Chapter 9.2: Love Affair
Jiang Lî thanked Madam Liu and afterwards, Madam Liu took all the madams and young ladies to rest in the nunnery. Immediately afterwards, Yu Xiang followed Jiang Lî. Jiang Lî and Tong’er changed their usual room to a nun’s cozy room. In the temple, not even one nun was seen at all.
Taking advantage of the time when Yu Xiang went out to bring water, Tong’er asked Jiang Lî in a low voice: “Young lady, what’s going on ah? Where are all the Buddhist nuns? Why are there so many people coming here?”
Tong’er had probably guessed that Jiang Lî had something to do with this matter. But she didn’t know, in the end, what exactly Jiang Lî had done. These days, Jiang Lî only told her to feed the monkeys. But merely feeding monkeys wouldn’t cause any events ah!
“Didn’t I ask you to feed the monkeys?” Jiang Lî mildly said: “Master Tong Ming who is in charge of He Lin Temple has an adult disciple called Liao Wu. This disciple has an affair with Head Nun Jing An from our Buddhist nunnery. Every month on the nineteenth, they will have their tryst at the back of He Lin Temple. These monkeys in the mountain were fed pastries in the past half month. Every night they would wait in the same place where you had fed them. Tonight is the nineteenth and as usual the monkeys waited for you to send food. Seeing Jing An and Liao Wu, they thought they were the ones who were bringing food and advanced to get their food. These two people originally had guilty conscience and were very likely to be startled by the sound of the movements, which in turn disturbed the ladies and gentlemen there. The ladies and madams who came are wealthy and respectable people. How could they tolerate filthy matters on the clean Buddhist ground? They most certainly must demand explanations and the rules to be held. So the Buddhist nuns must have already been all arrested.
Tong’er understood clearly after hearing Jiang Lî’s explanation and mumbled: “How is it possible…….” She nervously stood up and sat down again a few times, “Such a hidden matter, how did young miss find out?”
“I heard it.” Jiang Lî picked up the cup of tea on the table and took a sip. “Two little nuns were gossiping and I overheard.”
Tong’er could still not cope with all this situation: “It’s too awful.”
Jiang Lî smiled, naturally she knew. At that time when she was still Xue Fang Fei, Princess Yong Ning would get somebody to give her Chinese medicine every day, hoping that she would slowly wither and die. She was kept in house arrest and could not go out. Those female servants spoke without paying any attention to her, treating her as an already dead person. So she found out, actually the place where Princess Yong Ning and Shen Yurong had their trysts was precisely at a temple not too far from Yanjing.
Those female servants also revealed another secret. Liao Wu from He Lin Temple was actually an amorous monk and the females that he had defiled were a lot. Even the nuns at the neighboring nunnery were not spared from his grasp. Princess Yong Ning got inspired exactly from this Liao Wu. So she held her rendezvous with Shen Yurong at a temple in a similar fashion.
When she woke up and became Jiang second miss, and then learnt that not too far from there was the back of He Lin Temple, the first thing she recalled was this piece of secret. Especially after she met Head Nun Jing An, Jiang Lî was even more convinced that Head Nun Jing An definitely had a lover. A young female nun with such good looks, if she didn’t have a man in her heart, why would she use hair ointment, why would she put an attractive fragrance on herself?
In the end, it was to maintain herself pretty.
A complete plan emerged in Jiang Lî’s mind. Naturally, this plan might not succeed. Perhaps, what those female servants gossiped about was untrue. Perhaps, Head Nun Jing An’s boyfriend was not Liao Wu. There was also the possibility that during their tryst, they didn’t let any sound out. Any of these things would become a critical factor in causing her plan to fail.
Until the time came, Jiang Lî could only look for another way.
However, her luck couldn’t be that bad. As many coincidences equaled as much success.
Tong’er put her palms together in prayer: “Thankfully young miss heard their gossip. Thankfully young miss thought of this method. By the way, what if young miss didn’t meet that Madam Liu? Maybe all of these lucky coincidences came to us because of seeing the flower demon tonight……. No, the appearance of the spirit of the flower deity let those evil creatures receive their retribution!”
Flower deity? In front of Jiang Lî’s eyes, immediately appeared the appearance of the frivolous man perched on the roof beams.
“He was not a deity.” Jiang Lî laughed.
“He was Duke Su.”