Dagouwan, as the name suggests, is a big ditch with water in it.
In fact, Dagouwan is the most "dirty" place around our village.
The dirty mentioned here does not mean dirty in the usual sense, but refers to the rather gloomy nature of this place.
In fact, Dagouwan is not only not dirty on the surface, but also has an excellent ecological environment. It runs from north to south, about one kilometer wide and ten kilometers long. The entire bay is full of large and small , dotted with water beaches, the water in the water beaches is not deep, at most it is waist-high, and more places are deep to the feet, so it is full of water plants and lush reeds, and the reeds grow very Some reeds are thicker than a thumb, especially in the middle of the deep water, where the reeds cover the sky and the sun, so dense that the human eye cannot see through them. Once you accidentally walk in, it is difficult to find a way out.
Theoretically speaking, such a place should be a desirable paradise, but why did it become the most filthy place? This has to start very early.
The first thing I want to talk about is that in the last years of the Qing Dynasty, when wars were raging and warlords fought, this Dagou Bay was occupied by a group of water thieves. These people hid in the reeds during the day and came out at night to block roads and rob, murder and rob goods. Hundreds of women from good families were harmed by them, and many little girls were taken captive into the reeds, where they were tortured to death. Dagou Bay first became the gate of hell in the hearts of ordinary people. Since then, people near Dagou Bay have disliked this place, and always feel that this place is not a good place.
Later, when the devils invaded, they became even more brutal. I heard from the old people in the village that the devils raided in the early years and arrested all men, women and children in the village. The women were taken back by the devils and ruined, and the men were all dragged to Dagouwan and beaten to death. , after death, the body sank in the most central pool.
That water pool is also an evil place. To put it bluntly, it is a swamp. The silt in it is thick, so after the corpses sink, it is difficult to find them. Still rotten in the mud.
To this day, every time it rains heavily in summer and the water rises, there are still bones floating out there. Who wouldn't be afraid of such a place?
Of course, not only the corpses of ordinary people sank in Dagou Bay, but also the corpses of devils. This is also what I heard from the old man in the village. He said that the Eighth Route Army came to fight the devils, chased and beat them all the way, and finally threw more than a hundred wounded devils into the village and let the villagers take care of them. As a result, the villagers hated them. These devils are dead, how can I care about them? As soon as the villagers made up their minds, they beat all the devils to death and threw them into Dagou Bay, which added another batch of corpses to Dagou Bay.
It is precisely because there are too many dead people buried in Dagou Bay, and the water plants and reeds inside are dense, so over time, this place has become a ghostly place that everyone fears, and the villagers even made up a jingle to say that Okay, the content is: Dagou Bay, surrounded by three mountains, with bamboo poles growing on the three mountains, and Dead Man's Beach in Dagou Bay.
This catchphrase is not a random one, it is actually a contrastive sentence, which means that there are as many dead people in Dagou Bay as there are bamboo poles on the three mountains.
What kind of scene do you imagine? It's simply hell on earth.
That's not to mention, after the liberation of Dagouwan, it has not been peaceful. Firstly, it is a gloomy place with too many water plants and reeds, so few people usually go there. Secondly, this place has long been notorious, so the surrounding The people who live here are just throwing the cans and throwing them in, and they don't want to see it more and more. Whoever's dead pigs, chickens, etc. are also thrown in, and sometimes even dead babies are thrown in. This has caused some inexplicable floating in this place all year round. The stench from the dead body is constant, and when the wind is down, it can blow for several miles.
To put it bluntly, in this place, if you kill one or two people and throw them in, no one will find them. The corpses will slowly rot inside, and no one cares about them at all.
When I was very young, I heard many legends about Dagouwan. Some old people in the village said that Dagouwan was haunted. Women often cried in the reeds in the middle of the night. Some people even saw a group of ghost soldiers patrolling there. Others said that there were monsters in the reeds, with two big wings, but they could not fly. Instead, they plopped and ran forward on the reeds, and when they saw people, they would grab them and eat them.
To be honest, I was often frightened by these kinds of stories when I was a child, and sometimes I was so frightened that I couldn't sleep at night.
But then I gradually grew up, and because of cattle grazing, I passed by Dagouwan a few times, and I felt that there was nothing special there, so I relaxed my vigilance.
What I didn't expect was that Xiaotu's father actually buried her here, which made me feel a little unacceptable anyway, because I felt that they were humiliating Xiaotu and insulting her. No matter how bad it is, you should find her a good place to bury her. What does it mean to be buried in such a terrible place? Doesn't this make it clear that she is going to become a lonely ghost, and she can't even find her bones?
