Chapter 72

There was still some distance to the Yin family’s house, but light streamed faintly from a window ahead. 

It wasn’t the flicker of a kerosene lamp; instead, the steady flashes resembled the beam of a flashlight. 

He Ting moved quietly, leading Lu Baiwei as they crouched and approached the window. Sure enough, familiar voices could be heard from inside. 

Liu Chunhua’s voice came through: 

“Jianguo, did you find anything?” 

Inside, Lu Jianguo emerged from under the bed. 

“No, there’s nothing here at all.” 

Failing to find anything under the bed, Lu Jianguo looked puzzled as Liu Chunhua shone the flashlight around. 

“If it’s not hidden in Shen Guixiang’s room, then where could it be?” 

Liu Chunhua offered a suggestion: 

“We’ve searched every corner of this house, even the secret compartments behind the cabinets, and still found nothing. The space under the bed would be the best place to hide something—so why is there nothing there?” 

Before leaving the brigade’s health station, Lu Baiwei had told He Ting that the reason Lu Jiaojiao had been so eager to marry Yin Zhihe was because he had secretly told her that there were gold bars buried beneath the Yin family’s house. 

He Ting had dismissed it as nonsense. 

If there really had been gold bars buried there, the Yin family would have dug them up long ago when their troubles began. 

He Ting had been in the brigade long enough to hear the members talk about the Yin family’s past. They had been wealthy landlords, but when disaster struck, the family preemptively donated their possessions and even moved into the servant quarters they had built for farmhands. Since no valuables were ever found, the Yin family had been labeled as “rich peasants” instead of landlords. 

The Yin family had shown foresight in donating their possessions to mitigate risks. If there truly were gold bars buried beneath the house, Yin Zhihe wouldn’t have been foolish enough to broadcast it. 

He Ting had only agreed to come here because Weiwei had insisted on sneaking out for a bit of excitement. After being pestered by the two kids all day, he also wanted some time alone with her. 

What He Ting didn’t know was that Lu Jiaojiao had been reborn. 

Of course, Yin Zhihe wouldn’t have been foolish enough to spread rumors about gold bars. In fact, neither Shen Guixiang nor Yin Zhihe himself knew anything about the hidden treasure. 

In their previous lives, after the implementation of the household responsibility system, Lu Baiwei and Yin Zhihe had made money through business and decided to renovate the Yin family’s old house. That was when they accidentally unearthed a small box of gold bars buried by Yin Zhihe’s father before his death—hidden in the outhouse. 

As Lu Baiwei and He Ting crouched beneath the window eaves, eavesdropping, the two inside had already reached an agreement. 

After searching the Yin house for several days, Liu Chunhua, emboldened by the absence of Shen Guixiang’s family from the Xiangyang Brigade, had even dared to search the house in broad daylight. 

Frustrated by the fruitless search, she suggested to Lu Jianguo: 

“I think Shen Guixiang must have hidden the gold bars under the bed. If they’re not under the bed now, there’s only one possibility—they’re buried beneath it.” 

“I’m sure Shen Guixiang hid the gold bars under the bed. If they’re not there now, there’s only one possibility: they’re buried beneath it.” 

“Old Lu, let’s move the bed and dig underneath!” 

Liu Chunhua encouraged Lu Jianguo, adding, “I refuse to believe we won’t find something valuable under the bed.” 

Shen Guixiang stuffed everything under her bed. 

With Liu Chunhua holding the flashlight, Lu Jianguo began pulling out the mess from under the bed. Dust flew everywhere, covering him from head to toe. Some even got into his mouth, and he spat several times to clear it out. 

Over the past few nights, when sneaking into the Yin house, Lu Jianguo and Liu Chunhua had dared to dig a few holes in the yard and refill them. They were confident it wouldn’t be noticed since Lu Jiaojiao had already dug around there searching for gold. The soil was loose, making it easy to cover up. 

But digging inside the house was a different matter. If Shen Guixiang came back, she’d immediately notice something was amiss. 

Lu Jianguo and Liu Chunhua had searched every possible spot in the Yin house. If there were gold bars, the most likely hiding place was indeed under Shen Guixiang’s bed. After all, Lu Jiaojiao had said the gold was buried underground. 

