Chapter 64 Chapter 64 Two Chapters in One
"I'm old now, I don't like to drink tea, and I don't like to dress up anymore. Only flowers and plants can cheer me up," said Mrs. Huang.
Those who came here today were all the wives of Huang Xueshi’s disciples. The oldest was only in her thirties. They were all very reserved and didn’t dare to say much.
It was Mrs. Huang's eldest daughter-in-law, Lady Ning, who joined in the fun: "The 'Luoyang Brocade' that mother transplanted from Yinli Garden can produce purple-red and pink-white flowers on the same branch. I heard that they have a new name now, 'Er Qiao'."
Erqiao's peony flowers are of course very famous in later generations, but they were just cultivated in the Northern Song Dynasty.
Everyone said they were going to see the peonies together. Jinniang and the fourth girl were the last to walk. Jinniang did not feel that she was inferior to the other girls from the Zhou family. Life has its ups and downs, and nothing is constant.
Seeing the peony in a picture is one thing, but seeing the two Qiao sisters in person is quite shocking.
"Madam Ning, can I draw the Erqiao? They are so beautiful even if I haven't seen them with my own eyes." Jinniang thought that if she could draw the Erqiao, and name it "Luoyang Brocade", it would be enough for her to embroider it in May and June.
Madam Ning saw that Jinniang looked friendly and shy when they first met, but now she made this request. Since they were a family of scholars, it was natural for them to accept it.
Ah Ying always carries an ink box and paper with her, and Jin Niang doesn't need a big space. She is originally a "flower and bird school" specializing in various flowers, and is very familiar with the branches and leaves of peonies. Now she first spreads the ink, draws the shape, then outlines it with a liner pen, and then starts to mix colors and color it.
She painted slowly for more than an hour by herself, and when she came to her senses, there was no one around.
"Where are they?" Jinniang asked.
Ah Ying said, "It seems like he went over there to play flower cards."
"Then let's go over there too." Jinniang smiled.
The dishes that Mrs. Huang prepared for them at noon were not expensive, but they were very Fujian style, especially the beef soup. The soup was very clear and there was nothing special about it. It was just a few pieces of beef, a few thin shreds of ginger, and a handful of chopped green onions. But it tastes natural.
When saying goodbye to the Huang family and going back, Jinniang said to Aying, "Let's tell Juxiang. We don't know if Juxiang can make this dish."
Ah Ying said honestly, "I'm afraid not. Ju Xiang's three skills are only for the few of us to use."
Jinniang covered her lips and laughed.
When she went out, she saw Jiang Xian again and he immediately looked at her with concern, "How are you? Are you okay?"
Jinniang remained calm and said, "Very good, what can happen to me?"
"Okay, let's go home." Jiang Xian had a lot to say to her.
Jinniang said, "You go back by yourself. Aying and I are going to the store, and I have something urgent to do." She already had an inspiration and had to draw the pattern of the clothes quickly. How could she have the time to go home?
Jiang Xian was stunned.
After Jinniang returned to the embroidery shop, she began to paint a jacket. The jacket was made of vermilion silk, and the collar was embroidered with Wei Zi, Er Qiao and peonies, as well as fluttering pink butterflies. Two Er Qiao flowers were embroidered on the chest, and the edges of the jacket were decorated with peony flower patterns, using the method of tracing gold and printing colors.
Once I got the inspiration, I finished it almost in one go.
"Draw two more sets of different colors tomorrow." Jinniang stretched lazily.
Looking at what Zhu Xiu Niang had done, Jin Niang frowned and said, "Mrs. Zhu, did you add the color here?"
Mrs. Zhu said quickly, "I think it would be better to embroider a branch here."
"Mrs. Zhu, we have to calculate the cost of every thread for the things we make. The extra embroidery you did not only waste extra thread, but also ruined my layout. I asked you to do it, not to let you do whatever you want. You have to do it according to my requirements." Jinniang stopped beating around the bush.
Mrs. Zhu usually saw that Jinniang was always very nice to everyone and always smiling, but now she pointed it out directly. She quickly said, "Don't worry, I will remove the thread immediately and make sure there will be no trace."
Jinniang smiled and said, "It's good that you can do this."
When she got home, she didn't expect Jiang Xian to be lying on the couch. She hurried over and said, "Why are you lying here without a thin quilt? Be careful not to catch a cold."
