Chapter 415 No Shrewishness, No Rules
A few moments later, He Shuijin was led in. Just as Madame Zhuang had said, her eyes were still slightly red. But she had calmed down, and after greeting and taking her seat, she exchanged a few pleasantries and said, “I’ve come to apologize to you today, Aunt!”
Madame Zhuang said unexpectedly, “What happened?”
“Today I went out to inspect some stores. I felt familiar with some of the items in a store, so I asked someone to take me for a closer look. I thought they looked very similar to some of the items in my eighth sister-in-law’s dowry.” When He Shuijin said this, Madame Zhuang’s face became unpleasant.
“I was afraid that I might be mistaken, so I asked the shopkeeper who had taken them. But I found it was someone from our mansion!” He Shuijin was apologetic, “Firstly, I have been in charge of the internal affairs since I entered the mansion. No matter who did this, I am responsible for it! Secondly, I didn’t think that it was really my eighth sister-in-law’s dowry at first, and so I didn’t clear the place when I traced it. I’m afraid that if this spreads a bit… Anyway, it’s all my fault and I beg you to punish me!”
Madame Zhuang looked calm, “Who did this?”
He Shuijin looked as if it hadn’t been convenient for her to say anything. Seeing Qiu Yelan not far away shaking her head slightly towards her to hint that she should not keep Madame Zhuang in suspense at this time, only then did she say, “It was… Brother Yadan’s concubine!”
“Mrs. Chang, go and drag all the concubines in Yadan’s courtyard out. Cane each a hundred times and sell those who are not dead!” Madame Zhuang didn’t even ask who exactly she was, but just ordered!
Such a sharp arrangement made He Shuijin dumbfounded, and only after a while did she say, “And then the concubines…”
“These are the ones you stumbled upon by chance!” Madame Zhuang coldly interrupted her, “Since one concubine did this, are the others necessarily innocent? I wonder how many of An’s mother’s things have been sold off. The dowries are the things that we, the Jiang Family, don’t even touch as her husband’s family, but these lowly women dared to touch them. You can see how reckless they are! If I leave them in the courtyard and even if they don’t do anything now, they will definitely cause trouble in the future! It would be better to get rid of them sooner rather than later!”
And then she called Qiu Yelan, “Although you are just her aunt, since An is under your care, until he grows up and is able to dispose of his mother’s dowry, it is your duty to make things right for him! Tell Mrs. Qu and the others to go with you to Yadan’s side. Take the list of your eighth sister-in-law’s dowries, check them off, and seal them in the wife’s house! If any item is missing, even if you beat all those b*tches to death, find out where they have gone!”
Madame Zhuang couldn’t stop herself from slapping the table and snapping her teeth, “My daughter-in-law was gone, and my official grandson lost his mother just after he was born! Now even his own mother’s belongings have been taken away by a bunch of nasty women that can’t even show up in the public! If we don’t get to the bottom of this, there will be no more ‘rules’ in this family!”
Qiu Yelan was not surprised by Madame Zhuang’s reaction. She had long known how much Madame Zhuang valued the wife over the concubines. No, she not only looked down on the concubines but even ignored them. Jiang Yadan’s trueborn son, An, was not loved enough by Madame Zhuang, but none of his children of concubines was even able to meet their grandmother!
Not to mention his concubines.
Although He Shuijin had heard of Madame Zhuang’s ways, she was not like Qiu Yelan, who was always by her mother-in-law’s side. After getting slightly shocked, she felt envy at her. But in a flash, she regained composure and gently reminded, “Aunt, there are many stores that have the dowry of my eighth sister-in-law, and the profit the past half year…”
Obviously, she had offended Jiang Yadan’s concubines anyway and now she didn’t care about offending them a little more. Besides, as the official daughter-in-law of the third branch, she wasn’t so afraid of the concubines and the concubines’ children! After all, Madame Zhuang’s att.i.tude was obvious. So, if these people wanted to stand up for themselves, they had to go through Madame Zhuang first!
Madame Zhuang slightly frowned and said, “I’ll do the checking of An’s mother’s dowry. Yelan, since you’re pregnant now, you’d better not do hard work.”
If He Shuijin was just envious, it was hard to say how disappointed she felt, “Why am I not lucky enough to have such a mother-in-law?”
However, she did not come here today to see the fourth branch mother-in-law and daughter-in-law being as close as mother and daughter. So, she quickly settled down and said with a smile, “If Aunt does not mind, I am willing to give a hand to my nineteenth sister-in-law. I think I still have some experience in reading the account book.”
