Chapter 91: Guessing at Some Inside Information
When she spoke of her own misery, Liu Xingyu did not shed a tear. Yet Jiang Fan’s promise of concern brought tears to her eyes.
After her parents died, she was still only a little girl who could not walk. Once her maternal aunt took her in, she lost all contact with her elder brother and elder sister.
She worried about the two children left behind with her husband’s family, and about her disabled aunt. Those three people needed care, and they were the dearest to her in this world.
The family that had bought her regarded the silver they had spent as justification enough. They had never treated her like a human being, but only used her like an ox. Axing was spineless too; he treated her as a tool for bearing children. When he came to Dongguan to work, he treated her as a tool for making money.
The people at the factory only knew that Axing had made a scene at the gate because of her affair with Gou Biao. No one bothered to think about what sort of man Axing was. In Axing’s eyes, as long as there was money, everything could be discussed.
Gou Biao beat Axing badly enough to send him to the hospital for a week. After he was discharged, Gou Biao gave him three hundred yuan.
On the night before Axing left Dongguan, he stayed in the rented room shared by Liu Xingyu and Gou Biao, the three of them in a single room.
Just as Liu Xingyu was wavering over whether she should sleep in the bed with Gou Biao or on the floor with Axing, Axing, having received the money, took the initiative to lie down on the floor and even gave her a cheerful shove, signaling for her to go sleep in the bed.
That shove from Axing erased even the last lingering memory of their already shattered marriage.
By putting up with humiliation and enduring shame to stay with Gou Biao, Liu Xingyu had thought she had found a harbor of refuge. She had not expected it to be yet another trap.
Leaving aside the matter of Gou Biao’s other woman, as she gradually came into contact with him, she discovered that Gou Biao was not only greedy but especially selfish. She had done everything she could to help him carry out shady business, and he had reaped handsome rewards. Apart from the rental room they shared and the hundred yuan she sent to Axing, Gou Biao had never even bought her a single piece of clothing, let alone given her any money.
It was not that she had never thought of leaving Gou Biao. But the person who had come to Dongguan with her was not only Axing’s fellow townsman, but also Gou Biao’s fellow townsman, with a touch of kinship besides.
Though Liu Xingyu looked strong on the outside, her heart and body were soft and yielding. In this strange land where she knew no one, she did not dare strike out on her own, which was why she cared so much about her present job.
She had come hoping to try her luck. Unexpectedly, Jiang Fan, whom Gou Biao, Zhu Bing, and the others described as domineering, unreasonable, and sharp-tongued, offered her a tender promise, and gratitude brought tears to her eyes once more.
Liu Xingyu looked at Jiang Fan and said hoarsely, “I may not be a good woman, but I can endure any hardship. Even if I have to work on the assembly line, as long as I can live with a clear conscience, I want to leave Dafeng now.”
Jiang Fan kept one eye on the clock hanging in the dormitory building while he replied, “No need to rush. Maybe those bastards are already gone, and you can stay. That way you’ll keep this well-paid job and won’t be harassed anymore.”
Comforted somewhat, Liu Xingyu noticed that Jiang Fan still seemed uneasy and kept checking the time. She asked, “Do you still have something to do?”
Jiang Fan nodded. “My girlfriend is coming back today. I need to go wait for her at the factory gate.”
“I heard you rented a place on the commercial street. Why not wait for her there?”
Hearing Liu Xingyu mention the location of his rented room, Jiang Fan immediately became alert.
There were only a few people at the factory who knew where he lived.
A Ping was a woman of tight lips. When Chen Anlong came looking for him, even Tang Jun had to show the way before he could find the place. He also believed that even if Shen Tingting and Liu Xingyu made up, she would not tell her about it.
Jiang Fan asked warily, “How do you know exactly where my rented place is?”
Seeing how seriously Jiang Fan took the matter, Liu Xingyu did not hide it. She told him that the night before last, when Zhu Bing had gone with Gou Biao for a late-night snack, they had mentioned where Jiang Fan’s rented room was.
“What else did they say?”
Liu Xingyu shook her head. “When they talked about it, it was like they were speaking in riddles. They only said half the story, all mysterious and cryptic. After the late-night snack, I only heard Zhu Bing say one sentence: that he would make arrangements. What arrangements he meant, I really don’t know.”
