Chapter 27 third quarter

That evening, Magpie had been busy all day from Ding's house, and was about to go home to have a look. When he went out, he saw a broken round table outside Ding's house under the shade of a tree, and a group of ragged people were eating and drinking there.These are all beggars, who follow the smell of wine, and cannot sit at the proper table.The Ding family set up a table outside the house with rice and simple dishes for them to eat and drink.The group of beggars were shouting and yelling, fighting each other. There was also a child who jumped on the table, grabbed the rice in the pot and stuffed it into his mouth.

Among the group of people, there was a man in sackcloth, a broken straw hat on his head, and a stick tucked in his arms. He just sat still, as if he was thinking about something.The magpie felt strange, so he looked at the man twice more.When she returned home and was lighting a fire under the stove, she suddenly felt that this person looked familiar, but she couldn't remember who it was.She always felt uneasy in her heart, so she got up and turned off the fire, and went back to Ding's house, wanting to find out, but when she got to the door of Ding's house, she found that the person was no longer there.

On the day of the funeral, the mysterious beggar appeared again. The man was curled up under the eaves of his neighbor, leaning his back against the gable wall, and was devouring steamed buns.The brim of the hat was pulled down very low, holding a dog-beating stick, and his hands were thin and dark.However, the magpie couldn't see the man's eyes.This man must have been seen somewhere.At that time, Magpie was holding a dustpan in his hand and was distributing funeral flowers with Granny Meng to the funeral bearers. Those small flowers were made of paper, and there were two kinds of white and yellow.She silently recited all the people she knew in her heart, but still couldn't figure it out.She decided to go up to see what happened.Strangely, just as she took a few steps forward, the beggar also stepped back along the corner.The magpie quickened his pace, and the man adjusted his pace accordingly, turning his head to look at her as he walked out of the village.This shows that the beggar not only knows himself, but also worries about being recognized by the magpie.She chased all the way to the outside of the village, and when she saw the man walking on the official road leading to Meicheng, she stopped, pressing her waist and eyes with her hands and gasping for breath.For many days after that, Magpie was very preoccupied, always thinking about the beggar.

Of course, this was not the only thing that bothered her.On the second day after Mr. Ding's funeral, an evil wind blew from nowhere and brought chicken plague, killing all the dozens of hens she worked so hard to raise.She plucked all the dead chickens, marinated a dozen of them, and sent a few more to Granny Meng and Hua Erniang's family. Granny Meng said with a smile: "Why don't you say that Mr. Ding is a lucky man. Once he died, the chicken died too. If he lives to this day, where do you get the eggs for him to eat?" In August, Murakami dates are all red.This morning, after magpie woke up, Xiumi suddenly disappeared.I searched everywhere inside and outside the house, but there was no sign of her.In the end, the magpie made a calculation. It happened to be a fair day. Would she go to Cheung Chau alone?At noon, she hadn't come back yet, so the magpie couldn't hold back anymore, so it hurried to the market.When we arrived in Cheung Chau, the market was almost gone.The magpies searched everywhere, and inquired when they met acquaintances, and stayed until evening before returning to Puji.

When she returned to the village, she saw Hua Erniang next door with her two sons throwing jujubes under the tree.Seeing her sweating profusely, Hua Erniang pouted at her and smiled.She told Magpie that as soon as she heard that Xiumi was missing, she and Granny Meng helped find her. "In fact, she didn't go anywhere. She sat on the grave of the little thing in the west of the village all day. The two of us just persuaded her to come back, and she's lying at home right now." Hearing what she said, Magpie felt relieved.Just as she was about to go home, she heard Erniang say behind her back: "I only thought of that poor child now, isn't it too late?"

When Magpie returned home and saw Xiumi lying in the attic sleeping soundly, a hanging heart finally let go.Unexpectedly, on the same night, such a thing happened. The magpie was ready to cook, but Xiumi didn't get up to eat.He only slept with his head covered on the bed.Magpie hastily grabbed a few mouthfuls of food, thinking of going upstairs to accompany her.She saw that Xiumi seemed to be crying, and the pillow cover and quilt were wet from crying.Magpie thought, maybe she saw that every family went to the grave during the Mid-Autumn Festival, and somehow remembered that little thing.Thinking of the little things, the magpie couldn't stop crying.I heard that Xiumi gave birth to a child in prison, but I don't know if it is dead or alive.If it is alive, it should be as big as the little thing back then.Shui Jin at the ferry insisted that the child was born to Tan Si, and visited several times to inquire about the whereabouts of the child.He said that even if the ferry is sold, the child must be found.But what can he do when he meets such a dumb person.No matter what he said, Xiumi's face was livid as usual and she didn't say a word.Thinking of these sad things, she shed tears for a long time with Xiumi.Then he took off his shoes and socks, turned on the lamp, and fell asleep next to her.

