Chapter 32 Little Bean

  Many book friends in the review area have been saying that the 9,000-word rent setting in the book is unreasonable and also mentioned the price issue during the Tang Dynasty. After checking some materials, Lao Mu felt that the book friends' opinions were reasonable, so he revised the 9,000 words to include the rent and the debts owed by Zuo Gui's family, including the money borrowed from Zhao San Niang for medicine and dowry for their daughter Huixiang, totaling 9,000 words, making it more reasonable. Lao Mu also wrote a short essay on the price issue during the Tang Dynasty and posted it in the relevant section of the work. Interested book friends can take a look and offer suggestions.

  ——————————————

  "Really?" This was the first time the girl had spoken so much to him, and she even gave him this little squirrel. Zuo Shao Yang was very happy and said with a smile: "Don't worry, thank you! I'll treat it right away!" Zuo Shao Yang put down his medical box on his back, took out surgical instruments and medicine, first cleaned the wound of the little squirrel, then applied the medicine. He looked at it and said: "The wound is not too deep, it should be fine. Just change the dressing a few more times!"

  The girl smiled and nodded.

  Zuo Shaoyang placed his fingertips near the little squirrel's mouth, teasing it. The little squirrel stuck out its tongue and licked his fingers, which tickled. Zuo Shaoyang laughed and said, "It's hungry, what should we feed it?"

  "Walnuts, chestnuts, and pine nuts are all fine."

  "Alright, got it."

  The girl shook the firewood basket on her shoulder, smiled at him, and walked along the mountain road with a twist of her small waist.

  Having walked a long way, those crisp mountain songs again lingered among the mountains:

  Brother Xin Xi

  Brother's footprints on the mountain slope.

  Whether it's sunny or rainy, I have to go.

  It's great to see your footprints, just like seeing you, brother.

  Listening to the mountain song, Zuo Shaoyang's heart was filled with a sweet sensation, as if a bowl of honey had been poured from head to toe, and his whole body felt sweet and pleasant. He wanted to sing another mountain song, but couldn't find the right tune or string together a sentence. Seeing the firewood girl walking away in the distance, and Old Dad and Fat Master already descending the mountain, he couldn't wait any longer, so he shouted loudly towards the girl's back: "Thank you, miss! Next time you come to town, feel free to rest at our Guizhi Hall and have a drink of water!"

  It's just talk, but in his heart, he has no confidence at all, and doesn't know if Guizhitang will still be his home after the 30th of the lunar new year.

  He carefully put the little squirrel into his bosom, and then quickly caught up with Lao Die and the others. On the way, he picked a lot of pine nuts to feed the little squirrel when he got back.

  All the way down the mountain, the child continued to cough. Due to incomplete relief of asthma, unrelieved throat congestion, weak phlegm, and constant light coughing, but unable to cough up phlegm. Before reaching the foot of the mountain, a small face had already turned purple, eyes began to roll back, and severe suffocation symptoms appeared.

  The plump couple were frightened out of their wits, hastily ordering the sedan chair to stop, and with clasped hands they begged Left Treasure: "Elder Master, my son seems beyond hope, please save my son quickly!"

  Zuo Shaoyang was also panicked, and there was no other way but to cut open the trachea from the front of the neck and use a tube to suck out the sputum. But where could he find a tube? Plastic tubes were impossible to come by, what else could be used as a substitute? The tube and knife had not been disinfected, what if an infection occurred? There was no anesthetic for infiltration, what if pain shock occurred? Now there was no choice, the only option was to first think of a way to suck out the sputum before considering anything else!

  Just as Zuo Shao Yang was looking around, preparing to find a gourd vine to use as a tube and steeling himself for the operation, Zuo Gui asked the young woman in a low voice, "Do you have any needles and thread?"

  The woman always carried a needle and thread with her. The young wife hastily took it out, not knowing what Zuo Gui wanted to do with the needle and thread at this time, and handed it over to him.

  Zuo Gui took it over, squatted down and found a croton seed from the medicine box, pricked several needles on the croton seed, then threaded the needle through the croton seed, tied a knot, hung it up, came to the child's side, stuffed the hanging croton seed into the child's mouth: "Young master, quickly, swallow this thing!"

  The child struggled to swallow the bean, but Left Gu's hand pinched his cheeks and pulled the thread back out, pulling the bean out again. The child's coughing immediately worsened, accompanied by dry heaves, but nothing came up.

  Zuo Gui made the child swallow the Ba Dou again, then pulled out the thread several times. After repeating this process a few times, the child finally coughed up a large amount of thick phlegm. The sound of his coughing became much clearer, and the phlegm in his throat was almost gone. Lying in his mother's arms, he breathed heavily with a loud gasping sound, and his complexion looked much better.