Qiu Yelan didn’t want to worry her mother-in-law either. After all, Madame Zhuang had been ill only a short while ago so Qiu Yelan said, “Mother, why don’t you let sister Shuijin help me? I am in good health! Besides, the nannies said that it was better to move around as much as possible during pregnancy!”
Madame Zhuang looked at her daughter-in-law’s sanguine face and pondered for a moment before saying, “In that case, then I’ll leave it to you!” She also urged, “If you don’t feel well, don’t force yourself! If anyone is insensitive, just report to me! I’ll take care of it!”
The two sisters-in-law excused and went out. He Shuijin laughed softly, “You are really lucky for my aunt loves you so much!”
“What’s wrong with you today?” Qiu Yelan looked at her eyes, which hadn’t completely faded from red until now, and asked in a lowered voice.
For a moment, there was a faraway look in He Shuijin’s eyes, but she shook her head, “Nothing.”
“You can just say.” Qiu Yelan said suspiciously, “The sixth brother was gone and because of the eighteenth sister, Yashuang offended your maiden family a lot before. But now things have pa.s.sed. If you need help, you can just say it!”
“Of course.” He Shuijin smiled to herself, ” I’m here to trouble you now, aren’t I? You see, if I hadn’t come here today, you wouldn’t have had to make this trip. And you may be hated.”
Qiu Yelan shook her head, “It’s about my eighth sister-in-law’s dowry, which is also An’s stuff! As my mother said, An is now under my care so how can I not keep his things for him? I should thank you for saying that, otherwise, when An finds out that something is missing when he checks it, how can we still check it out then?”
As they spoke, they had already reached Jiang Yadan’s courtyard, and Mrs. Chang was waiting for them at the door, “Madame has asked me to invite the Eighth Young Master over for a chat.”
This was to avoid the embarra.s.sment of Jiang Yadan’s sisters-in-law coming to the house in that he didn’t have a wife in the house. It also prevented those concubines and the concubines’ children from coming to him crying and making him come out to stop them.
He Shuijin and Qiu Yelan thanked Mrs. Chang for telling them and went in together. By this time there was chaos inside with adults and children!
It actually made sense that when Madame Tao Junior was there, she was unable to manage the courtyard. They were so used to getting away with it that when they were suddenly hit with such a vicious attack, how could they not be in disarray?
But Mrs. Chang and Mrs. Qu were very good at holding the fort. They caught the most favored concubine these days, slapped her twice, and made her kneel down, and then did the same to a few others who were usually in the limelight. Suddenly the rest were shocked and dared not to violate the rules.
But when Qiu Yelan announced that she would investigate thoroughly about Madame Tao Junior’s dowry, a flurry of uproar went around the crowd. This time, Mrs. Chang did not do anything, but announced sorrowfully, “By order of Madame, the fourteenth madame and the madame Qiu will count the eighth madame’s dowry. Anyone who disobeys and provokes trouble will be killed on the spot!”
Having seen her ruthlessness, the crowd immediately calmed down!
The investigation went very smoothly, mainly because Qiu Yelan did not tell them what Madame Zhuang had done with those who had taken away Madame Tao Junior’s dowry. It was also because almost every concubine was not clean. At Madame Zhuang’s words, they all should die!
He Shuijin and Qiu Yelan were not sympathetic with them. As Madame Zhuang said, even a decent husband’s family would not touch his wife’s dowry these days, let alone a concubine! When Madame Tao Junior was alive, she was bullied by those people, and now that she was dead, these people still wanted to continue to bully An, who was still in his infancy!
“Let’s do as mother wishes!” Qiu Yelan looked at the list in her hand and said indifferently.
Madame Tao Junior’s dowry wasn’t checked out at last. The main reason was that many of them had been sold a long time ago. How could they be recovered at the moment?
There were also some that were simply broken, for example, Jiang Jingheng and Jiang Huizhu both revealed each other’s crimes that they had deliberately smashed several of Madame Tao Junior’s porcelain vases of flowers and birds.
Looking at the jewelry, clothing, herbs, and treasures found in each room… even He Shuijin sighed and quietly said to Qiu Yelan, “As for this backyard of brother Yadan, if he doesn’t marry a shrewish wife, you can’t think about the word ‘rules’!”
“It’s a good thing that my mother is a rule-follower!” Qiu Yelan felt suffocated as she didn’t know how tolerant Madame Tao Junior was. How could she be able to live in such a backyard for so many years?
If she had been her, she would have died with Jiang Yadan long ago!
“Please ask the two nannies to tidy up here. I will go back with sister Shuijin to report to my mother first!” Seeing that she really could not recover more on the spot, Qiu Yelan wrote down the things that had been sold out and asked the concubines to get them back. After that, she got up and said to Mrs. Chang and Mrs. Qu.
