The heavy snow on the main roads and prosperous areas of the streets of Lingzhou Mansion was quickly swept away by the people of the government organization, leaving only those remote streets and alleys with no one to sweep the snow, and was repeatedly trampled by those small characters who lived at the bottom of the society, becoming dirty and messy, and the snow flakes were brought up and down, ravaged and crushed under the trampling of various shoes.

The snow on the roofs of each house could not be swept away, and as soon as the sun shone out, the snow slowly melted and turned into clear water and fell along the tiles.

A donkey cart creaked through the dirty snow and drove into a narrow alleyway and stopped outside the gate of a small courtyard.

"Is Ah Xia born?" a middle-aged woman got out of the car and asked the young man who came out of the door urgently.

"It's born," the young man replied in a feeble voice, "but it's not good, it's been bleeding for the past few days, and it's about to drain the person." ”

"How so? Would you like to see it?" the woman's face changed.

The mother-in-law of the Li family came out of the door, and she was also worried, "Please, please, I've already pleased, I've taken the pulse, and I'm taking the medicine, but it's not very good." ”

As he spoke, he lifted a tightly patched torn cotton curtain and invited his daughter-in-law's mother into the door.

The sound of striking iron in the Wang's blacksmith shop has been resting for several days, and the neighbors are disturbed by the sound of tinkling and clanging every day, and they have long been accustomed to that kind of sound.

A mother-in-law put her hands in her sleeves, and two big cotton nests on her feet stepped on the dirty snow, and walked idly past the door of the blacksmith shop, "Why hasn't Wang Mazi opened for several days? ”

"You heartless mother-in-law, your daughter-in-law has just died, how can you still have the heart to open the door?" An old man next to him passed by and scolded with a smile.

The mother-in-law's face showed sympathy, "Yes, this is really unfortunate, the daughter-in-law is dead, the child in the womb is also dead, one corpse and two lives, enough for the king blacksmith to be sad for a while." But it's enough to be sad and sad, it's common for this woman to die in confinement, blame this woman for not being blessed, and she can't get over this hurdle - a woman, it's just a hemp paper pasted on the wall, peel off a layer, and paste another layer, anyway, Wang Mazi is not short of silver. If he continues soon, I can bring my niece's niece together. ”

In the deep alley west of the street, in a mud-walled tile house, there is a petite body kneeling on the earthen kang, and the little daughter-in-law with a naked lower body looks short and delicate from behind, but when she looks at the front, it is like a pot buckled on her stomach, and the belly is so big that it is about to burst.

The three midwives were hurriedly tossing around the little daughter-in-law, and the little daughter-in-law let out a burst of more tragic cries from her mouth.

A midwife guarded the little daughter-in-law's lower body and checked, reached out and groped for a while, and touched a slender and slender thing, and suddenly retracted her hand like a ghost, her face was dark, "The first to come out is the feet--how is this good-"

Another mother-in-law climbed onto the kang, "No, you have to shake it quickly, only by throwing it hard can you turn the fetal position upside down." ”

A man was called in, he picked up the little daughter-in-law, everyone helped on the side, the little daughter-in-law was hung on the side of the kang, suddenly the man let go, the little daughter-in-law howled and fell to the ground.

She cried and clutched her stomach.

Several mothers-in-law did not allow her to rest, pulled and pulled on the kang again, picked it up again and threw it down.

The little daughter-in-law was soon dazed and rolled her eyes.

"You can't do this, I still have a local method that works very well - I won't take it out until I have to.+" The third woman shouted with a big grin, "Go find a bowl of water, get a big spoon and a pair of chopsticks-"

The mother-in-law of the little daughter-in-law was guarding the door, and she had already flown to get something.

The mother-in-law groped out a large paper bag from her pocket and opened it layer by layer, revealing small packets of yellow sheet paper one by one.

She opened three packs in a row, poured out three piles of incense ash and rushed into the bowl to melt, and then called the man to pry open the little daughter-in-law's mouth with chopsticks and pour the incense ash water into her stomach with a big spoon.

"Don't underestimate the incense ash I asked for this time, but I ran a lot of ways to go to Lingyan Temple to ask for it, but it worked-"

The mother-in-law showed off to her two companions.

The companion was also convinced, "That's that, this must be useful if you drink it." With the blessing of the Buddha. ”

The incense ash is very difficult to drink, and the little daughter-in-law spit it out when she drinks it, and tears and snot flow together.

"Pinch your nose and pour!" the mother-in-law ordered viciously.

A large bowl of gray fragrant ash water was poured down.

Still not moving?

Several mothers-in-law began to toss around the little daughter-in-law again.

Outside, the winter sun only drew a cursory circle on the sky, and then slid down the southwest wall of the sky.

A day passed.

The little daughter-in-law still hasn't been born.

She fainted again and again, and was brought back to life by cold water again and again, drinking bowls of fragrant ash water and spitting it out, and the blood under her body slowly seeped out one pool after another.

Finally, when the lights were lit, the three midwives spread their hands at the same time, looking helpless, "We tried our best, but it was useless - spare us for saying something that is not to be heard, your little daughter-in-law must have collided with the gods during pregnancy, and the gods are unhappy, so it is so difficult to give birth, you still have to ask Wang Qiao's hand, maybe she has a way." ”

The little daughter-in-law, mother-in-law and husband suddenly went limp on the ground and couldn't get up again.

The three mothers-in-law curled up and walked away with their own things, and before leaving, they saw the little daughter-in-law lying upright on the kang because of the pain, and a mother-in-law stared at her eyes and issued a warning: "Don't lie down like this, lying down like this can only make the child in the belly pierce deep into the belly, and when the child's little hand grabs the mother's heart, that is, the child digs into the heart, and it is completely hopeless - only kneeling can make the child feel uncomfortable, and can he slide down the birth door-"

The man got up from the ground and wiped the sweat from his face, "I'll go and ask Wang Qiaoshou, no matter how much money it costs, I will admit it—if we don't have money, we will sell this ancestral house." ”

After saying that, he ran out.

The little daughter-in-law woke up in a daze, looked at the gray roof overhead, and desperately thought that Wang Qiaoshou was not easy to invite, and people were only willing to do the business of big families now.

Unexpectedly, Wang Qiaoshou came, and it came quickly, she had a small burden under her arm, and rushed into the door, and saw the little daughter-in-law curled up and kneeling in the kang, and it was already so painful that she only had one breath left to drag slowly.

Wang Qiao's hand lost the burden and went to the kang, stretching out his arm to pull the body away, while roaring angrily and asking: "Why do you kneel? Do you still have the strength to kneel when you are about to die of pain?" Isn't it more difficult to kneel?" Flattened the little daughter-in-law's limbs, flattened her and put her down, and shouted to the ground, "Go and get some egg soup and broth or something--you have to hang your life, and you don't have the strength to give birth." ”

The words from the little man flashed through his mind, "Go and boil some ginseng soup to hang your life—"

The people who live in the west of this street are all poor, and she knows that they can't take out ginseng to make soup, but she is afraid that they may not even see what ginseng looks like, so she can only retreat to the next best thing, and change it to egg soup or broth. (To be continued.) )