八十三歲 Eighty Three Years Old and Alone
老母今年八十三歲，只我一人奉養。倘若身喪，誰與他埋屍送老？苦哉，苦哉！痛殺我也。」老母今年八十三岁，只我一人奉养。倘若身丧，谁与他埋尸送老？苦哉，苦哉！痛杀我也。」
逐句解 Line by line
My old mother is eighty-three this year, and I am the only one who provides for her.
奉養 is to support a parent — the specific word for the duty a child owes, not general provision. Fourteen characters, one number, and the number is doing all the work.
If I lose my life, who will bury her body and see her out of the world?
送老 is to see a parent through to the end and perform the funeral — the last of the obligations, and the one that cannot be delegated. He is not afraid of dying; he is afraid of her dying unburied.
Bitter, bitter! The pain of it will be the death of me."
痛殺我也 — the very four characters the master used a few passages back, now in the woodcutter's mouth. The novel gives the two men the same closing cry, and this is the second of the two.
Eighty-three, and one son. That is the whole argument and it does not need a second sentence.
The repeated cry is the point of the scene. Two men, two entirely different accounts of what a death would cost, and identical words at the end of both.