Third watch, the second last day of the month, asking for pink votes.
While Lian Manman and Lian Yeye were talking, the servants had already set the breakfast on the table. In a farmstead household, the three daily als are such that breakfast is the simplest, dinner the most lavish, and lunch varies. In winter, when the days are particularly short, many families simply omit lunch and have dinner earlier.
Lian Manman’s family naturally wouldn’t skip lunch, and because Lian Manman always emphasized the importance of breakfast, their breakfasts were usually quite plentiful.
This morning’s breakfast had thick jujube millet porridge, two large plates piled high with white stead buns, mixed-grain mantou, and crispy scallion pancakes. In addition, there was also a soft stead egg custard with dried scallops and dried cockles, thinly sliced soy sauce beef, deep-fried peanuts, perfectly pickled garlic eggplant, sweet and sour radish slivers, soy-pickled cucumbers, and more.
The incident at the old house they just heard about did not affect their appetite; the whole family ate heartily. This too was customary; if they were constantly swayed by the affairs of the old house, then year after year, day after day, they would hardly have any happy days.
After the al, the family was once again in the mood to continue the previous conversation.
"...Could it really have been Jizu’s wife who hit her?" Lady Zhang seed sowhat skeptical.
The Woo family lived far from everyone and had little interaction with the villagers. Er Gou’s Wife rarely left the house. If the Woo family had offended anyone, it was long ago, in the days when Woo Ergou’s and his brother’s father was still around.
Now, in the village, few would care about the Woo family. There’d been no talk of any grudges, no one plotting against Er Gou’s Wife. The timing of this incident seed so coincidental.
"Who knows." Lian Yeye said, "She herself claid that after being hit, she heard the one who hit her enter the gate of the old house. She also said what was used to hit her was the gate bar from the old house."
"If it was Jizu’s wife who hit her, she deserved it." Lady Zhang recalled when Lian Jizu and Lady Chiang returned to collect rent that year, and so gossip she had heard afterwards, and comnted as such.
"If you ask , it’s fortunate that your old house didn’t fancy her. If your old house had liked her and she got married, the troubles would never end. Just that few in the Woo family wouldn’t be able to handle it," Lady Li said slowly to Lady Zhang.
"Isn’t it," Lady Zhang nodded, "Didn’t I say before, that girl called Er Gou’s Wife ’big aunt.’ If she really got married, the two brothers would be of the sa generation as the Old Master.... Nobody else got matchmakers, but they did, that’s quite a favor.... The Old Master, just to find soone for his head of the house, would disregard everything else."
As people in the room were talking, soone ca to report that Lian Shouli had arrived.
"Yeye, did your father co from the old house to call there?" Lian Shouxin asked Lian Yeye.
"Hard to say, it’s uncertain with my father." Lian Yeye said with a conflicted expression, but she didn’t stay conflicted for long. "Fourth Uncle, you just stay inside, don’t go out. I’ll go tell my father you went out for sothing early in the morning."
Lian Yeye had overheard Shouxin earlier, saying he didn’t want to go to the old house, and so she volunteered to drive Lian Shouli away.
"Alright, go ahead, Yeye. Don’t let it slip," Lian Manman said.
Lian Yeye went to the front yard, and shortly after, returned with Lady Zhao.
"I told my father, and he went back to the old house. I didn’t let my mother go." Entering the house, Lian Yeye said to everyone.
"Third Sister-in-law, have you eaten? Have so here with us." Lady Zhang invited Lady Zhao to sit on the kang.
"I’ve eaten, no need to trouble." Lady Zhao waved her hand quickly. Seeing Lian Shouxin in the room, she didn’t show any surprise, obviously having been inford by Lian Yeye before entering. "Fourth Uncle, Fourth Aunt, please don’t mind. Yeye’s father, that’s just his temperant. No matter how we try to persuade him, he doesn’t listen. Watching him running back and forth like this, he ends up with nothing on either side."
"I know my third brother. It’s fine." Lian Shouxin said.
Old Master Lian always liked to say this one had no bad intentions, that one had no bad intentions, and Shouxin believed Lian Shouli truly had none. Lian Shouli was just a pitiable man. Even if Lian Shouli did sothing slightly amiss, it was completely manageable and wouldn’t cause any trouble.
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