"Mom, why are you here?" Zhuang San asked as he opened the door.
"Why, I am your mother, why can't I come whenever I want?"
The old lady had just been snorted by Liu Kanzi's wife, and after looking at the door for a long time, no one answered her. She was feeling unhappy, and kept speaking out word by word.
Zhuang Sanyi didn't listen well, my mother seems to be a bit difficult to take care of today.
"That one of yours is hiding again?"
Seeing the black dust on her son's hands and some stains on his clothes, Mrs. Qian felt angry.
Well, Mr. Wu, men are so tired from working outside, why do they still have to do housework? Is marrying you here to enjoy the blessings?
After saying that, she waved her son away and started to hold his hand. She opened the door of the main room and entered the back room in two steps.
The room was warm, and she felt comfortable as soon as she entered. The pores on her body opened, and even the wrinkles on her face seemed to relax.
Mrs. Qian was stunned and forgot all the curse words she had just accumulated.
No! It’s not winter yet, and the stove is already turned on? It’s a waste of firewood!
She suddenly woke up and turned her little mung bean eyes, trying to search for the shadow of the clay stove in the house. But there was no stove in the house. Apart from the bed, there was only an old wooden table and two stools. There was a small tile on the table.
There was a jar, and the bowl next to it contained some light brown water, which had a sweet aroma.
The old lady was about to murmur something about wasting money, but she choked. She didn't give up, walked to the table and brought the bowl of water. Before Wu could stop her, she opened her mouth and drank a big gulp.
"Have you boiled sugared jujube water?" There was a lot of sweetness in her mouth, and there was a hint of jujube fragrance. Mrs. Qian couldn't hold back a few more sips, and drank the bowl clean, then put down the bowl and came out with an empty mouth.
Continue to scold: "Ms. Wu, I really can't say anything bad about you!"
"My three children work hard in the fields every day, and it is not easy to earn some money. Why waste it on you like this? Back then, I gave birth to three sons for the old villager, and they were not even willing to take a sip. You gave birth to a girl, and she was still a sick person.
Yangzi, do you have the nerve to drink this?"
Mrs. Qian suddenly forgot the question of why the room was so warm, and just held on to the sugar water. She originally thought that the Wu family was not good at living, and was lazy and slippery, which made her son suffer. Now she caught people who only know how to enjoy themselves.
The handle, and then thinking about what I heard a few days ago that they brought a lot of things back to their parents' home, the ugly words immediately opened their mouths and spewed out, which only made Zhuang San frown.
"Mom!" Zhuang San asked Old Mrs. Qian, "What are you talking about? When did we go back to our parents' house?"
"The Liu family next door saw it with their own eyes!"
"You also listen to what that naughty woman says, really!"
Zhuang San didn't dare to say that he went to the main house, but he insisted that he went out without a gift, which was all nonsense made by Liu Kanzi's wife.
Mrs. Qian looked at her son's serious face and was doubtful. When she looked back, she remembered that Liu's nose was not a nose and his eyes were not eyes. She immediately believed her son.
"Then you can't just spoil the people in the house like this, you've lost some of your manhood!"
"These are all things given by others, and we have never bought them ourselves."
When Zhuang San saw that his wife's face was livid, he was about to explode, so he quickly gave her a reassuring look.
"Who sent it?"
Jujubes are cheap, but brown sugar is not. They are expensive and no one is willing to buy them at ordinary times. I only bring one when I go to the elders’ home during the holidays. Her son knows that he has a bad reputation. At this time
Who else would bother with him, let alone give him such an expensive gift?
"Just, I did a favor to someone I knew in the next village." Zhuang San explained in a low voice, not daring to glance up at all, for fear that the old lady would catch him.
Seeing that she couldn't get anything out of the question, Mrs. Qian stopped pressing her. She just kept mumbling, and after careful listening, she was all scolding Mrs. Wu.
"As long as you don't have to spend it yourself, money is hard to come by, so don't waste it carelessly."
"Yes, yes, your son will remember everything you said."
Zhuang San coaxed and invited the old man outside. As soon as Mrs. Qian came out of the house, she shivered from the air-conditioning, and immediately thought of why the house was so warm.
"Why is it so warm here?" She squinted her eyes and squinted at her son. Because her eyes were too small, all she could see were layers of eyelids fluttering.
"Mom, we have made a fire kang in this house." Zhuang San replied, "We invited Liu Da's construction team to come and it will be ready in half a day. The children will not be afraid of the cold in winter."
Mrs. Qian also heard about the village's Kang team, but she had always been disdainful.
The village has survived the winter well for so many years, but this year people have suddenly become more delicate and even make a fire bed. Her family will definitely not make anything that costs money and waste wood!
