A Western Doctor’s Happy Farming Life[1] chapter 80

The first place they went to was in the northwest side of the provincial capital. It was a boisterous place where there was crammed with full of vendors and gangs of villains, all in a mess yet prosperous. So when they arrived, they could hear babel of voices while all manners of peddlers cried their wares in the street.

Though they had just finished their breakfast, Song Qinghan still felt a bit hungry when he stared at dazzling assortment of street food.

Wu Dahu found out the desire in the eyes of Song Qinghan, he pondered and then asked while smiling, “What would you like to try? Let’s check out the flavor here in this provincial capital.”

Song Qinghan hesitated for a moment, but then he got inspiration all of a sudden when he fumbled in his pocket and touched the ticket draft in a bulge. Following the most fragrant smell, they approached to a stall which sold fried stuff.

Upon seeing Song Qinghan and Wu Dahu, the peddler greeted enthusiastically, “What tastes do you like? My dearest guests, sweet or salty?”

Song Qinghan pondered for a moment, and then turned to Wu Dahu, saying slowly, “Swee… sweet ones.”

“Alright! So do you prefer ones with more oil or less?”

“less oil please.”

The peddler who had got the information reacted immediately, he then wrapped two pieces of sugar oil cake up in one kraft paper sack, saying, “Try this out, you must love it.”

Song Qinghan was actually more curious about other kinds of street food. After all, he had tried sugar oil cakes thousand times already in modern time. It would just be boring if he tried this again without getting another.

The peddler got his face sullen all of a sudden noticing that Song Qinghan didn’t even stretched forth his hands to take over the food, he said while showing a gloomy face, “I have already packed them up, are you going to throw them away?”

Wu Dahu frowned while he noticed that people around were all gathering their gaze over, and then he took out ten cooper coins and put them into the peddler’s hands. But just as he was about to take the kraft paper sack, the peddler retreated his hand, while saying arrogantly, “Hey, ten more copper coins are required.”

Song Qinghan frowned, “What? Ten cooper coins for each sugar oil cake?”

The peddler held his arms while answering without fear, “How I set the price is my own business. But whether you buy or not is your own business.”

The other peddlers who had cold and cheerless ambience on their own stalls today approached them one after another, all of them swarmed into the back of that arrogant peddler, as if they were another gang of bandit.

Without intention to cause any trouble, Wu Dahu took out another ten cooper coins and put them all into the peddler’s hands, while taking over the kraft paper sack and leaving with Song Qinghan.

Not until they left far away from the stall did Song Qinghan started complaining, “How come all the peddlers here are so unreasonable, they make trouble out of nothing!”

He took out one of the bamboo tags from the kraft paper sack with rage and bit down one of the sugar oil cake in resentment. He then murmured while chewing the food in his mouth for a moment, “Despite the fact, it tastes quite good though…!”

The freshly fried sugar oil cake was incomparably delicious in crisp outside with tenderness inside, the flavor of it was quite superb. In addition, with the melted sugar covered on the cake’s surface, it delivered an enchanting look for the passersby.

After he finished eating that piece of sugar oil cake, his anger was about to dissipate. Yet he was still a bit uncomfortable mentally, saying as if he was going to let off all his negativeness, “I would say if that guy has a better attitude to his customers, he wouldn’t have had such a bad business. How brainless he is!”

Wu Dahu delivered Song Qinghan a warm smile as if he was trying to comfort him by doing so, while shaking his head and saying, “It’s obviously that those peddlers are allying. They will harass people from alien places. The accent of us is a far cry from their ones. That’s why they were just unscrupulous and made trouble out of nothing.”

Well, it could be predicted that if they didn’t take the sack of the sugar oil cake or they just refused to give the peddler money, probably his accomplices would have besieged them.

Song Qinghan took out the remaining piece of sugar oil cake and reached out to feed Wu Dahu. But Wu Dahu just shook his head after eating one of them. With that signal, Song Qinghan prepared to tuck them into his own mouth. But beyond his expectation, Little Shitou grabbed his arm and stopped him eating. This little baby was gazing longingly at the sugar oil cake with his eyes blinked.

