Samayoi

Chapter 18: In the restaurant (2)
Overseer.But it ended up being one thing, enough to trick my mother into reassuring her. ——Ah, you look at me like this, do you blame me for being so different from before?Yes, I also remember when we went to the Temple of the God of God to pluck the beards of the gods together, and we talked about ways to reform China for days and then fought.But I am like this now, perfunctory and nonchalant.I sometimes think to myself that if my former friends saw me, they might not recognize me as a friend. —But that's how I am now. "

He took out another cigarette, put it in his mouth, and lit it.

"Looking at your expression, you seem to have some expectations of me--I am naturally much more numb now, but I can still see some things. This makes me very grateful, but it also makes me very disturbed: I am afraid that I will finally fail. An old friend who still has good intentions for me." He stopped suddenly, took a few puffs of cigarettes, and then said slowly, "Just today, before I came to this stone house, I just did one thing. It's a boring thing, but I'm willing to do it myself. My former neighbor on the east side is Changfu, a boatman. He has a daughter named A Shun. You may have seen it when you came to my house, but you must not Be careful, because she was still young at that time. She didn’t look good after that, but she had a normal thin oval face and yellow skin; only her eyes were very big, her eyelashes were very long, and the whites of her eyes were as blue as a sunny day at night. , and it is a windless and sunny day in the north, so the place here is not so clear. She is very capable. She lost her mother in her teens. , the family fortune gradually became stable. Almost none of the neighbors did not praise her, and even Changfu often said something grateful. This time when I left and came back, my mother remembered her again. The old people have such a long memory. She said that she once knew that Shun Gu was beaten by her father because she saw someone wearing red velvet flowers on her head and wanted one herself, but she couldn't get it. She cried and cried for half the night. The eye sockets were still red and swollen for two or three days. This kind of velvet flower is something from other provinces, and I can’t buy it in the third city. How can she get it? When I go back to the south this time, she asked me to buy two to give her.

"I don't feel bored with this job, but I like it very much. For Ah Shun, I am really willing to contribute. The year before last, when I came back to pick up my mother, one day, Chang Fu was at home. I started chatting with him. He wanted to treat me to snacks, buckwheat flour, and told me that what was added was white sugar. You think, a boatman who can have white sugar at home is by no means a poor boatman, so he also eats it. It’s very generous. I was persuaded, so I agreed, but asked to use only a small bowl. He was also very sophisticated, so he told Ah Shun, “They literati don’t know how to eat. You can use a small bowl and add more sugar.” !' However, when it was prepared and served, I was still taken aback. It was a big bowl, enough for me to eat for a day. But compared with Changfu's bowl, mine was indeed a small bowl. I never had I have eaten buckwheat flour before, but this time I tasted it, it was really unpalatable, but it was very sweet. I took a few mouthfuls and thought about not eating, but accidentally, I suddenly saw Ah Shun standing far away in the corner of the room , I immediately lost the courage to put down the bowls and chopsticks. I saw her expression, which was fear and hope, probably because she was afraid that she might not make it well. May we have a delicious meal. I know that if there are more than half of the bowl left, I must I was very disappointed and sorry. I decided at the same time, let go of my throat and drank it down, eating almost as fast as Changfu. From this I know the pain of hard eating. I only remember eating as much as I was a child. A bowl of granulated sugar mixed with roundworm powder is so difficult. However, I don’t complain, because the smug smile she smiled when she came to clean up the empty bowl was more than enough to make up for my pain. So I Even though I was so full that I couldn't sleep well and had a series of nightmares, I still wished her a happy life and wished the world a better place for her. However, these meanings are just the traces of my old dreams, and immediately Laugh at yourself, then forget about it.

"I didn't know that she had been beaten for a velvet flower, but as soon as my mother mentioned it, she remembered the buckwheat flour, and she became diligent. I searched in Taiyuan first, but there was nothing. ; all the way to Jinan..."

There was a rustling sound outside the window, and a lot of snow slid down from the Yiji camellia tree that was bent by him, and the branches straightened up, showing the fat black leaves and blood-red flowers.The leaden color of the sky became thicker, and the little birds were chirping. It was probably dusk, and the ground was covered with snow again. There was no food to be found, and they all rushed back to their nests early to rest.

"All the way to Jinan," he continued, looking out the window, turning around and drinking a glass of wine, taking a few more puffs of his cigarette. "I just bought velvet flowers. I don't know if it's the kind that made her get beaten, but it's made of velvet. I don't know whether she likes dark or light colors, so I bought a bright red one. Bring all the pink ones here.

