Section 4 Small Strip of Cloth

Shimizu Daisa's special operations team, after quietly evacuating the town of Kawaguchi at dawn, did not follow the established route to the southeast. Fearing that their whereabouts would be discovered and besieged, Shimizu ordered the whole group to turn due west, crossing a dense ditch not far south of the Fallen Horse Pass, and stopping at a no-man's land marked on the map.

This is done to shake off the tail that may be there, to move forward to the area that the opponent is not expecting, and then wait for the eight roads to be careless before striking them by surprise.

The Taihang Mountain, which runs thousands of kilometers from north to south, and the Langya Mountain in the northwest of North China, coincide in this area, forming many deep canyons and steep cliffs, and Qingshui's special team is hidden under a cliff in the swallow ditch. This cliff is in the middle of the canyon, and the top of the cliff slanted into the blue sky, looking like a swallow spreading its wings.

At the bottom of the cliff is a stone trough that can accommodate hundreds of people to rest and move, and there is a spring dripping from the top of the cave. The ditch is deep, the forest is dense and the mountains are dangerous, except for the medicine collection and sheep grazing, this ditch stretches for several miles and is uninhabited.

This ditch was led by a plainclothes man named Chen Liang in the plainclothes team and brought the special team over.

Chen Liang's family was originally from Shangyu Village, west of the military camp town, and his family was the only rich family in the village who could be called a landlord. When he was young, this boy did not like to read or do farm work, so he liked to follow an old man in his family and hunt all over the mountains.

This swallow ditch was discovered when he was hunting with the old worker, and later he was forced by the landlord's father to go to Baoding to go to school, and he never returned to his hometown.

When the Eighth Route opened up the base area in 38, this landlord surnamed Chen joined forces with the big families in several other villages to contribute money and grain to the militia to protect themselves, openly resisted the Eighth Road's united front and anti-Japanese policies such as rent and interest reductions, and even clashed with the work teams that came to the village to mobilize the masses.

The local governments of the six sub-districts sent people to do the work of the anti-Japanese united front several times, but they were all driven back. When it was learned that the militia wanted to collude with the devil puppet army to sneak attack the Eighth Road, the Sixth Division simply disarmed the militia in the area of the military camp town and suppressed several leaders of the militia who committed the most heinous crimes and had great public anger, and Chen Liang's father was shot on the spot after the public trial.

The family property was also distributed to the poor families in the village by the peasant association, and Chen Liang, who was studying in Baoding, heard that his father was suppressed by the Eighth Road, and the family property was privately divided by the poor sticks, so he voted for the devil and became a plainclothes traitor.

This guy is the only one in the entire plainclothes team who recommended himself, with one purpose, to avenge his father! In the first few attacks on the village, the cadres of the Eighth Route who were caught were all beheaded by this kid!

On the mountain beam outside Kawaguchi Town, when he learned that he was going to attack the military camp town, Chen Liang tried his best to ensure that he was familiar with the terrain in that area with the captain of the plainclothes team.

Yanzigou is less than twenty miles away from the military camp town, and it is only seven or eight miles away from Shangyu Village, so it is really suitable as a lurking location.

After carefully inquiring about the situation around the barracks town to this plainclothes Chen Liang, Qing Shui discussed with Lieutenant Mashiko and several other officers to prepare to rest here for two days, and after two days, secretly infiltrated the vicinity of the barracks town of the Eighth Road to inquire about the news, and if the Eighth Route was indeed not aware of the existence of the special forces, then launched an attack and destroyed the smelter and weapon repair station mentioned in the intelligence.

After completing this task, it is almost time to carry out the important task agreed with the North China Headquarters, and the attack on the barracks town can be regarded as a special operation drill along the way.

The little devils also tossed for a night, trekking dozens of miles in the big ravine, all tired and sore backs, as soon as they talked about camping, they staggered and fell asleep.

The sun shone obliquely on the wild grass and wild trees in the valley, the chickadee at the mouth of the ditch was jumping on the branches, the spring water was gurgling from the cracks in the stones to the grass, and a few hares were quietly picking up the ripe and fallen fruits under the mountain pear trees.

Suddenly, the chickadee stopped chirping, the hare stood up on its hind legs, its ears stood up and turned a few times, and it stooped down and swiftly scurried back to the burrow, and a breeze drifted by, and in the mottled shadows of the trees at the mouth of the ditch, there was a shadow of a man.

