severed tongue
"Chen Xu's house is filled with medicinal herbs, but he doesn't need to take so many. The bitter smell of those herbs is used to cover up the scent of the poppies!" She swallowed, her palms sweating. "The poppies conceal the evil spirit, and the lavender in his yard is just used to cover it up."
This explains Chen Xu's madness very well.
Under the erosion of evil spirit, he became stupid, and the strong fragrance of poppy flowers made him lose his mind and look like he was crazy.
Wanqi Si nodded: "You are not stupid."
Yu Heyi glared at him unhappily. "It seems that both Madam Shen and Mrs. Xu are highly suspected. The lavender in the courtyard was planted by Madam Shen, and the dried flowers hanging in Mrs. Xu's room include poppies."
“But if Madam Shen wanted to harm Shen Xu, why did she find someone to treat him?”
"You forgot that Shen Yu is also a suspect."
Shen Yu?
Master of the Shen family?
"Mrs. Shen said that the herbs in Shen Xu's room were all left by the doctor that Shen Yu found, and the bitter taste of the various herbs just happened to mask the scent of poppies coming from the back garden."
"It seems that the water in the Shen Mansion is really deep."
When they returned to the South Courtyard, they heard a maid shouting, "The Master is back!"
Shen Yu is back.
He was on his way to the South Courtyard, and Mrs. Shen pulled his arm all the way, trying to persuade him to calm down.
"I hired them to treat Xu'er's illness. Master, please don't be angry!"
Chen Yu was furious and said, "Those are all swindlers! Haven't I found enough doctors for Chen Xu? So many famous doctors in Yandong haven't been able to cure him, and you still let two swindlers in? Aren't you just adding to my troubles!"
"master!"
Madam Shen ultimately failed to stop Shen Yu, and he walked into the South Courtyard aggressively, his face gloomy and terrifying.
There were two people standing in the South Courtyard. One of them looked at him with a smile, while the other didn't even look at him.
"Master Shen, even from this distance I can hear you saying we are here to cheat people."
Veins popped out on his forehead. "How could such an impolite woman possibly cure Shen Xu's illness? They're both obviously charlatans!"
"Since Lord Shen is so unwelcome, we will not accompany you." She spread her hands and looked at Madam Shen helplessly, "It's just that the people in the Shen Mansion who wanted to frame Shen Xu are probably going to get what they want."
Hearing her words, Mrs. Shen cried out: "Who wants to harm my Xu'er? Didn't Xu'er go crazy because he hit his head on the steps?"
"Chen Xu is indeed mentally unstable, but when he had an attack yesterday, he said that he became like this because of something he saw. Madam, are you sure that he just bumped into the stairs and was not framed?"
"What nonsense!"
Chen Yu's face was grim. "Previous doctors all said that Chen Xu had suffered a head injury, which caused blood stasis and blocked meridians. That's why he became so crazy. As long as he takes the medicine on time, he will recover. Madam, don't be deceived by these shady people!"
"But Lord Shen, Shen Xu has been taking medicine for so long, is there any improvement?"
Yu Heyi spoke frankly.
"Oh no! Oh no!"
A maid ran out in a panic, screaming and interrupting the conversation.
She knelt before Shen Yu and kowtowed: "Master and Madam, this servant deserves to die..."
"What's going on? Baoqiu, please explain yourself clearly."
Mrs. Shen had an ominous premonition in her heart.
"I just went in to feed the young master some medicine, and when I heard some noise outside, I stood at the door and listened for a while. But when I turned around, the young master..."
"His tongue was cut off and his mouth was full of blood!"
Mrs. Shen's eyes darkened when she heard this, and she almost fell down on the spot.
Shen Yu was furious: "How dare you! Who dares to do such a thing under my nose! Investigate it for me, if you can't find anything, all of you will be exiled!"
The servants standing at the gate of the South Courtyard responded timidly.
