The Death of Yuhuan (10)
No one knows the specific process of Lihua's revenge, but judging from several key points, she has already succeeded.
However, as Lu Fanye said, although the clues were sorted out last night, everything was still based on conjecture, and it was necessary to find evidence that could link the deaths of Du Qiong, the second lady and the old housekeeper.
This will be another hassle.
But fortunately, we finally have a more specific direction for investigation.
On the fourth day of the copy, just after dawn, Xu Wei and Lu Fanye returned to the room, intending to wait for Taoist Jiang to wake up and pretend to have just gotten up.
Unexpectedly, the person was gone from the bed.
Just as he was wondering, Taoist Jiang came in with a cold morning air, followed by a haggard-looking woman.
It was the Second Madam’s personal maid, Liu Xu.
She had now been demoted from a maid who enjoyed generous food, clothing and other expenses to a servant in the courtyard. Her salary had declined, and she was now wearing rough cloth clothes. Her face had lost some color and her spirit was very depressed.
Xu Wei tried to remain calm and asked, "What happened?"
The clues came to your door?
"Ms. Xu! Mr. Lu!" Liu Xu suddenly knelt on the ground, took a few steps forward, grabbed Xu Wei's skirt, and cried, "Save me! I don't want to die!"
Xu Wei quickly squatted down to help her up: "Why are you kneeling? Get up quickly and calm down first."
"Please, Miss Xu, please save me!" Liu Xu grabbed her hand and held it tightly, kneeling on the ground and unable to get up. "I will be your slave and serve you for the rest of my life! You can ask me to do anything!"
"You get up first," Xu Wei said helplessly, looking at Taoist Jiang, "What happened?"
Taoist Jiang was standing aside as if watching a play, his legs apart, a whisk tucked under his armpits. It would be a shame for him not to eat some melon seeds.
Hearing Xu Wei's question, he was startled and quickly pulled the whisk out from under his armpit, tucked it back in his armpit, and said seriously: "I woke up in the morning and found that the ghost aura was stronger. Seeing that you were not there, I wanted to go out and investigate. On the way back, I saw her in the Second Madam's courtyard."
"She insisted on getting me to tell me she wanted to get rid of some ghost, so I checked her ghost energy and found only a little bit. There was nothing to be afraid of. Besides, I couldn't get rid of it, so she came to you guys."
Xu Wei looked at Liu Xu, who had already started to sweat and was shivering all over, obviously very frightened.
Xu Wei had no choice but to wipe the sweat off her forehead and said softly, "Don't kneel down yet. Since you've come to us, tell us the whole story so I can help you."
After imitating Zhang Yuan's gentle and soft voice, Liu Xu finally calmed down and was willing to sit down and talk.
Xu Wei poured her a cup of tea and comforted her, "It's okay, talk slowly."
Liu Xu took a sip and found the tea very strong and bitter. She frowned and then a trace of color returned to her face. She said in a trembling voice, "There really is a ghost. I saw it with my own eyes."
Ever since the second wife became pregnant, the room has been haunted frequently. At first, it was just the silk cloth that was moved, and later the doors and windows moved automatically without wind, and a candle fell to the ground and almost caused a fire.
Liu Xu didn't believe this at first.
She was just one of the big maids in the courtyard, and above her was Nongqin. After the haunting, the Second Madam did not trust others and only let Nongqin stay in the room, so many times Liu Xu only heard the Second Madam screaming outside the door, and only went into the room with other maids to clean up when things got serious.
She was also frightened at first by the occasional noises made by the Second Lady and Nongqin, but became numb after many times - sometimes it was simply that the Second Lady herself had misremembered, or it was an hallucination that never happened at all, and things like doors and windows moving automatically and candles falling to the ground did not happen frequently, so they could still be explained as coincidences.
As for the ghosts they were shouting about seeing, Liu Xu had never seen one.
Until that night.
The Second Lady took a walk in the yard after dinner and felt sleepy early. Nong Qin helped her wash up and go to sleep, and the two of them stayed in the room the whole time.
Liu Xu was on duty. The lady slept well in the first half of the night, but the noises gradually became louder in the second half. At first she was just muttering and talking in her sleep, but later it became worse and worse, she started yelling and cursing, cursing Nongqin, the master, and a group of useless servants, then she started to cry and banged her head against the wall, crying "I'm sorry" and "Let me go".
At this time, Liu Xu came into the house - Nongqin could no longer control the situation, and there were many servants who had gotten up at night outside, and the second wife did not want to be seen in this state. After working together to control the wife, Nongqin hurriedly went to invite the master.
The master's comfort calmed the lady down. Seeing this, Liu Xu went outside to drive away the strangers who were still watching from afar. As soon as she walked in front of those people, the noise in the house got louder. She hurried back, and before she stepped over the threshold, she heard the lady's shrill and terrifying cry.
When he rushed into the house, he saw the master trying to hug his mistress but she suddenly broke free and pointed at the window behind him with her eyes wide open, her mouth about to open, and her throat making "huh" and "huh" sounds as if there was phlegm stuck.
The master fired a shot at the wall without hesitation.
There's nothing on the wall.
The lady held on for a while, but her body could no longer support her and she collapsed on the bed. Blood flowed out from between her legs and she couldn't stop the bleeding.
Nong Qin was standing far away from the lady's bed, also slumped beside the desk, trembling, his eyes fixed on the back of the master.
There was nothing there anymore, but Liu Xu was sure that she, Nong Qin and even the lady had all seen "her".
