"Cuba?"

Chen Jianqiu thought about it, didn't say anything, and returned the gun to the people in the arsenal.

Lieutenant Rhodes never expected Chen Jianqiu's marksmanship to be so superb.

Now that he couldn't pretend to be forced in front of the guests, there was no point in staying at the shooting range, so he proposed to go back to the factory in the town to eat.

The chefs in the factory have already prepared a dinner party, washed the dust for Chen Jianqiu, and signed the contract after eating and drinking.

Perfect!

Chen Jianqiu was very casual, paying attention to a guest and following the host, so he followed the lieutenant out of the shooting range and rode to the town.

Along the way, Lieutenant Rhodes still tried to get close to the hidden Oriental merchant in front of him.

He now regrets his recklessness at the shooting range, and instead of performing well, he has become a laughing stock.

God knows what this Mr. Chen thinks now.

"Mr. Chen, how many years have you been in the United States, and are you still used to living here?"

"Mr. Chen, are you married? Where is your wife from? ”

"Mr. Chen"

Chen Jianqiu's ears were listening, his mouth was perfunctory, his eyes were looking ahead, and his mind was pondering other things.

Along the way, he didn't remember any of the questions the lieutenant asked, except that it seemed that the lieutenant had begun to talk about his experience of fighting wits and courage with the Indians in Montana.

They soon returned to the arsenal.

They headed straight for the largest building in the middle of the arsenal.

It was not only the lieutenant's office, but also his private residence and banquet hall for his guests.

A young man pacing back and forth at the door attracted Chen Jianqiu's attention.

This young man is dressed in a suit, with a white embroidered neckline tuft in front of his neck, and wavy curly hair, no different from the young American seen on the mainland.

But the reason why he was able to attract Chen Jianqiu's attention was that this young man's hair was black.

He has the contours of a Latina face, but with a touch of the Orient.

Chen Jianqiu felt a trace of kindness on his face; From his also black eyes, I found a familiar feeling.

This man is a mixed race.

But Chen Jianqiu did not rush to speak, but continued to walk inside with Lieutenant Rhodes.

When the young man saw the lieutenant returning, he hurriedly greeted him, not noticing Chen Jianqiu behind the lieutenant.

"Lieutenant, can we talk about weapons procurement?" He said as he hurried over.

But before he had taken a few steps, the lieutenant indifferently gestured an index finger at him and motioned him to stop:

"Sir, I'm very busy right now, we'll talk later when we're free."

The young man wanted to say something, but was stopped by two employees.

Lieutenant Rhodes walked briskly to the door of the room, pulled out the key and opened it.

He let go of his body and turned to Chen Jianqiu behind him, and his face suddenly changed.

The captain made a gesture of invitation to the door, and said to Chen Jianqiu with a grin:

"Mr. Chen, please come in!"

Chen Jianqiu stepped forward unceremoniously and stepped onto the steps.

But before entering, he turned his head and looked at the young man.

The eyes of the two men met.

When the young man saw Chen Jianqiu, he was stunned and stood on the spot.

After Chen Jianqiu gave him a meaningful look, he turned his head and walked into the room.

He spent another half hour or so in Lieutenant Rhodes' office, listening to the head of the arsenal continue to boast of his military experience, and how he had broken through with five or six soldiers surrounded by more than a hundred Indians.

Chen Jianqiu didn't bother to investigate whether the story he told was true or false, and only had a polite smile on his face.

Every U.S. Army general has a belly full of stories about how he galloped across the field.

The opponents were either the Confederate army or the Indians.

What these stories have in common is that the storyteller, that is, the protagonist of the story, has a poor start, outnumbered the enemy, and turns the tide through his own ingenuity and force comparable to the god of war.

Quite an American style of personal heroism.

Outside the window, it was completely dark.

The door to the office was suddenly opened, and the head of an employee of the arsenal squeezed in through the crack in the door:

"Lieutenant, Mr. Chen, dinner is ready, you can go and eat."

"Smack!"

Lieutenant Rhodes clapped his hands and stood up.

He still has some unfinished business.

"Mr. Chen, let's go to dinner first, I have another story about hand-to-hand combat with Indian warriors, I'll tell you when I drink."

The dinner was set up in the lobby of this building.

The hall is not luxurious, but it is spacious and clean compared to the rest of the Arsenal.

In addition to Chen Jianqiu and the captain, there were also lawyers who came with Chen Jianqiu to sign the contract, engineers and some key personnel from the arsenal.

To Chen Jianqiu's surprise, the dinner was surprisingly rich.

The people of the arsenal took guns and went to the mountains to "search" in advance.

