“Her child was switched into our family and got to live a good life, yet she turned around and abused the one who took her place. We’re both mothers—how could she be so vicious, so cruel as to do such a thing? Our family is still at the hospital right now paying for treatment for that bastard child of hers. My son was just born! My poor boy, his little body is covered in needle marks. That family of animals—how could they do such poison to a newborn? They’re not even human.”
Old Mrs. Lin was so furious she nearly collapsed, trembling all over, leaning against the wall and gasping for air. Thank heavens the child was back. If they hadn’t found him, or had stayed deceived, how much more would that little one have suffered? Using needles on a newborn—what kind of black-hearted monster could do such a thing?
Lin Wenya could not hold back her rage at all. She rushed out of the hospital room and went straight to the doctor, eyes red, voice shaking: “That sick child—our family will not pay a single cent for her treatment. You’d better hurry up and have those old beasts come pick up that little wretch. Even if she dies, don’t come telling us about it.”
Her mother had previously thought that these were all the adults’ faults, that children were innocent. But now, thinking about how that child had nearly taken her nephew’s place, and how the child’s own mother had so viciously abused her nephew, she couldn’t stop herself from pouring all her hatred onto that little girl.
Lin Wenya went straight to the police station. She wanted to interrogate that poisonous woman herself. Lin Huaiqing, afraid something might go wrong, quickly chased after her.
Even Xiao Mandong couldn’t help but tear up. The image of Wang Xiumei beating three-year-old Lu Min with a thick wooden stick seemed to hang right in front of her eyes, stabbing at her chest.
After a long while, Lin Wenhui’s mood settled slightly with the baby’s faint cries. She carefully picked up the child, and the little bundle of softness—for some reason—turned and gave her a faint, soft smile. Lin Wenhui smiled too. It was her first smile since giving birth. But her smile carried tears in it, both bitter and warm.
Xiao Mandong didn’t want to disturb this long-overdue family reunion. She pulled Xiao Manxue with her and quietly left the hospital room.
The two sisters got back onto the ox cart heading to the village. Across from them sat Cripple Liu and Hu Guizhen. Cripple Liu kept rubbing his knee. He didn’t understand why, ever since that day, his leg ached every day like it was being pricked with needles.
Hu Guizhen’s face was not looking good. She seemed sickly. An auntie asked curiously, “Comrade Hu, your face is so pale—is it morning sickness from the pregnancy?”
Hu Guizhen ignored her completely, not even lifting an eyelid.
Everyone knew full well the child wasn’t Cripple Liu’s, and they kept asking her that every day, just to sneer at her. What else was it?
The auntie saw that Hu Guizhen wasn’t responding, curled her lip, and went quiet.
“Did you go deaf when someone’s talking to you?”
Cripple Liu couldn’t stand her dead-faced attitude. They were from the same village, after all. If someone spoke to you, you shouldn’t just sit there with a face like pork belly and never answer.
No matter what Cripple Liu said, Hu Guizhen kept her mouth shut, sitting there and picking at her fingers.
She wasn’t insane—being mocked between the lines every day, the last thing she wanted was to put on a smile and play along. She was suffocating inside. It had been agreed that she’d give Cripple Liu three hundred yuan for a divorce, and her family would help arrange her return to the city. But then Cripple Liu had suddenly changed his mind, refused to divorce her no matter what, and now her chance to go back to the city was slipping away.
Seeing the tension, the people on the cart tried to smooth things over: “Forget it, forget it. Comrade Hu is probably not feeling well.”
“She’s a city girl. We country folk aren’t worth her notice. Fine, so be it.”
“Right, look how impressive her mother is—came in like a bandit, even dared to smash up her in-laws’ house.”
“The rich are just different. We’re just sour cucumbers in their eyes.”
One after another, the passengers’ words stuck into Cripple Liu’s heart like needles. His chest was so tight he could barely breathe. He’d married a woman who was pregnant with another man’s child, had his wedding feast smashed by his mother-in-law, and now this shameless slut wanted to keep that bastard baby and refused to have an abortion.
The more Cripple Liu thought about it, the angrier he got. So many people, and none of them had any respect for him.
Burning with rage, he finally snapped.
“Smack!” He slapped Hu Guizhen across the face. She was stunned for a moment. Then, like an enraged lion, she lunged at him, clawing and tearing. Uncle Niu, who was driving the cart, quickly stopped it:
“Get off and fight. Don’t scare the commune’s ox.”
All said and done, Hu Guizhen was a woman, and men have the strength advantage. Cripple Liu—ignoring the pain in his leg this time—grabbed a handful of her hair and dragged her off the cart by force.
Slap after slap landed on Hu Guizhen’s face. Soon she was on the ground, unable to match him with her hands, but her mouth kept cursing:
“Cripple Liu, you useless coward! You’re a good-for-nothing excuse of a man. Every day you come and go like a postman—standing at the door but never crossing the threshold. If I don’t keep this child, you’ll never even have someone to hold the funeral urn for you. You’re not a real man!”
Hu Guizhen spewed filth, curse after curse, uglier and uglier. Cripple Liu, half out of his mind with rage, kicked out straight at her belly.
“Ahh—” Hu Guizhen let out a scream, clutching her stomach with both hands as her body curled into a ball. Blood quickly soaked through her trousers.
She couldn’t lose this child. She knew Chen Yulan couldn’t have children. She was counting on this baby to make Fan Wenhai marry her.
Even Cripple Liu was terrified now, frozen in place, not knowing what to do. One auntie hurriedly called to Xiao Mandong: “Comrade Xiao, take a look, quick!”
Xiao Mandong pointed to the hospital not far ahead. “The hospital is right there, not far. Get her there quickly.”
Hell no. She wasn’t going to meddle. She was afraid Hu Guizhen would try to frame her.
Even though Cripple Liu secretly hoped the child would miscarry, he couldn’t just refuse to save her in front of everyone. So he scooped Hu Guizhen up and ran for the hospital.
Back on the ox cart, it felt like the air itself had gotten fresher without those two around.
When they got off the cart and headed to the stone house, they passed by the educated youth dormitory and happened to see Jian Qiuyue talking with Sun Wenbin. Xiao Mandong hadn’t expected Sun Wenbin to move so fast. She wondered whether Jian Qiuyue would fall for his tricks and get deceived by him. Though she felt a pang of regret, she really didn’t dare to get involved. Offending a spy was a death sentence. And the radio in her space—she still hadn’t found a good chance to return it to Director Huang.
Jian Qiuyue saw Xiao Mandong and immediately called out, “Xiao Mandong, wait! A letter arrived for you today. I’ll go grab it.”
Xiao Mandong stopped in her tracks. Seeing Sun Wenbin made her scalp crawl. She really didn’t want to exchange so much as a single word with him.
Sun Wenbin spent two days investigating in the village, and everyone at the sent-down youth station had been cleared of suspicion. That left only Xiao Mandong and Xiao Manxue, because they had their own house, which made it convenient for hiding things.
