Chapter 6
Good books are read every day, good websites are visited every day, good posts are topped every day. Good books are read slowly, and there is a beauty like Jade in the book. This is the Golden House, this is the Mihua Online Library.
Ma Yingchang is younger than everyone else, but everyone listens to him and regards him as their leader. They sing that melancholic flower song of the Loess Plateau: The flower is originally a word in one's heart, if not sung, it would be unbearable for oneself; with a knife, cut off one's head, if not dead, still this singing method.
The melody of the ancient song sweeps across the yellow earth, yellow sand, yellow grass and yellow wind, sweeps across the vast Yellow River and the endless blue sky, with ups and downs, presenting a kind of simple yet intense beauty.
Ma Yinglong said: "Only poor devils sing folk songs. To follow me, Ma Zhongying, you must be willing to shed blood and lose your head."
The brothers put their hands on his hand, many hands piled up like a city wall. The brothers said: "You are our commander, we will follow you."
The title of "General" was thus called out loud.
That spring, the children on the embankment smelled the fragrance of their own bones. The old people cried out: The dolls are going to rebel.
That spring, the girls on the embankment showed off their maiden beauty at a young age. The river ice had just melted, the willow branches were still black, and the wild grass was still withered, but the girls were already as beautiful as peach blossoms. When they were very young, their parents arranged for them to be betrothed to other families. They were people with masters.
That spring, the son's bones hardened like wheat ears filled with milk, revealing the sharpness of a steel knife; his eyebrows grew into a knife, the corners of his mouth grew into a knife, and his whole body shone with a cold light, awakening the dreamy peach-like girl.
"Your father told you: 'You should have waited until you were 16 years old before sending you to your husband's family, but since your man is going to start a killing spree, you have to move in ahead of time.'"
The girl was silent, she was fourteen years old and understood things. Her mother was busy preparing her dowry. Her father said: "When your husband cuts you with a knife, don't dodge, you are his wife, your blood belongs to him, if he drinks your blood with a knife, it's like living a lifetime together." The girl's face turned pale, all the blood gathered in her chest, swelling into a flower bud. Her father said: "When your husband kills you, look at him. Those who can pull out the knife under their wife's gaze are all men of blood." Her father said: "Remember!" The girl said: "I remember." Her father patted his hands and went outside to bask in the sun, as if he had just finished a light task.
That spring, the young men wore black clothes and trousers to pay respects at their father-in-law's house. After engagement, they had to visit their parents-in-law every year, but only met their fiancée when paying respects. The girl served tea and handed it to her fiancé, exchanging a brief glance with each other, judging the other's appearance in that fleeting moment.
A lifetime of happiness flashes by like lightning, and both sides use all their wisdom to decipher this brief moment.
On the way home, the young man and his parents listened intently. If there were no songs on the hillside, a man's life would be desolate. Because of the girl's unrequited love, she was married to him against her will, and the sorrow was shared by two people. The husband's steel knife was quick but not gentle, and when fighting with his opponent, it would break into two pieces at any time. The husband could only use half a steel knife to fight bloody battles. That half of the steel knife was the incomplete life of a man.
On the way home, parents will abandon their son in a ditch and ask him to wait again. Parents are experienced people who know that flowers are the lifeblood of the wilderness. The flowers flutter and turn, and the son's life has light.
Most men experience loneliness. On the bridge, there is nothing but the whistling cold wind, let alone a woman as beautiful as a peach blossom. If you can't win over a woman's heart, it's your own fault. You have to take care of your warhorse and steel sword while suffering from loneliness. A knight without a woman's love is like a stone among stones. They don't have the spring of life, and they are often the first to fall when breaking through the enemy lines. They charge into battle with damaged lives, and the enemy's blade will give them a fatal blow at their weak point. The singer sings about them: No fragrance, no sleep, flames burning my home, ravens rolling over the desert, camels shedding ancient tears, making bloody sounds and suicidal cries. This ancient song originally had no lyrics. Singers sang for many centuries, unable to come up with words to alleviate the knight's loneliness and sorrow. It was a true loneliness, heaven gave him a woman, but he couldn't pull out that rib from his body. He charged into enemy lines without armor, his back exposed; he was so vulnerable to injury. A knight without a woman's love is as fragile as an untempered steel sword. Women are the clear water given by heaven to knights. Knights who didn't drink the water had to cross the Gobi Desert, and their blood would lose half its vitality; others were blood and water, but they had to be blood clots.
