Fox of France

Early this morning, Matt climbed up from the shack with his father, ready to leave the village and go to the field to ridge and cultivate potatoes. This is the busiest time for farming. Potatoes in the ground now have small flower buds, which means that underground, the tops of the potato stolons are beginning to swell to form small tubers. If the soil is not cultivated in time at this time, the growth of the tubers will be affected, thereby reducing the yield.

A group of farmers came to the entrance of the village. The village is surrounded by a trench about twelve or thirteen feet wide and two people deep. There are sharp wooden stakes inserted into the bottom of the trench. Come to deep water.

At the entrance of the village, there is a wooden bridge that can be retracted over the ditch. Several Irish Sheriff's Police officers are standing here, checking out the village crowd.

The British forcibly concentrated people from several nearby villages into this one village, saying it was easy to manage. But this actually caused a lot of difficulties for the local people. The first is housing. For example, some homes belong to this village, but people who were forcibly moved from other villages don’t even have housing. They can only find some branches and soil and build a shack for themselves.

The second trouble is that it is a long distance from here to the fields they cultivated, and it will take a lot of time on the road. And the British implemented curfew management in these villages. Before dawn, those black dogs of the Irish Security Forces (they wore black uniforms, so they had such a title) would not let people out of the village at all, but in the afternoon , Usually after lunch, these black dogs will put away the bridge when they drink most of their saliva. And those who haven't come back at this time can't enter the village.

Then, according to the rules of the British, if a villager fails to return to the village on time, then he is a suspicious person and needs to be investigated. And once investigated, even if he can prove that he has not colluded with the rebels and violated the curfew for the first time, he will be whipped. And if it is the second time, they will be sent to a place like a quarry to serve a year of hard labor. If you can come back after a year of hard labor and commit the crime again, you will be hanged directly.

In this way, the lives of almost everyone in the entire village were in the hands of those black dogs. Those guys deliberately delayed the opening time and brought forward the closing time. Those who couldn't enter the village had to bribe them to survive.

Matt's land is about four miles (about 6.5 kilometers) from the village. Even if he trots all the way back, he can only work in the field for less than an hour before he has to go back. Heigouzi rushed back before putting away the wooden bridge. But a few days ago, Matt's father just sent a sum of money to Hulahan, the captain of the black dogs.

Captain Hulahan is notoriously greedy and ruthless. After he arrived here, he sent ten people to the gallows and sent more than twenty people to the gallows in just one month. out of the quarry. Relying on such means, he made everyone have to bow their heads to confess to him.

Captain Hulahan was not particularly satisfied with the figures sent by Matt's father, but he still accepted the money, but he asked Matt's father to sign another IOU. After that, Captain Hulahan graciously allowed them to go back later every day.

Of course, how much later this late is, Captain Hulahan didn't say clearly. He just said: "I'm also Irish. How can I not know that it's the time for potato buds? If you don't plant well, when will you pay back the money you owe me? Don't worry, you are also in the middle now." After working for me, can I still embarrass myself?"

Captain Hulahan did not bother everyone with such issues since then, no matter how late he came back, as long as he "borrowed" Captain Hulahan's money, he could enter the village. It is said that Hulahan's subordinates suggested to him that this is not safe, it is better to let the farmers spend the night in the wilderness by themselves, and let them come in at dawn. But Hulahan said disapprovingly: "Those rebels are finished long ago. What are you afraid of? Besides, people from Robert's Mounted Police sometimes come out to patrol at night. Big or small is a problem."

Like Matt and his family, there are quite a few people who have followed the lead of Captain Hulahan. They left the village together, and then desperately rushed to their own fields.

On the way, Matt passed the village where he used to live, which had been burned to a white ground. Matt still remembers that when they were forcibly moved away, an old man in the village hugged a big tree at the entrance of the village and said that he would not leave even if he died. Then a British soldier fulfilled his oath with a bayonet. Up to now, there is still a deep bayonet mark on the tree at the entrance of the village.

Matt's field is next to the former village. Now the green potatoes are growing just right, and small flower buds have begun to form. In ten days or so, the field will be full of white flowers.

