Chapter 4 Four

That scene on New Year's Eve deeply trampled on Luo Xiaomao's desire to make progress, just like a flower bud being trampled into powder by a bull's hoof.He began to indulge himself and wiped away the teacher's criticism and education like dust. "Luo Xiaomao, you are getting worse and worse." Teacher Jin said to him.Luo Xiaomao said: "I want to behave well, Teacher Jin." "Then why don't you behave well?" Teacher Jin questioned him.Luo Xiaomao smiled darkly: "I just need to behave well tomorrow." But the next day he was the same again, playing with his things in class as usual, and he didn't care much about his small talk.One day in physical education class, the physical education teacher saw him making trouble in the queue, picked him out, and punished him to stand under the sun to bask in the sun. He refused to accept it and scolded the physical education teacher's mother.The physical education teacher got angry, walked over and slapped him, "You little bastard," the physical education teacher roared, "I'll kill you little bastard." Luo Xiaomao rushed forward and bit the physical education teacher's fan Of course, the hand in his mouth was bleeding from his bite.So Luo Xiaomao was punished with a serious demerit on his shoulders, so Luo Xiaomao didn't care about his future even more.

The small dormitory area of ​​Teacher H is also called the second dormitory. The second dormitory is located in the middle of a street called Jixiang Street. The so-called Jixiang Street is just a few alleys extending in all directions. Boys at that time liked to gather together to play gambling games. Marbles.Luo Xiaomao met Wang Dali in a game of glass marbles.Wang Dali lives in a porter's dormitory not far from the second dormitory.Wang Dali was three years older than Luo Xiaomao, and he was strong and strong. Boys who were a few years older often fell on his hands.For this reason, Luo Xiaomao admired him very much, and even transferred his former respect for his teacher to Wang Dali.Wang Dali is quite good at diving and swimming. He can put his head in the water and let everyone calmly count to a hundred or even two hundred.Sometimes when his head came out of the water, Luo Xiaomao and the others were stunned, because he almost swam to the middle of the river, and he waved his hand to them while stepping on the water in the middle of the river.

Wang Dali's father was a porter who didn't like to talk, and he would get angry when he talked. He would often carry a pair of large tongs that could only be found in a large cafeteria, chasing Wang Dali in the streets and alleys, and Wang Dali would always let his father catch up to him and stand in a certain place out of breath, yelling, Wang Dali stood 40 to 50 meters away from his father, smiling triumphantly.Luo Xiaomao's theft behavior when he was young was inspired by Wang Dali.When Luo Xiaomao made friends with Wang Dali, he also made friends with the latter's bad habits.The first time Luo Xiaomao and Wang Dali stole something was at noon in the summer of 1969. On that day, they went down the steep slope of the large dormitory area of ​​Teacher H to catch crickets.There was an old-fashioned old house in front of the steep slope. There was a rotten armchair on the lawn, and a dustpan for drying pumpkin seeds was placed on the armchair.It was a rotten dustpan with many copper wires wrapped around it so that the dustpan would not fall apart.Wang Dali glanced at the dustpan, "Little Maogui, go and steal that dustpan." Wang Dali glanced back and forth, left and right, and then instigated Luo Xiaomao to say.Luo Xiaomao timidly said: "I dare not." "Do you want to learn to wrestle with me?" "Of course." "Then you go. Wrestling first needs to exercise courage."

Wang Dali stared at Luo Xiaomao, "You are as courageous as a mouse, you can learn to wrestle?" This sentence undoubtedly aroused Luo Xiaomao's courage.So Luo Xiaomao walked over, picked up the dustpan and ran over to pass it to Wang Dali. Wang Dali hurriedly stepped into the steep slope and the narrow place of a wall, and quickly removed the copper wire.He squeezed the copper wire into a ball and put it in his pocket. "Let's go," Wang Dali smiled happily.But after walking a few steps, Wang Dali's thief eyes caught sight of a copper pot resting on a coal stove.Back then, the dormitory of Teacher H was a one-story house with wide eaves. Each household had only two rooms. There was no kitchen or toilet. "This copper pot can really sell for money," Wang Dali said to Luo Xiaomao obsessively: "This is the copper pot in the security chief's house." Wang Dali said: "Go and bring the copper pot here." "I'm afraid," Luo Xiaomao said, "the security chief likes and dislikes." "Do you want to learn wrestling?" Wang Dali asked Luo Xiaomao again.Luo Xiaomao said in a low voice: "I don't dare, you steal it yourself." Wang Dali thought for a while, then looked around, it was lunch break and there was no one there.

