War Photographer's Notebook

Chapter 1499 The Second River

On the vast grassland, the fiery red morning sun jumped out of the horizon with difficulty, making everyone who had been walking for half the night and shivering breathe a sigh of relief.

"Take a break."

Zhang Erwa, who was walking in the front, finished speaking tremblingly and led everyone to a small bare hill.

After returning the wind and rain lamp that had been blown out long ago to Nurse Ji, Zhang Erwa did not even take a rest. He called Li Zhuang for help, took out the oilcloth from Wei Ran's carrying pole, and set up the tent as quickly as possible.

Although the sun had finally come out and the snow that had been falling all night had stopped, a cold wind blew on the grass that was almost freezing people.

After fixing the four corners of the oilcloth with wooden sticks with great difficulty, everyone rushed in impatiently. Each of them sat on a bamboo hat, covered themselves with the only three blankets, and with their red and numb hands, they struggled to take off their fur shoes and ice-covered "cloth shoes", rubbing their feet which had also been frozen and numb.

"Captain, please light up the kerosene lamp at least to keep the little lama warm."

Li Zhuang shivered as he spoke. A layer of ice had formed on his shoulders. "He's still sick. He'll freeze to death if he continues like this."

“No need to light kerosene lamps”

Before Zhang Erwa could speak, Wei Ran said, "I have a way."

As he spoke, he reached into the bamboo basket and rummaged around, taking out his enamel pot, which contained half a cup of horse oil that had solidified due to the low temperature, and four pieces of rags that had been soaked in the oil before it solidified.

After finding out the flint and other things, Wei Ran finally lit the tinder after hammering it for ten minutes, and then ignited the scraps of cloth.

As the enamel pot began to burn with black smoke, everyone sat closer together and stretched out their red, frozen hands to the flickering flames to absorb the precious warmth.

"Nurse Ji, can you lend me the oil lamp?" Wei Ran said, and couldn't help sneezing again.

Nurse Ji didn't ask any further questions and immediately took out the oil lamp and handed it to Wei Ran.

After taking the oil lamp, Wei Ran studied it for a while, then carefully took off the spherical glass lampshade which was only one size smaller than the volleyball, and shone it on the enamel pot.

With the lampshade, the four flames became stable and no longer jumped. The heat they released no longer dissipated in the wind, but was first conducted to the lampshade and then slowly released from the lampshade.

"Eat something!"

Zhang Erwa suggested, and as he spoke he had already taken out two water bottles wrapped in layers of blankets from the bamboo basket.

"Gulp" everyone swallowed involuntarily.

The two kettles, including the larger and better copper kettle, were filled with boiling fish soup before they set out. Wei Ran had been carrying them all the time. In order to keep them warm, they even wrapped all the blankets around the three containers.

"It's still hot, everyone take out the bowls."

Zhang Erwa called out to them, and Li Zhuang hurriedly took out the enamel bowl that he had found together with the kettle and distributed a bowl of fish soup to everyone.

"Nurse Ji, please give the little lama the medicine." Wei Ran reminded.

Hearing this, Nurse Ji immediately took out the copper lunch box from her bag, opened it, picked up two pieces of charcoal from the tray and handed them to the little lama.

Now that the little lama no longer has diarrhea, he naturally doesn't need to drink salt water anymore, but he still needs to eat the charcoal for a while.

After the little lama had eaten the charcoal, Wei Ran and Nurse Ji each picked up their enamel bowls and couldn't wait to drink the fish soup which was still a little hot.

"Sergeant, are we going to continue walking?" Li Zhuang asked.

"What do you think?" Zhang Erwa asked everyone, "We still have breakfast to eat. If..."

“I think we should keep going.”

Nurse Ji said worriedly, "We have already rested several times. If we delay any longer, we will not be able to catch up with the main force. Besides, this big bowl of fish soup is enough. We should eat the fish meat in the lunch box when we can no longer hold on."

"Okay." Zhang Erwa thought for a moment and asked carefully, "Can the little lama still bear it?"

"No problem. He didn't even need our help to walk in the second half," Nurse Ji replied.

"I think we should keep going," Li Zhuang agreed. "We should go as far as we can while we have food and drink."

"I have no opinion"

Wei Ran also nodded, and then took another sip of fish soup. This bowl was not as big as Nurse Ji said. Its capacity was probably not even as big as an enamel pot.

"Then let's warm up a bit and then continue on our way." Zhang Erwa finally made a decision.

