Although Song Shi’an’s words made a lot of sense, Jiang Chun thought carefully for a while and still rejected it.
“No, our family just bought a mule cart, it’s already very eye-catching, so I’ve been going out crying poor when there’s nothing going on. If we buy another mule cart, others will definitely get suspicious, wondering if our family has gotten some unexpected windfall.”
The Jiang family slaughters one pig every day, after draining the blood, removing the bones, and taking out the internal organs, there are about a hundred jin of pork left.
The price of pork and the price of pigs are both transparent, so how much silver money their family earns every month—don’t mention the villagers of Daliushu Village—even the people of the entire Hongye Town have a clear idea.
Buying one mule cart under the excuse of conveniently taking Song Shi’an, this sickly son-in-law, to see the doctor, others can still understand.
After all, the Jiang family has been slaughtering pigs and selling meat for so many years. Although in the past few years they’ve built a green-brick tile house, paid for Zheng-shi’s medical treatment, and even bought a live-in son-in-law, the expenses are huge.
But they still have some savings, so affording the money for one mule cart is still manageable.
However, now this sickly son-in-law Song Shi’an needs three taels of silver every month just for medicine to regulate his health, and in the meantime, he also falls ill from time to time. Theoretically, the Jiang family should already be drained dry.
Yet they still have spare money to buy a second mule cart—how could that not raise suspicions?
Jiang Chun also considered moving the whole family out of Daliushu Village, buying a house and a shop in Hongye County, and doing some more respectable business besides slaughtering pigs and selling meat.
But in just over a year and a half, less than two years, the Song family will be rehabilitated, and the two of them, father and daughter, will follow Song Shi’an to the capital.
Spending money to buy a house, decorating and setting it up, living for just over a year, and then having to sell it again.
Coming and going, not only is it troublesome, but it will also waste a lot of silver.
Moreover, Song Shi’an is still a registered government slave, so quietly staying in a small village as a live-in son-in-law of a butcher family is fine, but if they go to the county city to buy a house and a shop, looking all wealthy and prosperous, they’re afraid it will attract the suspicion of Liu Guifei’s faction [Noble Consort Liu].
They’ll suspect that there are other forces secretly supporting the Song family.
By then, if they send people to Hongye County to investigate, the county magistrate, Lu Zhengheng, who comes from an established noble family and has never had direct contact with Song Shi’an, naturally wouldn’t be afraid of this. But Jiang Chun wouldn’t be able to withstand such an investigation.
After all, she’s been in and out of Hongye County’s pawnshops multiple times, pawning things, and most of the items she’s pawned aren’t things a countryside pig-slaughtering woman could have.
The people in Hongye County believe she’s running errands for people in town, but people coming from the capital won’t believe such nonsense.
If they arrest her and subject her to severe torture, forcing her to confess the origins of these items, then it’s over.
So, in these next two years, they must lay low. Other matters can be tolerated, but when it comes to money, they absolutely cannot be too ostentatious.
Jiang He listened to his daughter’s words, felt they were reasonable, and nodded in agreement: “Chun-niang speaks reasonably. We can’t get too extravagant just because we have some silver. If we attract suspicion from outsiders and get targeted by petty thieves, that’ll be a disaster.”
Song Shi’an’s mouth twitched slightly.
What petty thief would dare to have crooked thoughts about Jiang Chun’s household, this tigress? Wouldn’t that be no different from seeking death?
But in the end, it was his own lack of foresight, thinking that buying another mule cart wasn’t a big deal, but he overlooked that they were currently in a generally impoverished rural village.
In the entire Daliushu Village, among the more than 200 households, counting the Jiang family, there were only three families that owned a mule cart.
If they were to buy another one, the Jiang family, owning two mule carts, would be the only wealthy family within a radius of ten li to eight li.
Raising the suspicion of petty thieves was a small matter; the most fearful thing was attracting the suspicion of Liu Guifei’s faction.
After all, a mule cart is a large household item and is used frequently. Even if they wanted to hide it, they couldn’t.
He pressed his lips together, sincerely apologizing: “Father’s words are reasonable, it was Xiao Xu [小胥, a respectful way for a son-in-law to address himself in front of the father-in-law] who did not consider thoroughly, making Father laugh.”