They killed a deer and several rabbits, and killed a few ducks by the river.

Now these animals have been plucked and skinned, and turned into delicacies on the table.

The alcohol is beer from Boston.

The beer is said to have been developed by Samuel Adams, another founding father.

This revolutionary on a par with Washington masterminded three of the most important events of American independence: "the rebellion against the Sugar Act, the Stamp Act, and the Townsend Act", and the "Boston Massacre"; "The Boston Tea Case".

He was born into a winemaking family, and he himself has a lot of experience in winemaking.

The wine developed by this rebellious brewer is naturally very strong, and the alcohol content is not comparable to that of ordinary beer.

After a while of pushing and changing the cup, Lieutenant Rhodes was already a little floating.

His cheeks were flushed, he staggered to his feet, and staggered to Chen Jianqiu with a wine glass.

The lieutenant wanted to put his hand on Chen Jianqiu's shoulder, but the latter "inadvertently" adjusted his sitting position.

Rod's hand pressed into the air, and he fell to the ground with a "plop".

The wine glass in his hand also fell to the ground, and the wine in the cup naturally spilled on the ground.

Chen Jianqiu also stood up and pulled the lieutenant up from the ground with one hand.

Several employees of the arsenal also stepped down and came to help.

Rhodes didn't have any big problems, but a piece of skin was scratched on the palm of his hand, and his clothes were full of stains.

"Thanks, out of the way, out of the way."

Rhodes stumbled a little as he stood up.

He held the edge of the table with his hand, shook his head, his tongue was a little big, and said triumphantly to Chen Jianqiu:

"Mr. Chen, you, do you know that I also spent time in the Arizona Military District in the south, Jie, Jeronimo you know, right? That seal, the Indian god of war. ”

"I've heard a little." Chen Jianqiu sat back in his seat.

"Hey, it's not that good at all, I, I used to compare with him, he, he almost died, died in my hands, hands!"

Rod's gaze was a little foggy.

"Oh, then you must be amazing." Chen Jianqiu put his hands together and placed them on the table.

He also drank a lot, but he was only slightly drunk, and his face was slightly red.

Lieutenant Rhodes hiccuped.

A strong smell of alcohol wafted out mixed with stomach acid and all kinds of strange smells.

Chen Jianqiu subconsciously frowned and sniffled.

"Chen, Mr. Chen, you, you don't believe it?"

Lieutenant Rhodes supported himself with his hand on the table, looking at Chen Jianqiu's expression, as if he was a little dissatisfied.

After three rounds of drinking, the soldier regained his self-confidence, and at this time, his self-perception was beyond the scope of the norm.

Simply put, the world is his.

Slightly drunk, he wanted to show himself in front of this Chinese again.

Before being in the shooting range, Chen Jianqiu must have been Meng, yes, Meng.

Chen Jianqiu glanced up at him.

He pointed to the wooden keg with beer on the table and said to the lieutenant:

"If you finish this barrel of wine, I'll take your word for it."

When Lieutenant Rhodes heard this, the wine came up again.

Isn't it just amazing? Me too!

"Good! Look at me! ”

He shouted, startling the other people behind him who were talking.

Then, in full view of everyone, the lieutenant put his head under the barrel.

His next behavior stunned everyone present, including Chen Jianqiu, who was arching the fire.

The lieutenant unplugged the barrel and gagged it with his mouth.

For the first few seconds, the lieutenant's throat twitched, and he seemed to be able to catch the beer coming out of the keg.

But after a few seconds, the frequency of the sensation in his throat clearly couldn't keep up with the rate at which the beer was coming out.

The lieutenant's eyes widened, his cheeks bulged, and yellow, frothy liquid spilled from the corners of his mouth.

After less than two seconds, Mr. Lieutenant, who was blocking the mouth of the barrel with his mouth, finally reached a critical point.

With a "flutter" sound!

A "beer fountain" erupted from the lieutenant's mouth, and beer flowed out of the barrel's mouth, filling the table.

Chen Jianqiu's eyes were quick, and he even retreated more than a meter with a chair to avoid disaster.

The rest of the neighborhood weren't so lucky, either getting sprayed or embarrassed by the liquor on the table.

As for the lieutenant himself, he disappeared in an instant.

Chen Jianqiu bent down and looked under the table, only to find that he was lying under the table on all fours, unconscious, and his mouth was still foaming from time to time.

Chen Jianqiu straightened up and shook his head.

I really don't see it.

A group of employees of the military factory dragged their "factory director" out from under the table with all sorts of hands.

Chen Jianqiu didn't continue to pay attention to how they dealt with their superiors.

"I'll go out to the bathroom, you go on."