"Yes!" Everyone responded in unison. By the time everyone had drunk two bowls of fish soup, the sun was already two fingers high from the horizon.

"Look over there!"

Li Zhuang suddenly sat up straight, raised his hand and pointed in the direction of advance, but there was no surprise in his tone. In other words, what he saw was definitely not a good thing.

At this time, the sky was already bright, the wind was a little lighter, and even the visibility was much higher.

Looking in the direction of Li Zhuang's finger, sure enough, at the end of the field of vision, there was a winding river that was dyed golden by the morning sun.

"Go, go."

Zhang Erwa stood up as he spoke, "Pack your things and try to get to the other side of the river today."

Upon seeing this, Wei Ran immediately blew out the horse oil lamp and carefully placed the enamel pot in the bamboo basket.

Together they put away the oilcloths and blankets, put on their cold cloth and fur shoes again, and filled their empty water bottles with cold snow grits before the sun melted the snow on the surface.

Zhang Erwa was still walking in the front, but this time Li Zhuang was in the second place, followed by Wei Ran who was carrying a load on his shoulder.

"puff"

As soon as he stepped down, the cold mud immediately took away the little warmth that had accumulated on his feet with great difficulty. Wei Ran shivered uncontrollably, clenched the wooden stick in his hand, gritted his teeth and took the second and third steps.

As time went by, the sun climbed up overhead little by little, the originally biting wind gradually died down, and sweat began to form on everyone's clothes that were once again exposed to the sun.

Meadow after meadow, swamp after swamp, and wooden sticks with or without cloth tied on them were gradually bringing their journey closer to their still invisible destination.

From time to time, they could see the swollen bodies of Red Army soldiers floating on the muddy water, or they could see a Red Army soldier sitting alone on the meadow, holding a wooden stick in their arms, looking at the bodies of Red Army soldiers at the finish line.

Squinting his eyes to look at the sun rising higher and higher, Wei Ran took the opportunity when they stopped again and waited for Zhang Erwa and Li Zhuang to explore the way, and placed the kettle full of fish soup on the black tarpaulin, and covered it with another layer of black tarpaulin, hoping to use solar energy to heat the remaining fish head soup in the kettle.

As for the breakfast that they had not eaten from beginning to end and was still in the lunch box, it seemed to have been forgotten by everyone. In order to preserve it longer, Wei Ran even placed it outside last night. At this time, the fish meat and fish soup inside had frozen into aspic with ice chips.

After a short stop, Wei Ran and the other two took another step at the call of Zhang Erwa and Li Zhuang, and walked carefully along the black mud path they had waded through, leaning on wooden sticks.

"Comrade Wei Ran, can your camera still take pictures?" Zhang Erwa, who was walking in front, asked abruptly.

"Yes," Wei Ran responded, "I can take three more pictures."

"How about taking a picture together after we cross the river?"

Zhang Erwa asked without turning his head, "Let's take another picture after we all walk out of the grass."

"What about the other one?" Wei Ran asked subconsciously, "What is the other one?"

"Can I give you all of them?" Zhang Erwa smiled, "You can take whatever you want in the remaining one."

"it is good"

Wei Ran responded loudly, "We'll take a picture after we cross the river, and another one after we walk out of the grass!"

The agreement to take a photo together was like a shot of adrenaline for this small team with only one person left. Everyone gritted their teeth and quickened their pace, hoping to cross the river earlier and take a photo together.

"It would be great if we could still catch fish in that river," Li Zhuang couldn't help smacking his lips, "then we can make a big pot of fish soup."

"We need firewood," Zhang Erwa couldn't help but remind him, "We don't have much firewood."

"Maybe there is one on the other side of the river," Li Zhuang guessed optimistically.

But everyone knew that it was just a daydream. Along the way, apart from the pine forest where they stopped last time, they didn't find even a decent bush.

As we chatted, the sun gradually set, the sky was gradually covered by dark clouds, and the river finally appeared in front of us.

Although this river had several ropes tied to it like the previous one, it was only four or five meters wide. The only thing they were thankful for was that the flow of the river did not seem to be too fast.

But what made people despair was that on the river bank on their side, on the meadows, there were nearly a hundred Red Army soldiers sitting in groups of three or five, leaning on wooden sticks, sitting on their straw hats, facing the other side of the river.

The military caps on their heads were worn particularly straight, and the red stars on the caps were particularly eye-catching, but... they all smelled bad.

The strong stench of corpse could be clearly smelled by Wei Ran and others even when they were still far away from here more than half an hour ago.

