Zhang Wuyi's heart tightened, thinking that something really happened, so he hurriedly went down to the ditch, found Ah Mao, and was surprised to see that he was still alive, but his finger was poked into a hole, and the bleeding had stopped. I quickly carried him on my back and walked along the bottom of the ditch for most of the night before carrying him out of the bottom of the ditch and back home. After a closer look, Ah Mao was in good health, and he went to work in the field again a few days later.

But I didn't expect Ah Mao's middle finger to be poked by a branch to be infected with wind poison, and a boil grew, embedded in the flesh, hard as a nail, and even the ten fingers were distressed, Ah Mao endured it. Who knew that soon it began to fester, Ah Mao couldn't bear it anymore, he rolled on the kang in pain, howled like a pig, and didn't eat or drink for three days, but his fingers were festering day by day, and his flesh and blood were gradually blurred. Zhang Wuyi was anxious, he had no money to see a doctor for Ah Mao, thinking that if it continued to be so rotten, I was afraid that his whole hand would not be protected, so he discussed with his daughter-in-law that Ah Mao's fingers should be cut off, otherwise, if Ah Mao has three long and two short, the Zhang family will be ashamed of Lin Rong Xianlie. The daughter-in-law nodded yes. At night, Zhang Wuyi took advantage of Ah Mao's sleep, was ruthless, gritted his teeth, and used a pair of scissors to cut Ah Mao's fingers. In the chaos, he didn't cut the joints, but cut the bones, the skin and flesh were cut, but the fingers were not cut, Ah Mao "instigated" to stand up from the bed board, like a corpse, wanting to cry silently, glaring angrily, thinking that the adoptive parents would take advantage of the middle of the night to kill themselves.

Zhang Wuyi knew that he was scared of the child, and when he saw that he was wearing a cloak and a haircut, he described him as withered and unhuman, but he was so frightened that he threw down the scissors and ran out of the house. His daughter-in-law Zhang exclaimed outside the door: "His father, you can't give up halfway, if you don't cut it off today, the child's hands will be wasted, and his life will not be saved at that time." Zhang Wuyi came back to his senses, turned around and entered the house again, and said to Ah Mao: "Child, bear with me, just cut it again." I couldn't help but say, threw myself on the bed, grabbed Ah Mao's hand, Ah Mao reacted, it turned out that his adoptive father was going to cut off his fingers, and he screamed in fright. Zhang Wuyi hurriedly called for Zhang's to help, Zhang's pounced on Ah Mao's body and pressed him down, Ah Mao struggled powerlessly, let her press, and grabbed his hand tightly and called Zhang Wuyi: "His father, cut it quickly!" Cut from articular cartilage! Zhang Wuyi turned his back, clamped Ah Mao's hand tightly between his legs, did not let him move, held scissors in one hand, touched the middle knuckle with the other, put the scissors at the joint, gritted his teeth and cut it. The scissors that are usually used to cut ropes and branches have been notched, the knife edge is too blunt, and the flesh is broken and the skin is connected when the scissors go down, and Ah Mao screams and faints. Zhang Wuyi didn't do it, he didn't stop doing it, and then cut the rubber band, and Ah Mao's fingers fell to the ground.

"Quick, get cotton to plug the blood." Zhang Wuyi shouted to Zhang.

Zhang let go of Ah Mao, got up and ripped open the hem of the cotton clothes, and pulled out a mess of rotten black cotton wool from it, Zhang Wuyi used it to wrap Ah Mao's fingers, and then tied it tightly with a strip of cloth, only then did he breathe a sigh of relief and slump on the ground. After this toss, Ah Mao stood on the kang for three days and three nights, and miraculously came back from the ghost gate, and soon went to work in the field. Zhang Wuyi thought to himself, the descendants of the revolutionary army should not die, the will is resolute, and there will be a blessing if they do not die in great disasters. Later, the father and son worked together to reclaim a sandy land in the wilderness outside the village, planted sweet potatoes, peanuts, and sorghum rice, and the family of three lived a self-sufficient life.

Who knew that in the eleventh year of the Republic of China, when Ah Mao was thirteen years old, a sudden locust plague, the land of Fengyang for four thousand miles instantly became a barren land, and the peasants went into battle shirtless to defend the crops, fighting to the death with locusts, but to no avail, starvation, death, freezing to death, heat death, leaving their hometowns to beg for eight or nine out of ten empty villages. Seeing that the family was dying and unsustainable, Zhang Wuyi took out the only copper coins in the family and asked Ah Mao to go to the village market to exchange for some food, and repeatedly took care of as long as vegetables and not meat. Ah Mao came to the market, the market was barren and withered, not to mention vegetables, even vegetables and weeds did not see a single petal. There is some meat, but the price has risen from 30 to 120 yuan. Ah Mao had no choice but to return empty-handed and tell the truth: "It's so strange, the vegetables and vegetables are not a single leaf, only the meat is hanging high, but it is fresh." Zhang Wuyi said: "Where is this animal meat, it is human flesh!" ”

Ah Mao was taken aback: "My mother! Selling human flesh in the market? Where does human flesh come from? ”

Zhang Wuyi said: "There are dead corpses everywhere, and human flesh everywhere. Now that the dead bodies have been eaten and sold out, I'm afraid that even the living will be killed, eaten, killed, and sold! The fresh meat you see is probably the flesh of a newly dead man. ”

Ah Mao didn't believe it, and said: "Aren't you afraid of being caught by the government when you kill someone?" ”