In the middle of the night, Mengzhong Magpie suddenly heard someone let out a long sigh: "Ugh--" The magpie woke up suddenly.Who is sighing?The voice seemed to come from far away, clear and heavy.Magpie sat up from the bed, lit the lamp, and looked at Xiumi. She seemed to be sleeping soundly, and her teeth were grinding.The magpie opened the door suspiciously. Outside the attic, the moon was looming in the clouds, and the trees were shaking in the wind, rustling, but no one could be seen.Could it be that I heard it wrong, or had a dream?Her heart was up and down. Magpie went back to the bed and lay down again. Just about to fall asleep, she heard Xiumi turn over and said loudly in the dark:

"Alas—there is no heat on the face, and the snow will accumulate." This time she heard it so clearly that she couldn't help but break out in a cold sweat.To hell, to hell, to hell!So she can talk!It turns out she is not dumb!turn out to be…… Magpie sat on the bed with her knees hugged, her body shivering as if shaking.After touching for more than half an hour, she heard Xiu Mi grind her teeth for a while and let out a regular snoring sound, and then she slowly stabilized her heart.She lied to me for three and a half years!If it wasn't for the dream that leaked the secret, she might have kept me in the dark for the rest of her life.But why is all this?When she wakes up tomorrow morning, I will ask her carefully, Magpie thought.However, when she met Xiumi under the trestle the next day, she suddenly changed her mind.

In February and March, the spring air sprouts, the pond is green and the rain is continuous.The thin and dense flower needles drizzle from the Jingzhe to Qingming, and the willow silk shines brightly in the rain.On a sunny day, Xiumi occasionally passed by the trellis in the backyard, and suddenly found that the more than ten pots of plum blossoms transplanted over the years were all in bloom. The flowers of Jiangmei are thin, thin and rhyme, with a light fragrance; while Guancheng plum has plump flowers and leaves, a yellowish heart, and dense stamens.The rest belong to the genus Xiangmei, Lvca, Baiye, Yuanyang, and Xingxin. The flowers and branches are sparse and tremble with the wind.Its color may be purple red or tender white, and its fragrance may be strong or light, and they are all crowded in clusters, competing for splendor.

After several years of cultivation, there are more than 100 kinds of flowers and plants under the trellis.There are crabapple, plum blossom, peony, perilla and rose in spring; hibiscus, hollyhock and pomegranate in summer; jasmine, sweet-scented osmanthus, orchid and impatiens in autumn;Many people in Puji have the habit of raising narcissus. Around the winter solstice, they buy one or two bract heads at the market to store water in a porcelain basin, stack them with pebbles, clean the windows, and release them proud of the snow.Only Lamei is the most difficult to get.According to Fan Chengda's "Plum Spectrum", wintersweet is not a kind of plum, because it is at the same time as plum, has a similar nature, a similar fragrance, and a color like a honey spleen, so it is named plum.Xiumi has repeatedly asked the magpies to look out for them when they go to the market.But year after year, nothing came of it.