Jiang He waved his hand indifferently: “What’s this, a distinguished young master like you, it’s only natural that you don’t understand the ins and outs of us country folk. It’s not strange that you didn’t think of these things.”
Song Shi’an furrowed his brows in thought for a moment, then decided to make amends and proposed a new suggestion: “Father, do you think this would work?”
“In the morning, wife can drive the mule cart to town to set up the stall, Father you can still go to the surrounding villages to collect pigs as usual. Father comes home for lunch at noon, and after the meal, you can drive the mule cart to bring the collected pigs back. After all, wife needs at most two hours each day to pack up the stall, it won’t delay Father’s use of the cart in the afternoon.”
Jiang He was overjoyed, reaching out to pat his son-in-law’s shoulder, but then worried his strength was too much and might slap the sickly son-in-law onto the ground, so he hurriedly withdrew his hand.
Rubbing his hands, he praised: “Son-in-law’s idea is not bad, this way Chun-niang and I won’t have to argue over the mule cart, both of us can make use of it.”
Jiang Chun also felt this compromise was quite good, both she and Jiang He would have a much easier time each day.
So while her father wasn’t paying attention, she threw a flirtatious glance at Song Shi’an, even pouting her lips and blowing him an air kiss from a distance.
Song Shi’an: “……”
Ever since the two of them slept together, this person had become increasingly unrestrained, teasing him whenever there was an opening.
Simply like a starving wolf that hadn’t eaten for hundreds of years.
Sometimes he even suspected that this person, with her meticulous care for him, paid more attention to his body than he did himself—probably so that he could recover quickly and be devoured whole by her.
Lately, this person even added an extra bowl of tremella lotus seed soup for him at noon every day, and at night, without fail, a bowl of rock sugar bird’s nest.
Both the blood-red bird’s nest and the tremella were top-grade goods rarely seen in the market, of even better quality than what he used to eat in the Song family.
Obviously, they all came from her ability to retrieve items out of thin air.
Even so, these things clearly weren’t easy to come by; otherwise, there wouldn’t have been that previous instance when the blood-red bird’s nest supply ran out.
He had to admit, she was truly willing to spend blood money on him.
Thinking further, since she had spent such a fortune on him, in the future when his body was fully recovered, she would definitely want to get back the capital plus interest.
“Hiss.” Song Shi’an quietly sucked in a breath of cold air.
What is this called? The hardest to bear is a beauty’s favor?
Looks like even after his body recovers in the future, he’ll still have to continue nourishing himself with premium tonics, and must also train and exercise daily.
Otherwise, cough, he really might not be able to satisfy this hungry wolf’s bottomless appetite.
After all, there’s an old saying: Only the ox dies of exhaustion, no field is ever plowed broken. [This is a proverb implying that no matter how much a man exerts himself, a woman can handle it—hinting at enduring female passion or desire.]
“Fujun [夫君, husband], what crooked thoughts are you thinking about, how come your face is as red as a monkey’s butt?”
Jiang Chun’s voice suddenly came through. Song Shi’an’s expression instantly froze, his face turning even redder from guilty conscience.
Seeing that Jiang He had somehow already left the kitchen, he glared at her with a fierce exterior but a timid heart, speaking with displeasure: “I’m not like you, stop making wild guesses.”
Jiang Chun leaned closer to him, smiling mischievously: “How does Fujun know I’m thinking crooked thoughts? Do you want to hear what crooked thoughts I have? What if you happen to want the same?”
Song Shi’an firmly refused: “No. I don’t want to.”
Those crooked thoughts of hers, he didn’t even have the face to say them out loud. Just thinking about them was enough to make one blush and feel endlessly ashamed.
Ever since he fell ill, for the past ten or so days, he had been sleeping in the same quilt with her. This thick-skinned, shameless person had already forced him to kiss her soft pink grapes in front of her chest several times.
He practically regretted it so much that his intestines turned green. He really shouldn’t have started this in the first place. Once he started it, how could a person as greedy and insatiable as her possibly let him off so easily?