A woman with long hair and blood-red body.
What happened later was exactly the same as what Li Shaodong had said, except that it was Liu Xu who hired the doctor and the midwife. The second wife and the child could not be saved, the doctor was shot, and Nong Qin rushed out of the room in a trance and died at the hands of Du Xingye.
"Did you see what she looked like?" Xu Wei grabbed her hand soothingly and rubbed it gently.
Liu Xu gasped, his chest heaving: "I can't see, her face is blurry."
"How do you want me to help you? Get rid of ghosts? I'm not a professional Taoist priest." Xu Wei slowed down his speech and asked softly.
Liu Xu's eyes were filled with tears, and he grabbed her hand: "Please, Miss Xu, and Mr. Lu, I didn't want to make this public, but I, I have been sleeping in my room these past few days, and I always wake up in the Second Madam's courtyard! Every day! I am getting closer and closer to the coffin!"
At this point, she broke down and burst into tears.
Xu Wei understood. No wonder she met Taoist Jiang in the Second Lady’s courtyard today.
"Let me make it clear first, there is no ghost in the Second Madam's courtyard. I chased him to Master Du's courtyard and then came back." Seeing Xu Wei looking at him, Taoist Jiang immediately raised his hands and showed the compass, "The ghost in his courtyard is a little stronger."
Xu Wei frowned and hurried to comfort the collapsed Liu Xu.
"Please, help me! Tell the master that it was the Second Madam who killed Master Du Qiong!"
Xu Wei paused and moved his hand away from her back: "What do you mean?"
Seeing the faces of the people in front of her turn cold, Liu Xu shed another string of tears: "Miss Xu, Mr. Lu, you are the distinguished guests of the mansion. Only you can report this matter to the master without being affected. If we are servants, especially me who came from the second wife, the master will definitely kill me!"
Lu Fanye coughed and interrupted, "Excuse me, so why did you want to clarify the truth for Du Qiong?"
Liu Xu was sobbing breathlessly, and after a long while, she said, "It was the Second Madam who ordered Butler Liu to poison Young Master Du Qiong! I, I just went out to buy medicine for Madam, and I didn't know at that time that this was going to kill people..."
"These past few days, whenever I woke up, I was getting closer and closer to the Second Madam's coffin. I was really scared. Yesterday, I heard that there was a maid who was good at fortune-telling, so I went to ask her for a fortune-teller. She said that I had done something wrong and was possessed by a vengeful ghost. If I don't avenge this vengeful ghost, I will have to pay with my life!"
Xu Wei: "And you believed it?"
Liu Xu shook her head with a bitter face: "I didn't believe it at first, but I told her about it, and when I got up this morning, I stayed away from the coffin."
After saying that, he looked at Xu Wei expectantly: "Miss Xu, will you help me?"
Xu Wei: “…”
After seeing off Liu Xu, he called Zhang Yuan and the other two over to discuss the matter. Not long after, Li Hua came again.
She remained the same, standing silently by the door, waiting until the noise in the room died down before speaking.
"Dear guests, the master will host a banquet in the dining hall at noon to entertain you. Please be sure to be there."
Just as they were discussing the affairs of Du Qiong and the Second Madam, the Avenger showed up at the door. Although the players had shut up the moment the shadow appeared, they all looked at each other, still feeling a little nervous.
Lu Fanye said at this time: "Thank you very much, Miss Lihua."
"It's my job, Mr. Lu, no need to thank me. If it's nothing important, Lihua will..."
"Lihua!" Xu Wei stood up quickly and ran over to open the door. She was standing by the door with a pair of pigtails, bright eyes and rosy cheeks.
"Miss Xu, what's the matter?"
Xu Wei took something out of her pocket bag, looked up at her expression, and then held out her hand: "Do you know who this belongs to? I found it in the mansion."
Lihua looked down, her expression unchanged, and she said calmly, "I don't know him."
The half-rotten blue sachet lay quietly in Xu Wei's hand, with some withered herbs spilled out.
"Oh...well, I thought we could find the owner."
Turning back to her seat, Lihua asked from behind, "Did Miss Xu pick this up from the well?"
"Yes, I picked it up casually. It doesn't look like it belongs to Butler Liu. I heard that it is something that only the master of the house would wear." Xu Wei turned around and observed her expression and movements. "It's inconvenient for a servant to carry this while working."
"But this embroidery is really well done. Even though it's so rotten, you can still see the tall and straight pine and bamboo on it, green and tough. The person who embroidered it must have put a lot of effort into it."
Lihua stood there as if in a trance, not moving at all and not answering her.
"By the way, how is the situation with Butler Liu? The situation was urgent, so I went downstairs first. Did they come to look for you later?" Xu Wei casually stuffed the blue sachet into his bag with a very rough movement, and sprinkled a few dry grasses.
Lihua bowed her head and thanked them, "Thanks to you all, otherwise I don't know when Steward Liu would be found. I have already reported it as usual, and the master asked me to take good care of his body."
"That's good. Mr. Du doesn't plan to investigate? After all, he...right." Xu Wei hesitated to speak.
Lihua was silent for a while, and her expression finally changed. She looked embarrassed and said, "Butler Liu stole money from the mansion and put it into his own account before he left office, and that's why he was fired. The master meant that he was wrong in the first place, and it's been so long that we can't find out..."
Xu Wei understood and handled it with care.
"Lihua will take her leave first. I will come to greet you all at noon."
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