I was really angry at the time, but because I had a high fever, my stomach was churning, and I had no strength in my body, so I didn't say anything, I just followed my mother and Bai Xinghua to the edge of Dagou Bay in a daze .
When we got to the edge of Dagou Bay, we stopped and looked down from a high place. We only saw a large area of clear reeds and water plants, and didn't see any newly dug stubble.
At this time, Bai Xinghua looked around and said to us: "Let's take a walk to the north. There are woods over there, and there are still a few paths that can go down to the bottom of the ditch. Maybe the little picture is buried there. gone."
Hearing this, we walked north along the edge of Dagou Bay, first passed a corn field, then a pine forest, and then came across several winding paths leading into the ditch.
It was midsummer, the road surface of the path was whitened by the sun, and the dirt surface was swirling with the wind, making the path look like a big snake crawling in the grass and shedding its skin, which was a bit creepy to look at.
We've been here all the way, but we haven't found a place to bury the little fool, which makes us all a little anxious. After all, it's too hot, and it's a bit unbearable if we stay any longer.
At this time, I leaned against an old pine tree by the roadside, looked up into Dagouwan, and found something inadvertently.
I found that there seemed to be a little red in the reeds. It looked like a plastic bag from a distance, but it didn't look like it. This made me a little curious, so I pointed it out to my mother and Bai Xinghua.
After they saw it, they were also a little curious, so they took me there together.
After walking for a short time, we had already descended to the bottom of the ditch and entered a water grass field, surrounded by high and low, sparse and rough reeds, some reeds just emerged from the ground, shaped like bamboo shoots, with pointed leaves Yes, with a bulging belly, shaking in the wind, it seems to be saying hello to us.
We walked forward for a while, and soon discovered something. It was a pair of children's sneakers, with a lot of patches on them, but even so, there was a hole in the big toe part of one of the shoes. If a human foot was worn in, the big toe should just fit through the hole. come out.
The shoes were thrown in the mud pit. They were already soaked and smelled rancid. Bai Xinghua checked them out with a chisel and threw them away.
Going forward, I saw some clothes, all of which belonged to children, such as pants, gowns, etc. I still have some impressions of some of them. I remember that Xiaotuan wore them, so I know these things should be the items of Xiaotuan during his lifetime. , was thrown here by her father.
Looking at those scattered and discarded clothes, I was really sad. I felt that Xiaotutu was very pitiful. She was born in the wrong place. Just imagine, if she was born in the city and had a pair of rich parents, the situation would be certain. It's different, I don't know what it's like to be spoiled now.
Thinking about this in my heart, I continued to walk forward, and finally saw the red patch I saw before.
It was a small padded jacket worn by Xiaomu. It was bright red, and it was considered her best piece of clothing. In previous winters, she would wear it proudly every time, and play snowball fights with us, having fun. She treasured the padded jacket very much, and never got it dirty, and would cry for a long time if it got a little dirty, but she didn't expect that the padded jacket was also thrown away.
However, it is strange to say that the weight of the padded jacket is not very light, it is even the heaviest piece of clothing among all her clothes, but this padded jacket was blown high by the wind and just hung on a reed, which made It is like a banner, which seems to be issuing a declaration and challenge to this cold and cruel world!
The cotton-padded jacket was dangling on top of the reeds, as if it was about to fall off at any moment, but it never fell off, just hanging like that, which made people feel anxious for a while.
I was in a very sad mood, and as I stood there staring blankly at the padded jacket without speaking, my spirit fell into a state of chaos that I couldn't extricate myself from.
At this moment, Bai Xinghua suddenly shouted: "I found it, it's here!"
Hearing this, my mother quickly grabbed my arm and ran over.
Looking over, I found that a piece of mud had been dug up in the reed marsh. The stubble on it was very fresh, and a lot of weeds were still entangled in the mud, like a stretched earthworm, and it seemed that it would snap off at any time. .
I took a look at the mud field and found that it was only about one meter wide, and the depth was probably not much. That is to say, the little muddled was buried in such a hasty way. She is really pitiful, really pitiful, I feel a little bit acid.
However, what I didn't expect was that, just when I was hurting my kind, Bai Xinghua suddenly pulled me forward, and then pointed to the pile of mud where the little muddleheaded was buried, and said to me: "Yihen, give me a hand!" I can scold as much as I can, and I have to scold her so hard that she doesn't dare to pester you, hurry up, start scolding now!"