Singers can only sing out some intermittent melodies, and no one can capture the content of the melody.
That spring, Gao Shiling went to pay his respects and was taken aback when he saw his fiancée. The lyrics of "White Peony" suddenly echoed in his mind: White peonies are as white as snow; red peonies are as red as broken hearts.
The watermelon on the ridge is really sweet, and the peony that blooms in the Gobi Desert; thinking about it makes my heart sour, living alone is pitiful! On the way home, his parents abandoned him in a ditch. His mother was full of confidence in her son, "My child will not be lonely."
The parents left with peace of mind. A red sparrow landed on the tree, and the general waved his hand to throw a stone, the red sparrow fell down, bloodstained, like a bright peach blossom. From afar came the sound of a woman's song: Since you left that day, my soul has been lost in thought.
Others see you but I don't, turning around with tears falling down.
Sleeping sideways and listening with an upturned face, I hear my brother's camel bell.
Hearing the camel bells on the road, sweeping the floor and changing clothes.
If you want to eat noodles, sister will roll them out for you; if you want to drink strong tea, sister will serve it to you.
If you can't make a good one, then don't make a bad one. My sister will make you a pair of shoes that fit your feet.
The general turned over the earth mound and saw a pair of new shoes and socks on the stone by the side of the road. Even if the bride-to-be was bold, she wouldn't dare to meet her man before the wedding. The general had just hurried back onto the original path when he heard a woman singing on the other side of the mound, the tune making the yellow earth and deep ditch gleam with a quiet splendor: Focused thoughts, I don't mind, sister, muddy bowl, chopsticks stuck together.
Rather let him be emperor and the country be in chaos than for our relationship to come to an end.
Embracing your head on my bosom, I'd sacrifice my life for you.
You die and I live, heartbroken, sister won't die if you don't suffer loneliness.
The woman had been married for only a few days when the general led his troops to roam around. The sound of cannons in her heart evoked distant echoes, the sound of horses' hooves and shouts, the melodious military horn, often suddenly appeared in her dreams, she woke up again and again in the dark, her whole body chilled to the bone. The cold air on the northern plateau was heavy, but she had hot blood surging through her veins, not even a single sneeze.
The cannon fire had stopped, and her husband was nowhere to be found. To be exact, her husband had never sent her any news at all.
The heart of the Hezhou man is harder than iron. All he heard was news of Ma Zhongying's death. She didn't believe in this kind of death at all, and she firmly told everyone: it's a rumor, don't believe it. The family members calmed down from their panic. For them, not believing the disaster was the wisest approach. Soon after, war broke out again in the distance, and Commander Ma came back to life.
Her judgment was confirmed. Believing in an eternal life is a kind of loyalty from wife to husband.
Years later, her uncle took her to a very distant place to meet her husband, riding on a small donkey for several days, and arrived at the end of the Qilian Mountains. Her husband was training troops here, preparing to conquer Xinjiang. She only then understood her uncle's good intentions. Since ancient times, how many people have returned from battles? The uncle wanted his nephew to leave some descendants for the Ma family. That trip was as tragic and heroic as Meng Jiangnu searching for her husband thousands of miles away.
This strong man spent a week with her, and then left without looking back. They both understood the meaning of this, a long life condensed into six or seven days, and life presented an extraordinary splendor. Outside the window was the Rouge Mountain that ancient Xiongnu people sang repeatedly, and the vast grassland where livestock thrived. In a week's time, she remembered her husband's everything with a woman's meticulousness and passion, his voice, appearance, smile, and heroic posture when riding horses. Another new life, another shadow of her husband would be born on her! This was a vow of life! It was confirmed by the majestic mountain peak in front of the window. Her heart surged with waves like the ocean, but her voice was very soft and small, she asked her husband in a low voice: "What mountain is that?"
"Qilian Mountain, connected to the sky, is called Qilian Mountain, and also connected to the Taizi Mountain of our Hezhou."
She wanted to verify the mountain, she had to verify the mountain! She asked her husband's sidekick, a Han Chinese man with a refined face, who looked like a university-educated person. Her husband said: "Let him tell you, he is a Russian returnee, very knowledgeable." The knowledgeable gentleman told her: This was the ancient homeland of the Xiongnu people, during the Han Dynasty there was a great general named Huo Qubing, who led troops to conquer the Western Regions and drove the Xiongnu to Europe. The oldest empire in Europe, the Roman Empire, was squeezed out by the Xiongnu people, "this is called dog chasing rabbit."
