Republic of China 1927

() After more than ten days, the training of the security team gradually entered the right track. Several people who couldn't keep up with the training rhythm were kicked out one after another. On the 16th day of the month (the 1rd day of the twelfth lunar month of the Ding Mao year), the whole group was slightly relieved.These two days are the days of giving away the kitchen gods to the people, and it is also the most important festival before the end of the new year. The security team paid a month's salary in advance. Except for the Jingwei and search teams, they also took two days off to let everyone go home. Prepare some New Year's goods. After the 26th, they will continue to train until the 23th of the new year, three days after the festival, and continue to train on the fourth day of the first month.

In the morning, Du Yan came early as usual, and accompanied Li Yunshan to compete in martial arts for a while, and led the boys from the search team and the guard team for more than half an hour, and hurried back after receiving the report from home.

"Uncle Donglou, what's the matter? Call me back in such a hurry." When Du Yan rushed back to the Du Mansion, everything was as usual at home. Du Yan asked suspiciously, leaving the daily affairs at home to Wang Donglou. Yes, he is only required to look over the large expenses involved.

"There is a large amount of supplies that need to be shipped out, and you need to sign, young master." Wang Donglou took out a list and handed it to Du Yan, saying, "This day will change, and I am afraid it will snow. It can’t be sent to the villages.”

"Are you here in time today?" Du Yan quickly glanced at the list in hand, signed his name and asked.Since Zhang Zongchang became the governor of Lu, the life of the people in Shandong has become more and more difficult. Although the Du family has exempted most of the rent from the tenants, the few villages near the mountains still struggle to feed themselves. Some food, cloth and other materials were sent to several villages in the mountains, which is one of the reasons why Du's family is widely praised.

"It depends on the face of God." Wang Donglou said helplessly: "It's okay for the other villages to send them one by one. Maowo Village, which is the closest to the mountain, may not be in time!"

"Then divide into two routes, one to Zhujiadonggou Village and Zhangjiaping Village; the other to Houwang Village and Maowo Village." Du Yan pondered for a moment and said, "It's snowing, the mountain road must be impassable."

"This is the best way. If you hurry up, you may be able to come back overnight." Wang Donglou nodded, but said in a difficult way: "It's just that the mansion is preparing for the New Year, and there may be insufficient manpower in the two routes."

"There is no problem with the manpower. The search team and the police guard team are not on holiday today, and they are idle if they are idle." Du Yan waved his hand and said, "I'm also playing for a while, and I have the right to go to training."

"Yukun, go and tell the search and security teams to assemble outside the gate of Du's house with full armor." Du Yan said to Zhu Yukun, the soldier beside him, "Just say that I will lead them to the mountains for special training."

"Young master, are you going into the mountain too?" Wang Donglou asked nervously, "The mountain has not been peaceful recently, let Yuan Si lead the team."

"It doesn't matter, and if I don't go, it's not easy to take care of these bastards." Du Yan said with a smile: "Hurry up and load the car, and find me a familiar person as a guide."

"Okay, I'll make arrangements now." Wang Donglou saw that it was getting dark and hurried to arrange for the servants in the mansion to load the car.

At a quarter past nine, the two convoys set off, one led by Wang Donglou and the other led by Du Yan himself. The guides were Lu Laifu and Mao Hu, a young man from the police guards. He was from Maowo Village and was most familiar with the mountain roads. .

The whistling north wind continued to blow, and the ground was frozen hard. A convoy of seven or eight vehicles was slowly moving forward on the mountain road. When crossing the mountain ridge, more than a dozen people pushed a car, one car a car too.

"Brothers, work harder, you must arrive at Houwang Village before lunch." Feeling the increasingly bitter north wind and looking up at the increasingly cloudy sky, Du Yan said anxiously and loudly: "Otherwise tonight Just spend the night on the road."

"It's not far away, just cross the two beams in front." Lu Laifu had been here for the past two years, and he stood by and said, "Last year, what we ate in Houwang Village was wild pork from the mountains!"

"There are still two beams?" Du Yan frowned. It's impossible to go on like this. Even if you arrive at Houwang Village, you still have to share the food and have a light meal. If you delay, you can't go to Maowo until dark village.

"Laifu, take someone to Houwang Village first, and let them bring tools to welcome us here." Du Yan said to Lu Laifu apologetically, "I'm going to work hard on you again this time, the leg injury is fine!"

"Good morning, brothers should act appropriately." Lu Laifu smiled innocently and led a brother towards Houwang Village.

After Laifu left, Du Yan and his party continued on their way, but at this time the sky was getting darker, and gradually the fine snow like catkins had begun to fall.

After more than half an hour like this, the team climbed over a mountain ridge and rested at the foot of another mountain ridge.

"Here we come, we come!" The members of the search team standing on the ridge observing the terrain shouted, "People from the village are here."

Soon, dozens of men, women and children in thin clothes, under the leadership of Laifu and an old man over [-] years old, crossed the mountain ridge and rushed towards Du Yan's team.

"Young master, why did you come here in person!" The old man in a shabby leather jacket and black cotton shoes saw Du Yan rushing over from the crowd from a distance, and was about to kneel down on the stone road.

