Chapter 21 Carve the world seventeen

Carve the World Seventeen (1) In Shiping East Street shop, rats beg for wives, roosters come to pull horses, and minks come to shake the shop. ——Yunnan Folk Songs There are two wealthy families in Zhengying, Shiping County, the Duan family and the Zheng family.The owner of the Duan family, Duan Yunsheng, worked in the Dongfanghuili Bank, which was run by an old Frenchman. After making a fortune, he returned to Zhengying and wanted to build a mansion—the Duan Family Courtyard.Duan Yunsheng asked a German to draw a drawing of the Duan family compound for his family. It was a German-style western-style building covering an area of ​​over a hundred acres, with high walls on three sides, a huge pond in front, and a blockhouse on each side. .The main building is built in the center, and there is a watchtower like a bunker on each side of it. Between the watchtowers is a row of long buildings with wide and long corridors.In the courtyard in front of the building is a rockery, with a huge fish pond under the mountain, and a fountain four or five meters high on the mountain.There is also a basement downstairs with secret passages.On the hill behind the building is a tall tower, and the whole castle uses running water.

Zheng Kaiming, the owner of the Zheng family, is the major shareholder of Gejiu Tin Mine and a member of the Taxation Committee of Gejiu Tin Mine. While developing the tin mine, he transported tin to Sichuan and Hong Kong, and bought cloth and department stores after selling it. , transported back to southern Yunnan for sale, and obtained high profits, so he became the richest man in southern Yunnan.Zheng Kaiming also wanted to build a big house——Zheng Family Garden, a Chinese-style deep house compound. The construction of the Duan Family Courtyard and the Zheng Family Garden started almost at the same time, so the two secretly competed to see who would have the greater influence.At first, both families received equal attention and admiration from everyone.However, the situation later changed subtly, that is, when Zheng Kaiming heard the story of Zhou Ziya stealing the wooden lattice door of Gao Shimei in Xinlin Village in Lin'an City, he said to his family: "Gao Shimei must be a skilled carpenter. We can’t steal his wood-carved lattice door, but we can invite him to carve the lattice door for my house.” Sure enough, the Zheng family sent someone to Xinlin Village, Nilang Town, Xizong County, to invite Gao Shimei, but of course the people in Xinlin Village would not let him Gao Shimei leaves them.The people sent by the Zheng family took coercive measures and snatched Gao Shimei to Zheng's house in the middle of the night without any explanation, provided him with the best food, and paid him the highest wages.Gao Shimei was finally moved by the spirit of the Zheng family and agreed to stay and work for the Zheng family.

Gao Shimei still only sculpts for two or three hours a day as in Xinlin Village, and only when the sun is shining at noon does he open his eyes that seem to be always hazy and sleepy.The members of the Zheng family said that Master Gao had to sleep in every day, and never got up before nine o'clock on that day.As a result, how to pay wages has become a big problem.This kind of labor of Gao Shimei, because there is no concept of time, no time standard, no labor intensity, and even no labor image and hard-working quality that a craftsman should have.How to do it?The members of the Zheng family pondered hard, and finally got enlightenment from Gao Shimei's slow image and movements: Gao Shimei's day is definitely not a complete day. A pinch of wood flour.And these fine wood residues, wood chips and wood powder have weight, so they came up with a strange way of paying wages - exchanging wood residues, wood chips and wood powder for gold and silver.In the first stage of carving, Gao Shimei did rough work, and the Zheng family exchanged a catty of wood residue for a tael of silver; in the second stage, it was fine work, and the Zheng family exchanged a tael of wood chips for a catty of silver; in the third stage What Gao Shimei does is the most delicate work, there is no wood slag and sawdust, only wood powder, and these wood powders seem to have lost weight, just some insignificant dust-like things.Therefore, the Zheng family exchanged one tael of gold for one tael of sawdust.Therefore, Gao Shimei lives in a kind of shining day, a kind of golden dream.Of course, Gao Shimei does not live on these gold and silver. Every day, he is provided with high-quality food free of charge by the Zheng family, and this high-quality food has basic standards, that is, there must be a bowl of pork, a salted duck egg, and a piece of meat. A pot of vegetables, plus a bowl of white rice.In addition, it is necessary to provide enough opium for Gao Shimei to smoke.These conditions were negotiated in advance, and the Zheng family has always strictly fulfilled their promises. Day after day, month after month, year after year, they delivered the best meals and opium to Gao Shimei.Gao Shimei, one shining day after another, penetrates his beloved carving knife deep into the wood's textured nerves, and at the same time presents his sense of time, life, religion and mystery in his sleepy eyes and dreams Monsters, dragons, horses, turtles, courts, gardens, swords and guns, banners, waves, clouds, rocks, trees, figures, etc., are deeply injected into the wood, allowing them to grow and show their own mysteries, charms, images, Personality and color.

