Courtyard House: Rebirth of a Shopkeeper in 1937

The sweetness of the watermelon I just ate was still in my mouth, and now I felt a little more anticipation for setting up tents and even building brick houses in the future. Even the air felt less anxious like during wartime and more like the everyday life of ordinary people.

Not long after, my second brother brought my grandparents back. As soon as my grandmother entered the door, she smelled a faint aroma of watermelon and asked with a smile, "What good thing did you eat? The aroma is so strong!" Gui Xiang quickly took my grandmother's hand and told her about the watermelon. She even pulled my grandmother to look at the remaining watermelons in the cupboard, which made my grandmother exclaim repeatedly, "It's rare to see such a big watermelon!"

When my father saw my grandfather arrive, he told him about setting up the tent and buying tung oil. My grandfather agreed, saying, "Setting up a tent is a virtuous thing to do; the villagers will definitely remember it. We also need to get the tung oil as soon as possible. These days, supplies are scarce, so we should get it as soon as possible."

In the afternoon, Xingbao woke up from his nap and, along with Guixiang, joined the other villagers to deliver water to the road construction site. After distributing the water buckets, the two returned home together. As they passed through the courtyard corridor, Xingbao suddenly recalled the scene of his father and uncle building the corridor roof—the two had to climb to great heights to work, each step taken with extreme caution, fearing a fall. This scene instantly reminded him of a "safety rope"—a crucial item for ensuring personal safety when working at heights, but he had no idea how to tie it or how to make it. In his previous life, he had never been involved in the construction industry and had never actually used a safety rope; he had only seen its general appearance on television, the details long since blurred in his memory.

Thinking of this, Xingbao felt a strong urge and immediately turned and ran to the storeroom, rummaging through drawers and cabinets until he found a sturdy, thick hemp rope. He dragged the rope to the center of the main room, sat cross-legged on the floor, and fiddled with it repeatedly: sometimes he tried to wrap the rope around his wrist, sometimes he tried to tie it around his ankle, attempting to tie a safety knot similar to the one he remembered. But each time he finished tying it, he felt it didn't match the style he remembered, so he had to undo it and start over. After struggling for half an hour, not only had he not made a decent knot, but he was also covered in sweat, his bangs soaked with sweat and sticking to his skin.

Gui Xiang was leaning against her mother, playing with the thimble her mother used for needlework. She saw Xing Bao squatting on the ground, talking to himself over a rope, sometimes frowning as he untied a knot, sometimes looking down and pondering. His flustered appearance made her stare at him with a slightly puzzled look. Her little face was full of confusion, as if she was thinking to herself: Is this little brother a bit silly? Maybe we should wait until the baby in Mom's belly is born and get a normal one.

The mother sat beside him sewing shoe soles, watching Xingbao struggle for a long time. Not only had he failed to make anything of it, but he had also tangled the rope into a mess. Unable to bear it any longer, she put down her needlework and asked, "Xingbao, what are you doing? You're just putting the rope around your hands and feet. Aren't you afraid of hurting yourself?"

"Mom, I'm making a safety rope!" Xingbao didn't even look up, continuing his "struggle" with the rope in his hands. His tone was somewhat urgent. "Dad will be working at heights when he's setting up tents and repairing roofs. With a safety rope, even if he slips and falls, he won't fall too badly. It can save his life in a critical moment!" As he spoke, he sighed heavily again—he felt that the knot he tied was far from the standard of a "safety rope," but he just couldn't figure out what was wrong. His fingers were trembling with anxiety.

Upon hearing the words "life-saving," the mother immediately took it seriously. Seeing Xingbao about to untie the knot he had just tied, she quickly snatched the rope away, saying, "If you keep fiddling with it like this, you won't finish it by nightfall. Tell me carefully what kind of safety rope it should be, what knots to tie, and what precautions to take. I'll help you with it." The mother was skilled at needlework and had nimble fingers, so she was already adept at delicate tasks like knotting ropes.