The two nannies said, “You should go since there is no need to stain your eyes.” Even Qiu Yelan didn’t say so, they were going to ask the same thing. The madame was pregnant. If the execution scene scared her out of her wits, even if they were Madame Zhuang’s henchmen, they couldn’t afford to take responsibility for it!
“If they are so bold in the mansion, how can we say that about the estates and the stores?” Back in the main hall of the fourth branch, Madame Zhuang looked at the things her daughter-in-law and niece-in-law had presented to her and was so angry that her whole body trembled. She couldn’t help but pick up the duster in her hand and smack Jiang Yadan, who was sitting at the bottom, “Look at those who you married! Look at your backyard! No wonder your wife died at such a young age! I feel like I’m going to lose a few years of my life just by looking at them for a while!”
Jiang Yadan was a noncommittal person after growing up crooked, and of all the elders in the Jiang Family, only Marquess Qin could make him truly afraid. But his own mother was different in the end, so he meekly allowed himself to be beaten and scolded, and he only said awkwardly, “What are you saying, mother? Mother is blessed with a long life!”
“If you really want me to live a long life, what do you think about these people?” After a few blows, Madame Zhuang was tugged by He Shuijin and Qiu Yelan by sleeves and they pleaded for mercy for Jiang Yadan. Thinking that her eldest son was so old and was still being watched by her two sisters-in-law, she really shouldn’t make him lose face too much and then put off her duster.
Jiang Yadan was the kind of person that if he could not satisfy everyone, he would not even do such a thing. Thus, he did not have any solutions. He said with a smile, “I listen to my mother on everything!”
“Do you really listen to me?” Madame Zhuang laughed coldly, “And then you don’t want all those concubines!”
Jiang Yadan didn’t even think about it, “Listen to you!”
“All those who have stolen An’s mother’s dowry will have their children’s share of the family property, dowry and daily reduced by half!” When Madame Zhuang saw Jiang Yadan’s hesitation after she said this, her anger flared up again and she shouted angrily, “What? They have bullied An’s mother to death, and now they are bullying An. You are a father and a husband! Can the dignity of your wife and trueborn son be made up by just those lowly women’s lives?”
Only then did Jiang Yadan say, “No!”
When Madame Zhuang saw that he was obedient, her anger subsided a little, and she said to He Shuijin in a pleasant manner, “As for An’s mother’s dowry, the ones in the house have all been counted today, and we have sent people to check the lost ones. But I’ll have to ask you to run through the accounts and the stores outside.”
The implication was that she didn’t believe in the account books reported. After all, the mansion had gone too far. No one knew if the books were true or not. Not to say that they would have to be checked one by one, at least a few of them would have to be randomly checked!
But she couldn’t let Qiu Yelan go as well. Even if she took a carriage and only listened to what was going on, her pregnancy of five or six months would not be able to withstand the torment.
It was not an easy thing for Madame Zhuang to go, either. For one thing, at her age, she couldn’t afford to be rattled, and for another, she still had a lot of work to do. As there was no one suitable in the fourth branch, she could only leave it to He Shuijin. Especially as He Shuijin was an expert at this, she would be more efficient and productive than Madame Zhuang and her daughter-in-law!
“What are you talking about, Aunt?” He Shuijin said respectfully, “Since you don’t mind my recklessness, I am already grateful! Moreover, my eighth sister-in-law took great care of me during her lifetime, so I would like to do my best for her and for An!”
Madame Zhuang was pleased with her att.i.tude and took off the bracelet she was wearing to reward her, “Go back and tell your third sister-in-law that I need to borrow you, and if you have any difficulties, just call me!”
Qiu Yelan did not make a sound, but in her mind, she thought, “What is her intention in revealing this?”
She didn’t believe that He Shuijin was afraid that if she didn’t come to report this, Madame Zhuang would be in trouble if she found out that Madame Tao Junior’s dowry had been p.a.w.ned off on her own store. She could have concealed it with her skills. After all, she didn’t need to hide it for long as Madame Zhuang wouldn’t live in Jing City for long before she leaves for Beijiang. Even if it was revealed, she could just say she didn’t know and hand over a few scapegoats to end it.
“Although she is not afraid of the trouble caused by this matter, with her nature, if it’s not beneficial, she will not offend people in this way… What exactly does she want to do?”
When Qiu Yelan returned to her courtyard, she was still thinking about this. She quietly called Su He, “Go to the Ruan’s Mansion to borrow some unfamiliar people and… Ask them to keep a tight eye on her and be careful not to be noticed!”