Chapter 174: Chapter 174: No Difference Chapter 174: Chapter 174: No Difference The price was settled.
The uncle went down to the fishpond to catch the fish.
His movements were efficient, and in no time at all, he’d caught a full bucket of fish and brought it ashore. The bucket was filled with small fish, still jumping around vigorously.
“Ladies, that should do it. I’ll go weigh your fish now.” The uncle had worked at the fishpond for years, looking after Mrs. Qin’s fish, selling them, and sometimes even delivering them personally for her.
Catching fish was something the uncle did several times a day. With practice, he’d developed a good sense for it and estimated that the bucket should hold about thirty catties, the amount Su Yunjin and her friend had requested.
Having caught a bucketful, he came back up to the bank.
Su Yunjin and her friend followed the uncle towards the entrance, where the fish were weighed, as there was no scale inside the pond area. At the entrance, the uncle found a large steelyard balance. Before weighing the fish, he first drained the water from the bucket, leaving only the fish, which he then poured into a hemp rope bag to prevent them from jumping out.
He also tied the bag closed with a rope.
After these preparations, the uncle took the balance and weighed the fish, holding onto the scales until the arm was steady. Then he looked at Su Yunjin and her sister with a smile, “There we go! This bag has a total of thirty-one catties. Ladies, come take a look. Is there any mistake in the amount?”
Su Yunjin and Su Ningxiu had been watching the weighing closely. The uncle moved the scale closer for a better view. Upon careful inspection, indeed there was no mistake—it was thirty-one catties. Su Xiaobao also leaned in to look at the scale. He could recognize the numbers but was still unfamiliar with them and needed time to calculate.
Su Yunjin knew at a glance that the number was correct.
“Uncle, your weighing is correct, it is thirty-one catties.”
Once Su Yunjin and the others confirmed the amount, the uncle smiled again and said, “Ladies, I promised to give you an extra three catties. Let me pour these fish into the bucket you brought, and then I’ll catch another two catties to give you!”
The bucket they had brought was at the entrance; the uncle was about to pour the fish from the bag into their bucket.
Su Xiaobao immediately brought their bucket over and placed it in front of the uncle. The uncle poured the fish in two goes, filling the bucket halfway each time.
The fish were all very lively.
As soon as he poured them into the bucket, they started jumping around, with several fish bouncing out.
Ningxiu and Xiaobao hastily went to pick up the fish. The uncle brought over two pieces of old hemp sackcloth for Yunjin, “Ladies, cover your bucket with these on your way back, and the fish won’t jump out.”
“Thank you, uncle, thank you so much.” Su Yunjin was still thinking of a way to keep the fish from jumping out! Now, with the cloth the uncle had given her to cover the bucket, she wasn’t worried about the fish escaping.
The uncle had promised to give them three catties of fish and still owed two. He went back into the pond and scooped up two more ladles of fish. Without weighing these, he generously gave them directly to Yunjin and her friend, “Ladies, there’s more than two catties of fish in these ladles, but I won’t bother with the balance. Just take them as they are.”
With that, the uncle poured the fish from the wooden ladles into each of their buckets.
Su Yunjin smiled and thanked the uncle, then took out the copper coin she had prepared earlier and handed it to the man, “Uncle, here you go, this is the money for the fish.”
The uncle accepted the money, briefly counted it, and finding it correct, he kept it.