Seeing Han Chunling's unhappy expression, Ye Dongming frowned and said in a low voice, "Don't give me a cold shoulder. It's just a meal, so you have to pretend to the end.
"Is it for myself that I came here? It's for your disappointing son!"
When Han Chunling heard Ye Dongming talking about his son, her expression immediately eased a lot, but she still couldn't help asking: "The son is mine alone? Not yours?"
"It is because he is mine that I am thinking of a way to help him now.
"If it weren't mine, I would have kicked him out long ago."
Ye Dongming's first wife passed away early, leaving him with a son and a daughter, both of whom have already started their own families.
Han Chunling was his second wife, and they had only one son, Ye Qingze, who was sixteen years old this year.
Ye Dongming's eldest son, Ye Qinghong, passed the imperial examination and became a scholar. However, after failing the provincial examination, he did not want to take the exam again.
Now he has opened a private school in the county town and lives a stable and prosperous life.
Ye Dongming has always hoped that his youngest son, Ye Qingze, would study hard and surpass his eldest son, so that he could at least pass the imperial examination and become a juren, which would bring honor to the family.
Unfortunately, Ye Qingze is a good kid in every way except academics.
Ye Dongming originally refused to give up and watched his son study every day.
But now the child is in his teens, and Ye Dongming is no longer willing to admit it, but he knows what is going on.
Studying for the imperial examinations and pursuing a career in officialdom is definitely not an option.
The reason why Ye Dongming came to support Widow Liu's family was because he had his eyes on her son-in-law Yang Xing, who was working as a manager in the Qin Mansion. He wanted to use this relationship to get his son a job in the Qin Mansion.
Even though he is the patriarch of the Ye family, he appears to be very impressive in public and can even be called a brother by the county magistrate.
But once he leaves Fengle County, his identity will be useless.
In fact, if he wanted to arrange for his son to work in the county government as a minor official, it would be easy.
But what future can one achieve by being a petty official?
It's like that all your life.
But it’s different for the Qin family. If you can get in and work as a clerk, and then be promoted to a manager, that’s a status that even the county magistrate will greet with a smile when he sees you.
So ever since he came to the village last time and found out that Ye Donghai's family actually knew Nanny Qin, whom even Yang Xing didn't dare to offend, the person he wanted to show favor to suddenly changed from Widow Liu's family to the old Ye family.
However, he still remembered his identity as the patriarch of the Ye family, and was embarrassed to be too straightforward.
So he took advantage of the fact that Old Man Ye was buried in the ancestral tomb to establish a good relationship with the Ye family.
The couple exchanged a few words, and after reaching a consensus, they fell silent.
The kitchen was bustling with activity and the dishes were ready quickly.
Old Madam Ye listened at the door and heard no movement from inside the house. Then she pushed the door open and said, "Patriarch, Madam, lunch is ready. The men want to drink, so let them eat in the east room and we will eat on the kang in the west room."
As they were talking, Second Sister-in-law Ye and Third Sister-in-law Ye had already come in and cleared out and set up the kang tables in the two rooms, and then plates of food were brought to the table one after another.
Smelling the aroma that kept wafting towards her and watching the dishes pass by, Han Chunling felt quite surprised.
I didn’t expect that the Ye family, although they looked low-key, were really good at entertaining guests.
After all the dishes were served, Old Lady Ye said modestly, "I didn't prepare anything in advance because of the rush, so I just made some home-cooked dishes. Please don't be disgusted by them, both of you."
"With such a large table of food, what's there to dislike?" Ye Dongming went out early in the morning and was already hungry. Looking at the large table of food, his stomach began to rumble and his saliva began to secrete uncontrollably.
He said you're welcome, and he really wasn't polite. Without waiting for others to sit down, he picked up a piece of meat and stuffed it into his mouth.
Han Chunling was stunned. After all, ever since Ye Dongming became the clan leader, he had been particularly concerned about his every move.
She couldn't remember how many years it had been since she had seen him behave so uncivilized.
"This braised beef is really good!" Ye Dongming ate two slices, smacked his lips, and said doubtfully, "It just seems to taste different from the beef I've had before."
"Chief, this is sika deer meat," Old Lady Ye said with a smile. "My eldest brother brought it back from the mountains. His wife braised the shank, and it's perfect to go with wine."
After she finished speaking, she placed the wine jar on the table and said to her four sons, "Big Boss, you four brothers, have a few drinks with the clan leader."
This wine was given by Captain Zhang to thank Boss Ye when they were in Tianjin. It is of a higher grade than the one that Old Lady Ye bought to entertain Liu Quan.
"What a good wine!" Ye Dongming couldn't help but praise it after taking a sniff, and he couldn't put it down after taking a sip.
Even as the patriarch of the Ye family, he couldn't drink such good wine every day.
Looking down at the dishes on the table, in addition to venison, there were also pork elbows and pork belly fried with wood ear mushrooms, as well as a few vegetarian dishes.
The staple food turned out to be white rice. It seemed that the Ye family was just too low-key and inconspicuous, but the food at home was much better than that of other families in the village.
Ye Dongming had some leisure to think about these things at first, but after a few drinks, he became interested and had no time to analyze this or that. He told his four brothers about his great achievements after becoming the clan leader.
Old Mrs. Ye invited Han Chunling to eat on the kang in the west room.
She was worried about the children making noise and that Mrs. Guo would be too talkative, so she only brought Mrs. Ye to keep her company.
At this time, Ye Ersao, Ye Sansao and Guo were eating in the side room with the children.
My dear, there is more to this chapter. Please click on the next page to continue reading. It will be even more exciting later!
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