“I haven’t even dealt with those bastards yet, and they’re already starting to stir trouble. We’ve been sitting here talking for so long that Gou Biao will surely find out. When he asks you, just say that I want to arrange for someone to come into the factory and asked for your help, but you didn’t agree. Don’t say anything extra. The more you say, the more holes there will be.”
After Liu Xingyu left, Jiang Fan was left with fresh worries, but what he thought about most was that Wang Wenyu still had not returned.
He went to the factory gate and saw plenty of people outside, but not the person he had been thinking of day and night.
The crowd gathered outside the gate had all come for the recruitment notice posted there, which advertised three openings for hand workers.
When the factory got off work, the employees streaming out joined the disappointed job seekers, and the place grew lively.
Still not seeing Wang Wenyu, Jiang Fan stood outside like a statue, dazed.
A Miao, the section chief from the sewing line, walked up behind him and patted his shoulder. “Deputy Manager Jiang, which beauty have you set your sights on? You’re staring so intently.”
Recognizing A Miao, who had once invited him to watch a videotape, Jiang Fan joked, “You’re the beauty. Is there anything wrong with my staring at you?”
A Miao laughed and teased him, “I’m standing behind you. Are you saying you can stare with your backside?
I used to have a few ideas, but now you’re the factory’s favorite, and you even have such a beautiful girlfriend. Your eyes are practically planted on the top of your head. How could you possibly pay attention to someone as insignificant as me?”
When Jiang Fan first joined the factory, A Miao had taken the initiative to invite him out. He had not clearly refused, and that had really given A Miao some ideas. But as he kept stirring up trouble and his reputation in the factory rose, and once Wang Wenyu appeared at Dafeng, A Miao abandoned those thoughts. Still, whenever they met, they greeted each other warmly.
Taking in A Miao’s friendly teasing, Jiang Fan responded warmly. “You were the first friend I made after coming to Dafeng. I would never neglect your friendship, no matter when. Besides, I’m only an ordinary wage earner. I’m neither qualified nor inclined to move my eyes from my face to the top of my head. What would be the difference between that and a freak?”
A Miao saw that Jiang Fan had made his position clear and thought it over before saying, “Could you do me a big favor? For you, it should only be a matter of a single sentence.”
“What is it?”
“My cousin has been in Dongguan for more than a month and still hasn’t found a job. I’m willing to pay a referral fee. Could you help me get him into Dafeng?”
Jiang Fan pointed at the recruitment notice. “The factory isn’t saying it wants to hire boys right now.”
A Miao thought Jiang Fan was brushing her off and replied politely, “If it’s difficult, then forget it.”
Seeing that even her smile and expression had changed a little, Jiang Fan hurried to explain, “If I can help, then I don’t mind making things difficult for myself. It’s just that the factory really isn’t hiring right now.”
Realizing he was not simply fobbing her off, A Miao continued, “On my sewing line, a maintenance post has been vacant for more than a month. In that month, they did hire two people, and their repair skills were actually not bad. But after only a few days on the job, the maintenance section chief found some excuse to fire them. That position is still empty.”
Without connections, girls had to pay referral fees just to enter the factory, and because there were fewer jobs for boys, the silver needed was even greater.
Jiang Fan had experienced this himself, and he knew Dafeng had such under-the-table dealings. He had heard a little about it.
Getting into the factory could not be separated from the personnel office. With A Miao’s reminder, Jiang Fan guessed that what Liu Xingyu had not wanted to speak about that afternoon might well include referral fees.
He also thought that the sewing line section chief’s firing of people without cause was certainly tied to these money-related matters.
Jiang Fan picked up the thread and asked, “Do you know whether the sewing line section chief has any connection to the people at the factory?”
A Miao paused, then quickly shook her head. “I don’t know. I think this really may be difficult. Forget it.”
Seeing the flash of fear on her face, Jiang Fan was already certain in his heart that the sewing line section chief must have had backing to dare do such things so openly, and that the person behind him held a position high enough to make even a section chief like A Miao deeply wary.
He gave a cold laugh. “I still have something to do today. Come see you on your line tomorrow. If the factory really has an opening, I’ll definitely help make it happen.”
Jiang Fan had not even eaten dinner. He stood stupidly at the factory gate until after seven in the evening, and still Wang Wenyu had not come.