“Director Wu.”
Wu Dajun had just entered the commune with his briefcase when he heard someone call him. Squinting, he saw a figure crouched in the dimly lit doorway of the commune entrance.
“Is that… Yuan Xiu?”
“It’s me.”
Yuan Xiu pushed herself up from the wall. She had been waiting here for an hour.
Wu Dajun smiled, fishing out his keys while motioning for Yuan Xiu to follow him. “Don’t call me Director. Call me Uncle. Didn’t you often call me that when you were little? Why so formal now that you’re grown up?”
Yuan Xiu then called him “Uncle Wu.”
Wu Dajun led Yuan Xiu to his office door, unlocked it, and invited her to sit down. He poured her a glass of water and placed it in front of her. “Has something happened?”
Seeing the luggage she carried, he sensed her visit wasn’t trivial. This girl must have run into some trouble.
“Whatever it is, just tell me. Don’t stand on ceremony with your uncle. Even without the connection between me and your father, as the commune director, I’d still handle what needs handling. I won’t let you suffer any injustice.”
Yuan Xiu clutched the water glass tightly with both hands. “Uncle Wu, I need to go find my fiancé in the army. Could you please help me get a Letter of Introduction?” She emphasized the word “army” heavily.
Wu Dajun secretly breathed a sigh of relief. “So that’s what this is about. Alright, I’ll write one for you right now.”
He sat down at his desk, pulled out a blank sheet of paper from a drawer, placed an old newspaper underneath as a pad, then took out a fountain pen. After filling it with ink, he tested it with a couple of strokes on the old newspaper. “Which unit is your fiancé in? Give me the specific address…”
As he asked, he looked up at Yuan Xiu and was startled. “Hey, hey! Why are you crying, child?”
Yuan Xiu hung her head, tears falling one by one, weeping bitterly. “Uncle Wu, I don’t know which unit my fiancé is in. I only have the address and a phone number his parents left years ago. I don’t even know if the phone number still works.”
Wu Dajun shook his head with a smile. “Silly girl, why cry over such a small problem? As long as you have an address, there’s nothing to fear. You’ll manage to get in touch. But you shouldn’t just go like this. You should write a letter first, have them send your fiancé’s unit address to you. It would save you, a young woman, the trouble of traveling back and forth. Thinking about it now, I probably shouldn’t even write this Letter of Introduction for you. You’re still so young; I really can’t feel at ease.”
Yuan Xiu sniffled. “I did write. They sent a letter back.”
Wu Dajun frowned. “Then how come you don’t have the unit’s address?” Could it be they were unwilling?
Yuan Xiu’s hands clenched the hem of her clothes tightly, her face full of struggle. Just as Wu Dajun began to suspect the man’s family might be breaking their promise and calling off the engagement—”My… my uncle intercepted the letter. He had his daughter, Yuan Juan, take it and go to the army.”
Wu Dajun didn’t understand at first. “What? Why would your uncle intercept the letter? And have his daughter…”
The next moment, it dawned on him.
“What is Yuan Xinmin trying to do?”
Wu Dajun frowned, still holding onto a sliver of doubt. “Yuan Xiu, how do you know this? Could there be some misunderstanding?”
Yuan Xiu’s eyes were red. “I accidentally overheard it. At first, I didn’t believe it either, but a few days ago, Yuan Juan already left, saying she was visiting relatives. Uncle Wu, you know—whether it’s the Yuan family or my aunt’s side, where would they have out-of-town relatives?”
Wu Dajun nodded. That was true. His relationship with the Yuan family was fairly close, so he was aware of such matters.
Yuan Xiu continued, “My cousin might already be at the military base by now. I don’t know what to do. Even if I go to my uncle now, he won’t admit it, nor will he give me the address of the base. I thought that no matter what, I should go and ask. This marriage was arranged by my father when he was alive. I don’t want him to rest uneasy in the afterlife.”
“That’s the way it should be.”
Wu Dajun had also heard about Yuan Xiu’s betrothal. The man’s side and Old Yuan were comrades-in-arms, said to have shared life-and-death bonds. So, when they learned Old Yuan’s wife had given birth to a daughter, they arranged a childhood betrothal between their son and Old Yuan’s daughter. When Old Yuan was alive, he often mentioned it, saying he had found a good family for his daughter’s future.
If Old Yuan said so, it meant the man’s family conditions and character were undoubtedly good.
If this matter were true, then Yuan Xinmin was truly despicable!
If it weren’t for Old Yuan, where would he have gotten his job at the Supply and Marketing Cooperative?
At the thought of the job at the Supply and Marketing Cooperative, Wu Dajun’s eyes flickered. He said angrily, “I truly never expected Yuan Xinmin to do such a thing! You really can’t judge a person by their appearance! Back then, if you hadn’t been too young, this job at the Supply and Marketing Cooperative should have been yours. All these years, I thought he treated you well, like his own daughter. Who would have thought!”
Yuan Xiu sneered inwardly. He took her father’s job, moved the whole family to town, and left her in the countryside to take care of the elderly—was that treating her well?
If he really treated her like his own daughter, he wouldn’t have refused to even offer her a meal every time she came to town to deliver food.
Uncle Wu’s home wasn’t far from the Supply and Marketing Cooperative’s residential compound. If Yuan Xiu couldn’t see what kind of people Yuan Juan’s family were, how could Wu Dajun, as the director of the Supply and Marketing Cooperative, not see it?
Once a person is gone, the tea turns cold. No matter how close his relationship with her father was in the past, it was all in the past. She was just an orphan girl—who would stand up for her without some benefit?
Even family couldn’t be trusted, let alone outsiders.
Yuan Xiu lowered her head and let out a long sigh. “Uncle Wu, I don’t want to say much about what my uncle did. I just want to fulfill my father’s last wish. Even if the outcome isn’t good, I’ll accept it. Please help me write a Letter of Introduction.”
As she spoke, she took out an old envelope from her pocket and handed it over.
Wu Dajun took the envelope and looked at the address on it. It clearly wasn’t a military base address but rather the address of a factory residential compound. “Didn’t you say there was also a phone number left? Give me the phone number, and I’ll call to see if it connects.”
At this moment, he was even more eager than Yuan Xiu. “Silly child, this matter can’t be handled carelessly. If you slowly make your way to this address, your cousin might already have gotten a marriage certificate with him. You’re young and might not think things through thoroughly. Uncle Wu will help you!”
Yuan Xiu pursed her lips, opened the envelope, pulled out the letter, and pointed to a string of phone numbers at the end for Wu Dajun to see.