The leaders lined up to congratulate her family, and Wang Ximei was honored like an old matriarch.
Her divorce was kept secret from the team.
She had to marry Section Chief Wei; otherwise, her family’s prestige would vanish.
But of course, that was the supporting female character; Chen Mianmian was selfish and only cared about herself.
Secretary Chen’s smile lingered, then he saw her rolling up the letter and turned around, eyebrows rising sharply.
He reached out to snatch it, but a strong hand grabbed his: “Secretary Chen!”
Zhao Lingcheng didn’t remove his steel helmet or get off the bike.
His voice was hoarse and firm: “With this Letter of Merit for Living Lei Feng, you and your commune have already received enough. Now please return it to my wife. Thank you.”
With that letter posted, the Red Guards who came wouldn’t dare beat anyone and had to go do labor.
Higher leaders liked to praise Secretary Chen because Chen Mianmian was his protégé.
Without it, Hongqi Commune’s glory would be gone.
Secretary Chen didn’t want to lose face; he rolled his eyes and tried to play the victim.
But Zhao Lingcheng sneered: “Mianmian’s success isn’t because of her mother or you. It’s the people, the Party, the government, and her own abilities. She owes you nothing and owes no gratitude.”
Secretary Chen was puzzled how Zhao Lingcheng knew what he was about to say.
Under Zhao Lingcheng’s icy stare, he staggered back and saluted: “Commander, please go safely.”
His wife’s heart pounded; her belly gave a slight twitch—that was the baby moving.
Zhao Lingcheng saluted back: “Goodbye, Secretary Chen!”
This trip, Chen Mianmian’s actions surely dazzled Zhao Lingcheng, but it wasn’t over yet.
Chen Huandi’s husband’s family lived in New Village, on a cement road, their house right by the roadside.
Fearing meeting his mother-in-law, Zhao Lingcheng wanted to speed up.
But Chen Mianmian kept patting him: “Ride slower, slower, good, stop.”
Zhao Lingcheng braked hard, just in front of Chen Huandi’s yard gate.
He turned his head and just saw his mother-in-law.
Wang Ximei sat in the center of the yard, basking in the sun, wrapping cloth around her feet.
Chen Mianmian affectionately called out, “Dear mother!”
The sky over the Hexi Corridor was cloudless, the blue sunlight dazzling and hot.
But in that moment, Zhao Lingcheng broke out in a cold sweat, as if falling into an ice cave.
He thought he had been dreaming before, thought his wife had reverted to her nature.
But it was too late. Wang Ximei looked up and stopped wrapping her feet: “Mianmian!”
She grabbed a stick and went outside, calling repeatedly: “The most filial, capable girl in all Hongqi Commune, my Mianmian!”
Chen Mianmian held something up: “Mother, look what this is?”
Chen Jinhui had just been released from detention and reported back to work.
Although scolded by leaders, he kept his job.
Wang Ximei finally relaxed and came to her eldest daughter’s home to recuperate.
At noon, Chen Huandi cooked a dish of Cadres’ Down-to-the-Countryside Dishes with two eggs and some vermicelli, making her full.
Then Chen Huandi carried her son to the fields to earn work points, while Wang Ximei basked in the sun, rewrapping her feet.
She never believed her second daughter would be so heartless as to sever ties and abandon her.
Seeing her daughter come, she was overjoyed.
Seeing the radio her daughter held, and sitting on the motorcycle, she grinned ear to ear: “You want to give mother a radio?”
Thinking it was a new radio, she said, “I could’ve crushed you back then, said I’d sell you off. Back then, people still ate others, but I kept you, raised you with hardship. I knew you’d repay me.”
Zhao Lingcheng stiffened all over; the baby kicked him again.
Father and daughter were dumbfounded; they couldn’t figure out what Chen Mianmian was up to.
At that moment, she leaned close to Zhao Lingcheng’s ear: “Ride forward, don’t go too fast, or grandma can’t keep up.”
Turning back, she smiled: “Mother, look, such a nice radio to give to my brother.”
Wang Ximei’s feet weren’t well wrapped and couldn’t run fast, but seeing the motorcycle take off, she painfully chased after it: “Right, right, give it to your brother.”
She added, “A daughter is an outsider; a son is a pillar. To repay mother, you have to be good to Jinhui.”
But the motorcycle kept moving forward, grandma tried to keep up but couldn’t.
“Mother?”
She couldn’t go on, bent over to rest.
Chen Mianmian took out a wad of money, turned and said, “Mother, look, I have so much money. What do you think I should do with it?”
Wang Ximei saw the big bills in her daughter’s hands.
She tore off her foot wrappings and ran: “Mianmian, your brother’s wife left him. Your brother needs to remarry.”
She hopped and jumped: “It’s not easy for a widow to raise you. The bride price must be paid by you. Give me the money!”
