Fake Divorce Turns into Murder Case (17)

Chapter 69

Thirty years on the east bank, thirty years on the west bank¹. There was a certain truth to the old sayings.

Over the past few days, the members of the Zhang family had been carving two more decorative slices into their radish flowers than usual.

“Serves them right for the terrible things they did in the past. Now they’re getting their karma.”

Granny Zhang had been in high spirits lately. Taking advantage of a break in the rain, she set off early one morning for Yulan Town, carrying a half-full basket of old ginger and over forty eggs on her back.

She was going to visit her daughter.

Her daughter lived in Peach Blossom Village in Yulan Town, which required climbing a set of stone steps starting from the eastern end of the town’s main street.

The road was currently under construction. The original small stone steps were being replaced with large, solid stone slabs.

The load on her back wasn’t heavy, so the climb was manageable. From a distance, she saw several horses carrying the large stone slabs.

They must be for the roadwork, she thought. The lower section of the path was already finished, and the large slabs felt much more stable underfoot.

But soon, she saw people carrying the slabs on their backs.

With a massive stone slab pressed against their backs, these people struggled with every step as they climbed upward.

Granny Zhang quickly caught up to the group and realized they were all women.

She glanced at them and was about to pass when she noticed the woman at the very front looked familiar.

She froze.

“Xiao Zhen?”

The woman, who had been walking with her head down, looked up. “Mom?”

“What are you doing working like this?”

“Mom, why are you here?”

“No, why are you carrying stones here?” She remembered her son-in-law did odd jobs in Yulan Town to support the household, and her daughter already worked hard enough tending to the fields at home. Why was she carrying stones?

“Mom, the overseer is watching. I’ll tell you when I get home. Go to the house first; I’ll be back as soon as I finish this shift.”

Only then did Granny Zhang notice a middle-aged woman watching them with a very unpleasant expression.

Not wanting to cause trouble for her daughter, she had no choice but to head to her son-in-law’s house first.

Once she arrived, she finally learned the truth.

Her son-in-law had been working at someone’s house. While he was laying bricks, a wall collapsed and crushed him, breaking his leg. Although a doctor had seen him, he needed a long period of recovery. Furthermore, the family he was working for claimed they had spent all their money on the new house and refused to pay for his medical expenses.

Now, with one man with a broken leg and two children needing to attend school, her daughter had no choice but to find work.

“It was exhausting at first, but I’m used to it now. It’s not so bad. I can earn fifteen yuan a day,” her daughter said.

Granny Zhang didn’t have much money herself and couldn’t offer any financial help.

She stayed at her daughter’s house for two days before she had to return home.

On the way back, she couldn’t stop thinking about the image of her daughter carrying that massive stone slab.

The more she thought about it, the more painful it became, and her heart filled with hatred.

That hatred needed an outlet, and the Yang family was that outlet.

It was all the Yang family’s fault. If they hadn’t spread those rumors years ago, why would her daughter have married so far away!

If she had married closer, they could have helped her when trouble struck.

When she returned to the village, she happened to see the Yang family acting as if nothing had happened, badmouthing the police to anyone who would listen.

The Yang family didn’t want to be the butt of a joke, so they continued to pretend everything was normal.

Of course, there were people in the village who wanted to see them humiliated. Someone specifically went to ask Old Man Yang, “What’s going on with your third son? Why did we hear the police haven’t left because they’re investigating? They’re saying he was murdered?”

The question was asked intentionally to make him uncomfortable. If someone truly cared, they would have asked privately, not in front of everyone.

“My third son committed suicide. Do the police know better than his own family? They’re just carrying out a personal vendetta now. We didn’t let them touch the body before and even got into a fight with them, didn’t we? That offended them.”

“Would the police really do that? But I heard the autopsy found some kind of medicine.”

“There was no sleeping medicine or whatever. We’re all country folk; who would go out and buy that kind of medicine?” Old Man Yang said. “The police are saying that on purpose. We didn’t want them to do an autopsy, but they insisted. They cut my son open. They’re saying this because they’re afraid that if they find nothing, we’ll give them trouble.”

Old Man Yang emphasized again, “My son committed suicide. The police are only acting like this because they’re afraid of us. We said it was suicide from the start, but they didn’t believe us and insisted on an autopsy. Now they’ve embarrassed themselves and have no way out, so they have to keep saying my son was murdered. They keep wanting to investigate, but what is there to find?”

The listeners didn’t know the full details. After hearing this explanation, there was no joke to laugh at, and those who had hoped to mock them felt they had wasted their time.

