Chapter 162

That night, Xu Ran told everyone that Mr. Hu was going to leave on January ninth. Hearing this, Tangtang and Guoguo felt it hard to accept the fact because they had been on good terms with Mr. Hu who regarded them as his own grandchildren.

Looking at two teary-eyed kids, Mr. Hu also felt sad.

Liu Tong handed little Baozi to Shao Yu and went to console two kids with Xu Ran. Xu Ran said, “Alright, baby, don’t cry. Mr. Hu’s going home. His son comes to bring him a happy family. What are you crying for? Moreover, we can go to visit him at his home in the future. Don’t cry, baby.”

Liu Tong was also console the kids, but it didn’t seem to work.

After consoling them for a while, Xu Ran said, “Forget it, just let them cry. I haven’t seen them cry before. Sometimes, crying can be good for health.”

Where was the logic here? Nobody knew of it. However, it turned out that Xu Ran’s words worked. Two children stopped crying after hearing that.

Xu Ran smiled and asked them, “Why do you strop crying? You can stop it as soon as you want! It’s quite cool!”

Tangtang and Guoguo were amused by Xu Ran’s words and burst into laughter. There were snot bubbles emerged from their noses.

Xu Ran looked at the two with a frowned face, and the he took a handkerchief to clean their faces.

Xu Ran asked again, “Tell me, how can you stop crying so quickly at the same time?”

Tangtang said with teary eyes, “Dad, I found it hard to keep crying after hearing your words.”

Xu Ran asked Guoguo again, “How about you, Guoguo? Are you the same as Tangtang?

Guoguo shook his head. “Nope, I found that if Tangtang stops crying, I can’t cry anymore.”

Alright, this was called “telepathy” between twins. There was no need to explain it.

Seeing two kids were crying, Mr. Hu felt sorrow. In order to liven up the atmosphere, Xu Ran kept telling jokes and finally made it.

In the evening, Liu Tong asked Xu Ran what was going on. Xu Ran told him what Mr. Hu and Gao Quan had told him during the day. Liu Tong didn’t think too much about it, but he couldn’t bear to accept Mr. Hu’s sudden leaving.

Xu Ran consoled him, “It’s OK! Don’t be upset. We don’t know the real situation. Maybe we’ll know it after sending Mr. Hu back.”

Liu Tong nodded. “Okay, if there’s something wrong, please take Mr. Hu back. You said that we had enough food to support Mr. Hu, right?”

Xu Ran touched Liu Tong’s face, “I know. Just sleep, dear. We can get up early tomorrow and cook something delicious for Mr. Hu. Maybe he wouldn’t want to leave here after he had the food.”

“Okay,” Liu Tong agreed; then he blew the oil candle out and lay next to Xu Ran, holding little Baozi in his arms.

However, someone was doomed to fail to fall asleep tonight.

Mr. Hu tossed and turned on the bed for a long time. As soon as he closed his eyes, he could see his son with dishevelled hair and a dirty face.

Before his spouse was dead, they had made their living by planting and selling strawberries, and lived actually a happy life. Later on, their son told them that he wanted to to run a business with the money they had earned, and they trusted him.

However, they didn’t waited until their son came back, rather, they saw only a group of gangsters who came for debt collection. Unfortunately, all their money had been taken away by their son. How could they pay the debt? Therefore, Mr. Hu’s spouse was bashed up by those bastards. Even worse, Mr. Hu had no money to take his poor spouse to the doctor. After lying in bed for a few days, his spouse finally left him.

Mr. Hu believed this tragedy was caused by his strawberries, without which, they wouldn’t make money. Without money, their son wouldn’t be depraved, and his spouse wouldn’t lose his life.

That was why he promised to sell the strawberry seedlings to Qin Shuwen.

He didn’t dare tell anyone that his spouse was killed because of his son, who owed much gambling debt; instead, he told others that his spouse died because he had fallen ill badly and there had been no cure. Nobody in that village knew the truth. Neither did Qin Shuwu knew it even if he had sent someone to investigate it.

Mr. Hu’s son had never come back. Actually he had been willing to leave his house when Qin Shuwu promised him to take him away. Therefore, he agreed to help Xu Ran plant strawberries, but in fact, he didn’t need to do anything as Xu Ran and his families treated him like he was their dad. They wouldn’t allow him to do any hard work.

However, it turned out that he failed to get rid of his fate, and his happy life came to an end finally.

His son was back. His son, who had been away for more than two years, was back now.

He could tell that his son hadn’t had a good life these years. He must come for money this time.

Even worse, his damned son came to Xu Ran’s house. Of course Mr. Hu wouldn’t cause more trouble for Xu Ran, so he could only return his own home.

He didn’t know what would happen after he returned, but he was sure that he had to leave now. Anyway, he couldn’t turn a blind eye to his biological son. Anyway, he had to go back to his own home.

He couldn’t sleep but kept tossing and turning in bed all night. When it was day break, he finally fell asleep for a while.

The next morning, he woke up like nothing had happened and went to the kitchen to help Shao Yu cook breakfast.

Xu Ran said that he would make delicious food for Mr. Hu, so he got up quite early this day.  After entering the kitchen, he rolled his sleeves up to make food.

However, he forgot to make sweet dumplings this year again. He could do nothing but accept that he was getting senile.

Fortunately, there were some wine rice in the kitchen, and he can make something new.

Xu Ran asked Shao Yu, “Can you help me cook some wine rice?”

Shao Yu nodded, “Sure!”

Xu Ran wanted to make glutinous rice cake, and it wasn’t difficult. Moreover, it could be eaten as long as it was finished.

In addition, Xu Ran could also make fried potato pancakes. Although it was a little bit unhealthy to eat fried food early in the morning, it didn’t matter to do it for once.