Carve the World Seventeen (2) Gao Shimei's wood carving art gradually made people in Zheng Ying feel the marvelousness of Zheng's garden. Everyone's attention and praise almost shifted to Gao Shimei's wood carving lattice door and wood carving window.Because of this, the Duan family held a grudge and waited for an opportunity to retaliate. One day, the Duan family finally came up with a good way to get revenge-getting rid of Gao Shimei, which not only made the Zheng family's wooden lattice door fall by the wayside, but also brought bad luck to the Zheng family. After careful investigation, the Duan family discovered that Gao Shimei had a habit of eating, and almost ate a salted duck egg with every meal every day.The Duan family noticed that the head of the Zheng family would go to Mrs. Bai's house at the entrance of the village to buy salted duck eggs every one or two days, and Mrs. Bai often sent the best salted duck eggs to the Zheng family.

Mrs. Bai is a young widow living with a 3-year-old fool.Orphans and widows, very poor.But Mrs. Bai is very capable. She is not only a master of spinning and weaving, but also feeds a large group of ducks that lay eggs.She often takes the salted duck eggs to the market to sell.Her pickled duck eggs are excellent in color and fragrance, and are favored by Gao Shimei.Gao Shimei also developed the habit of eating salted duck eggs every day.Without salted duck eggs, he would not want to eat.Mrs. Bai also saved a lot of money because of this.At that time, there was a little hooligan in the neighborhood, nicknamed "Fei Xiaosi", who was idle and not doing business, and often bullied Mrs. Bai.Not only that, but Fei Xiaosi was also eyeing the money that Mrs. Bai had saved, planning to steal it.After Gao Shimei knew about this, she was determined to help Mrs. Bai defeat the little hooligan.

On a dark night, Fei Xiaosi sneaks under the fence of Mrs. Bai's house, trying to climb over the wall and enter the room.But when he listened carefully, he heard the sound of spinning wheels turning inside the house.He thought, this little widow is really hardworking, she is still spinning in the middle of the night.He had no choice but to lurk around Bai's house, planning to go in and steal in the middle of the night.If the timing is right, you can even tease the little widow.Unexpectedly, the spinning wheel was still spinning until dawn, so he had to leave resentfully. The second night, the third night... After waiting for several nights, Fei Xiaosi's attempt was not realized.Finally, Fei Xiaosi changed his mind and wanted to enter through the back door.As soon as he opened the door latch, he saw two ferocious wolf dogs lying at the door, about to rush at him.Fei Xiaosi was so frightened that he ran away.In this way, Fei Xiaosi no longer dared to bully Mrs. Bai.Of course, the secret was finally discovered.It turned out that Mrs. Bai neither spun yarn all night nor raised dogs.That is Gao Shimei, in order to protect Mrs. Bai, carved a special spinning wheel in her house, and carved two lifelike big wolf dogs at the back door.For this reason, Fei Xiaosi gritted his teeth at Gao Shimei and held a grudge.

