After just one meal, when Wei Ran and the three of them walked out of the warm basement, the cold wind outside became more and more biting, and the whistling sound became more and more penetrating.
Not daring to waste time, Wei Ran picked up the mouse cages given to him by Matvey. Under the leadership of Alexander, and with Lydia who obviously had something to say, he left the ruins and walked towards the shadow of the building on the other side of the road.
After walking through the streets and alleys for almost ten minutes, Alexander pointed to a burned-out dark building directly in front of him and said, "This is where we put the cages to catch the mice."
"Alexander, do you know the way back?" Lydia asked abruptly.
"I know you, of course I do..." "Then go back by yourself first"
Lydia didn't wait for the other party to finish speaking and then said, "Don't run around in the middle, especially keep an eye on the younger brothers and sisters. Don't let them eat the food made by Victor."
"I'm going back now!" After Alexander, who had just drank the broth and was full, he immediately turned around and walked back staggeringly while holding on to the wall.
It wasn't until the child's back was completely swallowed by the shadow of the building that Lydia pointed to the ruins in front of her and asked, "Victor, do you know where this place is?"
What do I know? Wei Ran grinned secretly, "Lidya, if you have anything to say, just say it."
“This used to be a nursing home”
Lydia looked at the ruins in front of her and said, "More than two months ago, when German bombers hit this place with incendiary bombs, dozens of old people were hiding in the basement of this building, and they didn't come out.
Including...including my dad, who is the health care physician at this nursing home."
"You mean..." Wei Ran shrugged his Adam's apple and forced himself to suppress the bad thought.
"I guess those mice must also like to eat cooked food..." Lidya said with a bitter look on her face the cruel truth that Wei Ran didn't want to hear.
Before he could say anything, Lydia said to herself, "I have no other purpose in telling you this, and I don't want to stop you from feeding rats to your children.
And I also know that the rats still alive in this city basically live by eating the corpses of residents. I also know that if we want to prevent those children from starving to death in a short period of time, we must not eat rats.
Lots of options - if we can catch the mice."
Taking a deep breath, Lydia continued to speak seriously, "But Victor, I don't want those children to discover this pattern. Alexander is a smart child. Sooner or later, he will know that many people have been burned to death here. Those who were burned to death
The people attracted a lot of mice to them.
But they are children after all, and they can survive by eating those rats, but I don’t want him to discover this cruel rule.”
"I understand." Wei Ran nodded, "I won't let the children participate in mouse hunting anymore." "Thank you."
Lydia wiped the corners of her eyes with the knitted gloves she was wearing, "They haven't grown up yet, and the reconstruction work of Leningrad will have to be completed by them in the future. They may live in this city for a long time.
Victor, I don’t want them to think of ‘rats prefer to eat burned people’ as their life experience when they recall this city.”
"I understand, I will pay attention to this matter." Wei Ran assured again.
"Let's go back"
Lydia wrapped her scarf tightly and said worriedly as she walked back unsteadily, "The wind is so strong, I'm afraid the transport team on Lake Ladoga will suffer another disaster."
"Is the material supply still insufficient now?" Wei Ran asked. "Food, fuel, medicine, ammunition, these are the things that are most lacking in Leningrad right now." Lydia sighed, "It has always been in short supply, and there are
capacity and thick enough ice.”
"Isn't it getting better?"
"The temperature dropped yesterday and today, which is a good thing. The ice surface is getting stronger and stronger."
Although Lydia said this, her tone was not very happy, "People are dying on that road all the time. You must have guessed it, Mrs. Via's son Beliya is dead."
"guessed
"
After Wei Ran finished speaking, he sighed silently. He had already learned how to judge whether a person was lying at the Hongqi Forest Farm.
But most of the time, if you can clearly realize that others are lying, you have to bear the pain that cannot be concealed behind the lie. "He was killed by a bomb, and his body sank into the lake."
