Chapter 76. [Case Thirteen] Descendants of the Salt Gang
I just found something to eat downstairs in the hotel. There was a school nearby, and many students on their way to school also bought breakfast nearby. Hu Zongren called his employer, who told us to find a place to wait in the town.
She and Hu Zongren looked at the nearby reference objects and named a place, then hung up the phone. Hu Zongren and I ate together while waiting for the employer to arrive.
After waiting for about half an hour, a middle-aged woman wearing maroon clothes rushed over. It seemed that their homes were really far apart. After meeting us, we got in the car and headed towards her home.
Drive in the direction. The accent of the people in Pengnan is relatively unique, and it is somewhat close to but not exactly the same as Hu Zongren’s. Hu Zongren is from Yilong, and Yilong belongs to Nanchong, Sichuan, while Pengnan belongs to Suining. Nanchong
Pengnan is originally adjacent to Suining, but the accent in Pengnan is more Nanchong. For example, when they say "go back", the pronunciation is "feike", and for example, when they say "speak", the pronunciation is "shuofa". Personally,
He said that he has a great fondness for this authentic local accent.
Their family didn't really live close by. They were walking along a narrow mountain road with twists and turns. The road was so narrow that they could only pass a tricycle and a car in parallel. Fortunately, it was still early and there was nothing on the road.
After the car passed a mountain temple, we arrived at their house. This is a typical farmer's house in eastern Sichuan. It seems that the family is relatively well-off in such an environment in the countryside. It is a two-story brick house.
There are several small side rooms arranged at right angles to the side of the house, which are the kitchen and the toilet. In front of the house is a large square yard, surrounded by waist-high brick walls.
There are some chickens. Opposite the house is a large piece of open farmland. Because the house is located at a high position, the view is very wide. In Hu Zongren’s words, this is called Qinglong on the left, white tiger on the right, with green mountains on the back.
It is "backed", and its Feng Shui position is considered to be excellent.
The middle-aged woman brought out two stools from the main room and gave one to each of me and Hu Zongren. Then she took out cigarettes from the room and distributed them to me and Hu Zongren, but did not smoke them herself. I guess she must be
For non-smokers, this pack of cigarettes either belongs to the male head of the household, or he made a special trip to buy them for our arrival. The latter is more likely, because she didn't even tear off the wrapping paper in the cigarette box.
.Then she sat down on her own and introduced herself.
She said her surname was Deng, Deng Xiaoping's Deng. She emphasized this point in particular. Hu Zongren said to Aunt Deng that since we had not made it clear on the phone before, we could only make guesses about many situations on the road, so I hope this will
Let’s explain the problem to our son face to face. Aunt Deng said that she is a widow and her husband passed away five years ago. She has two children at home. The eldest is a daughter. She just got married a while ago. Her son-in-law is from Suining City.
, her son is three years younger than her daughter, and she is currently studying in college away from home. She said that, to be honest, she is the only woman in the family, and she cannot farm all the land she has, so she sub-leases it to nearby villagers, who give them a nominal fee.
Pay some rent money. I mainly take care of the cherry orchard in the middle of the mountain that my husband contracted before his death. The cherries are relatively seasonal, so I won’t be particularly tired. Except for the hard work of killing insects and fertilizing, I only need to go there frequently on weekdays.
Look, it's just fire prevention and theft prevention. But this time, it was mainly my daughter who got into trouble.
After saying that, Aunt Deng pointed to the second floor of the building behind her, and then said, my daughter is in the room now. Her aunt knew that you two were coming today, so she specially came to help me take care of her. Duan Gong in the village
He said that this child was possessed by an evil spirit. When he was walking at night, he stepped on someone else's tombstone and was haunted by evil spirits. I told Aunt Deng, what are the specific symptoms, when did they start, and when did you notice them?
Has anything special happened? I asked the question a little more directly, because I was really worried that the person I met this time was a mourning ghost. This had nothing to do with whether I stepped on other people's graves or not. It was entirely due to bad luck.
Aunt Deng said that the main symptoms were that her body was hot but her palms were cold, her forehead was sweating, and her sweat was cold but her skin was very hot. She said that her daughter’s body constitution makes it easier to sweat, so she has been like this for many days in a row.
Worried about the child not being able to bear it, she and her daughter's aunt often wiped her body, physically cooled her body, and even force-fed her with water, fearing that she would become dehydrated. Aunt Deng told us that this was really strange, as she was sweating so much.
However, my lips have always been dry and cracked, and they have cracked into the flesh several times. My eyes can only be half-open at most, and the circles under my eyelids have turned purple, and they talk nonsense, just like a child.
It was the same as when I first started chatting. No one could understand what he was saying. Sometimes he would twitch. When he twitched, he would roll his eyes, straighten his hands and feet, and curl his fingers like chicken feet. He would urinate and feces.
To solve it in bed, we have to turn her over frequently for fear of getting bedsores or something.
Aunt Deng went on to say that it started about two weeks ago. Initially, her daughter just complained of dizziness and discomfort, thinking she had a cold. She took some medicine and didn't take it seriously. However, she woke up very weak the next morning and couldn't even take it seriously.
As an old woman, I could tell that something was wrong with my child, so I quickly asked her to lie down on the bed to rest. As a result, she became like this now. I asked Aunt Deng, and I heard Master Hu say that your daughter just got married.