With porridge, sweet glutinous rice cake and pickles, they could had a good breakfast.

Xu Ran had been busy in the kitchen for much time. It would take long to make fried potato cakes, and even longer for glutinous rice cake. It was a little hard for him to achieve all of these at a short period, so he asked Gao Quan to offer help. The dough of the glutinous rice cake should be pressed. Since there would be fried potato cake, Xu Ran didn’t plan to fry the glutinous rice cake, which could be eaten with sugar.

Tangtang and Guoguo were also fond of sweet. However, Xu Ran didn’t allow them eat too much for the health of their teeth. They must be happy this morning to be allowed to eat sweet food again.

The glutinous rice was soft, and Mr. Hu had healthy teeth, so he must be able to enjoy the breakfast.

During the breakfast, Tangtang and Guoguo found something new on the table and their eyes widened, “What’s that?”

Xu Ran answered their question and showed how to dip the glutinous rice cake into sugar.

Tangtang and Guoguo felt excited. After washing hands, they followed Xu Ran, dipping the glutinous rice cake into sugar and had a try.

Mr. Hu also smiled. He didn’t expect that Xu Ran had really cooked delicious food for him. Indeed, it was tasty.

Unfortunately, he didn’t know whether he would have a chance to taste it again.

Xu Ran said while eating, “Mr. Hu, I’ve made quite a lot of glutinous rice cakes. Please bring some back. You can steam or fry them before eating, and you can eat them with sugar or salt.”

Mr. Hu didn’t refuse him. He nodded. “Okay, old man like me is always fond of these things!”

Somehow, Xu Ran felt that Mr. Hu was actually sad when he said these words, but he also knew that Mr. Hu wouldn’t tell him the truth, and it was inappropriate to ask him directly.

Xu Ran helped Mr. Hu pack up his personal belongings including chess. Xu Ran had also prepared quite a lot of food such as cured meat, sausages and potatoes for him.

On January 9, Xu Ran drove Mr. Hu home in a carriage.

Tangtang and Guoguo badgered Xu Ran to take them to Mr. Hu’s home. However, it was too cold and they were too young now, so Xu Ran rejected their request.

Seeing the carriage left, Tangtang and Guoguo still chased it for a while.

Xu Ran didn’t plan to ride fast, so they would spend two days on the road and arrive at Mr. Hu’s house on January 11.

They didn’t seek for any lodging during this journey; rather, they spent the night in the carriage.

Xu Ran had comforter in his carriage. He had always kept them in case that he forget to bring them in the long journey.

Xu Ran and Mr. Hu wore many clothes and the comforter was quite thick, so it was fine to sleep in the carriage for the night.

Finally, Xu Ran and Mr. Hu arrived at the latter’s village early this morning, but Mr. Hu didn’t invite Xu Ran to his house. He even rejected his request.

Xu Ran wondered why, but he couldn’t leave the carriage and follow Mr. Hu.

Xu Ran looked at Mr. Hu ,who bent over, carried bags of things and walked forward step by step. Mr. Hu even turned around to look and wave at Xu Ran from time to time to ask him to go back.

Xu Ran saw Mr. Hu’s figure disappeared little by little until he could no longer see it.

Xu Ran wasn’t familiar with this place and he didn’t see anyone else, so he didn’t dare to stop the carriage. If it was really stolen, it would be impossible for him to go home. He didn’t take much money with him, and he had given some to Mr. Hu.

It was still early. If he went home, he could walk long.

Xu Ran stood at the gate of the village and hesitated for a while before leaving. He thought that since Mr. Hu had lived here so many years, it would be fine for him to go back here again. Moreover, he could visit him later.

On the way back, Xu Ran was still wondering why Mr. Hu rejected him to enter his house. After all, they had spent two days on the way and they needed to have a good rest. Anyway, Mr. Hu was really weird.

Thinking of this, Xu Ran turned the carriage around and planned to go back to check the situation.

Mr. Hu said that since his son was back, it was not proper for him to take others’ carriage.

Xu Ran thought that Mr. Hu probably didn’t want others to see him, so he had better to visit Mr. Hu at night. After all, he was familiar with the way to his house, and few people would notice his Big Black as long as he tied it around a tree; then he didn’t need to worry that Big Black would be stolen away by others.

There were food and water in his carriage. Xu Ran led the Big Black to a wasteland to allow it to find food by itself. Then, he rested in the carriage for a while and waited for the night.

When Xu Ran woke up, he saw the sun setting. He was on a lifeless wasteland, and no one would work nearby because it was the Spring Festival.

It was almost the time. Xu Ran ate some food, wore extra and tied the Big Black around a little tree. He told the Big Black not to run away and he would come back soon. Then he heard a snort of the Big Black, as if it understood and agreed with Xu Ran.

Then, Xu Ran walked towards the village alone.

There weren’t many people in the village and there were fewer people in the evening. Xu Ran saw two people from afar. When he walked to Mr. Hu’s house, he found it dark and silent inside. So weird! He walked in and knocked on the door but nobody responded.

Xu Ran wondered if Mr. Hu was asleep. Although it wasn’t too late, Mr. Hu had been in the carriage for two days. After all, he wasn’t young and energetic and Mr. Hu indeed needed to rest.

As for Mr. Hu’s son, Xu Ran totally forgot him.

After knocking on the door for a while, Xu Ran planned to leave. However, he felt that he couldn’t leave like this, so he shouted to the door, “Please take good care of yourself, Mr. Hu! If you need help, please ask someone to send me a letter. You know where I live! I’ll go back now.”

However, there was still no response. Xu Ran could do nothing but shake his head and left, feeling that Mr. Hu was over stubborn.

Xu Ran turned around and he would never know what was happening behind the door, and he would never know that someone was now taking his life to protect him.