Lydia wiped the corners of her cold eyes, "When I rushed to the port, his good friend Anatole asked me to help him hide it from Mrs. Via at all costs. Via is her youngest and last
She has sons. Her two oldest sons died in Kiev last summer. Her third son was a pilot and died in Poland last summer. Her only daughter is a traffic controller on the ice highway. A month ago
She is also dead, she was frozen to death. Now her only remaining child is also dead..."
"Alas..." Wei Ran sighed, but he didn't know how to approach this topic.
"That fish, those vegetables and half a bottle of milk every day are compensation and condolences to Beliya's family." Lidia wiped her uncontrollable tears in vain, "Although it will not be all, but the transportation team
We can only distribute so much supplies for the time being."
"When can we arrange for the children to be evacuated?" Wei Ran asked, changing the subject.
"not the right time yet"
Lidia shook her head and told another tragedy with increasing pain, "I heard from a comrade who came back from the port today that he encountered a broken down truck on the way this morning, with more than ten people sitting on it.
A wounded child the size of Alexander and a dozen wounded warriors.
They were originally preparing to retreat to Cobona, but when he got closer, he discovered that the children and the wounded had been frozen together with the truck's cargo box. The truck driver and the people on the cargo bed were all frozen to death.
"
Gently hugging the young girl who was covering her face and sobbing, Wei Ran let her hide in his arms and cry loudly, venting the negative emotions that her strength could no longer hold back.
This chapter is not over yet, please click on the next page to continue reading the exciting content! After a long time, the thin and shapeless girl finally stopped crying, and Wei Ran also just in time before the other party opened his mouth, put a round
The tin box was stuffed into the other party's pocket.
"What's it this time?" Lydia sniffed and asked, but she rarely refused the gift that had been stuffed into the capital.
"The box of chocolates that Kena found in the wreckage of a German plane." Weiran put the credit on Kena and deliberately made a bad joke, "Take it, women are naturally good at lying. If you starve to death
, I don’t think I can deceive Mrs. Via.”
"Women are naturally good at lying?"
Lidya sniffed and muttered, "Your lie is also very good. I already knew what you all encountered today from Ke Na's mouth, and I also know that the things she discovered have already been
I gave it to Comrade Matvey, but thank you anyway."
"Well, I am also a woman who is good at lying." Wei Ran made the joke on himself without any pressure, and his shameless appearance, which was not afraid of boiling water, finally made the look on Lidya's face
The sadness and surprise turned into an uncontrollable smile.
After helping this strong girl in her early 20s to adjust her mood, Wei Ran, who was actually in a worse mood, placed mouse traps everywhere in the ruins of the burnt building.
He also habitually cleaned up his footprints, and then under the leadership of Lydia, he returned to the ruins of the building where the basement was located.
This time and the effort of eating dinner before, the meat jelly cooked before the meal has completely solidified with the help of this low temperature.
Amid the expectations of the children around him, Wei Ran cut the large pot full of meat jelly into thumb-sized strips and distributed them to everyone present in the name of "tasting and tasting".
one person.
“A little bitter, a little salty, and a little sweet”
Ke Na was the first to comment, "In general, it's not as delicious as my mother's, but it's still delicious, except that the horsehide is a bit chewy. Is that horsehide? It must be, right?"
"Your mother can also do this?" Wei Ran asked pretending to be surprised. Of course he was pretending to be surprised. You know, whether in the Soviet era or the Russian era, Maozi's aspic was famous.
Famously delicious.
Especially in the Soviet era, aspic was nicknamed "Soviet glue". It was served as small as the dining table of workers or peasant families, as large as the dining tables of previous presidents of the Soviet era and even for banquets with envoys or presidents from various countries.
Various types of aspic appear as frequently as various types of pies.
"My mom does it too!"
Alexander, whose mouth was stuffed with meat jelly, said vaguely, "She would put a lot of fish, chicken, beef and pork in it. If my father caught a deer when he went hunting, he would also put venison. I will put venison in it."