Noticing that Little Shitou was all eagerness to put out his tongue, Song Qinghan burst into laughter, while holding his stomach and saying, “You little pumpkin! You’re still young but you’ve already been a foodie! I wanna know how you will be after you grow up.”

He reached out and quickly put the sugar oil cake on Little Shitou’s mouth. And at the moment the baby put out his tongue again trying to lick, Song Qinghan pulled the food back. And then it was a adorably impatient cry from the baby, and again, Song Qinghan put the cake back to the baby’s lips and pulled back again, he laughed joyfully after Little Shitou was cajoled again.

Helplessly, Wu Dahu looked at Song Qinghan who was being childish and playing with Little Shitou back and forth. He reached out to grab Song Qinghan’s arm and said in a tender tone, “If you don’t eat it, I’ll eat it. I’m afraid that Little Shitou is hungry right now. Let’s go back the lodge first later and prepare to feed him congee and then we will head to the next place.”

Song Qinghan retracted his hand embarrassedly and quickly finished eating the sugar oil cake. He was awkward because he never knew that why he behaved so childish to make fun of his own baby child. Probably that was because Little Shitou was too cute.

The two passed by another street on the way back. Right on the way they were walking, Song Qinghan got his ears moved a bit when he heard someone was shouting “goat milk”, and then he turned his head back while following the trace of the sound.

In front of a mansion with some splendid and grand trims outside, there stood a man who dressed up like a farmer and was delivering a ceramic jar to the servant inside the door. It seemed that he was explaining something from the movement of his lips.

Seeing that the man in the farmer dress was about to leave, Song Qinghan subconsciously caught up and asked, “Brother, did you just mention ‘goat milk’?”

The man in the farmer dress measured Song Qinghan and Wu Dahu with his eyes staring at them up and down, and then grabbed tight the silver coins in his hand, while frowning and asking, “Yes I did, what’s wrong with that?”

Wu Dahu and Song Qinghan looked at each other and it was Wu Dahu who took the initiative to ask, “Would you love to sell us the goat milk? Or just sell us the goat to us?”

The farmer dithered and then shook his head, saying, “I can’t sell it. I just got only two goats in my house. And I should deliver the milk produced by them to those rich families everyday. The quantity is not enough for you.”

Disappointment flashed across Song Qinghan’s eyes. But Wu Dahu was not discouraged at all and he continued to ask, “Then you should know where you got the goats, right? Our kid is just born not long ago, we want to feed him with goat milk. Would you please tell us where the market is?”

After that, he took out one silver coin from his pocket and then put it into the hand of the man in the farmer dress.

The man in the farmer dress took over the coin with his complexion changed a bit, seemingly tenderer, and then he took a glance at Little Shitou in Wu Dahu’s arms, saying gently, “Alright. I will definitely not tell someone other about the information. But from your accent, I might draw a conclusion that you’re not from this place. Right? Fine, I will trust you. Listen, don’t try to get others informed. Deal?”

Wu Dahu and Song Qinghan nodded in confusion, as if they didn’t get the point why the man in the farmer dress would keep this as a mysterious thing.

The man in the farmer dress looked left and right, then approached Wu Dahu and whispered, “Go west, and you will find a town which is named ‘MOSHANG’, there’s a big farm there which is breeding hundred of goats. People who get money can get the goats. But… I’ve heard that the town had suffered from a large-scale outbreak of smallpox since I came back from the trip. And I guess, probably it is a dead town right now!”

And then it was a long while for him to shake his head, no one would be able to figure out why he was shaking his head currently. Probably he was sympathizing with the suffer from the citizen of that town, or, he was just being regretful that he didn’t acquire more goats from that market.

“smallpox?”

Song Qinghan repeated it, being quite thoughtful.

He was quite familiar with the illness which he had heard about it earlier in his primary school period.

Wu Dahu thought Song Qinghan was just afraid of such an illness, so he consoled him, saying, “Since it was haunted by the illness, we can conceive of another idea. Except that town, there must be some other places where we can get the goats from.”

