Chapter 737: Great Surprise

Ye Yaodong asked his father to first haul a cartload of those bummaloes back, while he stayed at the dock to watch over them and weigh them in passing.

With so much fish and shrimp, Ye Fu had to make two trips to haul it all back; the third trip was specifically for the two sharks.

Ah Cai saw it and felt it was a pity too. He had originally wanted to buy the fins, but was refused by Ye Yaodong.

The essence of a shark is all in its fins. Usually sharks are bought and sold whole, and then sent to a specialized shark-product factory to be broken down and processed.

These two had been bitten all over by the bummaloes, so they couldn't fetch a good price. He wanted to keep the fins himself to make shark fin. As for the shark meat, if Ah Cai wanted it, he could just give it to him, but the man didn't want it either.

If you don't want it, forget it. Take it back and fry it up, or make dumplings—kids love it. Lin Lin Xiuqing isn't as stingy as her mother-in-law anymore; she's quite generous now, basically granting every request.

By the time he got home, there were already four or five women sitting in the yard, some killing fish, some sorting shrimp.

His mother was also picking through the shrimp while muttering about how it was a pity.

"Honestly, why didn't you find time to go gather them a few days earlier? More than half have gone bad, they're not fresh anymore, what a waste."

"You kids get out of here, don't crowd around. If you keep touching them, I'll turn you into straw bags, and tomorrow you won't grow anymore, just like that sickly little green chick."

As she spoke, she casually tossed a few not-fresh shrimp onto the ground.

"Get lost, get lost, don't get in the way here, go play by yourselves."

The group of children squatting beside her stood up with looks of regret on their faces. Only then did Ye Yaodong see that they had been gathered around a few goslings playing— no wonder they were all squatting there, and no wonder his mother said what she did.

His old lady was quite efficient though; he told her yesterday, and today she had already rounded them up.

There were six of them, quite a few.

Ye Fu said, "How would I find time to go gather them? Who would go? You go? The whole village was resting, watching the opera, joining in the fun— you want him to go out to sea alone in his boat? It's easy to talk when you're not the one doing the work."

Lin Lin Xiuqing said with a smile, "Those few days he was afraid of thieves, so Adong didn't go watch the opera either, he stayed home the whole time guarding the house."

Ye Mu shut up on the spot.

Dongzi really had been home those few days guarding the house, hadn't even gone to watch the opera, let alone gone out to sea to gather the shrimp traps. Who would have known the catch would be this good, and yet a big batch died.

The old lady also said, "Do more work, talk less."

"I just feel it's a bit of a pity, so many of them aren't fresh anymore."

"Didn't we buy a few geese back? The rest can also be taken to feed the pigs for the eldest and Li Li Laoer."

"So many dozens of jin here, all going into the mouths of livestock, what a waste…"

Ye Mu had just finished picking through them when she scooped up another small basketful from the bamboo crate with a small basket, muttering again, "Hardly any fresh ones…"

Suddenly she seemed to think of something, her eyes lit up. "Hey, why don't we just take them out and dry them in the sun, they probably won't be able to tell if they're fresh or not… we could still sell them…"

"How could that be okay?" After Ye Yaodong came back, he started taking off his clothes, his pants. He had been listening in without making a sound, but hearing this he couldn't hold back anymore.

"If this makes someone sick, who would still buy our stuff? If someone comes making trouble, what then? Feeding it to pigs and dogs isn't a waste."

The old lady also said, "Don't come up with bad ideas. For outside matters, listen to Dongzi. You just help out with the work."

Ye Mu pouted and said nothing more.

The other women said with a smile, "This matter can't be done carelessly. If it makes someone sick, we can't afford to compensate."

"Adong has earned plenty of money anyway, he won't miss this little bit."

"Oh, who would ever think they have too much money…"

Lin Lin Xiuqing ignored the others' talk, smiled at Ye Yaodong and said, "Go eat quickly, take a bath after you finish eating. It's very late, don't ruin your stomach."

"Mm, the cargo list is in my pants pocket, feel around and put it away."

The old lady immediately snatched the small basket from Lin Lin Xiuqing's hands. "You go on, you go on, go on in, we'll handle the work here."

Each of them had a small basket, scooping the shrimp from the bamboo crate into the baskets, then picking through them one by one.

Seeing her hands empty, Lin Lin Xiuqing didn't decline. She stood up with a smile, picked up the clothes Ye Yaodong had casually dropped on the ground, felt in the pockets as she went, and followed him inside.

"Since the weather's gotten hot, I didn't bother keeping the dishes warm in the pot. Only the soup and rice are heated in the pot. Let me bring them out for you…"

After getting their meal ready, she went back out to the door to help. Those shrimp and fish had to be sorted and killed tonight, then laid out to dry.

Ye Yaodong said to his father while eating, "When I came back, there wasn't much wind or waves on the sea. Looks like we'll probably go out to sea again tonight. After we finish eating, should I go to town and bring the boat back first? Otherwise we won't have time during the day, and I don't know when we'll have a chance to go get it."

"Even if we bring it back, we still need time to do the work."

"We could hire two people to do it, or we could take a day off in the next couple of days. We also need to go up the mountain and chop more firewood, prepare in advance, so we don't end up in a rush like last year, scrambling at the last minute."

