Chapter 11#

In mid-April, the weather in Zhuhai was starting to get hot. Cooped up in a low-ceilinged room, the ceiling fan whirred overhead but couldn’t dispel the anxiety in his heart. Ma Lei looked outside. In a warehouse 200 meters away, hundreds of televisions were piling up. Two trucks had already been sent out, but he just couldn’t find a new driver. This was the third day. The next shipment would arrive in less than ten days. How would he make the payment, and how would he get more stock?

Just as he was thinking, there was a clatter outside the door, and a man ran in.

“Big brother, no luck. I’ve searched all over outside the station, no drivers!” The man wasn’t very tall, but he was short and stocky, with muscular shoulders and a long scar on his face that gave him a fierce look. “Damn those Cantonese! They’ve snatched all the drivers to transport cars. Where are we supposed to find new people!”

Ma Lei wiped his face with his hand, and large beads of sweat rolled down his chin. He knew it! These days, the most fashionable business in Zhuhai was no longer smuggling, but the car trade. Driving a factory-price Santana back from Shanghai and reselling it could bring in 60,000 to 70,000 yuan. If you could get a new Audi from FAW, it was even better, like printing money. Batch after batch of experienced drivers had been poached to pick up goods from other places, desperately transporting cars to Zhuhai’s car markets, waiting for wealthy bosses from all over the country to come and pick them up. Who had time for this kind of low-profit business?

Seeing the conflicted look on his boss’s face, the man gritted his teeth. “How about I go? It’s more tiring to drive myself, but it’s better than letting the goods sit in the warehouse…”

“You idiot!” Ma Lei cursed. “Those are color TVs, they’re damn expensive. If you break them driving on the provincial roads for a few days, who’s going to compensate me?!”

Being scolded, the man immediately scratched his head sheepishly. “It’s not that I haven’t driven much. Big brother, if you let me drive a few more times, I’ll definitely get the hang of it…”

“Get lost! Stop acting dumb with me, it’s annoying to look at you!”

Pacing around the room, Ma Lei couldn’t take it anymore. He stomped his foot and gritted his teeth. “How about we just find a place in the city to sell the goods. We won’t make a profit on this shipment!”

The man became anxious. “Big brother! This is a deal worth tens of thousands! The rainy season is coming, who knows how many more shipments we’ll have! Don’t worry, let me catch my breath and I’ll go look again. I don’t believe that in a city as big as Zhuhai, we can’t find a single reliable driver!”

As they were talking, there was a sudden knock on the courtyard gate. Instantly alert, Ma Lei gave a signal. The man ran to the gate without a word, peeked through a crack in the fence, and was visibly startled. He turned back and mouthed something.

Hearing it wasn’t the police, Ma Lei immediately relaxed. He still had a warehouse full of smuggled goods in his yard; getting caught would be a big deal. But seeing the odd expression on the other man’s face, he gestured with his chin for the scarred man to ask.

“Who are you looking for?” the scarred man asked bluntly.

“Are you looking for a truck driver? I saw the poster.” The voice from outside was clear, not Cantonese, but Mandarin with a northern accent.

Both men were stunned. Ma Lei quickly walked to the gate and also peeked outside. He saw a young man standing there, a bundle slung over his shoulder, dressed in trousers and a vest. He was a bit dark and thin, looking travel-worn. A migrant worker from out of town? Seeing the scarred man’s questioning gaze, he finally gritted his teeth. “Open the gate.”

The large iron gate creaked open. The young man looked at the two unsavory-looking men in front of him without any sign of panic, simply repeating his earlier question calmly, “I can drive. Are you still hiring?”

Ma Lei narrowed his eyes. This wasn’t what he had expected. The boy looked thin and weak, with a student-like immaturity on his face. He wasn’t sure if he was even an adult. Although he seemed calm, who would dare to casually hire such a greenhorn?

The scarred man spoke first. “Whose kid are you? Go on, go home to your parents. We’re running a serious business here, we don’t have… we don’t have time for you.”

Despite being dismissed, the young man was unfazed. He shook the recruitment ad in his hand. “I saw this at the station. ‘Experienced driver with over 2 years of driving experience.’ I learned from my master for three and a half years. He was a long-haul transport soldier in the army, his skills are solid.”

