Chapter 30: Involved in it_1

Nanny Wu’s heart was pounding uncontrollably.

Nanny Wu waited for Mrs. Jiang to deal with the maidservants before she remembered the contract of the maidservants’ indenture. Unfortunately, up until now, she hadn’t been able to find the contracts in Bai Jinxiu’s dowry.

The original plan was to keep Mingyu behind. If the Duke’s Mansion pursued the matter, Mingyu, the personal maid, would step forward and claim that Bai Jinxiu had personally ordered her to give the contracts to Mrs. Jiang.

But who could have expected that the Duke’s Mansion would send someone with Mingyu’s contract to forcibly take her from Mrs. Jiang’s estate? Needless to say, the other five maidservants’ contracts must still be at the Duke’s Mansion.

Before Nanny Wu could deliberate on how to speak, the guilty Mrs. Jiang had already lost her temper: “Bai Jinxiu just entered the Qin family, yet she doesn’t think about honoring her in-laws. She disregards wifely virtues and uses deceit to instigate her husband to split from the family. And you have the nerve to ask me about those maidservants! If I, as her mother-in-law, beat Bai Jinxiu to death, no one in the world would say a word against it! Nanny Wu, leave now!”

Nanny Wu, covered in sweat, followed Mrs. Jiang.

“Madam, if you leave this door today with the idea of spreading rumors that my second sister conspired with Qin Lang to move out of the Marquis Mansion, slandering her, I advise you to think twice! Our Duke’s Mansion will deny everything, and my mother will surely stand up for my second sister and explain everything.” Bai Qingyan stood up, smiling, “My mother is praised by the Emperor himself as the model matriarch of Dadu City. Lady, think about the reputation you will have, especially with your crimes of conspiring to harm others and meddling with your daughter-in-law’s dowry. If you then smear her name, won’t that be quite ironic?”

The words Bai Jinxiu spoke to Qin Lang would damage her reputation if spread.

Bai Jintong, standing beside Bai Qingyan, shook her head as if helpless: “I told the madam what my second sister said, hoping she would add fuel to the fire! Eldest sister, you are too kind-hearted to remind her.”

“Dong Wanjun, do you think your Duke’s Mansion wants to tear apart relations with our Marquis Mansion?” Mrs. Jiang gritted her teeth, wringing the handkerchief in her hand.

Mrs. Dong lazily lifted her eyes: “Those two daughters of yours almost killed our Duke’s second young lady, and you dare ask for face here?!”

Bai Jintong stood with her hands behind her back, smiling coldly: “Is the Marquis Mansion’s face thicker than the city walls? We made a grand show of bringing my second sister back! Is that not enough?!”

“You people… fine! Go on, be arrogant!” Mrs. Jiang was so enraged her whole body trembled. She spat, “It won’t be long before you’ll be crying! Nanny Wu, let’s go!”

Bai Qingyan’s gaze lifted, her deep eyes fixed on Mrs. Jiang’s retreating figure.

Standing at the door, Nanny Qin saw Mrs. Jiang storm out and politely stepped forward to guide her out. Mrs. Jiang, full of anger, lashed out at Nanny Qin: “What, you need to watch me even as I leave? Afraid I’ll steal something from your Duke’s Mansion?!”

Once the Marchioness left, Mrs. Dong threw down her tea cup in disgust: “That Jiang woman, always thinking she’s the smartest in the world, and everyone else is a fool to be trampled upon by her!”

Bai Qingyan’s engagement was arranged when Qin Lang’s mother was gravely ill. Back when her mother was still a maiden, she had been saved from bandits by Madam Dong and Mrs. Dong, preserving her chastity. Ever since, she was deeply grateful and stayed close to the Dong family, forming a sisterly bond with Mrs. Dong.

When Qin Lang’s mother fell seriously ill, knowing her days were numbered, she entrusted Qin Lang to Mrs. Dong. She privately knelt and begged Mrs. Dong to promise her daughter to Qin Lang so that Mrs. Dong would become his rightful mother.

Moved by the sincerity of her dying sister, the young Mrs. Dong agreed boldly, giving Qin Lang’s mother a keepsake as a token and sealing the promise privately.

Qin Lang’s mother, out of deep love for her son, knowing she had no deep affection for Marquis Qin Dezhao, feared that if a stepmother entered the household, the heirship of the Princely Heir would be changed. To secure Qin Lang’s position, she calculated even with her sworn sisterhood.

