It was almost five o'clock in the morning when Zhao Xin and the others left Wang's house.
The reason why it was a little late was that, in addition to the delay caused by the resistance of the nursing staff during the attack, the other main reason was that Zhao Xin ran into Wang Jinglong's study and swept away all the collections, furnishings and furniture.
When the three of them walked out of Wang's courtyard door, Zhao Xin was the last one to come out. He closed them and stuffed two small wooden wedges into the gap between the door frame and the door panel to keep the small door closed.
At this time, the barking of dogs in various houses was already coming one after another. Several ordinary families who were awakened gathered at the cracks of their doors to check what was going on in the alley. Among them, the male owner of one of the families closest to Wang's house was surprised to find,
From the small door of Wang's house, three masked men walked out with only their eyes exposed. The reason why he could see that Zhao Xin and the others were masked was because of the two lanterns hanging at the door of Wang's house.
After the three people had taken almost a dozen steps, they then ran towards the road they had come from, leaving a series of footsteps in the long street. The peeping man looked at the Wang family's courtyard door again, looking at it for a long time.
When nothing happened, he lost interest. Then he turned around and yelled at the dog in his yard, then went back to the house and fell asleep again.
Zhao Xin and the others still dived out of the city from Shuiguan and hid all the way to the gate of Tianning Temple.
In the dim light of the early morning, a small van suddenly appeared out of thin air at the door of the ancient temple. Liu Sheng and Wu Siyu quickly opened the back door and got into the car, while Zhao Xin closed the door tightly. In less than a minute, inside the truck's compartment
There was a dull knocking sound, Zhao Xin took the truck back, and then he himself disappeared out of thin air.
At this time, on the Yangtze River more than two hundred miles away, a ship that should not have appeared in this era was speeding through the waves.
The sound of the whining motor came from far to near, and the six-foot-long white pointed-head speedboat passed quickly on the river, bringing up a nearly two-foot-wide white wave behind it. The sailors on the sandboats traveling all night along the way were all stunned.
They were stunned by the ghostly speed. When they tried to take a closer look, the ship had already sailed several feet away.
The waterway distance from Yangzhou to Wusongkou is nearly 600 miles; converted into sea miles, it is about 150 nautical miles. The speed of the official boat is maintained at about 25 knots. According to this calculation, it can reach Wusongkou in six hours; and then
You can reach Flower and Bird Island by sailing another 70 nautical miles.
Since the time to return to Flower and Bird Island has been advanced, the Thunder God driven by Deng Fei should still be on the way south at this time, and Wang Yuanfang and the others need to wait on Flower and Bird Island for a few days. In order to meet Wang Yuanfang and others, Lao Huang had already returned two days ago
When he arrived in Shanghai County, he would take a ship to deliver food supplies to Flower and Bird Island in advance, and prepare to build a temporary dock and warehouse.
Yes, Zhao Xin is preparing for the large-scale transfer of refugees next year. Flower and Bird Island is the first radio relay station he has selected; from here it should be possible to contact future secret radio stations in northern Jiangsu and even Shandong.
Shen Jingdan stayed in Yangzhou City. He didn't go anywhere, even his wife and daughter stayed at home. Originally, Lao Huang suggested that Zhao Xin take Mrs. Shen and Ayu away together, but Zhao Xin's answer at that time was that he could not move for the time being.
Even if you want to leave Yangzhou, you have to wait until the news of the incident has passed before leaving.
After thinking about it for a while, Shen Jingdan agreed with Zhao Xin's opinion.
Therefore, before the start of "Operation Thin Horse", Zhao Dong's family, who had a business relationship with Shen Jingdan, had already "left" Yangzhou and headed north two days ago. After Guisheng's tireless explanations, several Yamaos in the city All the monks and monks can testify that Mr. Zhao and his party left with the purchased goods two days ago. Since everyone has left, everything that happened in Yangzhou City after that has nothing to do with Zhao Xin and his party on the surface. .
Don’t think that the momentum created by Zhao Xin and others looking at thin horses is huge; as mentioned before, “thin horse trading” is an industry. If it can be called an industry, its business scale has been quantified. Compared with Yangzhou every day The number of transactions in the city and the behavior of Zhao Xin and others in picking "skinny horses" cannot even create a splash.