Zhang Wuyi said: "In a peaceful and prosperous world, the government will arrest people, and the government will take care of itself in the fierce year, where can I still see his shadow?" A few days ago, it was rumored in the neighboring village that the women in the family had been killed and eaten, so I told you not to buy meat, even the bark of the tree has been gnawed up, where are the pigs, sheep, cattle and horses slaughtered and sold! ”

At night, the family was so hungry that they couldn't sleep, and the oil lamp was saved, and they sat in the cold pit in the dark and talked, and Zhang said to Zhang Wuyi weakly: "The children are dying of hunger, and now they can't buy food with money, so they can't sit still like this." Tomorrow I will go to Gangdong's mother's house to have a look, pull down the bottom and ask for some food, it is important to save the child. ”

Zhang's mother's family is a well-off family in Gangdong, and because he thinks his son-in-law is poor, he never interacts with his daughter's family. Zhang Wuyi knew that his daughter-in-law couldn't stand it anymore, so he went back to her parents' house for help. Zhang Wuyi put together all the copper coins in the family and handed them to his daughter-in-law, hoping that her daughter-in-law could get some food at her mother's house tomorrow. He knew that even if he took the copper money to exchange, her mother's family would not necessarily help her daughter, but the disaster would not pass in a day or two, and she could only use a dead horse as a live horse doctor. At dawn the next day, Zhang went out, she had not entered the grain of rice for three or four days, the woman's body was thin, she walked and jogged, the cold wind blew, and before she passed the post, she fell to death in front of the door of the land temple, and when she died, she was dragging the copper coins in her pocket.

The remnant sun hung in the treetops, the sky was dyed bloody, and the crows had already set out, flapping their wings and circling and swooping over Zhang. Zhang Wuyi was full of hope and waited for his daughter-in-law to bring food, and saw that his daughter-in-law had not returned for a day, but he heard the sound of crows, and he was afraid of an accident, so he asked Ah Mao to watch the door at home, and he went out to investigate. Zhang Wuyi went out against the wind and sand, it was dark early in the mountains, and the sky was dark and heavy at this time, and the cold wind was bleak. Zhang Wuyi walked to the front of the Land Temple, saw a person lying in front of the temple, thought badly, and ran to see that it was his daughter-in-law Zhang. Zhang Wuyi hurriedly stretched out his fingers and tried under his daughter-in-law's nostrils, where would there be breath, and when he touched his body again, it was already cold. Zhang Wuyi knelt on the ground, cried and cried for a while, and his grief relatives carried his daughter-in-law to the mass grave and buried her. Knowing that Fengyang could not stay any longer, he went home to pack up his baggage, and told Ah Mao like this, Ah Mao wanted to cry without tears, and followed his adoptive father into the begging army and went to Jiangnan.

The father and son leaned on the 300 copper plates in their pockets, slept in the open air, and went all the way south. The road was full of refugees, and the trees had little bark, all of which had been gnawed away by the refugees. When I met a soup kitchener, a bowl of porridge was hungry for three days, and I could barely eat a full meal when I met a large family with alms.

After the Huai River, there is gradually improvement, and to the south of the Yangtze River, there is almost no disaster year. I don't know how long they walked, they came to Guangfu, Jiangnan, and bought a pigsty thatched hut on West Street with the only copper plate left in their pockets, which ended their life of begging in valuation. Zhang Wuyi got a short-term job in Houde Mansion and helped Niu Laosi to take a breather to support his family. An old tailor in the town of Amaobai learned the craft, and after eating dried radish rice for several years, he was better than the blue, and his craftsmanship was better than that of his master, so he set up his own mountain gate, set up a table in the thatched hut, and made clothes for people to make a living. At first, they all relied on walking the streets and alleys to sew and mend for others to make a living, and then all the towns and villages knew that there was a small tailor in Guangfu Town, Ah Mao, with excellent craftsmanship, long shirts and short coats, cheongsam dresses, everything, and the clothes made fit decently, and the price was fair, so all the towns and villages came to him to make clothes. Guangfu is a blessed land of heaven, people are relatively good, more and more people come to make clothes, and the life of Ah Mao and his son is gradually becoming stable.

On this day, Ah Mao got up early, opened the two firewood doors, and an uninvited guest came on the street, and at first glance, it was Mrs. Li and the servant Wu Ma of Houde Mansion, and Ah Mao hurriedly invited him into the house. There was only one stool and one bed at home, and Ah Mao rubbed his hands in embarrassment, so he had to ask Mrs. Li to sit on her own bench, but Wu's mother had no stool to sit on and stood aside. Mrs. Li did not sit down, but stood and said, "Master Ah Mao is famous, and the woman comes uninvited, so she bothers Master Ah Mao to raise her feet and come to the door to tailor clothes. ”

It turned out that "one street and two squares" started, Li Shanren and his wife discussed, this is a major event for the Li family, after a year and a half of completion, to feast the villagers, at that time Shen boss and his wife, Mr. Zhang, the village head, the village and the former master, Confucius and other dignitaries, and even the head shaving master, midwife, matchmaker, useful and useless people to invite, one is to celebrate the family events, the other is to thank the neighbors and fellow villagers, repay the favor. Mrs. Li said: "This move is very good, we must invite Mr. Zhang and his daughter to attend at that time, and Hai'er will also come back, and be a dark medium in private." Li Shanren said that he would go out in person, and go to Zhang's house more in the future, and Mr. Zhang would probe in front of him, if the girl of the Zhang family was already good, this matter would be over, or the Zhang family would not like Hai'er, and this matter would be fine. Madame nodded yes.