In the evening, Cao Ming carefully considered the language and told the aunt about the previous call.

Grandpa took a puff of dry tobacco and said in a muffled voice: "Xiao Ming, tell grandpa, what do you think?"

Cao Ming thought about it for a long time, and finally said a sentence that should have been figured out by the old man many years later:

"My dad's business, in fact, I can't blame my aunt, fatigue driving ......"

But before he could finish speaking, the old man slammed his pipe on the table and went out with his hands behind his back.

Cao Ming looked at the back of the rickety, and suddenly had the idea of slapping himself. Li Qingyi felt that this knot could not be untied, and the old man here, how could he feel that his son's departure could be easily touched?

Cao Ming decided to call Li Qingyi back later, and asked them to give the old man some more time.

At this time, the door was knocked open with a "snap", and the three fat men ran in with a strange look, looked left and right, lowered their voices, and said hoarsely:

"The Wang family, the Wang family...... The daughter-in-law who said she was going to pay her debts today is dead! ”

"Phew, what are you talking about during the Chinese New Year?!"

Three fat grievances: "I didn't talk nonsense!" That person hanged himself on the beam of the old Deng family's house!

My parents just came over there and told me in person. ”

Cao Ming was stunned.

In a trance, I seemed to see the originally young but colorless eyes again, the woman who wanted to run out of this village desperately but was chased and intercepted by dozens of big men and finally tied up by Wuhuada, the woman who was alone in the field with her back and silently nibbled on boiled water and drank steamed buns...

The three fat men pulled Cao Ming to the head of the village, where it was surrounded by water, men, women and children stretched their necks to look inside, and their expressions were as secretive as they were.

Old Deng squatted at the door with a gloomy face, scolding in his mouth, his loose trouser pocket was pulled around his waist, and he didn't know if he was scared enough or ready to shake off the fear of the unknown.

Standing opposite him was the Rotten Gambling King, muttering unspoken characters in his mouth, as if he was distinguishing something, and around the Rotten Gambling King stood several uncles of the Wang family, directing several women to wrap the corpses still lying in the wing room in sheets, and had already discussed finding a remote place to prepare for burial.

Cao Ming's grandfather is the only surviving elder in the village in this generation, and was invited by the Wang family to discuss the funeral.

The corpse was moved to the courtyard of the boss of the Wang family, and without the onlookers of outsiders, the head of the Wang family pulled the rotten gambling king, and his hands did not stop, and more than a dozen mouths were fanned over.

There was no one around, and the bad gambling king didn't fight back, and when he was tired, the boss of the Wang family spat hatefully:

"You lost all the face of the family alone!"

When Cao Ming heard this, his heart was cold, he originally thought that this man was angry for the deceased, but he didn't expect it to be just for the so-called face.

Sanpang used to shoot loudly, but when he really approached the deceased closely, he showed the opposite timid appearance, cowering and only inking at the door.

The Wang family, who was in charge, decided to bury the body in Bai Hualin at the back of the village, wanting to deal with it quickly before it was dark, of course, it was the kind of direct burial without a coffin.

The birch forest behind the village was a place to bury the dead when cremation had not yet been implemented, especially the poor families at that time, who had no money to hire a stonemason to erect a monument, let alone a carpenter to make a coffin, and often relatives and friends dug a pit under the birch tree and buried it, and the names and clans that should have been engraved on the stone tablet were also carved on the trunk with a knife.

In Cao Ming's impression, the government once organized a large-scale relocation of graves, when the excavator shoveled through the woods, the ground was full of scattered dry bones, the uprooted roots were still wrapped around several large and small skulls, and the roots of the tree were intertwined and shuttled between the holes of the white bones, like regenerated meridian blood vessels, strange and terrifying.

Therefore, in the eyes of the older generation, the birch forest looks like a natural cemetery made of countless tombstones.

Cao Ming's grandfather was invited to be an old man to send souls, wearing sackcloth and carrying an oil lamp, and in the evening, under the leadership of a group of people, carried the corpse that was still full of flesh and blood in the morning to the back of the village.

The three fat men helped carry some yellow paper, walked at the back with Cao Ming, saw that the weather was getting more and more gloomy, and talked to Cao Ming with a trembling voice:

"Why aren't you afraid at all?"

Cao Ming glanced at the corpse in front of him and pretended to be nothing:

"It's none of my business, what are you afraid of, ghosts can't find me when they come to seek revenge."

Sanpang swallowed his saliva and said in a tangled way: "I heard my parents say that she was forced to buy it, and she has escaped many times before, and every time she is caught, she is beaten, I am afraid that she will hurt our entire village..."

Cao Ming was also made to stand on end by the dead fat man's words, and kicked him away: "Don't scare yourself, if you're really scared, get back quickly." ”

After speaking, he ignored the three fats, and quickly caught up with the large army.

The trees in the birch forest were all fat and strong, obviously the rotten nutrients in the ground were sufficient, Cao Ming looked at the many knife marks on the bark that had been almost smoothed, and a chill broke out from the bottom of his heart.

The corpse wrapped in a straw mat was put into the soil pit, Cao Ming's grandfather stepped forward and whispered for a while, beckoning everyone to tell that the yellow paper he brought was burned, and after a simple operation, the people of the Wang family were already impatient and began to cover the soil in a hurry.

Grandpa Cao Ming wanted to speak and stopped, but in the end he just sighed, and didn't speak after all.

After returning home, the grandfather, who had been silent all the way, put down the oil lamp, and the nearly exhausted coal lamp fluttered like a bean, without blowing, and turned into green smoke with a slight shake.

The old man felt something, coughed, and said:

"You can reply to them, come and sit down."

It turned out that grandpa had been thinking about Li Qingyi and her mother coming over.

Cao Ming asked carefully: "If you don't want to, don't..."

The old man may have been touched by the life and death of the woman of the Wang family just now, and waved his hand to interrupt: "Let's call, I figured it out, people die like lights out, and it is better to see it early than to see it at night." ”

Cao Ming nodded.

Li Qingyi didn't react when she received Cao Ming's call, maybe she didn't let Cao Ming hear any fluctuations in her, but her aunt's tone was obviously very happy, and she chatted with Cao Ming for a long time, and even began to think about what kind of gift to bring.

Putting down the phone, Cao Ming nodded to his grandfather.

Just wanted to breathe a sigh of relief, there was a rapid knocking sound outside the door, Cao Ming opened the door, and an anxious face immediately pasted up:

"Cao Ming, have you seen our family's three fat?"