âWhat good are you huh? Your sister came home to take away the money and the household register and you just let her?â Yingyingâs parentsâ eyes turned red when they saw their box opened when they returned home.
âShe had that man with a scar with her. I tried to stop her but he grabbed me. I wasnât his match,â said Yingyingâs brother, sounding like he was being treated unfairly.
âThatâs stealing. Robbery! She took with her all 80,000 yuan. Why didnât you call the cops?â Yingyingâs mother ran down to the shop downstairs and called the cops. âI need to report a robbery. They took with them all 80,000 yuan. That was our lifeâs saving...â
âSlow down, maâam. Give me your address and I will have someone over right away.â Never mind about back then. Even in modern day, 80,000 yuan was a lot of money.
The boss lady of the shop asked after Yingyingâs mother hung up the phone. âWas it Yingying who took the money away?â
âYes, that ungrateful girl. Her dad and I gave birth to her, raised her. We treated her nicely. All girls get married at this age. Even if she didnât like the one that we have picked for her, did she need to call the cops of her dad and I? Had I known, I never should have given birth to her. I should have strangled her long time ago.â Mother Yingying grinded her teeth in anger when she talked about Yingying.
The police came shortly thereafter. She led the cops into the courtyard. Many others walked out and that was when they learned of their return, and that they had called the cops.
âAilan, Yingying took the money with her in front of many of many of us. She had already clearly stated that she will be taking the 50,000 yuan to the police so they can return it to the crippled when he got out. She didnât take an extra penny,â said a middle-aged woman in the crowd.
âThatâs impossible. The money that we have saved up ourselves was gone too. Who else would have taken it if it wasnât her?â said Wu Ailan angrily. âComrade Officer, I am sure she took the money and she stole the household register as well. You must arrest her and get my money back! That was our lifeâs saving.â
âYou said your daughter stole the money?â The police frowned.
âThatâs not true. I was here that day as well. I saw with my own eyes that her daughter left with 50,000 yuan. She did not touch the remaining 30,000. The 50,000 yuan that she took was the betrothal gift that they had accepted. Her daughter didnât want to wed so she took the money to return to the man. Perhaps your son was the one who took the money,â said the middle-aged woman again.
âBull, our Xiao Bao is the best child. He wonât steal. Besides, we saved up the money for him anyway. Why would he need to steal them?â Wu Ailan would never believe that her good son would steal from her.n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om
The cop found this amusing. The daughter had the neighbors be her witness when she took the money. Where were her parents and her brother at the time? Why didnât they stop her then? They asked around and learned that her parents had just gotten out of jail for try to force her into marrying a 40-year-old crippled man. After they had found out the background story, the cops no longer looked at Wu Ailan the same way.
âYou should think twice before you go on. You can be detained for making a false claim as well.â
Wu Ailan panicked a little when she heard detention. The few days in jail was not very pleasant.
âExactly. Your neighbors all saw that your daughter did not take it,â said the other cop.
âExactly. There were five or six of us invited inside to be her witness. There was 80,000 yuan in the box and Yingying took 50,000 yuan with her. She said she will be handing them over to the cops. We donât sure for sure whether she did that part or not, but she did not touch the remaining 30,000 yuan. We are just telling the truth here.â A older man stood up and said.
âThatâs not possible. If it wasnât Yingying, then it was one of you.â Wu Ailan refused to believe that her son would steal from her.
âWu Ailan, you need evidence to support what you are saying. I am a retired official and had never done a bad thing in my entire life. Stop pointing fingers without evidence. If you keep this up, we are going to call the cops on you.â
âThatâs hard to say. It was 30,000 yuan. Perhaps you split it among yourselves.â Wu Ailan was fabricating even more.