“Hey, Gongzi, your horse doesn’t eat meat, it doesn’t even look at it ah.”
The shop boy walked into the shop with a small piece of fat meat, his face full of unhappiness, complaining towards Zhu Pingan.
“Oh, don’t eat it even if you don’t.”Zhu Pingan nodded bashfully, calm and collected.
“Ah?”
The shopkeeper opened his mouth wide, then glanced at Zhu Pingan again, saw that Zhu Pingan was blandly baking with a wooden stick supporting his clothes, pondered for a long time, and then looked at the people who were watching the fruitless scene one after another, before he suddenly realised and let out an oh.
Just curiosity burst followed the shopkeeper out to see the horse eating meat people, at this moment also came back, mouth inside a variety of slurs and insults, such as “what horse eating meat, really stupid” and so on, but at this moment came back, looked at Zhu Pingan face baking clothes calmly, some of them can not squeeze in the baking fire when they squeezed, and only then realised that!The clothes were thin, and Zhu Ping An baked the clothes.
The clothes were relatively thin, Zhu Ping An baked them for a while before they dried, and the shopkeeper also sent over the meal that Zhu Ping An had ordered at this time. To be able to eat a hot meal in a stormy time, is no less than a pleasure, will mother Chen’s pickled tender cucumber took out, on the beautiful eat up.
While Zhu Pingan was eating, someone else entered the shop in the rain and got soaked. This person should be a freight man in a hurry, carrying two baskets of goods on a flat stretcher, hurriedly entering the shop. When he entered the shop, he tried to squeeze by the fire to roast his clothes and especially the goods in the baskets to dry them out and reduce the damage caused by the wet goods.
However, just like when Zhu Pingan first came in, the cargo man was unable to squeeze in even after a few attempts. It was a windy and rainy day, the temperature was more than ten degrees lower than usual, but people’s clothes were as thin as usual, and it was rare for them to get warm by the fire, so no one was willing to move out of the way.
The cargo man looked at the goods in the basket heartily and hung his head.
“Come here, my clothes are already baked.”Zhu Pingan, who was in the middle of eating, noticed and reached out his hand towards the cargo man.
“Thank you, sir.”The cargo man thanked Zhu Pingan with a delighted face.
“You’re welcome, it’s just a show of hands.”Zhu Pingan shook his head with a slight smile, packed up his things and headed towards the empty seat near the door.
The cargo man thanked Zhu Ping An again and again, and when he arrived at the fire, he set out the goods in the baskets to bake, fortunately, the baking was timely, and the loss was within the acceptable range, and in his heart, he was even more grateful to Zhu Ping An.
The day of May is like the face of Sun Monkey, changing at the drop of a hat. Zhu Ping An had just finished his meal when he noticed that the rain outside was getting lighter and lighter, and by the time Zhu Ping An had sorted out his manners and changed into dry clothes, the rain outside had stopped.
Good people do have good rewards, Zhu Pingan looked at the weather outside and slightly tickled his lips, after paying the 28 Wen for the meal, Zhu Pingan carried his luggage out of the shop. Putting the gifts back on the horse’s back, he waited for the horse to drink enough water, and then set off on the road to the north.
With the speed of a horse, Zhu Pingan arrived at the pier by the Yangtze River in the afternoon before sunset, and caught up with the last passenger ship that anchored and set sail from the pier.
There was a special shed for livestock on the ship, and horses were allowed on board, but they needed to pay an additional ship’s fare to do so. Zhu Pingan paid two boat fees and led the horse onto the boat. The sailors brought the horses to the livestock shed, and Zhu Pingan carried his luggage into the arranged cabin. Inside the cabin there is already a person, is an old man who went to Nanjing to visit relatives, Zhu Pingan came in and greeted the old man, then put the gifts under the bed and settled down.
Anchor and set sail, all the way downstream, because it just rained, the air with a humid and slightly cool, Xi Xi cool wind blowing, lying in the cabin bed comfortable.
Anchor sailing time has been evening sunset, although just under the heavy rain, but recent precipitation along the Yangtze River is scarce, the river water line than in previous years are lower than a lot of reefs along the way in a number of places also surfaced or although not surfaced but also on the ship sailing caused a hidden danger, taking into account these circumstances, the ship sailing speed than in previous years slowed down a lot.
This also strengthened the idea of Zhu Pingan to Nanjing after riding into the capital.
Rest for a moment, all the way to horseback fatigue swept away, in addition to the sound of the water, it is very quiet. Zhu Pingan lit the oil lamp in the cabin and took out the ink, paper and inkstone from the luggage. While riding on the road, Zhu Pingan had re-stepped through the impeachment of killing Liang and taking credit for it, and had gone through the similar allusions and information documents he had read in modern times in his memory, summarising the key points. Now, by the light of the oil lamp, Zhu Pingan collated the summary onto the rice paper.
“Young man, going to Yingtianfu to take the Academy Examination, right?”The old man in the same cabin looked at Zhu Pingan waving his ink into the oil lamp and asked in an affirmative tone.
“I ……”Zhu Pingan stopped his pen and considered how to answer the old man.
“I have a nephew who, like you, is also going to Yingtian Province to take the Academy Examination, but he left a few days ago.”The old man did not wait for Zhu Pingan to answer before he categorised him as one of the people who were taking the courtyard examination.
“Where is the young man from?”The old man asked again.
“I’m from Anqing Prefecture.”Zhu Pingan replied back.
“Anqing Prefecture is good, there’s one from your place who got the Scholarship, you’ve heard about it, right?”After the old man heard that Zhu Pingan was from the Anqing Prefecture, he nodded his head in succession.
“Hmm.”What else could he say, Zhu Pingan had no choice but to nod with a hmm.
“This is the first time you’re taking the Academy Examination, right, you’re a bit late to set off, but it’s better to gain experience for the first time. My nephew is the third time this year, his luggage is all prepared by me, I tell you, to participate in the courtyard examination you have to prepare a hollowed out ink stone and brush ……”The old man was more talkative, and even gifted Zhu Pingan with several experiences in the courtyard examination test.
Zhu Pingan had to listen, occasionally hmm a sound, the old man chatting energetically, until outside the late night, the moon on the middle of the night, chatty old man is too old to stay up all night, finally went to sleep.
Zhu Pingan in the old man sleep, continue to splash ink, finishing summary of relevant information, until midnight before blowing out the oil lamp began to sleep.
The next morning, about five or six o’clock, the passenger ship has sailed to Taiping Province Dangtu County, from Nanjing is only one or two hours away. Zhu Pingan got up, washed up, fed his horse with water and grass, and went back to the cabin to pack up his luggage, ready to wait for the ship to disembark when it arrived at Yingtian Province.
Zhu Pingan’s side had only finished packing when he felt a clamour outside the boat, and then soon the boat came to a halt against the river.
“Officials are handling a case, please make it convenient for all of you, dock and disembark the boat and wait for the officials to finish their errands and then we’ll be on our way.”The owner of the passenger boat went from cabin to cabin to notify the plea.
When disembarking, Zhu Pingan heard that there seemed to be a murder case, and the magistrate was leading the officials on the case.