He had closed his eyes and pretended to sleep when he heard Jinniang coming back, but now that he saw Jinniang getting him a blanket, he quickly sat up again, looked at her and said, "It's all my fault."
"What do you mean you're not good enough?" Jinniang didn't know what he was saying.
Jiang Xian said, "I didn't know the eldest lady of the Sun family was going too, otherwise, I wouldn't have let you go."
The eldest lady of the Sun family, isn’t she Miss Zhou Si? So this is why the child had to be so careful in his life. Jinniang looked at him and said, "What's the big deal? How did you get through all these years? Why are you so careful? I worked in the Shu Embroidery Workshop for two years and wanted to learn some real skills, so I followed the master to the Zhou family. After working for a few years, I went to the Wenxiuyuan. I don't regard myself as a slave, but just a place where I used to work. I am not too servile to the people of the Zhou family. The world has changed so much, and she should be the one who is uncomfortable. It's only been a few years, and I can sit on an equal footing with her."
She just thought Jiang Xian was too demanding. Then she told him about Erqiao's flowers that she saw at Huang's house, and showed him the flowers she had drawn.
“Isn’t it beautiful…”
Jiang Xian took it and took a look. It was indeed exquisite. He also felt that Jinniang was completely different from what he had imagined. He smiled and nodded: "It looks good. Very good. I misunderstood my wife. I have always been suspicious. Please don't mind."
"It's okay. You're worried because you care about me. I'm so happy. I'm the kind of person who grows lotus with mud when others throw it at me, and sells lotus roots to make money. I just hope you can tell me what you have to say. We can discuss it together, which is better than anything else."
Trust must be established between husband and wife, because trust is stronger than anything else.
Jiang Xian's eyes sparkled and he just nodded. He felt that his wife was really broad-minded, only cared about things that mattered to her, was not sentimental, and was the kind of person who could take root wherever she went.
Before the Dragon Boat Festival, the embroidery shop gradually got on the right track, and Jin Niang began to only make fine products. She embroidered the intricate and expensive embroidery herself, and left the rest to Zhu Xiu Niang.
But this time, the peony jacket had a complicated pattern, and even a quick worker like Jinniang took five days to make one. She quickly made three pieces and hung them up.
She asked the carpenter to make a lot of hangers for hanging clothes and divided the clothes according to price. Zhu Xiu Niang embroidered about two sets of clothes, plus a lot of purses and sachets, and the embroidery shop became quite large.
But Zhu Xiu Niang felt that the store did not have much business and was afraid that the business would be bad and her boss would kick her out. Madam Wei provided her with three meals a day and paid her a good salary. She didn't want to go anywhere else, so she had to concentrate on her work.
Jinniang was not worried, because most of the people who came to see the clothes could not afford them, and the prices of embroidered clothes were already very high. She is now rushing to make a jacket for Erqiao and preparing it for Jiang Xian to give to Madam Huang. Bright colors cannot be worn by elderly people, but the peacock blue color is excellent, showing luxury without being dull.
Before the Dragon Boat Festival, Jiang Xian went to the Huang family and had someone send it to Mrs. Huang. He also said, "My wife saw your Er Qiao last time and thought she was very beautiful, so I made a dress for you."
Sometimes, in a family, a woman's words can have an effect. Mrs. Huang saw that the jacket was beautifully made and had her Erqiao on it, and that he even wore it during the Dragon Boat Festival, so she said a lot of good things about Jiang Xian in front of Mr. Huang.
Because of this, Master Huang personally took Jiang Xian and another direct disciple to present the manuscript.
Xu learned all this from the coachman. For a woman like her who was more ambitious than her husband, this was something she could not tolerate. Therefore, he went to Mrs. Jiang Liu's place early in the morning to plant maggots.
"I heard that my sister-in-law sent clothes to Madam Huang. I wonder if you have any new clothes here? What patterns are they? The ones my sister-in-law has are all very beautiful." Xu still felt that she spoke very well.
Little did she know that Madam Jiang Liu had heard it right away. She smiled and said, "Your sister-in-law sent me a nightgown because she knew that I always sweat easily at home and rarely go out. This child is honest and said that the fine cloth from Qiongzhou can easily dissipate heat."
Xu didn't expect Jinniang to be so thorough, so she could only smile and say, "Sister-in-law is really considerate."
"I'm glad you know." Mrs. Jiang Liu thought that her eldest daughter-in-law came to her to complain. If an ordinary person knew that her younger sister-in-law did something wrong, they would definitely tell her privately and then help her. However, she wanted to suppress her.