Chen Mianmian supported her belly, shaking the money: “Come get it, come get it.”
Wang Ximei sprinted hard, almost grabbing the money but missed.
She tried again, barely falling short.
She had already run two li [about one kilometer] when she realized something was wrong: “Damn you, Mianmian, short-lived Mianmian, you’re tricking your old…”
Crash! The radio fell and shattered at her feet.
Wang Ximei, furious, chased after her: “That’s my radio, you damn girl, you broke my radio!”
Chen Mianmian shouted back, “I smashed it, but I wouldn’t give it to you, you old witch.”
Zhao Lingcheng dared neither go too fast nor too slow, nor say a word.
He didn’t know what his wife was up to.
He wasn’t afraid of her cursing but was afraid she might abuse elders.
Wang Ximei ran so much her feet bled, and she was furious: “Mianmian, you heartless white-eyed wolf.”
Chen Mianmian smashed half a bottle of Mao-tai Liquor on the ground: “Come on, come hit me.”
That was Chen Jinhui’s favorite liquor, only drunk half a bottle when entertaining Section Chief Wei.
She had smashed it!
But there was more—
Russian Matryoshka Dolls, postcards—she opened the bag and threw them everywhere.
Ignoring her bleeding feet, Wang Ximei chased and cursed: “I should have sold you long ago.”
She stumbled and fell, wailing: “Jinhui loved meat so much as a child; I never sold you for meat. You heartless girl, I curse you to have only daughters, ten daughters!”
Tearing at her clothes, she yelled, “Help! Help! My daughter wants to kill me!”
Zhao Lingcheng naturally stopped the bike because laborers in the field heard the shouts and ran over.
If he hadn’t stopped, he might have been accused of fleeing an accident.
He didn’t know how to end this; his mind was blank.
But Chen Mianmian clearly had a plan.
She didn’t get off the bike, holding her belly and Zhao Lingcheng’s back, shouting: “Neighbors, that’s my mother, but we have long since severed ties.”
She raised a paper, showing it to the approaching people: “Neighbors, my mother and I have severed ties.”
Wang Ximei then remembered the Duanqinshu written by Xu Xiaomei, and as an illiterate, she believed that document was valid.
The villagers also thought that once ties were severed, no issues remained, and no one could say anything.
But a mother whose daughter once was more loyal than a dog, who gave her everything immediately, how could Wang Ximei’s heart be at ease?
She began a “magical attack,” biting her finger, drawing circles on the ground with her blood.
She said, “Damn you, Mianmian. Even if I become a ghost, I won’t let you go!”
Chen Mianmian laughed: “You little Xiao Foot Ghost, you can’t catch up to my big feet.”
She had big feet because she ran wild in the mountains since childhood.
She could run fast; Wang Ximei, with her tiny feet, couldn’t catch her.
Wang Ximei looked at her bleeding, ulcerated feet, then at her daughter’s big wild feet, and stopped drawing circles, broken.
Because she realized even as a ghost, she couldn’t catch her daughter.
But her daughter had once been more loyal than a dog, delivering everything she found immediately.
How did she become so heartless, so cruel, with no love for her mother?
She was truly iron-hearted.
She slapped a man: “We have the Letter of Severance. I’m not afraid. Let’s go.”
Then she got on the brand-new big motorcycle and left boldly.
She even waved: “Goodbye, Xiao Foot Ghost!”
Though the old lady was pitiful, some couldn’t help but say, “Your little foot really is a little ghost’s foot.”
Others said, “So ugly and dirty, why wrap them like that? It’s disgusting.”
In Wang Ximei’s childhood, foot binding meant nobility and lady’s fate.
The smaller the feet, the more noble.
After liberation, everyone found small feet disgusting.
In a fit of anger, she grabbed her foot bones and twisted them until they cracked: “Chen Mianmian, I won’t forgive you.”
To catch her daughter as a ghost, she forced her feet open.
Then she told everyone: “I advise you, if you have daughters, break their feet immediately. Otherwise, no matter how well you raise them, once married, they’ll turn their elbows out and not care for their mothers. To be a good person, you must have sons.”
She muttered through gritted teeth: “Mianmian, I curse you to have daughters, only daughters!”
She abandoned personal dignity to enjoy a spiteful life.
Chen Mianmian had at last taught the difficult old lady a lesson—felt great!
Wang Ximei wasn’t undeserving; her maternal family was wealthy, running a grain store.
In the old society, poor girls rarely bound their feet; Wang Ximei did it because her family was rich.
But her father squandered the family fortune on opium and sold her to the supporting female character’s family; she lost the status of a young lady.
Her obsession with foot binding was really nostalgia for the high life.
She had no servants but could have children; she treated her daughters like laborers.
