Chapter 26: No horse cart, make a sled?

When Li Long and Tao Daqiang appeared in the production team leading the horse cart one after another, Li Long felt that this was happiness.

Although poor, it was peaceful.

Seeing that it was getting late, Li Long got up, said goodbye to Li Jianguo, and returned to the east room.

The stove in the east room had been banked with coal earlier. He used a stove poker to poke the fire, and a burst of smoke and fire rushed up. After the smoke and fire cleared, Li Long hooked open the stove lid, put a few pieces of coal inside, covered the stove lid, and began to take stock of today's harvest and plan for tomorrow's affairs.

The income from the deer antlers and water rat skins, after deducting the sesame cakes, tea, and the gloves bought for Tao Daqiang, plus the ten yuan given to his sister-in-law, now, including his original money, he had less than ten yuan left.

But with the pack of bullets given by his brother, Li Long was confident that he could trade for one or two more frozen sheep tomorrow.

He planned to buy some more tea, salt, and such tomorrow. Even if Halimu's family had enough, he could leave them there, and then go to other herdsmen's places to trade for other things.

The herdsmen's winter shelters were not far from the foot of the mountain, but they had more concerns, and they had no spare money, so they rarely went down the mountain to buy things.

But they had things in their hands, and Li Long could trade for these things and go to the acquisition station to sell them for money.

Looking at the time, it was only ten o'clock, and he didn't have any sleepiness yet, thinking about what to use to pass the remaining time.

In this day and age, there were no radios or televisions, let alone mobile phones. It was really difficult to pass the time.

Li Long was thinking about whether to go to someone's house to play cards. He vaguely remembered that "fighting the landlord" hadn't become popular in this day and age; there were only "throwing the two" and "striving for the top."

Entertainment activities in the 1980s were very few; otherwise, Gu Ermao wouldn't have called Li Long to watch other people's televisions.

Up to now, the entire production team didn't have a single television—not even constant electricity was connected.

Just as he was thinking, dog barking and footsteps came from outside.

Li Long put on his clothes and walked out.

A person was standing outside the courtyard gate, and judging by the figure, it was a girl.

Li Long shouted:

"Who?"

"Li Long, it's me, Gu Xiaoxia." The girl responded.

Gu Xiaoxia?

Li Long reacted quickly; this was the daughter of Gu Boyuan, the only college student in the production team. According to his brother Li Jianguo, Gu Boyuan had brought his daughter to the production team more than ten years ago. At that time, the captain was stunned when he heard this was a college student.

In that era, let alone college students, even middle school students were already intellectuals.

Why Gu Boyuan would come to a place where even birds didn't really poop when they first arrived, not many people in the production team knew. But a great talent had come to the team, and he wanted to stay, so he was naturally welcomed.

When Gu Boyuan arrived, his daughter was only three or four years old, and now, calculating, she should be less than twenty.

Because of special reasons, Gu Xiaoxia returned to the team after graduating from high school. In Li Long's memory, in his previous life, Gu Xiaoxia seemed to have married Gu Ermao because of his pestering, and then divorced because of domestic violence, and after that, her whereabouts were unknown.

"Xiaoxia is here, is your dad okay?" Li Jianguo also opened the door and walked out at this time. Seeing it was Gu Xiaoxia, he asked with a smile, "Come into the house."

"No... no need. Uncle Jianguo, I... I want to buy some mutton from your house. My dad is sick, I want to supplement him." Gu Xiaoxia's voice was very low, and it could be heard that she was quite embarrassed when she said these words.

"Your dad is sick? Did he drink medicine? What kind of illness?" Li Jianguo asked with concern.

He was a middle school graduate. Although he didn't have as high an academic qualification as Gu Boyuan, he was still one of the few "intellectuals" in the production team, and the two families had a good relationship.

"He drank it, my dad said it's nothing, he caught a cold."

"Then you wait, I'll cut you a piece of mutton." Li Jianguo hurriedly turned back to the house, took a piece of mutton, and came out, but he didn't hand it to Gu Xiaoxia, but handed it to Li Long:

"Little Long, you send Xiaoxia back, it's pitch black, it's not safe!" Gu Xiaoxia didn't refuse.

