Yingbao had no idea what to do.
A woman's marriage is decided by her parents, and outsiders have no right to interfere.
Besides, Chuchu is not young anymore and it is time for her to get married.
"How about you go talk to my master?" Yingbao gave her some advice.
In his opinion, Mrs. Wen is a female elder with a certain prestige here, and is the most suitable person to discuss this matter with Sister Chuchu's father.
"However, Sister Chuchu, I estimate that my master can only help you to postpone it for half a year at most. After the autumn harvest, you still have to go home with your father." This is the truth.
Chuchu is sixteen this year, and will be seventeen after the New Year. In the village, there are indeed few girls who are over sixteen or seventeen and still unmarried.
Chuchu nodded with a bitter face, and immediately took Yingbao to find Mrs. Wen.
Mrs. Wen was quite open-minded. Seeing that Chuchu had made up her mind, she nodded and agreed to help her this time.
When Chuchu happily ran to help the nanny with work, Madam Wen pointed at Yingbao with her finger and scolded her: "You little girl, you cause trouble for me as soon as you come back. Why don't you come and review the lessons you missed."
"Yes." Yingbao giggled and sat with Wenshu to read.
During the break, Wen Shu told Ying Bao, "My mother and I will be going back to Yuzhou in a few days."
Yingbao frowned: "Why?"
Wen Shu whispered, "My grandparents asked me to go back." She was embarrassed to tell Yingbao that she was already eleven years old and had to go back to the family to meet her parents.
In fact, Chuchu was not the only one who had troubles getting married. She had the same troubles, so A Niang agreed to help Chuchu this time.
But women are born to get married, so although she resisted, she had to compromise.
Yingbao knew that one day she would have to part with Sister Wen and the others, and she also anticipated that they might not be together for the rest of their lives.
He went forward to hug Wen Shu, put his face against her chest, and whispered: "Then you must remember me when you go back, and write to me often. Don't be like last time, when you left and there was no news after you left."
Wen Shu didn't expect Ying Bao to say this, and he chuckled: "I thought you would be reluctant to let me go."
"No matter how reluctant you are to leave, you will leave anyway." Yingbao sighed, "All good things must come to an end. As long as I am thinking of you, that's all that matters."
Wen Shu touched her head and hummed softly, "I will always think of you and write to you often, Yingbao, you have to be well. If you have any difficulties, please write to me. My family has a medicine shop in the city called Kang'an Pharmacy. My father is temporarily practicing medicine there."
Yingbao nodded: "Okay, I understand."
Wen Shu added: "Yuzhou will arrange for someone to come over. If you send a letter, let him take it."
"Um."
A few days later, Chuchu's biological father came to pick up Chuchu, but he was sent away by Madam Wen and never came again.
After another ten days, Yan Ru had used up all the icing sugar and made more than a hundred kilograms of apricot and peach preserves, and also some pear preserves.
All these preserved fruits have been dried and packed in jars, and some of them have been taken to the county town by Jiang Quan for sale.
However, preserved fruits are not selling well nowadays and are not as popular as fresh fruits.
Jiang Quan and his elder brother Jiang Cheng picked ripe apricots and peaches these days, transported them to the county town by horse-drawn carriage, and set up a fruit stall in front of Yingbao's shop. As a result, the business was very brisk.
During this period, Jiang Sanlang also went there once, paid someone to renovate the house and shop, and asked his nephew Dacheng to look after them.
The money for renovating the house was given by the younger daughter, a total of more than one hundred taels. It was the money that Mrs. Wen advanced to Jin Er, and in the end it was all used up.
Seeing that the grapes and peppers were ripe, Yingbao decided to pick some for Wu Daozi to try, and took her older brother Jiang Jie to visit Grandpa Wu.
The carriage arrived in front of the shop first. Jiang Quan and his eldest brother, who came with him, took three baskets of grapes off the carriage and left one basket of grapes on the carriage, preparing to give it to Mr. Wu tomorrow.
Yingbao put some grapes in a basket and put it together with the baskets on the car.
Afterwards, Jiang Sanlang drove his carriage to his new home in Meihua Lane. He wanted to tidy up and see how the carpenter was progressing.
Yingbao took her younger brother Jiang Jie to check inside and outside the store.
The shop had been cleaned and some brand new small bamboo baskets were piled inside.
The damaged parts of the house were repaired, and even the three huts at the back were renovated, but they were empty inside.
Jiang Quan followed behind his little cousin and said with a chuckle, "I will be the head shopkeeper of this shop from now on."
Yingbao said seriously: "Second brother, when you become the shopkeeper, you will be a merchant."
"Merchants are merchants." Jiang Quan said nonchalantly.
Jiang Cheng glanced at his brother and said, "It doesn't matter if you are a merchant, but don't let Yuanbao get in trouble."
"What do you mean?" Jiang Quan frowned: "I am a merchant, what does it have to do with Yuanbao?"
Yingbao: "Because the Mingfu said that as long as one person in the family is engaged in business, they are also merchants."
Jiang Quan scratched his head, was silent for a while, and suddenly said: "Then I will separate myself. I will have my own account and it has nothing to do with others."
Jiang Cheng sneered: "How old are you? You are not yet an adult, and you don't have a family or a career. How can you divide the household?"
“This…” Jiang Quan was at a loss.
Jiang Cheng continued, "I just became an adult this year." He glanced at his little cousin and said, "So I can be the shopkeeper of this shop."
Jiang Quan got angry when he heard this: "No! I, I..." He stuttered for a long time and couldn't think of any words to refute.
Indeed, my eldest brother has already grown up, and if he proposes to separate the family and start a business, my parents will definitely not object.
Jiang Jie tilted his head and looked at his eldest brother and then at his second brother and said, "Eldest brother hasn't gotten married yet." Not getting married means not having a family and career. Jiang Jie understood this.
Jiang Cheng pinched his cousin's cheek and threatened in a low voice: "I won't buy you mutton skewers later!"
Jiang Quan laughed and said, "It's okay, Xiaojie, I'll buy it for you later."
Yingbao on the side: ······
At this time, two servants in black walked into the shop.
"Huh? You guys also sell Western grapes?" A man saw two baskets of purple grapes in the shop, picked a few and stuffed them into his mouth, and said vaguely, "Not bad, not bad. How much is one pound?"
Jiang Quan ran over and said, "50 wen per jin. Since you are the first customer today, I will give you a discount and make it 35 wen per jin."
This customer is a regular here and has bought fruit from him several times.
The black-clothed servant curled his lips, picked a few more grapes and stuffed them into his mouth, muttering, "Alright, alright, thirty cents a pound, weigh ten pounds for me." Then he took out three hundred copper coins from the bag around his waist.
While complaining about the loss, Jiang Quan weighed out ten kilograms of grapes for him and also gave him a small bamboo basket because he had nothing to put them in.
The man who came with the servant also weighed five pounds, paid one hundred and fifty coins, and took a basket to contain it without any hesitation.
After the two men left, Jiang Quan put all the copper coins in a wooden box and muttered, "I lost another ten coins."
He bought these bamboo baskets from a porter for five cents each and reserved them for customers who bought large amounts of fruit.
Yingbao: "Not bad, not a loss."
Although grapes are sold at 30 wen per pound, which is not expensive, they are not cheap either. The advantage is that these grapes are all grown by ourselves, so we don’t spend any money on them. If we buy them from the fruit shops in the county and then sell them, we will lose a lot of money.
At this moment, Yingbao felt that her second cousin was more suitable to be a waiter.