Although the government repeatedly urged her to send her two daughters to literacy classes after liberation, she refused, wanting to keep them ignorant.
Because she knew that if they learned and understood reason, they wouldn’t listen to her twisted logic.
She not only harmed the supporting female character but also Niuniu.
Finally escaping her mother-in-law, they immediately entered the city.
Zhao Lingcheng sighed in relief.
Stopping the motorcycle, he handed his wife a thermos and said hoarsely, “Drink some water, eat some bread.”
Since their morning meal, it was almost three in the afternoon, and they still hadn’t eaten.
All they had to eat were steamed buns. Luckily, Jiang Xia steamed really good buns; otherwise, Chen Mianmian would have grown tired of them.
Suddenly, she felt something off and turned: “Why are you looking at me?”
Zhao Lingcheng’s skin was pale, ears bright red—very obvious, but luckily he wore a helmet, so Chen Mianmian didn’t see.
Because of pregnancy, she was swollen and looked plumper and fairer, actually quite pretty.
Before, aside from basic sleep, she spent all her time desperately scavenging food, skinny as a ghost.
Zhao Lingcheng said, “You’ve at least taken up three brick kilns—one for bread. What’s in the others?”
Chen Mianmian was surprised: “There’s no name on the kilns. How do you know I have three?”
Zhao Lingcheng only asked, “Are they also filled with bread?”
Chen Mianmian only showed him one brick kiln, but he had observed before that the entrances of all three were sprinkled with ash and attapulgite, used to prevent ants and mice.
Only Chen Mianmian stored grain in this way.
He was naturally curious about what treasures she hid in the other two.
But Chen Mianmian wouldn’t answer because those two kilns also contained things the supporting female character earned with blood and sweat.
Those were the wealth of her and Niuniu, which she planned to exchange for money in the future.
She smiled, helping Zhao Lingcheng up: “If you want to know, trade money for it. I’ll rest now; let’s go.”
Zhao Lingcheng first helped her onto the bike, then awkwardly got on himself, and said, “What you did earlier was to force Wang Ximei to unwrap her foot bindings, but I don’t think she’ll appreciate it. She’ll only hate you and think raising daughters is useless.”
Indeed, Chen Mianmian wasn’t so idle as to just play with an old lady.
But Chen Jinhui was an unfilial son who wouldn’t care for elders, and Chen Huandi often got beaten by her husband and didn’t dare help her mother too much.
With her bound feet, Wang Ximei was unable to work and needed support.
Would the commune find her to force her to support herself?
If Wang Ximei unwrapped her feet and became independent, Chen Mianmian wouldn’t worry about support.
Her waist hurt from sitting too long; she rested her chin on Zhao Lingcheng’s shoulder and murmured, “Thank you for taking me to the Gong’an Bureau.”
Every man secretly dreams of married life.
Today was what Zhao Lingcheng imagined their honeymoon should be like after they got married.
Unfortunately, the trip was short, only 40 kilometers.
He still had to go to the Gong’an Bureau.
Because the Sino-Soviet conflict was inevitable, and spies existed and were hidden.
He had to talk with the police to restart the spy case and catch the big spy who sold the military coordinates of the Northwest military industry years ago, eliminating the hidden danger.
He thought Chen Mianmian had something unimportant to do, and their daughter needed more nutrition.
He said, “I’ll go to the Gong’an Bureau myself. You go wait in the waiting room, drink milk powder, and eat biscuits.”
Chen Mianmian giggled, “So, can you get the Red Guards to stop going to the farm and beating the old revolutionaries?”
Then immediately said, “If I don’t interfere, a few old men will surely get beaten to death. How will you thank me? Or should we just talk money? You give me money?”
The Red Guards hadn’t been to the farm recently because they were busy dealing with the Xu brothers.
But after finishing with them, they would go back.
Especially Qi Jiali, Old Qi, was so stubborn-boned, the Red Guards loved beating him the most.
Just yesterday, the Steel Plant Women’s Federation’s Director Qiu was beaten by the Red Guards.
Yan General and the Deputy Secretary of Quancheng trembled when seeing the Red Guards.
But the kids ignored them, and even whipped them.
All over the country, government leaders worked during the day and went to get whipped by Red Guards at night.
But among those Zhao Lingcheng knew, the only one who got along well with the Red Guards was his wife, Chen Mianmian.
Money matters could wait; the important thing was she could really handle the Red Guards.
Zhao Lingcheng took the matter seriously and said, “Should I take an extra day off? That would require a telegram to explain to the base.”
Chen Mianmian still smiled: “It’s just a kid. A few coaxing words on the way are enough; no need to take leave.”
The Red Guards, feared by all, were said by her to be easily handled with a few words!
She asked again, “Let’s talk money. How much are you planning to give me?”