If my guess is true, then what happened that made Cheng Chi leave the Cheng family after Madam Guo passed away
It takes a long time for the ice to freeze three feet thick.
Zhou Shaojin thought about the suppression of Cheng Chi by the second-house ancestor, and Cheng Chi's behavior... If Cheng Chi had planned to leave the Cheng family at this time, then everything would make sense. Including his indifference to Cheng Xu, the arrangement of the maids around him, and his plans for his marriage... All of them had answers.
She even thought that if it were her, she would probably do the same.
Since you have decided to leave, the less you worry about someone, the better, and the more distant your feelings are, the better.
Zhou Shaojin was lost in thought when someone patted him on the shoulder.
"What are you thinking about?" Ji Ying's cold and beautiful face appeared in front of her. "I called you several times but you didn't respond."
Zhou Shaojin smiled at her apologetically.
Ji Ying said, "We can't drink today - I'm under house arrest and can't step out of this door; and you're powerless and can't dig. We can only wait for Qin Ziping to come over tonight and ask him for help."
Zhou Shaojin was no longer in the mood to drink with Jiying, so he left the crabs, made an appointment to come back tomorrow, and returned to Wanxiangju.
In Lixuezhai, not far from here, Cheng Chi was looking at the account book.
He asked Huaishan, who was standing in front of his desk with his hands folded in his sleeves, "What does the second in command of the Thirteen Hongs in Guangdong say?"
Huaishan said respectfully, "They said that they received 10% of the military pay from the nine borders this year, and they can't come up with that much cash at once. Can they take half first? They will use their branches in Guangdong, Panyu, Foshan, and Huizhou as collateral for the remaining half, with an interest rate of 3%, and pay it back in two years..."
"No!" Before Huaishan could finish his words, Cheng Chi, who had just turned a page in the account book, interrupted him firmly and said, "Tell them to give a little and pay it all off. If they still can't come up with the cash, tell the Fujian An family to prepare the money."
Huaishan couldn't help but say, "Fourth Master, the four branches in Guangdong, Panyu, Foshan, and Huizhou are the earliest branches of the Thirteen Hongs, and they are also the face of the Thirteen Hongs. They used these four branches as guarantees, and it is obvious that they sincerely want to take over our shipping company. And I have also inquired clearly that the Thirteen Hongs fought with Yongfu Sheng in the capital to receive the military pay from the Nine Borders, and both sides suffered losses. After this mission, they must have lost money, and it depends on how much they lose. Why are you so aggressive? The head of the Thirteen Hongs is a big shot. But the An family in Fujian made their fortune by colluding with Japanese pirates, and the money in their hands is not clean. If the court investigates, it will be very troublesome..."
"Huaishan!" Cheng Chi put down the account book in his hand, rubbed his brows tiredly, and said, "We need cash. I don't have time to wait for him for two years. Two years, too much has changed. I don't want to wait any longer!"
"Fourth Master!" Huaishan lowered his head in shame.
Cheng Chi looked at him, stood up, walked to him, patted his shoulder, and whispered: "I know you are doing this for my own good. I hope I can still be a famous and romantic person in this prosperous place in the south of the Yangtze River with the title of the fourth master of the Cheng family. But I am tired of it. I want to drink a pot of muddy wine and wake up in the wind and sand of the desert; boil a pot of clear tea and fall asleep listening to the tide of the waves...
"Fourth Master!" Huaishan raised his head with some excitement, his eyes slightly moist, and said, "Please stop talking, I will go and inform the Fujian An family right now!"
Cheng Chi paused for a moment while resting his hand on Huaishan's shoulder, and said, "Forget it! You have a point. The An family is too arrogant, and sooner or later something bad will happen. It will be bad if the Cheng family is implicated. Go talk to the second in command of the Thirteenth Bank, and do as they said before, pay half of the silver first, and settle the balance in two years."
"Fourth Master!" Huaishan opened his eyes wide in surprise.
Cheng Chi rarely changes his decision.
"Maybe it's because I'm getting older and softer." Cheng Chi knew it too. He smiled self-deprecatingly, "I can ignore others, but I can't ignore my mother. This matter... is settled."
Huaishan nodded and said hesitantly: "Fourth Master, Miss Jiying..."
"Are you talking about the Maoji Rice Shop?" Cheng Chi said indifferently, turned around and sat back on the armchair behind the desk, and said, "Just have someone follow that servant. Even if Jiying doesn't know what's good for her, the Ji family won't be foolish. Otherwise, they wouldn't have drawn a clear line with the Jiao family. However, this incident also reminds me, that second cousin of the Zhou family, you should send someone to find out her background. If she can order Jiying to run errands for her, she must not be a simple person."
He thought about how she had approached him several times, and thought she was just curious. But now it seems that may not be the case.
Cheng Chi's eyes narrowed slightly, and his brows became as sharp as a sword.
Huaishan was shocked and lowered his head as if he couldn't bear to look directly at it. He said, "I'll arrange it right away", bowed and retreated to the door before leaving.
Cheng Chi sat alone in the room, watching the light in the room dim little by little until the darkness enveloped him.
※
The next day, Zhou Shaojin did not go to Jiying to eat crabs.
Because Lanting insisted on seeing her and even started a hunger strike.
Zhou Chujin was very annoyed and said to Ma Fushan's family who came to report the news: "If she was willing to die, she would have died long ago. You don't have to worry about her. Just deliver three meals a day. Whether she eats or not is her own business."
