Who Stole My Pressure Cooker (6)

Chapter 26

This was Sun Er…

Yun Song felt a sense of confusion in her heart. “When was the last time you saw him? What was he doing at the time?”

Now that she thought about it… it really had been a while since anyone had seen this man.

If Liao Shanchun had seen Sun Er at any point recently, she would have immediately suspected him of stealing her pressure cooker. After all, a pressure cooker wasn’t like a heavy iron wok; it was light and new. If someone took it to town to sell, it would certainly fetch a decent price.

But Sun Er hadn’t been home lately.

So when was the last time they encountered him?

The mother-in-law and daughter-in-law began to reminisce. Having something to focus on actually helped push back their fear.

“The last time… I heard he was going to raise sheep to make money. When was that? I remember seeing him herding two sheep into the mountains,” Liao Shanchun said.

“That was a year ago,” the Old Lady remembered as well.

At the time, the man had gone to town and seen a bit of the world. He decided that raising sheep was a good way to make a living. The wool could be sold for money, and eventually, the sheep would breed. As the flock grew, the sheep themselves could be sold for a profit.

Originally, he thought raising sheep just meant letting them loose in the mountains to graze, which didn’t seem like much effort. In reality, it was far from simple. The summer sun was brutal, and the mountains were crawling with biting insects. After a month, he hadn’t seen a cent of profit. He didn’t even make it two months.

On a day of heavy rain, he was seen coming back with the sheep slung over his shoulders. He had already slaughtered them.

“I’m not earning this money anymore!” It turned out that while he was out grazing them that day, one of the sheep had gotten stubborn for some reason and gave him a hard butt with its head.

He thought about all his hard work over the past weeks just to raise these two sheep, only to end up getting attacked by one.

In a fit of rage, he killed them.

The villagers weren’t surprised. That was just his temperament. Everyone felt he was a lost cause for the rest of his life.

“After that happened, he probably felt too embarrassed to stay, so he went over toward Xiangjin Town.”

“After that, it was around New Year’s. I remember during the New Year, his family had a big fight,” Liao Shanchun said, having a very clear grasp of local gossip.

The Old Lady followed the memory. “I went to ask the old woman of the Sun family about it at the time.” The Sun family’s matriarch was Sun Er’s grandmother. She had many grandsons and granddaughters, so she naturally looked down on a failure like Sun Er.

At the time, the old woman had said: “His temper is incredibly strange. He went to Xiangjin Town and bought some fruit you can only get outside. They were tiny, a bit like oranges, and he said you’re supposed to eat them with the skin on. We weren’t used to that, so we just left them on the table. When his second older sister came back for New Year’s greetings, she saw them and thought the eldest grandson had bought them. She praised the eldest for being successful, and Sun Er just flew into a rage. He made everyone miserable…”

That was the whole story.

After the New Year, it seemed no one had seen him again.

Yun Song listened to the two women’s recollections, piecing together a profile of this man once more.

However, Yun Song turned over his palms. Why would he suddenly change? Why had he started doing hard manual labor?

Seeing her examining the corpse, Liao Shanchun felt fear creeping back into her heart.

Fortunately, Yun Song soon spoke again. “You two go back. My colleagues should arrive once it’s light out. I’ll need someone to point them toward my location then.”

Before coming, Yun Song had already called the city police station. She estimated the investigators would arrive from the city the next morning, but they wouldn’t know exactly where she was.

“Aren’t you coming back to sleep for a bit?”

Yun Song looked at her surroundings and said, “This is too close to the forest. With the body lying out here, I’m worried wild animals might come and disturb it. So, I’ll stay here and keep watch.”

The Old Lady looked at the body on the ground. She was an elder with plenty of life experience, so she came up with a particularly good idea. “How about we bury it back?”

Putting it back in the dirt would make it harder for wild animals to dig up.

“It’s fine, I’ll just watch over it here.”

Seeing her persistence, the two women finally agreed.

Yun Song added, “This time, don’t wait for me on the slope. Go all the way back. The investigators will need to know where I am when they arrive.”

The two nodded. This was a serious matter and couldn’t be neglected.

After the two women returned, Dayan’s grandfather and Dayan were still awake. The grandfather and granddaughter were sitting by the fire pit, waiting for them.

As soon as the two entered, they hurriedly explained the situation.

“It really is Sun Er. The police officer said it’s a bit strange. It looks like Sun Er did a lot of heavy labor, but he never seemed like the type who could handle hardship,” the Old Lady said.

“Exactly. He even complained about the exhaustion of herding sheep back then.”

“I wonder why Changgui’s family would kill him…”

“Come to think of it, didn’t Sun Er want to marry Chunfeng at one point?” Dayan’s grandfather had some memory of the matter.

“He was probably just joking. He’s more than ten years older than Chunfeng. Changgui almost looked down on that primary school teacher back then, so how could she have ever accepted him?”

The family talked about Sun Er’s history, deciding not to sleep at all while they waited for the investigators from the city.

