Later that night, around nine o'clock, at the quietest time of night in the village, a terrible scream suddenly erupted from our little courtyard. It was followed by my mom's piercing screams. "Help! My son isn't breathing. Somebody please help!"
All at once, kerosene lamps started lighting up in the neighboring houses. Neighbors threw on their clothes and ran out to see what was going on. Old Mrs. Yang was the first one there. She was muttering, "Oh, what a terrible sin."
The very next morning, old Mrs. Yang had already spread the news to the whole village, saying, "The Luos' boy was rolling on the floor in agony from a headache last night. He couldn't even talk. A weeping Li Shufang was desperately begging people for a vehicle to take him to the hospital." Finally, Old Lu the tractor driver took pity on her and agreed to give us a ride.
Later, at work, Old Lu recounted the event, still shaken. "Luo Zhenshan's face was as pale as a sheet. When Luo Wenxin and I were lifting him onto the tractor, he was totally limp."
And with that, the whole village knew. They knew that the brick Qiao Yuanzhong had hit me with had caused a serious injury that had finally caught up with me. The village elders shook their heads, saying, "The head isn't something you can just go around hitting. He was young and forced himself to keep working. But now that the underlying injury has flared up, it could be fatal."
In reality, though, I was lying in a bed at the county public hospital, the pungent smell of disinfectant filling my nostrils.
When my mom, Li Shufang, paid the tractor driver, her hands were trembling. It pained her to part with the money, but she had to keep up the act for me. She paid him while wiping away tears.
The doctor saw me clutching my head and moaning in pain. When he was told I'd been struck hard by a brick days earlier, the doctor's expression turned serious. He immediately scheduled a series of tests.
Doctors in those days were pretty trusting. Seeing how violently I was reacting, plus my dad standing there with a mournful face, talking about how poor our family was and that we only came because the pain was unbearable, the doctor went right ahead and wrote on my chart: Suspected severe concussion, possible intracranial damage pending investigation.
Following my instructions, my dad took all the papers stamped with the big red official seal. He carefully hid the diagnostic certificate and all the receipts inside his clothes. "This is our family's protective charm."
I was admitted to the hospital. In front of the doctor, my old man shouted loudly, "Doctor, you must use the very best medicine. Even if it means selling everything we own, we have to get our kid cured."
The two days I was in the hospital, it was all shots and medicine. The payment slips kept coming, one after the other.
When my parents saw that the hospital room was empty, they would hurry to the township commune to cause a scene, especially near the detention center where Qiao Yuanzhong was locked up. Li Shufang sat at the main gate of the commune, slapping her thighs and wailing, shouting that Qiao Yuanzhong had killed someone. A murderer must pay with his life. She said her son was in the county hospital undergoing emergency treatment, and in just two days, they had spent over two hundred yuan.
This amount left the commune staff completely stunned. Two hundred yuan in 1975 — that was ten years of savings for many families. It was an entire year's salary for a full-time worker.
The commune had originally planned to release Qiao Yuanzhong in a couple of days, but now everything had changed. No one dared to bear the responsibility for murdering a productive force.
And Qiao Xin was summoned to the township commune. His face was frighteningly grim. He looked at the receipts and the diagnosis report, each one stamped with the big red official seal of the county hospital. He was speechless for a long while.
The Qiao family discussed it for half the night. In the end, they decided to try a peaceful approach first. They had to settle this matter even if it cost them dearly. They couldn't let the Luo family actually take the matter to court.
That night, with a grim face, Qiao Xin said to his elder brother, Qiao Cheng, "Brother, the commune secretary himself has said that if the Luo family doesn't change its tune, Yuanzhong will be sentenced. He might even be sent to a forestry farm for re-education through labor."
Qiao Cheng, the group leader, valued his reputation above all else. Hearing that a family member might become a labor convict, he was so angry he slammed his pipe on the table, making a thunderous noise. "If he's in prison, how can our Qiao village ever hold its head high in the commune again? What about the honor of our Qiao family ancestors?"
Qiao Cheng also knew very well that the boy had only started the fight to help Qiao Xin get water. This money couldn't come from just his branch of the family.
The next day, with grim faces, Qiao Xin and Qiao Cheng came to my hospital room carrying some pastries. I was closing my eyes, pretending to be unconscious, while Luo Wenxin stood guard in front of my bed, looking like he was ready to fight to the death.
"Brother Luo, Yuanzhong is just young and impulsive. Look how this has gotten out of hand. We're all fellow villagers." Qiao Xin forced a smile.
I slowly opened my eyes. I pulled out a severe injury assessment from under my pillow, stamped with a big red official seal. I looked at him coldly. "Secretary Qiao, the doctor said this injury might never heal for the rest of my life. I just want to ask: attempting to murder the successor of a war hero and destroying a productive force — how many years would someone get for that in our township?"
I deliberately emphasized the words war hero. This was a family connection I had just worked out with Grandpa Wang.
Qiao Cheng's cheek twitched. He knew that once such a political stain was attached to them, the entire Qiao clan wouldn't be able to recover for a decade. He whipped his head around and roared at Qiao Xin. "Look at the fine offspring you've raised. Hurry up and apologize to the Luo family."
In the end, under pressure from the clan elder, Qiao Cheng, Qiao Xin had no choice but to pull out a thick wad of Great Unity bills from inside his clothes. A full four hundred yuan in compensation.
Not only that, I also forced Qiao Xin right on the spot to guarantee that the Qiao family would never again give the Luo family trouble over work points or water access. I completely ignored his eyes, which were practically shooting fire, and stuffed the four hundred yuan into my clothes.
I stayed in the hospital for another two days, but they couldn't find anything wrong with me, so they urged me to check out. By then, the medical bills had already reached three hundred yuan. It all came out of the four hundred yuan the Qiao family paid us in compensation.
When the Qiaos heard that they had not only paid out the money, but that our family had also spent so much at a major hospital, Qiao Yuanzhong's mom was so angry she fainted.
In 1975, four hundred yuan was an astronomical sum. That was the Qiao family's life savings. This time I had basically cleaned them out.
The Qiao family thought the Luo family was extorting them. But we had the receipts and the diagnosis report from a major hospital. To ordinary people, that was incredibly authoritative. Everyone thought our family was in the right. A person's life was at stake. After all, the Qiao family had to pay up. The matter was even brought before the commune secretary. Qiao Xin ran around trying to sort things out, but it was no use. He could only accept his bad luck.