Zhou Shaojin thought this was not a big deal, so he thought about it and said, "I'll go meet her!"
Zhou Chujin disagreed and said, "She just wants to force you to meet her."
Zhou Shaojin knew that everyone thought she was a pushover, and that they would come to her for help when things didn't work with her sister. In her previous life, she always shook her head, but in this life, she couldn't push all these things onto her sister and let her bear the bad reputation of being "unfilial".
What's more, this incident was caused by her!
"Didn't she keep saying that she was following my mother's orders?" Zhou Shaojin said to his sister, "Then let's make it clear and see what my mother told her to do. We will do whatever my mother told us to do. But if it wasn't my mother's order, we can't just let her do whatever she wants. Otherwise, what will happen to those mothers who raised us?"
Zhou Chujin thought this made sense and couldn't help but look at his sister with new eyes. He smiled and said, "Okay. I'll go with you. You talk to her and I'll listen behind the screen."
My sister is still afraid that she will be fooled.
But this is already a big concession.
Zhou Shaojin nodded with a smile, and after explaining the reason to Old Lady Guan, he and Zhou Chujin returned to the Zhou family's ancestral home accompanied by Ma Fushan's family.
Ma Fushan's family placed Lan Ting in a wing room behind the upper house and arranged a maid and a woman to "serve" her.
In his previous life, Zhou Shaojin's impression of Lan Ting was limited to the incident of "leaving the mother and keeping the son". When he saw her in this life, he couldn't help but look at her carefully.
She looked no more than seventeen or eighteen years old, with fair and smooth skin, a small oval face, and a pair of big watery eyes that twinkled, making her indescribably charming.
Zhou Shaojin was very surprised.
My mother has been dead for eleven years, and Lanting must be at least twenty-four or twenty-five years old now.
She didn't expect Lanting to look so young.
When she saw Zhou Shaojin, she knelt down in front of him and tears fell like rain.
"Second Miss, I finally get to see you. When I left, you were just this young." She wiped her tears, "It's a pity that I miss you every day, but I dare not go against Madam's wishes and let the master go to his post alone..."
Zhou Shaojin suddenly understood his sister's irritability.
Her mother has passed away, but she is still using her mother's name to seek personal gain... How shameless!
Zhou Shaojin interrupted Lan Ting's crying and said, "Get up and talk! The ground is cold."
Lan Ting was stunned for a moment, then her tears fell even harder, and she said, "Second Miss, you are really like my wife, you are just as kind-hearted..."
Zhou Shaojin smiled without saying anything, sat down on the armchair in the main hall, and asked Lan Ting: "Can you write?"
All this mixed up made Lan Ting a little confused.
She thought for a moment and said, "Yes, my wife taught me."
"That's good." Zhou Shaojin said softly, "I know that mother entrusted us sisters to you before she died. Father has respected you for this reason over the years. This time, it was actually our sister's idea to ask you to come back and give her the pearls."
Lan Ting was stunned.
Zhou Shaojin pretended not to see it and continued slowly, "We sisters were still young when our mother passed away. Now that I think about it, if it weren't for the small portrait of our mother hanging in our father's study, I'm afraid we wouldn't even know what our mother looked like. We sisters discussed it and called you back. Since you can write, why don't you write down what our mother said before she died? It can also be regarded as leaving a memory for us sisters."
Lan Ting immediately realized that Zhou Shaojin was annoyed that she always used Zhuang's as an excuse.
She sneered in her heart.
What did Zhuang say before she died? Zhou Zhen was not here, so she could just say whatever she wanted!
She nodded timidly.
Zhou Shaojin asked Ma Fushan's family to prepare writing brushes and ink for her.
Ma Fushan's family cast an admiring look at Zhou Shaojin.
Zhou Shaojin was ashamed.
She knew that Ma Fushan's family had misunderstood her. She just didn't want to listen to Lan Ting's chatter.
Soon, Lan Ting finished writing Zhuang's "last words".
Zhou Shaojin quickly scanned the text and asked Lan Ting, "Are you saying that mother asked you to take care of father and us?"
"Yes!" Lan Ting said with a red face, her eyelids drooping slightly, looking shy.
Of course there is more to it, but this sentence is the most important.
Zhou Shaojin smiled and said, "If that's the case, why don't you want to stay in the Zhou family? Father is now being taken care of by our stepmother, and we sisters are missing someone who can make decisions. Don't you want to take care of us sisters?"
Lanting was stunned.
Does Zhou Shaojin really not understand or is he pretending not to understand
She looked at Zhou Shaojin's delicate and beautiful yet slightly immature face, and suddenly felt that she seemed to have found the wrong person!
However, Zhou Chujin is even more powerful.
She had no chance of winning against Zhou Chujin.
Lan Ting's tears fell again. She knelt in front of Zhou Shaojin again and said, "The eldest and second young ladies are taken care of by the Cheng family, but the master is working alone outside. How can I leave the master alone in office..."
※
I know that everyone doesn't like to see these plots of wives and concubines fighting for favor, but please be patient. I write a sweet love story, and there are really few parts about house fighting. Every plot has a purpose... O(∩_∩)O~
PS: There are only two updates today, and tomorrow's additional update is scheduled to be around 3 p.m.
Finally, please give me a pink vote...
※(To be continued)