"Mother, Mother, where do you want to go?" Zhang Jiaohua had been in pursuit after coming out from the house.
"You don"t need to come, go back home." Liu Qiaoye turned her head to speak to her son, but still continued running towards Rocky Mountain.
Zhang Jiaohua also chased after. He saw mother"s appearance looked thoroughly fl.u.s.tered.
Liu Qiaoye turned her head to look, only to see her son come chasing after. She turned her head to speak, "Son, you must take care of yourself, don"t fall."
"Mother, wait for me." Zhang Jiaohua felt somewhat panicky in his heart.
Liu Qiaoye couldn"t wait for her son. She was feeling a bad premonition in her heart. Each and everyone from the village was running back from the rocky mountain, but she still couldn"t see any traces of her husband. Liu Qiaoye"s thoughts couldn"t help but go into a negative direction. She couldn"t help but recall the conversation she had last night with her husband. The contents of their conversation were somewhat ominous.
Liu Qiaoye was running very fast, she didn"t stop even a moment on the curving field ridges.
Zhang Jiaohua was following quickly, following a moment of carelessness he lost his footing, and stepped into the paddy field. His trouser leg became wet till the knee. Fortunately, he was barefoot and didn"t have to worry about the shoe sinking into the paddy field"s mud.
Zhang Jiaohua cried out, "Mother ah, wait for me." He had never seen his Mother behave like this before as if she didn"t care about him. Even when he fell down, she didn"t come to help him; he cried, but she didn"t come to coax. He also stubbornly pursued, however, his mother"s silhouette was growing more and more distant.
It wasn"t as if Liu Qiaoye didn"t want to stop and support her son, and comfort him patiently. However, she was not able to do so at the moment. What exactly happened to her husband? Why hasn"t he come back till now?
Tears started to well up in Liu Qiaoye"s eyes, blurring her vision. The distant rocky mountain had started becoming fuzzy.
Both her legs had already stopped responding somewhat and were moving forward precisely on instinct.
Zhang Jiaohua saw his Mother"s silhouette from afar, as she cried one hand, but on the other, she kept running forward.
All of the villager"s attention was focused on Zhang Shicai whose entire face was full of blood, not knowing if he was alive or dead. The tractor arrived rumbling into the grain drying area in the village.
"Quick Quick, spread the cotton mattress below and let Shicai lay down on it. Qiangw.a.n.g, you drive quickly!" Village Branch Secretary Zhang Dechun immediately came running upon hearing the news and immediately launched into action upon reaching the spot.
The tractor driver Liu Qianw.a.n.g promptly pressed his foot on the accelerator, preparing to deliver the patient to the hospital.
"Where"s Qianlong? Has he brought money or not? Nowadays, Hospital wouldn"t admit patients without payment!" Zhang Dechun remembering an incident suddenly looked right and left, and actually couldn"t find Zhang Qianlong.
"Can"t see him. He was here just now."
"That b.a.s.t.a.r.d, definitely out of fear for the medical expenses, he has gone into hiding. He truly is inhuman, other people came to help build his family"s house and were injured lifting rocks, but he"s unwilling to take responsibility and went into hiding. Could he even be called a human?"
The villagers immediately struck up a lively discussion to scold Zhang Qianlong.
"Don"t make a racket. Hurry up and look for someone, and find Zhang Qianlong." Zhang Dechun shouted out promptly. The power of Branch Secretary Zhang was exhibited here, his words were quite effective. The discussions amongst the villagers immediately stopped.
"Right, Right, hurry up and find him. Who saw Zhang Qianlong?"
"I noticed him walking towards the forest. Not even a moment pa.s.sed since he started walking."
"Then what are you gawking at, everyone go to the forest and find him! Even if the village is turned upside down, we must find him!" Zhang Dechun had also become furious. This Zhang Qianlong"s deed was really inhuman. However, regardless of whether Zhang Qianlong is found or not, the treatment of the wounded cannot be delayed.
"Quick Quick, go call Zhang Enzhong"s family to come over. See if anyone in their family has cash or not. If they are able to take out the money quickly, then each household in the village will also gather, and rescue the person. Everyone rest a.s.sured regarding these funds, sooner or later it will be accounted for from Zhang Qianlong. If he does not, then I guarantee that he won"t be able to build this house of his. Moreover, I have heard that his family has raised a fat pig. When the time comes then the village will forcefully sell their pig, and recover everyone"s money." Zhang Dechun continued to give out orders.
