Chapter 563: Chapter 561 The Tent
The next day, early in the morning.
This was an ordinary street, bustling with traffic. Vehicles and pedestrians stread by ceaselessly.
In the middle of the street, an alley lay dim and unlit. Puddles dotted the ground. In a corner, a few black trash bins, already filled to the brim, were placed. Nestled against the wall sat an old, faded tent.
The zipper door of the tent was not closed. Inside, one could see a pile of cotton quilts shaped like a human form.
Amidst rustling sounds, an elderly woman slowly lifted the cotton quilts. She sat up, rubbing her bleary eyes, and poked her head out of the tent.
She appeared to be around sixty years of age. She was sowhat bulky, dressed in a brown coat and black pants. Her hair was disheveled and her face lined with wrinkles. She had small eyes, dark circles, and drooping eye bags. She gave off an appearance of poor spirits, an unceasing anxiety in her gaze.
The cool breeze of the early morning brushed by, as the scent of food from the nearby breakfast joint wafted into her nostrils.
The old lady swallowed, slowly withdrew into the tent, and glanced downward. She noticed a few empty mineral water bottles and compressed biscuit wrappers scattered in the corner of the tent.
GURGLE.
A sound ca from her stomach. The elderly woman instinctively prepared to get up and crawl out of the tent, but as soon as her palm touched the ground, she quickly withdrew it as if she had touched a live wire.
No, I can’t leave this place.
She looked at the public security building across the street, licked her chapped lips, and glanced around. Then, she softly called out to a white-collar woman passing by, "Miss, Miss?"
The hurried white-collar woman, engrossed with her phone, heard the call. With a wary glance from the corner of her eye at the filthy tent and the old lady resembling a beggar inside, she quickened her pace without uttering a word and left the alleyway.
As she watched the white-collar woman ignore her and walk away, the old lady pursed her lips, a clear sense of helplessness flashing in her eyes.
She kept calling out from inside the tent for a while longer, but the passing pedestrians either completely ignored her, walking straight on, or casually tossed a few coins in front of the tent as they passed by.
GURGLE. GURGLE.
Her stomach growled even louder. The old woman sat disheartened in the tent.
At that mont, a handso young man wearing a black and white hoodie and loose blue jeans, with a buzz cut and an earring, walked down the street. He happened to stop in front of the alley, continually turning and looking around. The chanical female voice of a map navigation app sounded from the phone in his hand.
The old woman, as if grasping at a lifeline, hurriedly poked her upper body out of the tent, her face bearing an earnest smile, and called out to the young man, "Young man, young man?"
The buzz-cut young man turned around, his eyes wary. "Are you calling ?"
The old lady nodded with a smile. "Yes, yes. Could you help
buy sothing to eat? You don’t have to go to the breakfast joint; just so bread and mineral water from the supermarket next door will do."
The buzz-cut young man frowned, about to refuse, but the old lady hastily added, "I’m really not a beggar! Here, take this money. Just help
buy plenty of food, and you can keep the rest."
She hurriedly reached for the banknotes on the ground, took so more money from inside the tent, held it out in her hands, and pleaded, "Please, do
this favor. Help
out."
The buzz-cut young man looked at her suspiciously. "Auntie, are your legs disabled?"
The elderly woman hesitated for a mont, then nodded. "Mm..."
"...Alright then." The young man with the buzz cut hesitantly moved his feet. He pulled out two of the cleanest-looking twenty-yuan notes from her hand, frowned slightly, and said cautiously, "Just bread and mineral water, and you’re not picky about the brand, right? I’ll bring it to you in a bit. But don’t try to scam . I’m recording this."
"I won’t scam you, I won’t." The old woman breathed a sigh of relief. She watched as he walked down the street and into the supermarket on the roadside. Monts later, he erged with a bulging plastic bag.
"Here’s your stuff."
The young man placed the plastic bag on the ground not far in front of the tent, slowly straightened up, took two steps back, and wiped his fingers—indented by the plastic bag’s handles—on the side of his jeans.
Famished, the old woman nodded gratefully. She reached out of the tent, propping herself up with one hand on the ground while hooking the plastic bag with the other, and dragged the plastic bag into the tent. She rummaged for a while, took out so bread, unscrewed a bottle of mineral water, and began to eat and drink eagerly.
COUGH. COUGH. COUGH.
Because she ate too quickly, she began to cough violently.
The young man with the buzz cut was putting on his headphones. Seeing her pained expression, he couldn’t help but remind her, "Auntie, eat slower."
"Eh."
The old woman responded and slowed down her eating pace slightly.
The young man with the buzz cut pursed his lips. "Auntie, where is your family?"
The old woman’s movents paused. She said softly, "They don’t want
anymore."
"Don’t want you?" The young man raised an eyebrow. "Abandoning an elderly person, huh? Why don’t you report them to the police? Have them arrested?"
The old woman silently chewed her bread and did not answer the question. The young man, having received no answer to his awkward inquiry, looked slightly annoyed and muttered, "TSK. Never mind then."
"...They," the old woman’s gaze beca sowhat vacant, "dislike my bad reputation."
At the Special Affairs Bureau, in the employees’ canteen.
Wearing a white shirt, Wei Linglan sat alone at the back of a dining table, on which lay an untouched exquisite al and a file folder.
"Qi Lianxiang, Qi Lianxiang..." she murmured softly. She pushed her glasses up the bridge of her nose, her fingers tapping back and forth on the file folder as colleagues bustled around her.
In her ears were earphones connected to a small, portable tape recorder. Through the recorder’s glass cover, she could see the tape slowly turning inside.
"Sister Lan, what are you muttering about?" Chu Ying, carrying a tray, ca over and sat opposite Wei Linglan. She picked up the iced cola from her tray, took a big gulp directly from the can, then set down the can with a CLACK and a satisfied "Ah~" before slumping into her seat.
A smile flickered across Wei Linglan’s face. She too picked up the juice from her tray and took a sip. "Drinking cola so early in the morning?" she said with a laugh. "Why aren’t you having breakfast with Ash today?"
"He’s too boring lately. He’s always taking part in all sorts of training courses at the bureau, totally swamped." Chu Ying rolled her eyes in resignation and glanced at the file folder. "What’s this?" she asked casually.
"Just so information," Wei Linglan said indifferently, while the tape in her earphones played the recorded interrogation.
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