He dropped a word, turned around, and walked out of the door of the house.

At this time, the town of Springfield was dark at night.

The factory floor was still brightly lit, and the sound of a steam engine resounded.

The workers are still busy, rushing to make orders from the War Department.

Chen Jianqiu walked out along the factory gate and came to the riverside of the town.

He was going to take a dip along the river to digest the dinner in his stomach.

A full moon hangs in the sky, sparkling the moonlight on the river.

With the help of the moonlight and the lights of the workshop, Chen Jianqiu suddenly saw a person squatting by the river in front of him.

From the man's shape, he roughly guessed the identity.

The man picked up the pebbles under his feet and threw them into the river one by one, sighing one after the other.

"Young man, what are you sighing about?"

Chen Jianqiu walked behind the man and asked softly.

He was in English, and he wasn't sure if he understood it or not.

The crouching man was startled, quickly stood up, and reached his waist with his hand.

But when he turned around and saw Chen Jianqiu's face clearly, his hand instantly drooped.

At the same time, Chen Jianqiu also saw his face clearly.

Sure enough, it was the young man who was pacing in front of Lieutenant Rhodes during the day.

"It's you, sorry, I'm a little too excited." The young man sighed again and apologized to Chen Jianqiu.

"What's your name?" Chen Jianqiu asked, "I heard that you are from Cuba?" ”

The young man nodded.

"My Chinese name is Lai Gubei, my Spanish name is Dias, my father's name is Lai Hua, he is a Cuban Chinese, I can speak some Cantonese, but I am not very proficient, otherwise we should communicate in English, I studied in a church school."

"No problem." Chen Jianqiu walked to the young man's side, "Tell me about your father." ”

As expected, the young man in front of him had Chinese blood.

"My father came to Cuba a long time ago to work in a sugar cane plantation."

"During the first Cuban War of Independence, he joined General Francisco Carrillo with hundreds of local Chinese laborers, and became a member of the army."

"He not only gained respect and freedom, but also gained love, married my mother, gave birth to me, and our family was in the army."

Chen Jianqiu listened quietly.

"So you're a member of the Cuban Revolutionary Corps now."

"Yes." The lad didn't hide it.

He didn't even have a little wariness of the yellow-skinned man in front of him, and told him calmly, and his expression was much more relaxed.

"So, what are you doing here?" Chen Jianqiu then asked.

Hearing Chen Jianqiu say this, Lai Gubei's brows furrowed again:

"I don't know if you know, but Cuba is now in the midst of a second war of independence, and our revolutionary army is fighting to the death against the Spaniards."

"Originally, we were in a very good situation, but the Spanish authorities sent a new governor, and at the same time sent a large number of troops, bringing the most advanced guns."

"That man is called the 'butcher', he is extremely cruel, as long as he supports the independence of the village, he will be slaughtered by his entire village, the whole village."

"As a result, we have problems with our supply lines, and we don't have enough guns to deal with the Spanish army on the opposite side."

"So, I came to the United States this time to buy a batch of guns and ammunition to ship back."

"But you ate the closed door?" Chen Jianqiu pointed to the arsenal behind him.

The look on Lai Gubei's face became even more melancholy:

"I don't know why, the United States suddenly imposed an arms embargo on the Revolutionary Army in Cuba, which made it difficult for me to understand, and the lieutenant also used this as a reason to keep rejecting my purchase."

Regarding the arms embargo, Chen Jianqiu has also heard a little.

This is not surprising.

At present, the mainstream opinion in Congress is to avoid conflict with Spain and try to rely on diplomatic mediation.

As Roosevelt said, a large part of the population fears war.

They are afraid of the impact that the war will have on the economy and their accounts.

"How did you come up with the idea of crossing most of America to the Springfield Arsenal to buy weapons?" Chen Jianqiu asked with some confusion, "This is a state-owned arsenal. ”

Lai Gubei's answer made Chen Jianqiu a little crying and laughing:

"Because we thought that only such a state-run arsenal would be willing to sell guns to Cuba, and only they would be able to get an export permit, after all, we need to raise a large number of guns in a short period of time."

Chen Jianqiu patted Lai Gubei's shoulder:

"In the United States, this arsenal is not the only one with an export license."

"Guns, I can sell you, ammunition, I can sell you too."

"What this arsenal can export, I can export; What he can't export, I can export. ”

Lai Gubei was pleasantly surprised at first, but soon turned into hesitation.

That's a bit crazy.

"Are you telling the truth?" He asked, incredulously, "What do you call it?" ”

"Chen Jianqiu."

After Lai Gubei heard this name, his mouth opened wide and he couldn't close it for a while.

(End of chapter)