“You…” Shen Yuru watched as Jiang Xuening turned back and slowly approached her. Being stared at by those clear, untainted eyes made Shen Yuru feel a chill run down her spine.
“What are you trying to do?”
“Did what you said just now mean that I don’t want those pieces of jewelry because I have a guilty conscience?”
“I-I mean, that’s exactly what it is.”
“All right, then.” The corners of Jiang Xuening’s lips curved up slightly. “To prove that I don’t have a guilty conscience, I’ll take all those pieces of jewelry.”
Shen Yuru’s eyes widened in disbelief.
Jiang Xuening turned to the shopkeeper and instructed, “Wrap up all three sets of jewelry I looked at just now and put them on the Heir Apparent’s account. If the Heir Apparent comes after me about it, shopkeeper, remember to testify on my behalf. It was Fourth Younger Sister who forced me to take them. If I didn’t take them, she’d accuse me of being a thief who had stolen his private seal…”
“I… You…” Shen Yuru was left speechless by her retort.
The shopkeeper stood there dumbfounded for a moment. After weighing the importance of the Fourth Young Lady of the Marquis’s Residence against that of the Heir Apparent’s wife, he ultimately decided to obey the latter.
He had the three sets of jewelry carefully wrapped and even sent someone to deliver them personally to the Marquis’s Residence.
Jiang Xuening glanced at the dumbfounded Shen Yuru before leaving gracefully.
…
Jingning Marquis’s Residence, Muyun Courtyard.
The three sets of jewelry were neatly arranged on the dressing table in the bedroom. All three had solid gold as their base, some adorned with gemstones and others with pearls. The golden luster complemented the radiance of the jewels, exuding both elegance and wealth. They were undoubtedly top-quality pieces.
The mistress and her two maids stared at them, unable to look away.
Jiang Xuening had never seen anything particularly valuable before and had no idea how much these three sets were worth. Thinking that Chunlan and Xiamo had both previously served Madam Zhou and therefore had more experience than she did, she asked them,
“How much do you think these three sets of jewelry are worth?”
The two maids shook their heads, saying they could not guess. However, Chunlan pointed at a pair of gold earrings set with pearls and tourmaline.
“The First Madam used to have a pair that looked similar. I heard they cost thirty-eight taels of silver.”
A single pair of earrings cost nearly forty taels of silver?
And those earrings were merely the least valuable pieces in one of the jewelry sets.
Jiang Xuening estimated that each set must be worth at least three hundred taels of silver. The three sets together would amount to more than a thousand taels.
Shen Yi certainly would not buy these for her. Rather than wait for him to demand them back, it would be better to return them to him voluntarily so that he would not think she was an insatiably greedy person.
Thus, when Shen Yi returned that evening, Jiang Xuening knocked on the study door. She placed his private seal and all three sets of jewelry on his desk and told him what had happened at Baohua Pavilion that day.
“Fourth Younger Sister insisted that I was a thief who had stolen your private seal. I was angry, so I brought these three sets of jewelry back. I’ve gotten my anger out now, so I’ll trouble you to return these three sets of jewelry, Husband…”
In fact, Shen Yi had already learned about the incident as soon as he returned to the residence. He also knew that Fourth Younger Sister had provoked Jiang Xuening first. As compensation, he did not mind giving the three sets of jewelry to her.
“Since you’ve already brought them back, there’s no reason to return them,” Shen Yi said. “Just keep them.”
Jiang Xuening was startled and hurriedly waved her hands.
“I-I can’t afford these.”
Shen Yi glanced at her with amusement.
“Didn’t you charge them to my account? Naturally, I’ll pay for them.”
“Then… how much do they cost?”
“More than a thousand taels.”
Although Jiang Xuening had already guessed the amount, hearing him confirm it still made her heart jolt.
She remembered that before getting married, she had gritted her teeth and asked Legal Mother for three thousand taels so that her mother would have enough money to live comfortably for the rest of her life.
Yet these three sets of jewelry alone cost more than a thousand taels.