Wang Dali quickly picked up the copper pot, and hurriedly ran down the steep slope.Luo Xiaomao was nervous and excited, his heart was beating wildly.Wang Dali poured out the hot water in the copper pot, put the copper pot on the ground, stepped on it hard, and the copper pot collapsed immediately.After stepping on a good copper pot into a cracked flat copper scrap, he hurriedly loosened the belt, inserted the flat copper into the waistband of his trousers, and put down his clothes to cover it. Then he ordered Xiao Mao to say: : "Do you think there is no one outside?" "No." Luo Xiaomao went out and turned back and said.

So the two hurried out of the dormitory and happily walked towards a scrap store.The scrap copper and the copper wire were sold for a total of 5 yuan, and Wang Dali gave Jieluo Xiaomao 2 yuan.Luo Xiaomao was naturally very happy to have 2 RMB in his pocket for the first time.At that time, there was more ginger for a pack of 5 cents than now for a plastic bag of 1 yuan.The act of stealing something for nothing immediately occupied Luo Xiaomao's young heart very fascinatingly. Although the 2 yuan was credited, it was used up soon, so the two began to steal here and there again, as long as they could be sold for money, they even stole plastic sheets covering coal briquettes, toothbrushes on other people's windows and Toothpaste skins are stolen, and even the cloth shoes that are drying at the door of other people's homes are stolen and torn up by them to sell for money.

One day, Luo Xiaomao went to Yang Xiaohan's house to do homework. At that time, the students hardly read in the afternoon, because the teachers spent their afternoons studying politics, criticizing and self-criticizing. At that time, the school carried out the "one gang, one red" activity, and Luo Xiaomao was appointed by Teacher Jin as Yang Xiaohan to help.Yang Xiaohan's family lived diagonally across from the house of the deputy director of the school's Revolutionary Committee. The house of the deputy director of the Revolutionary Committee had a large copper pot. Luo Xiaomao had been coveting this copper pot for a long time.That afternoon, after Yang Xiaohan's mother went to work, Luo Xiaomao suddenly looked at Yang Xiaohan and said, "Yang Xiaohan, go and pick up that copper pot." Yang Xiaohan glanced at the copper pot, "What are you doing here?" Let’s sell it for money,” Luo Xiaomao said, “This copper pot can be sold for at least 5 yuan, and then half of each person will be sold.” “I dare not,” Yang Xiaohan said.It was raining heavily that afternoon, which was great for such a thing. "I'll steal it."

Luo Xiaomao said, of course he walked over.The doors and windows of the deputy director of the Revolutionary Committee's house were closed tightly, but the copper pot was standing majestically on the coal stove in front of the door, with only a gap left in the stove, and the chicken was being stewed over a low heat.When the aroma of chicken flew into Luo Xiaomao's nostrils, Luo Xiaomao hesitated for a moment, but quickly moved closer.He quickly picked up the steaming copper pot, took two steps, squatted down, lifted the lid, poured a pot of deliciously stewed chicken into the gutter, then walked into Yang Xiaohan's house and closed the door.He stepped on it without hesitation, and the copper pot was flattened immediately, and then he stepped on it a few more times, and the copper pot became a piece of flat copper. "Hide it away," Luo Xiaomao said to Yang Xiaohan.Yang Xiaohan glanced around the house a few times, and hurriedly stuffed the flat copper into a pile of tatters under the bed. "It's not your business, so just pretend you don't know, you know?" Luo Xiaomao looked at Yang Xiaohan and said.Yang Xiaohan smiled easily, "I don't know anything."

Only then did the two begin to do their homework, writing about their experience in studying Chairman Mao's works. "Ms. Jin said that I will learn the 'old three articles' this afternoon."Soon the mother of the deputy director of the Revolutionary Committee found that the copper pot on the coal stove was missing, and of course she shouted excitedly. "Isn't it a strange thing?" She stood at the door and said, "A pot of chicken was dumped into the gutter by a thief, but the copper pot disappeared." Yang Xiaohan turned pale when he heard this, and stared at Luo Xiaomao uneasily. "You look like this, don't tell at a glance that you stole it." Luo Xiaomao said, Yang Xiaohan's face turned paler, "You stole it."