The villagers moved separately; one group went to look for Zhang Qianlong, while the rest went to collect money from the village. It was still a good community; all in all, there were not many people who were like Zhang Qianlong. Not a moment later, from each and every house, your ten kuai, my five kuai, two kuai, one kuai, five jiao, one jiao, all been collected. [TLNote: Kuai is the colloquial term used for Yuan in China; Jiao is equal to one-tenth of a yuan] Finally, with great difficulty, over a hundred kuai had been raised. Promptly sitting on the tractor, they rushed towards the town. This delay had costed them half an hour.
At this time, Liu Qiaoye had already run up to Rocky Mountain, shouting in all directions, "Youping! Youping! Where are you?"
Liu Qiaoye quickly ran towards the place of explosion. She suspected that her husband perhaps had had an accident at the place where the stones exploded. She was feeling extremely conflicted in her heart. One aspect was that she wanted to find her husband as fast as possible, on the other hand, she didn"t want to think that her husband had had an accident. The moment she reached the point of explosion, she saw blood everywhere. Fortunately, she didn"t see any trace of her husband. It was as if a big stone had landed in Liu Qiaoye"s heart.
"However, if Youping"s not here, where else did he go?" Liu Qiaoye looked around but couldn"t find any trace of Zhang Youping.
Zhang Jiaohua had at last managed to catch up to his mother infront of the Rocky Mountain, and seeing his mother standing at the front, he went running over delightedly. Who knew that he would trip his feet on something and fall flat on his face. He fell down into a thick bush, fortunately being a short and small soson gra.s.s bush to soften the fall. Only several cuts had formed on Zhang Jiaohua face. As far as the brat was concerned, these kind of injuries were common. Zhang Jiaohua crawled up from the bush and turned his head to see the thing that tripped him. This looks serious, isn"t this Father? Only saw Father"s body soaked in blood, his eyes shut tightly, resembling the dead bodies from the television.
"Mother! Father"s dead!"
Zhang Jiaohua foolishly stood there and shouted out loudly.
Liu Qiaoye was still desperately searching everywhere for her husband. Hearing that shout from her son thoroughly broke her heart into several pieces. She turned her head to look, and saw that it really was her husband who was lying down stiffly on the ground with no sign of activity. Both his feet were soft, almost as if he was not sitting on the ground. However, she still came running over staunchly. On one hand, she was dashing forward while on the other, she kept calling the name of her husband.
"Youping, Youping, why did you leave us like this, Wa? Later, how will I live together with son, ah? ......."
Zhang Jiaohua pushed his father"s body, and Zhang Youping swayed slightly.
Liu Qiaoye came dashing directly onto her husband"s body, "I cannot live, ah!"
"Aiyo." The reclining on the ground and the already "dead" Zhang Youping let out a painful shout.
"Father is alive! Father is alive!" Zhang Jiaohua was jumping around and clapping.
Liu Qiaoye turned up her face full of tears to see her husband, and really discovered that Zhang Youping had opened his eyes.
Liu Qiaoye using both of her hands to slap several times across Zhang Youping"s chest, "You scared me to death, You may have scared me to death!"
"Aiyo. Don"t hit, Don"t hit, when the time comes I wouldn"t have died from getting hit by the stone, but actually from your slaps." Zhang Youping"s wounds opened as he grimaced in pain.
"Where were you injured?" Liu Qiaoye stood up in panic, and looked over Zhang Youping"s whole body full of blood, but she didn"t know which place was his wound after all.
"On the shoulder here, a fist-sized stone struck me. I lost so much blood, when I was preparing to return to the village, I pa.s.sed out there." Originally, Zhang Youping had fainted on the spot after being smashed by the stone, and after a while, he came to and opened his eyes to see that he actually couldn"t find a single person. A wide portion of his shoulder had already become red. He headed towards his village but hadn"t walked far when he lost his consciousness here.
"You just endure for a bit, I will look at your wound." Liu Qiaoye cautiously pulled open Zhang Youping shirt-collar.
There really was a big wound as expected. The blood had already stopped, but it seemed the wound was still incredibly serious.