One day at the end of winter last year, the magpie went to dig vegetables in the golden needle field in the west of the village, passing Zaolong Temple, and suddenly smelled a delicate fragrance floating in the wind.After following the incense, I finally picked up a few branches from the rubble of the collapsed Garan Hall in the temple, and put them in a vase in the attic when I came back.This bunch of wintersweet is dark yellow in color and the flowers are dense and fragrant.After the flowers are exhausted and removed from the table for a few days, there is still a lingering fragrance in the room. Xiumi knew that the wintersweet at Zaolong Temple was planted by a monk, commonly known as dog flies.She still remembers when she was a child, every Chinese New Year, when her mother took her to the temple to cut branches on the snow.Of course, she will not forget that this now-abandoned monastery was once the former site of Puji School.However, what Xiumi tried to forget was those things, like a wooden thorn stuck in a fingernail, maybe whenever she raised her hand, it would hurt her heart. Every time Xiumi and Magpie went to the market in Changzhou, they would see an old man selling flowers in front of a Taoist temple.But they almost never saw anyone ask him for flowers.Although they occasionally stopped to look at the Taoist temple when they passed by, the flower baskets were filled with ordinary flowers and plants, without any unique quality, and they never asked the price.Finally one day, the old man stopped them.He said that there is an ancient plum in his house, which was originally an old thing in Kuaiji Mansion.After he handled it, he has raised it for sixty years.His home was not far from here, and the old man asked them if they wanted to visit.Xiumi looked at the magpie, and the magpie looked at Xiumi, without making a decision for a while, but finally followed him. They bypassed the Taoist temple, walked through two long and narrow stone alleys, crossed several small bridges, and finally came to a clean courtyard.The yard is very large, surrounded by bamboo fences on three sides. Vegetables and flowers are planted in the garden, but most of them have withered long ago.It can be seen that the owner of the yard was originally a wealthy family, but for some reason only the old man was left alone.The old man led them through the path in the garden and came to a grass pavilion.It was indeed an ancient plum.The curly branches are twisted, and the awe-inspiring vigor is unforgettable at first sight.This flower has experienced wind and sun for a long time, and the earth's atmosphere is clocked. The flower branches are twisted and twisted, and the moss scales cover the body of the pot.There are also moss whiskers hanging between the branches, or several inches long.Occasionally, the wind blows, and the green silk is draped, which is lovely. The old man said: "This flower has been with me for the rest of my life. If it wasn't for a few coffins, I would never be willing to give it up." Xiumi watched it for a long time, and lingered again and again, but the old man's asking price was too high, so she had to give up.The two of them had just walked out of the courtyard gate when the old man chased them out and stopped them again. The old man said: "In Changzhou, there are many vulgar and floating people. There is no one who knows how to taste algae, flowers and trees. The two of you are willing to visit the cold garden, and you are also people who cherish flowers. If you like this ancient plum plant , just take it away. Money, you can just give it as you see. In the past, I don’t know how many people came to buy it because they were reluctant to send it to others, so they never sold it. Now, I am at this age, and I took it off today. Shoes and socks, maybe I won’t be able to wear them tomorrow morning. This Gumei has a place to stay, so I feel at ease.” While speaking, she burst into tears. Seeing what he said, Xiumi and Magpie dug out all the money in their pockets and gave it to him.When Lao Mei changed hands, the old man caressed her repeatedly, trembling, and couldn't bear it.Repeatedly told the trick of turning the pot and watering, the technique of maintaining and cultivating the soil, and finally sent the two of them out of Changzhou Town, and then waved goodbye. Unexpectedly, this ancient plum plant was moved to Puji's house, no matter how carefully Xiumi took care of it, within two months, it became sickly and withered.The magpie sighed: "This flower also understands human nature, I'm afraid it's reluctant to leave the owner." What she said made Xiumi sad.Later, when the two went to the market, they went to visit the old man's house.But I saw that the garden was withered, the door was crooked, and there was no one in the courtyard.Only the dead bean pods full of trees rustled in the wind.Asked about the neighbors, they said that the old man had been dead for many days. At the end of the summer of this year, Puji suffered a drought that had never happened in a century.The old people in the village said that the rains of the year were all over in the spring. Since July, there has not been a drop of rain from the sky. The land has cracked and the river has dried up.The scorching sun is burning, and the red land is thousands of miles away.Even a big apricot tree that had grown in front of Granny Meng's house for more than 200 years died.The flowers that Xiumi raised under the trellis, because they couldn't bear the coldness of the well water, turned yellow and wilted, within a month or so, most of them died one after