Chapter 1110 — Dine and Dash? In Any Case, She Was Back at the Hospital Now; Yu Xiaoke Certainly Could Not Run Back to the Train Station, and the First Order of Business Was to Pay the Bill.

Yu Xiaoke queued up and paid the surgery fee at the cashier's window, but to her surprise, there inside the little handkerchief bundle was a slip of paper, and on that slip were an address and a telephone number!

So he had given me the address after all. Relief washed through Yu Xiaoke's heart, and the worry that had gripped her before melted away. Good, then — all she had to do was scrape the money together, and she could go to that address and pay him back.

Carefully, Yu Xiaoke tucked away the slip of paper with the address on it, then took the payment receipt and went to find Xiao Ken.

Er Goudan waited at the train station for Yu Xiaoke to return his money. For one thing, he was afraid that if he left, she would not be able to find him. The money was a small matter; the crucial thing was that slip of paper with Chief Wei Zhao's address on it!

So Er Goudan did not dare stir from the spot. He simply sat there on the bench, and time flew — dark to dawn, dawn to dark — and in the blink of an eye two days had passed, and still Yu Xiaoke had not come back.

Only then did it strike Er Goudan all at once that he seemed to have been played for a fool.

"That lying little girl, she's got me mad enough to spit!" Er Goudan swore, glaring at the vast train station.

After all this time, and still no sign of Yu Xiaoke, even a man as simple and honest as Er Goudan understood that he had been cheated.

Er Goudan was thoroughly glum. Cheat him out of money if she must — but could she not at least give him back Chief Wei Zhao's address? To just up and vanish like that, was she not holding up his important business? Chief Wei Zhao was waiting on his potion!

"Ugh!" Er Goudan stood up, gave his backside a pat, and left the place with a helpless sigh. He needed to find somewhere fast and get a bite to eat; he had gone two days without food and was near to starving. Luckily his health was sturdy — anyone else would have starved to death long ago.

He had not gone far when the smell of fried chicken reached his nose. He looked up and saw a big sign standing beside him, bearing four large characters: "Burger Fried Chicken."

Burgers — that Western fast food — Er Goudan had only ever seen on television; he had never eaten one. There was no such food in Xixing Mountain Village, so the novelty of it, together with two days without a bite, set his mouth watering.

Er Goudan strode quickly into the Burger Fried Chicken shop. Inside there was only a single waitress; apart from her, the place was empty.

It was late now, and not a mealtime besides, so an empty shop was only natural.

"Boss, what's good to eat?" Er Goudan was about to faint from hunger, and at the sight of the fried chicken pieces in the warming case, drool ran from his mouth. "I want one of these, and one of these, and one of these... and a burger!"

"All right, one moment, please..." Yu Yuanyuan nodded and answered, her eyes blank and lifeless, and took out everything Er Goudan had asked for, laying it all on a tray.

There had been a time when she found this job of hers dull and deadening, but now Yu Yuanyuan clung to it dearly. She reckoned she would not last more than a couple of days at it; once she became Master Li's woman, she would probably never again be able to show her face in public.

So Yu Yuanyuan treasured this rare stretch of working days; most likely there would never be another chance like it.

"Sir, that comes to fifty-six yuan in all," Yu Yuanyuan said, handing the tray to Er Goudan.

"All right..." Er Goudan was secretly astonished. Things in the city were truly expensive; a single meal here would feed his family for days. So thinking, he fished in his clothes for money, but when his hand met an empty pocket, it came to him with a start: his money had been swindled away by that lying girl!

Er Goudan's face at once turned awkward. No money, and yet he had come in to eat — was that not dining and dashing?

"What's the matter?" Yu Yuanyuan had noticed the change in his face too, and asked, a little puzzled.

"I... I've got no money..." Er Goudan stammered, embarrassed. "My money was cheated off me..."

"Cheated off you?" Yu Yuanyuan was taken aback and eyed him with suspicion. But by his plain, simple clothing he did not look like the sort who would swindle a meal, and besides, fast-food places took payment up front — dining and dashing was impossible anyway.

"At the train station, a girl told me a child at her home had come down with acute appendicitis and asked to borrow money from me, so I handed over every bit I had, more than one thousand nine hundred yuan, and she said she'd pay me back. But I sat on a bench at the station for two days and never saw hide nor hair of her..." Here Er Goudan could not help but grow angry. "Ugh, she did me in good — two days without food, all for waiting on her, and she just up and left..."

"What?" Hearing his plight, Yu Yuanyuan was struck dumb for a moment. Surely not — this fellow was a bit too honest, was he not? A total stranger at the train station asks him for a loan and he lends it? Whatever anyone tells him, he believes? Appendicitis? He was plainly a swindler's mark!

Still, from Er Goudan's getup, Yu Yuanyuan could tell at a glance that he had just come into the city from the mountains. Folk like that were all simple and honest, and it was no wonder he had been cheated. Hearing that he had gone two days without food, she felt sorry for him. She hesitated a moment, then said, "Then let this be my treat. Eat up, quick, don't go hungry..."

She would be going to Master Li's before long, and Yu Yuanyuan knew that money would be of no use to her there; Master Li was not short of money in the least. So she did not mind doing a good turn.

To put it plainly, Er Goudan was much like her own father, Yu Ren — both had been taken in by others, and Yu Yuanyuan felt that if she could lend a hand, she would.

"This... how can I put you to that trouble?" Er Goudan scratched his scalp. He had never expected Yu Yuanyuan to ask for no money at all and treat him instead. Looking at the girl before him — not so pretty as that swindler girl, but in Er Goudan's eyes a beauty among beauties, and far more stylish than any of the village girls back in Xixing Mountain Village!

What was more, Yu Xiaoke's image in Er Goudan's mind had sunk to the very lowest, while the Yu Yuanyuan before him was kindness itself. Both were beauties who lived in the city, Er Goudan thought — how could the gap between them as people be so vast?

"It's nothing. You're kind-hearted, that's all — you were simply cheated. Eat up, it will go cold," Yu Yuanyuan said.

"Then... then I won't stand on ceremony! When I find that swindler girl and get my money, I'll be sure to come and pay you back!" Er Goudan gazed at the delicious fried chicken and burger, drool on the verge of dripping from his mouth.

That said, Er Goudan, overjoyed, carried the tray off to a seat and fell to eating with gusto...

Watching Er Goudan wolf down his burger with such carefree abandon, Yu Yuanyuan suddenly thought of her own wretched fate. How unlucky she was. Er Goudan had been cheated and lost only a few thousand yuan; but when her father was cheated, what was lost was herself...

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