Rebirth of Bayi Fishing and Hunting in the Northwest

Chapter 1077 Welcoming Lü Youcai Home: This Family Is Relatively Normal

Lu Youcai's son is named Lu Dehai. He is 31 years old this year and already has a son who is in elementary school.

He and his wife were working in the fields. It was almost noon, so they came back to help his mother cook and do some other things. When they got back to the yard, they saw Li Long giving his mother money.

"What are you doing here?" Lü Dehai asked, putting down his shovel. "How did you end up in my house?"

The question was not impolite, but the tone was not particularly impolite; it was just a normal question.

Li Long glanced at him and his wife, then looked at Wang Xiangyu.

“He…” Wang Xiangyu took the money, hesitated for a moment, and said, “He found your father’s… bones in the mountains.”

"What?" Lu Dehai was also stunned for a moment and looked at Li Long.

Li Long then briefly recounted how he encountered Lü Youcai's remains while in the mountains.

He was also a little worried that now that he had given them the money, the family might think that the gold dust was more than what they had and ask him for more money.
After listening to Li Long's words, Lü Dehai took the strip of cloth from his mother and examined it, confirming it was his father's handwriting. He paused for a moment, then turned to his wife and said:
"Go cook first, slaughter a chicken, we have guests."

Li Long hurriedly waved his hand and said:

"No, no, I'm leaving as soon as I finish what I need to do here."

“How can we leave?” Lü Dehai shook his head and said, “My mother and I have waited for my father for more than 20 years, and we have never heard from him. Although we say that my father has disappeared, to be honest, I have always felt that my father may have been gone for a long time.”

Now that you've brought back news of my father, I, as his son, should at least thank you. It's just that our family isn't wealthy, otherwise I would have at least slaughtered a sheep to thank you.”

After he said that, Li Long really found it difficult to leave.

The woman brought out two small stools from the house. Lü Dehai gave one to Li Long and the other to his mother. Wang Xiangyu waved her hand and slowly went into the house.

“My mom always thought my dad was still alive, and at first I thought so too, but as I grew older, I guessed it was impossible.” Lü Dehai sat down and said to Li Long:

“My dad was very concerned about his family. He went to the mountains with the sideline production team to get things and earn money, hoping to improve the family’s life. So if he were really alive, it’s impossible that there would be no news of him for so many years.”

Lu Dehai had actually come to terms with it. He spoke in Lanzhou-Yinchuan Mandarin, which Li Long also heard in the Fourth Team. Local people from the old northern Xinjiang all spoke this language, so they were very familiar with it and could speak it themselves.

Although he didn't want to cause trouble and wanted to leave as soon as possible, Li Long still felt a little guilty after hearing Lü Dehai's words, so he said:

“I found those bones in the mountains, and I guess they belong to your father. After all these years, only bones are left. We can’t tell whose bones they are, so it’s really hard to be sure.”

"That's true." Lü Dehai could tell that Li Long was trying to comfort him, so he nodded.

“But if that bone is your father’s, then he might have been murdered,” Li Long continued. “There are wounds on the bone.”

“My dad was injured before, he broke his arm,” Lü Dejun said. “You should be seeing this, right?”

“There are wounds on the skull, arms, and legs,” Li Long said. “Anyway, you can see a lot of injuries on the bones.”

Lü Dejun's eyes immediately turned red.

Knowing that his father had passed away was news, but if his father had been murdered, as a son, it would be impossible not to seek revenge and find out the truth.

He suddenly stood up and went straight into the house.

"Mom! I'm going to go to the mountains to bring back Dad's bones!"

Li Long now regretted it even more. If he had known that Lü Youcai had died in the 1960s, he would never have touched those bones.

At least if the crime scene wasn't disturbed, and someone investigated, they could find out how the person died. Now, it's worse; they've probably destroyed all the clues themselves.

Now that the deed is done, all Li Long can do is make amends.

Wang Xiangyu quietly agreed, saying it was the right thing to do.

Lu Dehai came out of the house and sat down opposite Li Long in silence.

Li Long thought to himself, "Shouldn't we go get the bones now?"

