No Repeats

Agreeing to the plan

After breakfast I led grandma slowly to Uncle Feng's house. Greeting Little Er at the gate we walked inside. When I saw Uncle Feng, I was startled. Why does he have such deep dark eye bags and his beard seem even more unkempt than normal?

"Little Er, quickly help Grandma Shu and Little Mei inside and close the gate! ...Lu Bai greets grandma." Uncle Feng said hoarsely. What happened to this man? My grandma was bewildered at his low hoarse voice that is very different from his usual boom.

"Grandma Shu, I haven't slept a wink last night, just worrying about that pile under the bed!" complained Uncle Feng.

I looked at him and smiled, "why, uncle, it's not like anyone knew to come and rob us?"

"I'm a useless man, I don't do big things. Just guarding your wealth has scared me half to death!" he explained in embarrassment. I looked at the brothers and they had similar expressions of discomfort.

"Dad! How could you, such a big man and yet losing sleep over something so little," Little Er yelled, "it's embarrassing, after all the effort Little Mei and I went through to get the pot, now, you....ai!"

"I admitted it didn't I? I'm big but have a little heart, I can't do big things! You little brat, stop pouring salt onto my wounds."

Feng Yi shook his head at the conversation exchange. His handsome face blushed as he looked straight into my eyes. With a slight tilt of his lips curved upwards, he apologised silently. I understand his feelings and winked as I smile back at him.

"What does Little Bai suggest we do now?" grandma gently went straight to the point. "The pot was bought back by Little Er and Little Mei, of course it belongs to them equally, why do you keep saying it's Little Mei's treasure?" I beam with pride at my grandma's sharpness.

"Of course, grandma you made the exact point that I have been thinking. Both Little Er and I dug up the pot and carried it back. But we are children, our treasures belong to you and uncle Feng..." I said politely.

Uncle Feng shook his head slowly and said with a slightly sorrowful expression, "as I said before, it is Little Mei's treasure, we have no part in this. Look at me, only after one night I am like this, do you want to push me to death by giving me that hot potato?"

Both Little Er and I tried to suppress our giggle, not wanting to add more misery to the man. I spoke gently, "in that case, I thought of a plan last night, it also happens to help solve a few of our problems...would you like to hear it?"

Looking at me, Uncle Feng let out a long exhale, "I knew it, Little Mei is such a clever girl, you will definitely come up with a good plan. What shall we do? I thought about burying it in the backyard but someone might see it and steal it from you. The gold nuggets would be difficult to explain, evildoers will probably frame us for thief!...."

Now I fully understand what kept him awake all night, he does not look like a worrying type but he seriously overthinks!

"Uncle Feng, let's take a breath. The huge pile is very hard to hide in our humble homes, but maybe we can try putting it back into the pot to see if it fits back in? That way we can hide it in plain sight?...." not sure if that works I looked at Little Er and blinked twice.

Getting my signal, Little Er went to get the pot and ran into Uncle Feng's room, we all followed him. As he kneeled down and started scooping the gold and silver pieces into the pot. We all held our breath in anticipation. To our amazement and satisfaction the pot continued to take the gold without filling up.

Just as I thought, the real treasure is the pot!

Beaming with a wide smile, Uncle Feng looked at me and slapped his head hard! "I'll be....of course! Little Mei, you pointed out an obvious point that we all couldn't think of...now tell me your plan, I will follow your word!"

"I think we should all move to Hangzhou and start a food stall. The city is an economic epicentre with many travellers and huge population. We will only need to cook a few of our local speciality dishes to fit into the niche market there....Once we have a little presence we can use the excuse that our business is turning over huge profits to expand to silk worm farming. We can use the gold to buy significant plots of land and plant mulberries. Mulberries grow fast and silk worms are easy to grow if we are careful.....We can hire our villagers to the plantation to care for the mulberries and worms, wouldn't it be great if we can legitimately share our wealth to improve the lives of our villagers?" I spoke rapidly in excitement and forgot to take a breath.

My heart beat rapidly as I look around the faces in the room. Yi  ge ge nodded as he smiled at me, understanding that this is my attempt at saving the villagers from the looming plague.

"It'll also solve your worry, in Hangzhou, with such a large population and money to back us up, there will not be any issues with getting Yi ge ge a wife!" I continued and pulled out last card.

Uncle Feng let out a booming laugh, breaking the tense atmosphere. Patting Yi ge ge on his back, he said, "Little boy, you have to work harder!"

Uncertain about the change in topic, I shot Yi ge ge a quizzical look while noticing his reddened face and neck. Handsome indeed!

"Uncle Feng, what do you think about my idea?" I asked with expectation.

"Good, good, as I said before, I will follow your words. We will go to Hangzhou, as long as grandma Shu agrees."

Grandma smiled, "at this age, I worry that I will be a burden to you if I come...but this is a good idea and a chance to legitimately escape our poverty....and to properly use this gift from the heavens to change our family tree."

As she spoke I nervously looked at Little Er but when I realised that she had agreed, I couldn't resist to pulling a victory pose.

"It is settled! We don't have any loose ends here and can set out tomorrow. Tonight we pack our valuables and tomorrow we head out to the next town to buy our supplies. We better use some of the silver to buy new clothes in town. I will then go and exchange one or two gold nuggets into smaller currency so that we don't raise suspicions," said Uncle Feng definitively.

Seeing his determination, grandma nodded and we agreed to regroup at dinner. Each with our own thoughts and things to do we returned home.

Before leaving, I took a handful of silver pieces from the pot and split it out evenly into five pouches I sewed this morning. It is coarse but does the job until I could make more sturdy versions. I gave each person a bag to carry and to buy necessities.

Uncle Feng instructed Yi ge ge to make a wooden lid for the pot and have it wrapped carefully so that it won't break in our journey.