"Old man Wang, this is impossible!" Du Yan dragged Village Chief Wang, who was much older than his father, and exchanged some pleasantries when Village Chief Wang came to Du Mansion to deliver mountain goods not long ago.

"It makes it so!" Old Uncle Wang said excitedly, "Without such a good owner, our Houwang Villagers would not be able to survive long ago."

"In this year, in this world, we should watch and help each other." Du Yan pulled up old man Wang and pointed to the supplies in the car, and said, "I will send you some food and things for the New Year, which were supposed to be delivered directly to the village, but today ..."

"Folks, this is the young master of the Du family. He personally delivered us new year's goods!" Old man Wang turned around and shouted at the villagers holding various utensils behind him.

"Young Master, we kowtow to you!" Old Uncle Wang suddenly broke free from Du Yan's hand and knelt down again, and the villagers behind him knelt down following Hei.

"Get up quickly, aren't you killing me?" Du Yan was a little at a loss because of this situation, and quickly ordered his subordinates to help the villagers of Houwang Village up.

"Du Yan said directly to Old Uncle Wang in front of him again: "Uncle Wang, help Laifu divide the things of each family in your village, we have to hurry later. "

"Eldest young master, you have to go to the village anyway, let us Houwang village treat you well!" Old man Wang's face changed and he grabbed Du Yan's hand and said, "Yesterday the village caught a wild boar that made trouble in the village. I want to send it to the Du Mansion!"

"Old man, I take your wishes." Du Yan pointed to the sky and said, "But I still have to go to Maowo Village, and I won't be able to go after the heavy snow."

"Oh!" Uncle Wang gave up his heart after hearing this, and immediately ordered the villagers to line up in units of households, and Laifu also led the Du family to distribute New Year's goods and food according to the number of households and family conditions.

"Old man Wang, how is the situation this year? How long can the food in the village last?" Taking advantage of this time, Du Yan dragged old man Wang to chat about the daily routine.

"To tell you the truth, young master, it's very bad! If Mr. Du waived our rent, we would not be able to survive long ago!" Uncle Wang wrapped himself in a thin cotton coat and murmured, "Most of the land in our village is on the mountain, and it is already thin. , this year there is little rain, and basically there is not much harvest."

"It's really difficult to live on a few acres of land in the mountains." Du Yan nodded in agreement, handed a cigarette to Old Man Wang and said, "You can't just stay in the mountains all the time. It might be better to go out and find other ways of living." Later generations until the [-]s, the Yimeng mountainous area was also a national-level poverty-stricken area.

"That's not true! A few years ago, many children in the village went out, some served as soldiers, and some worked as artisans. It's just that it has become more and more difficult to make a living outside in the past few years!" Old man Wang took the cigarette and carefully put it in his pocket In the middle of the day, he picked up the dry tobacco in his hand, took two sharp puffs and said helplessly: "I could still rely on the mountain to eat the mountain goods, but in the past two years, there have been more and more thieves in the mountains, and the mountain goods can't be bought anymore!"

"You won't be allowed to go hunting in the mountains anymore? Are there any big groups of bandits around here?" Du Yan's road was full of dilapidated villages, ragged, sallow and emaciated villagers, and occasionally passers-by who fell dead.

"You can hunt, but you have to pay tribute to the thieves on the mountain, and you have to pay a large amount of taxes to sell the mountain products in the market. There is not much left!" Old man Wang shook his head and said: "Originally, this area seems to be a surname. Zhao’s thieves’ territory, it was said a few months ago that Taipinggu’s thieves took the surname Zhao, but we don’t know the details, only a few small bosses come to the village on weekdays.”

"Young master, everything is divided!" Lai Fu came over to report.

"Then turn around and go in the direction of Maowo Village." Du Yan cupped his hands to Old Man Wang and said, "That's all for today. If you have any difficulties in the village, just go to the town to find me."

"Young Master, be careful all the way, the mountain is a bit slippery." Old Uncle Wang said reluctantly, he knew that Du Yan's time must not be delayed, otherwise another village that was comparable to them would suffer from cold and starvation.

"It's getting cold, folks, go back!" When Du Yan looked back after walking for a few minutes, he could still see the villagers from Houwang village watching them leave from the same spot.

These are the most honest, tenacious, and kindest Chinese people. As long as you treat them with even the slightest bit of kindness, they will repay you tenfold or a hundredfold.Now that I think about how heavy the truckloads of mountain goods sent to Houwang Village a few days ago were, the villagers were soaked in bitterness, blood and tears.

Snow, falling snow, heavy snow like goose feathers, the first snow in 1927, drifted down one after another, and soon the mountain road was covered with snow, and the road surface became slippery.Fortunately, half of the load was lost, and with Mao Hu as a good guide, the journey went smoothly, and some cars fell into the pit and were picked up by everyone.

"Leader, pass the forest in front, and turn over a small mountain ridge to arrive." Mao Hu, who has just turned seventeen, is still a big boy. He has been away from home for more than half a month, and he is extremely excited to see that he is approaching the door.

"Rest on the spot for 5 minutes!" Du Yan yelled as he stabilized the handlebar in hand and stopped in a dry place.Finally, it was almost here, and everyone secretly breathed a sigh of relief, which was not much better than daily training.

"Bang bang..." At this time, bursts of gunshots sounded not far away, breaking the peace in the forest.