She didn't ask any more questions. The provincial son's snake-killing stick asked her for some subsidies. So, wouldn't he have given up his fortune by taking this step?
"Then just use it. It will save you the trouble of having to spend money to hire a doctor if you get sick again in the winter."
The old lady's words were unpleasant and she was like a sick man, but at least she didn't say anything about making a kang. Zhuang San didn't know that his mother didn't let him go because he was afraid that he would beg her for money. He just thought that his mother was a grandma.
After all, she still has some tenderness in her blood and knows how to feel soft and caring for her granddaughter.
He happily sent the old lady to the door, Zhuang San grabbed a handful of dates, broke a piece of brown sugar and wrapped them, and then he allowed Old Lady Qian to go back safely.
The old lady of the banker is very disgusted with the fire kang now, but she doesn't know that when winter comes, it will be difficult for her to ask anyone to come and do work for her.
…
It is obviously the slack season for farming, but in Erli Village everyone has work to do and everyone has money to make.
The Pan Kang team was very busy, and there were constant orders from neighboring villages. Some relatives visiting relatives in the town came to the village and met them, and they all said they wanted to buy one for their houses in the town.
So Liu Da's construction team expanded, recruited more people, and divided into three teams to get the orders for those who could run.
The Pan Kang team has also driven the business of selling firewood and digging mud. Apart from these, the sweet potato workshop has also never stopped.
After Wu Fu Ji’s delivery promotion, no one in the town or surrounding villages knows about Erli Village’s specialty dried potatoes and vermicelli. Even those who used to run restaurants and food stalls have begun to sell various dishes made with vermicelli.
.There are soup noodles, mixed noodles, stir-fried noodles, all kinds of special ones.
The merchants who came out to sell goods were shrewd. They saw that this stuff was not only novel and delicious, but also durable, so they had to bring some with them when they went back. For a while, the shopkeepers in the town were also anxious.
After asking around, they went to the village to place orders.
Nowadays, the villagers of Erli Village are no longer surprised by these big figures they knew in the past. When they see someone asking for directions, they will give directions and follow behind to see what is new. These people in charge are no longer there.
With the kind of preferential treatment given by shopkeeper Hu before, he can still have the food prepared by Zhuang Keqing.
But no matter how good the business of the sweet potato workshop is now, or how popular the Pan Kang team is, the banker's main office is still as usual, grinding beans to make tofu every day, and going to the town to deliver goods every three days. Only Shen Ling and Zhuang Keqing are there every day. I dedicate one day of my life to help the sweet potato factory in the village keep accounts and calculate the wages and publish them publicly.
"Aling, come with me to the town tomorrow. After selling the tofu, you have to go to the Five Fortunes."
It was warm in the small room. Shen Ling was sitting at the table, holding the cheapest rabbit hair in his hand, and was writing quietly silently. Zhuang Keqing took a branch of hibiscus that he had just broken off in the morning and inserted it into the earthen vase in front of the window to add color to the room. A ray of fragrance.
"The young man came to see me last time and said that shopkeeper Hu would be arriving in the next few days and asked me to go there as soon as possible."
"Yeah." Shen Ling nodded lightly, and while he agreed in a low voice, he looked up at the girl in front of the window.
The sun shone in from the window, forming a circle of pale golden halo around her. Her young and beautiful face smiled without saying a word, like a bud blooming, eclipsing the fresh and delicate hibiscus.
"Then we have to leave early tomorrow. Dahei also needs to have a meal in the evening." After Zhuang Keqing arranged the flowers, he turned back and smiled at Shen Ling, with the corners of his lips slightly raised, which was touching.
Being caught secretly gazing, Shen Ling suddenly felt embarrassed and his eyes wandered for a moment.
"By the way, after Shopkeeper Hu's business is finished, we will go to the bookstore to see if there are any new books. By the way, we have to take time to go to Master Zhao's in the next few days."
Zhuang Keqing didn't know that Shen Ling's mind had wandered far away, and he was just arranging the next things by himself, "If you don't understand anything in the book before, just write it down first, and ask Master Zhao when the time comes. We have something with us." Go, he will definitely be willing to teach you."
After saying that, the girl didn't wait for Shen Ling's answer, she just cleared the window sill and tabletop, then gently closed the door and left the house.
At this time, Shopkeeper Hu from Five Fortunes just got off the carriage.
His back was straight, he was high-spirited, and his mustache was raised higher than usual. He glanced at the shops on the whole street with an arrogant look, and then looked at the Five Fortunes signboard above his head, and then he was served by the waiter. I walked in contentedly.