The investigators arrived at eight in the morning. About ten of them came, including Tang Chao and Tong Jin. Since the two of them had been to Tonglin Town to investigate a case before, they were more familiar with the area than the others.

A large crowd gathered, creating a massive commotion. The villagers didn’t even eat breakfast, coming out to watch the spectacle. The Village Party Secretary didn’t even know what had happened yet.

Liao Shanchun felt quite proud of herself. Since she was the only one who knew what was going on, she hurried to greet them and led the group to the Grave Hill¹ in the back.

The Sun family members were originally just following along to watch the excitement. Mother Sun was looking on with curiosity.

“Why are so many people going to the Grave Hill? Was someone’s grave robbed?” It was strange. What could possibly be worth stealing from those graves nowadays?

She tried to squeeze her way through, but she found that the people in front suddenly stepped aside.

Those at the front had already seen the situation, so they naturally made way.

Mother Sun looked behind her, thinking there were investigators coming through from the back, which was why everyone was moving.

But there was no one behind her.

“Mother Sun, you’d better go over there.”

Hearing this, Mother Sun felt a sinking sensation in her gut. She hurried forward.

There… her second son was lying on the ground, motionless.

How could this be?

“Ah!” Mother Sun rushed forward.

Even though she had six children, losing one was still a source of agonizing pain.

“Qiang! Oh, my Qiang! What happened to you!”

Everyone was used to calling him by his nickname, Sun Er. In a place like this, if someone had a bad reputation, they would eventually lose their original name.

But Mother Sun still called him by his childhood name.

“The heavens are blind! The heavens have no eyes!”

The onlookers found it difficult to step forward and stop her.

Sun Er’s mother first held the body and wept, then turned toward the investigators. She collapsed to her knees, but Yun Song reacted quickly, immediately supporting her. “Don’t…”

“Officer! You must find out who killed my son!”

She knew. She knew her son had a bad reputation, and she was afraid that because of it, the police would be biased against him. She quickly added, “My second son did some wrong things in the past, but in the last six months, he changed!”

Thinking of this made her even more heartbroken, and she kept muttering, “He changed, he really changed!”

Yun Song had the others carry the body away first, then helped Mother Sun to the side to ask about Sun Er’s situation.

“You said he changed. When did this happen?”

Speaking of this, Mother Sun could not stop her tears. “In the last six months, he really became different. He stopped stealing. He even told me that he used to be ignorant but had finally grown up. He wanted to earn more money so he could pay people back for the things he stole when he was young and foolish.”

Yun Song comforted her, “Tell me more about that.”

Human habits, once formed, are very difficult to change unless one encounters a very powerful external force.

Mother Sun began to reminisce. During this year’s Lunar New Year, the village had been very lively.

The Sun family was no exception. Her four sons and two daughters, along with the daughters’ children, had all returned.

The whole family was together in a bustling crowd.

Mother Sun’s eldest son had been married for several years and already had two children. Her third son had been married for four years and had one child. Both of her daughters had married well.

During the New Year, with such a large, lively family, she felt she had successfully held everything together since her husband passed away.

Turning her head, she saw her second son sitting in the main hall, tinkering with a gadget he brought back from town. He said it was called a radio.

Whether it was her eldest son, her third son, or her three daughters, she felt her duty to them was complete.

Only with this second son did she truly not know what to do.

Regarding this son, Mother Sun didn’t know which god she had offended.

When he was little, he was clearly obedient and sensible. Then one day, he suddenly picked up bad habits and stole two yuan from the house.

At that time, Father Sun was furious and beat Sun Er half to death. The boy neither admitted his mistake nor would he hand over the two yuan.

After that, the son started stealing money constantly. This time he would admit to it, but no matter how much he was beaten, he wouldn’t change. He also became increasingly lazy and stopped working.

Other boys in the village could get engaged by eighteen or nineteen, but no one spared a glance for Sun Er. Mother Sun was anxious, but there was nothing she could do.

He still needed to get married. Without a wife and children, what would he do in the future?

But Mother Sun also knew that with her son in such a state, no girl would be interested in him.

There was one positive thing: her son often went to town and to the neighboring, wealthy Xiangjin Town. His horizons were broader than others in the village, even if he was a bit lazy!

But having a broad perspective didn’t help much.

This year, he turned thirty-three. His younger siblings’ children were already six or seven years old.

Mother Sun couldn’t understand why this son didn’t know how to be ambitious or want to start a family!

She went inside to take the iron pot of stewed kelp and ribs off the stove and set it in the fire pit.

When she came back out, she saw her second son talking to Chunfeng, who was passing by.

As it turned out, Changgui’s youngest daughter, Chunfeng, had also returned to her parents’ home.

Chunfeng was twenty-two years old and had been married for less than a year. This was her first year returning to her parents’ home to pay New Year’s respects after getting married, and she looked as though she had been crying.

Mother Sun was a woman herself, so she could naturally tell that Chunfeng hadn’t truly been crying from a fight; it was just that in her first year of marriage, returning as a daughter who had “married out” made her feel sentimental and sad.

When a girl married, it was fine if she lived close by, but it was always like this if she married far away.