another. Men, women and children in the village kneel in front of Zaolong Temple to pray for rain, and some shrewd businessmen have already foreseen the coming famine in autumn and winter.They hoarded food secretly, causing the price of rice to soar, and people panicked.That day, some piglets raised by magpies were going to be sold in the market. Hua Erniang said, people are starving to death, where can they get food to feed the pigs?Sure enough, when she arrived at the market, except for a few foreigners with green eyes who were asking around for grain prices, the market was sparsely populated, and none of her piglets were sold. In August of this year, the drought has not yet eased, and the migratory locusts came again.The first person to find the migratory locusts was Tan Shuijin from the ferry. He only found three or four locusts from the cabin, and ran towards the village shouting: people are going to die!dying... In less than three days, those migratory locusts flew from the southeast in dense numbers, flying like arrowheads in the sky, wherever they went, it was like dark clouds covering the sun.Those villagers set off firecrackers at the beginning, tied torches to bamboo poles and went to the fields to drive them away.The migratory locusts gathered more and more, and they were everywhere on the head, collar, and mouth.Later, they squatted on the ridge of the field and cried bitterly.After the migratory locusts passed, there were no grains left in the fields, and even the leaves on the trees were eaten away. Mrs. Ding was obviously aware of the seriousness of the problem. She stood at the entrance of the village and said to herself over and over again: "The locusts are making trouble. After autumn, what are we going to eat?"Granny Meng replied angrily: "Eat shit." The sad-faced peasants in the village laughed.At that time, Tan Shuijin didn't smile, and was picking up the dead locusts without saying a word.I picked up several sacks and salted them all in a water tank.He and his wife Gao Caixia survived the famine by relying on these sacks of pickled locusts. After Xiaohan, people began to die in the village.Mrs. Ding also died at that time, and no one knew about it at the time.In the twelfth lunar month of this year, when people remembered this person, they realized that she had already turned into a mummy on the bed. In those days, the magpies were so hungry that their eyes turned green. In her words, they were so hungry that they wanted to tear down the tables and benches and eat them.Xiumi only drank a small amount of wheat skin soup every day, read a book in bed, and seldom went downstairs. She didn't seem flustered or in pain, and she was even more willing to do so.Everything in the house that could be sold was sold. Xiumi kept that golden cicada by her side all the time, when she carefully opened the handkerchief and handed it to the magpie, her eyes sparkled.Seeing the golden cicada, the magpie thought of the little thing, and remembered what Xiumi said in her dream: Alas -- the snow will accumulate when there is no heat on the face. Magpie took the golden cicada to the pawnshop, but the shopkeeper refused to accept it.He didn't even take a good look, rolled up his sleeves, and said flatly: "I know it's gold, but now people are starving to death, and this gold is worthless." The magpie heard that there was still some food left in the house of the butcher Er Bald, so he boldly went to Er Bald's door to borrow food.The two bald men used to run the Puji School with Xiumi, but later they took care of Da Jinya's shortage, butchered pigs and sold meat in the village. After earning some money, they opened a rice shop. The two bald men were warming up by the fire at the middle door, when they saw the magpie coming to the courtyard, they didn't speak, they just looked at her.The magpie lowered its head and blushed, standing in the courtyard and wriggling uncomfortably from side to side.Finally, Erbald put down the foot stove in his hand, came to her with a smile on his face, put his face close to her ear and said, "You are here to borrow food, aren't you?" Magpie nodded. "Now I have a sore on the tail of a mouse, and there is not much pus." Just as the magpie was about to leave, the second bald man said again: "Unless—" "Unless what?" Magpie asked quickly after hearing Erbald's relief. "Come with me into the room and let me fix it a bit. It's easy to talk about the food." Er Bald said in a low voice. Magpie didn't expect him to say such obscene words, so ashamed and anxious, he turned his head and ran out of the yard to Granny Meng's house. But before she could enter the door, she heard the crying of children in the room.She didn't knock on the door, and went to Hua Erniang's house next door. Hua Erniang was holding a grandson in one arm, and was sitting in a dark room, staring at the snowflakes flying all over the doorway in a daze, muttering in her mouth: "Don't be afraid, don't be afraid, if we die, the three of us will die together." The magpie had to pretend to pass by her occasionally. Looking at the door, he went home without saying a word. In the middle of the night, when she woke up hungry in the attic, picked a little lime off the wall and chewed it in her mouth, the magpie felt a little regretful.It might as well have agreed to the second bald boy and let him do it a few times.She sat up from the bed, looked at Xiumi, and asked, "What should I do?" Xiumi dropped the book in her hand, smiled, and seemed to say, "What should I do? Die!" The next day, the magpie got up early.But when she got to the kitchen