As for the "thieves" who robbed the "Skinny Horse", the night soldiers on the walls of Yangzhou City and the fishermen on the Shahe River and the Yangtze River can all testify that a speedboat went along the canal to Wusongkou overnight. The Chen family was robbed. As for the Li family, unfortunately, not a single person is left alive. Moreover, the unlucky Marine Su Song will soon make the most powerful proof.
Liu Siting was busy going back and forth at both ends of the cabin. One was to check the drug reactions of the "thin horses" after they woke up; the other was to take care of the dozen rescued girls. Lu Shoushan and Xu Dayong were guarding the stern of the boat. outside the hatch to prevent accidents.
Xu Dayong had never been on such a fast boat. The trees on the shore and the few sails on the river quickly retreated in his field of vision. From being excited at the beginning, he felt dizzy and had a stomachache later. Waves of nausea arose, and in the end he simply didn't dare to look around anymore.
The thirty-two girls headed by Tang Xiao were placed in the front cabin under the cab; a dozen rescued girls were placed in the rest area at the back, where there were two wooden beds with bunk beds. They squeezed into the bunk beds, drinking water and eating food quietly.
After eating and drinking, some girls yawned and fell asleep on the bed. Liu Siting found blankets to cover the children. After working for a long time, she was also very tired; but seeing these miserable children Squeezing into four beds and falling asleep, she felt that no matter how hard it was, it was all worth it.
Tang Xiao, whose hands and feet were still tied, and a dozen other "skinny horses" who woke up, looked at Liu Siting taking care of the children back and forth, and felt that the beautiful woman in front of him did not look like a bad person. Especially... This feeling became even stronger when they saw Liu Siting picking up a three or four-year-old girl and gently patting the child to sleep.
Tang Xiaowei said to Liu Siting: "Sister, can you let me go? I'll help you take care of them. Don't worry, I won't run away."
Several other girls also began to beg. Their hands and feet were tied all the time, which made them really uncomfortable.
Liu Siting was also overwhelmed. At this time, among the more than thirty "skinny horses" in the front cabin, there were still more than a dozen people sleeping, and she needed to check or even rescue them immediately.
Thinking of this, she put the girl in her arms back on the bed, turned around, walked to Tang Xiao, took out a folding knife from her trouser pocket, and cut off the plastic ties tied to the other girl's hands and feet; then, the hands and feet of the other girls who were awake did the same. All were let go.
Liu Siting glanced at Tang Xiao's little feet and reminded the girls: "It's not convenient for you to walk. The boat is going very fast now, so be careful."
Tang Xiao blushed and nodded while rubbing his wrists and ankles. He stood up delicately holding on to the coffee table and staggered towards the bunk beds. The wooden floor in the cabin was a bit slippery, and Tang Xiao's deformed feet
Walking on it, she almost fell down several times. Finally, she reached the pillars of the wooden bed, and then she felt safe.
The hatch was very high and required two steps to get up. Tang Xiao stood on tiptoe and stretched out her neck to look outside. She could see nothing except the fish-belly-white sky. Tang Xiao sighed helplessly.
He sighed, holding on to the bedpost, and sat down on an empty space on the lower bunk.
The girls slept very deeply. The panic at night and the process of boarding the boat took a lot of energy from them. After eating now, there was a trace of blush on their little faces.
Looking at these children, Tang Xiao remembered his former self.
She was almost three years old when she was trafficked from Suzhou to Yangzhou. The memory of her biological parents had long been blurred, and she only had a vague idea of what her hometown looked like. In her mind, this was the only picture she had of that home.
There is a pond in front of the house and a group of white ducks. When I was a child, I sat in front of my house and watched my mother busy in the yard.
Tang Xiao patted the girl next to him with his hand, and his tears couldn't stop flowing down.
After Liu Siting checked, she found that the breathing of several girls had become very weak and their heartbeats had slowed down. She hurriedly started to perform artificial respiration for rescue. After doing it for dozens of times, Liu Siting felt that the cabin was a little stuffy and rushed to the door.
There, she pushed open the door and shouted to Lu Shoushan and Xu Dayong outside the door: "Leave the door open!" Then she ran back to the girl and continued artificial respiration.
Lu Shoushan and Xu Da used their hands to hold the two hatches, and the cool breeze from the river immediately poured into the cabin from the hatches; the thinly dressed "skinny horses" were suddenly shaken by the cold wind.
A dozen girls were blushing at the moment, shyly watching Liu Siting perform artificial respiration through mouth-to-mouth. They didn't know what the woman in front of them was doing, but when they saw the anxious look on Liu Siting's face, they gradually understood her.
