The wind at twilight hour blew dust and sand past the General's Mansion's hanging flower gate. As soon as Chen Weiwan's carriage came to a stop in front of the moon-shaped gate, Chuntao lifted the curtain and exclaimed, "Look, young lady! There are so many people gathered in the storeroom!"
The old steward on the shaft pulled the reins, his brow furrowed so tightly that it could kill a fly: "It seems like the noise is coming from the direction of Madam Liu's courtyard..."
Shen Weiwan's fingertips curled slightly as she pinched the handkerchief, a sly smile playing at the corners of her lips. She had calculated the time well in advance—Liu would be unconscious for at least half an hour after being caught in the mousetrap, enough time for her to "coincidentally" rush back from the Guanyin Temple on the outskirts of the city.
"What are you still standing there for? Go and take a look!" Shen Weiwan stepped on the footstool handed by Chuntao and got out of the car. The moon-white skirt swept across the muddy bluestone slabs. She deliberately raised her voice and said, "Could it be that there was a thief in the warehouse?"
Before he could finish his words, a group of servants emerged from the warehouse, two maids in the middle carrying Liu out. Her hair was disheveled, the white cloth wrapped around her wrists was seeping with blood, and the swelling on the back of her head had pushed her hairpin askew. From a distance, she could hear her pig-like howling: "Chen Weiwan! Get out here, you little bitch!"
"Aunt?" Shen Weiwan pretended to be surprised and raised her hand to touch her chest. The nail polish on her fingertips glowed red in the twilight. "What happened to you? Who hurt you like this?"
Liu was brought closer, and when she saw Shen Weiwan's face full of "innocence", she was furious. She broke free from the mother-in-law's hand and was about to pounce on her: "It's you! You made the warehouse look like a rat's nest, and caused me to be pinched by the clamp!"
Chen Weiwan nimbly hid behind Chuntao, blinking her almond-shaped eyes as she looked at the open door of the warehouse. "Are there rats in the warehouse?" She covered her mouth and exclaimed, "I was wondering why I heard squeaking noises in there yesterday!"
The old housekeeper coughed twice at the right time, and pointed to the door of the warehouse with his crutch: "Miss, look, there is rat droppings on the ground." He bent down and picked up a small brown stone - that was the cassia seed that Chen Weiwan had scattered this morning when no one was paying attention.
"Oh my!" Shen Weiwan stamped her feet. "The Thousand Machine Lock must be broken, and the mouse got in!" She turned to Liu, her eyes burning with "concern." "Auntie, you got caught in a mousetrap? This is terrible!"
Liu was confused by her and nodded subconsciously: "That's right! That broken clamp..."
"Hurry up and apply the mud!" Shen Weiwan suddenly clapped her hands, frightening Liu Shi and shuddering. "Just like when my cousin was pricked by grass last time, applying mud can relieve the itch!"
The servants around them all laughed. Everyone knew that at the Spring Festival Banquet, Shen Ruoruo scratched her face with itchy grass scraps, and it was Shen Weiwan who "kindly" gave her a mud pack to help reduce the swelling. Liu Shi thought of her daughter's embarrassing incident, and her face turned redder than a monkey's butt: "Shen Weiwan, you..."
"Aunt, please don't be angry," Shen Weiwan took out a clean handkerchief and handed it to her, deliberately putting it close to her wound, "I soaked this handkerchief in mint water, it can relieve the pain when applied."
When Liu saw the handkerchief, she remembered the last time she was rubbing her hands with grains and cereals. She suddenly waved her hand and opened it: "Get out! Who wants your dirty stuff!"
The handkerchief fluttered to the ground. Shen Weiwan squatted to pick it up, but her fingertips accidentally touched the wound on Liu's wrist. Liu screamed in pain, stumbling back and bumping into the woman behind her. The bump on the back of her head hit the door frame, and tears streamed down her face in pain.
"Aunt, please be careful!" Shen Weiwan exclaimed and stepped forward to support, but was pushed away by Liu.
"Don't touch me!" Liu pointed at Shen Weiwan, shaking with anger, "You clearly did it on purpose! Where are the things in the warehouse? Where did you hide the jewelry?"
"Jewelry?" Shen Weiwan tilted her head, looking bewildered. "Aren't there just some old boxes in the warehouse? Oh, right!" She suddenly clapped her hands. "The other day, I saw the warehouse was leaking, so I asked the old housekeeper to move all the things to my yard to dry them in the sun to prevent them from being gnawed by rats."
The old housekeeper immediately responded, "Exactly. The young lady was afraid of disturbing the general's spirit, so she had this old servant move all the things to the warm room in the east wing."
Liu looked at the empty warehouse, then at the box-carrying servant following behind Shen Weiwan, and her eyes went dark and she almost fainted again. Those boxes were clearly empty! When did Shen Weiwan move the things?
"Aunt, you look so bad," Shen Weiwan touched her forehead with pretended worry, "Could it be that you got rabies from being bitten by a mousetrap? I heard that if you're bitten by a mousetrap, you have to drink coptis water to disinfect it."
"You have rabies! Your whole family has rabies!" Liu completely lost control and grabbed the broom in the hand of the old woman next to her and started hitting her.
Shen Weiwan was prepared and dodged behind Chuntao, and the broom hit Chuntao's shoulder hard. Chuntao fell to the ground with a cry of "ouch", and immediately a sharp-eyed servant shouted: "The lady hit the young lady's people!"
"What a rebellion!" The old housekeeper stepped forward on his crutches. "Madam Liu, as an elder, how can you lay hands on the young lady's maid?"
The servants around her already disliked Liu, and now they all gathered around her, talking to each other:
"Exactly! What does it have to do with Miss Guan about the rats that broke into the warehouse?"
"Madam, you got pinched when you tried to pick the lock yourself, and you're blaming others?"
"Last time he withheld our monthly wages, and now he's hitting us..."
Liu was surrounded in the middle, listening to the servants' discussions, and then looking at Shen Weiwan's half-smiled face, she suddenly realized that she had fallen into a trap. She pointed at Shen Weiwan, so angry that she couldn't say a complete sentence: "You...you...you guys...ganged up on me!"
"What are you saying, Auntie?" Shen Weiwan poked her head out from behind Chuntao, playing with the warehouse key in her hand. "I'm just worried that you might get trapped by a mouse, so I'm trying to find a way out." She shook the key. "Look, the key is perfectly fine with me. How could a mouse get in? The locksmith must have put it in when he was picking the lock."
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