The scarred man sneered. “Learned to drive for three and a half years? Are you even 16? Three years ago, could you even see out the window from the driver’s seat?”

The young man raised an eyebrow slightly. “I’m 18 this year.”

Ma Lei’s frown deepened. This boy did seem a bit strange. He looked young, but the way he spoke and acted wasn’t immature. In these times, malnutrition was common, making it hard to guess the age of teenagers. Moreover, his otherwise handsome face was covered in bruises, as if he had been beaten up a few days ago. Had he run away from home?

Seeing their suspicious expressions, the young man suggested bluntly, “Aren’t we talking about driving? If you’re not convinced, just let me give it a try. You don’t mean to say you don’t even have an empty truck, do you?”

His words showed his determination. What the heck, Ma Lei thought, we’re really short-staffed right now. If he’s good, a trial period of a month or so would be fine. Ma Lei gave a signal, and the scarred man grinned. “So you’re applying, huh? Follow me.” He then strode into the courtyard.

Seeing that he had passed the first hurdle, the young man couldn’t help but breathe a sigh of relief and quickly followed. The courtyard wasn’t very large and looked unkempt, with oil stains on the ground, making it look dirty. On one side were a few low-built single-story houses. Opposite was an empty parking lot, a loading/unloading area, and a small warehouse. By the courtyard wall stood an old banyan tree, its trunk almost as thick as two people, its huge canopy covering half the courtyard, lush and inviting. Under the tree were a rocking chair and a few bamboo chairs, suggesting people often relaxed there in the shade.

“So, can you drive it?”

The question interrupted his observation. The young man turned his head, looked at the big blue truck next to the scarred man, and nodded.

This is it, no doubt. Chen Yuanming’s heart finally settled. He had found the right place.

In his previous life, when he went north to work, he had followed a particularly boastful Fujianese foreman on a construction site. According to him, he had been involved in smuggling goods like color TVs and motorcycles in Zhuhai a couple of years earlier. The bosses were two cousins from Changsha who were very close. He followed “Brother Scar” on long-haul trips, while “Brother Ma,” the big boss, handled procurement and contacts. The two brothers’ smuggling business was huge back then, making them a major player on the southeast route. However, in ‘94, during the national crackdown on smuggling, they couldn’t escape the law, were both arrested, and sentenced to over ten years in prison. The whole gang scattered, and the foreman had then pulled together a crew to start a business in Beijing.

This story was so legendary that the Fujianese man had told it over and over again—the village where they stored their goods, the routes they took, the personalities and appearances of the two bosses, and even the big banyan tree in the small courtyard were described in great detail. Back then, there wasn’t much entertainment on the construction site. After work, everyone would gather in the sheds to shoot the breeze. Although listening to this bragging was a bit annoying, the memory was incredibly vivid. That’s why his first stop on his journey south wasn’t Guangzhou or Shenzhen, but Zhuhai.

After getting off the train, faced with an unfamiliar environment, Chen Yuanming felt a little uneasy, even suspecting that the Fujianese man might have been exaggerating. It took him a full two days to find the place from his memory. Coincidentally, he saw the recruitment notice and, without a second thought, came to apply directly.

“Heh, the kid’s not modest,” the scarred man sneered, curling his lip. “Do you even know what kind of truck this is to be nodding already…”

“Jiefang CA141,” Chen Yuanming interrupted his taunt bluntly. “It’s a new model from a few years ago. Besides this one, I’ve also driven the old Jiefang and Steyr models. I’m very experienced.”

An expert reveals their skill with a single sentence. A glint appeared in Ma Lei’s eyes. This kid had real knowledge, he wasn’t just bluffing. In those days, the new Jiefang and Steyr were brand-new models. Even in Zhuhai, they had only appeared in the car markets in the last couple of years. The drivers he had hired had taken some time to get familiar with them. Let alone anything else, just being able to recognize the model at a glance was a skill in itself.

The scarred man was taken aback, at a loss for words. He scratched his head but didn’t get angry.

“Alright then! Get in and take it for a spin. Let me see what you’ve got.”