Mountain boy picks stars

(This chapter refers to the article "The Nightingale's Song" in the ninth volume of the nine-year compulsory education textbook "Chinese Language" published by the People's Education Press.)

1

The auditorium of Yellow River Experimental School.

A banner reading "The 10th Cultural and Art Festival of Yellow River Experimental School" was hung on the stage of the auditorium.

The announcer came on stage and announced: "Next, Class 5-3 will perform the play 'The Nightingale's Song,' performed by all the students of Class 5-3."

After the announcer left, the curtain slowly rose.

In the center of the stage, Huang Xiaoxing plays "Nightingale," a brave and resourceful little boy from the Soviet Patriotic War. He wears a green shirt and blue pants that are the same color as the leaves, and is barefoot. He sits on a log and is whittling wood with a knife.

He kept whistling a tune that sounded like a nightingale's song.

Behind him was a large backdrop of a village burned down by the German devils.

Girls from the class, including Yuan Liuxing, Lu Jiahan, and Mao Zhiling, played the roles of small animals such as green trees, sparrows, crows, and owls.

Around him, people danced to lively music.

Suddenly, the music became somber.

The German officer, played by Cheng Hongdou, led a group of male classmates dressed as German soldiers, each holding a gun and hunching over.

They carefully moved from behind the curtain to the front of the stage.

Close-ups of the dances by Yuan Liuxing, Lu Jiahan, Mao Zhiling, and others gradually moved to the large backdrop.

Cheng Hongdou, playing a German officer, gripped his gun and shouted at Huang Xiaoxing, "Hey, kid, come here! Are all the villagers dead?"

Huang Xiaoxing stood up and answered loudly, "How could I be the only one left? There are sparrows, crows, owls, and plenty more. There's only one nightingale, though!"

"You bad guy!"

Cheng Hongdou, who was playing a German officer, interrupted Huang Xiaoxing.

He yelled, "I'm asking you, is anyone here?"

Huang Xiaoxing calmly replied, "People? There was no one here as soon as the war started. The village caught fire as soon as the artillery and gunfire began. Everyone shouted, 'The wild animals are coming!' and ran away."

"What an idiot!"

Hong Dou, who played a German officer, cursed.

Suddenly, he grabbed Huang Xiaoxing by the collar.

He pressed a pistol against Huang Xiaoxing's temple and roared, "Do you know the way to Sumontas Village?"

Huang Xiaoxing replied calmly, "How could I not know! My uncle and I often go fishing at that dam. The pike there are ferocious; they can even eat goslings and ducklings!"

"Stop talking nonsense and lead the way!"

Cheng Hongdou, who plays a German officer, puts away his pistol.

He pulled a lighter from his pocket, waved it in front of Huang Xiaoxing, and said:

"Kid! You'd better be sensible. If you can lead us to that village to wipe out the guerrillas, we'll give you this little thing. If you try anything funny and lead us somewhere else, I'll twist your head off. Understand?"

Huang Xiaoxing pretended to be scared and nodded.

He reached out to touch Cheng Hongdou's lighter.

But Cheng Hongdou grabbed it tightly and stuffed it into his pocket, shouting sharply, "Lead the way for us!"

Huang Xiaoxing and his male classmates who played German officers and German soldiers.

Facing the front of the stage, begin to step forward.

At that moment, upbeat music began to play.

The female classmates, including Yuan Liuxing, Lu Jiahan, and Mao Zhiling, dressed up as pine trees, red mushrooms, white mushrooms, and foreign mushrooms, and danced gracefully from behind the curtain to the front of Huang Xiaoxing and his classmates to the accompaniment of cheerful music.

A boy playing a German soldier approached Cheng Hongdou, who was playing a German officer, and said:

"Sir, the mountains are high and the forests are dense here. Could we have fallen into a guerrilla ambush?"

Cheng Hongdou, who plays a German officer, seems to be alert as he draws his pistol.