This period is also the most critical time for potato growth. If the management is not done well during this period and the harvest is affected, not to mention that the family has enough to eat, but the "borrowed" Captain Hulahan's money and the rent of Viscount Anderson above will not be able to pay. . And neither of these two people can be provoked by Matt and his family.

The farmers began to work in the fields. Since Captain Hulahan allowed everyone to go back later, everyone simply worked for a while longer. We worked until the sunset turned the sky red, and then we packed up our things and rushed back.

When everyone arrived at the entrance of the village, the sun had already set and the moon had risen. A group of farmers carried all kinds of farm tools and walked to the gate of the village. If some bourgeois-tempered people in later generations saw this picture, they might pretend to be elegant and say "Morning Xing cleans up the filth, and brings the moon's lotus hoe home".

But at this moment, none of us was in such a relaxed state of mind, and we all just waited for Captain Hulahan to pave the bridge for himself so that we could enter the village.

A plank that was much narrower than in the morning and could only accommodate one person was handed over and set up on the ditch. Several black dogs from the Irish Security Forces stood there with knives and guns and torches:

"Come over one by one. When you come over, put down the farm tools first, and raise your hand for us to search."

The villagers walked across the narrow bridge one by one, put their agricultural tools on the ground, and then raised their hands to let the black dogs search them. After the black dogs searched one, the next person was allowed to come.

After a while like this, it was about to be Matt's father's turn, but a person suddenly inserted in front of Matt's father and walked onto the bridge.

"Who is this!" Matt said softly.

The man was carrying a hoe, and the brim of his hat hung down slightly, covering part of his face. He walked over steadily, bent down, put the hoe on the ground, and then raised his hand so that the black dog could come up and search him.

Two black dogs came over, and one of them reached out to take off his hat. But at this moment, the man's raised hands suddenly sank, and with a flick of his wrist, two knives appeared in his empty hands. He stabbed the knife forward, and then pierced the throats of the two black dogs who came over.

The two black dogs with rifles on their backs panicked and quickly took the rifles in their hands, wanting to shoot. But at this time, the man had already pulled out the knives from the throats of the two black dogs who had been hit by the knives. The eye socket of the black dog aimed at by the gun.

It was Villefort who did it. He had just killed the four Irish policemen, but a feeling of extreme danger suddenly appeared in his heart. This feeling had saved his life more than once on the battlefield, and he didn't care much, so he rolled on the ground short. Almost at the same time, two gunshots came from the darkness, and two bullets hit the place where he was standing just now—Hulahan was not really completely unprepared, he had prepared two secret whistles. It's just that Villefort's movements were so fast that they barely reacted until this time.

At the moment when he rolled on the spot, Villefort had pulled out two revolvers from his back, and he fired a few shots at the place where the flames were lit just now, only to hear a muffled groan and the sound of his body falling to the ground , and in the darkness, the sound of someone dropping their rifle and running away. The man also shouted: "The guerrillas are coming in! The guerrillas are coming in!"

At this time, more people rushed over from that section of the bridge. They raised their guns and rushed into the village. Matt saw that his father was among them.

"Follow me, I know the way in here! I know where they are!" Matt's father yelled.

Villefort followed Matt's father and rushed in with some other soldiers.

The battle since then has been almost one-sided. When the guerrilla fighters chanted the slogan "Give up your guns and don't kill", almost all the Irish policemen chose to surrender their guns. It's just that Hulahan didn't know where he went. After he heard the gunshot, he immediately lit the prepared beacon, and then disappeared into the darkness.

Now that the beacon fire was lit, the guerrillas had to consider the issue of British reinforcements. Estimate the distance. If the British came out immediately after discovering the beacon, they would be able to get here in about two hours. Of course, it is not certain whether the British dare to come out on such a night. If they dare to come out, then Villefort really prepared a surprise for them.

But even so, they have to consider retreating. The guerrillas called the villagers together and told them that they were anti-British guerrillas and came to defend the Irish. He also told them that after the British came, they might retaliate against the villagers, but the villagers could choose to abandon the village and follow them to the "free land" that the British dared not go easily. In the end, most of the villagers who were relocated chose to follow the guerrillas, while most of the villagers who were originally from their own village chose to stay.