When I was a sophomore, one day in April I went to the general shop beside the Seventh Canteen to photocopy some materials. I made four copies in all, at two jiao each. Reaching into my pocket, I found I had only a single ten-yuan note, so I handed it to the girl at the copier. She took one glance at the bill and said, “That’s quite a big one. Wait a moment, I’ll get your change.” I was still wondering since when ten yuan counted as “big,” when she turned back and handed me a whole stack of money: ninety-nine yuan and two jiao. It was the first time in my life I had ever been given too much change, and I simply turned and walked away.
During the May Day holiday, some classmates and I went to Weihai. Prices had just gone up. When I calculated carefully, the train fare plus the ticket prices came to exactly ninety-nine yuan and two jiao more than before, not a fen more and not a fen less. So it seems that money gained without right is never truly yours. And that girl who mistook ten yuan for one hundred and gave me too much change, from whom had she herself first over-collected in greed? One link locked to the next, the net of Heaven vast and close-meshed.