The Yang family had been dominant in the village for many years. They were used to their old way of life and used to bullying others. What they feared most was being looked down upon; they knew exactly what life was like for those at the bottom.

When they bullied others in the past, they felt a sense of self-satisfaction. At the same time, a seed was planted in their hearts: they must never let themselves fall into the same situation as their victims.

Everything happening now made them defensive. Old Man Yang became even more aggressive than before, desperate to show everyone that he was still the head of the Yang family with five sons, and that no one should dare cross them.

But the Yang family was mistaken. As far as the rest of the village was concerned, everyone wanted to see them suffer. If they had shown a bit of humility now, perhaps the villagers would have let things go out of pity for their dead son.

Instead, their aggression only made the villagers who had suffered similar experiences as the Zhang family feel even more resentful.

Everyone needed an outlet. Yet in their hearts, they felt that perhaps this was just how it would end. Why wasn’t the Yang family facing more retribution?

Yun Song was unaware of the undercurrents swirling in the village. She had placed the priority on solving Huixiang’s problem.

After thinking it over, Yun Song felt that handling Huixiang’s situation shouldn’t be done in isolation from the villagers. The police wouldn’t stay here forever. Even if they secured land for Huixiang, it would be difficult for her to keep it.

The other villagers were not related to Huixiang. Even if they wanted to help at times, they would feel they had no rightful reason to intervene.

Yun Song grasped this point and began looking for a way to give them a formal cause.

There were many kind-hearted people in the village, but they were scattered and lacked a unifying force.

The information she had gathered during her previous visits now proved useful; she had a rough idea of who held a grudge against the Yang Family.

Consequently, there was no need to hide the fact that Huixiang was still alive from these specific people.

“It’s good that she’s alright. I kept saying, she’s so young and has two children, she mustn’t do anything foolish,” Granny Zhang said.

“Huixiang has been backed into a corner. For the time being, don’t let a word of this out.”

“That goes without saying. You told me because you trust me, so how could I possibly speak of it?” Granny Zhang quickly promised.

Yun Song knew this family had a daughter who had married into Yulan Town, so she said, “Huixiang’s parents and relatives aren’t around, and she has no one to stand up for her. We police say we can provide justice, but in the end, we aren’t stationed in the village permanently.”

“So, we want to entrust this matter to you.”

“What is it? If I can help, I certainly will.”

“It’s still about Huixiang. She and Yang Laosan were legally married. Now that Yang Laosan is dead, a portion of the contract rights² to Yang Laosan’s farmland must be allocated to her according to the law.”

“The Yang Family will never agree to that,” Granny Zhang said, already imagining how stifled and frustrated the Yangs would feel.

“Legally, that is what they must do. If they refuse to comply, Huixiang will eventually sue them. Our concern is that even if they agree verbally, they might immediately start causing trouble for Huixiang the moment the police leave.”

“That is why we need your help with this.”

“Just the two of us as a couple certainly won’t be enough,” Granny Zhang said. “You go find the Village Party Secretary and the Village Chief. I’ll reach out to the others in the village.”

This was exactly what Yun Song had planned, and she immediately agreed.

The Village Party Secretary considered things more deeply, worrying that if Huixiang set a precedent, other women might also try to take land away if they got divorced.

Yun Song sighed inwardly. Even though she found the situation unreasonable, the reality was that “Huixiang is only able to do this because she is a widow. In a normal divorce, the land cannot be divided.”

With that, the Village Party Secretary and the Village Chief no longer objected. For them, there was no need to offend the police for the sake of the Yang Family.

Meanwhile, Granny Zhang quickly found several people in the village she had good relationships with.

She explained the situation to them.

In the past, the common understanding was that if a man died and had a son, the land could be kept. If there was no son, or if the son was too young, the land would be divided up by other members of the clan.

Many women in the village recalled another fear etched into their very bones.

When they were young, almost all of them had heard stories of a household where the man died without a male heir. Consequently, the family’s fields were snatched away, and the widow was forced to remarry.

As a result, Huixiang’s situation was no longer just about Huixiang.

The matter now directly concerned the interests of these women, especially those who were slightly older.

Before long, the plan became a shared secret among the villagers.

It was currently winter, the slack season for farming, so everyone had plenty of energy. Thus, everyone showed unprecedented enthusiasm for the matter.

With Granny Zhang’s help, Yun Song met with the women privately to discuss how to help Huixiang defend her land.

Seeing their passion, Yun Song knew that the matter was eighty percent settled.

The criminal case hadn’t progressed much, but Huixiang’s problem was being resolved quite rapidly.

Translator’s Notes