The Death of Yuhuan (Part 3)
The next morning, the five of them gathered for dinner.
Li Shaodong has not rested since he watched the farce last night. He went to the area where the maids and servants worked and stayed there from dusk to dawn, following them tirelessly, back and forth, and finally found out everything.
"The Second Madam had a nightmare at four o'clock. It was very severe. The servants couldn't make up their minds and had to ask for help from the master. Du Xingye happened to be in his room at the time. He went there soon after hearing the news and held her to comfort her for a long time."
"The lady was about to fall asleep, but suddenly she opened her eyes wide and looked behind Du Xingye, shouting, 'There's a ghost!'"
Qi Xiaopei shook at the right time, squeezed next to Zhang Yuan, was grabbed, and held in his arms to rub his head.
Li Shaodong was quite satisfied with the audience's reaction and deepened his tone: "He wanted to comfort her, but the lady broke free from his arms! She burst into tears, screamed and screamed, and crawled onto the bed like a possessed person. She was so strong that she couldn't be suppressed at all. Everyone in the room ran to hold her down."
"The situation at that time was no different from being possessed by a ghost. The second wife struggled hard, and suddenly she let out a very shrill and terrifying scream, and fell on the bed. The blood flowed out from between her legs, and she couldn't stop it."
Zhang Yuan was surprised by his vivid description and asked, "Did you see it with your own eyes?"
Li Shaodong touched his head embarrassedly: "I heard the description from the servants. They listened to the sound before entering the house, so I reconstructed it based on what they heard."
Zhang Yuan said helplessly: "Okay, as long as the information is accurate, you can continue."
"The lady's maid, the one who died this morning, went to call the doctor and the midwife, saying it was a premature birth, and she started to fuss on the spot. Du Xingye was waiting for them in the compartment to deliver the baby, but after half a quarter of an hour, the doctor said that the lady had a heavy hemorrhage and could not recover her spirits, so she could not be saved."
Xu Wei was cracking melon seeds, and a crisp sound came from his lips: "And then?"
"Then Du Xingye put a gun to his head and shouted for help. I don't know what happened next. Anyway, except for the personal maid, everyone else was kicked out."
Zhang Yuan added: "The wife died, and the two fetuses were not saved. The doctor was shot in the room."
It was referring to the gunshot that occurred after everyone arrived.
Xu Wei frowned: "But why the maid?"
It was the madam who was having the nightmare. There were other maids staying in the room as well, so why was the eldest maid the one who was frightened like that?
Zhang Yuan shook his head: "This is also one of the doubts. Later we went to look for the body, but the body had been taken out of the mansion by the guards and disappeared. The clues were cut off."
Lu Fanye seemed to be thinking about something at this time, and looked at Li Shaodong: "When the servant invited Du Xingye, was he awake?"
Xu Wei exclaimed "Oh" and felt like he had grasped something.
Li Shaodong scratched his head and smiled awkwardly: "They didn't explain clearly, they just said that they invited the master and he will be here soon."
"He didn't change his clothes and slept in his clothes at night, so he just got up and went there?" Xu Wei could only guess based on the facts.
This would explain why he showed up in the middle of the night in his uniform, all wrinkled and untidy.
"Maybe he went to one of the ladies' rooms?" Li Shaodong came up with a new idea.
Zhang Yuan retorted: "I asked Du Xingye's family, he didn't go to other wives last night."
The reasoning reached an impasse.
"Why don't we stop worrying about Du Xingye and talk about the haunting." Xu Wei remembered the mission requirements.
"This haunting refers to the ghost that scared the second wife to death, right? We have to start with the second wife." Li Shaodong said.
Except for the Second Madam, everything in the mansion is currently normal.
"When did the Second Madam have the nightmare? There must be a story behind her." Xu Wei opened the bracelet and stared at the screen panel above with a frown.
"There must be a story. I heard from the servants that she has had nightmares from time to time since she became pregnant, and the situation became worse as time went on. She often talked in her sleep and kept yelling at others not to harm her." Zhang Yuan replied firmly.
No more information could be dug up at this point, so everyone could only split into two groups based on the two major suspicious points. Xu Wei and Lu Fanye would investigate Du Xingye, while the others would investigate the Second Madam.
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Chadu Xingye has high risks, and this allocation was made considering that Lu Fanye has a good impression score.
At this time, Zhang Yuan and his party had already set off, but Xu Wei had no clue and stayed in the house, feeling that he had nothing in his hands and didn't know where to start.
"Just check wherever you think something is wrong," Lu Fanye poured a cup of tea and looked out at the sky, "It's still early."
Xu Wei sighed, handed over his teacup, and said, "Everything is wrong, especially this Du Xingye. But he is too sensitive, he would notice it if he looked at him a few more times. Why are you asking about it under his nose? It's a private matter!"
After thinking for a while, he complained again: "This whole place is weird. Isn't the name of the dungeon called Yuhuan's Death? How does it have anything to do with Yuhuan? I spent so much time researching Yang Guifei, and those jade rings, I memorized their appearances, but it turns out that the opening part is somehow related to the Guifei's Complaint."
Lu Fanye nodded and poured her some tea: "Don't worry, take your time to sort things out and calm down first. You are usually very smart, but you always get anxious, and when you get anxious you can't figure things out."
Xu Wei took a sip of tea and forced himself to calm down.
No longer caring about the name of the copy, the attention was focused on Du Xingye. There were two doubts about him. One was his secretive attitude towards the death of the second wife, and the other was his whereabouts in the middle of the night.
It would be difficult to trace his whereabouts in the middle of the night since no one saw him, but the first point might overlap with Zhang Yuan and the others, which would be a waste of time.
