"Cough, cough... I-I'm fine... Whew... That must've been before the war began. I wasn't at Green Tea Manor then. I was just restless and making trouble, so I ran off. I went all over the place. I didn't starve, but I didn't make a fortune either. Cough, cough... Later, later I ended up in the capital with some people. There were plenty of foreigners there back then. Where I hung around, some people followed the foreigners to dig up graves and rob tombs. They made a lot of money from them. I... I thought of the things back home... deeds, family records, old things like that. The foreigners wouldn't want them. They didn't want jadeite or jade, either. Buddha heads... They wanted Buddha heads... Cough, cough, cough..."
###
"So you sold them the information?"
###
"No, no. It was an old crook I knew who told me about it. We all called him Old River. He was a great swimmer and had helped those foreign devils dive down and dig things up several times. I let something slip, and he figured it out. He secretly came to me and asked if I knew where there were any treasures, if my family had anything valuable. He knew those foreigners and could introduce me to them. I was thinking of going to them myself. Then he tried to cozy up to me, saying all sorts of things. One thing led to another, and we decided to do a job ourselves. We'd sell the things to the foreign devils afterward, and get a... cough, cough... a much better price."
###
"You took him to Green Tea Manor."
###
"Yes... Sigh... I brought him back here... I didn't dare go home, so I hid outside until dark, then took Old River up the tea