Finally, the opportunity to take revenge on Gao Shimei came.The Duan family quietly found Fei Xiaosi, gave him a sum of money, asked him to buy poisonous needles and poisonous water from foreigners, and then taught Mrs. Bai's idiot son to play games on the salted duck eggs his mother left for the Zheng family—— Inject the salted duck eggs.When Mrs. Bai delivered the eggs, she found that some of them had broken shells, so she left the salted duck eggs in the bamboo basket and took them home to eat by herself.Her naive son doesn't eat pickled duck eggs.As a result, Mrs. Bai was poisoned, her hands trembled and her eyes went blind.

The Duan family did not let Gao Shimei go because of this.They found that Gao Shimei put on a neat blue coat whenever she was free, walked to the door of Mrs. Bai's house, and listened to Mrs. Bai's nagging about her family's misfortune.In fact, Gao Shimei had a strange feeling from the day she met Mrs. Bai, as if she had seen her somewhere?He is very familiar with her appearance, accent, eyes, and manners, especially her figure seems to have existed and flashed in his mind?But everything is uncertain, he can only believe that he met her in his dream.Sister-in-law Bai also seemed to know Gao Shimei. After telling a story of her own suffering, she did not forget to tell him the happiest thing in her heart.But Gao Shimei always felt that Mrs. Bai was still hiding the deepest secret from him, and the door of her heart was always tightly closed, without a single gap, as if it was pitch black inside.One night, the image of Mrs. Bai suddenly and clearly appeared in front of Gao Shimei, as if carrying the breath of morning.Gao Shimei opened her eyes wide in the dark, trying to see the details of Mrs. Bai's face clearly.The result surprised Gao Shimei. He saw "Yula", that shudderingly beautiful Dai girl.When this feeling came, Gao Shimei almost stopped thinking and breathing, he was afraid that his thinking and breathing would scare away "Yula".Gao Shimei stayed up all night, and made a whimsical guess: Sister-in-law Bai might be Yula from the past.But as soon as this fiery and almost absurd conjecture emerged, it was immediately extinguished by Gao Shimei's clear water of reason.Didn't An Ye say that Yula married Su Helin and went to Beijing to live a good life?By what law did the gods let her come here again?People can get confused and turn things upside down.However, God will not.

Carve the World Seventeen (3) But no matter what, now that Gao Shimei saw such a beautiful, gentle woman like Yula suddenly become blind, his heart ached like being gouged out by a knife.He is determined to continue helping Mrs. Bai, and even thinks in his heart that helping this woman who is as beautiful as Yula is another mission of his.He took out a bag of silver and handed it to her, telling her to hire a young man to feed and release ducks for her family.Gao Shimei no longer eats meat, but only eats Mrs. Bai's salted duck eggs.Every time, with the support of her son, Mrs. Bai asked to "meet" Gao Shimei when she delivered salted duck eggs to Zheng's house.At that time, Mrs. Bai never forgot to take out a small clean handkerchief, cover her eyes, and wipe away the tears in her eyes.She kept thanking Gao Shimei, and was often choked up and unable to speak.Gao Shimei was very disturbed and didn't know what to say to her?He couldn't think of any way to help her family any further.

The Duan family made a living after failing to make a living. They secretly ordered a small peddler to sell salt at the door of Mrs. Bai's house.Mrs. Bai went out and bought a few yuan, and took it back to soak duck eggs.Unexpectedly, there was poison in the salt, and after Gao Shimei ate a few poisoned duck eggs, her eyes were also blind. It happened that the French opened a "Gospel Hospital" in Zhengying, and the Zheng family sent Gao Shimei to the hospital for treatment. The "Gospel Hospital" is like a garden, with Western-style buildings, flower beds, and lawns. The aisles are paved with gravel, and there are neatly trimmed winter jasmine on both sides.The dean is an American, and there are 4 foreign doctors and 1 foreign head nurse.Foreign head nurses have real power and manage all the affairs of the hospital.Economic power is overseen by a foreign priest.The nurses and staff of the hospital are all Chinese.Gao Shimei came to the "Gospel Hospital" full of eager desire to cure his eye disease, but unexpectedly broke into God's "Kingdom of Heaven".In the hospital, God only wants all patients to be tame lambs and to be God's servants for life.On the first day Gao Shimei was admitted to the hospital, the dean asked him to pray to God, pray early in the morning, and pray for God to give wisdom, everything goes well, and everything is safe.Also pray before lunch and dinner, thanking God for water and food.Confess at night, admit what you did wrong during the day, and ask God for forgiveness.The dean is also a missionary. He said to the patient: "God gives equality, mercy and fraternity to everyone."Go Seok-mi refuses to pray.He said to the dean: "My Buddha said that there is a Pure Land method in the west. It is a paradise. The land is quiet and flat, and the climate is mild and moderate. It is a truly subtle and quiet place. People there have unlimited life spans and solemn appearance , not to fall into evil customs, not to suffer, but to enjoy all kinds of happiness. I have vowed to live in the West, and I will be guided by my Buddha at the end of my life." The dean said: "It's terrible, you are crazy." Gao Shimei said: "The dean With all due respect, sir, you are a bunch of real lunatics."

