31 Night Visit
◎Sneak into Ji's house to see Xiao Yao'er◎
At the Ji residence, the old lady was sitting by the fire with Ji Dayong and his wife to keep warm. She was covered with a warm quilt made of fox fur, curled up inside. She was thin and small, with a gleam in her eyes, as if she was brewing some evil intentions again.
"The weather is getting colder," she said.
Ji Dayong put his rough hands close to the stove and rubbed them continuously: "Mom, it's been several days. I wonder how those two people in the North Courtyard are doing?" His tone was inexplicably excited.
Hearing this, the old lady frowned, sat up straight and hissed, "There's no movement coming from the north courtyard. I'll send someone to check it out tomorrow."
Logically speaking, they had nothing to eat or drink, let alone any means of heating, so they shouldn't have survived these few days. Thinking of this, she smiled with relief and patted the back of Ji Dayong's hand: "Don't worry, my son. If they were still alive, I would not let them have an easy time."
Ji Dayong laughed twice, then approached the old lady and said mysteriously, "Mom, the official took me to do business these days and I made a hundred taels."
The old lady was startled. She asked, "Dayong, what business are you in?"
Guo Cuiping, who had been silent all the time, also spat out the melon seed shells in her mouth and looked over here. She didn't know that her husband was doing business. How could a genuine farmer do business? She wanted to listen to him carefully to avoid being cheated.
Ji Dayong patted his chest, his face full of satisfaction: "When I was in the village before, everyone said that I was not as good as the second brother. So today I will prove to them that I, Ji Dayong, am also a man."
The old lady frowned. She knew her son's ability very well, so she said to Ji Dayong earnestly, "Son, don't go into business. The money in this mansion is enough for us to live on for several lifetimes."
Ji Dayong immediately became unhappy after hearing this. He stood up, kicked the stool, and roared, "Mom, you also think I'm not as good as the second brother, right?"
Seeing Ji Dayong angry, the old lady quickly said: "Look at what you are talking about. Our family has money. If you want to do business, just do it." Anyway, the money left by the second son was countless and could not be spent casually. It didn't matter if Dayong was given some trouble.
Guo Cuiping snorted softly and started cracking melon seeds again.
The old lady asked Ji Dayong what kind of business he was doing. Ji Dayong hesitated and refused to answer. The old lady just let him go. Then she looked at Guo Cuiping and asked, "What has Tianbao been doing these days?"
Guo Cuiping was a little disappointed: "He has been staying at Zui Xiang Fang these days and hasn't returned home for several days in a row."
The capital city is prosperous, and her son has mistakenly entered this world of pleasure, and it is likely that he will find it difficult to extricate himself.
Ji Dayong said indifferently: "Tianbao is still young, it's okay for him to have some fun. In the future, I will ask my mother to find a girl from an official family for him." After saying that, he looked at the old lady.
The old lady was, after all, an old lady from the countryside. She didn't have any connections to marry a daughter of an official family. But in the face of her son's request, she could only nod and spend some money to marry the daughter of a minor official.
The fire in the stove burned more and more vigorously. The old lady looked at Ji Dayong expectantly: "Dayong, what day is the 16th of next month?"
Ji Dayong ate the exquisite cakes on the table with big mouthfuls. Without thinking, he asked, "What day is it?"
The old lady felt a little disappointed, and she sighed: "The 16th of next month is my 70th birthday." In previous years, the second brother would remember her birthday clearly and would celebrate it with great fanfare. This year, it was her 70th birthday, and she was determined to hold a grand birthday party.
When Ji Dayong heard this, his eyes lit up. Wouldn't that mean he could collect a lot of money? He went up to the old lady and said, "Mom, when the time comes, we'll hold a big banquet and invite all the important people in the capital. I'm sure they'll give us a lot of gifts, and we'll make a lot of money."
The old lady was a little unsure. In previous years, when the second son was alive, some nobles would come, but now that the second son was gone, she didn't know if they would still come.
Speaking of birthday banquets, the old lady narrowed her eyes and thought of a plan: "Son, our dynasty values mourning. If those two people from the North Courtyard don't prepare a birthday gift for an old woman like me, what do you think the people in the capital will think of them?"
If she didn't freeze or starve them to death in the next few days, she would "legitimately" kick them out of the birthday party.
Ji Dayong still had some doubts: "Mom, what if they prepare a gift?"
The old lady sneered, her face full of malice, and whispered a few words in his ear. Ji Dayong's mouth cracked wider and wider, and he couldn't help but praise: "Mother, this is a great plan."
Guo Cuiping sat over and wanted to listen to what was said, but the mother and son of the Ji family were wary of her and immediately shut up when they saw her coming over.
The night was getting deeper and deeper. After coming out of the old lady's Shoukang Pavilion, Ji Dayong hurried to the nearby Liuxiang. The girls there were gentle and affectionate, much better than the half-wed mother at home.
Guo Cuiping looked in the direction of Ji Dayong and stomped her feet in anger. As expected, her son and father were of the same origin. Once they arrived in Beijing, they would never go home.
On the way back, when Guo Cuiping passed by Ji Zhao's door, she heard whispers coming from inside, and it seemed to be a man's voice. She was puzzled, stopped, put her ear to the door, and listened carefully to the movement inside.
