Chapter 100
After finishing making the smocks for everyone, Mu Jin took the opportunity, while delivering the dyed wedding cloth to the Zhou family, to walk around the village.
Blue is a color that makes one's skin appear fairer, and when worn by Mu Jin, it makes him look even fairer and more delicate, like a young man from the town.
Wearing a brand-new six-braided silver bracelet, she drew envious glances from everyone around her.
"Jin-ge'er, I've never seen this style of fabric before, it's really beautiful!"
Mu Jin smiled and said, "This cloth was brought back by Qi Qiu from the capital. He said it's a new style, a blue-printed cloth, which is very popular among the women and husbands in the capital."
"Oh my, I knew it! I've been to all the cloth shops in town, big and small, and I've never seen anything like this before."
As the woman spoke, she reached out and touched it.
Mu Jin didn't mind and let them touch his sleeves.
"Qi Qiu has learned the skill of dyeing this pattern. If the aunts and uncles like it, they should hurry to my dye shop. Although we won't be the first in our village to wear this patterned cloth, people from other villages will be envious and jealous when they see it outside the village."
The woman and husband surrounding the hibiscus were deeply moved.
With the Lunar New Year approaching, wearing this outfit to visit my parents' home will truly make me look good.
"Jin-ge'er, how much silver would it cost to dye one bolt of this blue-printed cloth?"
A woman asked timidly.
Mu Jin smiled and said, "The technique for dyeing blue-and-white printed fabric is much more complicated. It takes about twenty days to dye a single piece of fabric, so it is naturally more expensive. A single piece of fabric costs two hundred and sixty coins."
"Wow, that's a bit too expensive."
Mu Jin spoke to her with both emotion and reason, saying, "It may be a bit expensive for each of you, aunt and uncle, but one bolt of cloth can make several blouses for us adults. If several families pool their money to buy one bolt of cloth, dye it, and balance it out, it won't cost much money."
Ichifuro was somewhat persuaded, "That makes sense."
Seeing this, Mu Jin didn't chat with them any longer and quickly took her leave to go to the Zhou family, hoping to make them even more eager.
Zhou Wushi took the wedding cloth, her eyes filled with a desire to take off Mu Jin's new blouse and bracelet.
With a forced smile, he said, "Brother Jin has found someone to rely on, so he's not even hiding it anymore."
Mu Jin smiled without saying a word. When the wedding cloth was delivered, she didn't even drink a sip of tea before returning home.
With the biggest weakness in Mu Jin's hands, Zhou Wu could only sulk at home, filled with impotent rage.
Seeing Zhou Wu's frustrated state, Mu Jin felt incredibly satisfied.
Thinking that Bai Qiqiu and Wen Zhaoran had gone to Zhou Si's place, Mu Bai went back to the Mu family.
After turning a corner, he hurried over to sit with Mu Nianjun.
After a few people went around, everyone in the village, from three-year-old children to seventy-year-old women, knew that Mu Jin's dye shop had developed new dyeing techniques, which she had learned from a master from the capital.
Three or four wealthy households with money immediately sent over ten bolts of cloth.
Mu Nianjun had his own plans; with this kind of gimmick, none of the shops in town had it.
He then sent all ten bolts of fine cotton cloth he had saved to Mu Jin, and when he took them to town, he figured they would not only fetch a good price, but they wouldn't even be enough to sell.
With this in mind, Mu Nianjun was full of energy, thinking about weaving more cloth before the twelfth lunar month.
There are about ten families in the village who know how to weave cloth, and many families share the same idea as Mu Nianjun.
The cotton cloth delivered by just these dozen or so families amounted to fifty or sixty bolts, which made Mu Jin both happy and worried.
Other families in the village would send one horse together, sometimes five or six families, or sometimes three or four families.
The cloth from the small dyeing workshop could be taken to town and used to open a small cloth shop.
After returning from town, Zhou Lin worked tirelessly day and night, copying several openwork patterns made by Bai Qiqiu.
I picked out the most popular patterns from the villagers and carved out a slab of them.
Mu Jin, Bai Qiqiu, and Wen Zhaoran were working enthusiastically in the dye shop.
The two water vats in the kitchen, which were originally used as dyeing vats, were moved to the dye house and resumed their original function.
The fish that were kept in the water tank were thrown to Mu Zhaoye.
Bai Qiqiu even counted a few items, and said he would have to return them later according to the count.
Although Mu Zhaoye is her husband, she can't be without half of her brother Mu Jin's fish tail.
Bai Qiqiu, sweat beading on his nose from exhaustion, sighed and chuckled, "I really didn't expect that the most leisurely time of winter would turn out to be the busiest."
Mu Jin laughed and said, "Who told us that our dye shop is the only one in the surrounding villages?"
Mu Bai brought over a bolt of cotton cloth that Zhou Ling had been reluctant to use, and helped Mu Jin tend the fire at the dye shop.
Because he had to do some work, Mu Jin hid his cherished six-braided silver bracelet in a secret compartment.
When wearing old clothes and old cotton trousers, and dyeing cloth, one would naturally be reluctant to wear new clothes.
Distinguishing between close and distant relatives, Mu Jin first dyed the cloth sent by Mu Nianjun, mixing in one or two pieces from other people's homes, so as to avoid being criticized.
Zhou Lin hurriedly finished carving the last pattern of openwork panels, then rubbed his sore hands.
He sent the stencil into the dye house, but Mulan was too busy to talk to him. He couldn't help in the dye house, so he could only help hang the dyed cloth on the clothesline to dry.
During this period, the new designs brought by the carpenters from Beijing to the town's carpentry shops spread by word of mouth, bringing in a lot of business.
Mu Heng had been busy with his work for some time. Zhou Lin rushed around during the day and finished his household chores at night. After hanging up the cloth, he went straight to his master's house.
