So, Hu Decai helped Mrs. Song, who was in the closing hall, to take the bundles of flax from upstairs and throw them down the corridor. After the old man weighed the bundles of flax, he asked Hu Xiangcai to count them in a book, and he was so busy that he kept counting them. .
Hu Micai crawled around upstairs where the ramie was piled, but did not help Mrs. Song drop the bundle of flax. Song's mother didn't pay attention to his behavior. In the middle of her busy schedule, she found that Hu Micai went downstairs alone, and then Hu Micai drove the carriage out of the front of the house.
About an hour later, all the ramies upstairs had been weighed. They were all weighed by Old Man Song, and the numbers were reported to Hu Xiangcai. He stared at each number he recorded, for fear of remembering it wrong. Hu Xiangcai remembered it carefully, and there was absolutely nothing wrong with it. But in the end, Mrs. Song came downstairs and took out the abacus from the house and totaled the numbers. There were only 2,014 pounds of hemp.
Hu Xiangcai asked doubtfully, old man, didn’t you say that your family has more than 4,000 kilograms of hemp? Why only 2014 pounds of hemp were weighed?
Old man Song didn't believe his ears, and said in confusion, "It's really strange. I remember that every bundle of flax was weighed before being piled upstairs and counted. Why was half of it missing?" Even if the hemp doesn't dry and shrinks, it won't lose nearly 2,000 pounds.
Hu Xiangcai said calmly, "Old man, you weighed the scale, and it's your own scale; you reported the number, that's all." If you don't believe me, just use an abacus and tally up the numbers yourself.
Old Man Song was unhappy, so he used the abacus to add up the numbers again, and it was still 2014 pounds of hemp. He said unconvinced: It is indeed this number, but it is too strange. I really don’t understand. Why is there so much missing? Then he looked at Mrs. Song and asked, have you finished throwing out the hemp upstairs?
Mrs. Song said, throw it all away.
At this time, Hu Xiangcai instructed Hu Decai to pay the hemp payment to Old Man Song. They loaded a large cart with ramie, shouted "drive", and the variegated horse pulled the cart quickly away from the village entrance.
One afternoon in early summer this year, Fu Dexing began to recover from his asthma. He and Qian Wanguan, who was carrying a load of paint buckets, walked in the wilderness without coughing.
Qian Wanguan said, shopkeeper, thank you for trusting me. I will accompany you to the fur market in the north to buy mink coats. I am afraid it will take half a year to go back and forth.
Fu Dexing said, "That doesn't matter. In half a year, it will be winter with heavy snowfall. I will keep warm by wearing the mink coat I bought."
Qian Wanguan said, that's true, the shopkeeper thought it through.
Qian Wagguan walked in front with a paint load, looking back from time to time to look at Fu Dexing who was following him.
Fu Dexing walked slowly, and occasionally praised Qian Wanguan for walking fast.
Fu Dexing said, Wan Guan, you are a good person.
Qian Waguan looked back at him, stuck out his tongue, and smiled without saying a word.
Fu Dexing said, the reason why I say you are good is because what you do is really touching. That time, you sucked out a mouthful of phlegm from my throat. Even my daughter Chunlan couldn't do this.
Qian Wankuan said, why do you care about such a trivial matter?
Fu Dexing said, that is not a trivial matter, it is a very critical matter. I don't know how to talk about it, I can only say, if you don't suck with me, and no one will suck with me, others will think I'm dirty, but you don't care whether it's dirty or not, your selfless spirit of helping others is really annoying to me. admiration.
Qian Wagguan was certainly happy after hearing this, but he still said humbly, don't mention it, I haven't done enough.
Ahead is a large river with a pontoon bridge on the river and a stone tablet erected at the entrance. As they approached, they saw three official script characters written in white paint on the stone tablet: Wang Enqiao.
Now that he was getting hot, Qian Wanguan wiped the sweat from his forehead and looked at the stone monument again.
Qian Wanguan said, shopkeeper, do you know why the pontoon bridge in front is called Wang En Bridge?
Fu Dexing smiled and then replied that it is said that in ancient times, a king rode his horse to the river and was unable to cross. He immediately ordered the local government to organize workers to repair a pontoon bridge to facilitate pedestrians. In this way, in order to remember the kindness of the king's order to build the bridge, the common people erected a stone tablet and wrote the words "Wang Enqiao".