A few days later, Gao Shimei's symptoms disappeared quickly, and the world gradually became clearer in his eyes.But at this moment, because Gao Shimei repeatedly refused to pray and broke the rules of the hospital, the director ordered him to quit the hospital.From then on, Gao Shimei felt that her eyes were not working well, and she was hazy, as if she was only a small step away from the darkness. Strangely, after leaving the "Gospel Hospital", Gao Shimei aloofly came to Baisao's house and repeatedly persuaded Baisao to go to the "Gospel Hospital" for treatment.Sister-in-law Bai refused to listen, and Sister-in-law Bai said, "You have been kicked out yourself, why are you still persuading me to go in?" Gao Shimei said, "You are different from me, and I will never bow to foreigners. I have my own beliefs, and I will I don’t believe what they say.” Mrs. Bai said, “We eat fried carrots and cabbage every day. I also prayed to God to give me a glass of milk, a piece of bread and a plate of grilled ribs like a foreigner. Did you give me these things?" Gao Shimei said: "Stop talking nonsense, listen to me, and go to the 'Gospel Hospital' for treatment! The medical skills of foreigners are indeed very good, and their reputation is well-deserved. They can restore your eyes. See the world and see me again." Baisao said, "We don't have blue eyes and high noses, God will not bless us." Gao Shimei said, "After you go in, follow their instructions. One set, you do what they tell you to do. As long as it can cure your eyes, it doesn’t matter to bear it for a while.” Mrs. Bai said: "Master Gao, I will never go to the 'Gospel Hospital'. Do you know that when we Chinese poor go to the 'Gospel Hospital' to see a doctor, they charge a copper coin for medicine. I heard that in the outpatient department , a rural woman went to see a doctor with her child in her arms. The child’s condition was very serious and needed to be hospitalized, but she had to pay 40 silver dollars in advance before being admitted to the hospital. Even if there was a difference of one silver dollar, she could not be hospitalized. One child died without an injection. , his mother cried bitterly beside the dead child, while the dean pretended to walk up to the dead child, begging God to forgive the child's sins and let his soul go to heaven. A child who can't speak, what does he have Sin? They can't let a poor little life live in this world, but want his soul to ascend to heaven. Which reason is this?" Carve the World Seventeen (4) Gao Shimei looked at Mrs. Bai's empty and sad eyes, and after hearing her say so many reasonable words in one breath, he was speechless and stopped trying to persuade Mrs. Bai.Gao Shimei even found that Mrs. Bai had a transcendent and lingering beauty on her face. With a white face and black hair, she looked dignified and handsome, like a goddess.Then look at Mrs. Bai's hands and feet, which are naturally parked in their fixed positions, as calm as a stone.Gao Shimei understands that only a person with peace of mind can be so calm.Gao Shimei's heart moved slightly, it seemed to warm up suddenly, and her facial expression was also somewhat complicated.However, Gao Shimei immediately returned to normal. He thought he was just a little excited by Mrs. Bai's firm stand.However, Gao Shimei always finds it strange that she can always feel a familiar aura on Mrs. Bai's face and body, as if he had lived with her before. Gao Shimei still works unremittingly, constantly helping Mrs. Bai and her idiot son. Nine years passed, and Gao Shimei finally completed all the wooden lattice gates in Zheng's garden.Those 6 wooden lattice doors became the treasures of the town house of Zheng's Garden, and Zheng's Garden became famous all over Yunnan. One day, Zhou Mingda, a wealthy businessman from Gejiu City, came to Zheng’s Garden and was fascinated by Gao Shimei’s wooden lattice door. He immediately decided to build a Zhou’s Garden himself, and invited Gao Shimei to carve the lattice door.At the beginning, Gao Shimei did not agree. He said: "I have completed three lattice