Chapter 4: Wang Shi's scheme
Fu Imperial Capital
In the Fang Yi yuan residence of the zhumu managing the household in the fu, w.a.n.g shi's ashen face distorted as she cursed in rage over Ye Li, Xu furen, combined with Xu shi's entire family. On the floor were broken teacups and chinaware that had been smashed to the ground. The delicately beautiful Ye Ying silently stood at the side, watching her muqin venting out her rage, a trace of disdain flashing in her eyes.
(yuan – 院 – a residence within a family residence compound)
(zhumu – 主母 – owner 'mother' / mother in charge of the household)
(fu – 府 – official residence / family residence compound / household / term for family and home put together)
(furen – 夫人 – lady or madam of the house / wife)
(muqin – 母亲 – respectful or intimate way of addressing mother)
"Mother, don't let your anger harm your body. Quickly sit down to take a rest." Waiting until w.a.n.g shi's rage had been pretty much vented out, Ye Ying only then went forth with a face filled with concern to reason with her.
w.a.n.g shi seeing her daughter's complexion looking gentle and beautiful as well as clever, she couldn't help but express how her heart was full of grievances as she pulled Ye Ying while weeping, "I have painstakingly managed things in this fu for these many years, when did I ever cause her to feel wronged? Now she went so far as to even steal that bit of dowry from you. Good daughter, when you get married into the Li w.a.n.g fu, if the dowry were to be lessened it won't only just be you who will be made fun of, Zhao Yi niangniang's reputation also wouldn't look good. Aren't I just thinking on the behalf of the fu? That darned yatou actually dropped in earlier than the people from Xu family to say something!"
(niangniang – 娘娘 – term meaning 'mother' but is used when addressing the empress, concubine, female royal, etc. by someone of lower rank)
(yatou -丫头 – young girl / maidservant)
Ye Ying's watery eyes glimmered, she shallowly smiled and softly placated w.a.n.g shi, "Mother, His Highness Li w.a.n.g treats this daughter sincerely, he naturally wouldn't turn his back on me for having less dowry. What's more...the matter this time did indeed wrong elder sister. Giving elder sister some more dowry is a must. To outsiders seeing this, they will see you mother as being merciful and magnanimous for not treating the first wife's daughter badly, right? As for second elder sister...she will certainly understand mother's difficulty."
w.a.n.g shi was startled, thinking about how Ye Li and Xu shi resembled one another in appearance and bearing, and seeing her own daughter looking like she was trying really hard to endure her grievances, the nefarious fire in her heart flared out. Pulling Ye Ying's hand and patting it, she said, "Feel rest a.s.sured, mother of course wouldn't wrong you. Even if not taking care of your dowry, I still definitely won't let that yatou bring that much dowry through the door!" The final words already showed a hint of gnashing her teeth in bitterness.
Ye Ying's eyebrows knitted worriedly. "Then what does mother plan to do?"
w.a.n.g shi obviously planned in advance, smiling contentedly and said, "Mother has her own idea, you just have to focus on preparing your dowry."
The Ye fu's secondary daughter* was presently the most favoured Zhao Yi, and now there were two daughters who have both been bestowed marriages to the most favoured Li w.a.n.g and Da Chu's only heir for succession Ding guow.a.n.g.
(guow.a.n.g – 国王 – former appellation for '亲王 – qinw.a.n.g' which is the highest rank of a prince, used from Han to Ming dynasty)
The Ye family was naturally like a long ferry over high water on a sunny day, once the news of the bestowed marriages came out, there was a continuous stream of high officials and n.o.bles going to the Ye fu to pay a visit, making w.a.n.g shi and Ye laofuren happy to no end.
(laofuren – 老夫人 – old madam / t.i.tle for the mother of a n.o.ble or an official)
The Ye fu from top to bottom was naturally, hurriedly busy over preparing for the two guniang's weddings and dowry. Of course, there was more emphasis on the preparations for that of fourth xiaojie Ye Ying. Because w.a.n.g shi had left word that fourth xiaojie's wedding will be earlier than that of third xiaojie by half a month, first completing the preparations for fourth xiaojie and then preparing for third xiaojie could still make it on time. Actually the Ye family's underlings were well aware, w.a.n.g shi all along hadn't wanted to prepare third xiaojie's dowry. Of course, whatever good stuff there was, they must first urgently make preparations for fourth xiaojie before talking about anything else.
(guniang – 姑娘 – young lady / girl)
(xiaojie – 小姐 – young miss / lady)
It was a good thing that Ye laofuren was still one who was aware of the severity of the situation: although there were serious differences between Li w.a.n.g and Ding w.a.n.g, but all the same neither of them were someone that their insignificant Ye family could afford to offend. After w.a.n.g furen was once again unsatisfied and unwilling to give up the eight hamlets, twelve shops, and three woodlands, she once again brought out ten thousand taels of silver from the public and requested one of the clan's zhouli to help purchase more dowry. Also from one's own private savings she set aside ten thousand taels to add to Ye Ying's dowry, which could be considered to be all for the sake of placating w.a.n.g shi. Although w.a.n.g shi was still unsatisfied, she wouldn't dare to refute laofuren out in the open. She had no alternative but to resentfully hand over the land deeds and pinch the banknotes given by laofuren before leaving.
