The train driver in the courtyard

Chapter 17
"Brother, you are really accurate." Li Aiguo looked closer at the sight and gave a thumbs up.

"Of course, my ancestors have been eunuchs in the cleansing room for generations. If you cut off a little thing without leaving the root, you have to save people's lives. That's called being accurate!"

When the middle-aged man mentioned the glorious deeds of his ancestors, his cloudy eyes were full of longing, and the creases on his face straightened a lot.

"."

Li Aiguo looked at the two catties of bright red pork, was silent for a moment, then looked up at the middle-aged man.

"Haven't you ever been a eunuch?"

"Hey, it's all because of our bad luck. Finally, we are old enough to work in the palace. The emperor is gone."

"Phew, I think your luck is actually pretty good."

Hearing this, the middle-aged man was taken aback for a moment, and then laughed loudly: "That's right, if I had been a eunuch, I would not be able to do the job of selling meat now."

In this day and age, selling meat is a good job, which requires a good background and good skills.

Li Aiguo knows many butchers, and the family never needs to buy oil.

Every time before going home, the butcher will rub the fat with his hands a few times.

Along the way, those hands could not touch other things, let alone go to the latrine.

When I got home, I asked the mother-in-law to fetch a water basin and wash it in it. The oily flowers floating in the water were enough for the whole family to eat for a whole day.

More importantly, even if the leaders above knew about this kind of behavior, there was no way to criticize it.

After all, he is a butcher, and he needs to hold pieces of meat with his hands for work.

Saying goodbye to the big butcher seller, Li Aiguo walked around the market, and when he got out of the market, he had two more catties of apples and three catties of red dates in his hand.

That's not all, Li Aiguo went to the department store next door to buy two bottles of old Fen wine and two catties of eggs.

Fenjiu was given to Zhou Tiehu, and the eggs were kept for himself.

Zhou Tiehu's family lives in a railway compound near the locomotive depot, seven or eight miles away from the courtyard.

Li Aiguo turned his bicycle into a hot wheel, and in less than 10 minutes, he arrived in front of the railway compound.

Li Aiguo didn't know where Zhou Tiehu's family lived, so he went directly to the guard room.

Before he got close, the guards inside strode out, looked at Li Aiguo with strange eyes, and immediately became vigilant.

"Hello, comrade!"

Li Aiguo stopped and said with a smile: "I'm looking for Zhou Tiehu, can you help me get in touch, he is my father's colleague."

All the people living in this compound are railway employees, and the security officers themselves are also people on the railway, so they are familiar with the residents in the compound.

In addition, Zhou Tiehu is a train driver, and he can be regarded as the number one person in the locomotive depot. Of course, the security officer knows him.

Then he looked at Li Aiguo carefully, and saw that he was wearing an old railway uniform, with thick eyebrows and big eyes, and he looked upright and decent, not like a bad guy.

Even so, Li Aiguo still wrote his name and home address on the registration book.

After being asked a few more words about the situation of Zhou Tiehu's house, which was consistent with what the security officer knew, Li Aiguo was able to enter the compound.

In the compound, all are Soviet-style tube buildings. There are as many as seven or eight buildings in total, which were built by the railway department to accommodate railway workers.

As a train driver, Li's father was also eligible for a house. At that time, he carried forward his style and gave it to a young man who was about to get married.

Zhou Tiehu's house is located on the third floor of the third building.

Walking downstairs, Li Aiguo took the gift out of the canvas bag and carried it in his hand.

Walking up the stairs to the third floor, I knocked on the waxy wooden door.

The person who opened the door was a middle-aged woman in her 40s wearing railway overalls.

Seeing Li Aiguo standing outside, the middle-aged woman was stunned for a moment, looked Li Aiguo up and down, and said pleasantly, "You are. Li Aiguo, hey, I have grown so tall in the blink of an eye, I almost didn't recognize it, come in quickly."

This woman is Zhou Tiehu's daughter-in-law, named Wang Cuie. She works in the flight attendant section and has a good relationship with her predecessor's mother. She took care of her predecessor when she was young.

Recalling the information in his mind, Li Aiguo called "Aunt Wang" and handed out the gift.

"You are a real kid. You are all from your own family, and you even bring gifts. See you outside!"

Wang Cuie frowned looking at the gift brought by Li Aiguo.

At this time, Zhou Tiehu came from the corridor.

Seeing Zhou Tiehu's return, Wang Cuie complained, "Old Zhou, you see that Aiguo is getting more and more ignorant."

Zhou Tiehu was wearing a white vest, blue shorts, and a pair of old sandals on his feet. He was holding an enamel basin containing towels and soap.

Looks like he just took a shower.

The toilets and kitchens in Tongzilou are shared, and drivers take a bath in the bathroom of the locomotive depot in winter.

The weather is hot in summer, and I took a bath in Duanli, and I was still sweaty when I came back.

It's better to go to the public toilet at the end of the corridor and take a shower, it's easy and happy.

Unlike Wang Cuie's complaint, Zhou Tiehu didn't say anything, nodded and said, "Go into the room and chat."

The area of ​​the tube building is small, and each single room has an area of ​​about a dozen square meters.

The Zhou family was divided into three rooms, and a door was opened in the middle partition wall to connect the houses together. It was similar to the two-bedroom and one-living room in later generations, except that there was no kitchen and bathroom.

The floor is covered with gray cement, and the wall is surrounded by light blue dado. In the living room, there are eight immortals table and back chairs, and a radio box.

While Li Aiguo was looking at the house, Wang Cuie had already poured the tea and brought it over.

"Sit down quickly, as if you are at your own home."

"Zhou Ke, Zhou Lan, didn't you leave home?" Li Aiguo took the enamel jar and asked casually.

Zhou Ke and Zhou Lan are the children of the Zhou family. Zhou Ke is about the same age as Li Aiguo, and Zhou Lan is two years younger than them.

"Zhou Ke just entered our railway police station this year. It seems that there is some big case these days, and he hasn't come back for almost a week."

"That girl Zhou Lan is currently studying in a technical secondary school, and she's still out of school."

When mentioning a pair of children, Wang Cuie's face was filled with pride.

It's just that she wasn't very excited, Wang Cuie remembered the matter of Li Aiguo, and her expression suddenly dimmed.

"Patriotic, I've heard Lao Zhou talk about your matter. You kid is really serious. Why didn't you ask us for help when something big happened?"

Feeling the deep concern, Li Aiguo scratched the back of his head embarrassingly, "Auntie, I don't want to trouble you."

"Hey, it's not troublesome. When you were young, life was hard. Your mother had no milk. I fed Zhou Ke, and I had to feed you. At that time, I didn't think it was troublesome."

The women who work on the railway all year round are all hot-tempered.

Wang Cui'e yelled loudly: "Now that you have grown up, you dislike trouble. It seems that you still don't regard me and Lao Zhou as your own family."

(End of this chapter)