carvings in my life. I am afraid I will not be able to complete the fourth. My eyes are going to be blind." The Zheng family said: "Gao Master, your eyes will not be blind, you will not be blind. The French doctor said that as long as you stop carving and go to the "Gospel Hospital" to continue treatment, your eyes will not be blind." Zhou Mingda was slightly surprised when he heard that , Immediately pulled Gao Shimei aside, and whispered to him: "Master Gao, don't worry, our old city also has a hospital run by foreigners, which is large and beautiful, and I will take you there for treatment. Besides, my family still has Provide you with high-quality meals and pay you the highest wages." Gao Shimei nodded, agreeing.But he went on to say: "I will never enter a foreigner's hospital." Seeing that Gao Shimei insisted on going to Gejiu, the members of Zheng's family said, "Master Gao, you'd better not go to Gejiu. You will always live in my house. We are all your children. We will take care of you until the end of your life." Gao Shi Mei said: "Thank you, you have treated me so well, I will never forget it. But I still have to leave here. To be honest, I am not greedy for the Zhou family's wages. I just want to make another lattice carving. " Gao Shimei didn't sleep well last night.It may be that he is about to leave Zheng's house, which makes him uneasy.After dawn, he woke up from his dream state and heard a piece of news about Mrs. Bai.Said that Mrs. Bai was robbed by bandits last night, and escaped back this morning. Gao Shimei came to Bai's house without hesitation, and saw Mrs. Bai sitting under the eaves, her body was a little stiff, and her hands and feet twitched from time to time.She is painfully telling her "legendary story" to the folks.Gao Shimei stood behind the crowd, and no one else noticed him.Mrs. Bai's body has been exuding a dizzying stench, but everyone doesn't seem to mind. "Who said it was the bandits?" Baisao said, "Actually, in order to avenge Gao Shimei, the Duan family sent Fei Xiaosi to find the bandits in the mountains, and wanted to use the bandits' power to kill Gao Shimei. Do you know? Fei Xiaosi He once told the bandit leader that there was a beautiful little widow in Zhengying, who was taken by the famous carpenter Gao Shimei. Gao Shimei is from Xizong, how dare she come to Zhengying to bully men and women? He is too crazy and should be killed. Destroy his prestige. The Duan family never imagined that the bandit leader was not interested in Gao Shimei at all. The bandit leader had evil intentions at that time, and he decided to send someone to snatch me away. At this point, Mrs. Bai paused thoughtfully.When people turned their heads to see Gao Shimei, they were like a group of frightened children, each liberated from their trance, and their attention suddenly focused on Gao Shimei.Gao Shimei closed her eyes and did not speak.In order to numb everyone's curious eyes. "Sister-in-law Bai, how did you know these things?" Someone asked, "Did Fei Xiaosi tell you?" "It was indeed Fei Xiaosi who told me," said Mrs. Bai. "When the bandits came to rob me, Fei Xiaosi also came along. He told me that without him and Master Duan, I would never have dreamed of oppression." Mrs. Zhai. I spit on him. He didn’t dare to do anything to me, as if he just quickly wiped the saliva off his face with the back of his hand. Then Fei Xiaosi said, to tell you the truth, your pickled duck eggs Master Duan told me to pour the poisonous water in the pot, but unfortunately instead of poisoning that nasty carpenter Gao, it blinded you instead. It’s a pity, a pity!” Carve the World Seventeen (5) Someone asked again: "Sister-in-law Bai, how did you get snatched away? And how did you escape back?" Mrs. Bai said: "You don't know, last night, when those two bandits and Fei Xiaosi crawled in from the front of my house, we were already asleep. They found my room, tied me up, I stuffed cotton wool into my mouth. My silly son was knocked down by them and dared not cry out. But I kept resisting, either lying on the ground, kicking my feet in front of