Dedication to Alicia, A Triple bonus Week!

Hu Yongcai did not offer to buy Xia Xiaolan’s eggs.

It wasn’t that he was stingy. The guesthouse used varying amounts of eel each day, but eggs were a regular staple. Still, the municipal guesthouse was a public institution,it didn’t need to buy high-priced eggs the way ordinary households did.

If Hu Yongcai bought Xia Xiaolan’s eggs, he wouldn’t be helping her make money... he’d be making her lose it.

The twenty-plus jin of eel could be lifted with one hand, but Hu Yongcai didn’t want to get wet and smell of fish, so he called a young kitchen worker to help. It also served to make the purchase look official.

The young man hardly dared glance at Xia Xiaolan.

After weighing the eels at twenty-four jin in total. Hu Yongcai calculated the payment at 1.2 yuan per jin, the same as Xia Xiaolan’s retail price.

That was the power of a single carton of Daqiamen cigarettes. On those twenty-four jin alone, Xia Xiaolan would make at least nine yuan in profit, more than enough to cover the cost of the cigarettes.

In these times, there weren’t many sharp operators around. Otherwise, Xia Xiaolan wouldn’t have had the chance to build a connection with Hu Yongcai.

“All right. Be careful on your way home. Bring twenty jin the day after tomorrow. Whether we need more or less, I’ll let you know.”

It seemed Hu Yongcai had set a purchasing pattern. Twenty jin every two days, averaging ten jin a day, three hundred jin a month.

If she could maintain that volume, Xia Xiaolan could earn nearly a 100 yuan a month just supplying eel to the municipal guesthouse.

Her smile grew warmer.

“Got it. Goodbye, Brother Hu.”

She rode off on her bicycle. The young man who had helped stood there holding the eels, staring blankly.

“Brother Hu, is she your relative?”

Hu Yongcai shot him a look.

“Does my Hu family’s ancestral grave look like it’s smoking with good fortune? You think I’d have a relative that pretty? This is official procurement! Don’t talk nonsense.”

The young man laughed awkwardly.

“That’s not what I meant. I just think that female comrade is too beautiful. Even the female attendants at our guesthouse can’t compare.”

Hu Yongcai thought, What do you know?

The female attendants at the municipal guesthouse were all carefully selected beauties, elegant and dignified, fitting mainstream standards. But from a man’s point of view, someone like Xia Xiaolan was irresistibly alluring.

Yet with a face like hers, who would dare hire her as a server at the guesthouse?

Too eye-catching. She’d practically tempt the leaders into making mistakes.

For women, beauty alone wasn’t enough. What mattered was whether they could seize their two chances at rebirth. The first was literal birth, the second was marriage.

Take Xia Xiaolan, for example. She didn’t seem to have been born into fortune. If her family truly cherished her, they would have arranged a decent, respectable job.

A girl that pretty working as a small-time private vendor meant her family lacked the ability to secure employment for her. With her looks, she didn’t even need high education, basic literacy would have been enough to place her behind a counter in a department store.

Which meant she was most likely from a rural household registration, without even the qualifications to be recruited.

As a seasoned logistics procurement officer, Hu Yongcai was an old hand in the system.

He had guessed most of Xia Xiaolan’s background. It wasn’t that he looked down on her. She was simply too beautiful.Who knew? Perhaps one day she would seize that second chance at rebirth and turn her fate around.

After all, she was clearly calculating. Shangdu was vast, yet she had chosen to sell her goods near the municipal guesthouse. And who frequented that area?

Officials and cadres of every rank.

He clicked his tongue. Who could say?

Perhaps one day she’d perch on a high branch and become a phoenix.

Xia Xiaolan had no idea what Hu Yongcai thought of her. As long as there was money to be made, his opinion didn’t concern her. She continued hawking quietly along the streets, approaching anyone who looked like a potential buyer.

After circling much of Shangdu, she finally sold the remaining hundred-plus eggs. No matter how cautious she was, a dozen or so always cracked. Without foam padding or plastic trays, some loss was inevitable.

Still, she no longer intended to rely on eggs as her main trade. Thinking of them as secondary goods lightened her mood considerably.

There were plenty of loaches and crucian carp at home, and Li Fengmei had planted ample vegetables in the family’s private plot. After making a round of the market, aside from pork, she found little else to buy.

So she bought meat again. By afternoon, the fatty cuts were gone, leaving only lean pork. Lean pork was fine, really.

When she first arrived, she’d survived on sweet potatoes. Later, living with the Liu family during the busy harvest season, their meals had been generous.

She wasn’t craving oil and fat the way she had before.

She bought two jin of pork and several spices. Li Fengmei’s cooking was decent, but at home they used only salt, soy sauce, and vinegar.

At most adding scallions, ginger, and garlic from their own garden. There was no star anise, Sichuan peppercorn, or bay leaves. Xia Xiaolan picked some up.

Once your stomach was full, you began to care about flavor. Living a little better within your means gave you the motivation to keep earning.

Going to Shangdu every other day was the right decision.

The sun was strong today. The Liu family’s rice was nearly dry enough to store.

Xia Xiaolan had earned more than twenty yuan that day. She was already in high spirits when she returned to Qijing Village. As soon as she parked her bicycle, Liu Yong brought her good news.

“Zhang Erlai from Shipuo Village has been criminally detained. Looks like he’ll get a heavy sentence!”

While Xia Xiaolan had been selling goods in Shangdu, Liu Yong had made another trip to Anqing County. Unless those three hooligans were sentenced, he wouldn’t rest easy.

That day, Anqing County was conducting a Strike Hard campaign parade. Various criminals arrested during this period were paraded through the streets, forced onto trucks with placards bearing their names and crimes, loudspeakers blaring as the convoy circled the county again and again.

Liu Yong happened to witness it. He didn’t personally recognize Zhang Erlai, but the placard hanging from the man’s neck listed his name and village, from Shipuozi. Only Zhang Erlai matched.

Liu Yong had long wanted to deal with him, but with the ongoing crackdown, he didn’t want to implicate any acquaintances. Before he could act, Zhang Erlai had already been swept up by the campaign.

How could Xia Xiaolan not be pleased?

That bastard had twice tried to assault the original Xia Xiaolan. The first time she had been rescued by Wang Jianhua.

The second attempt had sparked the rumors that eventually drove her to slam her head into a pillar. Though others had fueled the gossip, Zhang Erlai bore much of the blame.

She had never done anything improper with him, but who would believe her?

People spoke with such certainty, as if they had personally witnessed her rolling in the hay with Zhang Erlai. She had been considering how to take revenge, only to find he had already been arrested.

“What was he arrested for?” she asked anxiously.

If it were for moral misconduct, what if Zhang Erlai dragged her down with him. During the 1983 Strike Hard campaign, illicit relationships didn’t just target men. Young women had been executed over such charges too.

Surely she wouldn’t have to prove her innocence through some hospital  examination?

Liu Yong’s dark, gaunt face relaxed into a smile.

“Burglary.”

“The police say the amount involved is huge. This time, he’ll definitely get a heavy sentence.”