Qian Wanguan said, Got it. Shopkeeper, you have been very kind to me, and I can’t forget you!
Fu Dexing saw another line of sweat on his forehead, waved his hand, walked onto the bridge, and said, just rest on the bridge for a while and then pick another guy!
Qian Waguan said, OK! So I carried the paint load onto the bridge. The wind on the bridge was gentle and very cool.
Qian Wanguan rested the paint load in the middle of the pontoon, and Fu Dexing followed him.
There was no railing on the edge of the pontoon, but he boldly approached the edge of the pontoon.
Fu Dexing said, don't step aside anymore, it's dangerous.
Qian Wanguan said, "It doesn't matter. Come over here. I'm here. What should the shopkeeper be afraid of?" Besides, I can swim. Even if I fall into the river, I won’t be drowned.
Fu Dexing leaned over.
Qian Wanguan asked, can the shopkeeper know how to swim?
Fu Dexing replied, no.
Qian Wankuan pretended to be attentive and said, "If you catch me, you won't be afraid anymore."
Unexpectedly, as soon as Fu Dexing grabbed his hand, Qian Wanguan's expression suddenly changed and he said, "Go see King Yama!" He turned around and pushed Fu Dexing towards the pontoon. "Boom!" Fu Dexing's whole body fell into the river and was swallowed by the river water.
Qian Wankuan held up his palms and said with a wild smile, "Wonderful!" How wonderful. What’s even better is that the total of 10,000 coins hidden in the two paint buckets belongs to me, Qian, exclusively!
Qian Wanguan got excited, so he put his hand into the paint bucket to try it, and even took out a few slings of money to look at it, his eyes widening with smiles. But my hands were covered with paint, and I felt uncomfortable and frowned.
The heat at noon was irritating and irritating. Old Man Song, who had sold all the ramie upstairs in his house, was unhappy and took the scale in his hand to weigh it again and again. He looked at Mrs. Song and said, "There's something wrong with our own scale, right?"
Song’s mother said, you weighed the scale yourself and you can’t blame others.
Old Man Song said, I think there is nothing wrong with this scale. He leaned the scale against the wall. He frowned and climbed up the wooden stairs. When he looked upstairs, there was no trace of numbness at all and it was completely empty. Walking further down the corridor, I found that the tiles had been lifted off in one place on the roof, forming a hole the size of a basket, like a huge skylight. Old Man Song returned to the stairs and shouted, "Honey, come up and take a look."
Mrs. Song went upstairs, and Mr. Song took her to see the skylight on the roof.
Old Man Song said dumbfounded, "Honey, you are so confused. You were throwing bundles of linen upstairs and throwing them downstairs. Why didn't you pay attention?" I deduced from this that one of the three men collecting hemp quietly opened a large hole in the tiles on our roof.
No wonder our family has more than 4,000 kilograms of hemp, but more than 2,000 kilograms are missing. It turns out that "thief" stuffed a lot of our hemp bundles out of the skylight to avoid you.
Mrs. Song understood and blamed herself very much. Why didn't she notice it? She was very angry, but her anger was in vain, so she said, yes, I saw a person go upstairs and make some small moves over there. I was in the middle of a handover with a hemp collector and had no time to pay attention to that side.
Old Man Song said that a man went upstairs for a while and then came down and drove the carriage away. He probably filled the carriage with the hemp bundles he threw behind our house and drove away.
The more they thought about it, the more uncomfortable they became. They pointed at each other and complained about each other.
Mrs. Song burst into tears, crying and complaining, it took a long time to cut these several thousand kilograms of hemp! My hands were tired and swollen.
Old Man Song got a hookah and sat at the door with his head down, smoking one puff after another. White mist filled his eyes, and he said nothing.
For two or three days in a row, Mrs. Song kept crying and her eyes were swollen from crying; Mr. Song looked at the gloomy sky outside the house with a gloomy face and sighed.
When the villagers noticed that the two elders were unhappy, they came to ask about the situation. Mrs. Song complained with snot and tears that the hemp collectors avoided them and opened up the tiles on the roof to create a huge skylight to steal the hemp bundles. Throw it out and let their family lose money in vain.
The villagers comforted the two old men with their kind words and tried to be more open-minded, but at the same time they cursed the three hemp collectors, saying they had a bad conscience and deserved to be killed.