"Let's take a picture of them after we cross the river." Zhang Erwa said, trying his best to suppress the trembling of his whole body.

"it is good"

Wei Ran nodded, turned his head to look at the river a few dozen meters away that looked like a divine punishment, took a breath and said, "Drink the fish soup before crossing the river. It has been exposed to the sun for a day, so it should be hot. This way, you won't fall over when you cross the river later."

“Okay,” Zhang Erwa nodded, “Drink all the fish soup. Once we cross the river, we’ll have dinner and eat all the leftover fish from yesterday!”

Before he finished speaking, Wei Ran put down the bamboo basket, took out an enamel bowl and gave one to each person, then lifted the tarpaulin that had been exposed to the sun all day, grasped the slightly hot kettle handle and opened the lid, asked Nurse Ji to add some coarse salt into it, then put the lid back on and shook it, then pulled out the wooden stopper from the spout and poured a bowl of fish soup for each person.

"This fish soup is still hot!"

Nurse Ji said in surprise that even though everyone had been exposed to the sun all day, the ground below their knees was icy cold mud, and now the sky was cloudy, and they were about to cross the river, so it would be great to have a bowl of hot fish soup at this time.

Putting down the kettle and picking up his own bowl of fish soup, Wei Ran took a sip and found that the fish soup had been dried to around 50 degrees Celsius. Moreover, it also contained much-needed salt, which was beyond his expectations.

Each person drank four bowls of fish soup in succession, until only the fish head, scales, bones and other items that were almost boiled apart were left in the kettle. Everyone couldn't help but look towards the river.

"Let's go." Zhang Erwa threw the enamel bowl into the bamboo basket.

All of a sudden, everyone who had finished drinking the fish soup threw their enamel bowls into the basket, and helped Wei Ran tie the mouths of the two bamboo baskets with blankets, and tied everyone's leggings together, and then walked to the edge of the river through the mud.

Reaching out and grabbing the rope that was only 20 centimeters above the water surface, Zhang Erwa took the rope handed to him by Li Zhuang, tied it around his waist and asked, "You all know how to swim, right?"

"I will" Li Zhuang responded first.

"I can do it too," Wei Ran answered second.

"I"

Nurse Ji panicked, "I don't know how to do it, or I'll stay."

"What nonsense"

Zhang Erwa said without thinking, "The squad leader asked me to take you all out. Even if you die, you have to die outside on the grass!"

After saying that, he looked at the little lama, demonstrated the dog paddling posture, then pointed to the river and asked the little lama in Chinese if he could swim.

Not sure whether he didn’t know how to swim or didn’t understand, the little lama shook his head and then said in Zang language that only he and Wei Ran could understand, “I can’t swim.”

"It seems that he doesn't know how to do it either," Wei Ran helped to make a judgment.

"fine"

Zhang Erwa tightened the rope tied around his waist and said, "It's okay if it doesn't happen. We'll pull you two over later. You'll just choke on some water at most."

As he said this, he stuck the wooden stick in his hand into the river, and then watched his elbows go under the river, but he still didn't reach the bottom.

Zhang Erwa turned pale, put away the stick, and took off the gun and water bottle on his shoulder, "I'll go first, Li Zhuang, you go second."

"Yes!" Li Zhuang agreed without thinking.

Without any preparation, Zhang Erwa grabbed the rope hanging over the river and walked into the river. With the help of the rope, he swam to the other side smoothly.

"Li Zhuang! It's your turn!" Zhang Erwa said as he untied the rope around his waist and tied it to a wooden stake on the shore.

After receiving the signal, Li Zhuang, who had been prepared, immediately tied the rope around his waist, walked into the cold river without thinking, and swam across smoothly while holding the rope hanging over the river.

"Wei Ran, bring the weapons and bamboo baskets over first!" Zhang Erwa gave the order again.

"it is good!"

Wei Ran immediately put everyone's weapons into the bamboo basket that was originally carried by Nurse Ji, then tied a rope and wrapped the strap around the thick rope hanging over the river.

With the help of the ropes pulled by Zhang Erwa and Li Zhuang, the first bamboo basket was successfully pulled to the other side. Soon after, the two bamboo baskets carried by Wei Ran and even the shoulder pole were also pulled over.

"Nurse Ji, you come first." Zhang Erwa said, "How will the little lama end up?"

"How do I do that?"

Nurse Ji suppressed her panic and asked, not to mention that they were all lacking in physical strength now, even under normal circumstances, such a wide river would be scary enough for her.

