The Courtyard House: The Little Red Devil Returning from the Peninsula

The next morning, Zhao Weiguo asked Zhao Gang to retrieve the roster of the Liujiapo Supplementary Company and the guard duty records for the past week.

Zhao Gang took the booklet back and flipped through it, finding no problems. All personnel were present; no one had asked for leave or left the team without reason. He handed the booklet to Zhao Weiguo: "Everything matches."

Zhao Weiguo didn't answer. He glanced at the booklet cover and said, "Check if anyone has asked for leave or gone out in the last three days. Especially those people in the west row."

Zhao Gang made a phone call to Liujiapo. The call was answered by Company Commander Wang of the supplementary company. Company Commander Wang said that everyone was present, no one had asked for leave, and no one was out. Zhao Gang hung up and shook his head at Zhao Weiguo.

Zhao Weiguo didn't say anything. The data on the map didn't show any problems, but the location of the blank area on the map from last night remained in his mind—the geometric center of the three red circles. He sat for a while.

"Have Lao Zhou go to Liujiapo under the guise of training and exchange. Keep it quiet, just take a look."

This is Nakamura's second visit to Liujiapo.

He was still wearing the same gray cloth clothes, and still pushing the same cart. This time, the cart was empty, as if he were just passing by. He stopped the cart under the old locust tree, sat down, and took out a piece of dry food to slowly chew.

Ma Si walked out of the camp. He saw a person sitting under the old locust tree, paused for a moment, and then continued walking.

Nakamura neither stood up nor looked up. He chewed on his dry rations and waited for Ma Si to approach before speaking.

"Has Platoon Leader Ma made up his mind?"

Ma Si squatted down, as if tying his shoelaces. He glanced around with the corner of his eye; no one was there.

"What is it?"

"It's nothing." Nakamura took a bite of his dry rations. "You'll be on the second half of the night watch tomorrow. Move the sentry post on the west side of Liujiapo back fifty paces. Leave a blind spot."

Ma Si squatted there, his hand resting on his shoelaces.

Nakamura took three silver dollars from his pocket and placed them on the tree root beside him. The dollars glittered in the sunlight.

"This is the deposit. The remaining twenty-seven dollars will be paid after the deal is done."

Ma Si stared at the three silver dollars for a long time. His monthly salary in the Independent Regiment was two silver dollars; thirty dollars would be enough for him to work for fifteen months without eating or drinking. He thought again of himself standing in the crowd on the day of the public trial, too afraid to say a word. The silver dollars glistened in the sunlight, pressing against the cracks in the tree roots.

"What do you want?"

"We're just passing by. No one will know you put it there. Just move the sentry post, that's all."

Ma Si remained silent for a long time. A gust of wind blew by, swirling a few fallen leaves on the ground. He glanced in the direction of the camp entrance, then at the silver dollars. Three silver dollars lay on the tree root, the engraved patterns worn and blurred, but the silver luster remained.

He reached out and picked up the silver dollar, clutching it in his palm. The dollar felt cold against his palm lines. His knuckles turned white slightly, then he stuffed it into his pocket. He nodded, saying nothing more.

Nakamura didn't say much. He stuffed the last piece of dry food into his mouth, stood up, and pushed the empty cart away.

Less than an hour later, Lao Zhou arrived at Liujiapo.

He brought two staff officers with him, both dressed in ordinary military uniforms and without any commander's insignia. He had the staff officers talk to the replenishment company men on the parade ground while he walked around the barracks.

Ma Si's platoon was located on the west side of the barracks. When Lao Zhou passed by, Ma Si was leading his men to clean their guns. Lao Zhou stood at a distance and watched for a while, then walked around the parade ground, squatted down next to Ma Si, and casually picked up a cleaned gun to examine the barrel.

"The gun is cleaned well," Old Zhou said.

Ma Si called him "Deputy Regiment Commander Zhou" in a low voice, his eyes constantly wandering elsewhere. Old Zhou asked him how training was going lately, and he said it was alright. He asked if there were any difficulties in the platoon, and he said no. Each sentence was short, and he would shut up after speaking, not initiating conversation, and his eyes never looked at Old Zhou's face.

Old Zhou noticed a detail. While Ma Si was speaking, he kept wiping his right hand on his pants, doing so two or three times. Even on a dry day, he was wiping his palm.

Old Zhou didn't stay long. He patted Ma Si on the shoulder and told him to do a good job, then left with his staff officer.

Back at Baimaling, Lao Zhou went into the regimental headquarters and closed the door. Zhao Weiguo sat at the table and glanced up at him.

"Ma Si is suspicious. When I arrived, he was cleaning his gun. When I spoke to him, he avoided eye contact, constantly glancing to the side. He wiped his palms on his pants several times. It wasn't normal nervousness." Old Zhou lowered his voice. "I've been in this business for over ten years; this guy has something to hide. He's the loophole you're looking for."

Zhao Weiguo listened without speaking. Old Zhou stood at the door, waiting for his response. Zhao Weiguo walked to the map and stopped, without turning around. The three red circles were still there; he had stared at the blank area in the middle for a long time last night.

