Chapter 19: Secrets

Chu Xuan actually wanted to go to the county town to sell her catch for a better price, but with the house construction at home, she couldn’t get away.

Such high-quality, pure wild, live sea cucumbers—each weighing about half a jin—selling them at the usual price for sea cucumbers felt like a real loss!

Li Tong noticed Chu Xuan’s hesitation and continued, “Perch is 1.5 yuan per jin, sea urchins are 6 yuan per jin…”

“These sea cucumbers are rare quality. I’ll pay 60 yuan per jin. I have friends in the city who love this kind of thing.”

Mu Chenze stood there with his hands in his pockets, looking relaxed.

Before Chu Xuan could reply, Li Tong enthusiastically suggested, “Why not sell your sea cucumbers to Mu Chenze? He’s got connections in the city. Just today, he bought a bunch of abalone and made a good profit selling them there.”

Chu Xuan coughed awkwardly. In her previous life, Mu Chenze had also been a middleman for deep-sea goods and made quite a bit of money. Otherwise, she wouldn’t have been able to get money so easily to help out her mother’s family.

This time around, Mu Chenze would get to keep his money.

In the end, Li Tong bought the sea urchins and perch, giving Chu Xuan 33.3 yuan.

Mu Chenze bought the sea cucumbers and wanted to pay Chu Xuan 90 yuan, but she only took 80.

With over a hundred yuan in her pocket, Chu Xuan picked up the half-bucket of green-scaled fish and headed home.

Mu Chenze called after her, “You can sell me any sea cucumbers or abalone from now on.”

Chu Xuan glanced back and gave him a grateful smile. “Alright!”

She thought her chubby face probably didn’t look great when she smiled, so she quickly wiped the smile away.

In fact, it was already late and dark out—Mu Chenze hadn’t seen her face clearly at all.

The next day at noon, Chu Xuan and her family had prepared lunch: fried green-scaled fish, cold cucumber salad, mixed-grain steamed buns, and seaweed egg drop soup.

In these times, hardly anyone would splurge on oil to fry green-scaled fish, so everyone was thoroughly satisfied. The fish bones were crispy, the innards were cleaned perfectly, and there was no need to spit out bones—the more they chewed, the tastier it got, leaving their lips shiny with oil.

At the end, everyone used their steamed buns to wipe the oil from their mouths before eating them.

Because Chu Xuan had put so much care into lunch, everyone working on the house worked even harder.

After lunch, Gao Meijuan and her daughter helped tidy up and were just about to head home for a nap when Chu Zhi and Feng Chunhua showed up.

Chu Xuan and Gao Meijuan exchanged glances—neither knew when this mother and son had been released.

Gao Meijuan whispered to Chu Xuan, “I’ll ask your Grandpa Wang about it when I get home.”

No sooner had she spoken than Feng Chunhua, hands on her hips and looking bossy, declared, “Chu Xuan, your second uncle and I have nothing to eat. Either give us some grain or feed us! All our money was stolen and squandered by Qiu Daguang, and we couldn’t get it back.”

Everyone was a bit stunned. Was begging for food supposed to be this self-righteous?

Chu Xuan was also shocked by her audacity. “Whoever stole your money, you should go ask them for it!”

“There’s no one left in the Qiu family,” Feng Chunhua said, flopping down on the foundation. “If you don’t feed us, we’ll just lie here and not get up!”

Chu Zhi, silent, copied his mother and lay down on the other side of the foundation.

The construction crew wanted to go over and move them, but Feng Chunhua shouted, “Anyone who comes near, I’ll latch onto you! I’ll lie at your doorstep every day!”

Chu Xuan didn’t want to drag others into this, nor did she want to delay the house construction, so she whispered something to Gao Meijuan.

Gao Meijuan nodded in agreement.

She called the construction team leader, Lin Lou, aside and deliberately spoke loud enough for Feng Chunhua and Chu Zhi to hear, “You all should take a nap on the foundation too! Rest up before getting back to work.”

She shot Lin Lou a meaningful look.

Lin Lou caught on immediately. “Alright. Guys, let’s take a break.”

