59 The Prefect's Tragic Death
◎Mushroom stuffed with meat◎
Madam Cuihua lowered her head and twisted her fingers, whispering, "It's not me...it's my husband's family..."
Ye Yunzhao was stunned. Since most married couples in Xixiang lived with their elders, she had assumed Cuihua and Liu Dazhuang lived alone, having assumed they had lost their parents and elders. However, growing woven mushrooms was a great opportunity, and if anyone wanted to grow them, she was willing to teach them.
"Why haven't I heard you mention this before? Which family in Xixiang are you from? If you want to grow mushrooms, you can first..."
"They don't live in Xixiang," Madam Cuihua hesitated. "County Magistrate Ye, do you know Guihua Village?"
Ye Yunzhao shook his head. Not to mention that she didn’t know, he was afraid that the original body didn’t know either.
Only after hearing Madam Cuihua's whispered explanation did Ye Yunzhao understand a little bit.
It turned out that Liu Dazhuang was married into Xixiang. He was originally a man from Guihua Village. It was no wonder that Ye Yunzhao had never heard of this Guihua Village before. The village was built outside a mountain and was not under the jurisdiction of Lingnan County.
Liu Dazhuang had six brothers and three sisters, making a total of nine children. A large family was a blessing for the wealthy, but a major worry for the poor. Not to mention the little boys eating their father to death, the six boys ate so much they almost wiped out the family fortune.
It was difficult to arrange marriage for a family like this, but no one could have imagined that Liu Dazhuang had such great luck that he and Wang Cuihua from Xixiang could get engaged so early after they exchanged glances.
The Wang family is a big family in Xixiang. Wang Cuihua's father worked as a housekeeper in a wealthy family in Yuezhou City. Her mother passed away early and they saved up some land. They lived a happy life, which was considered very good in Xixiang.
Wang Cuihua was the only child in the family. Although her father had originally wanted to find a son-in-law, it was absolutely impossible for him to do so with a family background like Liu Dazhuang.
Their meeting was a fortuitous occurrence. Last autumn, Wang Cuihua went to the mountains to collect chestnuts. She wandered too far into the mountains and got her foot caught in a trap set by a hunter. As the sky grew darker, a frail woman like her couldn't possibly have the strength to pry the trap open. Having never seen anything like this before, Wang Cuihua burst into tears.
He thought he would have to wait until the hunter collected the trap the next day to be rescued, but unexpectedly he met Liu Dazhuang who came to Lingnan County to work.
Although Liu Dazhuang has a burdensome family, he has a very upright face and is tall. Perhaps he does not eat well at home, so he looks a little thin. His skin is tanned from working every day, and his smile carries a bit of pure honesty - commonly known as a simple-minded person.
From that day on, Wang Cuihua had started to have ideas. Wang's father noticed the change in his daughter and secretly went to the place where she worked to see her. He found that she was a hardworking and diligent boy.
But after personally visiting Guihua Village, Liu Dazhuang realized that his hard work and ability to endure hardships were all wrong. He then took time out every day to visit the Wang family to express his feelings. Just as Wang's father relented, and just as he was about to marry into the family, he got drunk at the mansion and fell into a ditch on the way home. He was already dead when he was found the next day.
From then on, Wang Cuihua was the only weak woman left in the Wang family. In order to protect her family's land, she changed from a carefree girl to a fierce and difficult person.
She married Liu Dazhuang at the beginning of this year, but fortunately his family was kind and since their son had married into a wealthy family, they did not find any excuse to borrow food or money from her.
Now that Wang Cuihua has a profitable crystal cake business thanks to Ye Yunzhao's help, she is naturally not a conscienceless person. She is willing to help this group of considerate in-laws.
I plan to help my husband's family in Guihua Village in the next few days. If I can get a promise from County Magistrate Ye today, Wang Cuihua and Liu Dazhuang will be able to tell them the good news.
After hearing this, Ye Yunzhao couldn't help but sigh. He never thought that the bold and straightforward Cuihua had such an unknown pain.
"Master..." Madam Cuihua looked up at her.
This matter is really troublesome. If it were the people of Lingnan County, she would be eager to let them grow mushrooms, but it happened to be the people of Guihua Village, which belongs to another county.
Ye Yunzhao pondered for a moment and said, "My words don't count. After all, they are not from our county. I don't know what their county magistrate thinks. If they don't want to go, it would make us look..."
