Chapter Fourteen: Rui Xiang Inn

  Li Guoting didn't understand why Zhao Erhu wanted to pull him forward. He was even more puzzled as to why the boss of Fuchun Restaurant was chasing them. Didn't Erhu give him a silver dollar? Why was the boss still chasing them?

  "Second Tiger, didn't you already give the boss silver dollars? Why are you still chasing us?" Li Guoting followed Zhao Second Tiger as they desperately ran forward along the dark streets of Riverside Street, asking while running.

  "That silver dollar made me steal it back, isn't that right? Here it is." Erhuang ran while taking out the silver dollar from his pocket and flashed it at Li Guoting before putting it back in.

  "You little scoundrel, you're so unscrupulous, cheating people out of a meal..." Li Guoting's words were cut off as he heard loud shouting from behind. He quickly turned his head to see that it wasn't just the boss chasing after him, but also two police officers with batons.

  "Damn it, stop right there! If you don't stop, I'll shoot!" The police officer chasing after them shouted.

  Zhao Erhu saw this and pulled Li Guoting towards a dark alley next to them.

  "Bang!" A gunshot rang out, and a bullet whizzed by, carrying a trail of light, flying over the heads of Li Guoting and his companions.

  Zhao Erhu lowered his head and rushed forward, shouting to Li Guoting: "Big brother, lower your head, hurry up, run past this alley, they won't be able to find us."

  Two and a half big kids in a dark alley, playing hide-and-seek with two policemen.

  It was dark and there were no streetlights on the road. The two policemen chased after him until they ran into a dead end alley.

  At this time, Li Guoting and Zhao Erhu, who were hiding under the wheel of a carriage parked at a street corner, saw the two policemen running forward, so they crawled out from under the wheel.

  Zhao Erhu patted his buttocks, spat on the ground and said: "Hei Gouzi, go to hell. Catch me if you can, just wait." After finishing speaking, he turned his face to Li Guoting and said: "Brother, let's go, let's go to the hotel."

  "Live in a store? What kind of store?" Li Guoting was stunned again.

  "Come with me. I'll make sure you have a good night's sleep tonight." With that, Zhao Erhu reached out and pulled Li Guoting towards another alleyway.

  Li Guoting's eyes were pitch black, and he was completely unfamiliar with the alleys and streets here. He had no idea which way to go, so he could only follow Zhao Erhu forward.

  Li Guoting walked while thinking, these two tigers are really capable, they're not much older than me, and they understand a lot of things. He couldn't help but have some respect for Er Hu in his heart, but he didn't like Zhao Erhu's thieving and cheating ways. That was the behavior of the lowest class. Not worthy of being human. But now, without Er Hu's despicable methods, it's really hard to say how to survive.

  Following Zhao Erhu, they turned another street and the two of them walked to the edge of the city. From a distance, they saw a brightly lit courtyard next to the city wall. Walking further ahead, they saw several horses tied to the hitching post in front of the courtyard gate. Lifting their heads again, under the eaves of the bamboo door, eight large red lanterns were hung in a row.

  Li Guoting asked: "Ertu, what place is this?"

  The two tigers turned their heads and said: "This is Rui Xiang Inn. Isn't that what the sign above the door says?"

  "I don't recognize the characters. Does this inn allow us to stay?"

  "Inn, it's just a place for people to stay, as long as you pay, anyone can stay." Erhu said confidently.

  Li Guoting didn't say anything and just followed behind Erhutou walking forward.

  Arriving at the entrance of Rui Xiang Inn, Er Huo didn't go inside but instead circled around the courtyard wall and headed towards the back.

  After walking around in a circle, I arrived at the backyard of Rui Xiang Inn. There was a small door there, but it was closed.

  Standing in front of the small gate, Zhao Erhuo squatted at the door gap and looked inside. Through the gap, he could see a small path leading through a bamboo forest to the front yard, where a two-story wooden pavilion with large red lanterns was connected. From there, voices of people talking could be heard from time to time.

  Li Guoting stood behind Zhao Erhu, he didn't know what trick Zhao Erhu was playing again. He just felt it strange that the guest house wasn't supposed to have a big gate, so why did they come in through the small door?

  "Two tigers, didn't you say we were staying at an inn?" Li Guoting asked in confusion.

  "Yes, it's a lodging house, wait a moment." As he spoke, Erhu pulled out a thin wooden strip from his pocket and inserted it into the door seam, slowly prying open the latch inside. After a while, there was a "click" sound, probably the latch had been opened. Erhu gently pushed the door, and the back door opened a crack. He peeked inside, didn't see any movement, and then beckoned to Li Guoting behind him, slipping in himself.

  Li Guoting followed closely behind him and also slipped in.

  The backyard is facing a place that looks like a horse farm, a large area of bamboo sheds, separated from the nearby bamboo forest, and you can hear the neighing of horses.

  "Where is this?" Li Guoting asked in a low voice.

  "Shh, don't make a sound, someone's coming." Er Huo said in a low voice, then crouched down and moved forward from the bamboo forest.

  Li Guoting followed, crouching down, and the two of them sneaked up to the horse shed.

  This is where Rui Xiang Inn provides a place for guests to tie up their horses. Those original guests, some rode horses, and some drove horse-drawn carriages. To stay at the inn, the inn had to have a place to tie up and feed the horses. Generally, larger inns all had this. Some even had special people to take care of feeding the horses and providing fodder. When guests stayed at the inn, their horses and carriages were taken care of by the inn staff, so the guests didn't need to worry about them.

  Zhao Erhuo led Li Guoting in at midnight and slipped into the horse shed.

  On the other side of the horse manger, more than a dozen horses of various colors were tied up. The horses snorted, shook their heads, and swished their tails as they ate the fodder in the manger. A horse lantern hung from the horizontal beam at the top of the horse shed, casting a faint light over this part of the shed.

  Two Tigers looked east and west, didn't find the person who raised horses, then led Li Guoting into the horse shed to the place where hay was placed near the wall. Next to the haystack, on top of the roof, there was a two-story attic made of wood. Beside it, a ladder was also placed. Zhao Erhu and Li Guoting climbed up.

  The loft was piled high with hay, and a musty smell mixed with the scent of wild grass wafted through the air.

  Zhao Erhu said in a low voice: "Big brother, we will stay here tonight. It's not cold here, it's very warm."

  "Is this the inn you were talking about?"

  "Yes, that's the inn. But we can't stay in a regular one, no matter how much money we have, the boss won't let us stay, and we'll definitely be kicked out if we go in. Let's just stay here, nobody will bother us."

  As they spoke, the two of them quietly pulled over a pile of hay and spread it under their bodies. The two lay down side by side in the haystack. Then they pulled another pile of dry hay over themselves. It seemed they had settled in for the night.

  Listen, outside except for the horse's snorting and chewing on fodder, there wasn't any other sound. Li Guoting couldn't help but curiously whisper next to Er Hu's ear: "Er Hu, how did you do it? Clearly I saw you give that silver dollar to the boss, so how did you sneak it out again?"

  "Big brother, stealing these is just a small trick. What's the big deal? I've stolen even bigger things before," said Er Hu.

  "Oh, someone taught you?"

  "Yes, I had a master, unfortunately he's dead."

  "How did he die?"

  "You want to hear it? Then I'll tell you." With that, Zhao Erhu began telling Li Guoting the story of him and his master.