Lin Qimo patted her chest.
Thankfully, it was a cabbage snake non-venomous.
When Qin Wenying came back, she saw Lin Qimo standing in a daze holding a bamboo pole, staring at the corner of the wall. Walking closer, she exclaimed, “What a huge snake!”
“I don’t know who put it there,” Lin Qimo said softly. “There’s another one over there.”
Following her gaze, Qin Wenying’s eyes instantly lit up. She turned back and looked at Si Chongguang behind her.
“Go get a knife. I’m having snake congee today.”
Si Chongguang waved his hand, opening his mouth as if to persuade her, but under Qin Wenying’s intimidating gaze, he quickly backed down.
In the end, both snakes were caught by Qin Wenying, skinned and prepared. For safety, Si Chongguang and Lin Qimo searched the yard back and forth several times. Only after confirming there were no more snakes did they finally sit down and eat the snake congee Qin Wenying had made.
“So good. The flavor is authentic much better than farmed ones outside,” Qin Wenying said happily as she ate.
Si Chongguang was mentally resistant, but to save face in front of his wife, he tried a small bowl.
Lin Qimo also had a small bowl, but she didn’t have much appetite.
Who put the snakes there?
The only people she had offended were those two uncles and Li Daqiang.
In the past two days, no one from the old household had come to cause trouble. With just a little thought, she could guess the old couple had gone to the county to take care of someone.
She planned to use this time to start a long-term money-making business, so she went again to Li Daqiang’s house.
Lin Guihua was still at home alone, taking care of three children.
“Our village has the most land in your household, and you also grow the most soybeans, so I’m here to buy soybeans,” Lin Qimo said.
When Lin Guihua heard she was there to buy soybeans, her guarded expression immediately disappeared and turned into a smile.
“We sell them for 30 cents per jin. How much do you want? I’ll weigh it for you.”
Lin Qimo planned to buy 50 jin first.
Lin Guihua was shocked.
Fifty jin?
That was a big order.
Seeing how much Lin Guihua needed money, a faint smile appeared on Lin Qimo’s lips as her tone relaxed slightly.
“Of course, but if I come back to buy more later, you can’t raise the price.”
Lin Guihua naturally agreed. The more soybeans she sold, the more money she would earn.
“Qimo, I see you’re buying a lot. I can’t really carry them over to your house myself. How about this when my eldest son comes back, I’ll have him deliver them to you. Is that okay?”
She knew Li Daqiang had seven sons, and with the child she was currently pregnant with, that made eight.
Lin Qimo glanced at her heavily pregnant belly.
“Do you know where my house is?”
Lin Guihua nodded.
Although everyone lived in the same village, they were divided into different production teams, and each team’s households were several minutes apart on foot.
Douhe Village had over a hundred households in total. Unless someone was familiar, it was difficult to find a specific house.
She only knew how to find Li Daqiang’s home because it was the only house built halfway up the mountain.
But the fact that she knew where Lin Qimo lived surprised her.
“You probably don’t know this yet, but your reputation has already spread across several teams,” Lin Guihua said carefully. “People say you’re an old unmarried girl no one in the village dares to marry. I even heard matchmakers bring you up when proposing marriages they use you to scare young girls who don’t want to marry, and they secretly tell them where your house is so they can go see you.”
Lin Qimo paused.
No wonder girls had been showing up near her house from time to time. She hadn’t thought much of it before, but now she realized she had become a negative example.
So she had already become the “unwanted old unmarried woman” people talked about?
“Your husband hasn’t been home these past two days?”
Lin Guihua gently touched her swollen belly and sighed.
“He came back the night before yesterday, and then left again.”
Lin Qimo sighed as well. “Alright, I’ll head back first. Have someone deliver the soybeans later.”
Fifty jin of soybeans cost 15 yuan. She first gave Lin Guihua 5 yuan as a deposit.
It wasn’t that she didn’t trust Lin Guihua’s character it was that no one trusted Li Daqiang’s character. It was said he had been sent for labor reform in his younger years for beating people, and he hadn’t improved much after coming out.
In the end, she only took 10 jin of weighed soybeans for now.
After returning home, Lin Qimo used borrowing a stone mill as an excuse and went to the neighboring house, Zhang Chunhua’s place.
Zhang Chunhua wasn’t home only her only son, Goudan, was there.
By seniority, Lin Qimo should call him “uncle.”
“Uncle Goudan, I’m going to borrow this stone mill for a few days. Will it delay your family’s corn grinding?”
Goudan shook his head. “No, you can take it. No need to rush returning it.”
“Thank you, Uncle Goudan.”
As she cleaned the small stone mill she was borrowing, she thanked him again.
“We’re neighbors. Helping each other is only right. Aunt Liu was good to me in the past I remember that,” Goudan said politely.
Lin Qimo gave a slight smile. In her memory, her mother, Liu Yuling, was not only beautiful but also very polite to everyone.