As the saying goes, the eyes are the windows to the soul, and when a person lies, there will be unnatural subtle expressions in his eyes, but he does not, which shows that he is telling the truth. Qiao Yu recognized that what the kid was telling was what was really happening.

"Oh, then, the strange things that are happening in this village are very suspicious. It doesn't look like we're going to make this trip in vain. An Lan also sighed.

Immediately afterwards, Qiao Yu suddenly remembered a key question, and he asked the children in his companionship: "Who of you knows, whose old house is that abandoned house?" ”

"I, I know, I heard my grandfather say that Wang Jiaxin's family used to live there, and then they took the initiative to move down from the mountainside and live with the people in the village." The older kid replied first. ”

A group of four of us followed these village children while walking and chatting, and soon came to Wang Jiaxin's house.

The village children stood at a distance, pointed to the old mud house, and said to us, "This is the house, go ahead." ”

I saw that a few children were still talking and laughing just now, but when they came here, they immediately fell silent and their expressions became serious, and I felt a little weird.

I asked the children curiously, "Children, you seem to be very afraid of this family, has something bad happened to his family?" ”

"Well, it's not just a bad thing, his family has died of an underage child, in addition, their neighbor's family has also died four children in a row, by the way, just now in the village said that the child who died of sugar poisoning is the child of their two families.

Normally, the adults didn't let us get close to these two families.

Brother, sister, go in and ask for things yourself, let's go. With that, the group of children jumped up and left together.

By this time the sky had become hazy, and the sound of barking dogs could be heard around the village, but few people could be seen, and the fields and mountains in the distance had become faintly blurred because of the setting of the sun.

"Hurry up, let's hurry up, the winding mountain road here is very difficult, wait until it's completely dark, I'm afraid we'll get lost, and the navigation information here won't work at all." Jia Qing urged everyone.

"Okay, let's go." Qiao Yu greeted everyone.

He alone took the lead and knocked on the wooden door of the Wang family, whose gate was closed.

After a few knocks, the barking of the neighbors' dogs became louder, and only then did an old woman's voice sound from the courtyard.

"Who?"

"Auntie, open the door! We are your son's friends, so let's visit your old man's house. Qiao Yu was also clever and hurriedly responded.

"Here we are." The old woman walked slowly to the door and opened the door.

The old woman who appeared in front of us was about sixty years old, thin, with white hair, a wrinkled face, a dark complexion, and a rickety back, and she looked much older than her peers.

She looked indifferent and stared at the few of us with a questioning expression.

"My son didn't ask you to bring anything back, did he?" Hearing the old man's question, everyone was stunned for a moment.

When I came, I was in a hurry, and I really didn't think of bringing any gifts to the old man, and I didn't know that there was only one old man left in the family to watch the door.

"No, no, your son has been busy with work lately, so he can't care about buying it, but he told us on the phone to come and see you.

You're still healthy, aren't you? Jia Qing usually reads countless people, and he greets the old man flexibly and freely.

"It's okay, I'm the only one left at home, and I rely on me inside and out, so I don't dare to get sick."

As he spoke, the old man led us into the courtyard.

The so-called courtyard is nothing more than a waist-high fence made of stones in the mountains, and there are several stone piers in the courtyard that are used as seats, and there are four of us who cannot sit at all.

The old man apologetically tried to go into the house to move the chairs, but was stopped by the group.

"Auntie, don't be busy, let's stand and say a few words and leave.

Just now, you said that you were the only one in the family, where did Jiaxin's father go? Qiao Yu casually asked the old man according to his guess.

The old man sighed and replied helplessly: "Hey, don't mention that negative man, probably because he dislikes our mother and son, he went out to work alone, and he hasn't come back to see us for so many years, I have long forgotten him, just think of him as a person without him." ”

"Oh, go out to work, Auntie, are you sure he's going out to work?" Qiao Yu was very skeptical of the old man's statement.

"It's not a part-time job, what is it? A few years ago, when young people in the mountain village went out to work, Jiaxin's father told me many times that he wanted to go out for a walk and earn some extra money, but I refused.

I was left at home alone by a woman, feeding pigs, herding cattle, farming, and taking care of children, so I didn't want him to go, but I didn't expect that he would sneak away behind our mother and son, and there has been no news until now.

