Chapter 8 No Way Out

  When the carriage reached the entrance of the town, Old Wei said: "Young master, wait in the carriage for a moment, I'll go and talk to my family." He then stopped the carriage in front of a household's gate.

  I took a look at the house, and saw that the wooden door was slightly ajar, the grass on the roof was almost all gone, an old woman wearing tattered clothes came out to ask: "How long will you be away this time?" Old Wei said: "To Chang'an, I'll be back tomorrow. Bring me some dry rations."

  The woman responded with a sound and took out several corn breads and a piece of dark and salty vegetable from the house, wrapped them in cloth and handed them to Old Wei, saying: "Be careful on the road".

  Lao Wei responded with a grunt and turned back to the carriage, beckoning to the woman standing by the gate. He urged the horse on and set off towards Chang'an. Even after they had gone a long way, I could still see the woman looking in this direction. Turning my head, I said to Lao Wei: "Uncle Wei, was that just now your aunt? At your age, your children should be older than me, shouldn't they?"

  Old Wei said slowly: "We had a child before, but because we were poor and couldn't afford to see a doctor when he was sick, he didn't survive; now it's just the two of us."

  The sadness in his tone left me speechless. I sighed and sat down in the soft car seat, closing my eyes to think about my own affairs. Time and time again, I tried to guess the identities of those who had stolen the letter, as well as Zheng Xiong, who had always been someone I respected deeply, despite often cursing him and intentionally provoking his anger. Now, the image in my mind of Zheng Xiong, for whom I would have gladly given my life, was growing increasingly blurry, replaced by a face that seemed more and more terrifying and sinister the more I thought about it.

  Can't figure it out, so I won't think about it anymore. I started devouring the big bag of food I had grabbed earlier. After running for about three hours or more, the carriage stopped. Old Wei jumped down and said to me: "We'll rest here for a while, stop to feed the livestock before continuing on our way."

  Looking outside, since we are walking on an official road, there are many pedestrians on the road. It's now dusk, and it's time to feed the horses too.

  I put down my heart and said: "Alright, Old Wei, you take care of it";. Old Wei took out a small feed trough from under the carriage, filled it with a pile of fodder, and then took out a collapsible bucket, poured water into it, and placed it next to the trough. He himself found a stone to sit on, rummaged through his saddle bag, and began to gnaw on the hard biscuit with salted vegetables.

  I hastily picked up my extra-large meat bag and handed it over, saying: "Uncle Wei, you have this. I can't eat that much myself."

  Lao Wei looked at me and smiled: "Little brother, I'll just eat this one, you keep the rest for yourself, thank you."

  I didn't wait for him to finish speaking, grabbed the package of beef and two pig trotters and stuffed them in, then picked up one of his large pancakes and said: "Mine is too salty, swap with yours." After finishing speaking, I started eating.

  I just ate delicious meat, but the coarse and hard pancake is choking me, I'm rolling my eyes, while forcing myself to swallow it, I said to Old Wei: "You eat it, I've had enough of this pancake, if I vomit, I won't be able to get it out, if you don't want to eat it, I'll compensate you with silver."

  Lao Wei looked at me with gratitude and started eating the meat. While eating, he said to me: "I know you're a good kid, Lao Wei can't afford to treat you to good food, so I'll pray for Buddha to bless you instead."

  After eating a few pieces, he carefully wrapped up the remaining ones and stuffed them into his saddle bag. Seeing me watching him, his face turned red as he said: "My wife hasn't had this for a long time either, I'll save some for her." Let's get going! He then put away the feeding trough and bucket.

  In the darkness, I looked ahead at the gloomy road and asked: "How much longer until we reach Chang'an?"

  Lao Wei said: "In four hours, you can sleep in the car and arrive."

  "How long will it take on horseback?"

  Lao Wei looked at me with a knowing glint in his eye and said: "Even if you ride the fastest horse, it would take no more than two and a half hours. Are you in such a hurry? Even if you had a fast horse to get to Chang'an City, you wouldn't be able to enter now. The city gates only open at 5 o'clock."

  After I got on the carriage, I calculated the time and found that according to Zheng Xiong's big black horse's speed, it is possible for him to catch up with me before reaching Chang'an. He knows me very well and is familiar with my way of doing things, so I need to be prepared to defend myself.

  Sitting in the carriage, I looked around and found no suitable place to hide the letter. Feeling anxious, I reached into my bag and pulled out a pig's trotter and started eating it. As I ate, an idea suddenly came to me. I took out the undigested salted duck and carefully tore open a small hole, poured out the seasoning water, and used the large lotus leaf that had wrapped the pig's trotter to wipe the inside of the carriage's trunk for a long time. Then, I folded up the letter, wrapped it in the lotus leaf, and carefully stuffed it into the duck's belly.

  Then came to Old Wei's back and said: "Old Uncle Wei, I want to ask you for a favor".

