But Yingbao can only think about it.
As it stands now, the money I earn from selling goods doesn’t seem to be enough to hire a singer, let alone a flag and drum team.
The three of them came to a stage and looked inside through the railings.
From a distance, I could see a few people performing on the stage in brightly colored clothes.
"Would you like to go in and take a look?" Jiang Quan turned to look at his cousin: "It's very cheap, only ten cents per person."
Erni asked curiously, "How do you know?"
Jiang Quan pointed at a sign and said, "It says so on the sign."
"Okay, let's go in and take a look." Yingbao originally brought Erni sister out to play. This is the most prosperous place in the county. How could she not go in and take a look
So the three of them paid thirty cents and went in to find a table to sit down.
Soon vendors came running to sell food. Jiang Quan ordered a large portion of crispy, salty and fragrant toasted steamed bread slices, three bowls of tofu pudding, and three red bean glutinous rice balls.
The rice ball is also wrapped with a layer of diced meat in sauce, which is very delicious.
The three of them ate and watched.
Erni and Jiang Quan watched the dancers on the stage dancing and rapping, while Yingbao looked around.
This area is full of variety shows, with singing and storytelling in the teahouse next to it, and acrobatics and sword dances outside the brothels. It is very lively with the various shouts of the vendors.
Gao Lifan was a storyteller, and his wife Zhang followed him by beating drums and singing.
When I met Gao Lifan and his wife in my previous life, they were doing this business. At that time, their only daughter Dongmei had passed away for many years.
I remember that his family also adopted a child from Gao's cousin's family. It turned out that the son was very bad. Not only did he speak ill of the couple, he also often stole the family's property and gave it to his biological parents.
"Yingbao, Yingbao!" Erni tugged at her little cousin, pointed at the stage and whispered, "Do you think the woman on the stage looks like the eldest daughter of Chen Changping?"
Yingbao looked up and saw that there was a dancing girl on the stage who looked very much like Chen Wan.
Even though she had thick rouge on her face, her figure and face were undoubtedly Chen Wan.
Unexpectedly, she ended up in a dance troupe.
Erni put her hands beside Yingbao's ears and asked excitedly, "Should we tell Patriarch Chen?"
"It's up to you." Yingbao didn't want to get involved in this.
On the stage, Chen Wan waved her sleeves stiffly and danced around, with no expression on her face. Her eyes were always looking outside the brothel, as if she was looking for something.
Here, the three Jiang brothers and sisters finished their snacks and felt their stomachs were full. When the servant came with a copper plate to collect the reward money, they threw in a few copper coins and quickly got up and left.
On the way, Erni chattered about Chen Wan, sighing and gloating at the same time.
When I was almost at my shop, I saw a lot of people gathered nearby, pointing at the shop from afar.
Jiang Quan and Ying Bao were startled and ran towards the shop.
Inside the store, several vicious thugs were grabbing Jiang Cheng and beating him.
Yingbao was furious, but she still had her rationality. She turned around and told her second cousin: "Go find someone quickly! Find someone from the government office!" After saying that, she rushed in like a missile.
Jiang Quan hesitated for a moment, then immediately ran towards the patrol shop not far away.
Erni followed Yingbao into the shop and saw that the shop was in a mess, with several gourds smashed and scattered on the ground.
Fortunately, the preserved fruits and chestnuts were moved to the backyard and prepared to be packed in boxes, so they were not poisoned.
"Help! Someone is committing murder!" Yingbao shouted as she rushed into the shop, suddenly hugged a thug's thigh and hit him.
A thick steel needle suddenly appeared in her hand and she stabbed it into the guy's lower body. He let out a scream and immediately fell to the ground, curled up and howled.
After Yingbao poked the man, she dodged to the side and pushed Erni to the backyard: "Go in quickly!"
After all, Erni is already a ten-year-old girl and cannot be touched by these thugs.
One of the three thugs was knocked over, and the other two were a little dumbfounded, but they quickly reacted and rushed over to catch Yingbao.
But Jiang Cheng didn't let them do as they wished. He picked up a stick on the ground and swung it at them.
