Li Long had originally thought of forcing the man to clean up everything in the small room, but then decided against it. He couldn't give someone like this a chance. Given a chance, he might pull something else.
He hauled the man outside and dumped him on the grass, then tied his feet to the tractor with a rope before starting to clean up.
The losses of rice and flour weren't too bad. The bags had been slit and some had spilled, but what remained inside was still edible. The dried meat was more troublesome. Li Long gathered it into a basin and carried it outside, planning to wash it later. For now, he would clean up indoors.
By his rough reckoning, the ruined supplies were worth twenty or thirty yuan, and what the man had stolen was worth another dozen or so. Still, the sack the man had carried over contained fourteen or fifteen kilograms of fresh fritillaria. That could just about offset some of the loss.
He rearranged the things on the shelves. The rice and flour on the floor could only be swept up, since they had been trampled on. An ordinary household would probably have washed the rice and eaten it anyway, but Li Long simply swept it outside. He tore off the window paper to air out the smell of alcohol and put the torn rice and flour bags on the shelves, where they could just about stay put without spilling.
The large room hadn't suffered much damage. The man had only stuffed some enamel basins into his sack and taken all the cooked food, including the steamed buns. He had also kicked the stove, loosening it. Li Long figured he would have to mix some mud and plaster it again to secure it.
Otherwise,