Before the Dragon Boat Festival, Jinniang sold two jackets for a total of thirty strings of coins. She paid off a six-string loan and had three strings of coins for living expenses. After deducting the costs, she was left with eighteen strings of coins.
After working hard for more than half a month, I finally got some money back.
When they got home, Jiang Xian came back right after she arrived. He asked the servants to go down first and carried Jinniang to his lap: "If it weren't for the clothes you sent me, you wouldn't think so highly of me."
"That's impossible. You are the one who is very knowledgeable. My clothes are just the icing on the cake." Jinniang was purely paying for the copyright. After all, she had made a lot of money by relying on the Erqiao Mudan.
Seeing that Jinniang did not take any credit for herself, Jiang Xian liked her character even more. He had seen many women who took advantage of their large dowries to cause trouble, or who would brag about the smallest things they did.
It is said that Jiang Xian received a monthly allowance of two strings of silver, and he had an additional six strings of silver specifically for buying books or pens, ink, paper and inkstone, which came to eight strings of silver a month. It is said that this was the rule set by Mrs. Jiang Liu when she was the housekeeper.
After looking at the account book, Xu felt very distressed. However, Jiang Xian's money was not the biggest expense. There was also the medicine money for her mother-in-law, and her mother-in-law was sick. Her father-in-law originally had two concubines, but he sent one away, and the expenses for the other one were also one guan a month.
She gritted her teeth and went to Jiang to explain the situation: "It's not that I don't want to spend money, but the account is really short of money. You and Shiliu Lang make 192 strings of cash a year, and now Xuan Ge'er is about to start school again, so the money is not enough."
Mrs. Jiang Liu knew that there was more to her words, so she couldn't help asking, "Then what do you think we should do?"
"My daughter-in-law thought of cutting the money of the master and Uncle Sixteen's study by half, so that there will be more than seventy strings of cash saved a year." Xu felt that she had no selfish motives, and she was not only laying off Jiang Xian, she was sure that Madam Jiang Liu would be helpless.
In fact, Mrs. Jiang Liu also knew that what she said was the truth. She was relying on medicine to keep herself alive, at least until her sons took the imperial examinations next year. Her daughter and her family originally wanted to live in the garden, but she made this place into Shiliu Lang's new house, so her daughters rented a house outside. When the family is divided, I'm afraid my daughter will become estranged from her younger brother.
What's more, my grandson also needs to start his education, which will cost some money.
"Okay, now you are in charge of the household, you can handle it as you wish." Mrs. Jiang Liu said.
Xu heaved a sigh of relief and went out, thanking him profusely.
Mother Fang brought some warm water and couldn't help asking, "Madam, has our family come to this point? Even the money for my son's education has been cut in half."
"What she said is true, but it has not come to that point yet. Take the various gifts and gifts given by others for Xian'er's wedding. Aren't they all included in the public treasury? Aren't these also money? But I am thinking about Xuan'er, so I let it go."
In the past, Mrs. Jiang Liu would have been able to take care of everything, but she was in poor health, and the family was ultimately managed by Mrs. Xu. She planned for her sons, and Mrs. Xu also planned for her own sons.
Just as I was thinking about it, I heard Meng Dong come in with a smile: "Madam, Mr. Sixteen sent you a box of buttered abalone snails. He said he bought it right after it was made."
Mrs. Jiang Liu was very happy to hear this.
In fact, the snacks were not bought by Jiang Xian, but by Jinniang. However, she knew very well that Mrs. Jiang Liu would definitely prefer it to be sent by her son.
Jinniang also heard about the reduction of monthly wages. It was within her expectations, but she did not expect it to happen so soon.
But if Jiang Xian didn't say this, she wouldn't take out the money on her own initiative. If something is given too easily, people will not cherish it. Jinniang also received a big order. The daughter of the ruling official of Song was buying dowry for her wedding and she took a fancy to her Luoyang brocade clothes, especially those for Erqiao, Wei Zi, Yao Huang and Zhao Fen, so she made ten pieces in total.
"It will take three months to make these ten pieces of clothing. We will then have someone deliver them to your door," said Jinniang.