stove, she realized that she had nothing to cook.Sitting alone in the stove and weeping for a while, I saw the house turning straight in front of my eyes without realizing it, and when I calmed down a little, the house did not turn, but my eyes had double images of everything.She wanted to stand up, but she couldn't stand still.She knew her days were numbered.She scooped a ladle of cold water from the jar, drank a few sips, and then wanted to go back to bed and lie down. When passing the patio, I suddenly saw a bulging thing beside the wall.A night of snow covered it up.The magpie walked over and kicked it, it was a cloth bag.She scraped away the snow and pressed it with her hands, her heart tightened.She quickly opened the cloth bag: Oh my God, can't you?It was filled with white rice! "Oh my God!" the magpie screamed, "Where do you get so many meters?" She looked up at the courtyard wall of the courtyard, and then at the ground. Several pieces of tiles fell from the top of the wall and smashed to pieces at the foot of the wall.Someone must have turned the rice bag over the wall last night. She didn't have time to think about it, so she ran to the backyard.She didn't know where she got so much strength, she ran upstairs in one breath, and shouted at Xiumi who was combing her hair: "Rice, meter, it's rice." When Xiumi heard her yelling, she panicked a little, quickly dropped the comb in her hand, followed her downstairs, and ran towards the front yard.Sure enough, it was rice.Xiumi took out a handful of rice, sniffed it up to her nose, then immediately turned around and said to the magpie: "Go and call Granny Meng and Erniang Hua." "Why are you calling them?" "You just call, I have something to discuss with them." The magpie let out an "oh" and walked out.She was only happy, and at first, she didn't feel that such a conversation was unusual at all.But when she crossed the threshold, it suddenly stuck like a nail.She turned her head and looked at Xiumi in surprise.what what what?what did she say? ! She, she, she... Magpie's tears welled up all of a sudden: she finally spoke.She is not dumb.I have long known that she is not a mute, how can a mute talk in sleep? Now it's all right, the food is available, and Xiumi can talk.No more troubles.She felt that she had enough strength, even if she starved for another ten days and half a month, she could still hold on. Maybe it was because she was too excited, or maybe it was hunger that made her a little confused. As soon as the magpie opened the door of Granny Meng's house, she announced to the people in the house: "Our Xiumi has spoken." "Did she speak?" Granny Meng asked weakly.She was scraping the bottom of the pot vigorously with a spoon, but only a little iron filings came off. "Speaking." Magpie said, "She suddenly spoke, not dumb." "Oh, so she's not dumb. She's not dumb, she can talk, okay, okay." Granny Meng talked upside down and went to scratch her pot again. Afterwards, the magpie came to Hua Erniang's house again: "Erniang, I heard our Xiumi talking just now." "Talk? What's wrong with her talking?" Erniang Hua put her arms around her little grandson.The child was blue with hunger and his hands were shaking. "I thought she was dumb." "Is she dumb?" Hua Erniang asked coldly.She was obviously starving. Strange, why are they not surprised or happy? Magpie walked back suspiciously, and when he reached the door of the house, he realized that he had forgotten the most important thing.He went back the same way again. Looking at this bag of snow-white rice, Hua Erniang first kept calling "Bodhisattva Bodhisattva", and then said after a while: "Who has such a big family business, and now can still have such a rare thing!" Granny Meng said, "Girl, where did you get this bag of rice?" The magpie said: "When I got up in the morning, I saw it in the yard. Maybe it climbed in from the wall last night." Xiumi said: "Don't discuss where the food comes from. It's important to save people first." The mother-in-law said: "Yes, it's important to save people first. My daughter, what are you going to do?" According to Xiumi's intention, the bag of rice is given out by two old people every day, and the whole village endures it every day.Granny Meng said: "Girl, to put it bluntly, when you were insane, it was revolution again, it was cafeteria again, and you danced with guns and clubs all day long. My aunt saw it and felt bad..." Hua Erniang pulled Granny Lameng's sleeve to stop her from talking, and said with a smile, "The whole village will be saved now. When the famine is over, I'll ask someone to erect a monument for you." Granny Meng and Erniang Hua hurriedly tiptoed and went to each house to talk.Soon, strange to say, the villagers spontaneously sent bran, rice bran, and bean cakes from their homes, and some people brought all the bean seeds for the coming year, and even Erbald and his wife sent a bag of white flour. The two old people took the bag of rice and gave porridge at the door of Granny Meng's house once a day.Seeing the men, women and children in the village orderly waiting at the door of Granny Meng's house to share the porridge, Xiumi felt very sad and happy.The looting situation that I was worried about did not happen. Even when a few strangers and beggars of unknown origin mixed into the team, the villagers did not drive them away.This scene more or less reminded her of Zhang Jiyuan and the Datong world he had not had time to build; she remembered her days in Huajiashe, the Puji School that had died; and the Peach Blossom Dream that her father took away when he left .