Wang Lifa has been running a teahouse in Beijing for almost 20 years.
The teahouse inherited from his father was very close to the overpass, so the business was still booming. After Wang Lifa took care of all the gods, he still had a lot of surplus, and he was able to buy a small courtyard in an alley not far from the teahouse.
Wang Lifa thought that if he worked for a few more years, he would be able to save money for his child's schooling, so he felt energetic. However, after autumn this year, the great changes in the capital suddenly changed the future that Wang Lifa had planned for a long time.
Gotta sway.
At first, Wang Lifa was worried that the replacement of the gods would mean that he would have to reorganize the teahouse. It would be good to reorganize the teahouse. But if the new gods turned against him and wanted to take away his teahouse, it would be really fatal.
After finally making sure that his teahouse was safe for the time being, new worries came one after another.
This trouble comes from the guests of the teahouse. In the past, the guests of the teahouse were indeed divided into three, six, and nine grades, but usually they were all in peace, but after the Republic of China, the situation changed.
The customers in Wang Lifa's teahouse began to dislike each other and started to quarrel every three days. Especially after drinking, it was just luck that they didn't get into fights. In the past few days, three tables in Wang Lifa's teahouse were broken.
Already.
However, Wang Lifa has been running a teahouse for so many years. He has already figured out the rules. After the Republic of China, these guests are mainly divided into three groups. Those who wear mandarins, long gowns and braids as before are one group; those who wear foreigners' clothes are
The suits with parted hair are another group; there is also a group of people whose clothes are very similar to those of foreigners, but there are some differences. The most obvious signs of this group are the crew cut and the wearing of a pen in the breast pocket.
These three factions usually refused to give in to each other, but as time went by, Wang Lifa saw that the guests with braids were weak and could only show off their skills, while the other two factions without braids seemed to be equally strong, but the flat-top pen faction was more aggressive.
Stronger and more aggressive - in fact, those who dress up like this are young students. Newborn calves are not afraid of tigers.
After learning the ropes, Wang Lifa's persuasion became more direct and more effective. In the process, he also learned a lot of new words, such as Mr. De, federalism, and civil rights.
, people's livelihood, nation...
However, new problems have arisen.
Some old customers began to ask Wang Lifa to take sides, which stumped this old Beijing man - taking sides would definitely offend people no matter how he stood. What's more, although Wang Lifa had learned a lot of new words, in fact
He doesn't really understand those big principles. To him, it's only official that his teahouse can sustain itself, and it has nothing to do with him whether it's doctrine or republic.
But if he said it outright, he would probably offend both sides. Just as the old shopkeeper was hesitating, he was labeled as a "fence-rider". Wang Lifa spent several days trying to understand this fence-sitting faction.
Whether his hat was good or bad, everyone he asked thought he was joking, and no one explained it to him seriously, which made the old shopkeeper very worried.
No, when the door opened early that morning, his eyebrows were drawn into a Sichuan shape, and he was sitting behind the counter with a sad face, absentmindedly fanning the stove that was warming the wine on the counter.
At this time, customers came.
The teahouses in old Beijing are different from the teahouses in Guangdong. In the morning, most of the teahouse customers are busy with their own things: the short-shirted guests are gathering in front of several city gates, chewing pancakes and other work, and the long-shirted guests
Either they are still in Wenrou Township, or they have already entered various commercial schools and other places. Therefore, the teahouse in the morning is usually quite leisurely.
Wang Lifa stood up and recognized at a glance that the guests who came in were not locals - no, looking at their behavior, they might not even be Chinese, either Japanese or Korean. Although Wang Lifa also bought wine, after all,
It's a teahouse, not a restaurant, and not many foreigners usually come to visit, so the appearance of these Asians made Wang Lifa feel strange...
But as the saying goes, "The Eight Immortals table is set up to entertain sixteen parties, and all the guests come, all based on their mouths." So he still put on a smile and greeted him, and asked diligently: "How many gentlemen, would you like to have tea?"
