This lotus river is behind the stone alley, a narrow alley, with three or five houses. No. 10 is an antique brick two-story building, with a patio and a staircase in the corner of the courtyard that is only allowed to walk around. There are several houses above and below, and there are briquette stoves, water tanks, and dustpans at the door of each house. The five were watching from the courtyard when two people came down the stairs. One is a woman with permed hair, eyebrows, wearing a semi-short-sleeved silk cheongsam and soft satin embroidered shoes; One is a middle-aged man wearing gray cloth trousers, shoes on his face, and a bucket hat. As soon as the two of them saw the five, they exchanged glances and stopped. The man asked, "Sir, who are you looking for?" ”

The five said: "There is a ...... who writes novels"

"Hmm!" The man threw his mouth down the stairs, shook his head at the woman a little disappointed, and the two left. The five bent down to the bottom of the stairs and saw a small room with bamboo curtains. At the door, a banner was carved with white pear wood, "Drunk Sleeping".

There are two rooms inside and outside this room. It's too dark to see clearly. In the outer room was a desk inlaid with iron pear wood that did not fit the house. Two white wooden stubble chairs and a chaise longue from Prison No. 1. Books and newspapers, manuscript paper, cigarette cases, ashtrays, inkstones, and pen holders are stacked tightly on the desk. With the sound of footsteps, a tall, thin, gray-faced man with a mustache came out of the door of the black room: "Who are you looking for?" ”

"Mr. Drunken Sleeper lives here?"

"Just no, please take a seat, where are you from?"

"The newspaper, the chief writer asked me to pick up the manuscript."

"Oh, sit, sit, I've been socializing too much in the past two days, I'm too busy and ignorant, I forgot about you!"

"Ouch, just waiting for your manuscript to be published!"

"Hurry, you sit down for a while, it's too late to write, where is the last paragraph?"

"Huh?" Those five didn't read these editions of the novel and blushed. The lord smiled and said, "It's okay, it doesn't matter if you don't remember, I have an account here!" ”

He sat down at his desk, pulled out a blue ledger from the pile of papers, flipped a few pages and asked, "Is it "Yan Shuangfei" that you have posted there?" ”

The five said: "No, we are "Violet Pictorial", and we are "Little Jasper". ”

"Little Jasper." The lord lifted the account book to the end, threw it aside, pulled another account over, flipped through it, and said, "Ah, where is this "Little Jasper"? Oh, there you have it! He threw down the ledger again, took out a thick manuscript with a raw-edged paper spike in the drawer, found a page separated by a golden gun cigarette case, and said with a smile: "Good luck, you don't need to write it now, just copy a paragraph and it's over." Immediately laid down a piece of lattice paper, picked up a brush, brushed and copied. When the five came to receive advice, he pinched a one-yuan ticket in his hand, and in a blink of an eye, the master copied the manuscript, folded it and put it in an envelope, and then put the one-yuan ticket on the table. The Lord glanced at the banknote, but did not move it. Turning around, he shouted to the inner room: "Guests are here, hurry up and make tea!" ”

Out of the room came a woman in her fifties, with a round face and an ingot, squatted down to the five and said, "You have come early, please sit down!" This shallow house is a joke for you. Then he took up a jug, stretched out his hand, and picked up the dollar from the table, and said, "I'll fetch water." ”

The five asked, "I read the tabloids outside, all of which are publishing your novels, how many of them are you writing at the same time?" ”

"Eight or nine!"

"It's all written and there?"

"No, write a paragraph, write a paragraph, and eat a paragraph."

"Didn't I read this "Little Family Jasper" just now, and the whole book was written?"

"□, that's second-hand work."

"What is second-hand work?"

The Lord told him that someone had written a novel, but he was not famous and could not get out. There are also people who write for fun, but they don't want to be famous. There are also people who have finished writing the manuscript and are in a hurry to use the money, and they can't wait for the paragraph to be published. So they sold it. The fasting master buys it and retails it as a whole, and he can make a few profits!

