Zhou Yiyan is nineteen years old this year, but she looks older, even among people who are three or two years older than her, she looks like a big sister. When she encounters something that makes people angry, she rarely gets angry, at most she blushes for a while, and speaks with a little trill; When she encounters something that makes people ecstatic, she will not laugh and shout, but most of the time she bends the corners of her two beautiful mouths and gently makes two noises in her throat. This point once caused Yu Jie to misunderstand, thinking that she was scheming and good at disguising herself. In fact, Yu Jie didn't know about her experience.

Yi Yan's nickname is Xiu'er, born in Tianjin, I only remember having a father, but I don't remember having a mother. Dad is a Kunqu opera singer. From the time I remember, I was going around among the people who had slapped their faces and pasted their heads. When she was seven years old, her father accompanied someone to sing "Zhong Kui Marrying Sister", and she never got up again. Since then, she has become a public child in the whole opera troupe, this one tells her to buy a box of cigarettes, and the other tells her to make a bowl of tea; During the meal, Uncle Bai gave a piece of pancake, and Aunt Tian gave a piece of pickles; Sleep in the drama box with a straw bag. People fed her like a puppy. Later, the troupe could no longer sustain itself, and the actors had to go their separate ways. The steward had no choice but to lead her to the house of Mrs. Yuer, who often went to the singing church, and kowtowed, begging Mrs. to take the child as a girl. Mrs. Yuji squirmed for a while and left her behind. As soon as the troupe left Tianjin, she changed hands and gave Yiyan to her poker friend Mrs. Liu, and gave her mahjong card account.

Mrs. Liu's man has another small mansion in Beijing, and he doesn't go back to Tianjin once or twice a year. There are only a wife, a fat lady and a young master who smokes a lot. In the lower room, a distant relative of the wife was a butler who was half master and half servant, and there was a ruffian-turned-night watchman. Anyone who has experienced this kind of life in this world, just by looking at these members, you can think of how tenacious Xiu'er must be to survive it. Anyone is higher than her, everyone is more powerful than her, and anyone can support her, torture her, insult her, and use this to vent their boredom, hatred, and hostility towards life.

During the day, she had to clean up the house of three people, pour the bedpan of three people, wash the clothes of three people, serve the old lady to drink tea, serve the young master to smoke, and serve the young lady to embroider the dowry. At night they have to work for the stewards and watch the night watchmen. The steward and the night watchman team up to steal. She saw it clearly. Speaking out, the man and the woman gagged her in the middle of the night and scalded her with a stove; She didn't say anything, and the owner decided that she had stolen it, and made her kneel hungry in the snow for hours......

She finally couldn't get through it anymore, feeling that there was no hope and no meaning in living like this. But just as she was preparing for her short life, a hand suddenly came to her rescue from outside the sky. There was a guest surnamed Lin at this house. This person came several times in a row, and each time it was tea from Xiu'er. When she came the fourth time, she had just poured her tea and was about to take it off, when her wife said:

"Xiu'er, don't go yet, this is the doctor. Ask him to check if you have any problems, why are you always so thin? ”

The man smiled kindly, took Xiu'er's hand and said, "Don't be afraid, I'll just pinch and accumulate it for you, it doesn't look like you have any other disease." ”

He asked Xiu'er to stand on the chair, lifted the back of her clothes, massaged her waist to her neck, touched her shoulder blades and asked, "Child, have you had this mole on your back since you were a child?" ”

Xiu'er nodded.

"Where else?"

Xiu'er said: "There is also a piece on the left thigh. ”

The man put down Xiu'er, turned his face to his wife and said, "That's it, please bring the paperwork, we will pay it on the spot." ”

The wife sent Xiu'er out of the house, and after a while, the housekeeper came to inform her to pack up her things, and to give her good news, saying that the person who came was her uncle, who had come to ransom her.

Xiu'er can't estimate whether it's true or false, whether it's a blessing or a curse. But she clearly remembered that she had no relatives, and she was shocked and frightened, and trembled. At this time, the guest surnamed Lin came to the lower room to find her, he looked at the dark and damp lower room, stroked Xiu'er's thin shoulders, his eyes were red, and he choked up and said, "Child, grandma has been looking for you for many years." This look and voice is something Xiu'er hasn't seen or heard since her father's death. There are people in the world who treat her as human again. Even though she didn't know anything about this man, she couldn't help but pounce on him and hug him and whimper.

The "uncle" brought her from Tianjin to Hong Kong and from Hong Kong to Chongqing, and met Uncle Zhou in Chongqing, only to know that it was the Communist Party and Zhou Enlai who sent people to find her. only to know that the poor actor who sang was not her own father, but a neighbor who lived in the same hospital as her biological parents. Her parents, both Communist Party members engaged in revolutionary activities as teachers, were shot dead by warlords on April 12. The kind-hearted actor took the risk and adopted her, an orphan girl who couldn't yet speak, in return for their care and support for him during his lifetime. Uncle Zhou looked for her for many years, and at the beginning of the Anti-Japanese War, the party organization in Hebei Province inquired about her whereabouts from the artists who returned to Gaoyang, and immediately sent people to Tianjin to find her. Her father was also surnamed Zhou, and Uncle Zhou named her Yiyan and sent her to the Xin'an tour group. Soon, she went to the liberated area of northern Jiangsu with the Xin'an tour group.

In the Xin'an tour group, she did not have the liveliness and innocence of other children, nor did she have the precocious quality of culture and art. However, she was calm and sophisticated, made rapid political progress, was strict with herself, and soon became a small leading cadre. When the army's art troupe wanted to replenish a few teenagers, the tour group sent Zhou Yiyan to the New Fourth Army.

She was tempered by the war and became familiar with the general methods of work. It was the first time she could lead two people on a mission alone.

First of all, she first recalled the old leaders she had met, and looked for the practices she should follow from their behavior. She thought of it: first, we must lead by example and endure hardships first; Second, we must mobilize the masses.

Xiao Gao is a little old revolutionary, do her job well, and the two of them work together to help Yu Jie alone, and they will be sure to complete the task.

She pulled Xiao Gao to her side and talked quietly.