Ten minutes later, Feng Chunhua and Chu Zhi’s stomachs were growling with hunger.

Gao Meijuan covered her mouth and laughed. “Feng Chunhua, Chu Zhi, so you really did come here hungry? Come on! Follow me to the village office—they’ll definitely feed you a few meals. They’re building an office building over there and have a temporary canteen.”

As soon as they heard there was food, Feng Chunhua and Chu Zhi got up without hesitation and left with Gao Meijuan.

They planned to come back and make trouble after eating, but for now, they said nothing more.

The construction crew breathed a sigh of relief—they could finally get back to work.

To prevent this from happening again, Chu Xuan and Lin Lou discussed it and decided to build the courtyard walls and install the gate first.

Lin Lou immediately sent two of his men to push a cart to his warehouse and fetch a new gate.

He usually did contracting work with materials included, so his warehouse had some supplies.

As for red bricks, cement, sand, and water, those had already been delivered that morning.

Lin Lou’s home was in the neighboring village, over an hour’s walk round trip.

Chu Xuan had already arranged with Gao Meijuan to keep Feng Chunhua and Chu Zhi occupied.

Wang Shasha stayed behind to help, and Chu Feng and Chu Xuan joined in carrying bricks.

In less than three hours, the four courtyard walls were up and the iron gate was installed.

While the cement on top of the walls was still wet, they embedded shards of glass to deter thieves.

When Feng Chunhua and Chu Zhi returned to Chu Xuan’s house, they found it transformed—tall courtyard walls and a tightly closed iron gate.

They could no longer interfere with the house construction.

Standing outside the gate, Feng Chunhua shouted, “Chu Xuan, you little wretch! Don’t think you can keep us out and we’ll have no way in! Get out here!”

Chu Zhi chimed in, “Chu Xuan, Chu Feng, if you’ve got guts, come out! Cowards! Hiding inside and afraid to come out!”

Feng Chunhua slapped the courtyard wall. “Xiao Zhi, go home and get a hammer. We’ll smash this wall down!”

Chu Xuan wasn’t really afraid of Feng Chunhua and Chu Zhi—she just didn’t want to delay the construction.

She called out from behind the gate, “Smash the wall? Aren’t you afraid of getting thrown back in jail? If I’m not mistaken, it was Chu Dashan who took all the blame, and the Feng family pulled strings to get you two out, right? If you get caught again, there’ll be no one to take the fall for you!”

Chu Zhi tugged at Feng Chunhua’s sleeve. “Mom, we can’t smash the wall. You’re Chu Xuan’s real grandmother—if you just ask her for some food, no one can say anything. Let’s ask for grain first!”

If they didn’t steal or rob, just asked for food, no one could arrest them.

Reminded, Feng Chunhua stated her terms: “Chu Xuan, give me forty jin each of white flour and rice, or I’ll come block your gate every day and stop the construction crew from getting in!”

Chu Xuan sneered, “We’ve already cut ties. Are you sure you want to ask me for grain? Aren’t you afraid I’ll tell One-Eyed Dragon he can go to your house and take your things to sell?”

The words “take your things” triggered Feng Chunhua, who started banging on the gate. “That damned Qiu Daguang stole all our money and jewelry! Chu Xuan, if you dare let One-Eyed Dragon take our stuff, I’ll die right here at your door! Listen, I may have cut ties with you, but not with your dead father! You have to honor your father’s memory! Now that I have nothing to eat, you have to feed me for your father’s sake!”

Chu Xuan was floored by Feng Chunhua’s shamelessness—even her dead father was being dragged into this?

“Feng Chunhua, I seriously doubt my father was even your biological son!”

She watched Feng Chunhua closely through the crack in the gate as she said this.

A flash of panic crossed Feng Chunhua’s eyes, but she quickly recovered. “Of course your father was my biological son!”

Chu Xuan pressed further, “I’ve heard a secret about you lately. If you don’t want people to know, don’t do it in the first place! Feng Chunhua, you’d better go home and reflect on yourself!”

Feng Chunhua hurried away in a panic.

Chu Zhi chased after her. “Mom, why are we leaving so soon? We still don’t have dinner!”"