She hadn't finished her words, but Madam Cuihua understood what she meant. Growing mushrooms was something County Magistrate Ye wanted to promote in Lingnan County, but relations between counties were not as simple as relations between people.
After thinking it through, Madam Cuihua said, "Master, you are right. I was too abrupt."
Ye Yunzhao saw that she was forcing a smile, but she didn't say it out loud, so Ye Yunzhao pretended not to know.
When she suddenly traveled to such a strange era, she felt a little unwilling, but after going through all kinds of things, she has now fallen in love with the people and scenery here.
Ye Yunzhao wanted to change this impoverished county, but one person's ability was limited, and the people of Lingnan County had not yet escaped poverty. She was not a saint, so she naturally did not have the energy to care for the people of other counties. For now, she could only do her best to take care of Lingnan County.
"Put a big ceramic bowl on the steamer." Ye Yunzhao was afraid that she would keep thinking about this matter, so he arranged for her to help.
Madam Cuihua worked quickly and carefully placed the three large ceramic bowls on the steamer.
Ye Yunzhao used chopsticks to place the meat-stuffed morels in a ceramic bowl. The brown caps were wrapped with red and white pork, which looked very special.
There were six morels neatly arranged in each large ceramic bowl. She poured some of the soaking water into the bowls, barely covering the bottom of the bowl.
"Steam it for a while until the meat is cooked." Ye Yunzhao put the wooden lid on the pot and turned to her.
The method of stuffing morels with meat is very simple. Ye Yunzhao asked Madam Cuihua to put the stirred egg liquid on the stove, stuffed a few dry firewood into the stove, and then looked out.
In just a short while, Liu Dazhuang had built the chicken coop. Building a chicken coop is no different from building a house. It requires piling up the adobe bricks bit by bit.
Adobe bricks are essentially earthen bricks. Many households in Lingnan County have molds for making them. During the off-season, they mix yellow clay with rice straw to create square bricks. These bricks are unusable right out of the box; they need to be sun-dried for three to five days to dry thoroughly before use, making them stronger. Consequently, every household has accumulated a significant number of these.
However, in order to build houses for the refugees, many people had used up all the adobe bricks they had saved up, and Cuihua's family was no exception. Liu Dazhuang, who had originally wanted to come build a chicken coop for Ye Yunzhao in early autumn, had to put it off again and again. A few days ago, he made more than 200 adobe bricks at home, watched them dry, and finally brought them here today on a cart.
The moist yellow clay that was newly mixed in the yard today is used as an adhesive. It is no different from the cement used to build houses in modern society. Liu Dazhuang was afraid that the chicken coop would not be strong enough, so he made it very carefully.
He stood up with a smile, looked at his work with a rather smug look, then turned back and said, "Madam, County Magistrate Ye, would you please take a look?"
A miniature house was completed just like that. Ye Yunzhao praised: "It's done! It's done! Brother Dazhuang's craftsmanship is really great!"
Madam Cuihua also smiled and said, "It's just the right size. We won't be afraid of rain in the future."
Liu Dazhuang scratched the back of his head embarrassedly, and then went on to modify the chicken coop fence. He first looked around, saw the dried straw at the base of the courtyard wall, picked up a large bunch of it and stuffed it into the chicken coop.
Then he used the bamboo poles he had already split at home and drove them firmly into the ground, tamping them down with stones. The poles were interlaced and placed in a circle around the new chicken coop, connecting it to the old one. Liu Dazhuang stepped into the coop and removed the fence on one side of the old one. That was it.
Thanks to his efforts, several cute little hens clucked and swayed as they made their way to their new home. The little hens nestled obediently on the thick straw, occasionally turning their heads to peck at their feathers, looking very content.
Madam Cuihua walked closer and said something to him, while Ye Yunzhao returned to the kitchen and divided the egg liquid into three portions and poured them into three large ceramic bowls.
After waiting for a while, when she opened the wooden pot again, the aroma of eggs mixed with the fresh fragrance of morels filled the air.
Ye Yunzhao wrapped his palms with coarse cloth, took out the boiling hot earthenware bowls one by one, cleaned the pot, and added some previously boiled lard into it. The snow-white lard blocks melted quickly, and "sizzling" splashed out small drops of boiling hot oil.
Ye Yunzhao poured hot oil into three ceramic bowls. The fresh and fragrant aroma was stimulated by the hot oil and spread out more domineeringly.
She didn't stop and fried the steamed thin flour cakes in the oil pan. In this way, the delicious eggs, morels, meat and pancakes were ready.
