Red Mansion: Picking up a Lin Daiyu

Chapter 394: Prejudice in the Heart of the People is a Mountain

After Lin Daiyu and everyone else had sorted out the division of labor, the girls dispersed and went back to their own residences.

Each room has a bed, and the east and west wing rooms also have inner and outer rooms and ear rooms. After careful calculation, at least two people have to share a bed to disperse everyone.

The place was originally Yue Ling's residence, but now Lin Daiyu had settled the Jia sisters and Shi Xiangyun there. Shi Xiangyun had an idea and put two beds together to make a large bunk bed, which was big enough for the five of them to lie down together and chat all night long.

After seeing her masterpiece, Lin Daiyu just shook her head and smiled, "Sister Yun is really clingy. She is reluctant to separate for just one night and has to sleep together. When you come to the mansion, have you said hello to the Shi family?"

Shi Xiangyun lay flat on the bed, stretched out in a big character, and breathed a sigh of relief. "It's okay. They never ask about my affairs in Rongguo Mansion. Even if they ask about it this time, they should know that I'm here."

A wild girl, who had always been wild, so when Sanchun saw her she just covered her mouth and smiled.

Lin Daiyu shook her head helplessly and said to the Jia sisters, "I will go and see how they are preparing. You can sit here and have some tea. I will send someone to call you when it is time to eat."

"Okay, Sister Lin, go get busy."

After Tanchun saw Lin Daiyu out, she unbolted the door and looked around the room.

At first, when she heard Lin Daiyu say that they would be placed in Yue Ling's house, she felt a little uneasy and curious. But after entering, she found that this place was actually very ordinary.

It was not overly elaborate, there were no calligraphy or paintings on the walls, and no antiques on the bookshelves. Everything seemed extremely simple and did not look like the residence of a marquis at all.

But when I think about Marquis Anjing's reputation, I feel that he should not be a person who pursues pleasure.

Looking at Yingchun who was silently pouring tea, she really seemed to be in a state of mind of making the best of it, which made Tanchun speechless. She asked, "Second sister, you really treat this place as your own home. We are living in the room. What if Marquis Anjing suddenly comes back?"

Yingchun poured a cup of tea, then turned it over and filled another cup, responding slowly, "This was arranged by Sister Lin, there shouldn't be any mistakes. Besides, what can we do when we come back? We can't control anything."

Xichun sat back in the chair, held the hot tea in both hands, and drank it in small sips. "Second sister is right. Third sister seems to be particularly energetic when she comes here. She seems to want to look through the drawers everywhere, looking for some strange things."

Tanchun pointed to the distance and asked, "Just like her?"

Xichun looked in the direction she pointed and saw that Shi Xiangyun had already crawled under the table, opened the drawer, and was rummaging through things in the room. She was not idle at all.

"Hey, it's so ordinary, why is there nothing here?"

After searching through the books, Shi Xiangyun felt a little disappointed and lay down beside Yingchun to drink tea.

Tanchun poked her head out and asked, "What are you looking for? Why don't you ask Sister Lin if she has it?"

Shi Xiangyun raised her eyes, pursed her lips, and said mysteriously: "It is rumored that the Marquis has a big hobby."

"What is it? Why have I never heard you mention it?"

Tanchun also sat down next to him and listened with great interest.

"I didn't mention it because I thought it sounded like a rumor. I've been with the Marquis a few times in the past, but I didn't feel that way."

"What rumor?"

Shi Xiangyun cleared her throat and said, "It is rumored that the Marquis is fond of women, especially unmarried women, whom he likes the most."

"As a result, except that there are a lot of maids in this room, which is even more than the Rongguo Mansion, there is nothing unusual. I thought I would find things like bellybands and underwear in the room."

Tanchun couldn't help but shudder, clasping her hands tightly to her chest, and staring, "Sister Yun, what are you talking about? How could the Marquis be that kind of person?"

Xichun added: "That... is hard to say. Ordinary people have their own preferences, and rumors are not all groundless. It is unusual for the Marquis's maid to be compared with the entire Rongguo Mansion."

"Besides, food and sex are human nature. Lust is the nature of men, let alone the young and energetic Marquis, who has not yet married and has no parents to restrict him."

Tanchun shook her head repeatedly, "No, no, how could a man like the Marquis be obsessed with flesh and blood? The Marquis is a great hero admired by the world."

Having said that, Tanchun felt increasingly uneasy.

According to the temperament of the eldest master Jia She, if he knew the rumor that Marquis An Jing was away, and urged the three sisters to come to his mansion, wouldn't it be like sending his daughter to be a concubine?

Although Tanchun admires Marquis Anjing, she is not yet willing to devote herself to him.

Having just escaped from the wolf's den, she encountered the tiger's den. Tanchun's mind was in a mess and she couldn't make sense of anything.

Putting down the teacup, Tanchun slammed the table and stood up, saying, "No, I don't believe that the customs in Anjing Marquis's Mansion are like this. Let me go out and find out!"

After saying this, Tanchun pushed the door open and left.

Yingchun raised her hand and said, "No, that's not right."

Xichun sighed quietly, "Second sister and third sister are both out in a hurry."

But Yingchun turned her head to Shi Xiangyun and said, "Sister Yun, how could you rummage through the things in this room?"

……

The right side room opposite to Tanchun's room,
Ying'er, Ruizhu and Baozhu were sent out to get their luggage and help in the kitchen respectively, leaving Qin Keqing and Xue Baochai sitting opposite each other in the room.

On the tea table, Qin Keqing held Xue Baochai's hand and asked earnestly, "Sister Bao, I haven't saved enough money yet. This time when I come back to the capital, I want to return it to the Marquis. Otherwise, why don't you start a newspaper in the capital?"