He thought for a moment and felt he should help analyze it, so he said:

"Your dad went into the mountains with a sideline business team. There should have been other people there back then, right? Whether then or now, gold panning is illegal..."

"What do you want to say?" Lü Dehai suddenly looked up at Li Long, his eyes red.

"What I'm trying to say is that your father should have known about this. So there probably weren't many people who knew he was panning for gold. If the person who killed him wasn't one of the strangers in the mountains they encountered, could it have been someone who went into the mountains with them?"
When I found the mine where your dad was, it had been robbed. The places where he hid things in the mine were empty, so the other party must have taken away the gold dust that your dad dug out.

If it's someone from your team, then there should be some clues. Were any of the people who went into the mountains with your dad and the others disappear for a while, then moved away, or somehow became rich afterwards…?

Lu Dehai frowned and started thinking.

Actually, the probability is fifty-fifty; half of the time it could be a stranger, and the other half could be someone you know.

If it's a stranger, it's almost impossible to find out who did it, so you can only look at the remaining 50% chance.

"Liu Huijun!" Wang Xiangyu suddenly came out of the house and said through gritted teeth, "It must be him! When we returned from the sideline production team more than a month ago, he asked for leave saying he was going back to his hometown, but he came back in less than a week, and then his whole family moved away!"

Two days before he moved, he even went to the county to buy a bicycle!

"Who was in charge at the time?" Li Long asked again. "If we ask him about this, we should be able to get some more information."

Lü Dehai stood up abruptly and strode out with heavy steps.

Li Long breathed a sigh of relief.

Being able to help the other party find the murderer would put my mind at ease.

It was worth the trip if we got the gold dust from them.

“The person leading the team at the time was Zhou Yulong, the deputy leader of the production team.” Wang Xiangyu slowly sat down and said, “When he came over and said that Dehai’s father had gone missing in the mountains while digging for medicinal herbs, I felt that something was wrong.”

"My husband, Dehai, is very family-oriented and dotes on Dehai. We're not going to just disappear into the mountains forever, are we? Even if he encounters wolves or something in the mountains, he couldn't possibly stay completely silent, could he?"

Li Long thought to himself that Lü Youcai had been planning to hide in the mountains to pan for gold, and then come out when he had enough, but he never expected to be murdered.

If it really was Liu Huijun who did it, then Liu Huijun should have known about Lü Youcai's gold mining business and helped keep it a secret, but in reality, he harbored the intention of killing him and robbing him.

"Do you know that your husband is involved in gold panning?" Li Long asked curiously.

“I know,” Wang Xiangyu sighed. “Before he went into the mountains, when Dehai was still young, he told me that he had panned for gold with others in his hometown, but back then he was with other people and thought it was fun. There were small private gold mines near his hometown.”

Li Long thought that what Tao Shengli said sounded quite similar, so it seemed that there were quite a few places he was talking about that had hidden gold mines.

Lu Dehai's wife boiled water, took a knife and a bowl, put the bowl on a dirt platform, went to the chicken coop, spotted a rooster, pressed it down, held it by the comb and wings with one hand, and with the other hand she took the knife, plucked a few feathers off the rooster's neck, exposing the flesh, wiped it with the knife, and then raised the rooster's body to let the blood drip into the bowl.

The movements were very swift.

Li Long was very impressed. He himself might not be able to kill a chicken so skillfully. Women at that time were not so delicate.

After the chicken had bled enough, the woman threw it on the ground and went inside with the bowl. The chicken flapped its wings a few times on the ground, then lay still.

The woman brought out a bucket from the house; it was steaming, probably from boiling water. She put the bucket down, picked up a chicken leg, and headfirst stuffed it into the bucket of boiling water. She turned it around a couple of times, then put the chicken leg into the water again and pressed it down.

The water was too hot, so she made a "hissing" sound. Then she tugged at the chicken feathers to make sure they came off, then lifted the chicken out and quickly went inside.

Wang Xiangyu sighed and said:
“Actually, I knew myself that he might be gone. But then I thought, what if, this time, what if he's gone too... But it's alright. My son is filial, my daughter-in-law is capable, and now we have a grandson. Anyway, you brought news of him back... Thank you, young man.”