His gaze swept over the three red circles, then settled on the blank space in the middle. If Yamamoto were to enter through Liujiapo, which route would he choose? According to the map, about three li (approximately 1.5 kilometers) from Liujiapo towards Baimaling, there was a narrow, east-west valley. Low mountains rose on both sides, and the narrowest point at the bottom of the valley was less than twenty meters wide. The locals called it Coffin Gully. He located the spot on the map and measured the distance with his finger. Three li, about a twenty-minute walk. The ridges on both sides of the valley weren't high, but they were wide enough to conceal a person.

He closed his eyes and mentally retraced the route of Coffin Gully. Once Yamamoto's thirty men entered the gully, their formation would be stretched out. A five-man advance party would scout ahead, the main force of twenty would be positioned in the middle, and a five-man rear guard would bring up the rear. The middle section of the gully was the narrowest; if the ridges on both sides could lock down the firepower, those at the bottom of the gully would be unable to raise their heads.

He opened his eyes.

"Let him in. Beat him in Coffin Ditch."

Old Zhou didn't ask any further questions. He had followed Zhao Weiguo for so long, he knew what those words meant. He turned and went out to relay the order.

He deployed his forces overnight. The hidden sentries around Liujiapo remained in place, and Ma Si's visible sentry post was left undiscovered, allowing him to leave that opening. A platoon of soldiers was placed in ambush on each of the two flanks of the Coffin Gully, while a squad was sealed off at both the entrance and the end of the gully. Zhi Zi led a sniper to the south ridge, while Monk led a melee team to ambush behind the pile of rocks in the middle of the gully. Old Zhou led an assault team to ambush in the bushes outside the gully entrance, waiting to seal it off once all of Yamamoto's men had entered Coffin Gully.

Zhao Weiguo marked every location on the map. He ordered the messengers to set off separately, giving verbal instructions without leaving any written record. The departure and arrival times of each unit were staggered to avoid any overlap on the way. The entire deployment, from its inception to its completion, took less than two hours.

Before setting off, the monk stood at the entrance of the regiment's office and glanced at Zhao Weiguo.

The monk didn't say anything more.

Zhao Weiguo also spread a message: a batch of captured supplies would be transferred to the brigade headquarters from Baimaling the following night, passing through the Liujiapo direction. This message leaked out through several unintentional channels. The quartermaster of the supplementary company overheard Zhao Gang mention it, and Old Zhang from the cookhouse heard it from someone at the regimental headquarters. By the time it reached Nakamura's ears, it sounded like the truth.

As evening fell, Nakamura sat under the old locust tree, waiting for Ma Si to take his post. Ma Si walked out of the camp, took a few steps to the west, and glanced back. No one paid him any attention. He moved his post back about fifty paces, squatted under a crooked tree, and rested his rifle on his shoulder.

Nakamura confirmed the signal that the sentry post had moved. He called out three night bird calls in the darkness, paused for a few seconds, and then called out twice more.

Fifteen minutes later, Coffin Ditch.

Yamamoto's thirty-man special forces team entered from the ditch entrance. Their formation was a standard night infiltration platoon: a five-man outpost, a twenty-man main force, and a five-man rearguard. Tanaka led the outpost at the front, while Yamamoto personally led the main force in the center. The rearguard kept a distance from the front, following in the shadows near the ditch entrance.

The path at the bottom of the ravine was difficult to traverse. The shadows of the mountain ridges on both sides pressed down, leaving only a narrow sliver of moonlight. The footsteps of the outpost group crunched softly on the gravel. Tanaka led the way, his pistol pointed downwards, his pace neither fast nor slow.

When the main force reached the narrowest point of the ravine, Yamamoto stopped. The earthen embankments on both sides of this section were about a person's height; if someone fired from above, those at the bottom of the ravine would have nowhere to hide. He looked up at the ridges on either side. He couldn't see anything. His neck stiffened for half a second.

He raised his hand, signaling the team to stop. The defense team also halted near the mouth of the ditch.

The silence lasted a few seconds. A gust of wind blew in from the mouth of the ditch, pressing the withered grass at the bottom to the ground. Yamamoto didn't move; he was listening.

A sound came from the southern ridge. It was very faint, like the metallic clanging of metal before a trigger is pulled. The sound traveled far in the silent valley.

Yamamoto turned his head halfway to the south. His right hand had already reached for the holster at his waist.

On the southern ridge, Zhao Weiguo lay prone in the grass, watching the dark figures that had stopped at the bottom of the ravine. He didn't move. Yamamoto stopped at the narrowest point, neither moving forward nor backward. He was assessing the situation. Zhao Weiguo's hand remained on the trigger. He was waiting for Yamamoto to either continue forward or turn back. Whichever path Yamamoto chose, the entrance and exit of Coffin Ravine were sealed off. The ambushers on both ridges were in position, and every firing point from the ravine's mouth to its end was aimed at the bottom. At Zhao Weiguo's command, none of the men at the bottom of the ravine would make it out alive.

Zhao Weiguo whispered two words.

"close the door."

On the southern ridge, Zhi Zi's gun was already aimed at the dark figure at the far end of the ravine. Tanaka Yuzuru. The monk's hand was already gripping the pin of a grenade. Old Zhou gripped his gun tightly outside the ravine entrance.

The wind in Coffin Gully stopped for a moment.