Episode 107 Taihu Lake Horror

The long train dragged the soot from west to east.

Originally, this car of coal was going to be transported to Suzhou, and it didn't stop along the way, and it didn't even enter the stations along the way. There is a switch a few kilometers away from Wuxi Station, where the single-strand railway is divided into two strands, the right one leads to Wuxi Station, and the left one directly bypasses Wuxi and continues from outside the city.

It stands to reason that the train should be on the railway on the left, but the driver saw two soldiers with guns on their backs standing at the turnout in front of him, as well as a railroad worker. The railroad worker moved the switch, and the train was forced to drive onto the right railroad in the direction of Wuxi Station. The driver slowed down, poked his head out and shouted, questioning what was going on.

A People's Guard soldier climbed the handrail to board the locomotive, and the young man saluted and announced with great vigour:

"By order of Her Majesty the Empress, the People's Guard inspects all passing trains! Please stop in Wuxi Station and cooperate with the inspection! ”

The train driver, bare and sweaty, with a cigarette in his mouth, stood on the edge of the hearth, glared at the coal shovel and scolded:

"You melon baby, check it? Lao Tzu wants to pull coal into the Suzhou freight yard at seven o'clock, what is the way to do it if it is late? Her Majesty the Empress, Her Majesty the Empress does not pay Lao Tzu's salary! ”

The young man choked and stood there stunned, not knowing what to say for a while. At this time, the railroad worker also climbed on the handrail from the other side, and while looking down and flipping through a stack of papers, he said:

"Okay, okay, don't be so angry...... I asked Nong, who paid Nong? ”

The train driver turned his head to look at him and craned his neck:

"Taichang Railway Company!"

"Well, the Taichang...... Okay, take a look at it evenly," the railroad worker pulled out a signed and stamped telegram and handed it to him, "This is a telegram sent by the Chengdu headquarters of the Nong Taichang Railway Company, asking the Nong driver to cooperate with all inspections...... Oh, there is also the signature and seal of Manager Liu of Nongwu Wuxi Branch. ”

The train driver squinted, gave him back the telegram, shoveled a shovel of coal and threw it into the hearth:

"It's going to happen! Give Lao Tzu a salary, and Lao Tzu will listen to Chang Zi's command! …… Hey, boy, what's going on, what's going on? ”

……

In the coal pile on the sixth wagon behind the locomotive, a jet-black ear was erected, and these yelling conversations could be faintly heard.

Prince Ananta shook his head, got his head and face out of the coal pile, and then pushed Pachai beside him, and whispered:

"Did you hear that?"

Pachai nodded, and he also heard:

"Said that the end point of this train is Suzhou. Alas, if only it were Shanghai, we would soon be at the beach. ”

"You can't follow into Suzhou Station," the prince said fiercely, showing the only white tooth on his black face, "and they will unload coal when they enter Suzhou Station, and we won't be able to hide!" We are black, we have to find a place to wash, and then think of a place to hide first! ”

Pachai says:

"Your Highness, why don't we follow into Suzhou Station and find a way to pick up another train to the east in the freight yard? Maybe make it all the way to the beach......

Prince Ananta shook his head and directly denied:

"No! Why don't they check it out here? Why do you have to go to the station to check all the trains that pass by? Let me tell you, when you get to the station, there must be a dense crowd of soldiers standing next to every rail, and you may have to lead the dogs...... The train station may have become a barracks! No, when we arrived at Suzhou Station, we had no chance but to be caught! We have to get off before Suzhou Station! ”

"Your Highness, why don't we find a place to jump out of the car here?"

The prince lifted himself, looked to both sides, and sighed:

"No, it's close to the city, you see, it's full of houses on both sides...... Let's talk about it after Wuxi Station! Let's hide a little bit at Wuxi Station......"

After passing the turnout checkpoint, the train gradually picked up speed again, and after a while, it dragged black smoke into the freight yard of Wuxi Station.

……

Sure enough, as the prince expected, although there were not "dense soldiers standing beside every rail", there were also three steps and one post, five steps and one sentry, and there were soldiers and policemen. Each officer and policeman held a newspaper with a photograph of the prince in his hand, and watched vigilantly at every railroad worker, porter, and freight owner who passed by...... In addition, there were many more soldiers with guns and dogs, quickly inspecting every wagon.

More than a dozen shiny rail spurs line side by side on the freight yard. Nearly half of the rails are parked with a long or short series of wagons, which are already parked here, waiting for the yard to load and unload goods, or arrange reorganization and scheduling. A pitch-black locomotive spews black smoke and whirts back and forth across the rails. This is a special shunting locomotive, and now it is stepping up to disassemble and reorganize the wagons in the freight yard so that they can leave the station as soon as possible, so that the trains that have temporarily entered the station for inspection can make way for the tracks.

