After being thoroughly reprimanded by Zhao Dayong, Li finally calmed down.

Zhao Dayong frowned in thought. His sister-in-law would be coming to ask about the house tomorrow, and he should have asked the village elder about the current value of the old house so that he would at least have a general idea.

"Old woman, how much silver do we have left? Is it enough to buy the old house?"

Despite the arguments and quarrels, family matters still need to be resolved.

No matter how much the two argue, it can't affect important matters.

Only then did Mrs. Li remember that she still needed to spend money to buy the old house where her son was currently living.

“Dad was biased. The third son had a house, and the eldest brother also had a house in the county town. Our family was the poorest and had nothing. He knew this, but he still gave half of the old house to the eldest brother.”

"Now is not the time to complain. Take out the money at home and count it, so at least you'll have a better idea of ​​the situation."

Li reluctantly chased away her youngest daughter, then rummaged through every corner of the room, spreading all the silver on the kang (a heated brick bed). Zhao Dayong carefully counted it; it was three taels and four mace.

"Is all the money here?"

Li lowered her head, not daring to look at Zhao Dayong.

"Um."

Zhao Dayong couldn't believe it and counted twice more. Had his wife secretly kept some? Even if he had bought his mother's house, there shouldn't be so little left in the house.

He knew very well how much wealth they had.

"Why are more than ten taels missing?"

His wife kept arguing that she wouldn't buy a house, saying that if she did, they'd have no money left. He thought that buying the house would just take away most of their savings. Now it seems they've been completely bankrupted.

"Where's the money?"

Li opened her mouth, but didn't know what to say.

"You've been keeping secrets from me, and you still won't tell me?"

If that's true, his wife really broke his heart.

"What nonsense are you talking about? How could I possibly keep anything from you?"

Hearing the old man say that, Li became anxious.

"You mean the silver? What about the rest of the silver?"

Zhao Dayong banged his pipe against the kang (a heated brick bed) beneath his buttocks a few times, his eyes filled with anger as he looked at Li Shi.

A dozen taels of silver is no small sum. The family had nothing to eat or drink, and they hadn't bought any clothes. Where did she spend it? Did she give it to her parents' family?

"If you don't give me a straight answer today, I'm not done with you."

With tears welling up in her eyes, Ms. Li said, "I didn't squander the money. You know how hard I've suffered these past few years. I can't bear to part with anything."

"Where's the money?"

Zhao Dayong didn't want to listen to her nonsense; he just wanted to know where the family's money had gone.

"The money... I gave all the money to my son."

"What did you say? Explain yourself." Zhao Dayong's head started to ache again, and his mind was buzzing.

“Every time Sanzhuzi comes home, he asks me for money. If I tell you, you definitely won’t give it to me, and you might even scold the child. So I can only secretly give him a little bit at a time.”

The child already doesn't want to come home; if we force him out, what if he never comes back?

"They gave it all to Sanzhuzi?"

Li glanced at Zhao Dayong, and seeing his appearance, she dared not hide anything anymore. "No, there's also Dazhuzi. I don't know why, but every time I give Sanzhuzi some money, he knows and immediately asks me for it."

I thought I couldn't favor one son over the other; what kind of behavior would that be? So…”

So half the silver is still in Dazhuzi's hands.

Okay, very good!

His wife is truly impartial; she treats everyone equally. Shouldn't he praise her?

How much was given in total?