Chapter 133 Are you the young lady who just came back from Yandang?
"In the past two years, Su Jianrong has been to the mansion only a few times. Perhaps his tea business is doing well."
Su Ying followed her aunt's words and carefully recalled what she had seen and heard in the Su Mansion. The only thing she couldn't do was to call out the word "father".
"Su Jianrong treated Lin very leniently, and she had the final say on all matters in the mansion."
Speaking of this, Su Ying couldn't help but sigh and continued, "The maids and servants that Lin assigned to me had ulterior motives. Rather than serving me, they were more like keeping an eye on Lin."
"When I returned to the Su Mansion, Linglan was the only one by my side. Not long after I returned, because I had caused Lin to suffer a loss, she sent someone to set up a trap, falsely accusing Linglan of theft and trying to sell her out. I had no choice but to give in in order to protect Linglan and allow her to return to the academy."
Rong had just told her to share everything she found odd, so she didn't care if her reasoning was valid and simply voiced her doubts. "This Lin family's behavior really doesn't seem like that of a decent family. I only know that her father brought her from outside, but if she came from a lowly family, how could she sit so openly as the mistress without anyone questioning her?"
"Aunt, have you ever heard of the origins of this Lin family?"
Hearing her niece's question, Rong's face turned bitter. "You were only three years old when your mother passed away. After we brought you back to the academy, we agreed not to mention your father's deeds to you. We just wanted you to grow up without worries."
She sighed softly, her eyes filled with helplessness and regret. "You were young, and we couldn't bear to tell you about those ugly things. But who knew that it would make you have high expectations of them, so that when you first returned to the Su Mansion, you were not on guard."
"I wasn't married at the time, so I don't know much. But one thing is certain: this Lin was already being kept away by Su Jianrong when your mother was still alive."
"I've always had doubts about her background. This time when I go back, I must thoroughly investigate her background."
After Rong finished speaking, she paused as if remembering something, then asked, "Does she have any relatives? Since Su Jianrong lets her do everything, if she really has relatives, there will definitely be some information. We can follow the clues and investigate."
Su Ying nodded when she heard this. "She has a cousin named Wei Liang who works in the accounting office at the Su residence. But I've never seen any of her other relatives. I haven't heard her mention them, nor have I seen anyone visit."
Su Ying had no good feelings towards her cousin Lin, who relied on his status as the lady's cousin to enter and leave the inner courtyard freely.
"One day after dinner, I was thinking of taking a walk in the garden, and I ran into him."
I remember that it was only a few days since she returned to the Su Mansion, and Linglan was still by her side and had not been framed.
The dinner the kitchen brought was porridge and steamed buns. Su Ying wasn't a squeamish person, but it was too coarse. After a few bites, she felt bloated and didn't want to eat any more. Linglan suggested, "Miss, why don't we go take a look at the garden in the mansion?"
Back at the academy, she'd already taken a walk after meals, strolling along the paths of flowers and grass her grandmother tended, stopping and starting for a leisurely stroll. Linglan's suggestion struck her as a good idea, and she remembered how her grandmother often placed meals under the grape trellis in the summer evenings. She wondered, "Does the mansion have a grape trellis in the garden?"
The master and servant put down their bowls and chopsticks and left the yard. Unexpectedly, they did not find the garden, but met a stranger.
The man was not young, with a layer of stubble on his lips and a fair complexion. He didn't look bad, but Su Ying felt inexplicably disgusted.
When the man saw her, he didn't hide or evade. Instead, he put his hands behind his back, looked at her straight in the eyes, and asked, "Are you the young lady who just returned from Yandang?"
Su Ying became alert and took a step back. Linglan also cleverly stepped forward and stood in front of the young lady.
"Don't be afraid, Miss. I'm your uncle!"
The man pushed Linglan away and looked at Su Ying from head to toe with great interest.
Su Ying still feels uncomfortable when she recalls that scene. She said, "After that, I ran into him a few more times after dinner or lunch. From then on, to avoid chance encounters, I stopped going out after dinner."
Upon hearing this, Rong suppressed his anger, patted Su Ying's hand gently to comfort her, and secretly took note of it in his heart.
"You just said that Su Jianrong's business is doing well. What's the evidence?"
As expected, Su Ying's aunt's question made her feel less uncomfortable when she recalled Wei Liang. She frowned slightly and thought carefully.
"Su Jianrong always brings gifts to the twins every time he returns home. If his livelihood is so poor, how could he be so generous?"
Perhaps Su Ying herself felt that what she said was meaningless. After thinking for a moment, she took back what she had just said.
"Those might just be appearances."
Ying'er was intelligent, but despite having experienced the ups and downs of human nature in the Su family over the past two years, she still lacked some experience in foreign affairs. Fortunately, she was a good listener and thinker, and with just a little guidance, she could figure things out on her own.
So Rong waited patiently for her, waiting for her to think carefully and come to a conclusion.
Sure enough, after a moment, Ying'er's eyes lit up, as if she remembered something: "Because I have no one around me who can help me, I know very little. In addition, the servants and maids that Lin assigned to me know that I am not favored by Lin, so they often neglect me."
Su Ying's face began to redden as she spoke. "When I left the academy, I had already started my period. After Linglan went back, the maidservants were unwilling to serve me personally, so I had to clean the clothes that were close to my body myself."
I was young at that time and my period had just started, so there was no regular pattern to follow.
Sometimes I would get a stomachache in the middle of the night and only then would I realize I had my period. Sometimes my period would last for ten days and I wouldn't have enough menstrual cloth.
She remembered that one time the soap for washing clothes was gone and there was no one in the yard, so she had to go to the laundry room to ask for it herself.
Usually only servants came and went in the laundry room, and the little maids there had never seen a real master. When they saw Su Ying, although they found her clothes a little different, they did not suspect too much and thought she was the new head maid.
In fact, the two were of similar age, but the girl named Xiaocao, aware of her low status, called Su Ying "sister". Su Ying had no intention of correcting her. After Linglan left, she finally understood her situation in the Su Mansion. She didn't care at all whether she was called "Miss" or not.
"Sister, this is the pancreas you asked for. It's safe to go."
Su Ying thanked him and was about to go back. When she turned around, she heard Xiaocao cry out "Oh".
"Sister, are you having your period?"
Su Ying turned her head, and Xiaocao lifted up her blood-stained skirt to show her.
Seeing that Su Ying's face was a little pale and sweat was on her forehead, Xiaocao knew that he had guessed right and hurriedly helped Su Ying sit down.
From then on, the two gradually became familiar with each other. Thanks to Xiaocao, he not only secretly dried the menstrual cloth for her, but also sent her herbs when she had abdominal pain, and even secretly left a corner of the cleanest and softest coarse cloth dried in the laundry room for her.
"I remember not seeing her for a few days. I took advantage of the fact that no one was around and went to the laundry room to look for her. She was so tired that she complained to me, saying that she had washed a lot of Lin's old clothes because the housekeeper wanted to turn them into underwear as soon as possible before winter came."
"Ms. Lin always loved dressing up, so altering her old clothes was probably a sign that she was short of money. And, as luck would have it, after that incident, Mrs. Lin started to think about marrying me off to that fifty-year-old wealthy businessman."
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