"You have a share too. I'll say that the two of you stole it together." Luo Xiaomao threatened.Yang Xiaohan fell silent. That evening, the wife of the deputy director of the Revolutionary Committee stood at the door and yelled at her. What she couldn't imagine was that a pot of chicken was poured into the gutter.The deputy director of the Revolutionary Committee is the school's second in command, so naturally some people are concerned about this matter, and they all speculate who this wicked thief is.In the end it was decided that it was a bad boy's work, because grown-ups wouldn't do such a thing.So whose child will it be?Some people suspected Luo Xiaomao. "I'm afraid it's a child from outside," Yang Xiaohan's mother stood at the door and said, "Luo Xiaomao isn't so courageous? I'm afraid it's a bad child from outside..." Yang Xiaohan's mother is a cook in the cafeteria, an uneducated woman .The next afternoon, when Luo Xiaomao went to Yang Xiaohan's house, Yang Xiaohan hurriedly urged Luo Xiaomao to take out the crushed copper pot and sell it. "Slow down, my mother will kill me if she finds out," Yang Xiaohan said, "Take it out and sell Luo." Luo Xiaomao poured out the books in his schoolbag, stuffed the crushed copper pot into his schoolbag, and went on He went out and walked towards the scrap store.It was the first time that Luo Xiaomao walked into a waste shop to sell things alone. The copper pot was sold for more than 4 yuan. Luo Xiaomao bought a bag of ginger, a bag of olives and half a catty of fish skin peanuts, and ate them greedily all the way. with.

At around 10 o'clock that night, he was yelled at by his father from his dream.After dinner that night, he went to bed, but his schoolbag was left on the table.Luo Xiaomao's mother, after grading the students' homework, was looking for a pen. It happened that her pen with blue ink was thrown on the school desk, so she reached into her son's schoolbag Find a pen.She found ginger and olives in her son's schoolbag. "Old Luo," she said vigilantly, "Where did Xiaomao get the money to buy ginger and olives? Did you give Xiaomao money?" Luo Xiaomao's father was sitting on the recliner and reading at that time, he raised his head, "I didn't Give the dime," he said. "Then there is a problem," said Luo Xiaomao's mother. "Where does Xiaomao get the money to buy snacks? Isn't he a thief outside?" Luo Xiaomao's father put down the book in his hand, stood up, and put Luo Xiaomao on the bed. The clothes that were used as pillows under the head were torn out.Naturally, he found more than 4 yuan in his son's pocket, which is not a sum to be underestimated! "Get up, you piece of shit." The father yelled at his son angrily, "Get up! I'm going to beat you to death, you piece of shit." It was a cool day in October.The mother said to her son, "Let him put on his clothes first, and then interrogate him carefully." Luo Xiaomao put on his clothes naturally. "Tell me," his father stared at him sternly, as if he wanted to eat people, "where did you get the money in your pocket?" Luo Xiaomao said that it was collected from the money sold.His mother categorically denied with a very sad look: "Impossible, who can you deceive? You must have stolen the money somewhere! Tell me!" Luo Xiaomao remembered Liu Hulan who was tortured by the enemy in the movie, and she still What about a girl!Luo Xiaomao regretted that he should have put olives and ginger in his schoolbag, and even more regretted not hiding the money. "Pick up junk and sell it for money," Luo Xiaomao replied to his father.His father was so angry that he punched his son on the shoulder, causing the son to lean back and almost fall. "Still picking up junk and selling it?" the father said, staring at his son closely, his fist raised high.Luo Xiaomao thought of Xu Yunfeng in the movie "Red Rock" again. He was tortured by the Kuomintang secret agents in such a way that he would rather die than surrender. Is he so weak-willed and not beaten? "It's the money to sell junk," Luo Xiaomao said.So he was punched by his father again, which made him sit on the ground, which was very painful.Luo Xiaomao cried, but Liu Hulan and Xu Yunfeng still stood in his heart and shone with golden light.So, whether his father punched and kicked or threatened, he always cried and said that, after an hour, his parents finally got tired. "I'll just believe you once," his father said in defeat, although he still suspected that the more than 4 yuan in his son's pocket was obtained by doing shady things outside, "Starting tomorrow, no You go outside to pick up the trash, and follow me to haul the trash. Do you hear me?" "Yes," Luo Xiaomao said desperately.