"Wash your hands and get ready for dinner." Ye Yunzhao shouted towards the yard.
Madam Cuihua was quick to move the wooden table that was standing at an angle outside the kitchen into the yard. Together with Ye Yunzhao, she brought out three large ceramic bowls and a bowl of pancakes.
Liu Dazhuang quickly washed the dried mud stains on his arms and brought a few small wooden stools.
Seeing that everyone was present, Ye Yunzhao said, "Hurry and try it."
In a large khaki earthenware bowl is a circle of tender yellow egg custard, inside which are six morels arranged like flowers. The brown morels are filled with lotus root pink pork filling, which looks a bit unusual just by looking at it.
Madam Cuihua praised: "Master, your cooking skills are so good! I can't bear to eat it."
Ye Yunzhao smiled and said, "I was just figuring it out on my own, come and try it."
The wooden spoon gently pressed down and scooped up the soft and tender egg custard without much effort. There were a few oil spots on the egg custard. Madam Cuihua swallowed her saliva and put it into her mouth carefully. The tender and smooth egg custard slid down her tongue, and with a "slurp", the full spoonful of egg custard disappeared without a trace.
Madam Cuihua's eyes lit up: "Delicious!"
Liu Dazhuang on the side couldn't wait to put it in his mouth. The dried and soaked morels had a chewy texture, with the chewy and salty meat balls wrapped in the crispy cap, and more or less egg custard on the outside.
The taste is rich and delicious, with the salty aroma of pork mixed with the sweetness of morels, and a hint of oiliness from the hot lard, making it really hard to stop eating.
Seeing that they were enjoying their meal, Ye Yunzhao took out a pancake and pushed the ceramic bowl containing the pancake between the two of them. Liu Dazhuang raised his hand, took one and handed it to Madam Cuihua, and took another for himself.
The pancakes were a bit hot, the crust charred from the cooking, but tender inside. Ye Yunzhao had added some salt and cornus officinalis when kneading the dough. She'd been introduced to cornus officinalis by her aunt from Xixiang a few days earlier when she'd been up the mountain with her. Its fruit was bright red and had a slightly spicy flavor, making it a common seasoning for the people of Lingnan County.
Therefore, the pancakes this time were salty and spicy with just the right amount of flavor. The more you chewed, the more delicious it became.
"The food prepared by County Magistrate Ye is enough to open a restaurant." Liu Dazhuang smiled innocently.
Madam Cuihua also responded from the side: "That's true!"
Ye Yunzhao smiled unnaturally. If she hadn't studied a lot of modern recipes in her previous life, she wouldn't have had the chance to bluff them.
Liu Dazhuang chopped a lot of firewood in one breath and stacked it neatly in the kitchen. Then the two of them left together.
Ye Yunzhao lifted her chin and looked up at the sky. She couldn't understand why the knife-wielding man had threatened her in the first place. Was he really afraid that more innocent people in Lingnan County would starve to death? She really didn't know...
For two days, Ye Yunzhao was as busy as a top. Every day before dawn, she arrived at Aunt Wang's house, where a group of people were busy building mushroom sheds and weaving bamboo baskets. When the sky was slightly bright, she rushed to the county school without stopping to teach the students arithmetic and common Chinese characters. In the afternoon, she taught the little girls handicrafts...
Every time after washing up and lying down on the bed, it was already 2:15 am. Ye Yunzhao fell into a deep sleep as if his whole body was falling apart, and for a moment he forgot what Chen Jingshan had promised him in the private room of the restaurant that day.
However, on the morning of the third day, when she rushed back to the county government office from Aunt Wang's house, she ran into County Magistrate Han who was in a hurry to go out.
County Magistrate Han rushed out in a hurry. Seeing Ye Yunzhao from a distance, he hurriedly pulled her out and said, "Where have you been so early in the morning? I've been looking for you for ages! Let's go!"
Ye Yunzhao, with dark circles under his eyes, was a little slow to react. He was dragged for several steps before he realized: "Han County Magistrate, why are you pulling me so hurriedly? I have to go to the county school later..."
"Why go to the county school now?" Han County Magistrate scolded. He realized that it was a bit disrespectful after he blurted it out. He tried to calm down and lowered his voice.
"The prefect of Yuezhou died tragically at home last night! All his subordinates must go now! Please put the matter of the county school aside for now..."
These words were like thunder. Ye Yunzhao staggered and said in disbelief, "What? What did you say?"
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