It's not that he is frivolous about the sleeping woman.
As a large amount of fresh air poured into the cabin, most of the unconscious girls slowly woke up, and the one Liu Siting rescued slowly opened her eyes.
Director Liu took a deep breath and slumped down on the ground tiredly, his face covered with sweat.
The "Skinny Horses" were all helping each other, whether they knew each other or not. The girls who woke up lay on the ground and retched, while others helped to get water and at the same time gently patted each other's back with their hands as a sign of comfort.
ease.
"Yeah~~!" A scream came from near the cabin door. It was Tang Xiao. Liu Siting looked up and saw Xu Dayong carrying a big bag and walking into the cabin with a smile.
"Get out! Who let you in!" Liu Siting asked loudly, holding back her breath.
"This is Wang. Mr. Wang asked me to bring you water and food." Xu Dayong's neck turned red with embarrassment as he stammered in explanation.
"Leave the door open! Get out and close the door!" Liu Siting didn't talk nonsense to him at all.
Xu Dayong turned around angrily and went out. His original wish to see the little beauty was in vain. But when he entered the cabin just now, the girl sitting on the bed was so beautiful! Those little feet made Xu Dayong feel hot all over.
In fact, Dr. Liu was also a great beauty, but Xu Da lost all thought after using those natural feet.
Outside the cabin door, Lu Shoushan, who had heard the sound and came in a hurry, sneered and stared at Xu Dayong, leaned closer and said: "Take care of your evil eyes. If you dare to look around again, be careful and I will dig them out for you!"
"Yes! Yes! I don't dare anymore." Xu Dayong was really afraid of Lu Shoushan. "Brother Lu, what do you think the old men want to do by catching so many young ladies? Aren't they all going to be concubines?"
"Tch~! Let me tell you the truth, most of these girls are literate, and many of them will be sent to schools in Beihai Town to become teachers."
"What?! Be a gentleman! Not a concubine?"
"That's right!" Lu Shoushan nodded, remembering what Zhao Xin once said to him. "We have no slaves in Beihai!"
Just when he wanted to continue to teach Xu Dayong a lesson, Ding Guofeng walked out of the cockpit carrying a Negev and said to Lu Shoushan and Xu Dayong on the lower deck: "We found a Qing army ship ahead, prepare to fight!"
In the 17th year of Qianlong's reign, the Qing government abolished the Admiral of Anhui and placed the Admiral of Jiangnan Water and Land in charge of Anhui. The administrative affairs of eleven prefectures and one state along the Jiangsu River were also under his jurisdiction. The administrative affairs in the east of Wusongkou and overseas were also under his jurisdiction.
Due to the high speed of the official boat, the navy patrol boat stationed at Jinshan had no time to react. They watched the white speedboat disappear on the river in the early morning. The Qing soldiers patrolling the river thought they were dazzled.
However, when Wang Yuanfang drove his official boat into the jurisdiction of Jiangyin and Jingjiang, the Qing soldiers' river patrol boat finally discovered them in advance because it was already broad daylight.
"Quick! Follow up and stop that fast boat!" A Jiangyin water camp commander sat on the patrol boat and ordered the sailors below.
A sailor standing on the bow looked at the white clipper in the distance and said with some worry: "Sir, that ship is bigger than ours."
The general manager scolded him disdainfully: "Fart! I'm an officer and soldier. If you tell him to stop, you have to stop! Row over!"
A dozen sailors had no choice but to paddle hard. After a while, two patrol boats blocked the route of the white clipper. The sailor on the bow waved an khaki pennant with a flame edge to signal the clipper.
Stop.
"Fire the trumpet! Prepare bows and arrows!"
"Boom!" The white gunpowder smoke dispersed from the river patrol boat, and the speed of the boat that always found the other party seemed to have slowed down.
Wang Yuanfang in the cockpit looked at the two broken boats not far away and showed a contemptuous smile. He was prepared to suddenly increase speed when approaching.
Ding Guofeng climbed on the deck and shouted into the hatch below: "Liu Siting, open the curtains completely! Let the girls stand in front of the windows!"
"Lu Shoushan, you two come in and help!" Liu Siting was too tired to move, so she reluctantly got up and opened a curtain.
Soon, as the curtains were raised one after another, sunlight shone into the cabin through the eight spacious glass windows.
"Ah! This, is this crystal?!" A group of girls in the back cabin looked at the large glass windows on both sides with surprised expressions. Large pieces of flat glass these days are so expensive that ordinary ones
People can't afford it, and it's rare to see it.