Hey, I'm afraid that I found my mother-in-law and aunt in the field and set up a new home, so I left our mothers behind. ”

After the old man finished speaking, he bent his waist, lowered his gray head, and made a muffled voice, immersed in painful memories.

"Auntie, listen to what you mean, in addition to Jiaxin, you should have a child, right?" Because there is gossip from the village children, we have raised such a question.

"Child, my child, Jiaxin's younger brother has died a long time ago, that is a hard-working and unblessed child, he only lived to be thirteen or fourteen years old and went, why do you mention him?

What the hell is going on with the few of you? If I don't, I'm going to close the door and rest. The old woman seemed to have been told that she was in pain, and she stood up in displeasure, and was about to give an eviction order.

At this time, Qiao Yu was alone in the courtyard to check and think, I was worried that he didn't have enough time, and before he could check it clearly, he hurriedly stepped forward and took the old man's hand to stabilize her mood.

"Auntie, we're just curious, I just heard you talk about a child, so I casually asked, we were also unintentional, I'm sorry to remind you of your painful memories.

Auntie, Jiaxin rarely comes back, so does he call you often? Does he still send money home? I sat casually and talked with the old man.

"Hey, what will that white-eyed wolf send? Even if he has gold and silver, he won't send me flowers, and in his heart, there is no longer me as a mother.

My son is not him, and he is not my own son, so how can he treat me as his own mother and filial piety?

Pity my Ze'er, he is so filial to me, and so sensible, but he died early, if he doesn't die, it is estimated that he should be as old as you. The old man mentioned his own son, and couldn't help but feel sad, she seemed to have opened the floodgates of memory all of a sudden, and she had a lot to talk to.

I guess it's been a long time since anyone sat down to listen to her like this, and the grievances and depression in her heart poured out like beans in a bamboo tube at this moment.

"Auntie, Jiaxin is not your son, so what is he yours?" Confused, I asked the old man in front of me curiously.

The old man wiped his moist eyes with the back of his hand, and then reluctantly talked about his past.

"Hey, girl, it's a long story, I'm a hard-working person, I wasn't originally from this realm, because I married my first husband, and after my husband died of illness, I was introduced to the man here, so I took Ze'er to remarry.

The man himself has a doll, that is Wang Jiaxin, Jiaxin's mother died early, and his dead ghost father single-handedly pulled him up.

After I married my Ze'er, I was expecting to have a good life, but I didn't expect that these two children were incompatible, the two brothers were close in age, and it was forgivable, but that Jiaxin was one year older than Ze'er, and she was originally from here, so she always made it difficult to bully Ze'er.

And I had to be busy with the field work, and I didn't have time to take care of the two brothers.

The contradictions between Ze'er and Jiaxin grew bigger and bigger, and in the end, even the dead ghost man got involved, and he was reasonable, and under my persuasion, he taught his son a lesson for my Ze'er, but the good times didn't last long, and as they got older, the contradictions between the two brothers became more and more irreconciling.

Once, when I came back from working in the fields, I saw the two of them fighting together on the threshing floor, and Ze'er's face was scratched and he was bleeding a lot, and it took me a lot of effort to pull them apart.

Later, when I asked the two about the reason for the war, I learned that Jiaxin didn't know which idle person in the village was talking nonsense, saying that the dead ghost man accidentally picked up a treasure, which was worth a lot of money, and when Ze'er grew up, he would definitely snatch away half of the family property that originally belonged to him.

Later, the bitter battle between the two brothers also affected my relationship with the dead ghost man, and the two of us often quarreled and got angry over the matter of the two children, and even fought loudly.

The man was angry at home, and he clamored that he would leave the house alone, and that he would go to the city alone to work and earn money, and by the way, he would clean his ears.

I thought he was just talking about fun, but I didn't expect an incident to happen later that made him completely hide and ignore us. ”

After the old woman finished speaking, she shook her head sadly, and when she mentioned the husband in her memory, she seemed to still have deep feelings and attachments.

"Auntie, tell me quickly, what happened to make your husband leave this house completely?" An Lan listened curiously, and was also busy asking.

"Hey, that changed my life forever.

The story begins with a summer more than 10 years ago.

On that day, when I returned home from working in the fields as usual, I saw my Ze'er unconscious in the courtyard, foaming at the mouth, unconscious, unable to speak.

I couldn't figure out what terrible things had happened, so I cried out in fright, put my arms around Ze'er and called for him.