Is that right? Did these things happen after getting married? She said yes. I said, did you hold the wedding at home or in a restaurant in town? Aunt Deng said, we are far down the mountain and relatives
All our friends live in nearby villages, and it’s not what we rural people do to go all the way for a big event, so we hired a team of chefs and set up a dozen tables in the area from our yard to the intersection.
of running water seats.
I asked Aunt Deng again, so the people who came to the wedding were all acquaintances of your wife’s family, right? She said yes, her son-in-law is from Suining, and only his parents came with him, and the others were all fellow villagers from our village.
.I asked her, did you see anyone you didn’t recognize at the scene, or anyone dressed strangely? Aunt Deng saw my serious expression and knew I was asking a key question. She thought about it carefully and said, yes
Most of them are familiar to me, and a few are not familiar to me but I have seen them before. And as you know, families always come to banquets in rural areas, so I don’t think there is anything strange about this. I asked Aunt Deng, what was the wedding at that time?
Didn't you see anyone in mourning clothes at the scene?
Aunt Deng seemed a little unhappy after hearing my question. She muttered, "How is that possible? They are all from the countryside, coming to congratulate you. How could anyone come in mourning clothes? Besides, can those mourning clothes be?"
Is it something that a living person can wear? Hearing Aunt Deng’s answer, I suddenly felt a little confused. I turned to look at Hu Zongren, who also had a sad face. After analyzing the situation of their family, since it was a situation that only appeared after his daughter got married.
, if it is my previous guess, then it is very likely that he is a happy ghost among the mourning ghosts, who likes to wear mourning clothes to attend other people's wedding banquets, but I really can't think of any possibility that Aunt Deng wants to hide it from me. Logically speaking, in
When everyone is joyfully attending the wedding banquet, a person wearing mourning clothes will indeed attract more attention. Aunt Deng is marrying her daughter, so this should not be missed.
So if it's not a mourning ghost, then what should it be? So I asked Aunt Deng, Master Hu told me on the way here that it probably has something to do with the custom of marrying here. Can you tell me carefully what it is like?
Is it a custom? Aunt Deng said that it is a custom passed down from the ancestors, because there was no village in this village hundreds of years ago. The first person to live here was actually a salt trader from Guizhou to Sichuan.
The dealers later slowly developed into a village. People in our village all know this history. There are also inscriptions in the mountain temple. So I immediately thought of the mountain temple I met on the way here.
I know that there are three gods to worship. One is Guan Gong, because they often encounter heroes from the forest and need to resist robbery, so they worship Guan Gong. The other is Mazu, which is more common among salt gang members in coastal areas such as Guangdong and Fujian.
, was afraid that he would not be able to find a place to land after going to sea, so he worshiped Mazu and the mountain god.
In Chinese legends, wherever there are mountains, there is a mountain god who controls the mountains. Regardless of whether the mountain is big or small, the level of the mountain god is the same. In the early years, the main source of salt in Sichuan and Chongqing was Guizhou, and Shu Road
It is difficult to reach the sky. To enter Sichuan from Guizhou, you have to climb many mountains, and there are many mountains in Sichuan. So what Aunt Deng meant is that many people in their village are descendants of the Salt Gang. Aunt Deng went on to say, we
The marriage custom here is that once a man and a woman decide to get married, the man has to walk up the mountain with a bride price to kowtow to his mother-in-law, which is called "worshiping the mountain." No matter how close the couple was before, before the mother-in-law recognizes her son-in-law, the daughter must
They have to hide in the boudoir all the time, and cannot open the window or see anyone. The young couple cannot meet until the mother-in-law accepts the bride price. After the wedding ceremony, the man and his relatives need to leave early and return home to prepare for the wedding.
Before the bride comes, she needs to use a feather duster to clean up all the dust in the house, which means to remove the filth. When the bride comes, she will have a completely new life. The bride needs to give her husband's family enough preparation time, usually 7 days to half a month.
, and then the bride is sent all the way to her husband’s house by her natal family. After this trip, she is not allowed to return to her natal family before the first day of the first lunar month of the next year. Otherwise, it will be considered unlucky and she will be kicked out by her husband’s family. The consequences will be
It is because this woman will be regarded as a woman who cannot have children that she cannot be kept in her husband's family.
Although it is an old feudal custom, it is still an integral part of our culture after all. Most people nowadays organize weddings according to the rules and just follow the rules. As for the deeper things, I am afraid not many people want to delve into them. But since then
In Aunt Deng's description of local customs, I couldn't think of any steps that might lead to ghosts. If this is not a ghost of mourning and joy, and the customs are correct, how did this girl fall into the trap?
At this time, Hu Zongren interrupted and asked Aunt Deng, what will the family do in the past seven days when the husband's family is gone? Aunt Deng said that the family must prepare a dowry, quilts, mattresses, and local chickens.
You can’t miss duck, native fish, and eggs, duck eggs, etc. Most of them are agricultural and sideline products anyway. During this period, the bride will go to her close relatives such as grandparents, uncles, aunts, etc., and come to thank them in person, which means our children
When you get married, thank your elders for their blessings. If another elder in the family passes away, whether it is during the Qingming Festival or not, you must kneel down at the grave to comfort the ancestors.
Kneel down and worship at the grave? There is something wrong here!