Zhou Wushi came to see him several times, and her words implied that Mu Jin was extremely unfilial, even using her fourth brother's matter to blackmail her.
Zhou Lin listened without saying a word, being pressed on, and only gave vague and ambiguous answers to avoid the issue. He didn't tell Mu Jin about it when he got home.
Now, in his heart, everything his husband does is for the good of the family.
He naturally sided with Mu Jin.
Zhou Wushi had hoped that Zhou Lin would listen to her and help Mu Jin, but Mu Jin only came to help for an afternoon the day before Zhou Qiang's wedding, out of consideration for her family's reputation.
Only then did Zhou Wu realize that her eldest son, Zhou Lin, no longer cared about her and Zhou Laosan.
Otherwise, Mu Jin had never come to our house, and Zhou Lin hadn't come back to help when he returned from town.
She felt a bitter and cold feeling in her heart. The feeling of being abandoned by her eldest son, whom she looked down upon and who was once under her control, made her feel quite embarrassed and resentful.
Mu Jin and Zhou Si then came over to help wash the meat, vegetables, and greens that would be used tomorrow.
Before long, Zhou Qiang's wedding day arrived.
With drums and gongs, Zhou Qiang, dressed in red and beaming with joy, brought his handsome husband back from Baiyun Village.
Mu Jin had arranged with Bai Qiqiu beforehand that he should come to her at the end of the wedding banquet so that she could find an excuse to call him and Zhou Lin home.
He didn't even enter his new husband's house, treating himself as a guest at the wedding banquet.
Bai Qiqiu calculated the time and felt it was about time. He wiped his hands clean and went to the Zhou family. He made an excuse that a corner of the house seemed to be broken and called Mu Jin and Zhou Lin back.
And so, Mu Jin and Zhou Lin finished their meal comfortably, without helping to clean up or wash the dishes, and went home.
Zhou Wu was so angry that she stomped her feet behind him. But on such a joyous day, she couldn't afford to be careless, so she had no choice but to swallow her anger.
Zhou Lin went back and checked several of the molds, then asked in confusion, "Qi Qiu, which one is broken?"
Bai Qiqiu glanced guiltily at Mu Jin, then coughed lightly, "This is it."
Upon hearing this, Zhou Lin examined it carefully again and shook his head, saying, "It's perfectly fine."
Mu Jin smiled and said, "It's getting late now, Qi Qiu must have just misjudged the sight."
Zhou Lin breathed a sigh of relief. "It's good that it's not broken. There are so many jobs in town these days. If it had been broken, I'm afraid I wouldn't have had the time to carve a new one."
"Understood, brother-in-law. I will use it carefully."
Mu Jin smiled and said, "It's getting late. Have you, Zhao Ran, and Bai'er had dinner?"
These days, there's a lot of work to do at home, and we're very busy. A few days ago, we started serving three meals a day again.
Bai Qiqiu nodded. "I've already eaten."
Having made a blunder, Mu Jin didn't mention going back to the Zhou family to help. She closed the courtyard gate, bolted it, and braced it with a wooden stick.
Three oil lamps were lit in the dyehouse, and they were not extinguished until 9 PM.
Feeling dizzy, Mu Jin pulled Zhou Lin, who had been helping her, back to her room to rest.
Zhou Lin has been really exhausted lately, and she doesn't even have the energy for intimate moments with her husband at night.
Before the curtains were even properly tucked in, Zhou Lin had already fallen asleep the moment his head hit the pillow, and was even snoring softly.
Time flies by in a flurry of activity, and before we know it, it's the beginning of the twelfth lunar month.
Mu Bai reluctantly returned to the Mu family home, carrying her small bundle.
The fabrics that the family received last month, after working day and night, have finally been reduced to only five or six bolts that Mu Nianjun just gave us.
This morning, I hung it on the clothesline to dry.
As Bai Qiqiu's wedding day approached, the usually carefree young man inexplicably became nervous.
Hibiscus sewed a few sleeves for her family members out of scraps of cloth; when they put their hands inside, they felt incredibly warm.
Today was finally a bit quieter. The three brothers moved some stools and sat in the yard, basking in the warm sun and comfortably squinting their eyes.
The owl nestled at their feet, and Fatty Yellow nestled against its warm belly, snoring softly.
"The hard work of the past few days has paid off. I did the math last night and found that I earned 21.8 taels and 40 cash from dyeing cloth in the last two months."
"So many?!"
Mu Jin's face was full of joy. She reached into her bosom, took out a money pouch, and gave Bai Qiqiu and Wen Zhaoran seven taels of silver each.
"The remaining 840 cash will be used to buy dye. Now, after deducting the money spent on dye a while ago, we have saved more than one tael of silver in the public account."
Bai Qiqiu happily accepted the money, feeling the heavy silver notes, and all the hard work of the past few days vanished like smoke.
Mu Jin was also happy. Now, the silver she had saved in the secret compartment, minus the gold, amounted to fifty taels.
Under the mattress, the household savings accumulated amounted to eight taels and five hundred and thirty coins.
With so much silver, Mu Jin was afraid of losing it, so she sewed a new money bag out of scraps of cloth, put five taels of silver in it, and placed it in the hidden compartment.
There are only three taels and five hundred and thirty coins left for expenses outside.
The sun was warm and inviting, making people feel drowsy.
But an uninvited guest disturbed his sleepiness.
"Is any of you Brother Mujin?"
Mu Jin opened her eyes and saw a young man dressed in a light pink cotton coat standing at the courtyard gate.
Her eyebrows and eyes were delicate, and her lips were red and her teeth were white.
If it weren't for Zhou Qiang standing beside her, and the distant snow-white mountains, it could be considered a beautiful picture of a woman and a beautiful landscape.
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