At this moment, Madam Shen was about to faint. Shen Yu had no time to care about the two people in front of him. He snorted coldly and helped Madam Shen back to the North Courtyard.
Baoqiu was still kneeling on the ground, kowtow- ing with despair in his eyes.
"Master Shen has left, you should get up quickly."
Yu Heyi kindly tried to help her up, but she dodged him.
"I made a mistake. If I can't get my master's forgiveness, I will die..."
Several maids rushed into the room to stop Shen Xu's bleeding.
She was puzzled: "Who would be so bold as to quietly cut off Chen Xu's tongue in front of so many people?"
"Maybe it has something to do with what you said."
"What I said?"
Recalling what she had just said, she slapped her head and suddenly realized.
Just as she said that Chen Xu might have been framed, Bao Qiu came out and said that his tongue had been cut off.
"Don't you think it's a coincidence? Perhaps your words have made the real murderer feel threatened. Besides, Shen Yu has been trying every possible way to drive us away."
"But Shen Yu was right in front of us just now. His every move was under our observation. He definitely couldn't do such a thing. Besides, who in the Shen Mansion could do it and get away with it?"
Wanqi Si remained silent, with a cold look on his face.
"It's useless to ask you." She said unhappily.
At night, the sky is dotted with stars.
Xu was sitting on the bed combing her hair. Her two maids had just left.
"Didn't I say I was going to rest...why are you here?"
She thought it was the two maids who had returned, but when she looked up and asked, she found out who they were.
Yu Heyi said softly, "Aunt Xu, I came to ask you something."
"It's about Shen Xu, right? I heard everything that happened today. Shen Xu had his tongue cut out. You don't have to doubt me. I wasn't at the Shen residence at the time. My relatives and friends can testify. But the real murderer was so cruel that he didn't even spare children."
"Aunt Xu, this has nothing to do with what happened this afternoon. Have you ever grown poppies?"
"Poppy?" Xu shook her head, the confusion on her face not seeming fake.
Wanqi Si looked impatient and said straight to the point: "I don't want to beat around the bush with you. Did you plant the poppies to harm Chen Xu?"
He raised his eyes, his gaze like invisible sharp blades, full of oppression.
The silver sword was pressed against Xu's neck without any explanation.
“What are you doing…”
Xu's pupils suddenly dilated and her face instantly became terrified.
"Senior brother, don't scare me." Yu Heyi pushed away the silver sword.
She walked into the house, stood on tiptoe to take down the dried flowers hanging on the wall, and broke off one of them.
"This is a poppy flower. If you don't know, where does this flower come from?"
"Aunt Xu, are the poppies planted in the back garden related to you?"
"These dried flowers were given to me by the master... Did you go to the master's back garden?" Xu's eyes widened and she raised her voice. "The road to the back garden has long been blocked. How did you get in?"
"What do you know? Why is the path to the back garden blocked? Who planted the flowers there?"
Yu Heyi raised his eyes with sharp gaze.
"This is Master's business. I haven't heard of it... Master has forbidden anyone from discussing the back garden in the mansion. We all pretend that place doesn't exist."
She asked a few more questions, and Xu's answers seemed reluctant, but not like she was lying.
Maybe Shen Yu was hiding something in the mansion.
After leaving the East Courtyard, she seemed to remember something and hurried to the North Courtyard.
When she came back, there was another person beside her. It was Baoqiu, the maid who discovered that Chen Xu had a severed tongue during the day.
Shen Yu couldn't find the murderer, so he could only vent his anger on Bao Qiu.
The Shen couple wanted to sell her to a brothel on the grounds that she was not protecting her master.
Baoqiu hid in the house and cried, but there was nothing she could do.
Yu Heyi found her and asked her if she was willing to make a deal with him.
She could save her life and avoid the fate of being sold into a brothel, as long as the other party told her everything that happened in the Shen Mansion without missing a word.
Rather than being sold to a brothel, Baoqiu agreed without hesitation.
