Chapter 91

When Xu Ran came back from the town, he felt that the gazes from the people in the village looking at him were quite suggestive. He had come back from the entrance of the village. Seeing this scene, he felt that it was better for him to take the road from the back of the village in the future.

He didn’t expect that there were more people in front of his house and all of them were here to watch the show.

Xu Ran waited outside the crowd for a long time but was not able to squeeze in. Just then someone shouted, “Xu Ran is back.”

Everyone’s attention turned to him, and Xu Ran at last was able to walk to his yard under everyone’s gaze.

In the courtyard, Liu Tong, Mr. Hu and the two children were present. Xu Ran pouted his lips at the crowd outside and asked Liu Tong, “Tongtong, what’s happening there?”

Liu Tong grinned helplessly, “I don’t know who spread that our family has invited a senior man who can plant strawberries home. Thus they not only went to the fields to see the newly planted strawberry seedlings, but also came to visit him outside the house. They didn’t say anything but just took a look, so I cannot chase them away.”

Xu Ran shot a quick look at the audience outside, and found they really didn’t have any malice. They just kept staring at Mr. Hu, while the latter one didn’t feel it strange to be seen as a monkey. At the moment, he was sitting on the chair and enjoyed himself by closing his eyes.

Suddenly, a voice came from the crowd, “Xu Ran, I heard that the ten mu of land you just bought was all used to plant strawberries, right?”

Xu Ran nodded, “Yes, it’s indeed for strawberry planting. May I ask what it is about?”

Seeing that Xu Ran had answered him, the man asked again, “Then did you invite this old man back to help you plant strawberries?”

Xu Ran nodded, “Yes.”

“Then how much do you pay him a month?”

Xu Ran rolled his eyes and said to himself, ‘What does it have to do with you how much money I give him?’

After a pause, Xu Ran replied, “Well, this is my family affair. I am sorry I can’t say anything more. If you have nothing to do here, please go back first! We’ll still have something to do.”

That person was blocked by the words “family affair”, and it was indeed not good for him to continue asking any further questions. After all, all this had nothing to do with them.

Hearing this, the people who were just here for fun started to disperse. But some people who didn’t want to give up returned after the crowd had disappeared. They then continued asking Xu Ran other relevant questions. Xu Ran was speechless about all these. He tried to send all of them away with unannounced answers. He really didn’t want to pay attention to these people. They were too boring. And at the moment, it was a busy farming time.

After all the people outside left at last, Xu Ran apologized to Mr. Hu. The old man, however, did not mind it, “But Xu Ran, they just came to watch the fun and they didn’t disturb me. Don’t take it to heart.”

Xu Ran nodded to show that he understood it.

Now, Liu Tong would be busy with everything at home, and Xu Ran had to actively go over the books and prepare for the imperial examination. He hoped to pass the test at one time. After all, no one liked to sit for the test several times. It was such a tiring business.

Time flew by and on February 14th, all the strawberry planting work on the ten mu of land was finally finished. Of course the strawberry plants from Mr. Hu’s place were not enough. Luckily, Xu Ran had collected some strawberry seedlings one after another from somewhere else and they all  proved to be very helpful. Besides, Qin Shuwu had also helped to get some seedlings from other places, too.

Still, there were two other great helpers who had contributed a lot for the event, Tangtang and Guoguo. They two had collected plenty of ash as fertilizer for the whole land with merely a hundred copper coins. Not only that, they had played better with the children in the village, and they seemed to have become the head of the children, too.

Both Xu Ran and Liu Tong were overjoyed about this. They hugged their two children and kissed them happily. Xu Ran also rewarded the two children with ten taels of silver, letting them keep as pocket money.

Every child in the village had got more or less money as a reward, too. The adults didn’t expect that their children would get back some money while playing outside. Naturally, they were all very happy.

Among them, Wu Mei’s family were the happiest. Dahu was the eldest child among the children in the village, very strong and ran fast. He had earned 15 pence alone. Although Yueya’er worked slowly, he also got three pence. Wu Mei and the others didn’t care about how much money they got actually, but they were glad that their children had grown up.

At first, Xu Ran and Liu Tong did not expect that both Tangtang and Guoguo would come up with such a plan for collecting ash. Xu Ran felt that these two children were really smart. If they found a good teacher to teach them, they would be the backbone of the country in the future!

However, they now met the trouble that there was not much money left in Xu Ran’s wallet now. To be more exact, they were now short of money. The total cost of labor and freight was more than the money given to Mr. Hu. In an instant, more than 200 taels of silver went away. What’s more, their family just bought two piglets and twenty ducks. All of these added up to a lot of money in payment. Xu Ran felt distressed when counting all these!

But there was no way out. They had to pay for all those.

On February 15, with the sound of firecrackers, Xu Ran’s new house’ construction was officially started. Everything to be prepared was in place. Everyone present was jubilant. This was the beginning of a happy life for the family, the family members as well as their lifetime.

Now their new house was at last under construction.

And Xu Ran’s family began to get busy. The villagers had already prepared the land for raising rice seedlings. Xu Ran knew that vegetables and corn seedlings were raised at about the same time, so he managed to keep pace with everyone there and spread all the vegetable seeds he had bought into the field.

However, since there were not many corn seeds, they were treated specially. Piece by piece of land was taken out, and the dung was poured on it. Then sickles were used to draw squares on the land, and then the corn seeds were put down in the soil one by one.