Had it not been for the declining status of Qin Lang’s maternal family and knowing that Mrs. Dong was favored by the Duke of Zhen and just waiting for her grandfather’s three-year mourning period to propose marriage, Qin Lang’s mother wouldn’t have clung to this lifeline and begged the yet unmarried Mrs. Dong for this engagement.

Later, after Qin Lang’s mother passed away, the Marquis remarried Mrs. Jiang. Mrs. Dong knew full well what kind of person Mrs. Jiang was. Ever since Bai Qingyan was born, she had been worried for her.

Who would have thought that when Bai Qingyan came of age she would suffer an injury that made childbirth difficult, leading Duke Zhen to want to annul the engagement between the Duke’s Mansion and the Marquis Mansion? It was the Marquis himself who came to convince him to replace Bai Qingyan with Bai Jinxiu as Qin Lang’s betrothed. The Duke initially disagreed, but after speaking with the Marquis, he relented.

As a daughter-in-law, Mrs. Dong couldn’t say much more, fearing that saying too much would make the second mistress, Mrs. Liu, think she was unhappy with the change in engagement. After a few unsuccessful attempts to persuade, she decided to keep quiet.

Who knew that years later, Bai Jinxiu’s marriage would lead to such a loss? Had she known, she would have opposed it vehemently back then.

“Mother, don’t be angry.” Bai Qingyan comforted Mrs. Dong. “Before going to the Marquis Mansion, I thought the Marchioness was a formidable figure. Now, it seems she’s nothing much. With Qin Lang moving out being inevitable, you and the second mistress should send more capable nanies and servants to Jinxiu. Without a mother-in-law’s interference, how could Jinxiu not have a good life?”

Mrs. Dong sighed and nodded. Fortunately, the Emperor issued a decree, and even the Empress had spoken. Even if Mrs. Jiang had three heads and six arms, this was a done deal.

Thinking of Bai Qingyan questioning Mrs. Jiang about the whereabouts of the five maidservants, Mrs. Dong hesitated but then told her daughter the truth: “Yesterday, your second aunt asked me to send someone to find the remaining five maidservants of your second sister, to understand the whole story and seek future revenge. Although I sent people to inquire with the city brokers this morning, it’s clear in my heart that those five maidservants are likely gone. Your second aunt is straightforward and doesn’t know how wicked Mrs. Jiang is. I’m unsure how to break it to her.”

The five maidservants, as they were from the Duke’s Mansion, anyone dealing with city brokers would not dare to tamper with them without their contracts. Only the second mistress, Mrs. Liu, believed this.

“Mother, why do you need to explain to the second mistress? If we can’t find the five maidservants of our Duke’s Mansion, we’ll report it to the officials and have them search.” Bai Qingyan suggested firmly.

Seeing her daughter’s resolute and composed demeanor, Mrs. Dong’s worries melted away: “My child is right! I’m being foolish! If our servants go missing, we should indeed report it to the authorities! We need to have our steward take the maidservants’ contracts and their biological parents to the officers!”

Bai Qingyan walked out of the hall, her face solemn, repeatedly pondering the Marquis’s wife’s parting words—there won’t be long before you’re crying.

These words seemed to have deeper meaning. She lowered her eyes, gazing at the stone path beneath her feet, wondering if the Marquis’s wife knew something, which gave her the audacity to act against Bai Jinxiu just after her arrival?

That day, at the Marquis Mansion, Mrs. Jiang acted unafraid despite her daughter’s injury to someone. The usually cautious Marquis, even when angered by their removal of Bai Jinxiu, thinking the Bai family had dishonored them, why remained so adamant in such clear-cut right and wrong?

A cold sweat formed on her back. Regarding the Bai family’s affairs… how many influential figures in Dadu were involved?

Bai Jintong walked slowly beside Bai Qingyan, visibly pleased: “Seeing that vile woman trembling with anger was indeed satisfying!”@@novelbin@@

Not hearing a response from Bai Qingyan, Bai Jintong couldn’t help but think about the five maidservants and asked, holding a glimmer of hope: “Eldest sister, are the five maidservants really in as dire a situation as Aunt said?”

She came back to her senses and didn’t hide the truth: “Except for Mingyu, all of your second sister’s maidservants were drowned. The Marchioness feared their clothes might reveal their identities, so she ordered their clothes stripped off. On a snowy night, wrapped in straw mats, they were thrown into the Burial Mound.”