The farmer probably didn’t have much hope for this. He shook his head while saying, “Except ‘MOSHANG’, Only go further west till the border can you find any trace of goats. The place where the boarder lies is quite remote and it will surely take your time. Besides, you have to bear all kinds of risks along the way. Otherwise, why didn’t these rich families send their servants to take this risk? If it isn’t the fact that those rich families are in the relationship of mutual restriction, my goats probably would have robbed by them.”

Mentioning something like that, he couldn’t help turning his head and taking a glance at the mansion he just visited, and then he waved his hand to Song Qinghan and Wu Dahu, saying, “I’m leaving now. Take care.”

Staring at the back of the man in the farmer dress who seemingly fleeing away, Song Qinghan touched his chin, saying slowly, “This ‘MOSHANG’ Town, I would love to give it a shot.”

An astonishment overwhelmed the brain of Wu Dahu,and then he asked in confusion, “Aren’t you afraid of the smallpox? If the man told us the truth, and the town did really suffer from the illness of smallpox in a large-scale. Probably no one there survived, let alone the goats.”

That would be a total nonsense if Song Qinghan just declared that he was not afraid at all. After all, this body he possessed now wasn’t the same one he got in the modern time. His original body in the modern time had already been vaccinated by various vaccines though. In that case, he couldn’t be abrupt to head to the place without further consideration. And even though he could be as meticulous, he still bore the risk to get infected. At that time, he couldn’t even save himself.

However, the innate duty of being a doctor triggered the nerve of Song Qinghan. He pondered for a moment, and then answered in a decisive look, “After we settle down, I will go there and check out the situation. If it is too much serious, I won’t go in. But if it’s not that kind of serious… Probably I can find a way to save them.”

Wu Dahu got his nerved strained all of a sudden while grabbing Song Qinghan’s hands tightly and saying, “I’ll go with you, those who got a terminal disease sometimes are easy to lose their mind. That will be unsafe for you to go alone.”

Song Qinghan felt warm in his heart, and then he held back Wu Dahu’s hands while smiling faintly, saying, “Don’t worry, I’m just going to check it out. I will surely leave as soon as I find something wrong. Moreover, who will take care of Little Shitou if you come with me? We can’t leave him with Wenxuan alone.”

Although Wu Dahu knew that Song Qinghan’s words made sense, he still couldn’t stop worrying in his mind. But it would be just useless to worry about something which is not going to happen in the near future, so he just decided to pay no attention to it right away.

After the two returned to the lodge, they had their lunch with Yuan Wenxuan and fed Little Shitou with congee, and then went to check out the leader boy of the acrobatic team. And again, they headed out.

They wouldn’t consider the house located at the northwestern side anymore. Though they hadn’t seen the house there yet, how the peddlers reacted disappointed them so much. They would totally refuse to become a neighbor with those people.

After excluding the northwestern side, the two walked southeastern, which was the complete opposite of the northwest side.

If we should describe that the northwestern side of this capital is somewhere with boisterous ambience crammed with all kinds of ordinary residents, then the southeastern side of it should be of tranquility given by the noble and rich families.

Song Qinghan and Wu Dahu walked along the way to the target place, but they found it was quite silent as if it was a haunted place where various ghosts stayed. Along the way erupted various mansions with delicate and fabulously magnificent yards. Those yards could seemingly seclude their mansions away from the noises, while there occasionally rang some birds.

The ready-to-be-sold house was “squeezed” breathlessly right between two magnificent mansions. It was just like a poor poodle standing aside by two golden retrievers in big sizes.

Wu Dahu walked over and knocked on the door. And then it was a a bald middle-aged man with one pair of dark eyes standing right behind the door while popping out his head. He took a careful measurement up and down on Song Qinghan and Wu Dahu, but then asked in frustration, “What’s the matter?”

“We’re new to the provincial capital and would love to find a suitable place as an accommodation. I wanna know if…”

Before Wu Dahu finished his words, the bald man’s eyes lit up all of a sudden and he quickly opened the door, while saying excitedly, “Come on in, come on in.This house is definitely suitable for you. You will definitely like it if you grab a closer observation over it!”