Ye Yaodong poured all the plums cradled in his shirt into the sack of bamboo shoots. The little fruits rolled through the gaps between the shoots and down to the bottom.
He shook out his jacket again, put it on, and hurried off to look for those two little brats.
This time, he did not shout for them all over the hillside. He simply retraced his steps.
He had seen which little path they had ducked down earlier. When he reached the place where they had split up, he followed that path in too.
After about five or six meters, he spotted the loquat trees, but neither boy was in sight, so he could only keep going.
He passed three loquat trees and rounded a bend farther in before he finally saw the two boys, one catching fruit below and the other picking it up above.
A small heap of loquats already lay on a shirt spread out on the ground.
"Cousin, over there, over there... there are loads over there, really yellow ones... get some more..."
"Keep your voice down..."
"Nobody's here. What does it matter..."
"Ahem, ahem."
Just then, Ye Yaodong gave two dry coughs.
"Ah!!!"
The noise startled Lin Guangyuan so badly that he nearly lost his footing. Luckily, he only panicked for a moment and still had a firm grip on a branch, which kept him from falling out of the tree.
Ye Chenghu, meanwhile, took off running at the sound without even looking back...
Leaving his dear cousin behind...
A guilty conscience at work!
"Holy shit, Little Maternal Uncle, you nearly fucking scared me to death! You walk without making a sound, then cough on purpose. Ye Chenghu, you motherfucker, get your ass back here!"
Ye Yaodong, looking thoroughly exasperated, shouted too, "What are you