Comrade Lao An, head of the "Four Cleansing" working group, jumped down from the kang and paced in the narrow space between the kang and the table. He had just returned from breakfast at a member's house, and while he was waiting for two team members, he agreed to visit a poor peasant family who had not been photographed at noon.

Comrade Lao An paced and became anxious, and after entering the village for almost a month, he held dozens of meetings in various forms to expose the political and economic problems of You Zhimao, secretary of the party branch of Youjia Village, and all the cadres of the brigade and squad, but still did not catch any major problems. How is this going on?

The work is meticulous and solid enough. He and his team members visited all the poor peasants and lower middle peasants in Youjia Village from house to house, and when they entered the door, they first asked about the cold and warmth, remembered the bittersweet ones, swept the floor and carried water, and did the work together; and sat on the kang head, not afraid of lice burrowing into the waistband of their trousers. However, as soon as the question of the cadres of the large and small teams was discussed, the men and women who were smiling sincerely immediately became restrained, and they could not talk in a row......

The director of the city's Bureau of Culture and Education, who went to the countryside for the first time, was very uneasy for several days, and often lost sleep at night. The weekly "Four Qing War Report" of the county's "Four Qing" regiments contains many outstanding achievements! In contrast, the progress of the work in Youjia Village is slow, and it can only be regarded as downstream. Is there really no problem with the cadres in Youjia Village here? No, because there will never be a peaceful paradise. So, is it because the working methods are not in the right place? Or is it because the masses are backward? Or is it because "certain comrades" are leaning to the right as repeatedly warned in the "war report"? His brain is numb......

The situation of political and economic inconclusion, in any case, cannot continue. From last night to this morning, he held a meeting of all the cadres of the working group in succession, analyzed the reasons, and decided to further mobilize the masses......

At the morning meeting, after analyzing the situation of all the poor peasants and the lower middle peasants, he suddenly discovered that one poor peasant household had been omitted from the interview. After careful inquiry, they found out that there was a family living in a ditch on the east side of the village. He decided to take two members of the team to visit in person to make up for the lack of carelessness in his work.

Two members of the group arrived one after another, one was a high-enthusiasm, energetic, and low-educated pony, an activist drawn from the countryside of another county, and the other was Xiao Guo, a college student from the city.

The three of them left the village and walked up a narrow path along the east ditch. The ditch is bright green, the peach tree is full of bunches of fluffy peaches, the square buds on the persimmon tree are budding, the wildflowers are dotted, and the bees and butterflies are buzzing. Lao An and the two young generals had no intention of enjoying the scenery, walking all the way, looking all the way, looking for the room of the class brother who lived alone in Donggou.

Walking up a slope beam, under the cliff on the west bank of the ditch, there is a pillar of green smoke rising up, and there is a hole in the cave. The three of them looked at each other and quickened their pace.

Lao An and the two team members walked into the cave and saw a nest of wheat straw on the ground and a lump of cotton sleeves piled up indiscriminately. A small iron pot was propped up on three large stones, and the burned ash was spread all the way to the mouth of the cave. A man in ragged clothes, kneeling on the ground, facing the fire under the small iron pot, blowing the fire, the hole was filled with choking firewood smoke, and the three of them coughed at the same time.

The man looked up from under the pot, his face was greasy with smoke, and he was smeared with soot, but the eyes of the white and black were shining. He got up from the ground and saw so many uniformed staff members, trembling with fright, standing motionless, looking suspiciously at the person standing in front of him.

Lao An smiled and asked kindly, "What's your name?"

"You Ximing. His voice trembled a little, too.

"What's the ingredient?" asked Lao An more kindly.

"Wow, poor peasants of poor children!" You Ximing replied with emotion.

"How many years have you lived here?"

"Seven or eight years. You Ximing sighed.

"Didn't anyone ask you about the cadres of the big and small teams?"

"Alas......" You Ximing didn't know how to answer, and he stopped talking.

"Don't be afraid!" said Lao An.

You Ximing's eyes turned a ray of light, and he put on an unspeakable look of pain: "Who cares about us!"

"How did you get to this situation?" asked Lao An very emotionally, "tell me about your background so that we can be educated." ”

"Alas! It's hard to put it into words!" You Ximing shed tears, "I lost my parents when I was young, the landlord You Hulu occupied my land, and the Kuomintang pulled me to be a strong man several times. Liberated, turned over, my daughter-in-law divorced us, and the cadres bullied us ......"

Lao An and the two members of the group exchanged glances at each other, and his heart was very heavy, and he suppressed his feelings and said with emotion: "Look! In the socialist You family brigade, there is a primitive man living like an ape-man. ”

Xiao Ma said angrily: "You Zhimao, the person in power, has four major new houses and old houses. The contrast is so strong!"

Xiao Guo felt even more deeply: "The class differentiation in the countryside is unthinkably so serious!"

The firewood smoke in the kiln dissipated and brightened, and Lao An opened the small iron pot and was boiling half a pot of rice grits. In the only small porcelain urn in the kiln, there is half an urn of grain, which is all the belongings. He turned around and said to the two youth team members, "You go to You Zhimao and ask him to get some food for You Ximing first!" As he spoke, he solemnly unbuttoned his trouser belt, took off a pair of pants that were put on the outside, and sent it to You Ximing, with tears in his eyes and a trembling voice: "Change your torn pants...... Class Brothers......"

You Ximing cried "wow", "plopped" and knelt on the ground, grabbed Comrade An's delicate-skinned hands tightly, and couldn't cry: "You guys...... What a lifesaver...... Benefactor ......"

"Hurry up! Hurry up!" Lao An pulled You Ximing up with both hands and sat on the wheat straw, "If you have suffering, just tell it......"