“What brand are these watches?” Li Ruolan did not like wearing watches, so she did not recognize any of them.
Deng Minghao had bought watches before, but aside from a few very famous brands, he did not recognize most of them either.
“The mark on this watch looks very familiar. It seems to be a Rolex,” Deng Minghao said somewhat uncertainly after taking one out and examining it from every angle.
It was a men’s watch, with a matching women’s watch. Li Ruolan picked it up and looked at it as well. “It’s a couple’s set. Perfect, one for you and one for me.”
Besides these items, the wooden box also contained pearls, diamonds, jade, and other valuables. All of it belonged to them now.
“With these things, we’ll have more than enough to live in the countryside for seven or eight years. When Reform and Opening Up comes, we can leave the countryside and go into business,” Li Ruolan said.
It was August 1970. There were still seven or eight years to go before the resumption of the college entrance examination and Reform and Opening Up.
Deng Minghao nodded. “Mm. Put everything away properly. I need to sneak back out now and see if there’s anything else worth taking.
“He wanted to play dirty with me, so I have to teach him a lesson.”
After leaving the space, Deng Minghao waited for quite a while. Only after confirming that the black market boss was fast asleep did he slowly head out.
He searched the other rooms and, sure enough, found even more valuable items. In two of the rooms, there were many antiques, all of which Deng Minghao stored in the space.
In addition to that, he found quite a lot of medicinal herbs. In short, he left nothing behind, taking anything he came across into the space.
For a black market boss to have amassed such wealth, he must have committed no small number of robberies and murders. Under the cover of night, Deng Minghao quietly left the courtyard house and wrote an anonymous report, clearly listing the black market boss’s address.
He deliberately mentioned in the letter that the black market had been able to operate for so long because it was likely colluding with people wearing red armbands.
The black market helped many people put food on the table. Deng Minghao did not intend to shut it down entirely. He simply felt that this particular boss was far too greedy.
The things in this man’s possession alone were enough to provoke murderous intent. Just thinking about it made it obvious that the black market boss’s hands were stained with blood.
Dragging him down could be considered a good deed.
After finding a safe place, Deng Minghao returned to the space.
At that moment, Li Ruolan was busy inside, carefully arranging the antiques and jade Deng Minghao had brought in.
The black market boss had an exceptionally sharp eye. The antiques and jewelry Deng Minghao had taken were all items that would become extremely valuable in the future, especially the jade.
There were imperial green jade bead strings, jade plaques, and two pairs of imperial green bangles. There was also a pair of red jade bangles and a pair of lavender jade bangles, all of them top-tier pieces.
In another thirty or forty years, these items would sell for hundreds of millions at the very least.
“With these things, even if we just lie flat in the future, we can still live comfortably for the rest of our lives,” Li Ruolan said, touching one item and then another, completely unable to put them down.
Deng Minghao walked up behind her and wrapped his arms around her waist. “Then you can lie flat properly from now on. I’ll do the rest.” A mischievous smile curled at the corner of his mouth.
Li Ruolan said, “I suspect you’re flirting with me, and I have evidence.”
After fooling around for a bit, the couple started counting money.
There were six thousand yuan in the wooden box. The money gathered from other places amounted to about seven or eight hundred more. There were also quite a lot of coupons.
They checked the dates and sorted out all the Beijing coupons, planning to use them all up. Once they left Beijing, those coupons would no longer be usable.
There were many kinds of coupons: grain coupons, cloth coupons, meat coupons, and even overseas remittance vouchers.
“Once things calm down in a couple of days, we’ll use up all these coupons. I’ll take you to the department store and let you go on a proper shopping spree,” Deng Minghao said.
Li Ruolan shook her head. “All those empty promises you made before are finally about to come true. It really hasn’t been easy,” she said, then shot Deng Minghao a look.
“I wronged you before. From now on, you can buy whatever you want. I’ll just carry the bags and won’t say a single extra word,” Deng Minghao said immediately, smiling ingratiatingly.
After two or three peaceful days, something changed. The atmosphere suddenly grew tense, and everyone on the streets was moving in a hurry.
Deng Minghao and Li Ruolan took a bus to the city’s department store. Seeing this, neither of them spoke.
“We don’t lack any of the coupons for the ‘three turns and one sound.’ Today, we’ll buy everything. Whatever others have, you’ll have too,” Deng Minghao said with a big grin at Li Ruolan.
Li Ruolan replied, “We already have watches. As for the radio and bicycle, we’ll wait until after we go down to the countryside to buy them.”
Deng Minghao asked in confusion, “Why? Wouldn’t it be easier to buy everything now? We can just put it into the space. It won’t take up room, and we can leave right away.”
“In this era, bicycles need to be registered. You have to provide proof of purchase and then go to the local vehicle administration office to have a steel stamp pressed on the frame, which is basically getting it registered. Only then can it be used on the road. Otherwise, it’s considered an unregistered bike, and if it’s discovered later, it’ll be troublesome,” Li Ruolan explained.
This was something Li Ruolan had learned from reading novels.
“So that’s how it is. I’ll listen to you, Hubby. Whatever you say goes,” Deng Minghao said.
The department store in the capital had an extremely wide selection. Li Ruolan pulled Deng Minghao along, and the two of them first bought several sets of clothes each, for spring, summer, autumn, and winter, as well as sweaters, thermal underwear, coats, and leather shoes.
Only then did they take their time browsing. Whenever they saw something they lacked, they bought it. After all, they had plenty of money and coupons.
When they came across a counter selling Moutai, Deng Minghao used up all the liquor coupons and bought twelve bottles, five yuan per bottle.
Later, when they saw a pastry counter, they used all their pastry and sugar coupons to buy mung bean cakes, chestnut cakes, peach pastries, egg cakes, and other pastries, totaling more than twenty jin.
They also used the sugar coupons to buy red sugar and white sugar, ten jin each, and picked up some White Rabbit milk candies and fruit candies as well.
After buying so much, the two of them went out once to store everything in the space, then came back in to buy other items.
That day, they were both dressed in black trousers and white shirts, looking like newlyweds. Seeing them buy so many things, others simply assumed they were purchasing wedding supplies. Apart from a few extra glances, no one paid them much attention.
After wandering around for most of the day and using up nearly all their daily-use coupons, the two went to a state-run restaurant and enjoyed a hearty meal.
“Starting tomorrow, the two of us need to go around all the nearby state-run restaurants. Try to buy twenty meat buns, twenty sesame flatbreads, and twenty steamed buns from each one.
“After buying them, store everything in the space. Once we’ve gone down to the countryside, whenever we don’t feel like cooking, we can just eat these,” Li Ruolan said to Deng Minghao.