"Just hold on to the rope!"

Zhang Erwa gave orders loudly. At the same time, Wei Ran used the rope thrown from the other side to tie a simple protection rope around Nurse Ji's waist and thighs, which was quite commonly used in later generations.

While he was helping Nurse Ji make preparations, Zhang Erwa also wrapped the leggings rope in his hand half a circle around the rope hanging over the river, which was undoubtedly a smart move.

After some preparation, Nurse Ji walked into the icy river, holding the rope with both hands. With the encouragement of people on both sides of the river, she was finally pulled to the other side safely before she lost strength and let go.

"It's your turn"

Wei Ran patted the little lama on the shoulder and used the same trick to tie the rope thrown from the other side to the other person's body.

On the other hand, the little lama swallowed his saliva visibly, and then, at the signal of Zhang Erwa and others, he gritted his teeth, grabbed the rope bridge and walked into the icy river.

One step, two steps, three steps. When the little lama took the fourth step, it was as if he stepped on empty air, and like a weight, he sank into the river in the blink of an eye.

"pull!"

Zhang Erwa shouted and pulled the rope in his hand hard, bringing the little lama, who was struggling wildly in the water, to the shore.

"vomit--!"

The little lama, whose legs and buttocks were pulled up first, spat out a mouthful of mud before he could even stand firmly. Then, after a violent cough and gasp, he finally sprayed out the water that he had choked on through his nose.

"call"

  Seeing the people on the other side busy trying to appease the little lama, Wei Ran was relieved. He thought that this would happen here.

What are you thinking!

Wei Ran patted the back of his head with a look of relief, but at the same time he noticed that on the surface of the river, which was not flowing very fast, not only was there the little lama's wooden bowl floating, but also the rosary that he usually wore around his neck.

It's a pity that he discovered it a little too late. At this time, the two things had already floated quite far away.

"Little Lama!"

Wei Ran shouted towards the other side, and when the person on the other side raised his head, he immediately pointed to the river.

The latter looked in the direction of Wei Ran's finger, then subconsciously touched his neck and arms, and his also slightly thin body trembled.

But soon, the little lama showed his bright smile again and shook his head at Wei Ran.

"Wei Ran, go on!"

Before he finished speaking, Li Zhuang threw the leggings rope back.

  Is it possible that something will happen to me?

When Wei Ran was tying the rope around his waist, he had a sudden thought that he always felt that some accident would happen in this river.

With this in mind, he even checked the rope carefully before stepping into the icy river, holding on to the rope bridge, and swimming across exceptionally smoothly.

"I was so scared, I thought it was '咥咥咥!'" Li Zhuang muttered to himself, obviously thinking the same thing as Wei Ran.

"Is the little lama okay?" Wei Ran changed the subject while untying the rope.

Nurse Ji, who had also just breathed a sigh of relief, quickly picked up the new topic, "He seemed to have a cramp when he entered the water, and he couldn't swim, so he fell. Apart from choking on some water and swallowing a mouthful of mud, nothing happened."

"In this case"

Before Zhang Erwa could say anything, Wei Ran said while untying the blanket tied to the bamboo basket, "Let's take a picture here."

"I was just about to say this," Zhang Erwa smiled innocently and scratched the back of his head, "Comrade Wei Ran, check to see if your camera is soaked in water."

"Let me see"

As Wei Ran spoke, he pretended to reach his hand into the oilcloth as a cover and took out the Rollei twin-lens reflex camera from the metal book.

"good"

Wei Ran looked around nervously and said, "It's not soaked in water, squad leader, where are we going to shoot?"

Zhang Erwa glanced at the other side of the river, then at the other people around him, and said, "Let's do it here, Comrade Wei Ran, can you also include those comrades on the other side of the river?"

"No problem!" Wei Ran agreed readily.

Soon, everyone including the little lama stood in a row in the mud. Wei Ran also placed the camera on a bamboo basket and used the viewfinder to frame the young Red Army soldiers, the bottomless river behind them that spared them, and the comrades on the meadow on the other side of the river who were staring at them.

"get ready!"

"Everyone—salute!"

Following Zhang Erwa's command, everyone raised their arms in unison. This time, even the little lama's movements were exceptionally standard - he practiced a lot in his daily life.

Pressing the selfie lever, Wei Ran waded through the mud and ran over, stood with them, and raised his arms together.

After taking this photo, Zhang Erwa looked around for a while, then pointed to a small hill in the distance and said, "Let's go there! Let's eat all the remaining fish meat!"