them, or bumping my head against them. The two bandits and I struggled for a while, and then led me out of the gate. One of the bandits said: "It's dark, it's hard to say whether I caught the real Mrs. Bai." , lit a fire in front of me. Through the faint light of the fire, they saw my face, which was a big black face. In fact, I knew a little bit about the news that the bandits were going to Zhengying to rob me, so I used soot every night, Blackened my face, trying to make the bandits abandon me as soon as they saw my black face. But my intention failed. The two bandits each stretched out a hand and spit on the ground. Then, I rubbed it on my left and right cheeks respectively, and two flesh-colored patches appeared on my face. A bandit said: She wiped the soot on her, don’t be afraid, she will look better when she goes back and wash it. When the sky is dim, They went out of the gate of Zhengying and came to rest in the persimmon garden. There was no one in the persimmon garden at the time, only an old dog barked a few times, and there was no other sound. At this time, I smelled a pile of fresh The smell of dog shit. I thought, there is salvation now, and see if you are afraid of the smell? When the bandits untied me, I sat down on the spot and stepped on the pile of dog shit. At the same time, my hands were full Shit, on my face, on my head, on my body, I rubbed it all over. My shoes, pants, and clothes were covered with big and small pieces of shit. In my eyes, nose, and even my mouth , also stuffed some shit. In an instant, I turned into a shit man, emitting a stench all over my body. The two bandits were a little dizzy from the stench attack. They covered their nostrils and dared not approach me And I keep rolling on the shit pile, keep touching and pinching my face and hair. Bandits keep spitting dirty words at me, such as 'stinky bitch, bitch, son of a bitch' etc Wait, curse. A bandit approached me, inspected it for a while, and said, "It's too smelly, it's too smelly, and she still eats dog shit." Another bandit said, "There's no water nearby, how can I let her wash herself?" Look, there is dog feces in her big crotch. At this time, the men in the village started to work in the field, and there were scattered footsteps and voices in the distance. The bandits panicked when they heard it. They helped me up and ordered I'm going. I pointed to my bare feet and didn't speak. A bandit hurriedly looked for my shoes. When I found them, I lifted them up and said that they were full of dog shit. The bandit spat out 'pooh' and took my shoes. The shoes were thrown far away. The other bandit took a big stride, and said while walking, "Run, what do you want this stinky woman to do?" When the other bandit heard this, he immediately left me and followed, and the sound of their footsteps It disappeared after a while." Everyone quietly listened to Mrs. Bai finish her strange experience.It could be seen that everyone tried their best to restrain their anger towards the Duan family and Fei Xiaosi, wishing to report to the government immediately so that the government could punish those two villains.Gao Shimei said to the crowd: "Forget it, forget it, let the past pass. Good will be rewarded with good, and evil will be rewarded with evil. We are people who want to enter the 'Pure Land', so we don't have to worry about those villains." Everyone left.The sun was shining obliquely in the dark room of Bai's house. When the dust in the sun had settled down, Gao Shimei picked up seven or eight loads of water and boiled more than a dozen pots of hot water to wash Mrs. Bai's body.But that stench has been floating in the room of her house. Gao Shimei is about to leave Zhengying.That morning, he unexpectedly did not come to say goodbye to Mrs. Bai.He and Zhou Mingda rode a big horse each, and walked towards Gejiu early in the morning.However, after walking for a long time, Gao Shimei turned around and walked back.He said to Zhou Mingda: "I want to take Mrs. Bai's mother and son to Gejiu. Boss Zhou, what do you think?" Zhou Mingda hesitated and finally agreed.