She smiled: “Mother, feel free to speak. As a widow, what gossip do I have to fear?”
“You…”
“What? If Mother cares too much about face to say it, then I’ll say it for you,” Hai Yunshu recounted calmly: “Back then, if it weren’t for Mother-in-law’s persuasive words, my stubborn father wouldn’t have insisted on breaking off the engagement, making me come to fill the financial hole of the Marquis’s household.
“Mother-in-law knew I had a marriage contract with the Jiang family, so you shouldn’t have urged my father to break his promise. Later, since you succeeded, took the silver and gained the advantage, you shouldn’t have used this matter to stab me in the back, making me lose face in front of everyone.”
Old Madame Cheng didn’t expect her to retort: “What urging? Your Hai family wanted to break off the engagement yourselves, what does it have to do with the Marquis’s household?”
“Nothing to do with the Marquis’s household? If I remember correctly, Mother-in-law’s burial money also came from my dowry, didn’t it?”
The Old Madame’s face flushed red down to her neck in anger: “You, what kind of nonsense are you talking?”
“The dowry list, the red-headed account books—every word and figure that has filled the Marquis’s household’s holes over the years has witnesses. If you don’t believe it, let’s check item by item and see who’s really talking nonsense?”
Old Madame Cheng never expected that Hai Yunshu, who had always been easily manipulated, would suddenly become so assertive. In her panic, she was left without a comeback.
Seeing this, the elder sister-in-law hurriedly tried to mediate: “Sister-in-law, Mother didn’t mean it that way. In this household, you’re the most well-read and have the broadest connections for spending money. We just wanted to discuss it together. Now that the men of the family have all been arrested, we must think of a way, mustn’t we?”
Think of what way?
Wasn’t it just wanting her to continue using money to buy connections?
Over the years, the eldest brother loved currying favor with the powerful, spending lavishly in taverns and gambling dens. Sanlang and Si Lang, young and impulsive, always lingered in pleasure quarters, and the debts for the girls’ rouge and powder, inside and out—which ones weren’t brought to her to repay?
Under the pretext that the Marquis’s household was managed by Hai Yunshu, naturally, they needed her approval.
But who ever reported their expenses in advance and entered them into the household accounts? Weren’t they all just Hai Yunshu using her own dowry time and again to patch their holes and keep the peace?
Even so, in the eyes of some, she was still of lowly merchant birth. Even with immense wealth, she couldn’t compare to their prestigious, high-minded families and deserved to be exploited.
Hai Yunshu looked at the household members’ leech-like behavior, and the more she thought about it, the more stifled she felt.
“Whether the Marquis is truly dead or escapes back to face death, either way, I’m going to be a widow, so there’s nothing for me to worry about.” Hai Yunshu adopted a stance of washing her hands of the matter: “But as for you all, with your husbands’ lives in danger, instead of thinking of ways yourselves, you’re still here thinking of having someone else step forward. Ridiculous.”
Only then did they panic: “You, you can’t just give up and not care about the lives of the other branches, can you?”
“Jiang Chengjing specifically named you to go. Even if we wanted to beg him, we have no way to reach him.”
“What, is knowing one more person than you all now my crime?”
“He’s someone who never bargains, acts arbitrarily, and kills without blinking. Offending him means death for us either way.”
The Marquis of Mingjin—such a noble household—with one accusation of rebellion, he turned the Marquis’s household upside down.
“Usually, you all boast about being official families, scholarly households. Why is it that at a critical moment, all those disciples and old connections disappear? And you want a merchant’s daughter to step forward?”
Truly, the righteous are often found among butchers and dog-handlers, while the heartless are most often scholars.
Old Madame Cheng was also greatly puzzled, pretending: “Yunshu, what if Zifeng is still alive? Don’t you want to save him?”
“Why should I save him? It would be best if he died.”
“What?” The old madame was dumbfounded.
“Dead men tell no tales, and no one can pin anything on us. If Cheng Zifeng is truly a coward who fears death, surrenders to the enemy and then runs back, wouldn’t that bring disaster upon the whole family?”
Her reasoning was sound, and several of the women nodded in agreement.
Old Madame Cheng was like a mute tasting bitter herbs—unable to voice her suffering.
Was Hai Yunshu planning to wash her hands of everything once the funeral was over?
To abandon Second Son as a dead man outside, so she could seize the opportunity to take charge?
She should never have told her in the first place!
For three consecutive days, news kept pouring into the marquis’s estate.
It was nothing more than Eldest Son, unable to endure the flogging, blabbering wildly and exposing the marquis’s estate’s embezzlement of imperial estate funds and grain.