It would have been fine if she hadn't heard it. As soon as she heard it, her blood immediately rose and she pushed open her daughter's door regardless of anything. The two people in the room were startled by the sound and they all looked towards the door.
After seeing who was coming, Ji Zhao quickly got off the man's legs, looking panic-stricken, while the man looked at it all in confusion, not knowing what to do.
Guo Cuiping came up angrily and slapped the man, pointing at him and yelling: "Who the hell are you? How dare you seduce my daughter?" She saw that the man was wearing a coarse linen shirt that was washed white and looked timid. She knew at first glance that he was not a rich man's son, so she dared to slap him.
The man was a little dazed by the sudden slap, but the woman in front of him was dressed in gorgeous clothes and wearing pearls and jade on her head. She was obviously a well-known person. He swallowed the curse back and ran to hide behind Ji Zhao.
Guo Cuiping was even more furious when she saw the man's cowardly look.
Ji Zhao walked up carefully and tugged at Guo Cuiping's sleeve: "Mom, don't tell Dad about what happened today, otherwise he will beat me to death." His voice trembled slightly when he said the last sentence.
Guo Cuiping sighed and tucked her daughter's clothes together: "How long has it been?"
Ji Zhao: “Half a month.”
Guo Cuiping simply sat down and examined the man. He was quite good-looking, fair-skinned, and dressed like a poor scholar. She then looked at her daughter and asked, "How did you meet him?"
Ji Zhao answered honestly, "My daughter's purse was stolen half a month ago. Yonglang helped me get it back."
Guo Cuiping looked at the man's weak appearance and couldn't imagine how he could get the purse back from the thief, so she was suspicious.
"What's your name?" she asked the man.
The man stepped forward timidly and said, "My name is Ge Yong, nice to meet you, Madam."
"What's going on at home?"
Ge Yong's eyes turned: "Please rest assured, Madam. I will definitely pass the imperial examination next year, and then I will marry Miss Ji in a grand ceremony."
Guo Cuiping saw all the calculations on Ge Yong's face, but he avoided answering, which was enough to show that there was a problem in his family.
Now that their family was no longer a small family in You County, she would never let her daughter marry down, so she said to Ge Yong: "Don't bother Zhao'er again, or I will make sure you can't stay in the capital."
Ge Yong trembled with fear and dared not look up again.
Guo Cuiping spat out coldly: "Get lost."
Ge Yong didn't dare to fart and ran out crawling.
Ji Zhao was anxious and was about to chase her lover, but was pulled back by Guo Cuiping: "How can you be so shameless?"
Ji Zhao stiffened his neck and retorted, "Mom, you don't understand Yonglang at all. He will definitely pass the imperial examination next year, and then I will be the wife of an official."
Guo Cuiping scolded him harshly: "With his cowardly appearance, what future do you think he can achieve?"
Ji Zhao fiercely shook off Guo Cuiping's hand and sobbed loudly: "Mother, I like Yonglang, so why not let me marry him?"
Guo Cuiping shook her head helplessly: "From today on, you are not allowed to have any contact with him, otherwise I will send you back to You County."
After saying that, he ignored Ji Zhao's crying and locked the door.
…
North Courtyard.
A luxurious carriage was parked beside the low wall at the side gate of the Ji Mansion. A man in a black suit knelt in front of the carriage and said respectfully, "Sir, we have found the young lady's residence."
Chen Jing'an curled his lips into a smile, and a purple figure flew over the low wall and merged into the boundless night.
Shu Yao suffered from insomnia again. When she closed her eyes, all she could think of was the well in the yard and the pale face. She felt a little upset. She wrapped herself tightly in the thin quilt, turned over, closed her eyes and forced herself to sleep.
There was infinite silence all around her, and she was half asleep. Just when she was about to fall asleep, she suddenly heard a loud noise coming from the house. She sat up reflexively, and all her sleepiness disappeared in an instant.
The room was pitch black. She carefully recalled the source of the sound. It was winter now, and there was no way there could be mice in the house.
There was only one possibility, her house was robbed.
Thinking of this, she held her breath, not daring to breathe, and listened vigilantly to the movements around her. She waited quietly for a long time, but no sound came. Her heart relaxed a little, thinking that maybe it was because of the mental stress during this period that caused the auditory hallucinations, so she was about to lie down and continue to sleep.
“Snap—”
She suddenly looked towards the place where the sound came from, her heart tightening. This was not an auditory hallucination at all. The sound came from her room.
She put on her clothes, groped her way out of bed and prepared to light a candle, taking every step carefully. When she came to the table, she reached out to take the candle on the table, but she touched something slightly warm, and she shuddered with fear.
Just as I was about to turn around and run, my hand was tightly held by a warm big hand, and at the same time, a scent of gardenia came to me.
…
In Shoukang Pavilion, the old lady tossed and turned.
Today, she had just told Ji Dayong about the two people in the North Courtyard. Did they starve to death or freeze to death? The more she thought about it, the more she couldn't sleep. She wanted to find out.
So he quickly changed his clothes, picked up the heater, and took the sedan chair to the north courtyard.
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