Since there was no plastic sheeting in this era, people in the village covered the seedlings with tree branches. At first, they covered them tightly, and they would not take away some branches until the seeds germinated.

At first, Xu Ran also wanted to cover the land with those branches, but he changed his mind when he saw the brown paper at home. He realized that he could use the brown paper as plastic sheeting，which could be taken away after the seeds germinated.

Thus, the whole family started to get to work, while Mr. Hu helped to put the corn seeds one by one into the field.

Liu Tong was quick and neat. He did all the heavy work, while Xu Ran was giving him a hand. Then he instructed several people who were drawing squares on the land and spread corn seeds. After a day’s hard work, the whole family had finished planting all the corn seeds, covering them with brown paper and then clapping their hands. The work was thus over.

And then, Xu Ran began to concentrate on his preparation for the test. He took Tangtang and Guoguo to read and study together. Liu Tong was busy with all the chores at home and outside. Mr. Hu would help cook pig food if he got up early in the morning.

The days were fleeting, and it was March 5th. Liu Tong had prepared early the materials for Xu Ran’s test and even specially bought tea in the town. As he heard that drinking tea could help to refresh himself, he made a few bamboo knots of tea for Xu Ran to drink.

The examination would be held in a town. Though the town was the nearest to their county, called He Shui Town, it had to take Xu Ran two whole days on the way to get there and he needed to find a place to stay in the town, so Xu Ran had to start today.

Xu Ran felt reassured to leave the family matters to Liu Tong, but the only trouble now was Mr. Hu. Although he was an old man, there was only Liu Tong, a Ge’er, as well as two children at home. It was always easy for people to gossip about such a situation. People in the village were always bored and gossiping.

Xu Ran and Liu Tong had a discussion about it and decided to send Mr. Hu to Zhuo Yun’s house for a few days. When Xu Ran came back, he could take him back again. The strawberry field did not need to be watched every day, so there should be no problem.

For this arrangement, Mr. Hu had no any objection, and he knew the town was not far from the Xu Village.

Xu Ran had also communicated with Zhuo Yun about this earlier. On the same day, March 5th, Zhuo Yun sent the shopkeeper to receive both Xu Ran and Mr. Hu to the town in the carriage.

Foreman Li and the others also knew that Xu Ran was going to sit for  the test. Foreman Li kept on assuring him that since he had left the new house construction work to him, he would certainly do it well.

After spending these days together, Xu Ran knew the construction team well, so he was not worried about their ability. Still, he asked Wu Mei to come and have a look often.

Even though Xu Ran did not tell anyone else about his trip, several friends knew about it. Quite many people came to see him off including the village head. The Xu Village had not got a Xiucai (one who passed the imperial examination at the county level) for some years, and even pupils (people failed in the imperial examinations) were rare. Xu Ran thus was now the hope of their village. Naturally, the village head would come to give him encouragement.

Xu Ran helped Mr. Hu get on the carriage while exchanging the usual pleasantrie with the people there. Finally, he repeated his encouragement and exhortation to both Tangtang and Guoguo, and gave Liu Tong another hug. Then he got into the carriage and set off.

From the carriage, Xu Ran waved his hand at the people outside, “Don’t worry about me! I will take good care of myself. Goodbye!”

As Xu Ran had been out before, Liu Tong was not worried about him, and he believed in Xu Ran’s ability. As for Tangtang and Guoguo, when they saw their dad went out again and that they couldn’t see him for a few days, they felt very down lowering their heads as if they had been bullied by someone.

Seeing this, Liu Tong learned from Xu Ran and tried to comfort them. He went forward and stroked their heads, “All right. Cheer up. Dad will be back soon. Will you give me a hand at home?”

Both Tangtang and Guoguo looked up at Liu Tong and then Tangtang asked, “Daddy, how many days will dad be away?”

“Mm, maybe seven or eight days! Dad will return before you finish counting up your ten fingers,” replied Liu Tong.

“Uh, we’ll wait for Dad to come back,” said Tangtang while Guoguo also nodded by the side.

Liu Tong smiled and let the two children enter the house.

Here on the carriage, Xu Ran and Mr. Hu just got to the Zhuo Mansion. According to the arrangement with Zhuo Yun, Mr. Hu would stay here until Xu Ran came back from the test.

Xu Ran had planned to leave directly, but Zhuo Yun insisted on his staying for dinner. Qin Shuwen also tried to keep him stay. It was indeed ungracious not to accept their hearty invitation, and thus Xu Ran had lunch there and then got into the carriage again for He Shui Town.

The carriage had been running on the road for two days and two nights so Xu Ran almost collapsed by the roadside. When they had just come out on the way from the village, the carriage drove steadily because Mr. Hu was present. Later, on the way to He Shui Town, only he and the shopkeeper were left in the carriage, so it was naturally not so steady and got faster. Thus when they reached the place, Xu Ran even felt weak in his legs.

The shopkeeper had to wait for Xu Ran to go back together, so he would stay in the town. Otherwise, he would be very tired from running back and forth in such a long distance.

The first thing for them to do at the moment was to find an inn first. He Shui Town was much richer than their town, which could be seen from the dressing of the people on the streets.

It was already March 7th today, so they had to quickly find a place in the town and then went out to get familiar with the surroundings. The time for the test was approaching.

When they at last found a inn to settle down, they had a meal and took a shower. It was about time. Xu Ran then decided to get a good sleep first.

The shopkeeper naturally learned from Xu Ran.