The more I think about it, the more headache I get.
"Okay, let's go around to the other ladies and ask the people in their courtyards." Lu Fanye said when he saw that she was becoming ferocious from thinking about it.
So this morning, the two men wandered around the courtyards of the ladies, dealing with the people who were doing the work.
This type of investigation is not difficult, but it is labor-intensive, tedious, and contains a lot of irrelevant information.
I worked until noon and only got two messages.
First, Du Xingye would go to the women's rooms to rest every night. In the past few years, he mostly stayed at the second wife's, and the rest of the courtyards were equally shared. He recently married the fourteenth wife, and sometimes went to her courtyard.
Second, Du Xingye had planned to visit the Fourteenth Lady last night, but changed his mind halfway and returned to his own room to stay the night.
The more they investigated, the weirder it became. When they were having lunch in the west wing at noon, Xu Wei scratched his head and said, "I really don't understand. They have so many hidden things."
Because of the death of the second wife, the mansion was preparing for the funeral, and some courtyards had already hung white banners. Du Xingye seemed to be busy too and had no time to care about these "distinguished guests".
Li Shaodong picked up a piece of meat with chopsticks and chewed it. "The Second Madam also has a personal maid named Liu Xu. It took a lot of effort for her to be willing to speak. She said that the Madam felt guilty and refused to say anything else."
"We have to find a way to pry her mouth open." Zhang Yuan leaned back in his chair and sighed. It was obvious that their investigation was not going well.
Xu Wei took out the silver ingots from his pocket bag, counted them, a total of eight, and gave them four: "I'm the only one with the bag, let's split it in half and see if the money can pry their mouths open."
Before he took the silver ingot back, he looked up and saw a figure quietly imprinted on the door.
The figure had been there for an unknown amount of time. When he saw the voices in the room had disappeared, he knocked on the door and said, "Dear guests, we will invite a Taoist priest to make arrangements this afternoon. We will hold a fast and a prayer ceremony in the Madam's courtyard tonight. If there are any young ladies who are afraid, you can come and watch the fast and a prayer ceremony."
Zhang Yuan reacted quickly and said immediately: "We don't believe in these ghosts and gods. Thank you Miss Lihua for your concern."
But they still had to go to the ritual. Li Shaodong replied tacitly: "I have never seen this kind of ritual before. I am very curious."
"Why not go and take a look?" Xu Wei also reacted at this time.
Lihua was silent for a while outside, then bowed towards the door and said, "The music will start when the ceremony begins, and the distinguished guests can go there on their own."
After saying this, the shadow gradually faded away like ink.
There was silence inside the door for a moment.
After a while, Li Shaodong covered his chest and panted exaggeratedly: "I was startled. It came quietly. I don't know how much I heard."
Zhang Yuan glared at him speechlessly: "After a few days of peace, you forgot where you were?"
Lu Fanye glanced at Xu Wei at this time and said lightly: "Let go."
Xu Wei loosened his hand that was clutching his sleeve and buried his head in the bowl to eat.
The Taoist priest really came in the afternoon.
As soon as he saw them, the Taoist priest clapped his whisk and his big belly trembled: "There is a ghost!"
Zhang Yuan was walking in front. Hearing this, he pointed at himself and asked in a questioning tone, "Me?"
"Of course not," the fat Taoist priest gathered his sleeves, bowed, and stroked his sparse beard, saying mysteriously, "There is a ghost in this courtyard. It was the ghost that killed the second lady."
"Everyone, please be careful!"
The encounter with a charlatan-like figure made Xu Wei suspicious of the fat Taoist priest who was hired at a high price. He looked at Lihua who was standing aside holding a plate.
Lihua understood and smiled, "Master Jiang is an orthodox Taoist priest of Baiyun Temple."
"Hello." Xu Wei stretched out his hand half-doubtfully.
Taoist Jiang tucked his whisk under his armpit, shook hands with her, and gave her a strong squeeze.
Xu Wei:?
Just as he was about to explode, Du Xingye came, and Lady Fourteen leaned against him, holding his hand tightly.
"How is Taoist Jiang's arrangement going?"
The fat Taoist priest quickly pulled out his whisk, and returned to his immortal appearance. He stroked his beard and said, "Master Du, the arrangements are almost complete. We can start in the evening."
Madam Fourteen had a delicate face and said softly, "Thank you for your hard work, Taoist Priest."
Du Xingye looked at Lu Fanye at this time: "I'm sorry to make you laugh, I don't believe this, but my wife is timid and wants to hold a fight."
At this time, Lady Fourteen shyly rubbed against Du Xingye and said "hmm" coquettishly.
Du Xingye rubbed her buttocks with his big hands, not caring about the others watching, and told Lihua: "In this case, I still have important things to do. You should arrange everything tonight and take good care of the lady."
The person he was pointing to was the person next to him.
Lihua knelt down and nodded.
As soon as Du Xingye left, the tense atmosphere suddenly relaxed, and even the whistling sound of the wind became lighter.
Xu Wei couldn't get angry at this time, so he just stared at the fat Taoist priest hatefully without saying a word.
The latter was quite thick-skinned. He was busy writing talismans with cinnabar, folding yellow paper, and asking the three members of the band he brought to line up.
Seeing him getting annoyed, Xu Wei turned to Lihua and started a conversation: "Lihua, are you the housekeeper of the mansion?"
Du Xingye was taken care of by her, both big and small. During the two days he stayed in the mansion, he had never seen a servant with a higher status than her.
"I am just acting as housekeeper. I will step down once the master finds a suitable new housekeeper." Lihua answered modestly.
"Did something happen to the original housekeeper?"
Lihua shook her head: "He disappeared the day after he left office."
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