Chapter 271

Zheng Tan had never seen that man before; in the kindergarten, basically all the teachers are women, and they all got in after multiple screenings and some personal connections, so relatively speaking, they're more reliable.

Zheng Tan knows both teachers in Zhuo Xiao Mao's class; there's simply no such man.

Chu Hua University Kindergarten is strictly managed; strangers are not allowed in. Everyone inside is the child of school staff, the gatekeeper is an old man whom most people know, so it's impossible to make such a mistake as to let an unfamiliar person in.

Of course, those measures only apply to people; they don't work on Zheng Tan this special case—those walls and fences can't possibly keep out a cat.

Zheng Tan jumped onto a nearby tree and watched Zhuo Xiao Mao and that man over there.

Zhuo Xiao Mao was playing with blocks, having built a small car; the man beside him was guiding him, and later, seeing him anxious, the man squatted down to help build without stopping his talk. Zheng Tan listened, and the man was talking about high-end cars—words completely unfamiliar to most kids; to them, a Hummer is less appealing than a fire truck.

"Missing a wheel." Zhuo Xiao Mao looked expectantly at the person beside him.

"I'll go look." The man set a block in place, then stood up and stepped back, preparing to go to the block box to see if there's a suitable one.

And just as the man stepped back, his foot landed on something, he slipped, and fell flat on his back.

The indoor rooms are all covered with foam mats, but outside is not, especially the spot Zhuo Xiao Mao chose—though it's not concrete, a layer of planks was laid, but slipping like that still hurts plenty; you can tell from the man's twisted face on the ground how painful it is.

Zhuo Xiao Mao hadn't reacted yet; a nearby little kid saw the man slip and burst out laughing, other kids heard the noise, looked over, and joined in—children easily start a chain reaction of laughter, being laughed at by a bunch of kids, the man lost face big time.

The two female teachers over there heard the commotion and came to see what was happening. The teacher surnamed Bai, upon seeing the man's condition, was especially nervous.

"How are you?" Bai Lao Shi asked.

"... I'm fine." The man on the ground struggled to get up. Although he said he was fine, it was just to save face; from his gasping, you could tell it was definitely not easy.

"It's a glass marble." Another teacher found the cause of the man's slip.

Glass marbles are dangerous for the little kids in the small class—they can easily slip and fall, and there's also a risk of swallowing them. After all, many small children like to put anything they pick up into their mouths. So such toys are absolutely not provided in the kindergarten; this kind of thing could never appear here.

"It must have been dropped by a kid from the big class!" the man said through gritted teeth. A few days ago he saw big-class kids playing with these, although they were later put away. This area had also been cleared, but he didn't expect one to have been missed.

The two female teachers searched the area again, and after confirming there were no more glass marbles, the little Bai teacher helped the man leave to go to the school infirmary for a check-up, while the other teacher stayed behind to continue looking after the kids.

Zheng Tan could see clearly from a distance; that glass marble was the one Zhuo Xiao Mao took out of his pocket and placed there while the man was squatting to arrange the blocks, not paying attention.

Those two teachers would never connect this incident to Zhuo Xiao Mao. What could a two-and-a-half-year-old possibly do?

Here, Zhuo Xiao Mao is the youngest in the small class; the other kids basically start at three years old, with some arriving a couple of months early. Parents either are too busy or fear their child will fall behind at the starting line, seeing other families send their kids to school, they hurry to send their own.

Actually, whether a child can attend kindergarten also depends on the child. If they're too young, their psyche is fragile and they lack self-care ability; sending them to kindergarten tires the teachers and makes the child suffer, possibly causing aversion. As for Zhuo Xiao Mao, who is about six months shy of three, he now has strong mental resilience and self-care ability—he can eat, sleep, and use the toilet on his own, surpassing many three- to four-year-olds; moreover, attending kindergarten was his own suggestion.

On the first day of kindergarten, this guy let out a howl just as the teacher had finally managed to calm all the children, causing the other kids, who had just stopped crying, to burst into tears again—for these little ones, the first separation from parents makes crying too easy. Meanwhile, the instigator, Zhuo Xiao Mao's classmate, while everyone was crying, ran to the front table, picked out a big, nice apple, and sat beside it to nibble.

Who knows who he learned it from—this little brat is wicked!

The kids soon stopped paying attention to what just happened and went back to playing on their own; they had just finished a long lesson in the classroom, and it's rare to get out to play, so they won't bother with trivial matters. That's the difference between kids and older kids: the latter would keep discussing what just happened, while the former forget it quickly. To them, the toys in their hands and the slide are far more appealing.

Zhuo Xiao Mao scattered the car he had just built, preparing to continue playing; he laid the blocks on the ground into a circle, then stacked more blocks on top to form a cylinder. These blocks aren't all cubes—there are also triangles and round trapezoids—but this child can use these differently shaped blocks to stack the cylinder high and steady.

After laying out all the blocks on the ground, Zhuo Xiao Mao knocked down what he had just built, yawned, looked up at the tree, saw Zheng Tan, and immediately hopped over happily.

Zheng Tan came down from the tree, stopped at the edge corner, and waited for Zhuo Xiao Mao to come over.