The Song family paid the money readily, but Jinniang still had to find a place to see the Yaohuang and Weizi flowers. Many officials in Bianliang opened their private gardens, and people could go in and see them for a symbolic fee. Every morning after paying her respects to Madam Jiang Liu, Jinniang would go to the shop to arrange for Sister Zhu to do embroidery work, and then go to the garden to paint peonies.
After finishing the painting, I had to start designing. I heard Ah Ying said, "Madam, I heard that the daughter of the Song family has a dowry of 200,000 strings of cash?"
"How much?" Jinniang couldn't believe it.
"Two hundred thousand strings of cash." Aying said.
Jinniang was shocked: "I don't know where they got so much money."
As soon as she finished speaking, White Snake came in. White Snake was an old customer, so Aying hurriedly served her tea and water. This time, White Snake came with her mother, and they also came to order wedding dresses.
Jinniang quickly took the album of wedding dresses. After she got married, she found that holding a wedding was extremely profitable, so she specially sorted out the previous wedding dresses on the Dragon Boat Festival.
Mrs. Bai saw her daughter only looking at the pearl dress, and couldn't help coughing: "We are a family of scholars, and your father said that we don't need to be too extravagant."
Bai Niangzi obediently flipped through the booklet in front of her. Last month, Liu Jixiang's daughter-in-law, Madam Xun, acted as a matchmaker and promised Bai Niangzi a son of an official. This man's brother was a Jinshi and his sister-in-law was also an official's daughter. Although the man looked average-looking and had no achievements, he was already a good candidate.
At least it was better than last time. Last time, she had her eyes on a student from the Imperial College, but he was snatched away by someone else. That person's family was just a family of imperial officials, but they were very rich and offered a dowry of 5,000 strings of cash. Naturally, she couldn't compete with him.
Not to mention a dowry of five thousand strings of cash, she didn't even have five hundred strings of cash.
Not to mention five hundred strings of cash, even two hundred strings of cash was barely enough. Her father was a magistrate in a lower state, and his monthly salary was only a dozen strings of cash. This dozen strings of cash had to support a large family, and she had several brothers, so it was not enough.
The dowry was not much, and the only thing she could rely on was her status as a daughter of an official. Her father would not let her family, a merchant family, fall into disgrace, but most people in the world only cared about the dowry. If it weren't for the Liu family, even this marriage would be difficult to come by.
"Madam Wei, this set is nice. How much is it?" White Snake asked with a smile.
Jinniang took a look and saw that the suit that Bai Niangzi chose only had some embroidery on the collar, and the rest was bare. This suit was on sale, so she said, "This suit costs eight strings of cash."
Eight strings of cash? The price was lower than what White Snake had in mind, so the deal was done immediately.
Naturally, this set was done by Zhu Xiu Niang.
Because she had an extra 158 strings of cash in just a few days, Jinniang took 15 strings of cash to a fur shop and bought a tiger skin with no arrow holes in it. Not only was the skin good, but the patterns on it were also rough and black. She spent 10 strings of cash on this tiger skin, and another five strings of cash on a deerskin. Last winter was so cold that Jinniang had to buy some to store.
Another hundred strings of cash was used to pay off the loan that had lasted for one year and five months.
The whole month of May was busy, and Jiang Xian was also preparing for the test in full swing. The two of them did not have sex as frequently as before, mainly because Jinniang controlled the frequency, fearing that he would overdo it.
At the end of the month, Jinniang invited Jiang Xian to have a meal at the nearby Yuxianlou. This was the first time the couple went out on a date. She smiled and said, "I heard that there are plum blossom buns in Wanglou Cave nearby. Let's buy some and you can send them to mother. Let's also buy a pot of Yuye wine from Yuxianlou to honor father. How do you think?"
"Okay, I'll do as you say." Jiang Xian had no objection to this, but when no one was paying attention, he said, "Tomorrow is the first day of the new year, you can't put me off anymore."
Jinniang blushed: "Why do you always think about this kind of thing? You don't even feel ashamed in public."
"Good wife, good sister..." Jiang Xian pulled her clothes, looking pitiful.
Jinniang couldn't resist and had to agree, but she also reminded: "Don't make trouble too late, don't let me do that."
"Okay, I'll serve you." Seeing that she agreed, Jiang Xian drank three glasses of wine in a row.
On the way back, Jinniang asked him if he was good with his money. "I always find that I don't have enough money at the end of the month. The other day, I heard Dou'er tell me that my sister-in-law cut the expenses of the study by half. I wonder if you are good with your money? If not, just open the box under my dressing table and take out some money."