Had he known that after that accidental mishap of the thing going into his mouth, he should have decisively apologized, clarified the situation to her, and not softened his heart, thinking that she had worked so hard to care for him while he was sick and thus deserved a little reward.
There were a thousand and one ways to repay someone—why did he have to choose this unspeakable method?
Now, it’s turned out like this. She would launch sneak attacks whenever she could, catching him off guard, pulling off her small clothes, and stuffing those soft pink grapes into his mouth…
Once the thing was already in his mouth, could he still push her away? He could only helplessly serve her.
So, he absolutely did not dare to listen to her crooked thoughts. Listening would lead to endless trouble.
“Forget it if you don’t want to listen. Go back to your room and paint your pictures.” Jiang Chun pouted and waved her hand at him.
Actually, Jiang Chun hadn’t teased him for a few days now. She felt that she had been a bit too indulgent recently, tasting the marrow and finding it delicious [食髓知味, a phrase meaning once you’ve tried it, you can’t stop].
Song Shi’an’s body was still weak, and he had just suffered a severe illness recently. For her to force him every now and then to kiss her soft parts, and every time his body would respond accordingly, this was clearly not good for his health.
For the sake of long-term happiness, she felt she had to restrain herself.
Coincidentally, the mule cart was now ready. Once they brought it back tomorrow and took a look, if there were no issues, she would go to the county town the day after tomorrow.
She would check at the Gou family blacksmith’s shop to see if the heating stove had been made, and while there, she would get another month’s worth of medicine for Song Shi’an, and also haul back another thousand jin of coal.
It was already the end of September. Even someone as strong and healthy as her couldn’t handle it anymore and had already switched to wearing thick cotton clothes. Snow could fall at any time.
Never mind other things—getting the coal back first was essential. Otherwise, once the snow fell, the mule cart would struggle to move. The stove, she could carry back by herself, but she couldn’t possibly carry a thousand jin of coal and walk for two or three hours through the snow, could she?
Besides, she also needed to buy a pair of deerskin boots.
It was rare that Song Shi’an had thought about her, earnestly suggesting she buy a pair of deerskin boots that could resist rain, snow, and water. She couldn’t disappoint him.
Thinking of this, she walked into the west room and said to Song Shi’an, who was mixing pigments: “I’m planning to go to the county town the day after tomorrow to check if the heating stove has been made. Do you have anything you want to buy? If you do, just say it. Your wife has money—I’ll buy it all for you.”
After a moment’s hesitation, she still couldn’t help but add a sentence: “Nothing too expensive though. The savings of our family don’t come easily; we have to spend carefully.”
Living in the capital city in the future would be no easy thing, and there would be so many places where they’d need to spend money, so they had to be frugal now.
Song Shi’an turned sideways, handing her a copy of the Analects that he had transcribed earlier, and said: “I don’t have anything I want to buy. Just take this book and sell it at the bookshop for me.”
Lately, he had been busy painting landscapes for Lu Zhengheng and hadn’t had time to copy books. This book had been transcribed earlier.
“Alright.” Jiang Chun agreed without hesitation and took the book.
Song Shi’an lowered his head, holding a brush and continuing to mix pigments.
Jiang Chun glanced at him sidelong, her gaze falling on the rough wooden hairpin on his head.
Although the coarse wooden hairpin couldn’t hide his outstanding looks, for some reason, Jiang Chun didn’t want to let him be so wronged.
When she went to the county town the day after tomorrow, she would go to the jewelry shop and buy him a silver hairpin. Anyway, it wouldn’t cost more than a few taels of silver.
Consider it a surprise for him.
Since it was a surprise, of course, she couldn’t tell him in advance.
But this Jiang Chun, who just couldn’t hold her tongue, at night when the two of them were lying together in one quilt, she still couldn’t hold it in and blurted out her plan.
Song Shi’an lifted his head from her embrace, glanced at her sideways, and felt deeply touched in his heart.
But he still opened his mouth to express his refusal: “There’s no need to waste silver money, I rarely go out, a wooden hairpin is more than enough.”
Jiang Chun smiled cheerfully and said: “Even at home, one must dress up pretty and nice. I heard someone say before, ‘Men dress up for those who please them,’ I think that makes a lot of sense.”