Mother Sun remembered that she had once considered trying to match Chunfeng with her second son. After all, if she married into their family, she would be close to home.

Of course, she also knew that Changgui’s family would never agree. Changgui’s family was snobbish, and Chunfeng was beautiful. They certainly wanted her to marry into a good family and would never look twice at her own household, so she never pursued it.

Sure enough, within two years, Changgui’s family had somehow found someone to introduce her to a Chinese teacher at the town’s primary school.

Chunfeng married into the town. Changgui’s family was overjoyed every day, feeling that their son-in-law was a man of letters.

Mother Sun had always been unhappy with that family. Now, seeing her second son talking to Chunfeng, she felt a bit displeased.

She always felt that Changgui’s family looked down on them.

To her surprise, her second son, a man who usually cared about nothing, came inside and asked her, “Chunfeng isn’t doing very well, is she? She looked like she’d been crying.”

Mother Sun looked at her second son, and an idea suddenly formed in her mind. She said, “She’s uneducated and married a primary school teacher; she’s bound to have a hard time. Come to think of it, if she had married into our family back then… I’ve watched that child grow up since she was little. Our family would have treated her well, and her parents’ home would be right nearby. Anything would be better than marrying so far away.”

Her second son said nothing.

Mother Sun continued, “I’m not trying to nag you, but look at your younger siblings and the people in the village. Everyone is married with kids. You need to think more about yourself. You’re not a child anymore; it’s time to make a plan.”

In her generation, people always felt that starting a family would make a man grow up and fix his bad habits.

But since her second son couldn’t start a family right now, her thoughts turned to a girl like Chunfeng.

She added more fuel to the fire. “You aren’t lacking in any area yourself, and you often go to town and the city. You have more world experience than the other boys in the village. When I went to Changgui’s house before to propose a match…”

The second son suddenly looked up. “I thought you didn’t go?”

She hadn’t actually gone, but she was desperate now. Mother Sun said, “I did go, but Changgui didn’t agree. She’s a snob. She said you didn’t have a proper job and feared Chunfeng would suffer if she married you. Chunfeng, on the other hand, was willing.”

“That family has no foresight, marrying her off to a primary school teacher. Changgui and her husband thought they were climbing the social ladder, but in reality, she’s just gone there to suffer. You haven’t seen it, but Chunfeng is quite pitiful. Every so often she has to come back to carry vegetables home because that teacher’s family doesn’t even have enough to eat.”

“That’s just because you don’t know any better. It’s hard to buy vegetables in town; she probably just doesn’t want to buy them.” Sun Er went to town often, so he naturally knew how things worked.

“That might be true for others, but definitely not for her. Chunfeng lived such a good life in her own home. I heard people say that when they passed the school, they saw Chunfeng doing hard labor. There were three or four iron crates filled to the brim with metal lunchboxes, and she has to move them every day. It’s a hard life. Her husband is a teacher, which sounds prestigious, but in truth, Chunfeng is the one suffering by being married to him.”

Her second son fell silent.

“In my opinion, Chunfeng won’t stay with him for long. They might even get a divorce before too long.” She let out a sigh. “Chunfeng is a good girl, usually so refined and polite, and she’s always respectful when she speaks. It’s a pity.”

Mother Sun was originally just trying this method to see if she could make her son change for the better. In truth, she didn’t know if it would work.

To her surprise, it actually did. Sun Er was human after all. When he was younger, he didn’t care about anything as long as he was happy.

But as he grew older, everyone around him began to marry and have children, starting their own families. The brothers who used to be willing to mess around with him now had wives and kids and didn’t visit much anymore. With his mother nagging him every day, even if he didn’t show it on the surface, he secretly hoped to have a wife of his own.

And Chunfeng was an excellent choice. Since she was a child, she had been clean and refined. Who in the village wouldn’t want to marry her?

Even though Chunfeng was married now, he didn’t mind.

Thus, Sun Er decided to change his ways. He felt he had more experience than others and looked down on Tonglin Town; the neighboring Xiangjin Town was where the real money was.

He went to Xiangjin Town. There were coal mines and many factories there. In this place, he found work mining coal.

He began to work desperately hard. On the rare occasions he returned home, Mother Sun was truly happy. Several times, she moved to tears while looking at the money he brought back.

Her son had finally changed! He had turned his life around!

Not only that, her son even shared his inner thoughts with her. When he was seven years old, he hadn’t actually stolen those two yuan, but his father had beaten him severely for it. That was why he kept wanting to steal money afterward; he wanted to get revenge for everyone calling him a thief.

Mother Sun didn’t take this to heart at all. It was something from so many years ago and wasn’t a big deal to her. In her mind, her son’s reformation was the only thing that mattered.

She calculated in her head that if they saved a bit more, she could find a wife for her second son.

She didn’t take the things she said during the New Year to motivate her son seriously. After all, to her, those were all lies, so she naturally didn’t keep them in mind.

No one expected that her second son, who had already turned over a new leaf, would suddenly die!

“The heavens are blind! The heavens are blind!”

Translator’s Notes