As they looked at the pile of junk pulled from under the bed, Lu Jianguo grew bolder. If they dug under the bed and simply pushed the bed back into place and stuffed the junk underneath, it wouldn’t look any different. Unless Shen Guixiang suddenly decided to crawl under the bed, she’d never notice a thing. 

Driven by dreams of unimaginable wealth, Lu Jianguo made up his mind. 

“Alright, let’s dig under the bed.” 

He called to Liu Chunhua, “Come help me move the bed so we can get started.” 

Outside, He Ting held Lu Baiwei as they crouched beneath the window, hidden in a pile of firewood. Their legs had gone numb from squatting so long. He Ting eventually sat down and offered his legs for Lu Baiwei to use as a makeshift bench. 

With her arms around his neck and her head resting on his shoulder, Lu Baiwei’s eyes were unfocused in the dim light. She struggled to suppress her heavy breathing, trying not to gasp audibly. 

It wasn’t clear how much time passed, but eventually, the sound of digging from inside the house ceased. 

“Chunhua, there’s nothing here,” Lu Jianguo panted, exhausted from digging beneath the bed. 

Liu Chunhua, equally disappointed, sighed. 

“How can there be nothing under the bed? Then where is it hidden?” 

So, where exactly is the stuff hidden?

Convinced that gold bars were buried under the Yin family property—and certain they were most likely hidden under Shen Guixiang’s bed—Liu Chunhua dug for half a day but found nothing. She was still unwilling to give up.

“Old Lu, dig a little deeper; we’re bound to find it.”

Seeing Lu Jianguo, who was about to collapse from exhaustion, Liu Chunhua relented. “Fine, let’s call it a night and come back earlier tomorrow to dig.”

“I sent someone to inquire at the commune. Turns out Jiao Jiao will need to stay in the hospital for a few more days. Shen Guixiang is using Jiao Jiao’s treatment as an excuse to hang around the commune, dragging Yin Zhihe along to mooch off her second daughter.”

“She’s sweet-talking her in-laws into feeding and serving them well. As long as Jiao Jiao stays in the hospital, neither of them plans on going home.”

“Let’s dig again tomorrow night. No matter what, whether we find anything or not, we’ll fill the hole back in.”

Liu Chunhua coaxed Lu Jianguo, “No one will ever know. We’ll put everything back under the bed. As long as Shen Guixiang doesn’t crawl under there, she won’t notice a thing.”

Fortune favors the bold, and the timid starve to death.

After digging around the Yin house for several days, Lu Jianguo had become quite bold.

He agreed, “Alright, we’ll dig one more time tomorrow. If we don’t find anything, we’ll stop…”

As the night grew late, Lu Jianguo and Liu Chunhua snuck out of the Yin house with flashlights in hand, their voices fading into the distance.

From beneath the firewood stack, Lu Baiwei and He Ting crawled out.

Earlier, when Lu Jianguo and Liu Chunhua were rummaging around in the house, they never stopped moving.

The pair had been hiding under a pile of dry firewood.

One careless noise, and they would’ve been discovered.

After tidying up her somewhat disheveled clothes, Lu Baiwei angrily pinched He Ting. “Tell me, if the Yin family really buried gold bars, where would Yin Zhihe and his father hide them?”

Despite being pinched repeatedly by his wife, He Ting wasn’t the least bit annoyed. Instead, he let out a low chuckle in the dark of night.

Since his Baiwei also believed in the absurd rumor of gold bars hidden by the Yin family, He Ting dutifully helped her analyze the situation.

“If I were Yin Zhihe or his father, I’d bury them in an unexpected place.”

He Ting reasoned, “A place others would think is filthy and wouldn’t want to touch.”

It wasn’t that Lu Jianguo and Liu Chunhua were greedy enough to wave their hoes around recklessly in the Yin house. Even if Lu Baiwei knew there were gold bars, she wouldn’t dare covet them.

But now?

If anything went wrong, there were already two scapegoats.

After all, even the auntie visiting the clinic had seen Lu Jianguo and Liu Chunhua sneaking into the Yin house under cover of darkness.