Such an astonishing sum was spoken of so casually by Shen Yi, as though it were not more than a thousand taels, but merely a hundred or so.
Even a hundred-plus taels was more than Jiang Xuening could bear.
“Husband,” she asked tentatively, “do you have a lot of money?”
Shen Yi nodded casually.
“How much?”
“A lot, but it’s inconvenient to tell you.”
“Did you earn it legitimately?”
“…” Shen Yi raised an eyebrow at her. “What do you mean?”
Her dark, bright eyes looked at him with a hint of disdain.
“You know exactly what I mean.”
He was the Assistant Director of the Court of Imperial Sacrifices, a fifth-rank official whose monthly salary was around seventy to eighty taels. Although he was the Heir Apparent of the Jingning Marquis’s Residence, he had not yet inherited the family’s estate. Like her, he could only receive his monthly allowance from the household.
By that calculation, he should only have a little over a hundred taels a month.
Yet he could casually spend more than a thousand taels to buy jewelry for her.
He was even willing to spend that much on her despite not liking her.
That alone suggested that he must have an enormous amount of money.
But where did his income come from?
It was difficult not to let one’s thoughts wander in an unpleasant direction.
“I don’t want these pieces of jewelry.” She glared at him, her voice filled with disgust. “And I don’t want to use your dirty money anymore!”
“Dirty money?”
A low chuckle rose from his throat.
Looking at the angry young woman before him, Shen Yi did not know why, but instead of finding her annoying, he found her rather adorable.
“What kind of person do you take me for?”
Jiang Xuening did not dare say it too loudly. She muttered vaguely,
“A corrupt official…”
She did not know that, in Shen Yi’s eyes, the way she disliked him yet was afraid of offending him was particularly amusing.
Thus, his light chuckle gradually turned into hearty laughter.
Ever since their marriage, it had been a long time since he had laughed so freely.
Jiang Xuening had no idea why he was laughing. Seeing his laughter grow louder and louder, she blinked uneasily.
“Y-You should stop laughing. You’re scaring me.”
“When you called me a corrupt official, why weren’t you afraid?” Shen Yi finally stopped laughing, though the smile remained at the corners of his lips.
“Then are you one or not?”
“Of course not.”
“Then why do you have so much money?”
Shen Yi was in an especially good mood that day, so he did not mind explaining it to her.
“Besides my official salary and my monthly allowance from the residence, I also possess quite a few tea certificates, salt certificates, and medicinal-aroma certificates. The income generated by these commercial permits is quite substantial.”
“Tea certificates? Salt certificates? Medicinal-aroma certificates?”
It was the first time Jiang Xuening had ever heard of such things.
“What are those?”
“They are exclusive trading permits issued by the government for tea, salt, and medicinal herbs. With them, one can engage in trade for profit, collect the goods and sell them independently, or hold onto them until the market is favorable and then resell them to exchange shops in the city for ready cash…”
Jiang Xuening knew that she lacked worldly knowledge, but she had never realized just how little she knew.
She had never known that such a way of making money existed in this world.
Seeing the curiosity on her face, Shen Yi took out a salt certificate and showed it to her.
“It’s this.”
Jiang Xuening took it and examined it repeatedly before asking,
“How much money can one make from this?”
“When the market is good, it can be resold for twice the price. If you collect the salt yourself and sell it, then after deducting the costs, the profit from a single salt certificate can equal the income of an ordinary household for two or three years…”
Jiang Xuening’s almond-shaped eyes suddenly widened.
She secretly calculated in her mind.
An ordinary household’s income for two or three years was probably around a hundred taels.
That meant a single salt certificate could earn that much.
And Shen Yi certainly did not have only one.
Besides these, he also had tea certificates and medicinal-aroma certificates…
No wonder he did not even take more than a thousand taels seriously.
Shen Yi pulled the commercial permit back from her hands and looked at the dumbfounded young woman, teasing her.
“Now, do you still think my money is dirty?”