When Zhao Tianbao heard Su Qingluan's words, his face twitched with fear.
However, he had been a scoundrel for so many years, and he had seen people bluffing before. Often, as long as he denied it to the end, others would usually be unable to do anything to him - after all, although he often did something dishonest, it was usually just petty theft.
What's more, after so many years, he has become very "experienced" in making connections - he speaks vaguely and ambiguously, especially when it comes to women, he would make up stories about things that would defame people's reputations. In order not to make things worse and embarrass himself in front of outsiders, many people just gritted their teeth and endured the loss in silence.
However, for some reason, the eldest girl from the Su family didn't take the words that she said to heart at all today, and even said that she had "confessed herself"?
Did he really let it slip accidentally?
No, no, no - Zhao Tianbao shook his head secretly - he didn't say when and where he got the brocade bag, so there was no way to confront him.
Just as Zhao Tianbao was desperately trying to comfort himself, he heard Su Qingluan sneer, "It seems you won't cry until you see the coffin. Since you said that after I 'given' you this sachet, you always hung it around your neck and kept it close to your body, let me ask you, how did you get it to hang around your neck?!"
When everyone heard Su Qingluan ask this, they subconsciously looked up at the sachet.
Originally, Su Qingluan's hand was pinching the opening of the sachet. She could vaguely see that the part she was holding was a tightly wound string, but it was a mess and her length could not be clearly seen.
However, most sachets are tied around the waist.
Su Qingluan understood that someone like Zhao Tianbao who had stolen the sachet temporarily would naturally not say that he "tied it around his waist" - after all, if he said that, the red sachet would be very eye-catching, and no farmers in the village had ever seen anyone wearing a sachet. If he unilaterally said that he had worn it for many days and no one had seen it, this lie would be very easy to expose.
Since it cannot be tied "around the waist", it naturally has to be placed elsewhere - and it sounds like it should be a place where the sachet cannot be exposed outside.
In this case, "hanging it close to the neck" is a good idea. It is not easy to be confronted with whether you really wear it, and it is easier to add an ambiguous and erotic color. If you meet a girl with a thin skin, she will probably be embarrassed to death.
However, Zhao Tianbao was wrong. Su Qingluan was not an ordinary young lady. Having died once, she could, in a sense, be thicker-skinned than a city wall. This level of "rumors" was worse to her than a mosquito bite.
Su Qingluan smoothed out the tangled string bit by bit, allowing it to slowly reveal its original appearance - it was just a thin rope that was at most three inches long. Not to mention being able to be put around an adult's neck, it could only barely be put around a young lady's wrist.
"Please tell this... uh, young master of the Zhao family," Su Qingluan suppressed her desire for Zuan and ultimately refrained from calling him "little bastard" or "bastard" out loud. "How on earth did you manage to hang it around your neck with such a short string?"
"I... this..." Zhao Tianbao hesitated for a long time, but he showed some rogue quick wit. "I used another straw rope to thread it through, and I don't know when it broke!"
In fact, although the villagers of Huaxi Village are all simple and honest, they are not stupid or mentally retarded. Seeing Zhao Tianbao's guilty conscience and incoherent words, it is basically understood that he is just stubborn and refuses to admit to stealing.
So even though he came up with a new excuse, some people still started to jeer, saying, "Just admit you stole it—it's not the first time, everyone's used to it."
"Hahahahahahaha..." The people around burst into laughter.
Zhao Tianbao was quite the scoundrel. He stiffened his neck, his face flushed, and said unconvincedly, "I said I didn't steal it! You have no evidence, so you can't slander a good person like this!"
Su Qingluan thought to herself that if someone like you is considered a "good person", then all the "bad people" in the world would be dead!
But she didn't want to argue with the other party about good guys and bad guys. She just wanted to get rid of the person in front of her as soon as possible and then have a good rest - she was too tired today.
So she turned her palm over and said to everyone: "Everyone, please look!"
"Oh!" Su Guangfu was shocked when he saw his eldest daughter's palm, and almost let Zhao Tianbao, who was in the clamp, escape.
Zhao Tianbao originally felt that the force of the clamp on his body was relieved, and wanted to jump up and run away, but Su Guangfu came to his senses and pinned him down again. He grimaced and howled in pain again.
"Daya, your hand is bleeding?" Su Guangfu held down Zhao Tianbao, who was like a little chicken, again, but his eyes were fixed on Su Qingluan's palm.
Su Qingluan was obviously shocked by her father's reaction. She quickly waved her hand and comforted him, "Don't worry, Dad. It's just fading."
The older men who weren't used to doing laundry were a bit confused, but the two wives who had come to help with the cooking suddenly realized, "Hey, Su's eldest daughter, weren't you holding that red sachet just now?"
The other one nodded and took over the conversation: "Oh my, the color has faded so badly in just a short time? Whose fabric is this? I won't buy it next time!"
Su Qingluan smiled and shook her head: "I can't remember which family it was from, but because the fabric fades so badly, even though the color is fresh, my mother has never used it to make clothes for us."
As she spoke, she casually wiped the area of her palms. "My palms were just a little sweaty, and yet the fabric has faded so badly. I wonder how badly the clothes of this 'personal keeper' have been stained?"
Seeing this, everyone looked at Zhao Tianbao again.
A few curious people stepped forward and shouted, "Search him! He said he was wearing it close to his body. Let's take off his clothes and see if there is any mark of the red cloth!"
Since a little sweat from the palms can cause such serious staining, it is impossible for clothes or skin to not be stained if carried close to the body.
So several people rushed to strip Zhao Tianbao's clothes. Although Su Qingluan did not have any self-restraint of "don't look at what is indecent", she also understood that at least in front of outsiders, she still couldn't go too far.
So she turned around very consciously and let Zhao Tianbao howl in agony.
Finally, Zhao Tianbao's clothes and skin were naturally very clean - but his hands were a light red different from the blood color, which was obviously caused by standing on them when stealing.
The evidence was now irrefutable. If Zhao Tianbao hadn't previously sworn that he had carried the sachet "closely on his person," his theft wouldn't have been confirmed. However, his habitual desire to falsely accuse women of their innocence only made his guilt a certainty.
Now there is both human and material evidence. According to the laws of the Sheng Dynasty, even if the stolen items are of low value, as long as it is proven to be theft, the offender will be flogged with at least fifty strokes of the cane.
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
