted more than ten jujube trees that were two or three years old last year, and they’ve borne fruit this year. You can go pick some later.”
Meng Qing nodded.
Further ahead, you'll see Du Li's mulberry fields. The trees in the mulberry fields are short and sparse, and you can clearly see a thatched hut.
The thatched hut wasn't big, but it was quite tidy. Du Li had chosen a good location, using four jujube trees as stakes and elm branches as railings around it. The gaps were filled with straw, and he had even trimmed the bits of straw. The thatched hut was simple but not sloppy.
"Dad, Mom, watch your step. I've put up a fence of vines around the shed to keep snakes away. Don't let it snag your pants," Du Li reminded them. He threw five live chickens into the coop, pointed to the doorless shed connected to the main shed, and said, "This is where I cook. I built a two-burner stove out of mud, and it works quite well."
Then, he opened the door of the thatched hut, inside which was a wooden bed he had built himself, with a clothes trunk stacked at the foot of the bed, and buckets and wooden basins stuffed under the bed.
Du Min felt a poke in the back. He turned his head, and Du Laoding waved his hand, signaling him to follow.
Du Min thought for a moment, then followed. The father and son walked silently forward until they could no longer hear the voices coming from the thatched hut, at which point they stopped.
"What do you want to say?" Du Min asked directly.
"What? Still angry?" Old Du asked with a smile. "I thought you came back because you knew you were wrong. Was I wrong?"
Du Min was silent for a moment, then said, "I was remorseful, but what was your attitude when I came back? One ignored me, the other was sarcastic, and my mother even chased after me and cursed me in front of outsiders. I'm not a three-year-old child, I have my pride."
He got angrier and angrier as he spoke. Last time at the Meng family, his second sister-in-law had bluntly told him that he cared about his reputation. She even asked them directly why they, as parents, didn't know how to protect the reputation of their juniors. Why didn't they know any remorse?
“That’s just how your mother is. If she’s even slightly unhappy, she’ll throw a tantrum. She’s the kind of person who can’t be respectable. You haven’t been back for almost half a year, and when you finally come back, you’re with the Meng family. She’s always disliked your second sister-in-law’s mother, and she doesn’t get along with your second sister-in-law either. She thinks the Meng family came to laugh at her and her mother for not getting along.” Old Du said with a look of disgust, “I spent all night trying to persuade her last night before she finally agreed to greet everyone with a smile. But she can’t hold her temper in; she changed her attitude in the blink of an eye.”
"Just because of this, you two are giving me attitude?" Du Min didn't understand this absurd reason. He wanted to resolve this issue completely, and asked bluntly again, "I've never understood why you embarrass me in front of outsiders. You did this outside the prefectural school before, and you slapped me in the street too. I thought I had made things clear to you, but you haven't changed at all. Are you doing this to let people know that you are right and I am wrong? Are you trying to force me to back down by making me lose face?"
Du Laoding's smile faded. "Didn't you come back to apologize?"
“I came back to admit my mistake. I was just being vain before, and I felt that you had embarrassed me. I was wrong to do something unfilial.” Du Min said these words in a calm tone.
Du Laoding heard what he wanted to hear, but he was not satisfied. He felt a sense of emptiness, like he had swung a sledgehammer high but only managed to kill a mosquito.
"Okay, I forgive you, let's put this behind us." Old Ding forced himself to say these words. He made a request: "I won't bring this up again, but you have to act like a proper son. Your attitude is unacceptable. You yell at your mother and are impatient with me. It makes me uncomfortable. Du Min, I don't know if you heard something from someone, but when I saw you this time, you seemed like a different person."
Du Min frowned. He wasn't stupid; he keenly understood his father's meaning. "You mean to say that the Meng family instigated me to turn against you?"
"Today is neither the beginning nor the end of the month. Is it really the prefectural school's ten-day holiday? You took leave to come back, didn't you? Is it to hang out with the Meng family?" Old Du asked bluntly. "You've always looked down on merchants, so why are you suddenly getting close to the Meng family? No wonder your mother is suspicious; I don't understand it either."
"The Meng family is our in-laws, our two families are relatives, they have helped me a lot, why can't I be close to them?" Du Min laughed, he said sarcastically, "Father, I remember you called me an ungrateful wretch, now that I know how to be grateful, you're not satisfied. Father, I understand, you want a son who completely obeys you and only listens to your commands. If you give me a penny, I'd better give you a string in return; if someone gives me a string, and I give back a penny, it's a betrayal of you. Am I right? You are too selfish. Before you accuse me of being ungrateful, examine yourselves."
Du Min recalled Meng Qing's words; his parents' imprint was truly etched into his very bones.
Du Laoding's face twitched. He truly felt powerless. The son in front of him could never go back to the way he used to be. This seemingly righteous son made him uneasy. Facing him, he even felt the same fear he had when facing Meng Qing—the fear of having his thoughts exposed, as well as the shame and anger of being betrayed.
"Father, do you really treat me as your son?" Du Min asked in disappointment. "Why can't you treat me with sincerity?"
"Haven't we been sincere enough to you? Before this year, I never laid a finger on you. All the money we had was spent on you. Even the money your mother and I painstakingly saved was for you. Isn't that sincerity? What kind of sincerity do you want?" Old Ding Du said angrily. "Du Min, you are truly ungrateful. Even if you don't compare yourself to your older brothers, go and compare yourself to the sons of Dujiawan. Which man in the whole village is better off than you? You say your mother and I aren't sincere to you? If we weren't sincere to you, would we have raised you to be like this? Go and look throughout Wuxian County. Can you find someone like you who dares to yell at their parents? You are unfilial and disobedient, yet you are fearless. What makes you so fearless? It's because you know that your mother and I spoil you and won't do anything to you. No matter how disappointed we are, we will never ruin you, so you are not afraid."
Du Min lowered his eyes, feeling a sense of shame at having his thoughts exposed.
"Am I right? You still dare to say we weren't sincere with you?" Old Du's eyes were full of disappointment. "I heard the Meng family is holding some kind of banquet on a painted boat. Their business is booming, and you're not short of money anymore? You look down on us and don't need us anymore? You want to turn around and kick us far away?"
“Du Min, let me tell you today, you’re wrong if you think like that. If you continue to treat your mother and me like this, then you unfilial son shouldn’t go on to teach or become an official and harm people. You should come back and farm the land honestly, and experience the hardship your mother and I endure toiling in the soil to support you.” Old Ding Du couldn’t let Du Min continue like this. He wouldn’t listen to reason, so he had to resort to his trump card.
Du Min's heart tightened, and he looked up.
“I’m not joking with you. Someone like you who disobeys even his own parents has no respect or fear in his heart. How much success he can achieve in the future will determine how much trouble he will cause. I don’t only have you as my son. I have other sons and grandsons. I can’t let them suffer because of you.” Old Du’s words were eloquent.
Du Min laughed loudly. What kind of heinous person was he? Just because he disobeyed his parents, he was presumed to commit heinous crimes? How absurd!
"What are you laughing at?" Old Du asked, his face flushed with anger. "Do you think I'm joking with you?"
"Being a parent is so great, you become emperors just by having children. Father, you must be dreaming about how to control the three of us brothers, right?" Du Min pressed closer and asked.
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