Two or three cheongsam beauties holding umbrellas walked by slowly, and occasionally a few soft words from Wu Nong and a faint laugh floated over.
In this ordinary alley, there is a grocery store called Simao Grocery Store.
The shop owner is a middle-aged short and fat man. His name is Huang Defu, and Si Mao is his nickname.
At this time, Huang Simao was sitting on the chair behind the counter like a pile of mud, with four burly men standing around him.
A big man looked at the watch on his wrist from time to time, and the anxiety in his heart became stronger and stronger.
"Huang Simao, if you dare to lie to us, I will chop you alive!" The man yelled at Huang Simao in a low voice.
"Sir, I really didn't lie to you. The agreed time is nine o'clock sharp, and he has never been late." Huang Simao said with a hunched body and a sad face.
Huang Simao knew what would happen to him. Now that he fell into the hands of these people, he was no longer a human being, not even as good as a dog.
His only wish now is to die quickly. A painless death is already the greatest blessing.
Outsiders simply don't know, not even his neighbors, that Huang Simao's shop is an important contact point for the Shanghai underground party and an intelligence stronghold.
Huang Simao has been working for the underground party for several years and never thought that he would be exposed here. The people who come to him to collect documents and information are the people he is most familiar with and the people he respects the most.
Those people will never betray him, because they have long taken life and death lightly, and have long put their personal interests aside. So what is the problem?
Huang Simao always felt like there were strangers walking around these days, but he didn't care. After all, Shanghai has a large passenger flow and a large immigrant population. Some people who are not familiar with the route visit relatives and friends and enter by mistake.
It's also common in alleys.
Many of the alleys in Jiangnan look so similar to each other, and are full of twists and turns. To outsiders, they look like a maze.
As soon as the store door was opened this morning, four people suddenly rushed in from the door. They were all tall and muscular, and they were all wearing shell guns.
Huang Simao knew this kind of gun. Folks called it a German gun with twenty rings, a large mirror, etc. It was so powerful that it could be called a small machine gun.
However, he didn't know where these four people came from. They handcuffed him when they came up, and then asked him where the information was hidden, who was the person who came to get the information, etc.
Of course, Huang Simao would not admit this. He denied it flatly, saying that he was just a law-abiding, hard-working small grocery store owner who made a living by running a small business. He didn't know what "intelligence" they were referring to.
The four big men didn't beat him or scare him, they just told him the names of people who often came to his shop to get information.
Huang Simao was quite surprised. This was a secret. The enemy already knew the details, so naturally they couldn't get away with it.
The enemy arrived so quickly that he had no time to process the information placed on the counter. As a result, he was simply found out by these four people.
Huang Simao was confined to the space of about three square meters behind the counter. He could sit on a chair and get up to tidy up the shelves next to the counter, but he was not allowed to take any actions beyond the norm.
In other words, everything Huang Simao does must look like he is still doing business normally without any accidents.
At this moment, the only hope in Huang Simao's heart was that the comrade who came to collect information was delayed by something and could not come here today. In this case, this comrade could escape.
Huang Simao sat on the chair with no expression, but he was full of regret in his heart, regretting that he had been too careless.
All along, the intelligence delivery mission has been smooth sailing, and there has never been any problem.
As time passed, Huang Simao relaxed his vigilance. Because there were many things going on yesterday, he did not hide the information in advance.
Now that the information has fallen into the hands of the enemy, his life is no longer important, but losing this information will bring heavy losses to the party's cause.
The more Huang Simao thought this way, the more frightened he became, and the greater the psychological pressure became. In the end, he no longer had the strength to stand up.
The four tough men just thought that he was greedy for life and afraid of death, and looked at him with disdain. However, they had no idea that what Huang Simao feared was not his life at all, but the serious consequences of losing information.
While the four big men were anxious, suddenly a watchman whispered: "Someone is coming, please pay attention."
The four people immediately divided their work. Two people hid behind the two doors, and two people hid in the counter, crouching down, holding the shell gun tightly in their hands, the bullets already loaded.
A rickshaw came quietly, like a boat floating on the Huangpu River. When it arrived in front of the door, the man pulling the rickshaw stopped, put the rickshaw down, and prepared to walk into the small shop.
Huang Simao's eyes immediately widened. He could clearly see that the person who was about to enter the store was the traffic officer he was most familiar with.
"Hurry up, there's an ambush!" Huang Simao yelled with all his strength.
When the people outside the door heard the sound, they were stunned for a moment, then turned around and ran forward.
"Cuff Huang Simao first, others, chase!" one of the leaders of the four shouted, leading the other two people and ran out of the grocery store.
The man ran to the end of the alley, but stopped again.
Four people appeared at the end of the alley, blocking him in front of him. They were all holding rifles, and their dark muzzles were pointed at him.
"Hou Liang, surrender, you can't run away." A person shouted.
The man turned around and started running again, and bumped into four big men rushing out of the grocery store.
The walls on both sides of the alley were three meters high, making it impossible to climb up. This man was desperate and rushed over, trying to snatch the gun from one of them.
The four burly men immediately put away their guns and passed from both sides. Two of them grabbed his arms, and one hugged his neck. The last one knocked him down from behind.
The man was still struggling like a fish thrown on the beach. Four big men barely held him down. Four big men from the alley also rushed over, pressing his shoulders and thighs.
The man was pressed firmly to the ground, and a foot was stepped on even his head.
"Handcuff him!" someone shouted.
Someone took out a pair of handcuffs and cuffed the man's hands behind his back. Another person took out a rope and tied his feet.
"Damn, this guy is really strong, you can't tell." A big man gasped.
"Fortunately, two groups of us came together. If only one group had come, he might have been able to break free." One person said, wiping the sweat from his head.
"Escape? No matter how strong he is, he can still outrun our bullets." One person said proudly.
"What are you talking about? Isn't it clearly stated above? Those must be captured alive, and guns are not allowed."
Four people carried the young man named Hou Liang, and the other four returned to the grocery store, only to see Huang Simao lying motionless on the ground, with a wisp of black blood flowing out of the corner of his mouth.
Huang Simao is dead.
"Damn it, why is this guy dead?" a big man shouted.
"How could he die? Didn't he already be handcuffed?" the little leader said in surprise.
"Maybe he had prepared the poison a long time ago and hid it somewhere on the counter, or we were careless." One person realized this problem.
The faces of several people who had just become excited gradually turned gloomy.
They thought that Huang Simao was not an important person and could not have poison for suicide. Besides, they had already handcuffed him, but they did not expect that he could still get the poison and eat it.
At this time, three people ran in from the entrance of the alley, none other than Weng Bailing, Huang Yanning and Zhao Yuanliang.
The eight big men here are all members of their second action brigade, and Weng Bailing personally directed this arrest operation.
"We have arrested someone. Can you confirm that he is the person we want to arrest?" Weng Bailing asked sharply.
"Report to the stationmaster, this person is Hou Liang, there is no mistake. He is the traffic officer of the Shanghai Underground Party Municipal Working Committee and is responsible for delivering information and instructions." A big man stood at attention and said.
"Huang Simao has exposed Hou Liang's identity, and he is the person we want to arrest." the little boss reported.
"The transmitted information has also been seized. Please check it with the webmaster." A man handed Weng Bailing the intelligence materials he had searched when he first entered the house.