He'd heard that in recent years, the cuttlefish fishing season had been getting worse year by year. In his previous life, Ye Yaodong seemed to have heard something about it too— it seemed like after some year there was no more cuttlefish season. He hadn't paid it any mind back then, but thinking about it now, he figured it would only be a few more years.

"Hiring people to do it isn't that reassuring either…" Ye Fu still had some concerns. After all, it was a Luzhou Island fishing boat, and he was afraid someone handling it might notice something off.

Ye Yaodong immediately understood.

Thinking about it, he was right— this kind of thing that couldn't be shared with outsiders was better handled by themselves.

"If you're not comfortable with that, then let's just take a day off the day after tomorrow. We can go up the mountain and chop firewood too. We still need to go out at night. Tomorrow during the day we have to go down and check if the soft coral in the crevices of the hidden reef is still there. If there's any we can catch, catch a few more— that's worth money."

Ye Fu nodded. "That works too. Oh… I was in such a rush to come back earlier, I didn't ask if there were still any abalone on the hidden reef."

"Where would abalone come from? It's only been a year. Wait three years and see if they can grow back. There are quite a few in the crevices, but you can't reach your hand in, can't pry them out."

"Maybe if you look carefully, you can still pry out a bit from the edges and cracks at the bottom, it's just that there's not that much time to stay down there. Every time Hui goes down it's in a rush, can only pick up whatever he sees."

True enough.

Just as Ye Fu was about to say something, shouts from Ah Zheng and Xiao Xiao suddenly rang out from outside the door.

"Is Dongzi back?"

"He's back, he's eating inside. You guys go on in."

Ye Yaodong also looked toward the door. "You guys got back a long time ago?"

"We came back as soon as the sun set. We came by once earlier when it hadn't gotten dark yet, and your wife said you hadn't come back yet."

"Let's have a couple of drinks. Lin Lin Xiuqing, get the liquor and cups…"

"Okay."

The two of them also sat down nearby.

"I wanted to ask you, when the cuttlefish fishing season comes next, should we do it like last year? Catch around that island we went to last year together?"

Ye Yaodong swallowed the rice in his mouth and replied matter-of-factly, "Yeah, still over in that stretch."

A-Zheng asked curiously, "I heard from your mother that you bought another boat. When was that? How come I never heard? How much? When are you bringing it back?"

Xiao Xiao also asked, "Are you planning to fish there too? Should we make room for you? If we look again from scratch and start searching now, we can still find one…"

Ye Yaodong was nearly overwhelmed by their questions.

"You two are firing off a whole pile of questions one after another—how am I supposed to answer which one? I'm planning to go bring the boat back right after we finish eating. I asked my dad, and three boats fishing around the area won't get in each other's way. Just set out your own spat collectors and let the heavens decide how much catch they attract."

The two of them also breathed a sigh of relief. "That's good then…"

They didn't know when it had started, but it felt like Dongzi had become something of their pillar, and as he kept doing better and better, the two of them seemed to trust him more and more.

"Following you means easy money," A-Zheng joked.

"Call me Adong and let's hear it."

"Pfft~ Then when you bring the boat back, are you going straight into fishing, or do you need to do some maintenance first?"

"I don't know, depends on the situation. The haul was pretty good today, so I can't bear to take a day off. Anyway, I'll bring the boat back tonight. I don't know what kind of date my mother picked, but once there's an auspicious day, I'll just set off a string of firecrackers. It's not my first boat, and it's not new, so a token gesture will do."

"You've suddenly got another boat anyway. The big ship will be ready to hand over next year, and that's a brand-new one, and a big one. A token gesture now, then next year we can really set off a few strings of firecrackers and fireworks to make it lively."

"That's the idea. Save the ceremony for the big ship, so the village doesn't hear nothing but my firecrackers."

In a few days there's still a third boat coming!

Even without firecrackers, the neighbors' eyeballs would pop out of their sockets.

"How on earth did you get rich? Right under our noses, we just watched you buy boat after boat. If I didn't trust that you wouldn't do anything illegal, I'd have thought you'd gone into smuggling too."

Ye Yaodong rolled his eyes. "I'm a good citizen! A model good citizen. I just have a better brain than you guys. Let me tell you—when you've got money, buy houses, buy shops, buy boats. You can't go wrong. If you don't have enough, and you're a little short, borrow the money and buy it if you can. You won't lose out."

The two of them thought it over, half-understanding. Dongzi really was like that—the moment he saw a shop, he bought it on the spot; the moment he saw a boat, he bought it on the spot. The only thing missing was buying a house.

They never saw him hesitate either; he went straight to the shipyard and ordered a boat costing over ten thousand, without thinking it was too much at all.

If it were them, even if you chopped off their hands, they still wouldn't have been able to make that decision.

"Then it looks like we need to buy another boat too…"

"Hey! There's actually a real chance to buy a boat!"

Ye Yaodong put down his chopsticks and looked at them with a smile. "In a few days the Border Defense Station is going to clear out a few confiscated smuggling boats. If you want to buy a boat, you can start getting the money ready."

"How do you know?"

"The deputy station chief of the Border Defense Station was drinking tea at my place the other day and mentioned it. Director Chen of the Haishi Bureau, while he was at it, helped me get one of those boats…"

"Huh???"

"Holy shit!!!"

"Got you a boat??"

"Another one?"