As Li Long listened to Wang Xiangyu recounting her past, he felt as if he were learning about Lü Youcai's entire life.

Half an hour later, Lü Dehai returned.

"Have you found out what they said?" Wang Xiangyu, who had just said she had figured it out, suddenly stood up and asked.

"Uncle Tian said that when he took my dad and the others out to the mountains to do side jobs, my dad was with Liu Huijun. He arranged for them to dig up medicinal herbs, and the two of them worked together and had a good relationship."

"Do they know where Liu Huijun went after that?"

"It moved to the Red Star Brigade, but it died a few years ago. They said it was involved in speculation and was arrested by the anti-speculation office. After being detained for a few days, it was released, but it was terrified. Plus, it was hungry, sick, and exhausted, so it died."

When Lü Dehai said this, he felt very relieved.

“I plan to bring my father’s bones back first,” Lü Dehai said, “and then go to Hongxing to inquire whether Liu Huijun is dead.”

"What if you die?" Wang Xiangyu asked.

“They’re dead… there’s nothing we can do about that.” Lü Dehai shook his head. “We can’t exactly go after their family, can we? There’s no way to verify anything when they’re dead.”

Li Long nodded slightly.

“Comrade… By the way, brother, I haven’t asked your name yet?” Lu Dehai’s mood returned to normal, and he asked Li Long with a smile, “I have to thank you properly. I’ll need you to show me the way later so I can bring my father’s bones back.”

“Sure,” Li Long said. “We can leave after lunch and get back to the county in the evening.”

“It might not work.” Lü Dehai shook his head. “If I get my father’s bones and can’t come back today, I’ll have nowhere to stay. The guesthouses in the county won’t let me stay with the bones.”

"Then you can stay in the county tonight, and I'll take you to the mountains early tomorrow morning. You can collect the bones there, and then I'll send you back to the county. How about that?"

"Okay, okay, thank you so much." Lü Dehai thought this arrangement was good.

“Dehai, shall I go with you?” Wang Xiangyu said. “I also want to see where your father died.”

"Mom, please don't go," Lü Dehai advised. "I'm only going for one day, and it's in the mountains. The mountain paths are difficult to walk on, and I have to carry Dad's bones and take care of you. Think about it..."

Wang Xiangyu then stopped insisting on going.

“Datong will be back this afternoon, and he’ll be taking care of things by himself. I’m worried about him,” Lü Dehai continued. “There’s still work to be done in the fields.”

“Okay, then I won’t go. You can write down the place; I’ll always want to go there sometime in the future,” Wang Xiangyu said.

"Okay, sure," Lü Dehai agreed, and then started chatting with Li Long.

Li Long also inquired about the cotton planting situation in the Liuhudi area.

"The cotton yield is alright right now," said Lü Dehai. "The highest yield per mu can be over 100 kilograms, and one kilogram of seed cotton costs two yuan. Although the cost of seeds and fertilizers is higher than that of wheat, the yield is also higher, so it's not bad."

"Picking cotton must be tiring," Li Long asked.

“Of course it’s tiring,” Lü Dehai complained. “Picking cotton is the most tiring part. You have to bend over the whole time. People with bad backs can’t pick much in a day if they squat down. Picking cotton is too tiring, so we can’t plant too much of it. Otherwise, we simply can’t harvest all the cotton.”

Li Long knew this, of course. In less than five years, the Fourth Team started dealing with cotton. By the beginning of the next century, almost half of the Fourth Team's land was planted with cotton. And ten years later, after drip irrigation was introduced to the Fourth Team, nearly 10,000 mu of land in the Fourth Team was planted with cotton.

Having grown cotton for so long, Li Long naturally knows how tiring it is to pick cotton.

Lu Dehai only mentioned one point: when picking cotton, it's better to have dew in the morning and damp cotton leaves. But by noon, when the sun is at its strongest, it's hot and humid, and there's usually no wind in the cotton fields, making it unbearable for people to be in the sun.

At noon, the cotton bollards were so sharp they pricked my fingers, and the cotton leaves were dry and easily crumbled into the cotton, so I had to pick them out.