The man crouched under a hickory tree, and was watching his surroundings with alarm, and after a while he went down to the mouth of the ditch, and pressed against the bushes, carefully examining the grass and the ground.

The more this guy looked, the more excited he became, and the more he looked, the more slowly he approached the hillside where the ditch mouth was about to fall, and suddenly his eyes lit up, and a few meters in front of him, a thick sour jujube tree attracted his attention.

This sour jujube tree sticks out obliquely from the crack in the stone, much taller than other jujube trees in Zhouzhou, and there are a lot of unripe jujubes hanging in the middle of these branches and jujubes, a small strip of cloth flutters slightly in the mountain wind.

The man trotted over, gently took off the small strip of cloth from the sour jujube thorns, put it in the palm of his hand and looked at it for a long time, and then gently put it in the hidden pocket on the inner seam of the close-fitting Han jacket.

After brushing aside the bushes and grass, revealing his two eyes, and glancing into the ditch for a while, the man turned around and soon disappeared into the mountains northeast of the mouth of the ditch.

Although Shimizu Dazuo, who was sleeping under the cliff, arranged an undercover post of no less than 10 people, he never thought that what could expose the whereabouts of his special team was actually a soldier's clothes hanging by sour jujube thorns!

During the march, it is not allowed to eat, drink, smoke, urinate, etc., so many precepts are to ensure the secrecy of the troops' march, but people are still not as good as the sky, and a small strip of cloth was still discovered by the soldiers of the Eighth Route who were looking around.

After the old five sons broke up with Yang Bangzi's brigade, they expected to cut horizontally along the east and west mountains, if the devils were going south, they would definitely be able to find the clues of the devil's march, and then follow these traces and quietly follow.

But after they set off, they drove more than ten miles in one go, and they did not find any traces left by the march of the large army, and the villagers of Yujian on the road also said that they did not see any troops wearing the uniforms of the Eighth Route Army passing by.

That's weird! Didn't the devil go south? Yang Bangzi obviously saw that the devil had disappeared over the mountain beam on the south side of the avenue, how could he go so far and not find a trace?

After studying it for a while, the second vulture slapped his thigh violently and remembered something! In the past, when they were bandits, if they tied up a ticket or made a fence, in order to prevent being tracked, they should always go south, and they should turn around in a circle in the east or west, and only turn back to the hiding place after a large detour.

The devil must have gone west! The east side has to cross our avenue, the road is full of people, it is easy to expose the target, first go west into the mountains, avoid the village, walk a long way and then go south, the devil must go like this!

No matter how cunning the fox is, he can't fight a good hunter, and no matter how special an operation devil is, he can't hide it from the Chinese bandits! At that moment, the two vultures singled out a dozen or so of their subordinates, and scattered them out radially to find the traces of devils according to the direction of the south and west! These dozen or so people have all been hunters, and they didn't work to say it!

Sure enough, more than an hour later, all the people on both lines came back! In addition to the small strip of cloth found on the southern front, traces of the passage of large troops were also found on the western front, a rubber heel that had been worn out and peeled off! This kind of shoes are only equipped with devils, this generation is an old base, and there is no need to drill deep ravines on the eighth road, and it is also a path and avenue to walk, and the heel found in the ravine can only be the special team of devils.

The soldiers of the second vulture and the fifth son of the old man made the local area, roughly drew a map on the sandy land, and marked the location of the two relics on the map, and it was immediately clear!

After the devil set out from Kawaguchi Town, he immediately marched west for more than ten miles, and then turned south and advanced for more than 10 miles, and found that the place where the cloth strip was less than 20 miles away from the military camp town, and according to the speed of the devil's march, he could arrive in half a day.

The second vulture estimated that Yang Bangzi and they should have arrived in the military camp town a long time ago, and the devil would go this way, and it was impossible to rashly attack during the day, after all, they were only one hundred and ten people, and they were designated to wait for dark before they started.

Then the dozens of people he brought with him should set off now, and strive to touch the back of the devil's butt before the devil attacks, and this task will be completed.

Without further ado, the second vulture immediately ordered the warrior who found the strip of cloth to lead the way, and hurried to the ditch!