I think it tastes the best.”
“Venison needs to be stewed very well to be delicious.”
Ke Na said subconsciously, and at the same time, she did not forget to throw two large pieces of aspic with only horsehide, horse intestines and some horse liver into her mouth. She chewed big mouthfuls and said, "My father also goes hunting occasionally. He
I once hunted a bear. It was not a little bear that put on a show for us, but a very big one. My mother made all the bear meat into aspic and gave it to the neighbors. The bear skin used to be spread on the ground.
It's warm in my bed."
"I testify that what she said is true."
Mrs. Via joined the conversation with a smile, and after throwing a piece of aspic into her mouth, she said, "I also received the aspic sent by Kona at that time. The bear meat in it was bright red and tasted very good.
, that was the first time I ate bear meat, and I have never tasted such delicious aspic again.”
As the old lady described it, the children around her who were listening to the story couldn't help but speed up the process of stuffing meat jelly into their mouths.
At the same time, Wei Ran was also secretly thankful. Fortunately, he had laid a sufficient foundation for adding food to the children's meals from time to time in the past few days. Fortunately, the water content of these meat jelly was relatively high. Otherwise, eating so much meat jelly would not be enough for these hungry people.
Children who have been eating it for too long may not be able to digest it at all.
Wu Ran glanced at Lidia who was also eating meat jelly. Wei Ran, who had been watching silently just now, also picked up a piece of meat jelly and threw it into his mouth.
After just one bite, he frowned. This meat jelly was definitely not delicious. It was fishy, smelly, hard to chew, and had the unique bitter taste of liver.
But looking at the children and women around him who were eating with gusto, Wei Ran finally threw the remaining half into his mouth, chewed it, and swallowed it into his stomach.
That night, the biting cold wind never stopped, and for the first time in the warm basement, the children gathered around the stove had the illusion of being full.
Especially before going to bed, they also received a large glass of slightly hot honey water from Wei Ran.
In such an era and in such an environment, no one cares about whether drinking honey water before going to bed will cause tooth decay. Those children who are sweating profusely from drinking spend the whole night unconsciously smacking the remaining traces of honey in their mouths.
The sweetness, and in this increasingly faint sweetness, they cuddled together, wrapped in various blankets, surrounded by the stove that had never been extinguished, and peacefully entered a dreamland without war.
That night, Wei Ran, who also filled his stomach with pork skin jelly, suffered from insomnia. Whenever he closed his eyes, he would think of those dismembered military horses and the nursing home hit by incendiary bombs as described by Lidia.
, thinking of those rats that like to eat cooked meat, thinking of the five children that Mrs. Via had sacrificed, and also thinking of what Lydia said about the drivers, children and injured people who froze to death on the lake.
Also suffering from insomnia were Kona and Lydia, who were sleeping side by side, back to back. Both girls put their hands into the pillow rolls rolled up with clothes. Inside, without exception, there was a box filled with German chocolates.
round iron box.
Of course, in the girl Kona's arms was a pair of bearskin mittens lent to her by Weiran. In one of the gloves was a German P38 pistol without top bullets.
In the faint red light emitted by the stove, the girl could not help but think of the German pilot who was shot dead by her, of the German corpse she saw hanging on the wooden beam by Wei Ran, and of those things that appeared in Wei Ran's mind.
corpses of military horses, and aspic that filled everyone’s stomachs before going to bed.
It feels so good to be full...
Ke
Na couldn't help but squeeze the tin box containing German chocolates, and then she quietly took her hand out, and slowly put it into the warm bearskin gloves. The furry touch inside the gloves was very much like her before.
The bearskin spread on the bed.
It feels so good to be full...
On the other side of the stove, Mrs. Via also let out a silent sigh of contentment. She gently pulled out a small tk pistol from under her pillow, touched the wooden grip patch on it, and touched the "Soviet Bank" on it.
"" in Russian, and finally slowly and contentedly closed his eyes, returning to the Leningrad without war.