Third Son and Fourth Son had even less backbone; before even being tortured, they began turning on each other, accusing one another of forcibly seizing common women and forcing good girls into prostitution.
In short, before Cheng Zifeng’s defeat and surrender to the enemy could be thoroughly investigated, the others had already gotten themselves entangled in lawsuits.
The entire family was restless, unable to eat or sleep peacefully, with only Hai Yunshu remaining calm. Aside from holding her child, she spent her time reviewing account books, as if she had long devised a plan.
That morning, a palace eunuch came to deliver an imperial decree. It made no mention of the marquis’s estate’s case, only stating that it was the Empress Dowager’s birthday and that the marquis’s wife, Lady Hai, was to be invited to the palace for the evening banquet.
The decree’s arrival was somewhat peculiar.
The marquis’s estate was under lockdown, with no one allowed in or out. Not to mention the Empress Dowager’s birthday, even the customary court visits by titled ladies should have been exempted.
Yingge sensed the deeper meaning: “Madam, I fear this may be a banquet at Hongmen.”
“You noticed the strangeness too?”
The eunuch delivering the decree had an unfamiliar face and claimed to serve by the emperor’s side, but Hai Yunshu could smell the Yunxue Ganlu incense on him—a fragrance unique to the Empress Dowager’s palace.
The current emperor was only six years old, with the Eastern and Western Empress Dowagers ruling from behind the curtains.
Among them, Empress Dowager Xi, née Kang, was the Young Emperor’s birth mother.
Empress Dowager Kang was in the prime of her youth and beauty and was Jiang Chengjing’s cousin.
Because of her youth, many privately referred to her as the Little Empress Dowager.
There were rumors among the common folk that the Little Empress Dowager had long been secretly involved with the Prince Regent, and the two indulged in shameless, extravagant pleasures even within the imperial palace.
Otherwise, given the Jiang family’s former status, how could they have risen so rapidly if not by climbing the Empress Dowager’s line and becoming imperial relatives?
“Perhaps, Madam, you should plead illness and not go.”
“Of course I will go. Not only will I go, but I also intend to see Jiang Chengjing.”
“This servant does not understand.”
A faint smile appeared at the corner of Hai Yunshu’s lips. In truth, she had long laid her plans and had been waiting for him.
To avoid wasting time, it was she who had anonymously sent a secret letter accusing Cheng Zifeng of surrendering to the enemy.
She knew Jiang Chengjing would come to seal the marquis’s estate, so she deliberately wore the blue cloud-patterned water gown he liked most that day.
She stood in the most conspicuous spot, and sure enough, he noticed her at first glance.
She would never again be like in her past life, taking all the blame upon herself and foolishly begging others for help.
She wanted them to be afraid, to panic, to desperately seek any remedy, leaving them with no choice but to kneel and beg her to resolve the situation.
Afterward, she could openly go to Jiang Chengjing, using the power in his hands to exact her revenge step by step!
Yingge was unaware of Hai Yunshu’s thoughts and worriedly said, “Madam, you also know that the Little Empress Dowager and the Prince Regent…”
Hai Yunshu took a sip of tea: “I will handle it. As for them…”
She firmly set the teacup on the table: “Those who love without concealment bring about their own destruction.”
At noon, several wives from the other branches, upon hearing that Hai Yunshu was to enter the palace, gathered outside Shouning Hall, weeping and wailing.
Unable to withstand the pressure, Old Madame Cheng had no choice but to order the small kitchen to prepare a few dishes that Hai Yunshu favored. She personally brought them to Guanju Ge, wearing a forced smile.
The Old Madame made a promise: “Yunshu, the palace is filled with powerful figures who look down upon us. If you go, please plead for mercy on behalf of Dalang and the others. If you can rescue them, I will immediately invite the Cheng family elders to witness and grant Cong’er the position of heir.”
What clever scheming and planning. She had the audacity to do such a convenient thing, pushing her own agenda while pretending to be righteous.
Smug in the belief that Cong’er was Cheng Zifeng’s true flesh and blood, she coaxed Hai Yunshu into going to Shezheng Wangfu while simultaneously elevating her own grandson to the heir’s position—killing two birds with one stone.
Hai Yunshu remained calm and composed: “Whether you invite witnesses or not, the heir’s position belongs to Cong’er. I am in no hurry.”
The heir’s position was right before her eyes, yet she remained so composed?
Having endured decades in the deep mansion, these old foxes knew when to bend and when to stand firm: “Yunshu, whatever you want, just tell me. As long as I have the authority, I will not refuse.”
“Then, why not start by selling off Bai Shishi?”