  The young woman asked urgently: "Son, how are you? Are you feeling better?"

  "Hmm..." The child nodded, panting, "Coughed up phlegm, not suffocating anymore..."

  "My poor child..." The young woman hugged her son tightly, and couldn't help but burst into tears.

  Zuo Shaoyang also let out a sigh of relief. He found the method that Old Man Zuo used to help with coughing up phlegm to be quite strange. He suspected it had something to do with the stimulation of the throat by the croton oil contained in the croton seeds, but he wasn't entirely clear on the reason. He asked Old Man Zuo, "Dad, just now you had him swallow the croton seed and then pull it back out, and that was able to bring up phlegm. Why is that?"

  Zuo Gui chuckled and leaned in close to Zuo Shao Yang's ear, saying: "In the past, when I saw your grandfather, who is also your master, he used this method to treat people who couldn't cough up phlegm. So I learned it from him. To be honest, I don't know why this method works either."

  Zuo Shao Yang secretly admired in his heart, ancient doctors had many useful TCM clinical skills, such as this simple and easy method, which he didn't know himself. Just now he was thinking of performing surgery, but thinking about it, it's really laughable. It can be seen that ancient doctors still have a lot to learn from. Although they may not be able to explain the medical theory behind them, these methods are indeed effective.

  As the son's phlegm was coughed up, his feverish forehead cooled down a lot, his limbs slowly stopped convulsing, and he became more lucid, able to converse with his parents. The wealthy couple beamed with joy, praising Old Master Left Gu for his divine medicine that saved their son's life.

  Zuo Gui stroked his white beard with a hint of pride, humbly uttering a few words, although he himself couldn't quite grasp the source of this pride. The method of using croton seeds to stimulate the throat and help cough up phlegm was one that he had confidence in, and it indeed proved effective. However, he couldn't fathom how the three white pills he had randomly used earlier could possibly have invigorated his mind, cleared his orifices, reduced fever, and stopped spasms. He was particularly perplexed by the fact that the purgative medicine he had administered the previous day had unexpectedly cured a case of retained dead fetus.

  He thought to himself that the two urgent cases were cured with ease using his own prescriptions, which shouldn't have had any significant effect. His son Zuo Shao Yang's medical skills were taught by him personally and weren't impressive, so he couldn't fathom that it was actually his son secretly helping behind the scenes. He wondered if this was just a case of a blind cat stumbling upon a dead mouse or if heaven really did have its eyes open, specially favoring him?

  Half a time later, they finally descended to the foot of the mountain and continued on for another stretch, arriving at Hezhou Shijing County Town as the sun set in the west. At this point, the child was already able to lean against the soft couch, coughing once while talking to his mother. The child couldn't tell lies; whether he was ill or not, whether his illness was mild or severe, it could all be seen at a glance.

  Fat Chao said he wanted to take the child to Hui Min Tang to see Dr. Nai, and Zuo Gui bid farewell to them with a bow. Fat Chao repeatedly bowed his head in gratitude, asked about the location of Guizhi Hall, and promised that once the child recovered, he would come to thank him in person.

  See them off in the distance, Zuo Shaoyang took out the purse from his arms and handed it to Old Man Zuo Gui: "I don't know how much money they gave us, but I hope it's enough to pay the rent."

  Zuo Gui pinched his nose, shook his head: "I'm afraid it's not that good." Although he said so with his mouth, he also hoped that he had misjudged himself. He hastily opened the money bag and looked around to make sure no one was watching before pouring the money into Zuo Shao Yang's palm.

  There is a string of coins strung together with twine, which should be one tael of silver, or 100 copper coins, and the rest are scattered copper coins.

  It's just over a hundred taels, although this has already exceeded the single-day medical income record since Guizhi opened the medicine shop (not counting that bracelet last time), but it's still somewhat disappointing, after all, it's still far from enough to pay off the debt owed to Zhao Sanniang.

  Just as he was about to put the copper coins into the money bag, Zuo Shaoyang's sharp eyes discovered that there was another layer inside the lining of the bag and hastily said: "There is something else in here!"

  Zuo Gui also saw it and quickly reached into the lining, pulled out a look: "Ah, it's silver!"

  Zuo Shaoyang hastily leaned in to take a closer look and indeed found several small pieces of silver, about the size of soybeans. This was his first time seeing ancient circulating silver coins. The color was ordinary, with a dark grey tint. If thrown into a corner, it would be hard to distinguish from a small stone, and wouldn't attract anyone's attention.

  It's too expensive now, Zuo Shaoyang couldn't help but swallow a mouthful of saliva: "How heavy is it?"

  "Probably one or two more."

  Left Shao Yang is delighted. On the 30th of December, which is the day after tomorrow, I will receive 3,500 yuan. With this more than 1,000 yuan, I am one big step closer to my goal.