After much persuasion, Zhang Qiang finally saw off Wang the Miser, who had come to collect his debt. Returning to the courtyard, he looked at the huge pile of brooms, his face turning green.
Was he really going to have to take the big brooms to the market and sell them one by one?
Zhang Qiang felt he could never live down the humiliation!
Just then, his son, who was not yet school age, came over and hugged his leg.
"Dad, Dad, I want watermelon! Someone's selling watermelons at the village entrance. Buy me one, please?"
"Watermelon, my ass! All you ever think about is eating! Go on, get lost! Stop bothering me!"
Zhang Qiang really was upset. He barely had a yuan left. How could he afford watermelon?
Besides, even if he went to sell the big brooms, they had to be complete brooms, with handles.
Not a single broom filling his courtyard had a handle. What was he supposed to do?
Frightened by Zhang Qiang's shouting, his son ran crying into the house to find his mother. Zhang Qiang squatted at the courtyard gate, took a tin from his pocket, then pulled out a stack of precut newspaper strips and began rolling some Mohé tobacco.
During his first two days back, he had still been smoking Jade Pool and Red Mountain cigarettes, saying only old peasants smoked Mohé tobacco.
Yet hardly any time had passed before he was smoking it himself.
Hearing a donkey cart, Zhang Qiang looked up. When he saw who was driving it, he hurried to his feet with a smile.
"Oh, Dad! What brings you here?"
"I came to see you all." The visitor was Zhang Qiang's father-in-law, Wang Tiansheng. He lived in the neighboring village and was on good terms with Carpenter Zhang.