The leader did not answer, but the younger gentleman next to him spoke. He asked Wang Lifa for a private room on the second floor and ordered a few pots of tea and some snacks.
Then, followed by Wang Lifa's eyes, the group went up to the second floor.
Wang Lifa felt more and more that something was wrong, so after the tea was ready, he did not ask the waiter to bring it to him, but carried the plate to the second floor himself.
Outside the private room, Wang Lifa heard someone inside the door mumbling something in Japanese. Although he couldn't understand it, he could still tell that the speaker was very excited.
The old shopkeeper stood at the door, hesitating whether to knock on the door or not. At this moment, the voices in the room stopped for a moment, and then the door to the private room opened with a click, and the young man who had just ordered the refreshments was blocked.
At the door, he looked angry.
"Shopkeeper, eavesdropping is not a good habit!"
"No, no, no, I'm just here to deliver refreshments, and you all speak Japanese. I don't understand it at all, I don't understand, haha."
The young man stared at Wang Lifa for a long time, then snorted, grabbed the refreshments from his hand, and slammed the door.
Wang Lifa turned around and left, only to find himself breaking out in a cold sweat when he returned behind the counter.
"unlucky."
With this muttering, the old shopkeeper began to seriously consider whether to invite a Feng Shui master to give the teahouse passed down to him by his father a new look.
At this moment, another stranger entered the teahouse.
It was a tall young man, wearing a long-sleeved foreign coat - Wang Lifa knew that some of the young people of the flat-top fountain pen school had recently changed their clothes. It was this style. It is said that Lord Lin, the Minister of the Navy, landed in Tianjin after
This is what I'm wearing.
"Shopkeeper," the young man grinned before Wang Lifa could, "I made an appointment with a few friends to meet you. They are Japanese. Where are they?"
"The second room at the west end of the second floor." Wang Lifa said it casually. As soon as he finished speaking, his eyelids began to twitch crazily - this is a bad sign!
"Guest, guest..." The old shopkeeper grabbed the sleeve of the young man who was about to leave the counter and go to the stairs, "You..."
His usual eloquence seemed to be no longer working. The old shopkeeper didn't say anything for a long time, but the young man smiled first and then put a roll of Nanyang tickets on the counter.
Wang Lifa knew that this green note was more useful than silver now. Such a thick roll would probably be enough for him to renovate the teahouse, so he froze there and allowed the young man to break free from his hand and walk towards the stairs.
.
After a while, there was a sound like firecrackers being set off upstairs. After crackling for a while, everything returned to silence.
The young man just now hurriedly walked down the stairs, glanced at Wang Lifa, and ran out of the teahouse without saying anything.
**
Chen Tianhua watched the young man get on the rickshaw and hurriedly passed through the crowd who had gathered after hearing the sound, and disappeared at the end of the street, and then turned to look at the girl in the dress in front of him.
"I need an explanation."
"National security operation. That's what Mr. Lin, whom you admire most, is called." The girl leaned forward as she spoke and took off the glasses on the bridge of her nose, so that her red pupils were exposed to Chen Tianhua's field of vision. The scarlet color made her
Lin Ji's intelligence chief swallowed subconsciously, "We started tracking the Japanese from Japan. There are signs that they are likely to use bombs to attack Mr. Lin's train."
"Just signs? No real evidence?"
"No," Victoria admitted frankly, "but 'there are signs' is enough, isn't it? They are the remnants of militarism anyway, and they must be cut off sooner or later."
Chen Tianhua fell silent and didn't speak for a long time.
Victoria put on the special glasses again to hide her red pupils, and at the same time said to Chen Tianhua solemnly: "I will give you a piece of advice, if you can't be so cruel that you can turn yourself into a devil, then don't do it.
This line of work is good. I personally think you are very talented. For example, you could be in charge of Lin Ji's propaganda department. I think that would be a more suitable place for you than the spy agency."
"I will consider it." After Chen Tianhua finished speaking, he picked up the hat on the table, stood up, and said, "Goodbye."