Li Long returned to the house, put on his hat, carried the mutton, and walked out.

Gu Xiaoxia followed him silently, the two of them keeping a distance of one and a half meters.

In this day and age, people's words are fearful.

"When did your dad get sick?" Li Long asked.

"Yesterday. Yesterday, there wasn't much firewood at home, my dad was chopping wood in the courtyard, sweated, and caught a cold."

"That's not serious, just sweating it out will be fine." Li Long nodded. "Is there medicine at home?"

"Yes." Li Long asked one sentence, and Gu Xiaoxia replied one sentence. She kept her head half-lowered the whole time.

Li Long felt it was boring, so he didn't speak anymore.

His brother Li Jianguo meant it wasn't safe outside, and it was truly not safe. Don't look at the fact that it was more than twenty kilometers away from the mountains, but just a month ago, wolves appeared in the reed marshes outside the production team. The dogs raised in the team were not good-natured either; at this time, local dogs grew quite large and were fierce.

And even more dangerous were those hooligans who didn't rest well at night and whose energy couldn't be vented.

!.

Otherwise, there wouldn't be a "strike hard" campaign in two years.

The Li family was about three hundred meters away from the Gu family. The moon hadn't risen at night, but with the snow reflecting the sky light, the road could barely be seen. Li Long carried a flashlight, although he didn't turn it on, he was always prepared.

Just as they walked halfway and were about to turn, Li Long heard footsteps not far away on the opposite side. Gu Xiaoxia behind him leaned back, and he immediately reacted and shouted loudly:

"Who?"

When he shouted, the flashlight beam was already turned on, shining toward the corner.

A black shadow ran quickly into the distance, and soon darted behind someone's courtyard, disappearing.

A burst of dog barking rang out over there.

"It's fine, maybe someone passing by." Li Long turned his head and said to Gu Xiaoxia, "Let's go."

Gu Xiaoxia had lingering fears. She probably knew what the black shadow wanted to do, but she didn't expect that Li Long, who she heard was quite cowardly before, would be so "fierce" at this time?

Next, they walked all the way to the Gu family's door without Li Long speaking. Entering the courtyard, Gu Xiaoxia walked two steps quickly and opened the door.

Li Long carried the meat into the house and saw Gu Boyuan lying on the bed.

He was sleeping and didn't hear the movement.

Li Long saw that the room was quite warm, so he said:

"Prepare warm water for your dad, drinking more water will make him get better quickly." After saying this, he put down the meat and turned to go out.

"Give you money!" Gu Xiaoxia chased out and shouted.

"This is what my brother said, to treat your dad's illness, no money needed." Li Long waved his hand and went back.

It seemed Li Jianguo had mentioned that the work points earned by the Gu family at the end of the year were even less than their own family, and they didn't get much money and even had to pay extra.

Fortunately, Li Long remembered that next spring, the production team would change to a village, and the village primary school would open. The village would only teach the first and second grades, and the third grade would go to the brigade. At that time, Gu Xiaoxia seemed to be a teacher in the village primary school, and her family's life would get better.

He thought about the black shadow earlier while walking back.

Who could that be?

Looking at the figure, why was it so familiar?

(End of chapter)

There was quite a bit of money left. In his heart, he felt that Tao Daqiang had a share in this money, but for the moment, he couldn't give it to him yet.

Let's talk about that later.

What’s urgent right now is how to earn enough money for the bicycle first.

The next day after breakfast, once Tao Daqiang had hurried over, Li Jianguo, Li Long, and Tao Daqiang took Li Juan and Li Qiang with them to the Small Sea.

When they were almost at the Small Sea, they saw a horse-drawn carriage leaving the village in the distance.

Li Long thought to himself, setting out at this hour and still hoping to go into the mountains to haul wood? Are they daydreaming?

Thanks to book friends 161008195704931 and 20230112071150496 for the monthly tickets, thanks to book friend Tianjie Xiaofeng for the tip, and thanks to everyone for the recommendation tickets and suggestions. I will work hard and diligently at my writing. I also hope everyone will support me, vote, and follow the updates—which means you must read to the very last chapter and flip to the end! This is really important!

(End of chapter)