The Thing Inside the Buddha Statue

"Why did it take you so long to get back?"

Father and son had barely stepped through the door when they heard Li Yue'e ask, sounding a little displeased.

Wei Guoqing paused. "Wasn't I dragged off to lunch by Old Zhou?"

Li Yue'e glanced at him. "Did you drink?"

The question made Wei Guoqing nervous. He took out the fish sauce he had brought back and presented it to Li Yue'e like a treasure.

"Old Zhou insisted on having a few drinks with me at lunch. Then I asked his wife for some fish sauce. Give it a taste and see if it's still the same."

Li Yue'e unscrewed the glass jar and sniffed it. Her face lit up with delight. "That's the smell. How many years has it been since I last had it?"

Seeing her reaction, Wei Guoqing's tense muscles instantly relaxed. He knew the matter of his drinking had blown over.

"Huh? Donglai, what's that you're holding?"

"A Buddha statue."

"What did you get that thing for?"

Wei Donglai explained what had happened with the statue.

Of course, he didn't mention that it had started because of Wei Guoqing. He simply said he hadn't been paying attention while walking and had bumped into someone.

Beside him, Wei Guoqing couldn't help secretly giving Wei Donglai a thumbs-up.

Wei Donglai knew that if he told his mother the incident had started because his father had been drinking, his father probably wouldn't escape a good thrashing that night.

When Li Yue'e heard that Wei Donglai had paid five yuan in compensation for it, she winced at the expense.

After all, five yuan was enough for her to buy quite a few things. Now it had been exchanged for a battered Buddha statue. How could she not be pained?

"Mom, just think of it as losing money to ward off disaster."

"Easy for you to say. How much money do you have to lose?"

Wei Donglai chuckled. "Not much. I'm still a little short of what I need to buy the boat tomorrow. Mom, how about helping me out a bit?"

Li Yue'e was puzzled. "Don't you have nearly two hundred yuan on you? Isn't that enough to buy a small wooden boat?"

"It was originally, but Uncle Zhou has one ready-made, and the materials are very good. So it costs a little more: two hundred yuan."

Wei Guoqing chimed in from the side. "It's a very good boat. Two hundred yuan is a fair price."

Li Yue'e naturally didn't think Zhou Huaimin would cheat the father and son. If he was asking two hundred yuan, it was surely worth that much.

If the boat was better made, she would feel more reassured when Wei Donglai went out to sea.

"How much more do you need, then?"

Wei Donglai counted on his fingers. "I have a little over one hundred and eighty yuan on me now. Tomorrow I'll ask Uncle Guowang to drive his tractor and help me haul the wooden boat. I also need to get some fishing nets and other equipment before I go out to sea. I'll need about fifty yuan more."

"Then I'll give it to your dad tonight. He can take it with him when he goes out tomorrow."

Wei Donglai nodded. "Okay!"

After they had chatted for quite a while longer, Li Yue'e looked at him. "Third Son, are you eating dinner at home tonight?"

Wei Donglai shook his head. "I ate quite a lot at lunch, and I'm still not very hungry. I need to go over to Uncle Guowang's later and ask him to help me haul the boat tomorrow, so I won't eat at home tonight."

Wei Donglai really had eaten quite a lot at Zhou Huaimin's house at noon. For one thing, Aunt Xu was a genuinely good cook; for another, she had been far too hospitable.

He remembered a saying from his previous life: Grandma always thinks you haven't eaten enough. Today, Aunt Xu had given him a real taste of what it meant.

Seeing Wei Donglai get up, Li Yue'e pointed at the Buddha statue beside him. "Aren't you taking that back with you?"

"How about I leave it here?"

"Please don't. Every time I see that statue, I'll remember it cost five yuan. You'd better take it away."

Seeing this, Wei Donglai bent down and casually picked up the statue.

"Hold it steady. It cost five yuan, after all. Don't drop it again."

Wei Donglai was speechless. His mother just couldn't get past those five yuan today.

"Don't worry, I've got a firm grip on-"

Before he had finished speaking, Wei Donglai felt an oval object bump into his stomach.

The Buddha statue in his hands went flying in an instant.

"Third Uncle!"

Along with the shout, an oval head popped up against his chest.

Wei Donglai looked at the Buddha statue, now shattered on the ground, and couldn't help glancing back at Li Yue'e.

Sure enough, his mother's face had fallen.

"You said you had a firm grip. Where is it now? Firmly on the ground?"

"Mom, Wei Hai suddenly rammed into me... Ow! Don't pull my ear."

"I told you I didn't want to see it, and look what you did-you smashed it right in front of me. Are you deliberately trying to make life difficult for me?"

"It was an accident! Who knew Wei Hai would suddenly come charging out?"

Wei Hai, the culprit, watched his grandma tugging on his third uncle's ear and asked curiously, "Third Uncle, what bad thing did you do to make Grandma angry again?"

"Was I the one who made her angry? If you hadn't run into me, would your grandma be hitting me?"

"What? Are you going to take your temper out on Xiaohai now?"

Li Yue'e gave his ear another half twist, making Wei Donglai howl in pain.

"No, it was my own fault. I wasn't careful. Mom, could you let go first?"

Xue Li and Wu Fengying hadn't expected to come back from picking up a child and find such a show waiting for them.

Sure enough, their little brother-in-law was the one who could stir things up.

Without him, the house wouldn't be nearly as lively.

When Li Yue'e saw her two daughters-in-law return, she let him go.

Wei Donglai clutched his ear, furious but not daring to say a word.

This Buddha statue had really cost him money and brought him suffering today.

"Clean up the floor before you leave."

Wei Donglai obediently went to pick up the Buddha statue from the floor.

The statue no longer had just a broken hand; the entire base had broken off as well.

Wei Donglai had just picked up the body of the statue when he saw that it was hollow inside, and something seemed to be hidden in it.

Could there be a treasure?

Wei Donglai reached inside and felt around. Before long, an object wrapped in silk appeared in his palm.

The wrapped object wasn't very big and felt somewhat hard.

Curious, Wei Donglai unfolded the silk, and a stunning flash of purple met his eyes.

It was a big-bellied Buddha pendant carved from purple jadeite.

Wei Donglai held the Buddha pendant up against the last rays of the setting sun and saw that the whole pendant had a lustrous, translucent purple hue.

At that moment, everyone in the courtyard also saw what Wei Donglai was holding, and they were all stunned for a moment.

"Third Uncle, is that purple glass?"

Hearing Wei Hai's question, Wei Donglai thought that the boy's usually rather annoying face was surprisingly adorable at that moment.

"That's right. It's purple glass."

"Donglai, let me see."

When his second sister-in-law spoke, Wei Donglai handed it over.

His eldest sister-in-law and his mother also crowded around.

Although they didn't often see jadeite, they understood that this definitely wasn't the purple glass Wei Donglai had called it.

Besides, a love of beauty seemed to be in women's nature. The exquisite Buddha pendant passed back and forth among the three of them, and none could bear to put it down for a long while.

"Donglai, is this crystal?"

Hearing his eldest sister-in-law's question, Wei Donglai felt like laughing. But he couldn't blame her. She had been thrifty all her life and truly had never worn any precious jewelry.

Wei Donglai explained to her, "It's jadeite."

"Jadeite? Isn't jadeite green?"

Li Yue'e looked curious too. "I've seen jadeite bangles, but I don't think they were this translucent, were they?"