The five said strangely: "According to this, as long as you have money to buy manuscripts, you can become famous without doing it yourself?" ”

The lord said: "Of course, this is ancient, there was a prince in the Ming Dynasty, how many operas were carved in his life, and not a single word was written by him!" ”

When the five heard this, they smiled. Take the truth as a lie and say: "As soon as Ming'er is happy, I also bought two manuscripts, and I have passed the addiction of being a celebrity." ”

The lord of the fasting said: "Like you, who eats newspaper food, you are a head shorter everywhere without fame, and you can't play, so you should find a way to create a brand." Besides, you always have to read the manuscript when you buy it, not only to read it, but also to copy it. Practice makes perfect, without three days of Liba, I will slowly be able to write. Writing a novel is a layer of paper windows, and it will break when you poke it. ”

Speaking of which, the lord of the Zhai sold a martial arts novel "Carp Dart" that he had just bought to Na Wu. The asking price is a hundred oceans. The five are holding the fake painting made by Ganzi Qian, and they are going to be it, and now they are even more excited. After he got the price of 300 yuan, he came out of the cheap shop and went directly to the "drunken bed" and said to the owner: "I brought the money, I have to see the goods first?" ”

The lord said, "You're fighting again, aren't you?" Buying a manuscript is not like buying a cucumber, turning it over and looking at it, and then pinching it and tasting it. You read the content in your stomach, put it down and don't buy it, and then turn around and make up another book according to this meaning, what should I do? Buying old cattle across the mountain is all about credit. ”

The five handfuls of money were in their hands, and they couldn't make up their minds. The lord slapped the table and said, "That's it, I've made you a friend!" Then he turned around and went into the inner room, took out a broken shoe box from under the bed, took out a manuscript of red checkered paper, took it to the door, patted the dust, handed it to the five, and said, "Look at it first!" ”

The five looked back, but it was also fiery. You can weigh the weight, look at the thickness and say, "How can this be divided into 100 sections?" I'll buy it for a hundred dollars, and I'm done with the 30th paragraph......"

The Lord said, "Isn't it true that you are young?" Fame and fortune are one thing, but they can't be all together. Didn't you ask for a name first? This manuscript is well written, to ensure that you are a blockbuster, and you will make profits after becoming famous! ”

The five handed over the money, came out with the manuscript, and handed it to the editorial department without looking at it, requesting that it be published paragraph by paragraph. Masson accepted it and put it away for a month, but there was no response. Every time he asked, Masson said, "I haven't finished reading it yet, I think it's pretty good." "But I won't talk about the announcement. The five asked Tao Zhi for news. Tao Zhi smiled:

"That guy sold you a manuscript and didn't tell you the rules for publishing it?"

The five asked: "I don't think there are any rules for our manuscript of the drunken bedding master, don't you just send a paragraph and give one dollar?" ”

The deputy lead writer laughed. said to him: "The drunken fasting master is like Ma Lianliang, he is famous for singing, as long as he is on stage, he is not afraid that no one will cheer him." You, like a ticket holder, a ticket holder can't make money by singing, but has to spend money. Rent a venue at your own expense, ask the scene to pay for yourself, invite someone to play at your own expense, and invite someone to eat and give tickets after the end, so that people will come to cheer. The actor sings to eat. Ticket holders singing are famous for their pictures. Picture for fun! If you become popular, you can naturally go to the sea, but you have to spend your own money to lay the bottom first. ”

The five took out another hundred yuan, asked Tao Zhi to open a list for him, and invited a table of guests in the banquet building. "Carp Dart" was published under the pseudonym of "Listening to the Wind Mansion". Since that day, some friends have called him a "writer" when they met, congratulated him on his "blockbuster", and said that he was sure to revive his family. The five were modest in their mouths, but in their hearts they were as dizzy and hot as if they had four taels of burning knives[note 1], and their voices changed, and their feet in the aisle were lighter, and they felt that the two hundred oceans were unyielding. Although the fake painting was exposed, he was forced to sell another suit to fill the hole. has the encouragement of this road to fame and family, but it has not dampened his spirit.

