Chen Xuejiao looked back and saw Zhao Yiming standing next to the bean rack behind her. He was dressed in a straight blue shirt, and although his hair was gray and old, he was clean and neat. Zhao Yiming saw Chen Xuejiao turn her head, the corners of her mouth rose, and a bright smile appeared, the autumn sunset was red and dazzling, and the afterglow was sprinkled on Zhao Yiming's face, showing a clear and clean halo.

Chen Xuejiao hadn't seen Zhao Yiming for a while, and when she saw him at this time, she couldn't help but feel cordial, and she couldn't care about Chen Xuemiao in her heart, so she picked the last eggplant and said to Zhao Yiming with a smile: "Brother Yiming hasn't come to our house for a long time, how can I be free today." ”

Zhao Yiming was still smiling, and did not answer Chen Xuejiao's words, climbed the bean rack with both hands, and picked a few white beans that were missed in the summer from between the dead branches and leaves.

"I've been doing work in the fields these days, and today I went to the private school to find your brother, and he forced me to come home." Zhao Yiming smiled and showed two tiger teeth.

Chen Xuejiao put away the basket and trotted towards Zhao Yiming, a pale green skirt became more and more playful and beautiful in the dusk.

In June, the lotus bloomed, Chen Xuejiao's birthday, Zhao Yiming gave her a pool of lotus flowers as a birthday gift, and she was also wearing green clothes at that time, running in the dusk.

For a moment, Zhao Yiming was in a trance.

"Why, if my brother doesn't pull you here, you won't come to my house." Chen Xuejiao walked to Zhao Yiming's side, stood under the bean frame, smiled brightly, and said narrowly.

Zhao Yiming scratched his scalp embarrassedly, knowing that he had just said the wrong thing, his smiling face was shy, and he waved his hand again and again: "I didn't mean that." ”

Chen Xuejiao glanced at him lightly. chuckled: "I was kidding you just now, I still don't know you, I know that you don't mean that." ”

Zhao Yiming's mother, Xu, is still working in Li's embroidery workshop. Because Li and Wenying's sister-in-law had a lot of things at home, they couldn't guarantee that they would go to the embroidery workshop every day to check, so they promoted the steward of Xu's pawnshop. Xu did not rely on Li's promotion to feel superior, she was a widow herself, she knew the pain and hardship of the lonely and widowed, and still only treated the female workers in the embroidery workshop as sisters. Before Zhao Yiming's father got sick, he opened a rice noodle shop in Xuzhou Mansion. Xu has been immersed in the shop for a long time, and his stomach is full of business experience, although he is illiterate. Can wipe the abacus and settle accounts. She remembered the daily expenses of the embroidery workshop clearly, and she didn't bother Li and Wenying at all.

The business of the embroidery workshop has Xu's. It's getting more and more prosperous than ever.

Li gave Xu a wage increase. In addition to the income of embroidery, I get a few hundred more money per month than others. The Han family purchased more than 100 acres of land when it was most developed, and in addition to the 30 acres sold to Chen Xuejiao's family, there were still dozens of acres left, and the output of these fields was quite a lot every year.

There are all kinds of seventy-seven eighty-eight, and the income of most of the year is about to pay off the silver owed by Zhao Yiming's father when he is sick.

Although the life of the mother and son is still poor, it is much better than when Zhao Yiming's father just died.

Xu helped with the embroidery workshop. All the work in the field fell on Zhao Yiming. Fortunately, Zhao Yiming looked weak, but he was a person who was willing to endure hardships. Doing the work in the field is no worse than Qi An, who has lived in the countryside since he was a child and is used to doing farm work. Chen Xuejiao's family bought cattle and other tools for ploughing land this autumn, just for the convenience of farming, after the Chen family's farm work was done, they lent the cattle to Zhao Yiming, and Chen Xuejiao, Chen Qi'an, Shishi, and Qi Ping went to help when they broke corn and sowed wheat seeds, so Zhao Yiming's farm work was very smooth, except for a few acres of land on the mountain, because it was inconvenient to enter the ox cart, Zhao Yiming decided to work by himself.

"Is the land on the mountain planted?" Chen Xuejiao lifted the basket, and the last stubble of autumn eggplants had more than a dozen, all of which were very large, and they were a bit heavy in the basket.

"It's all done, yesterday Qi An and Xingjian helped each other with their classmates from the private school, and there were three acres of land on the left and right, and all the wheat seeds were sown." Zhao Yiming took Chen Xuejiao's basket with his hand, "The basket is quite heavy, this is the last batch of eggplants, my family has already eaten it." ”

Chen Xuejiao heard him say that the three acres of mountainous land had been planted, so she relieved herself and shook the arm that was carrying the basket: "You can eat at our house tonight, and you will have to cook when you go back." ”

Zhao Yiming's mother is busy in the embroidery workshop until dark every day, and the embroidery workshop manages two meals at noon and evening every day, so Zhao Yiming cooks and eats at home alone at night.

"I just came here to eat today, look at the eggplant you picked, it must be a fried eggplant box, I like to eat this the most." Zhao Yiming said mischievously.

The two of them were talking, Zhao Yiming suddenly seemed to think of something, just now whispered in Chen Xuejiao's ear, and saw Chen Xuemiao standing under the loofah shelf a little farther away and looking this way.