Song Shi’an: “……”
He said speechlessly: “It’s ‘Women dress up for those who please them’, don’t misquote it.”
Jiang Chun immediately cried out her grievance: “What do you mean I misquoted? I heard someone say it in the city before. I can’t even recognize a single character, how could I have the ability to randomly change it?”
“Do you think I’ll believe that?” Song Shi’an let out a light snort. He dared to use his own head as a guarantee—it was definitely her who changed it.
Aside from a woman as thick-skinned and shameless as her, no other woman could have said such words.
Jiang Chun’s almond-shaped eyes suddenly widened, a bit lacking in confidence, and she shouted: “What does Husband mean by this? Are you saying you don’t believe I can’t read a single character?”
Had she covered it up for so long, and it was finally exposed?
Song Shi’an didn’t want to tear down her disguise right now, so he lightly shook his head and explained: “What I mean is, the word ‘men’ in ‘Men dress up for those who please them’ must have been changed by you, Wife.”
Jiang Chun quietly breathed a sigh of relief, straightened her back, and proudly said: “That’s right, it was me who changed it.”
Song Shi’an’s face was pressed right against her chest, and with her straightening up like that, his face was immediately smothered by her cotton-soft curves that soared to the clouds.
He turned his head slightly, avoiding this suffocating “land of tenderness.”
He wanted to say a few words to her, but thinking about how once the heating stove was brought back, he wouldn’t have to share a quilt with her anymore, he silently swallowed the words back down.
In his heart, there was even a faint trace of reluctance.
He absolutely wasn’t greedy for her body. He, Song Shi’an, wasn’t the kind of person who lusted after beauty. Otherwise, in his past life, with so many beautiful women throwing themselves at him, why would he have rejected them all?
He merely coveted the warmth of her body. Holding her, who emitted the scent of his most beloved orchid fragrance, soft and warm, while sleeping—it was simply too pleasant.
Although every few days he had to “serve” her once, and for that, even his disobedient thing would “get angry,” but in this world, how could there be a good thing where one only takes advantage without paying the price?
Such a “benefit exchange” was still within the range he could accept.
Of course, the precondition was that Jiang Chun didn’t get too greedy and make more outrageous demands.
But a few days ago, she had told him that once the heating stove was made, she would go back to sleep at the foot of the bed and not share a quilt with him anymore…
It was a pity that his skin was too thin, and he couldn’t bring himself to tell her not to go back.
Jiang Chun did have a point when she said: if it weren’t for her thick skin, the two of them might not have made any progress even after decades.
After all, Jiang Chun in his previous life was exactly this kind of person, and sure enough, they hadn’t made any progress at all. The one who had progress with her was Fan the Butcher from the Fan family’s meat shop in the West Market of the capital city.
He let out a long sigh in his heart and still advised once more: “Truly, there’s no need. A wooden hairpin is perfectly fine for me.”
Afraid that Jiang Chun would insist, he changed his argument, trying to “besiege Wei to rescue Zhao” [围魏救赵, a strategy meaning to divert attention from the main issue]: “On the contrary, it should be you, Wife, who should buy some hairpins and rings for yourself to wear. All day long you have nothing but a plain, bare silver hairpin on your head—how shabby.”
Jiang Chun, instead of feeling ashamed, said proudly: “All day long I’m either slaughtering pigs or running the stall, or else circling the stove. What do I need such nice hairpins and rings for? Didn’t we agree before? I’m in charge of earning money to support the family, and Husband is in charge of being as beautiful as a flower. So buying a silver hairpin for Husband is perfectly reasonable.”
Song Shi’an: “……”
Who agreed with you?
Hadn’t he been earning money to support the family? Where did the one thousand plus taels of silver in her hands come from?
But he didn’t dare say it out loud.
He could only complain inwardly in his heart a few times.
If he said it, it would be not giving her face. If he didn’t give her face, she would get angry out of embarrassment. If she got angry out of embarrassment, he would have to submit to her. If he submitted to her, she would raise all sorts of outrageous demands.
In the end, the one who suffered would only be his own lips and tongue.
Rather than that, he might as well surrender from the start.