On the other half of the rails, there were whole trains of wagons, and at the front of each train there was a locomotive with white gas. These are all trains that were not intended to enter the station, but now they are all stopped and entered the freight yard for inspection. Now not only is every track in the freight yard full, but even on the line outside the show, there are whole trains of wagons parked, waiting for the trains to be checked in front of them to leave the station.

Now, due to the temporary search, a rare "railway traffic jam" has been caused. The captain and sergeant of the People's Guard, who were in charge of the search at Wuxi Station, stood in front of the large glass window of the dispatch tower, looking at all this below, chatting without saying a word, but their hearts were already anxious.

It was getting darker and darker, and suddenly there was a "bang", and the whole yard was brightly lit, and the mercury lamps and incandescent lamps were turned on. Immediately the windows of the buildings were lit up. This heralded the official arrival of the night. Although a large-scale "violent" search was carried out all afternoon, no trace of the Siamese prince was found. The manhunt was inevitably dragged into the night. This means that the difficulty of the search has increased exponentially.

The soldiers and policemen searching below are also aware of the current railway traffic jam and the consequences of this. Everyone was in a hurry, quickly opened the door of one section of the container truck, got in and shone a few flashlights, and then jumped down to check the next section. Flatbed trucks transporting timber and tanker trucks transporting fuel are basically not inspected, and they can't hide people at all, so they just sweep them with their eyes. At most, they bent down and swept the bottom of the car with their flashlights.

A squad of soldiers dealing with an open wagon carrying coal. Two soldiers led the dog and quickly ran past both sides of the car, allowing the dog to symbolically sniff at each car, basically without stopping. A dozen or so soldiers in the back were holding bayonets, and the inspection was slower. Each person quickly climbed up to the top of the gondola to take a look, thrust his bayonet twice into the pile of coal, and then jumped down to inspect the next section......

After all the open cars of the "good ————" wagon had been inspected, the squad leader in charge of the train waved the flag twice to the dispatch tower and shouted at a long time, "Finish————

On the dispatch tower, the captain nodded and said to the dispatcher next to him:

"Release."

The dispatcher, not even hearing the second sentence, immediately gave the signal to start, and at the same time moved the lever to change the switch of the coal train track so that it could drive out of the yard.

The train driver of the coal car did not want a second sentence at all, and immediately pulled the whistle happily, and the front of the car let out a long whistle and drove out of the station with a long whistle.

……

It wasn't until he felt a shaking beneath him, and was sure that he was completely out of the station, and was galloping at full speed, that the prince poked his head out of the coal pile and took a long breath of fresh air. Pachai beside him also came out, greedily breathing in the fragrant smell of the field.

The ears are whirring winds, the sky is full of stars, and the lights of thousands of homes are on both sides of the railway. Through the lights of the villages and towns in the distance, you can see large fields of farmland on both sides of the railway.

Neither of them spoke, and both leaned wearily against the coals behind them. Each of them softened with fright. Especially when the soldiers climbed into the open cart and plunged their bayonets into the coal pile, they were all scared to death.

Fortunately, I didn't get it twice.

The next stop is the terminal Suzhou. Suzhou station is much larger than Wuxi station, and it is conceivable that the search there will be more rigorous and terrifying. Moreover, this car is passing through in Wuxi, and it is impossible to be searched too carefully, so it may be lucky to escape. When I arrived in Suzhou, it was the final station, but I had to unload the goods. There's no way to escape that anyway.

The prince decided to take advantage of the darkness to find a place to jump the train in the dozen kilometers between the two stations. The train was moving very fast, as if trying to make up for the delay, and it was traveling at a speed of sixty or seventy kilometers per hour. In this case, more than ten kilometers, that is a matter of ten minutes.

Damn, driving so fast, how did you jump out of the car...... But it doesn't matter, there will always be corners...... If you slow down in a corner, you will jump out of the car......

Gradually, a wave of water came to my face.

Prince Ananta craned his neck, sniffed the small droplets in the air, and looked south again, but it was too dark to see anything.

"Your Highness?" Pachai cautiously asked, "What's wrong?" ”

The prince sniffed a few more times, and said with certainty:

"There's a big lake or a big river around here...... It could be Taihu Lake! It's very close to Taihu Lake! ”

"That'...... So what? ”

The prince laughed:

"There are a lot of scattered fishermen on the shores of Taihu Lake, and they all live on boats...... We can find such a household, give them some money, and hide in the boat for a few days...... They won't be searching for long, today and tomorrow at most. Then when we left, we killed the fisherman and went clean to the beach! ”

As if to cooperate with him, there was a long chirp from the front of the car in front of him, and then the speed of the car began to slow down, and a tilting force was clearly felt.