Zhao Yiming's face turned slightly red. Although there is no saying in the countryside that men and women are not kissed, and Chen Xuejiao and Zhao Yiming are both young, even if the two of them are seen head to head, they will not say anything unpleasant. If it were someone else, Zhao Yiming would never care anymore, but this person was the daughter of the second room of the Chen family, and she had always had an enmity with Chen Xuejiao, and she didn't know what kind of ugly words would come out when she saw it.

According to the distance between relatives and relatives, Zhao Yiming is the distant cousin of Chen Xuemiao's grandmother's family, but because the two families don't have much contact, this relationship has gradually forgotten.

Chen Xuejiao was pricking up her ears, but she didn't expect Zhao Yiming to stop talking, and when she followed his gaze, she saw that Chen Xuemiao was staring in their direction, but instead of looking at them, she was focusing on the plane tree behind the courtyard wall.

Chen Xuemiao secretly wrote it down, and she didn't break Chen Xuemiao in front of Zhao Yiming, and said with a smile: "What's the matter, what do you have to say to hide it from me." ”

Seeing Chen Xuejiao's relaxed appearance and tone, she didn't take Chen Xuemiao in her eyes at all, smiled embarrassedly, and whispered: "I just want to tell you ......."

"You see, I've picked up some more books in the town in the past two days, and I've brought them to you today." Zhao Yiming glanced left and right, saw that there was no one, took out a few small books from the wide sleeves of his clothes, and quietly handed them to Chen Xuejiao.

One is "Wu Song Fights the Tiger", the other is "Dou E's Injustice", and the other is "Zhao's Orphan". Chen Xuejiao flipped through it slightly, the characters were vividly depicted, the text was concise and powerful, and such a book was simply a modern comic.

Chen Xuejiao happily put the book into her sleeve, clasped her hands together and said to Zhao Yiming: "Thank you so much, I love to read these illustrated books." ”

The two men entered the north wing.

"Ichimei is here." Li didn't wait for Zhao Yiming to salute, then stood up, looked at Zhao Yiming and smiled, "It's been a little stronger again this time, it's good, it's good." ”

"I guess I'm sticking autumn fat." As soon as Zhao Yiming's words fell, everyone laughed.

Li left Zhao Yiming to eat, and seeing that it was getting dark, he put down the needle and thread, took the eggplant in Zhao Yiming's hand, and went to the pot house to manage dinner.

Qi Ping came home from school, and pestered Li to eat the eggplant box, and was sent by Li to read and write. At this time, he had already written a type, and when he heard that Zhao Yiming was coming, he pulled Zhao Yiming into the inner room and asked Zhao Yiming to teach him how to plan the plate.

Chen Xuejiao saw Zhao Yiming go in, so she walked out.

When I arrived next to the vegetable garden, I saw that Chen Xuemiao was still staring at the plane tree behind the wall.

Chen Xuejiao's eyes flashed, and now the Zhao family was thinking about how to please Mrs. Chen in order to return to Xuzhou Mansion, and they didn't care about Chen Xuemiao at all, nor did they realize Chen Xuemiao's abnormality.

Chen Xuemiao looks like this, if something happens, all the girls in the Chen family who have not left the cabinet will be implicated.

Chen Xuejiao decided to make a move.

The plane trees behind the walls were tall and thick, and although it was late autumn, the leaves on them had not yet set, and if there was a person climbing on it, it would not be visible to anyone if it was covered by the dense foliage. I think the merchant himself knows that standing at the gate of the Chen family is too eye-catching, so he came up with this method.

Chen Xuejiao followed Chen Xuemiao's gaze and looked behind the wall, there was no one on the plane tree at this time, thinking that the merchant would climb up when it was dark and no one had an idea.

Chen Xuemiao looked at the sycamore tree stupidly, still wearing the red plum blossom skirt, and the plum blossoms bloomed as soon as she moved the corner of the skirt. She was now pinning her mind on the plane tree, and she didn't notice that Chen Xuemiao was observing her at all.

There was a rich fragrance coming from the pot house, and Chen Xuejiao knew that Li was frying the eggplant box. The pot house in the upper room also began to light the stove, and in order to learn from the Zhao family, Mrs. Chen had the task of cooking these days on the Zhao family's head, and the Zhang family was talking nonsense on the side, stimulating the Zhao family from time to time.

Zhao was wearing coarse cloth clothes, busy with his hair and hair, and was beaten by Han Laojiu's daughter-in-law two days ago, and his whole face became more and more gray. Choosing vegetables, scooping water, and feeding pigs, Zhao was busy coming and going back in the yard, and there was no shadow of Chen Xuemiao in his eyes, and it was impossible to find Chen Xuemiao staring at the sycamore tree stupidly.

Chen Xuejiao walked to the gate and walked around, and saw the merchant carrying a burden from a distance at the entrance of the village. It's so late, it must not be here to peddle business.

This is not the first day she has observed the merchant's whereabouts, but she has been secretly observing for several days, so she knows when the merchant usually climbs the tree and has a "private meeting" with Xue Miao.

She had already made a plan in mind.

The setting sun took away the last rays of light, and the village heard the noise of children, the barking of dogs, and the sound of eating.

Chen Xuejiao quietly called Qi An out, and as soon as she told her about the matter slightly, Qi An's face turned red, and her heart was even more angry. On the one hand, Qi Xue Miao is not self-respecting, and on the other hand, the angry merchant dares to run to the tree behind the house, he not only has a private meeting with Xue Miao, but the other sisters in the family are also looked at by him.

“…… Brother, we can't keep quiet, after all, we still live in this courtyard. Xue Jiao muttered a few words in Qi An's ear, and Qi An nodded heavily. (To be continued......)