Of course, we'll find out later that it's actually okay not to pick up the cotton leaves, because when processing seed cotton into lint, these broken leaves will be ground into powder and blown away. On the contrary, hair is more fatal. If hair gets mixed in, it will affect the grading and pricing of the cotton.

Li Long knew about the development and changes in cotton cultivation in later generations, but he really didn't know at this time. He asked quite detailed questions, and Lü Dehai was very grateful to Li Long, answering them in detail.

Currently, each family grows about ten or twenty mu of cotton, no more and no less, and with a little effort, the whole family can manage.

Li Long estimated that if the cotton were brought to the fourth team, the situation would be similar. After all, currently, apart from sowing, almost everything else about cotton cultivation relies on manual labor. There aren't enough people; if they planted too much, they simply couldn't handle the work.

Just spraying pesticides alone takes a whole morning to spray 20 acres of land, carrying a sprayer on your back. If you plant too much, the spraying alone is exhausting.

Of course, when cotton is planted in large quantities, Li Long should get tractor-driven sprayers.

Li Long inquired about the pesticide application, and sure enough, Lü Dehai said that the cotton plants were very susceptible to insects, including bollworms, spider mites, and aphids. He explained that once an infestation occurred, if it wasn't stopped in time, an entire field could quickly become infected, resulting in a poor harvest, if not a total crop failure.

"We also have a problem with hail," Lü Dehai said. "Cotton is most vulnerable to hail. If it hits, it can knock the cotton plants down to bare stalks, resulting in a complete crop failure."

Li Long thought to himself that it was fortunate that the fourth team had hardly ever encountered hail, so such a situation did not exist.

As they were talking, the meal was already prepared. Guests had arrived; there was steamed rice, stir-fried chicken, and a dish of scrambled eggs with chives.

Although there were only two dishes, the portions were very generous, and you could feel the host's hospitality.

The hostess was quiet and a little shy, while Lü Dehai warmly urged Li Long to eat more meat.

Li Long wasn't short of eggs, and knowing that the family had a son, he ate a few more.

When they finished eating and were about to leave, Wang Xiangyu handed a basket of eggs to Li Long:
"Take it with you, it's from one of our chickens. There's nothing to thank you for, just take it home and eat it."

The Lü family was neither poor nor rich; they were middle-class in the village. Li Long hesitated for a moment but couldn't refuse, so he accepted.

After getting into the car with Li Long, Lü Dehai became a little reserved. This was understandable; he'd hardly ever ridden in a truck, let alone a jeep. It was only after Li Long started chatting with him while driving that he gradually relaxed.

“There are only a few cars in our whole township, so I’ve hardly ever ridden in one. I have ridden in and driven a tractor, though. Actually, now that you’ve given me the money, I was thinking of adding it to my savings to buy a small four-wheeled tractor for the family, so that it would be easier to work.”

Li Long thought for a moment and said:

“If you want to buy a tractor, I’ll get you a combine harvester when I have some free time, before the wheat ripens. You can drive the combine harvester to harvest wheat and earn some money. We get two yuan per mu (unit of land area) of wheat there, so you can earn quite a bit over a wheat season.”

"I know, I know." Upon hearing this, Lü Dehai hurriedly replied, "We have them in our township, and there's one in the next village. They're making a lot of money! They say they're hard to buy."

"It's okay, once you buy a tractor, I'll find someone to get one for you."

A harvester doesn't cost much. The Lü family was kind; they didn't suspect Li Long and even treated him as their benefactor, which made Li Long a little dazed. But then he realized this was the normal situation, so he also intended to help the Lü family out.

More than an hour later, the jeep arrived in the county. Li Long took Lü Dehai to the guesthouse and let him stay there. He then drove the jeep back to the fourth team to pick up Mingming and Haohao.

Because he was going to take Lü Dehai to the mountains the next day, Li Long packed everything he needed for the trip in advance, including a bowl of beef and mutton offal soup that he bought from Ru Xiangu Li, the sheep from Keyumu, in Shicheng, which he would take to the mountains tomorrow.

The next morning, after Li Long dropped Mingming and Haohao off at the Fourth Team, he took Lü Dehai and headed into the mountains.

(End of this chapter)