"In our Henan province, we don't say 'dogs chase rabbits', but 'horses chase rabbits'."
"My wife is great, right? She knows about horse racing. I'll tell you, foreign students, when I was 12 years old, I rode a big horse and chased rabbits and wild chickens in the Hezhou area, no one could beat me, I won every year until I was 17, leading troops to fight against Feng Yuxiang."
That was just when the sun went down, Mount Qi Lian was bathed in a sea of blood. The distant mountains transmitted the loud neighing of a full herd of horses.
She whispered: "It's hard for the Xiongnu people to leave Mount Qilian."
Foreign students recited a ancient poem: Losing the Rouge Mountain makes our women lose their beauty! Losing the Qi Lian Mountain makes our six domestic animals not thrive.
She returned to her hometown in Hezhou, and soon became pregnant. The glorious years of a woman's life had arrived. She carefully nurtured her husband's flesh and blood, the child was robust and clever, just like a little general. A lovely child, a capable woman, the whole courtyard presented prosperity and vitality. Muslim women do not show their faces in public. From the old people's conversations, she knew that Ma Bufang and Ma Buqing had become high officials and made a fortune, which was the greatest wealth of the Hui people in Hezhou for 600 years. When people talked about Ma Buqing's Dong Gongguan or Ma Bufang's mansion, it was like talking about the Forbidden City in Beijing.
It is said that after Ma Bufang became the governor of Qinghai Province, he returned to his hometown in glory and passed by the gate of Ma Zhongying's house. Ma Zhongying's mansion was not high or large, but very clean, with a sense of grandeur that could not be underestimated, and a straight column of smoke rose from the chimney on the roof, piercing through the clouds. Ma Bufang involuntarily exclaimed: "Their chimney is still smoking!" His soldiers rushed over, "Sir, let's use cannons to blast him away, he's harming us." Ma Bufang stroked his beard, suppressing his intense emotions, and said calmly, "What do you think I am? How can I bully a widow and her children? Am I Yuan Shikai?"
The people of Hezhou all say that it is the blood of General Ka, and the chimney is strong, which smoked Ma Bufang black.
The East Mansion is good, the West Mansion is also good, but no matter how high the gatehouse is, it's still not as high as the smoke from the chimney.
After many years, a group of soldiers who had escaped from Xinjiang returned, and the Hui and Han people in Hezhou City all ran to the city wall, to the ancient ferry terminal on the banks of the Das River to watch. On the main road west of the city, dust rose high into the air, and the sound of horseshoes grew louder. War horses, a group of war horses, all from the Western Regions' grasslands, Yanqi horses, Ili horses, carrying a group of tattered Han men rushing towards Hezhou Ancient City.
The magnificent steeds from afar cannot be underestimated by their masters, they lift their front hooves and strike out with elegant thuds, then quietly walk into the city gate. The stunned people of Hezhou woke up from their daze and shouted to find their sons, brothers and relatives.
They drank three rounds of hot tea. These old soldiers woke up, repeatedly telling, "The big desert is so big, the largest desert in the world, Old Wei said that the desert can't be entered and exited, our 36th division went in and out several times, the old Muzi's plane was like a crow, covering the sky and sun, above their heads, tatata, machine gun bullets were thicker than balls, like carrots, tatata, tanks, armored vehicles, Shengshi Cai's Northeast Cavalry, surrounded by heaven and earth, four sides, cannonballs and bullets like snowflakes, tatata, we managed to run out of the big desert, ran into the Alkin Mountains, along the Qilian Mountains, long Qilian Mountains, ran for twenty years.
These scarred veterans returned to Hezhou with a radiant aura. In the minds of Hezhou people, a man must live out this radiant life in his lifetime, like charcoal or the sun in the sky. The soldiers under General Gai changed the radiance that had been deeply rooted in people's hearts for hundreds of years. In the past, Hezhou men would travel the world empty-handed, and after ten or eight years, they would ride tall horses, bringing back many things, and everyone would regard him as a good man; what was most despised was returning empty-handed.
People's eyes widened in shock, unable to utter a word, with a sea of hot blood surging in their hearts, yet struggling to squeeze out a single sentence. The children were so clever, the children pried off a shiny metal piece from the old soldier's shoulder blade: "My grandpa, the golden lump is buried in the bone!"
