บท 4: Chapter 2 Beat Him
Ms. Qian, having nearly finished crying, and having caught her breath, opened the chest and dug out a box from the bottom. She opened it to show her youngest son and daughter the money inside.
Inside were strings of coins, quite heavy, with only two small pieces of broken silver, which were leftovers from building their house.
The only savings they had were copper coins. Seeing these, Ms. Qian couldn't help but wipe away more tears.
She counted the money over and over, but no matter how many times she counted, there were still only nine strings of coins, and those two pieces of broken silver added up to only one and a half taels.
Ms. Qian also took out the cash box from the bedside cabinet, which contained the money for daily expenses. With the autumn harvest underway, Third and Four had been working for Landlord Bai and brought home their wages, which she had yet to add up and put away in the cabinet.
But this sum of money wasn't large either, neatly strung into strings, one hundred wen a string, ten strings to a tael.
Their luck was really bad; there were only six strings of coins in the box, and at the bottom, there were twenty or thirty wen of loose change.
Ms. Qian looked at her daughter, then at her youngest son, and, hearing the increasingly loud cries of misery outside, stood up, handed all the money to her youngest son to carry out, and, supporting her daughter, went outside herself.
Seeing his mother carry out the cash box, Zhou SiLang, Dason, let out a breath of relief, and almost couldn't help bursting into loud sobs.
Manbao saw everything clearly and was very annoyed with Fourth Brother.
In the village, there were also gamblers; their neighbor, Third Uncle Zhou, saw his son lose at gambling half a year ago, bringing back those from the gambling house to sell his wife andchildren in order to settle his debts.
Their niece, Daji, was two years older than her and a good friend, so Manbao remembered gambling was a deadly matter; she didn't know if it would claim her life, but it definitely could take the lives of her loved ones.
At the time, her father and mother had taught her brothers, strictly forbidding them from gambling, but now it was their family's turn.
Unable to contain her anger, Manbao rushed forward and kicked Zhou SiLang fiercely in the face.
Zhou SiLang shouted "Ouch, ouch," yelling, "Little sister, little sister, don't step on me, I...I know I was wrong!"
Ms. Qian did not stop her but said to her husband, "The money is not enough; we're still missing four and a half taels."
Old Zhou frowned with worry while Ms. Qian looked at her three daughters-in-law, saying, "Whatever money you have at home, take it out. Consider it a loan from your Fourth Brother, and we'll have him repay you later."
Junior Ms. Qian, Ms. Feng, and Ms. He looked at their husbands, who nodded with grave faces, then took their own children back to their rooms to get the money.
The Zhou Family had not divided their household; all earned money had to be shared, and everything consumed came from the common pot. Long ago, Junior Ms. Qian and Old Zhou had mentioned dividing the family; short of their death, they would only consider it once all the children were settled with their own families.
But Ms. Qian also knew there was a difference between sons who had established their own households and those who hadn't; one needed to have some money at hand.
Thus, she had always been lenient; she managed all the harvest from the fields, but from other sources of income, she only took sixty percent and left the remaining forty percent for the individual households to manage.
For example, in the main branch, Junior Ms. Qian earned at least one hundred wen a month helping in the school's kitchen. After contributing sixty wen, the rest was hers to keep.
Then there was the second branch, where Two had learned a bit of carpentry while working at Landlord Bai's place and knew how to weave bamboo and rattan, taking his handmade items to the market for some extra cash during his spare time.
Similarly, the third branch had Third who worked tirelessly, favored by the manager of Landlord Bai's estate, always called upon first for work, enabling him to earn a bit extra.
As for the remaining younger sons, there were no expectations from Four, who lay sprawled on the ground, while Five and Sixth, both young, either had their money taken by coaxing from their mother or sister or spent it begging Second Brother to buy candy at the market. Even if all their clothes were searched, it was doubtful more than two wen could be found.
Ms. Qian didn't bother searching them.
The daughters-in-law from the three branches quickly produced their own private savings, but it still wasn't enough; they were two strings of coins short.
Ms. Qian then looked towards the head of the family and her several sons.
Junior Ms. Qian was the first to break down, collapsing on the ground, slapping her legs as she said, "Mother, we really have nothing left. We even took out the money for mooncakes we were going to send to my family for Mid-Autumn, this will ruin us!"
Ms. Qian, annoyed, slapped her, "Why are you crying? Your mother isn't dead yet. We've survived famine years; do you think we can't survive this measly two hundred wen?"
Manbao thought for a moment, then ran back to the main room, dug out a silver lock from her precious box, and handed it to Ms. Qian, "Mother, use my silver lock."
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