Zhuo Xiao Mao usually doesn't talk much, is very obedient, has strong self-care ability, and after finishing his own tasks he often helps other kids; that's why his impression on teachers and classmates is very positive—only when he's with Zheng Tan does he talk a bit more, revealing his little thoughts that differ from his outward appearance.

"Hei Ge, Hei Ge, I just punished a bad guy!" Zhuo Xiao Mao said, looking for praise.

A bad guy?

That man?

To be honest, that man's first impression is not bad. His appearance is overly deceiving—he looks good, which already earns him points; after a bit of self-promotion, he indeed doesn't seem problematic.

Zheng Tan trusts Zhuo Xiao Mao.

"I saw him steal Xiao Li's little bear and then lie about not seeing it." Zhuo Xiao Mao whispered his discovery to Zheng Tan.

The Xiao Li Zhuo Xiao Mao mentioned is another child in the small class; Zheng Tan had indeed heard a couple of days ago that a child here had lost something—a crystal pendant shaped like a little bear, worth over a thousand, given by a relative. That child often showed it off. Unexpectedly, after falling outside and coming back, he discovered the pendant was gone; when he returned to the spot where he fell, he still couldn't find it.

The parents even suspected the kindergarten teachers. But there are plenty of well-off kids here; several have jade pendants. Speaking of value, those jade pendants are worth far more—why haven't we seen anyone lose theirs? Yet yours is the one that got lost.

They investigated but couldn't find anything, and worried about affecting other kids, so in the end they just let it drop.

Now it seems the person who picked up that pendant is that man just now?

Listening to Zhuo Xiao Mao's whisper, Zheng Tan finally understood: originally, Zhuo Xiao Mao couldn't sleep at noon that day, and using a 'periscope' he made from children's toothpaste and two small lenses, he saw it.

Kindergarten children nap here at noon and don't go home; Xiao Li woke up during the midday rest to go to the bathroom and fell. As for that 'periscope', primary school labor classes have a simple periscope made from stiff paper and two lenses based on light refraction; earlier Zheng Tan had seen some kids in the compound playing with it, but for someone as young as Zhuo Xiao Mao, Zheng Tan had never encountered one before.

"Every time he squats for a while and then stands up, he steps back—uh, that far." Zhuo Xiao Mao gestured with his hand.

In other words, this guy didn't just randomly place the glass marble; he put it there after observing and roughly measuring. But is this observational skill being used in the wrong direction?

But after all, he's just a little kid; he didn't think that deeply, nor did he intend to tell the teachers or parents—he just treated it as a little game for his own amusement.

As for why Zhuo Xiao Mao didn't tell Xiao Li about this, Zheng Tan heard his tone just now—he doesn't like that loud, showy Xiao Li who also wets the bed; he once even put a bug in Xiao Li's skirt, scaring her into tears, and nobody knew it was Zhuo Xiao Mao who put it there.

From a parent's perspective, now is the time to educate him about right and wrong, to figure out the proper way—but Zheng Tan can't, he's unable to, he can't even speak, let alone educate.

"Zhuo Xiao Mao, is this your family's cat?" a little girl walked over and asked.

Although Zhuo Xiao Mao said his name is Zhuo Yang, many kids still prefer to call him Zhuo Xiao Mao.

Zhuo Xiao Mao shook his head: "No, it's my brother."

The little girl's eyes widened upon hearing the answer, incredulous: "No wonder you're called Zhuo Xiao Mao—so your brother is a cat; can you turn into a cat?"

"No."

"Oh." The little girl looked disappointed, turned sideways to glance at Zheng Tan, stretched out her fair little hand to tug his whiskers, but Zheng Tan dodged.

Zheng Tan doesn't have much fondness for these little brats—no matter how cute they are, they can annoy you to death when they act up, they don't know their own strength, and they cry easily, so he also doesn't plan to stay here; he raised his hand at Zhuo Xiao Mao, who was about to say something to the little girl, but seeing Zheng Tan like that, he quickly reached out and touched Zheng Tan's cat paw.

"Bye, Hei Ge!" Zhuo Xiao Mao waved at Zheng Tan's back, turned around, and continued what he hadn't finished saying, telling the little girl not to tug Zheng Tan's whiskers in the future, or else "Hei Ge will get angry."

After leaving the kindergarten, Zheng Tan kept thinking about what Zhuo Xiao Mao said—that man is a bad guy; having such a person in the kindergarten is definitely not a good thing.

Just then, while taking a shortcut past the school infirmary, Zheng Tan saw the man and woman coming out of the infirmary—the woman was the Bai Lao Shi kindergarten teacher, the man was the "bad guy" Zhuo Xiao Mao mentioned; now the man walks a bit awkwardly, likely he really fell hard.

When they reached a fork, the two split up; Bai Lao Shi headed back to the kindergarten, still needing to urge the kids to eat lunch and nap, unable to leave. Meanwhile, the man took another road.

Zheng Tan thought for a moment, then followed behind the man. (To be continued…)

ps: (5.29) Outside, I spent a long time at night looking for my laptop charger, searched my messenger bag and backpack to no avail, just about to borrow someone else's computer when I discovered—hey, it was actually lying on the table…

Blind……otz