"This is glass." Lu Shoushan replied dully.
The girls all opened their mouths in surprise. They supported each other, walked to the window and stretched out their hands to touch.
"Is this glass?"
The early morning sunlight shone on the girls' faces through the glass windows, and a crowd of warblers and swallows were chatting away. Xu Dayong stared blankly at the beauties vying for beauty in front of him, feeling that he was nowhere to be found.
Like the human world.
"Sir! That, that, that."
"Say quickly! What's wrong?"
"Look, sir, there are women on that boat. They are so beautiful!" The sailor on the bow stared blankly at the white speedboat passing by. Behind the large glass windows, a group of young girls were pointing outside.
Click. He always stared blankly at the peerless scenery flashing before his eyes, drooling from the corner of his mouth onto his official uniform.
"Stop! Stop the boat! I told you to stop the boat, do you hear me!" Mr. Ba suddenly reacted and shouted angrily at the white clipper.
Ding Guofeng, who was holding a light machine gun at the stern, sneered and pulled the trigger under the waterline of the patrol ship.
As the machine gun started firing, the official boat suddenly began to accelerate. Amidst the roar of the motor, the Qing soldiers saw that the white speedboat used incredible flexibility to bypass their own interception and rush downstream.
"Da da da!!!" The sound of machine gun fire echoed on the river, and water splashed outside the ship. However, the officers and soldiers on the two patrol boats were confused by the sudden gunfire. The muskets of this era were
It doesn't sound like this when you cast it.
"Sir, our ship is leaking!" a sailor suddenly shouted.
"Damn it! These people know evil magic! Block them quickly and go back to report to Master Guerrilla immediately!"
In this way, the official boat swaggered like this, fearing that others would not know that there was a group of young girls on board, and rushed through the Jiangyin Defense Area, Songjiang Defense Area, and Chongming General Defense Area at high speed, and entered the inner ocean of Chongming.
The officers and soldiers on the sandboats and river patrols along the way all saw the beautiful faces of young girls behind the large crystal glass on the boats.
In order to let these officers and soldiers see clearly, Wang Yuanfang deliberately slowed down every time he rushed through the interception, so that the navy officers and soldiers could see the girl on the boat; at the same time, if the Qing soldiers dared to get close to intercept, Ding Guofeng would machine-gun him
Bullets serve.
Some patrol boats were hit by bullets, causing sawdust to fly everywhere, and screams after being injured could not be heard.
Under the threat of machine guns, these naval officers and soldiers were so frightened that they ran away with their heads in their hands. They lay in the cabin for a long time without showing their heads. They watched helplessly as the white clipper rushed through Wusongkou and headed towards the sea outside Chongming.
In the afternoon, the reports from each battalion were sent by speedboat to the Jiangnan Water and Land Admiral's Mansion in Songjiang. Lan Meiyuan, the Jiangnan Admiral who received the report, was shocked when he heard the news. He sent someone to prepare the report and prepared to fly it to the Governor of Liangjiang, Sa Zai, and Jiangsu Province.
Governor Min Eyuan issued several orders at the same time:
The battalions under the chief military officer of Chongming Town were ordered to strictly guard all areas of Chongming and closely monitor whether the white clippers docked at Chongming. If found, they would be arrested together.
Order the Fourth Battalion of Susong Town's Middle, Left, Right and Qi Battalions to send additional ships to closely patrol the inner and outer oceans near the Yangtze River Estuary.
Wusong camp and Chuansha camp were ordered to send additional ships and manpower to patrol the ocean and islands in the north of the Yangtze River.
The Langshan Town Langyou Camp and the Diggang Camp were ordered to send additional ships to conduct strict inspections of the outer ocean north of Sheshan and the islands.
In this way, starting from the early morning of the next day, all battalions of the Qing navy under the Jiangnan Admiral were dispatched one after another. A large net laid by the Qing army stretched from Wusongkou in the west, to the Ma'an Islands in the east, and to Chengshan on the east side of Rugao in the north.
The vast ocean slowly spreads out to the foot of Dayang Mountain in the south.
At this time, Wang Yuanfang and others knew nothing. After passing through the Yangtze River Estuary, the official boat sped toward the southeast and finally arrived at Flower and Bird Island in the afternoon.
In the bay, Lao Huang and Shen Jingdan's thousand-stone Nanjing boat were waiting for their arrival.