Xingbao then stopped what he was doing, moved closer to his mother, and gestured with his hands to show her the shape of the knot while describing it in detail: "Mom, the rope should first be wrapped around your waist and around your chest, and the two loops should be connected and tied into a knot to secure it; then two loops should be taken from the side of your waist and put around your hips, and the large loop around your chest should also be connected to two small loops and hung on your shoulders; you should also leave two rope ends at your waist, so that you can hold them in your hands to maintain your balance, or tie them to the frame next to you, so that you can work steadily at heights."

The mother listened intently, her fingers deftly manipulating the rope, tying knots step by step as Xingbao described. Just then, the father walked in from outside carrying a jar of tung oil. The jar wasn't sealed tightly, emitting a faint tung oil smell. Guixiang disliked this pungent smell the most; she immediately covered her nose, turned, and ran out the door, muttering, "What a horrible smell!"

Seeing this, the eldest brother quickly put down the firewood he was holding, took the jar from his father, and said to the second brother, "Let's go and paint the arch of the bridge in the corridor with tung oil first, and finish building the stone steps and filling them with soil as soon as possible, so that the village children won't get hurt playing there." The second brother nodded in agreement, and the two of them found an old brush and carried the tung oil jar to the corridor by the door. Their steps were light, obviously wanting to finish the work as soon as possible.

The father turned and went back into the main room, where he saw the mother bending over and fiddling with a rope, one end of which was still tied around Xingbao's waist. He couldn't help but tease her, "Third Aunt, you've tied Xingbao up like this. Is he being naughty again, and you're going to hang him up and spank him?"

Upon hearing this, Xingbao's eyes widened immediately. He glared at his father and retorted, "Dad! This isn't for tying me up; it's a safety rope for you! Mom just used me to test the size and see if the knot was tied properly!" He was afraid his father would misunderstand, so his tone was a bit more urgent than usual.

The father's smile froze instantly, and he looked at the mother in astonishment. The mother shook her head helplessly and explained in detail why Xingbao wanted to make safety ropes to protect people working at heights. The father then understood, and his expression immediately became serious—currently, road construction in the village required scaffolding, and quarrying involved climbing steep slopes; high-altitude work was needed everywhere, and these safety ropes could indeed prevent many accidents and save many lives—it was a crucial matter.

The mother, skilled in delicate work, tried twice according to Xingbao's description and accurately tied a safety rope that met the requirements. The father picked up the safety rope and examined it carefully. Then, he grabbed the two rope ends that were left at the waist of Xingbao's vest and pulled gently, lifting Xingbao up completely. He even deliberately swayed him from side to side to test the strength of the knot.

Xingbao, suspended in mid-air, was terrified and quickly grabbed the rope beside him, only to hear Guixiang shouting gloatingly from the doorway, "Xingbao! If you don't give me good food from now on, I'll have Dad hang you up like this forever!"

Upon hearing this, Xingbao was both amused and exasperated, and he didn't even have the strength to struggle anymore—he should have known better than to mention the safety rope to Guixiang. Now, he had only given her a reason to "threaten" him. He had really shot himself in the foot!

The eldest and second eldest brothers, who were applying tung oil outside, heard Guixiang's shouts and curiously put down their brushes and ran in. When they saw Xingbao hanging limply in the air by his father, looking exactly like the soft-shelled turtle that the second eldest brother had caught by the river a few days ago, the two brothers couldn't help but burst into laughter, forgetting to put down their brushes.

Father smiled and put Xingbao down, untied the safety rope and hung it on the wall as a template, then found a new hemp rope and imitated the template to tie knots. After Mother explained the purpose of the safety rope, the eldest and second eldest brothers also became interested and gathered around Father to learn how to tie knots, occasionally discussing how to tie them; only Guixiang, smelling the lingering tung oil scent on her two brothers, ran far away again, sitting on the threshold playing with wildflowers, unwilling to come near.

As evening fell and the afterglow of the setting sun spilled into the courtyard, my father took my eldest brother to Uncle Youcai's house to finalize the previously agreed-upon matter of purchasing bamboo.