That was a piece of shrapnel, a memento left on the body from the Soviet plane's bomb. People shouted "Hurrah!" Children pulled thick bullet heads out of the veteran's cheeks and buttocks, as big as a child's fist.
"What is this thing? Is it a bullet?"
"The veterans said: 'This is a Soviet water drop bullet.'"
Everyone burst out laughing, "The Soviets made bullets so big just for you, Japanese devils!"
(Butt hole)
The old soldiers thus became heroes. The most eye-catching were the fine horses from the Western Regions, running in the mountains and valleys of Hexi, with their long manes fluttering and neighing loudly. The old people couldn't help but exclaim: "This is the heavenly horse that the Han emperor wants!"
Ma Bufang's soldiers saw these horses from afar, stopped in their tracks, lowered their heads, all wearing military uniforms and carrying steel guns, it was too interesting to treat the soldiers like this.
Ma Bufang had also seen the Ili horse a few times and was extremely envious. Later, Kazakhs who escaped from Xinjiang to Qinghai sent him a famous Ili horse; he rode it for several laps, and as he rode, he became dazed on the horse's back.
"Ma Zhongying, the carpet-beater, you've really made a show of your dignity this time."
Ma Bufang spat out a few mouthfuls of dry saliva, returned to the office to study the map, the 1:500,000 military map drawn by the Japanese, with the entire Tianshan Mountains visible before his eyes. The dream of riding horses across the Tianshan Mountains could only be left in his mind, and the white gloves on his hands gently patted.
The messenger of the Garrison Commander was brought back by a guard. Only one guard came back, without riding a horse, leaning on a date palm stick from the desert. He walked to the edge of the Dashar River, where there were no people, and went down to wash his body naked, like shedding his skin, and emerged from the river as a brand new person. Sitting on the ground, looking up at the sky, he seemed to have eaten the clouds in the sky after a meal. With a full stomach and contented heart, he opened his sheepskin bag, changed into a new military uniform, and became a clean and tidy Garrison Commander's guard, with a strange handgun hanging from his waist. He walked straight to the Garrison Commander's house.
The commander's wife was in the inner room, and she heard clearly through the door curtain: her husband had gone to the Soviet Union and his whereabouts were unknown, and the troops had been dispersed. The guard only talked to the old man and didn't see the person behind the door curtain in the inner room. The guard said, "The Soviets are blind, Commander Ga is probably not going to make it." The guard handed something over to the old man, said a few comforting words, and left.
(② Blind: Northwestern dialect, bad, black.)
She didn't know how she walked out. The mother-in-law and daughter-in-law looked at each other, then started to unwrap the thing, layer by layer, wrapped in sheepskin, which was as soft as silk. The last layer was indeed silk, a famous and precious silk from the Hejian region. Unwrapping the silk, inside was a jade pendant, like a lump of moonlight, like it was dug out from the heart of the moon, shining brightly even in broad daylight. The mother-in-law said: "This is Hejian's jade stone, your husband left you this treasure, take it." The old woman was calm as water, and the Hejian moonlight jade cast its light on her face, she said: "This is a predetermined thing, no one can change it, leaving behind such a treasure is also our longing."
She started packing things up, and by evening, after settling the whole family in with a good meal, she told her intention to the old man: "Mother, I'm leaving. I've settled everything at home. I couldn't take care of you properly, so I'll kowtow to you."
She knelt on the ground and kowtowed to the old man, "From now on, things in the back house will be entrusted to Eldest Brother's wife."
The old man was so surprised that he couldn't speak, the thing his daughter-in-law wanted to do was too big, the old man knew what his daughter-in-law wanted to do in his heart, but he was still shocked.
"My husband is a great man, just like a general. I know my husband hasn't died, and I'll go find him. Meng Jiangnu was able to find the Great Wall, so I can find Kunlun Mountain."
"Dolls, from ancient times to the present, going out of Yangguan and walking into the Western Regions are all men among men." The old man grasped the veil and covered his face, "Doll, your husband's guards have returned, but he himself has not returned, don't you understand?"
The daughter-in-law doesn't speak, the daughter-in-law feeds the child. The child is already two years old and has long been weaned, but in the child's memory, there is still a warm nipple. The child bites his mother's nipple, unaware of what big things are happening in the world, with eyes wide open looking at her face.
The daughter-in-law held the child all night, and the child slept very soundly. As the sky brightened, she slowly approached from the east to the west. She put the sleeping child in her quilt. Before dawn broke, she swept the yard clean, sprinkled clear water, cooked breakfast, paid respects to the elderly, packed a small bundle, and left.
