Li Feng spoke frankly: “If Er Tian really wants to split up with me, considering he’s younger than me and doesn’t have any skills, I could give him the house. But he’s always nitpicking about how I spend my money, scheming to squeeze grain out of you and Shun Ge, and he’s rotten to the core. I have to teach him a lesson. From now on, I’ll be his landlord. Every autumn harvest, I’ll come to collect my debts. He can pay them back slowly. If he can’t stand it, he can go live with his father-in-law’s family as a son-in-law. I won’t stop him.”
Er Tian has been married for two years now. In the past, he was discreet and knew to avoid Chen Guizhi.
When a family lives together, they don’t keep such strict accounts. The young couple doesn’t even have a child, and when they were told to save money, they didn’t listen. They just wanted to drain the family’s savings, thinking that it wasn’t a big deal.
One thing isn’t a big deal, two things aren’t a big deal, but can they keep draining the family’s savings every day? Even a mouse has its limits when digging a hole, let alone their family’s savings.
Their family didn’t have much savings to begin with, and they still had two children who hadn’t been betrothed. Chen Guizhi flew into a rage. She no longer kept the silver in her hands; she handed it all over to Li Feng to save.
In the village, most betrothals took place in winter. Li Feng wanted to save up for a banquet, but Chen Guizhi postponed the date. She had no silver left, but she had enough to eat and drink. The couple only cared about eating and drinking.
In the past, they knew to save some grain for daily use. Chen Guizhi would scold them a few times, but in front of Li Feng, she would cover for them a bit to keep the brothers harmonious.
Little did she know that Li Feng had only been married for a few days when he took all the meat and eggs.
This place is farther from the mountain, making it easier to dry goods. She could attend to both sides.
Honest words hurt. Li Feng said, “Mother, your son respects you, so you can control him.”
Living under the same roof every day, if she could control Er Tian, it wouldn’t come to the point of dividing the family.
Chen Guizhi remained silent.
Li Feng said again, “He’s my own brother. How could I not care about him? Let’s divide the family first and let the two of them fend for themselves. Once they know how hard it is to earn money, they’ll learn to be thrifty and take care of the family. If we have extra, let him do whatever he wants. Who cares?
“I’m not just saying this out of anger when I suggest he marry into another family. Why can Wang Dongmei control Er Tian? Isn’t it because the Wang family all fawn over him? Let him stay with the Wang family for a while and see if his own mother is better or his father-in-law is better. A man isn’t afraid of hardship. Even if the Wang family are just ordinary farmers, they won’t eat him alive. You just have to be willing to let him go.”
After speaking harshly, Li Feng softened his tone and explained his difficulties.
“You know the conditions down the mountain. Winter is fine, but once the weather warms up, there are many insects and snakes, and my husband can’t handle it alone.
“Now he has to open a small shop to sell goods, and there’s no one to take turns going to the bathroom. He also has to collect mountain produce, with people coming from both sides. How is he supposed to manage that? If we send Shun Ge to accompany him, leaving you alone in the new village with that couple, you’ll be so frustrated you won’t have anyone to talk to. How can I feel at ease?”
Once the reasoning was clear, Chen Guizhi was willing to listen.
She had tested Lu Liu’s attitude and asked Li Feng again, then nodded.
“Alright.”
The house can be rented out, but what about the fields?
The Er Tian couple can’t cultivate that much land. The two of them can manage ten acres at most; any more and they’d be exhausted trying to tend to it all.
There are still six acres left. Good farmland isn’t hard to sell, and it’ll fetch the same price, so there’s no loss. But Chen Guizhi couldn’t bear to sell the land.
Their village didn’t allocate much land, and the rest was purchased from the government office.
Selling it is easy, but buying it back later might cost another fortune.
It’s not easy to accumulate wealth over the years, and it’s even harder to acquire good farmland.
Li Feng thought, “Shun Ge’s share is on me, so I’ll split it with Er Tian. Sixteen acres of land, eight for him and eight for me. I’ll go find Wang Meng tomorrow and ask if his family wants to farm. His family only has Wang Meng as a hunter, the rest are farmers, and they have little land, so this can be distributed evenly. I’ll leave some room for maneuver and let them farm it for two years. Within two years, our family must not demand anything. After two years, if our family doesn’t farm it, we’ll sell it to them at market price or resell it to another family.”
Two years is enough time for Er Tian and his wife to endure hardships.
As for the taxes they have to pay each year and the grain they have to set aside, we can use the rent from this house to offset them, and have Wang Meng’s family pay some rent as well.
Waiting two years before selling made Chen Guizhi feel better.
But she said, “You’re not keeping any land for yourself. Are you really not planning to farm to support your family?”
Li Feng had no such plans.
Over the years, they had tried farming, but what had it accomplished?
Only large families with many members and extensive fields could make a living from the land.
Before the family split up, farming was already difficult for them. They worked themselves to the bone and barely earned three or five taels of silver a year. Saving two taels was considered a feat.
Li Feng had his own plans. As the pillar of the family, he couldn’t afford to get stuck in the mountains.
Chen Guizhi asked him, “What kind of business?”
Li Feng hadn’t decided yet: “We’ll see when the time comes.”
Chen Guizhi reminded him, “Don’t let the county business blind you. Yang Ge has an older brother in the county doing business, so you’re eager to do the same? We don’t even know how to read. Going to the county to sell things, it’s good if you don’t get cheated.”
Li Feng was about to leave, but upon hearing the name Lu Yang, he sat back down.
Chen Guizhi didn’t understand: “Your husband is Lu Yang, isn’t he? How could Lu Yang be different from Lu Yang?”
Li Feng tried to get her to say it herself: “Tell me, is it possible that I didn’t marry Lu Yang? Look at his temperament; it’s so different.”
Chen Guizhi nodded, “It’s possible. You’re dreaming.”
She remained calm, which made Li Feng feel uneasy.
Chen Guizhi pondered and made connections.
Only the young men from the county know how to do business, like her eldest son’s husband’s older brother from the county.
Anyway, her current young husband doesn’t know how to do business, so is the one from the county Lu Yang?
She asked, “Lu Yang’s younger brother?”
Li Feng: …?
His mother was so clever.
He gave up and said, “Yes, he’s Lu Yang’s younger brother, Lu Liu.”
Chen Guizhi remained silent for a long time, her expression changing repeatedly, her anger rising but then suppressed.
Li Feng had known all along, yet he had bought pig’s stomach to appease her.
She had also said earlier that as long as Li Feng could live well, she wouldn’t dwell on the matter.
The mother and son hadn’t spoken for a long time, so Li Feng dragged a chair closer. He was clever, quick-witted, raised in the county, and well-traveled. Though he seemed brash, he was willing to listen to his elders and could handle both household and external matters.
Living with him would inevitably lead to friction. If they talked things out, worked together for a while, and each made a concession, everything would be fine.
Li Feng refused, insisting on changing the match—and ended up choosing someone who had already captured his heart.
Li Feng could accept it, but she couldn’t accept it right away.
She told Li Feng, “You two can go back today, and come back for the New Year’s Eve dinner. This year’s New Year’s dinner will be the same as usual, on New Year’s Eve.”
Li Feng agreed and said again, “We’ll clean up the house in the next few days, and you can come and stay with Shun Ge in the first month of the lunar calendar.”