He threatened Huang Xiaoxing's temple again: "Kid, tell me, are there any guerrillas around here? If you don't tell the truth, I'll shoot you!"

Huang Xiaoxing pretended not to understand: "Are you talking about a kind of mushroom? No, we don't have this kind of mushroom here. We only have red mushrooms, white mushrooms, and oyster mushrooms."

Cheng Hongdou, who played the German officer, cursed, "They're utterly stupid! It's like casting pearls before swine!"

Then, they turned and walked from the center of the stage to the backstage side.

Huang Xiaoxing kept hitting it with a tree branch in his hand.

He also occasionally whistled a beautiful tune, like the song of a nightingale.

After they all went backstage, female students Yuan Liuxing, Mao Zhiling, Lu Jiahan, and others, dressed as sparrows, crows, owls, pine trees, and mushrooms, danced gracefully on the stage to cheerful music.

At this moment, Shi Xuankai and his male classmates, playing guerrilla fighters, walked onto the stage from the other side of the curtain, carrying guns.

A series of clear nightingale calls came from behind the curtain.

A guerrilla fighter gripped his rifle and said to Shi Xuankai, "Captain, something's up!"

Shi Xuankai, playing the role of the guerrilla leader, stood at attention, listened intently, and instructed his guerrilla fighters: "Don't make a sound."

Then they began counting the nightingale's calls: "One, two, three, four, five... three nine."

Shi Xuankai waved his hand excitedly and said, "Comrades, this is not the song of an ordinary nightingale, but a signal sent to me by our brave and resourceful messenger. Thirty-nine German devils are heading this way. We are about to have a big battle."

Then came the calls of two cuckoos.

"The German devils still have two machine guns! Our communications officer is brilliant! Comrades, are we confident we can wipe them out completely?"

"We must resolutely annihilate the German devils!"

"To avenge our fallen loved ones!"

“…………”

The guerrillas raised their various guns and roared in anger!

Shi Xuankai ordered, "Alright! Take cover immediately. Wait until all the Japanese are surrounded before opening fire on my command!"

Shi Xuankai and the other guerrillas quickly concealed themselves behind the female classmates, including Yuan Liuxing, Lu Jiahan, and Mao Zhiling, who were playing the roles of pine trees, sparrows, and mushrooms on both sides of the stage, and aimed their guns at the center of the stage.

Somber music began to play.

Huang Xiaoxing led a group of male classmates dressed as German soldiers onto the stage from the other side of the backstage.

One of the male students, dressed as a German soldier, complained, "We've walked so far, our feet are blistered, and there's not a trace of guerrillas to be seen! Sigh! I can't walk anymore, Captain, let's just stop and rest for a while!"

After saying that, he sat down wearily in the center of the stage.

Cheng Hongdou, playing the role of a Japanese officer, grabbed the soldier and ordered, "No, this place is high in the mountains and dense in the forest. If the guerrillas come, none of us will survive."

At that moment, Huang Xiaoxing kept looking ahead with his hand on his forehead.

Suddenly he seemed to see something.

He shouted loudly, "Guerrilla uncles, fire! The Japanese are all surrounded!"

After shouting, he ran to the side of the stage.

Shi Xuankai shouted, "Fight! The time has come to avenge our fallen fellow villagers!"

They rushed out of the "pine forest" (played by female classmates) from the guerrilla unit and fired their guns at the German soldiers in the center of the stage.

A series of "ping-pong" sounds rang out.

The male students playing German soldiers collapsed on the stage one after another.

The cheerful music started again.

Students such as Yuan Liuxing, Mao Zhiling, and Lu Jiahan, dressed as sparrows, crows, owls, pine trees, and mushrooms, began to dance gracefully on the stage.

Huang Xiaoxing ran forward and hugged Shi Xuankai, who was playing the role of the guerrilla captain, tightly.

Thunderous applause erupted from the audience.

Under the stage in the auditorium

Zhou Sixuan clapped her hands incessantly from the front row of the audience, celebrating the success of her classmates' performance.