After hiding Baoqiu in her room, she climbed into Wanqi Si's window.
She drank up all the tea that Wanqi Si had just heated up.
"Yu Heyi, you'd better come here for something." His temples were throbbing and he spoke through gritted teeth.
"Brother, guess who I went to see?" She ignored his cold face and said with a smile, "I went to see Baoqiu. She was bought by the Shen family to be a servant when she was very young. She must know something about what happened in the Shen family."
"What does she know?"
"This is the clue I found. If you want to know, should I show my sincerity?"
"Like... heat me another pot of tea?"
"Then Junior Sister, you can go back now. I will definitely strengthen my precautions in the future to prevent any thieves from stealing the tea again." He looked away and put away the tea set.
Yu Heyi looked dissatisfied: "Senior Brother, you are so stingy."
"Bao Qiu said that Shen Yu doted on Shen Xu in the past. Shen Xu liked sunflowers, so he planted a large field of sunflowers in the back garden. The sunflowers grew lushly, and Bao Qiu took good care of them."
"But one day, Baoqiu was watering the sunflowers in the back garden when Chen Xu suddenly asked her to leave, saying he wanted to admire the flowers. After that day, he went mad. Baoqiu was terrified, but no one except Chen Xu knew that she had watered the sunflowers, so she escaped punishment and was not blamed."
"She didn't know why Shen Xu went crazy. The doctors the Shen family hired said he was mad because he hit his head on the stairs. But she saw with her own eyes that Shen Xu went into the back garden and didn't come out, but there were no stairs in the back garden."
Wanqi Si raised his eyebrows: "In other words, there is something wrong with the doctor that Shen Yu invited."
"That's right."
The two of them immediately got up and headed to the west courtyard.
There was only one room in the entire west courtyard with lights on, and a figure was walking back and forth in the room.
There was a knock on the door.
"Xu Changjia, I don't have time to accompany you today. Come back another day." Shen Yu said anxiously.
"Sir Shen, it's me." Yu Heyi said lightly.
"What are you doing here?"
Wanqi Si kicked the door open and said with a smile, "Master Shen, I want to talk to you."
Shen Yu paused in stroking the jade ring and looked back and forth between the two of them.
"What's up?"
Wanqi Si put the teacup down heavily on the table with a faint smile, making a crisp sound. "Your son got into trouble today. Does Lord Shen have any clues?"
"I...how do I know who did it? The Shen family has a bunch of good-for-nothings, and we can't find out who did it." He hesitated and avoided looking.
Seeing the two people's eyes full of suspicion, he shouted: "You doubt me?"
"Wasn't I right in front of you when Chen Xu got into trouble? I was too busy to do anything else, so how did I manage to cut his tongue?"
"Master Shen, don't be impulsive. We didn't say it was you." Yu Heyi's lips curled up in an intriguing arc. She walked in front of Shen Yu and looked straight into his eyes. "But Master Shen, we are more curious about why the back garden was blocked?"
Shen Yu's expression was stiff, and he forced an unnatural smile: "This happened a long time ago. Shen Xu... is allergic to pollen, so naturally he had to gamble."
"Then, Lord Shen, do you know... who planted the poppies in the back garden?"
Noticing the flash of panic in his eyes, the two became more certain that this matter was related to Shen Yu.
"You planted the poppies in the back garden, didn't you?" she said in a deliberately drawn-out tone.
“I don’t understand what you are saying. Chen Xu is my child. How could I possibly harm him?”
His face flushed crimson.
"Then it seems that I have wronged you, sir. Please don't take it to heart."
Shen Yu covered his mouth and coughed lightly, claiming that he needed to rest, and sent the two away.
Standing outside the west courtyard, Yu Heyi said softly, "Chen Yu almost has the word guilty written all over his face."
Wanqi Si said jokingly, "He's just an idiot. He lost his composure without doing anything."
"Let's go. There will be a good show tomorrow."
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