"Railroad bend! The train is slowing down! The prince excitedly got out of the coal pile and climbed to the side of the carriage to look down, "Pachai, get ready!" We're jumping out of the car! ”

Pachai also hurriedly got out, held on to the side of the carriage, and nervously prepared.

The prince was in the dark, trying to see the terrain in front and behind, and then shouted:

"One, two, three, jump!"

The two black shadows jumped out of the coal car, rolled under the roadbed, and slowly got up, supporting each other, limping away from the railway.

……

Not far to the south of the railroad is a large area of reeds, more than one person high, and the insects and frogs around it are almost deafening. The two of them were one foot deep and one foot shallow in the reeds, and they couldn't tell the direction, but they felt that this was the best hiding place. After walking a few hundred meters in the dark, the mud under my feet became more and more rotten. Suddenly, both stepped into the water.

No way! Is Taihu Lake so close to the railway line?

The prince shuddered with excitement. He thought it would be a long and dangerous journey from the railroad to the lake! He quickened his pace, paddled his legs through the reeds, his hands apart from the reeds, and walked forward.

Suddenly, there were no reeds left in front of me, revealing a large area of pitch-black water, with the stars in the sky reflected on the water. The strong wind carried the water vapor in the face, and the lake under his feet was like waves, wave after wave into the reeds.

There are a few fishing fires in the distance, which should be fishing boats on the lake. But the shores of the lake on both sides are blocked by reeds and cannot be seen. Prince Ananta carefully walked into the water with Pachai again, wanting to expand his vision. When the water is chest-deep, the vision expands. The two saw that more than 100 meters to the right, there were two fishing boats. More than 200 meters to the left, there is a smaller fishing boat, lonely.

The boats are all lit up, and it is estimated that the fishermen above are cooking dinner.

"Let's go, get on the boat on the left!"

With a wave of his hand, the prince paddled the water with Pachai and touched the lonely fishing boat more than two hundred meters away to the left. Behind him, Pachai held the gun and money wrapped in his jacket, and paddled hard.

Ten minutes later, the two touched the side of the fishing boat. The prince climbed the boat and flipped up. He turned around and took Pachai's cloth bag, took out a gun from it, and reached into the cabin with his waist bent.

There was an oil lamp lit in the cabin, and a **-year-old girl was doing her homework under the lamp, and next to her was a skinny old woman in her sixties who was sewing clothes. Probably grandparents and grandchildren.

Both the grandfather and grandson noticed the uninvited guest, and raised their heads in astonishment to look at the man who was wet and his face was still painted with coal black. In particular, the man was carrying a gun in his hand.

The little girl was frightened and threw herself into the old woman's arms. The old woman took the scissors, looked at the prince tremblingly, and asked in the local dialect.

Although the prince spoke the Chinese "official dialect" very well, he did not understand the Wu Nong dialect. He didn't understand, just smiled and nodded, and walked into the cabin with a big grin, beckoning Pachai behind him to come in as well.

The prince sat down beside the old woman, took out the scissors from his dry old hand and threw them aside, then touched the little girl's head, and said with a smile:

"Little girl, don't be afraid. Where's your dad? ”

The little girl could speak official language, but her eyes widened in horror and she didn't say a word.

The prince turned to the old woman again and asked:

"Where's your son?"

The little girl was so frightened that she was about to cry. The mother-in-law replied loudly and hugged the little girl tighter.

The prince still didn't understand, but turned his gaze to the little girl. The little girl was bold and said crisply in official language:

"My dad went to someone's boat to drink!"

The prince nodded, and counted. He put the gun in his waist, took a stack of money, took out one, stuffed it to the old woman, and said with a smile:

"Old woman, don't be afraid, we are not bad people, we are passers-by, there is no place to live, stay with you for two days. How about giving you fifty Mingyang in two days? ”

The old woman looked at the 50 bills and stared at the prince in disbelief. Fifty Ming Ocean, they can't earn fifty Ming Ocean for a year's fish!

However, these two people are so terrible, and they still have guns, and they carry so much money, needless to say, they must be fugitives......

……

At this moment, on the surface of the lake outside, the sound of a roaring motor was faintly heard, and it soon became very deafening. It's the sound of a high-speed engine! Definitely not a fishing boat, it's a speedboat! Approaching fast!

The prince and Pachai turned pale, drew their pistols, and crouched down. The prince put his pistol to the old woman's head and shouted in a low voice:

"Don't be silent!"

The little girl cried "wow" loudly. The prince snatched the little girl again, covered her mouth, and shouted:

"Don't cry! Cry again and beat you to death! ”

But the little girl became more and more frightened, kicked her legs desperately, and bit down.

The prince screamed, and the little girl broke free, ran out of the cabin, and with a "poof" got into the water, and skilfully swam out of the waves.