Previously he couldn't beat three of them alone, but now there were only two left. After all, he exercised every day, so when he got ruthless, he didn't care about anything and beat the two thugs until they screamed in pain.
So the two thugs turned around and wrestled with him.
Seeing this, Yingbao pounced over and attacked, poking their lower backs, thighs and buttocks with steel needles unexpectedly. She poked wherever she could, making the two thugs scream.
A thug was furious. He turned around, grabbed Yingbao, and stabbed her head with the dagger in his hand.
"stop!"
Just then, a loud shout was heard, and a figure rushed forward and kicked the thug over. "How dare you! You dare to commit murder in the street? Come on! Arrest them all!"
Several bailiffs rushed in, kicked the thugs to the ground, and put iron chains around their necks.
Jiang Quan ran back to the store breathlessly, hugged his elder brother whose face was covered in blood, and cried, "Brother! Brother! How are you?"
Jiang Cheng sat on the ground exhausted and shook his head at him: "It's okay..."
Ying Bao, who was standing by, raised her head and thanked the leading yamen runner: "Thank you, Uncle Jin, for saving me."
Jin Wu touched her head and said with a smile, "Why thank you? It was Uncle Jin who came late and scared Xiao Yingbao."
He turned around and pointed at the thugs and cursed, "Are you blind? How dare you bully a man like me who has five golden shields?"
The three thugs knelt on the ground and begged for mercy: "I'm sorry, Boss Jin, we didn't know it was the gang leader who asked us to come..."
Before he could finish his words, a yamen runner slapped him hard in the face: "Shut up!"
Jin Wu waved his hand at them and said, "Take them away! Take them back to the government office for trial. You dare to hurt people with weapons in broad daylight? I think you are tired of living!"
The two major gangs in the county are both involved with the yamen runners and police, and the relationship between the two is mutually beneficial.
But these thugs actually dared to come out and cause trouble for them in the name of their gang. They really don't know how to live or die.
The Grand Commander personally asked them to take good care of Jiang's Specialty Shop, so Jin Wu and others would not dare to slack off even if they had ten times the courage.
These bastards chose to come out and cause trouble at this time, so don't blame him for making an example of them.
A group of yamen runners escorted the three ruffians out, and Jin Wu stood at the door and shouted, "If anyone dares to commit crimes and disturb the people again, I will destroy his lair!"
He said this to the gang members in the crowd, letting them know that they were not allowed to move into the shop here.
Sure enough, someone in the crowd ran away quickly, probably to inform others.
After sending Jin Wu and the others away, the terrified Er Ni hugged Ying Bao and said tearfully, "The people in the county are so scary."
"They are just a few thugs. Don't be afraid. Our shop has paid the deed tax and we have police officers looking after it. They dare not kill anyone." At most they are here to cause trouble.
However, Jin Wu just said that his own shop will be much safer in the future.
Yingbao opened the medicine box, took out the medicine to wipe her cousin's face, and fed him a pill.
Jiang Cheng only had some superficial injuries, which wasn't a big deal, and he would probably be able to recover in a few days.
The crowd of onlookers gradually dispersed, and Jiang Quan cleaned the shop with a painful look on his face. He put a few usable gourds aside and swept away the rest of the debris.
Erni collected all the seeds in the gourd pulp and gave them to her little cousin to deal with.
At this time, Jiang Yunniang came in, looked around and asked, "Erquan, what's going on?"
"Aunt." Jiang Quan called out, "A few ruffians came to cause trouble and have been taken away by the government."
Jiang Yunniang frowned and said, "Erquan, you have offended the Tiger Head Gang. What's going on? Even the people from the government office can't do anything to them."
Then he said to Jiang Cheng, "I'm not saying anything bad about you, but you're trying to be brave without knowing anything. Is it that easy to open a shop? Now you've got yourself into trouble for no reason."
Yingbao turned to look at her aunt: "Aunt, how did you know that those people must be from the Tiger Head Gang?"
The three thugs had already been taken away by the yamen runners. Could it be that my aunt could predict the future