Chapter 116: Ji'an Hall is closed down, and my mother prepares to get married
"After you told Aunt Sun about the Ji'an Hall incident, she fainted on the spot?"
In Wanxiang Courtyard, Honeysuckle, Cattail, and Sangruo sat in the outer room of Xie Yao's bedroom, roasting charcoal fire and listening to Qiliang talk about what happened in Aunt Sun's courtyard.
Xu Susu was standing aside, calculating the accounts using an abacus.
There are three days left before her daughter's wedding, and she is registering the families who will give gifts to the Xie family and sending out wedding invitations.
Hearing the low chatter of the maids and servants, she shook her head helplessly, but her eyes held a tolerant smile.
As soon as Xie Yao woke up, she heard Qi Liang saying:
"Not only that, when Aunt Sun fainted, Uncle Wenchang was terrified. Then, someone from Ji'an Hall happened to show up, and Uncle Xie thought they were there to check on her pregnancy."
Honeysuckle asked curiously, "And then what?"
"I didn't expect that man to kneel down and say that he was the owner of Ji'an Hall and was delivering a message to Aunt Sun, asking Aunt Sun and Uncle to make the decision."
"Master Xie was so angry that his face turned green. He told him to get out, then stormed out, leaving only Madam Zhu to look after Concubine Sun."
Xie Yao sat up and looked out the window.
It was late at night, and a full moon hung in the sky. The moonlight, as clear as mercury, shone through the window lattice and fell on her bed.
She raised her voice and asked, "What's going on at Ji'an Hall?"
The four servants in the outer room looked at her at the same time, and the sound of Xu Susu's abacus also quietly stopped.
The next moment, three pretty faces appeared in front of Xie Yao.
Honeysuckle, mulberry and reed: "Miss, wake up!"
At the back door, Qi Liang, who was standing at the door and peeking, said, "Miss, this is the happy news I wanted to tell you before."
Xie Yao tidied her clothes, walked to the outer room, and sat with a few people.
She saw her mother and her eyes suddenly brightened: "It's so late, why are you here, mother?"
Xu Susu stood up: "Then I'll go."
Xie Yao immediately jumped up, pressed her shoulders, and said coquettishly, "No! If mother leaves, I won't be able to sleep."
Xu Susu saw that her face was rosy and her complexion was very good, so she felt relieved: "You are the one who sleeps the best. You were snoring just now."
Xie Yao immediately retorted: "Impossible."
Xu Susu didn't argue with her, sat down again and continued to calculate the accounts.
"These servants keep the lamps burning late at night and gossip, which makes your room very bright. I come here to settle the accounts and can save some money on lamp oil." She said lightly.
When faced with her mother's explanation, Xie Yao could only say five words: Don't believe it, it's made up.
At this time, Sang Ruo brought a bowl of lotus seed porridge: "Second Miss has slept for two hours, she must be hungry, after getting drunk, have something light first."
While Xu Susu wasn't paying attention, she whispered in the second young lady's ear, "Madam was worried that the second young lady would feel uncomfortable after getting drunk, so she was the first one to wait in the outer room. She also asked me to make this porridge in advance."
Xie Yao took the porridge and looked at her mother who was checking the accounts under the lamp.
Her eyes became softer and her heart became more determined.
Qiliang then said that not long after she left the Bo Mansion today, her uncle Xu Zhixing sent someone to bring her the news.
Since Shengjitang opened next to Ji'antang, it has become the number one medical clinic in Beijing.
The medicines sold at Shengjitang are of guaranteed quality and quantity, and are inexpensive. The doctors there are also well-known physicians in the capital. A few days ago, even the imperial physician Zhou in the palace said that the doctors at Shengjitang were excellent and admitted they were better than them.
So, Ji'antang finally couldn't sit still anymore.
Yesterday, a pair of brothers came to Shengjitang carrying a torn straw mat.
On the straw mat was their dying mother.
The two claimed that the doctor at Shengjitang had made a misdiagnosis and given their mother fake medicine, and started a quarrel at the door of the clinic.
Xu Zhixing happened to be in the clinic.
Xie Yao once wrote a letter to remind her uncle that a clinic is different from other shops. It is not just about seeing patients and prescribing medicine, but also about keeping good medical records and guarding against the insidious tactics of competitors.
Xu Zhixing had long remembered Xie Yao's words and took out the medical records on the spot, which recorded in detail the list of patients who came to see the doctor every day and every hour, as well as the prescribed medicines.
There is no record of this old woman seeing a doctor in the medical records.
The two were recognized again and were famous scoundrels on the street.