The old man really couldn't move his legs, the old man knew that the doll had walked to the other side of the slope, knew that the doll had climbed up the ditch. The men and women of Hezhou could walk through the deep ditches and ravines. The small figure of the daughter-in-law rose and fell, and the city of Hezhou was far away. The old man's ears suddenly became clearer, and he faintly heard a woman's voice echoing on the ridge: "With a person in my arms, a knife in hand, I'll sacrifice my life to you."
You die and I live, heartbroken, sister won't die if you don't suffer loneliness.
A woman wearing a moonlight jade, after going through hardships, walked all the way to the origin of the jade and Tian, living in a small village between Kunlun Mountain and Taklamakan Desert, alone, guarding a clean and tidy yellow mud house. No one knew her identity. The local elderly only remembered that she was once a beautiful woman, empty-handed, came here, spun sheep's wool, made shoes and hats to pass the days, and later bought a house. A lone woman, strictly guarded by women's morals, beautiful and ruddy, until old age, still with charm, the local Uyghurs, Hans, and Huis all said she was a person with a god in her heart. People also knew that her husband was alive, in a distant foreign land, unable to return to his hometown due to various reasons. A woman who loved her husband so much was easily respected by the people of Tian. People imagined her husband, he must be a man among men, a powerful and mighty man.
Her accent is from Hezhou, and the people of Tianshui are very familiar with the distant Hezhou. Since the Republic of China, Xinjiang has been dominated by people from Hezhou, from Yang Zengxin to Jin Shuren to Ma Zhongying, but no one would have thought of putting her together with Ma Zhongying.
She smiled and let everyone guess. There were two people living in her, which was her happiness and also the difference between her and others. Occasionally, she would talk about Hezhou with everyone, saying that it was her mother's home. A woman's memory of her mother's home is always limited. A good woman, after getting married, slowly merges into her husband's life like a river flowing into the sea.
"You are our He Tianren."
"I've lived in Hezhou for decades, I'm definitely a Hezhou native, because my husband is a Hezhou native."
"What does your husband do?"
"He is an outstanding craftsman."
She was shocked, the majestic General suddenly became a craftsman of jade, just like gold diggers and businessmen's porters. All men who walked through the western pass were such characters. She believed that when her husband found the moonlight jade, he must have been moved by the beautiful mountains. The high Kunlun Mountains, where no grass grew, were covered with ice and snow, and the continuous mountains only produced beautiful jade and peace. Brave men would calm down when they came here. The people of Hetian were so peaceful, regardless of their age or gender, their eyes shone with a rare tranquility, under the sun flowed cool moonlight, this was the people of Hetian. Those who crossed the Sea of Death and arrived here yearned for the night of moonlight, yearned for the baptism of moonlight. In Taklamakan, there were footprints of high monks and mausoleums of Islamic saints. The beautiful jade shone brightly on the top of the mountains, even the sun had to restrain its light, floating in the vast desert like a sleeping baby.
Mazaar: A graveyard for Muslims.
The husband's lifelong yearning for the sea in the desert, and the sea is right here. The bloodthirsty men who rushed out of the Hezhou Plateau, all the way to kill, just for this piece of peaceful and peaceful land.
She sang a song called "White Peony", in the dreams of women from Hezhou, love would turn into peonies on the Gobi Desert. She must have been the first woman from Hezhou to come to the Gobi Desert, after singing "White Peony", she was no longer a person from Hezhou, and began her life with the people of Hetian. In the courtyard of the Hetian people's house, there were tall white poplars and fiery red roses. The first time she saw the roses, she couldn't help but pull her headscarf tight, such a passionate cluster of red flowers, placed under the scorching sun, without hiding their beauty! With a woman's intuition, she felt that this was the hometown of the yellow earth, the rough and rugged yellow earth had thousands of feet and tens of thousands of feet, also blown by the strong wind from the Kunlun Mountains. Take a look at the roses growing among the sand and rocks, the bold and beautiful roses with the quiet and elegant jade stones, what a wonderful combination! My husband, I'll sing you Hetian's rose song. She sang out a very authentic southern Xinjiang folk song, in the midst of the passion of Uyghur songs, mixed with the serenity and mystery of the Loess Plateau, she actually sang out the Qilian Mountains; there were also roses in the Qilian Mountains, which was something she never thought of.
