Chapter 261 Wen's Wishful Thinking
Yu Qingci felt that it would be more detailed and substantial for her to tell the story.
After hearing his daughter's account, the Earl of Nanping found it unbelievable. How could Qiao have secretly poisoned Chengniang all this time?
He instinctively didn't want to believe it, but subconsciously he knew it couldn't be fake; his daughter and son-in-law's men were still waiting in the yard, ready to pounce.
Lu Yunqi silently took out several confessions and showed them to him. After carefully reading them one by one, the Earl of Nanping remained silent for a long time.
"Where are the Qiao family members? And where are the others mentioned above?"
The Earl of Nanping asked.
Lu Yunqi: "The Qiao family is in the Begonia Courtyard. The other people involved in the case are being watched by my men. We're just waiting for my father-in-law to return and make a decision."
"Wait for me to decide? Humph! You two are so capable, you've investigated everything clearly, what do you need me to decide?"
The Earl of Nanping vented his anger and then sat there without saying a word.
The young couple exchanged a glance and remained silent with him.
The room was quiet for a while before the Earl of Nanping's voice rang out again:
"Now that everything has been explained, someone go to the Vice Minister's residence to report that the Marquis of Nanping's mansion is going to divorce Qiao Shi!"
"Never mind, I'll just say I have something important to discuss."
After the messenger left, Yu Qingci raised her eyelids and asked in a calm tone:
"Father, would you like to go to the Begonia Courtyard to see that person?"
The Earl of Nanping glared at her: "No need, let's talk about it when someone from the Vice Minister's residence comes."
At this moment, the Earl of Nanping was filled with mixed emotions. Besides the worry and guilt that Su Chengniang had almost lost her life, he also had emotions that he himself did not understand. His mind was filled with images of Su Chengniang's years of mutual support and affection, her every smile and frown, and Qiao Shi's gentle, considerate, and virtuous homemaking.
He couldn't understand why things had turned out this way.
It wasn't that he didn't want to ask Mrs. Qiao in person why she did this, but he had a vague idea of what Mrs. Qiao would say to him, and how he should respond.
The more I think about it, the more confused I get, so I've decided to stop thinking about it altogether.
"By the way, what did your grandmother say? She has never liked your mother. Even with these witnesses and testimonies, she will probably only side with Qiao. If she says anything unpleasant, don't take it to heart. Now that I'm back, I'll take care of things with your grandmother."
Yu Qingci and Lu Yunqi exchanged another glance, a mocking smile playing on Yu Qingci's lips:
“My grandmother has been saying that she is not feeling well these past two days and is resting quietly at Shouyin Hall, and she does not allow us to disturb her.”
Earl of Nanping: ...
The Earl of Nanping eventually went to the Begonia Courtyard. He wanted to ask her face to face why she had done such a terrible thing to Chengniang. Wasn't she usually the most understanding, gentle and virtuous? How could she do such a thing that was like a smile hiding a knife?
After the Earl of Nanping went inside, he sent all the servants out of the room. No one knows what the two of them said inside. Half an hour later, the Earl of Nanping came out alone, and the expression on his face was unreadable.
From inside the house came Qiao's suppressed sobs, her cries particularly heart-wrenching.
Vice Minister Qiao and Lady Wen arrived quickly, and the Earl of Nanping had someone lead them to the reception room first.
Sitting in the reception room were Vice Minister Qiao, Madam Wen, and Wen Yuexiu.
After the three sat down, they gradually sensed something was wrong. The atmosphere was quiet, and apart from the occasional servant coming to change the teacups, there was no one else around.
The ominous feeling in Vice Minister Qiao's heart grew stronger. After all, they were in-laws of the Earl's family. How could a father-in-law come to visit and no one came to greet him? Unless something had happened to his daughter!
Vice Minister Qiao's expression grew increasingly grim, and he glared sharply at his wife.
Wen became increasingly uneasy under his gaze.
Her husband didn't know what had happened, so how could she, as a mother, not guess? The fact that her son-in-law had suddenly invited her over and then left her there unattended suggests that someone had probably discovered something amiss!
Wen's heart sank even further.
No wonder she gave her daughter such a ruthless suggestion. Ever since the Earl's Mansion took back that mother and her two children, her daughter's status in the mansion has plummeted. Although the old lady of the Earl's Mansion is backing her up, and the household affairs of the mansion have always been in her daughter's hands, they themselves know the difference in the matter.
Especially after her daughter was demoted to a secondary wife, Wen's anger was completely aroused, so she came up with this idea to clear the obstacles for her daughter.
With her years of experience as the mistress of the house, she had plenty of ways and means to kill someone without anyone knowing. She ultimately chose to use arsenic, a dull knife, because she knew that this would make that wretched woman, Su, suffer endless torment before she died, which was what she meant by dying a terrible death.
At first, she was a little worried, but later she learned that after Su was infected, the imperial physicians and even the royal physicians had not been able to find the cause of the illness for many days, and thought it was just a cold. She gradually felt relieved and secretly pleased with the subtlety of this method.
In the meantime, her granddaughter Qingyan was getting married. In order not to affect her granddaughter's wedding, she specifically instructed her daughter to stop giving Su a few days' worth of medication and to resume the medication only after the wedding.
This makes it less likely to be noticed.
It just so happens that her son-in-law, the Earl of Nanping, has been sent by the court to provide disaster relief. This is a godsend opportunity. While he is away, they should increase the dosage of the medicine and send Madam Su to her death within a few days.
After Su died, the daytime temperature was still quite hot, so the body couldn't be left for long. We bought a coffin and nailed it in for burial as soon as possible. Once the coffin was nailed in, it absolutely could not be opened. This was an old rule about feng shui. At that time, that little bitch Yu Qingci would definitely not be able to tell anything.
It was common knowledge throughout the household that Madam Su had been in poor health. When her son-in-law returned, all he found was a coffin, and that was the end of everything.
These past two days, she has been preoccupied with trivial matters in the inner quarters of the Vice Minister's residence. She has been busy helping Yuexiu and her sons suppress their daughter-in-law, Ruan Shi, and has neglected to look after her daughter. Only when she was almost done with her work did she realize that she hadn't received any news from her daughter for several days and didn't know how things were going.
They were just about to send Shengcai and Shengwang over to find out what was going on here when they received a message early this morning from the Earl of Nanping, asking the couple to come to his residence.
Seeing that Vice Minister Qiao was glaring at her with displeasure, Madam Wen was even more nervous and could only force herself to remain calm and pretend that nothing had happened.
Wen Yuexiu, who was accompanying her, was not very shrewd and quickly showed her impatience, complaining:
"What does the Earl's mansion mean by this today? We are honored guests. Since you invited us here, why are you leaving us hanging? And why isn't my sister coming out to greet us?"
Wen Yuexiu was the concubine of Qiao Chengfeng, the eldest son of the Wen family, and also a niece of the Wen family. In addition, she gave birth to two sons and a daughter for the Wen family, and was deeply loved by the Wen family and others. Therefore, Wen Yuexiu's status in the Vice Minister's Mansion was much higher than that of the first wife, Ruan Shi.
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