RYEY – Chapter 247 The Child Was Drowned

“Li Huan, Mom—where’s Little Cheng Li?”

“Qiao, don’t worry. Little Cheng Li is at Uncle Ye’s place. Uncle Ye knew you were being discharged today, so he took Little Cheng Li with him. He said you should focus on your postpartum recovery, and Little Cheng Li will stay with him this month.”

Hearing that Little Cheng Li was with Ye Jun, Cheng Qiao felt relieved. Although Ye Jun was already quite old, someone like Li Huan wouldn’t be a match for him—even one-on-two wouldn’t be a problem. And if he ran into someone like Feniu, Ye Jun could easily handle five or six of them.

Seeing Cheng Qiao relax, Li Huan smiled as well. Now that their second child had been born, he started thinking about when the third one should come. Yesterday he had deliberately asked the doctor, who said it was best to space childbirth by one to two years.

After a woman gives birth, there’s a period of weakness. She must properly recuperate before conceiving again; otherwise, her body would be completely drained, and the one who suffers is the woman herself.

How could Li Huan bear to let Cheng Qiao exhaust her body? So before discharge, he even spent money to buy condoms. It was just that the hospital was too stingy—so few of them, how could that possibly be enough?

The doctor was speechless. One box had ten condoms, and they promised to give him three boxes a month, yet he still said it wasn’t enough. Was he a bull or something, working so hard at it? Honestly.

Aunt Wang led a group of women, going door to door handing out red-dyed eggs. Cheng Qiao had given birth to another son, and by custom, the eggs should have been distributed after she returned home.

But Mother Li was too busy, so she gave the eggs to Aunt Wang, asking her to dye them red and distribute them to the villagers. Of course, Aunt Wang was allowed to take ten extra eggs for herself.

“Aunt Wang, why didn’t my family get any red eggs?”

Zhaodi saw Aunt Wang pass by their doorstep with a basket on her back without stopping, and she immediately grew anxious. She had seen it clearly—every household received two red eggs.

Even those families who had split off had each gotten red eggs, all saying that Cheng Qiao was truly blessed. She had given birth to two sons in a row, firmly securing her position in the Li family.

“You? Heh. Does your family get along with the Li family?”

Aunt Wang glanced sideways at Zhaodi and mocked her smugly. Zhaodi was so furious she wished she could snatch the basket from Aunt Wang’s back and smash all the eggs on the ground.

Aunt Wang and Zhaodi had clashed many times before and knew each other well. Seeing Zhaodi’s look, Aunt Wang smugly hitched the basket higher on her back.

Your man isn’t the accountant anymore—no salary, no chance to skim anything either. If you smashed a whole basket of eggs, what would you use to pay for it?

Besides, these were the red eggs of Li Huan’s son. Who was Li Huan? The rogue village chief—county commune leaders were warm and friendly the moment they saw him. And you, the mother of a murderer, still dare to rebel?

“I’m warning you seriously—these are the red eggs of the village chief’s youngest son. Touch even one and see what happens!”

Aunt Wang shouted at the top of her lungs, startling Wang Xiangyang, who was hoeing weeds nearby, and her own husband. Both men rushed over with their hoes in hand.

Chen Weimin immediately backed down. His wife could still hold her own against Aunt Wang alone, but Wang Duocai was fiercely protective of his wife, and Wang Xiangyang was an utterly loyal lackey of Li Huan.

Chen Weidang also walked over, coldly staring at Chen Weimin. He had grown increasingly disdainful of this younger brother—always hiding behind his wife, grabbing benefits when there were any, and dodging trouble whenever it appeared.

“Weimin, you’re a member of the Chen family. A person needs to take responsibility, especially a man. Always hiding behind your wife and picking up leftovers—how spineless.”

Zhaodi felt as if she had been struck with sudden enlightenment. She turned in shock to look at the man she had relied on for decades, only to realize that it was actually the man relying on her. The realization hit her hard.

Just as Zhaodi was about to explode, a villager came running over in panic. He was a member of Xiangyang Village’s security patrol. Today it was his and another villager’s turn to patrol, and they had spotted a child soaking in the river at a glance.

The child was floating face-down. By the time they pulled him out, he was already dead. Although the body was bloated from soaking, they recognized at once that it was Chen Dazhu’s son.

Chen Weidang’s eyes suddenly sharpened. Chen Tiezhu—well done indeed. Don’t tell me this child’s death has nothing to do with you.

“Has the village chief come back?”

“He’s back. The ox cart just passed by, heading toward the back mountain.”

“Did you tell him?”

The villager shook his head. A whole family was happily bringing their youngest son home—telling them a child had drowned in the village would just be asking to get beaten.

“Come on, take me to see.”

Aunt Wang also grew curious and turned to follow Chen Weidang. Wang Xiangyang grabbed her arm—she was delivering red eggs, going to see a dead child would be bad luck.

Thinking it over, Aunt Wang agreed. She took off the basket and handed it straight to Wang Xiangyang. This glorious yet arduous task was now his—most of the houses were already done, just a dozen or so left.

With no choice, Wang Xiangyang took the basket. To him, he was actually willing to deliver the red eggs. He truly despised Xu Laidi and Chen Dazhu—their child living or dying had nothing to do with him.

A small corpse lay by the riverbank, the whole body swollen from soaking, clearly drowned a long time ago. The villagers found it strange that the child hadn’t been swept away by the current—perhaps there was a grievance weighing on his heart.

“Who’s going to call Chen Tiezhu over?”

“Uncle Chen, I’ve already seen it.”

Chen Tiezhu looked at his nephew lying on the ground, shock filling his heart. He had been living separately from his wife. His wife lived with their son and this nephew in Dazhu’s house, while he stayed at the old homestead.

Because the nephew’s leg was broken, he was usually kept at home and didn’t go out. Since his wife had to work in the fields, she would take their son along with her.

“Go call Tiezhu’s wife over.”

Juhua, holding Niqiu, was so frightened that she hid behind the crowd, not daring to make a sound. She had always abused Xu Laidi’s child, sometimes even forgetting to feed him—there were times he went hungry for two days straight.

But if you said she had drowned the child, she wouldn’t dare even if beaten to death. Besides, she had already forgotten to feed the child for two days—she truly didn’t know when he had drowned.

“Report it to the police.”

After settling Cheng Qiao, Li Huan rushed over. A life had been lost in the village—even if it was a child, as the village chief, he would certainly be held responsible.

When the comrades at the Public Security Bureau heard that a child had drowned in the river, they weren’t particularly surprised. Every summer, many villages lost children to drowning—this year, it just seemed to have happened a bit earlier.

In March or April, people here still needed to wear light padded jackets; no child would go into the water. Moreover, Li Huan said the child was disabled and couldn’t even walk—this was clearly a murder.

Yet no matter how the police searched for clues, around the house near the village entrance, aside from the footprints of Chen Tiezhu and Juhua, there were only Niqiu’s footprints.

Aunt Wang patted her chest in relief. Fortunately, she hadn’t gone to deliver red eggs to Chen Tiezhu’s family. Otherwise, she would definitely have left her own footprints—wouldn’t she have been suspected of being a murderer then?