"It was this afternoon, as soon as I finished eating, I went to see Changfu. I delayed a day because of this. His home is still there, but it looks a little dark, but I'm afraid it's just my own feeling. .His son and second daughter—Azhao, both stood at the door, growing up. Azhao didn’t look like her sister at all, she looked like a ghost, but when she saw me walking towards her house, she ran away Go into the house. I asked the boy, knowing that Chang Fu was not at home. "Where's your eldest sister?" He immediately opened his eyes and asked me why I was looking for her, and he seemed to be viciously about to pounce on me and bite me I hesitated and backed away, I'm perfunctory now... "You don't know, I'm more afraid of visiting people than before.Because I already know that I hate it, even I hate it, so why bother to make people secretly unhappy by knowingly committing a crime?However, this time the errand had to be done, so after thinking about it, I finally returned to the firewood shop diagonally opposite the door.The owner's mother, Grandma Laofa, is still there, and she still knows me, so she invited me to sit in the shop.After we exchanged a few words, I explained the reason for returning to the 3 cities and seeking Changfu.But she sighed and said:
"'Unfortunately, Aunt Shun is not lucky enough to wear this velvet flower.'

"So she told me in detail, saying, 'Since about last spring, she has been thin and yellow, and then she burst into tears frequently, and asked her why, but she didn't tell her; I couldn't stop getting angry and scolded her for being old and going crazy. But at the beginning of autumn, she had a slight cold at first, and finally lay down, and couldn't get up since then. Only a few days before her death, she was willing to tell Changfu, She has long been like her mother, who vomits red and sweats from time to time. But she hides it from time to time, lest he will worry about it. One night, her uncle Chang Geng came to borrow money again——this is a common thing—— ——When she refused, Chang Geng sneered and said: Don't be arrogant, your man is worse than me! She has been worried since then, and she was ashamed, so she couldn't ask, so she had to cry. Chang Fu hurriedly told her man How could there still be time to tell her what I said in anger? Besides, she didn't believe it, and instead said, "Fortunately, I'm already like this, so it doesn't matter."

"She also said, 'If her man is really inferior to Chang Geng, it would be terrible! He is not as good as a chicken thief, what is that? But when he came to deliver the funeral, I saw him with my own eyes. His clothes were clean, and he was a decent person. He said with tears in his eyes that he had spent half his life on a boat, saved up money to hire a woman, but died again. It can be seen that he is really a good person. Chang Geng said everything It's a lie. It's a pity that Gu Shun would believe such a slanderous lie and lose her life for nothing. ——But I can't blame anyone, I can only blame Gu Shun for not having such a good fortune.'

"That's all right, my work is over again. But what about the two velvet flowers that I brought with me? Well, I asked her to send A Zhao. As soon as A Zhao saw me, he ran away and probably regarded me as a A wolf or something, I really don’t want to give her off. —— But I will give her off, mother just needs to say that Ah Shun likes it when she sees it. What are these boring things? Just be silly. After the New Year in a daze, I still teach my 'Zi Ri Shi Yun'."

"Did you teach 'Zi Ri Shi Yun'?" I felt strange and asked.

"Naturally. Do you still think ABCD is taught? I was two students first, one read "Book of Songs" and the other read "Mencius". Recently I added another one, a woman, who read "Naughty Girls". I don't even teach arithmetic. , it’s not that I don’t teach, they don’t.”

"I really didn't expect you to teach such books,"

"Their old man wants them to read it, and I'm someone else, and I have nothing to do with it. What's all this nonsense? Just do whatever you want,"

His face was already flushed, and he seemed to be a little drunk, but his eyes were depressed again.I sighed slightly and had nothing to say for a while.There was a commotion on the stairs, and several drinkers crowded up: the first was a short man with a round, swollen face; the second was long, with a red nose conspicuously showing on his face; Even walking down the small building trembled.I looked at Lu Weifu in a blink of an eye, and he was looking at me in a blink of an eye, so I asked the waiter to settle the bill.

"Can you still support your life with this?" I asked as I prepared to leave.

"Yes.—I have 20 yuan a month, and I can't be perfunctory."

"So, what are you going to do in the future?"

"In the future?——I don't know. Do you think that what we planned at that time has a good result? I don't know anything now, I don't even know what will happen tomorrow, and even the last minute..."

The waiter brought the bill and handed it to me; he was no longer as humble as when he first arrived, he just glanced at me, then smoked, and let me pay the bill.

We walked out of the store together. The hotel where he lived was in the opposite direction to mine, and we parted at the door.I walked towards my hotel alone, feeling refreshed as the cold wind and snow flakes hit my face.Seeing that the sky is already dusk, the houses and streets are all woven in the pure white and uncertain net of dense snow.

（原刊1924年5月10日《小说月报》第15卷第5号）
(End of this chapter)