Traveling back to 1977

Chapter 2 Be honest
Seeing that Chen Fan refused to cooperate, Captain Yang got angry and immediately slammed his hand on the table, shouting outside, "Third brother, go and call Zhu Gong'an over."

Chen Fan shrank back, feeling incredibly guilty, yet unable to shed a tear.

What the hell is this!

Then Captain Yang remained silent, staring at him sternly, hoping to break down his defenses and get him to confess his origins.

Twenty minutes later, a bicycle bell rang, and the villagers who had been crowding at the door discussing the matter quickly made way for a man wearing a peaked cap and a dark blue police uniform to walk over.

Before he even entered the room, his voice arrived, "Captain Yang, what's going on?"

Captain Yang stood up first, took out a cigarette and offered it to him, then lit it for him with a match, and lit one for himself as well. He then led the man to sit at the table before pointing at Chen Fan and saying, "Yesterday, when I went to fetch water, I found this person by the river. He was only wearing a set of thermal underwear..."

Chen Fan silently corrected himself in his mind, "These are pajamas, not thermal underwear."

As Captain Yang recounted his story, he finally understood what had happened to him.

In short, yesterday when Captain Yang and his team went to the river to fetch water, they found a person lying on the bank with most of their body submerged in the water, wearing only a single layer of clothing.

When they found that the man was still breathing, they brought him back to life. They wiped his body, fed him ginger and brown sugar water, and even invited Dr. Zhang, the barefoot doctor from the brigade headquarters, to come and prescribe two doses of medicine for him. Then they settled him in the educated youth settlement, which is the room where Chen Fan is now.

As for who took off his clothes and wiped his body, Captain Yang didn't say, and Chen Fan didn't dare to ask.

Captain Yang recounted the whole story, then pointed at Chen Fan and said, "This kid woke up today, and I asked him where he came from, but he knew nothing and kept giving me the runaround. So I had Lao San call you over so you could interrogate him."

Zhu Gong'an sat in a chair smoking, his eyes scanning Chen Fan up and down. After a while, he finished his cigarette and asked with a stern face, "Where are you from?"

Chen Fan shrank his neck and said, "I don't remember."

Zhu Gong'an then asked, "What's your name?"

"Chen Fan."

Zhu Gong'an sneered, "You remember what it says but not where you're from? You have selective amnesia!"

Then he slammed his hand on the table, "Why don't you confess!"

Chen Fan looked miserable. "Officer, I really don't remember. You can't expect me to just make something up, can you? And then you check and it's not there. What would that make me?"

Whether it was the 50s, 60s, or 70s, before large-scale population movement, the household registration system was both the most rigorous and the most lenient.

To be rigorous, it means that as long as you investigate, there is no person you cannot find, or at least there will be some background information. If you cannot find such a person, there must be a problem.

The problem with the laxity is that all files are managed by people. With just a stroke of the pen, someone can create a person out of thin air, and with a few more people covering for them, that person can take root and grow.

Chen Fan was new to the area, so who would write for him and cover for him?
Therefore, the safest approach is to honestly say you don't know, which leaves room for maneuver.

Judging from his appearance, Zhu Gong'an was a man in his forties or fifties with an upright posture, most likely a retired soldier. His sharp eyes scanned Chen Fan up and down, and after a moment, he suddenly said, "Stand up and walk a few steps."

Although he didn't know what he was going to do, Chen Fan obediently stood up and walked around the corridor in the room.

When they reached Zhu Gong'an, he suddenly stopped them and said, "Put out your hand."

Chen Fan held out both hands and thoughtfully asked, "Want to see the back?"

Zhu Gong'an gave him a strange look. "Look."

Chen Fan immediately turned from white to black. Only then did he realize that his hands seemed to have become much softer and whiter, and all the small wounds he had made before had disappeared.

With a guillotine hanging over my head, I have no time to think about anything else; I'll just have to get through this for now.

Zhu Gong'an didn't say anything, but took out a small notebook and a pen from his pocket and placed them on the table. "Write your name." Chen Fan complied.

Zhu Gong'an picked up his notebook, glanced at it, then looked at Chen Fan, and nodded to Captain Yang, "Come out and talk."

Captain Yang glanced at Chen Fan and followed Zhu Gong'an out.

Chen Fan watched them squeeze out of the crowd, and then the doorway was blocked by "helpful people." He couldn't help but grin awkwardly and nod amicably, extending his goodwill.

The onlookers in the front row didn't speak or respond; they just stared at him without blinking.

Since there's not much to do in winter, the sudden appearance of an unidentified person falling into the water naturally draws everyone's attention.

The people in front of Chen Fan didn't want to speak in front of him, but the people at the back of the crowd were not so quiet, and they were all whispering among themselves.

"Could it be a spy?"

"What kind of spy is so stupid as to go on a mission in the water? Are they trying to slack off?"

"If you ask me, they're mostly educated youth sent to the countryside."

Why would educated youth jump into the river for no reason?

"I don't want to go to the countryside."

"Is going to the countryside worse than jumping into a river? Do you see any educated youth in our team who jumped into the river?"

"Could it be an old rightist?"

"Even a rightist wouldn't jump around here."

"Hey, look at his fair skin and delicate features, could he be the son of some official?"

"Who can say for sure? Wearing only a thermal undershirt in this freezing weather, and not drowning after falling into the water, it probably drifted in from not far away."

"But there are only a few production teams upstream, where would they get cadres?"

"I didn't say it was a cadre."

"In my opinion, he was an educated youth who was abducted halfway through his journey, stripped of his clothes, knocked unconscious, and thrown into the water to fend for himself."

"Nonsense, the militia have already wiped out all the bandits, so where would there be any highway robbers left?"

"That's hard to say. In the middle of nowhere, in the middle of nowhere, you could be knocked down with a single blow, who knows!"

"Hey, third brother, you're pretty skilled. Have you done this before?"

"Go away, go away, we're talking about robbers, why are you dragging me into this?"

……

On the other side, Officer Zhu pulled Captain Yang into another room, closed the door, and after the two sat down, he said, "I just checked him. This kid has never been in the army or done any work. He doesn't even have a callus on his palms or the backs of his hands. His skin is even more delicate than my grandson's. He writes in simplified Chinese characters and speaks with a local accent. He shouldn't be a spy."

He chuckled as he spoke, "If they were really spies, they would have made their lies sound so convincing that they wouldn't be so easily discovered."

Captain Yang looked at him and said, "Even if he's not a spy, he must have some shady background. Otherwise, why wouldn't he tell us where he came from?"

Officer Zhu took out a cigarette and offered it to him, but Captain Yang quickly took out his own, saying, "Take mine, take mine."

(End of this chapter)