At the end of the novel, the situation is a little wrong. I don't know if Tao Zhi's list is incomplete, who he neglected, or if someone deliberately embarrassed. In several other tabloids, articles commenting on "Carp Dart" appeared. These articles are sarcastic and scolding. Some say that he stole it, some say that he plagiarized, and some say that he is "hot and faint, and does not know the height of the sky". There are also people who find out that "the owner of the wind building is also after a certain internal affairs official." His ancestor was once favored by a boxer in the Bagua Gate, so he wrote a novel to depreciate the shape and praise the gossip. "Those five are a little out of breath. He ran to the drunken master and asked him, "What taboo have you committed in this manuscript?" Why do you attract so much gossip? "This manuscript was originally bought by a smoker for ten dollars, and I haven't read it myself. He clasped his hands into fists and said, "I said you were a blockbuster, didn't you?" Hello here! As soon as someone picks an eye, you'll be red. At the beginning, I paid someone to write a manuscript and scolded me! Think about it, Guangdeng Novel, isn't it only three days for your name to be returned? When others comment, scold, praise or praise, you have to mention your name several times in an article, and you are afraid that everyone will not remember it? Besides, the things of the world are complementary to each other, and if someone scolds them, there will be people who praise them, and they are vindictive, and you are not happy to reap the benefits of fishermen? ”

When the five heard this, they felt that this was indeed the case, and they turned their sorrows into joy. But I didn't have fun for a few days, and as soon as I entered the editorial office that day, Ma Sen handed over a letter and said, "Fifth Master, this is your letter." Our cooperation was originally a good exchange, but don't bother our brothers. Leave us the territory of "Violet" and drink it! ”

With such a heavy tone, the five are naturally seen as a joke. When he opened the envelope, he realized that he had fallen under the mouth of the well and was falling into the water.

This is an eight-line zhulan on rice paper, written in thick ink:

"Listen to Mr. Taijian, the owner of the Wind Building. It is hereby scheduled to be held at 3 o'clock in the afternoon on the sixth day of the first month of this month, and to cook tea at the Fushoujing Soil Plaster Shop in Dashilar. If you don't come, please be careful. Say what you say, don't say it unexpectedly! The signature is: "Wu Cunzhong".

He asked Ma Sen: "This Wu Cunzhong is so familiar, what is he doing?" ”

Masson didn't speak, and threw him a tabloid. There was a small article circled in red ink on it: "Wu Cunzhong is old and frail, and he resigns from the appointment of a county magistrate!" "The following said that Wu Cunzhong is a descendant of Xingyimen, at the end of the Qing Dynasty, he was a boxer in the Shanpu camp, and after the Republic of China, he worked on the flyover, and changed to playing straw rope after the Qiqi Incident. Recently, a county magistrate hired him to be a bodyguard with a large amount of money, but he resigned. After reading the five, Masson added: "You heard that a few years ago, there was a Russian Hercules in the ring in Zhongshan Park, who wants to beat him, and he gave up ten gold medals?" ”

The five said: "Isn't it the time when Li Cunyi was thrown off the stage and broke one of his legs?" ”

Masson said, "That's right. Wu Cunzhong is Li Cunyi's senior brother! ”

Listening to that May Day, the back of the backbone is damp. With a crying voice, he said, "When he saw that I was coming, he couldn't cut me off?" ”

Masson complained and said: "If you publish a novel, you will not end the novel, what are you doing nonsense about the portal dispute of gossip and meaning?" ”

The five said, "Lafayette, where do I know!" Isn't that a bought manuscript? ”

Tao Zhi saw that he was strange and pitiful, so he comforted him and said, "Don't worry, most of these passers-by are very affectionate." If you go to kowtow more and talk less, he may not be able to do anything when he sees that you are soft. ”

Ma Sen said: "You can't not go, if you don't go, he dares to come and tear down this inn, and we can't afford to pay for it when the time comes!" ”

Since that day, I haven't eaten a whole meal in those five or three days, and I haven't slept a night.