(zhouli – 妯娌 – sisters-in-law / wives of brothers)
The furen coming over to help Ye Li purchase dowry was Ye Shangshu's tangsao (堂嫂 – wife of father's blood-related cousin), although their family's laoye was only a fifth-rank official that was inferior to the ill.u.s.trious Ye family, but he was still a kind and honest person. Usually among the zhouli she also didn't hear little about third guniang's matter and felt some sympathy for the Ye family's di daughter. Normally Ye Li seldom left the house, so she only felt that she was a gentle and refined guniang. Furthermore no one on the outside had said that she was so unbearable, she naturally understood and only feared that it was w.a.n.g shi who had allowed people to spread around such words.
(tangsao – 堂嫂 – wife of father's blood-related cousin)
Now that they have met, although she wasn't like the moving, bright and beautiful second guniang, nor was she the delicately beautiful and lovably moving type like fourth guniang, but her temperament was gentle, refined, serene as well as elegant, her manner of speech and bearing was also completely appropriate, and what was particular was her calm pair of eyes, looking as placid as still water but always somehow making people feel that there was something about her that was not like the other guniang. Although it wasn't the same as being the kind of soft and graceful beauty that a lot of men were fond of, but when compared with the Ye family's other guniang, she definitely wasn't inferior to them in any way. She couldn't help but feel some grievance on Ye Li's behalf, never mind her getting married off to an invalid, rubbish w.a.n.gye, this ten thousand taels' worth of dowry was a lot for an ordinary family, but it was not as good as when compared with the Ye family's other da guniang who had been married off earlier.
(w.a.n.gye – 王爺 – term for addressing an imperial prince)
It was a good thing that laotaitai was reasonable, having the Ye family's first wife's hamlets and shops returned to third guniang, or else was only afraid that this matter would've made the Ye family look bad.
Ye Li's mood in getting back the properties left behind by her muqin was rather good, and so was disinclined from bothering laofuren about giving Ye Ying ten thousand taels as well as the matter of w.a.n.g shi shifting a lot of the public funds to add to Ye Ying's dowry. Originally, a family's children would feel favoured as well as not favoured, the ten fingers have both long and short lengths (metaphor that means children are different from one another). She didn't mind that the Ye family doted on Ye Ying more, as long as they didn't make things unbearable towards her reputation then that would be good. As for the future, although she didn't think that from now onwards this niangjia can give herself any amount of support, but she still can't have a fallout with her niangjia when she hasn't even gotten married yet.
(niangjia – 娘家 – married woman's parents' home or family)
Spending two days' time in poring over the ledgers for the shops, the result really caused Ye Li to scowl. Among the twelve family shops, five was going through financial losses, four were not making any profits nor losses, and the only three that was earning money only had little profit. Among the eight hamlets, four of them were not of the original, w.a.n.g shi's explanation was that at the time when Zhao Yi had entered the palace, she had given four of the hamlets to Zhao Yi to spend, and thus it was from the fu that four were brought in as compensation. Ye Li didn't need to look to know that the four brought in as compensation had what kind of morality and conduct. If it weren't for her making the first move in bringing it up with the laofuren, she was only afraid that in the time of waiting for the hamlets, all eight of them would have been swapped.
Early in the morning, Ye Li paid respects to laofuren and notified her before taking Qing Shuang with her to go out to inspect the shops.
Ye Li had seldom walked around outside, so almost no one in the capital recognized her, this round of walking around didn't only cause Qing Shuang's eyes to emit fury, even Ye Li who believed herself to have a pretty good temperament had also gotten really angry.
Among the twelve shops, there were seven family shopkeepers who had only took office in less than two days before she had got back the shops within her hand and who had no prior knowledge whatsoever of matters relating to shops. Furthermore there was one jewelry store that watched people coming and going, one look at the accounts' book can tell they were all financial losses. As for the two shops making profit, the goods were old-fashioned and the shop a.s.sistant was dispirited and downcast, even the counter had a lot of dust acc.u.mulated on top of it–it would be strange if there were customers visiting.
"Xiaojie, furen is being too much. When we return, definitely will tell laofuren and laoye!" Qing Shuang said resentfully.
"Tell them then what? Of her two daughters, one is Zhao Yi who will soon have the position of a fei, the other is going to become Li w.a.n.gfei–what do you think father and zumu will do to her?" Ye Li said as she looked at Qing Shuang with a faint smile. Qing Shuang was dumbstruck for a moment, resenting the unfairness of the situation, "Unless we can just leave it just like this? Furen obviously wants to make xiaojie lose face. What would be the difference between having such shops as dowry and not having any?"
(fei – 妃 – imperial concubine)
"Lose face huh? For your own family's guniang to feel like I've lost face is losing face in itself. If I don't feel like I've lost face, then I haven't lost face."
Qing Shuang blinked, her face full of expectation as she looked at her own family's xiaojie, "Does xiaojie have a good idea?"
Ye Li only laughed without saying a word, walking past Qing Shuang to go ahead. Qing Shuang wrinkled her nose and with a face full of delight followed after her, "Xiaojie, the one in front is the final shop. Shen De Xuan, it's a family antique store."
(shen – 慎 – careful / cautious de – 德 – virtue / morality / ethics xuan – 軒 – pavilion with a view / curtained carriage)