  Lao Wei said: "Speak up, if there's something you want me to do, just tell me, no need to ask if I'm willing or not."

  I said: "I'm a greedy person, I see something delicious and can't help myself, didn't I just buy two of my favorite ducks? I wanted to save one for my mom to try too, but I couldn't control myself, if I put it next to me I would definitely eat it all. So I thought of putting this one with you, so I wouldn't finish eating it all."

  Lao Wei listened and laughed, saying with a smile: "After all, you're just a kid, okay? I'll help you keep it for now. Don't forget to ask me for it when you get home."

  I said: "Then I'll go to sleep, my home is in the Sun Guoan Sun's mansion inside Chang'an City, just send me to the door and that's it."

  Lao Wei replied: "Alright, go to sleep. We'll arrive at dawn."

  After I finished this matter, I felt at ease. I fell asleep in the car and started snoring loudly.

  Just as I was sleeping soundly, I felt the carriage stop. When I opened my eyes and looked around, it was still dark outside, but the horse-drawn carriage was surrounded by more than a dozen black-clad masked men.

  Looking at Zheng Xiong standing in front of me, I wasn't afraid at all. Old Wei sitting in the front of the car was scared stiff by a knife placed on his neck.

  Zheng Xiong looked at me and said slowly: "I didn't expect it, this place is only a dozen miles away from Chang'an. You can run to here, you really have skills. Where is the letter? Hand it over. I'll spare your life for the sake of our past relationship."

  I looked at Zheng Xiong and said: "Zheng Xiong, heroic Xiong. Which Xiong is the heroic Xiong?"

  The person standing next to me suddenly shouted and slapped my face. Zheng Xiong waved his hand at him and said: "Don't play dumb with me anymore, hurry up and hand over the letter! I keep my word, you know that. As long as you hand over the letter, I won't kill you. You should know that I truly care about you, this little thing, but this time it just so happens that you're the one delivering this letter, and I have no choice."

  After hearing this, I almost shed tears and forced myself to say: "Believe me, the letter has been sent from the post road, it should have arrived in Chang'an by now."

  Zheng Xiong said: "Are these the ones? One says 'Congratulations on getting rich', these two are for my pig head and a distress signal, and this one is for Shangguan Jing... Are they all gone?"

  My heart suddenly sank, it seems that none of the letters were sent out. I hastily asked: "Where is the old man who delivered the messages? What did you do with them?"

  Another person replied: "We didn't disturb that old man, I stole the letter after he sent it to the post station."

  I was shocked to find that the speaker was Ma Liu Jin. Zheng Xiong said at this time: "If you don't speak again, I can only use torture to force you to speak, hurry up and speak."

  Ma Liu Jin smiled slyly and said: "I'll take care of the punishment."

  I gritted my teeth and stared at the two of them, cold sweat dripping down from my forehead. Just then, Old Wei suddenly shouted: "You bunch of rabbit bastards, you can't even let a kid go, I'll fight it out with you!"

  Shouting, he pushed away the people around him, swung his fists and rushed towards Ma Liuji. While fighting, he shouted: "Quickly run, quickly run!"

  Ma Liu Jin dodged a few punches and then kicked Old Wei to the ground with one foot. Stepping on Old Wei's back, he looked at me and said: "You little brat really knows how to pick people, huh? Watch closely, I'm going to chop him up right in front of you!" As he spoke, he drew his knife from behind his back and started hacking away.

  "I shouted loudly: 'Stop it, let him go, trust me I've hidden it away, I'll take you to get it'"

  Zheng Xiong said suspiciously: "You've hidden the letter away? This isn't right, what can you do in Chang'an City without a letter?"

  I said: "As soon as I saw you were also one of them, I knew it was unlikely that the letter would be delivered, so I hid it well and thought that if it reached Lord Sun's place, he could bring people to escort me to retrieve it; if I were caught by you, the letter would not fall into your hands."

  Zheng Xiong thought for a moment and said: "That makes sense. I'll let him go if you take us to get it."

  I said: "Of course, I've figured it out, you're the one who led me in, now that things have come to this point, all I can do is follow you down this road."

  Zheng Xiong smiled and said: "Consider it a worthwhile lesson for you, I'll let him go as promised."

  Ma Liu Jin nodded and lifted his foot, saying to Lao Wei: "You're lucky today, get out of here!"

  Lao Wei stood up and stared at me blankly, saying: "Girl, are you going to go with them and come back?" As he spoke, he suddenly ran to Zheng Xiong's front, knelt down and said: "Sir, please spare him, I'll give you this horse and carriage." Then he kowtowed.

  Ma Liu Jin scolded: "I told you to get out, are you not going to leave? Are you waiting for my knife to chop you?"

  I walked up to Old Wei and helped him up, saying: "You'd better hurry off, just remember that I'm also a filial child." As I spoke, I pinched his hand.

  Lao Wei nodded at me and then got on the car heading towards Chang'an without saying another word.