Jiang Xian still looked a little uncomfortable. After all, using his wife's money was not what a real man should do.
So I'm a little hesitant.
Who knew Jinniang said: "Oh, you and I still have to argue about this? If you hadn't taken me to the Huang family, I wouldn't have been able to paint Er Qiao. Otherwise, I wouldn't have made a small fortune recently. We are husband and wife and we complement each other. Besides, I like you, so I am willing to spend money on you. If you marry someone else and that person treats me badly, I won't be so stupid as to spend money on you."
These words made Jiang Xian very happy, and he started chatting with Jinniang about all sorts of things. Just after returning home, Jiang Xian went to deliver plum blossom buns and jade liquor, but unexpectedly, Deng from the seventh room came to his door.
"Fifteenth sister-in-law is here." Jinniang asked her to sit down.
Deng came in just a few months before her. She had snow-white skin, but her reputation was just that. She was talking at length: "I am impatient to take care of those matters, but my mother-in-law insisted that I take care of them. I will wait until the last day to sort out all the accounts."
"That Fifteenth Sister-in-law is truly gifted." Jinniang knew that she particularly liked to create this kind of character, so she didn't expose her.
Deng took a long time to explain her purpose, "I want to borrow the red silk crane dress you wore last time to go to the wedding banquet."
The life of the seventh room was slightly better than that of the sixth room, but only slightly better. Not everyone could spend more than ten strings of cash on clothes every day, so if they couldn't buy them, they would of course borrow them.
Jinniang didn't want to borrow this one, and said, "This is a wedding dress, it's not easy to borrow."
Mrs. Deng smiled and said, "This is not a wedding dress. Isn't a wedding dress your wedding dress? Are you afraid that I will dirty it? Don't worry, everyone in this area knows me. If I didn't have time to make clothes, I wouldn't have specially asked you to borrow it. I can wear it and introduce you to others."
Jinniang said, "It's not that I don't want to lend it to you, it's just that my skin is prone to rashes. I've had this problem since I was a child. If I wear clothes that have been worn by others, my body will itch."
Having said that, she still refused to lend the money, and Deng left unhappily.
Seeing her leave, Xi Qiu and Min Zhi came in and said, "She borrowed it from Eleventh Young Master's wife last time and when she returned it, the grease stains on it couldn't be washed off."
"It's better to reject her once than to get angry with her in the future if she destroys one of my clothes." Jinniang said.
When Jiang Xian came back, she naturally told him about it. She was afraid that Jiang Xian would think she was stingy, so she just said, "That dress was what I wore on the first day of my wedding. It's not good to lend it to others."
Jiang Xian didn't blame her, instead he said, "It's her duty. If she wants to wear it, let her make it herself. There are so many people in the clan, there are all kinds of people, don't worry about it."
Seeing that Jinniang was still a little upset, he coaxed her, "Just now I sent plum blossom buns and jade liquor to my parents. When my parents knew that you asked me to send them, they praised you a lot."
Jinniang thought that even if your parents were happy, your sister-in-law might not be happy, but she couldn't care less. This is the case with Mrs. Xu, who is unwilling to spend extra money to honor her elders. When she sees others showing filial piety, she is afraid that they will gain fame, so she wants to suppress them.
In fact, Xu also thought so. The next day, Xu came to pay her respects, and Mrs. Jiang Liu naturally told her about this matter. She knew that her grandson Xuan Ge'er had never had many snacks since he was a child and had been brought up very strictly, so she asked Xu to take the buns to her grandson. Unexpectedly, when Xu heard that they were sent by Jinniang and others, she hurriedly said that she was afraid that the child would have indigestion and refused.
After Xu left, Madam Jiang Liu was naturally furious: "When Wei came in, I won't say anything about Xu's repeated complaints. She is obviously the eldest sister-in-law, and she was afraid that my younger sister-in-law would be popular. She only went to socialize after receiving the invitation, and didn't call Wei at all. Wei is really generous. Otherwise, if she knew that my sister-in-law from my mother's family didn't invite her to her 60th birthday, I don't know what she would think. This is still when I am still here. If I am really gone, I don't know what will happen?"
Fang's mother quickly advised: "Don't be angry, it's not worth it, it's not worth it."
"Go, go and call the Sixth Master over. I want to divide the property but not the family." Mrs. Jiang Liu finally made up her mind and divided the property in advance.
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