After being surrounded by onlookers, they confessed the truth, saying that they had received money from the neighboring Ji'antang and came to Shengjitang to frame them. The medicine their mother took was all prescribed by Ji'antang.
Xu Zhixing put aside his past grudges and asked the doctor on duty to treat the old woman. However, the doctor discovered that there was indeed something wrong with the old woman's medicine during the diagnosis.
Outraged by the public outrage, Shengjitang reported the matter to the authorities. Jingzhao Yin Du Da Ren personally led a group to the scene and searched Ji'antang and found banned drugs, as well as many expensive counterfeit drugs.
Now Ji'an Hall has been sealed off, and the owner of Ji'an Hall, Sun Hongfang, Aunt Sun's eldest brother, has also been imprisoned.
At this moment, Aunt Sun had just learned about the scandal between Xie Zhi and Marquis Anping, and also learned that Ji'an Hall had been sealed off.
Finally she woke up and had to stand up again to prepare a dowry for Xie Zhi.
The Sun family tried their best to get Sun Hongfang out, and even sent people to ask to see Wenchangbo and Aunt Sun, but they were all driven away.
I heard that Aunt Sun looked much older overnight.
On the other side, Xu Susu was also preparing Xie Yao's dowry, and at the same time allocated money to prepare for the banquet.
The Xie family has only two branches, and there are three or four elders of the same generation as the old uncles in the clan. Although each of them has a large family, they do not have many real relatives.
Xie Ming'an was very good at making friends in the court and was very good at making friends with officials, so he had many friends.
Even though the Xie family encountered many misfortunes one after another, there was still an endless stream of people coming to give gifts during the last two days of the wedding.
After receiving the gifts and replying to the wedding invitations, Xu Susu sorted out the accounts. Roughly speaking, the Xie family had to prepare fifty or sixty banquets, which was much more lively than the Winter Solstice Banquet.
Xie Mingan disappeared all day long, making it clear that he was stingy.
Because it was a marriage of high status, Xu Susu did not want the banquet to be too simple and lose face for her daughter.
She prepared an extremely generous dowry for Xie Yao. It included not only the hundred boxes of betrothal gifts sent by Prince Jingbei, but also all of them were used as dowry and carried back to the prince's palace.
There was also the dowry that the Xu family gave her seventeen years ago, including the land, farms, and shops. After so many years, she only had 30% left. She took out 90% of this 30% and gave it all as her daughter's dowry.
Xu Susu knew that those who came to give gifts to the Xie family did so because her daughter was canonized as Princess of Jingbei by the Emperor and married to the Prince of Jingbei, and they wanted to curry favor with her daughter and the prince, not because of Earl Wenchang.
So out of selfishness, she added those gifts into the dowry and gave it to Xie Yao.
But the accounts of the Bo Mansion were already in deficit, so the money for preparing the banquet was not enough.
Unless she withdrew another sum of money from her own shop, or used the cash from the dowry sent by King Jingbei.
Tomorrow, the seventeenth day of the winter month, is the wedding day of Prince Jingbei and Miss Xie II.
In the end, Xu Susu chose to pay the money herself.
Early in the morning, she took out the jewelry that she had always been reluctant to wear and called Sang Ruo.
"Take my warrant and go to the three shops in the west of the city and pay out all the money they have on their accounts. If it's not enough, send the bracelets to the pawnshop. There's no jade this good anymore, so three hundred taels wouldn't be too much."
Xie Yao came out and snatched Xu Susu's bracelet.
"Mother wants to pawn such a nice bracelet to hold a banquet for the Xie family?" She frowned.
Xu Susu: "A wedding banquet represents the importance the Xie family places on you. It can't be shabby. It also represents the reputation of the Bo family."
When Xie Yao heard this, a faint light flashed in her eyes.
She didn't care about the Xie family's banquet, but wanted to use this wedding to achieve her own goals.
"Mother, don't you know whether the Xie family values me or not?" Xie Yao asked back.
Seeing her mother's hesitation, she raised a sarcastic smile at the corner of her lips: "As for the reputation of the Bo Mansion, it turns out that the Bo Mansion still has face?"
Xu Susu's eyes were filled with sorrow: "But you are marrying the King of Jingbei. The relatives and friends of the Xiao family in the King of Jingbei's mansion will be even more numerous, and the banquet will be even more grand."
Xie Yao shook her head: "The Xiao family..."
Just as he opened his mouth, Qi Liang came to announce: "Miss, people from the palace are here."
A man and a woman came. The man was Bai Zhu's guard, and Xie Yao also knew the woman. She was the old nanny who had given her the token of Old Madam Xiao.
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