Xue Baochai raised her eyebrows and asked, "How much do you still need?"

"About two thousand taels."

"It's just two thousand taels, I'll lend it to you."

Qin Keqing hurriedly shook her head, "That won't work. If I don't write articles, I won't have any extra income. If you lend it to me, when can I pay it back?"

Xue Baochai pulled her hands back and folded them in front of her, feeling very embarrassed. "This is the capital, where the literary style is not as relaxed as in Suzhou. Those obscene words you wrote may not be published. We should behave ourselves and not cause trouble for the Marquis."

Qin Keqing also sighed, "That's right. I originally adapted the story based on what happened in the mansion. I experienced it myself, so I was able to write it vividly. However, I haven't been able to have sex with the master for a long time, so I can't write those articles anymore."

"How about I try to write it in a subtle way?"

Xue Baochai frowned, "What are you going to write?"

Qin Keqing looked up, her eyes rolled around, and she said, "Otherwise, we can use the Rongguo Mansion as a template and write a story about a mansion that has fallen into disrepair, with the women having no choice but to live on the streets, and then being taken in by someone. At first, people thought the owner had good intentions, but later..."

Xue Baochai shook her head and said, "It's not as exciting as the previous stories. It's too cliché. It's better to consider the Marquis's previous suggestions."

As they were talking, the door was suddenly pushed open from the outside.

When she stood up again, she found that it was not Ying'er, Ruizhu or Baozhu who came back, but Tanchun who was standing in front of the door in a daze, with tears welling up in her eyes.

Xue Baochai was startled by this and asked, "Third sister, what's wrong with you?"

Tanchun took a step back in panic and waved her hands repeatedly, saying, "It's okay, it's okay. I'm not familiar with the road and went to the wrong door. I'm sorry to bother you." Then she stumbled out of the door, and soon her foot tripped on the threshold, making a thud.

Qin Keqing came back to her senses and asked, "She couldn't have heard what we said, could she?"

Xue Baochai glared and said, "It's all your fault. You didn't say anything nice, but had to bring up these indecent things. If she really heard it, she would definitely have a big misunderstanding."

……

It was not convenient to ask Lin Daiyu, so Tanchun wanted to go find Xue Baochai, whom she knew, first. However, when she stood at the door, she heard the conversation inside clearly.

"What obscene words, and you still treat us as people who are being humiliated? Sister Bao actually feels that this is not enough and wants to follow the advice of the Marquis. What is the advice of the Marquis!"

Tanchun's eyes were red, she rubbed her calves, and she was so aggrieved that she cried. As a little girl, she was really scared.

She ran out of the lobby in a panic, and when she came to her senses, she had arrived at the east side, where Zijuan, Qingwen and others lived.

Standing in the corridor, Tanchun was out of breath from running. She looked up and saw the people in the window who seemed to be doing needlework, all in harmony, and she breathed a sigh of relief.

"I must have misunderstood something. Sister Qin is the Marquis' personal maid. It's normal for her to have served him. It's also very common to use characters as templates to create stories and essays. I must have scared myself."

Patting her cheeks with both hands, Tanchun muttered to herself, "If I think with prejudice, then I will only get prejudice. I need to listen to them with a normal mind."

Then he lowered his head and lay outside the moon-shaped window, listening to the conversation inside.

"This bellyband is not new anymore. Why do you have to mend it? Can't you just make a new one?"

"Now that we are back in the capital, there should be a lot of extra cloth in the treasury. How could the Marquis be short of this piece of fabric from you?"

Qingwen bit the thread and said this while she was still carefully mending the bellyband that Xiangling brought.

Xiangling's cheeks turned slightly red. She was not good at making up lies, so she stammered, "This, this undergarment is different. It belongs to my daughter."

Qingwen blinked her eyes in confusion and asked again, "What's the difference? Besides, can the Xue family still be short of a piece of cloth?"

Xiangling raised her hand to cover her hot face and said, "This is what the girl didn't want anymore, so I brought it here."

Qingwen was stunned for a long while before she asked tentatively, "Are you going to wear it?"

Xiangling's cheeks were as red as lanterns.

"Was it Sister Keqing's idea?"

Xiangling nodded shyly again.

Qingwen suddenly felt that the material was a little hot, so she threw it aside and asked sternly, "Well, you put on Miss Bao's bellyband to please the Marquis and have sex with him, and you still want me to mend it. What do you think of me?"

"I I I..."

Tanchun didn't hear the rest of the conversation between the two, but the last sentence was like a bolt from the blue, leaving her mind a little dazed.

"Is this the Marquis I know? Is the mansion really so promiscuous? Even Baoyu... No, Baoyu and we are siblings, there shouldn't be any such things between men and women."

When she thought about it carefully, Tanchun's face felt like it was burning.

After taking a few deep breaths, she slowly managed to hold on.

"No, this may not be what the Marquis meant. It may just be because there are too many women in the mansion, so they want to compete for favor. This is very common among the servants."

"Third Miss, what are you looking at?"

Someone patted her shoulder from behind, and Tanchun felt as if her whole body went limp. She shivered and her legs became a little unsteady.

When she turned around, she saw that it was Zijuan, whom she knew.

"Third girl?"

Tanchun was always a smart girl when she was in Rongguo Mansion. But today, her eyes were dull and she looked silly, which surprised Zijuan.

Zijuan raised her hand and waved again, and the bag in her arms loosened and fell to the ground.

Tanchun then came to her senses and hurriedly squatted down to help Zijuan pick it up.

Tanchun laughed and said, "There are too many people in the room. I feel a little stuffy, so I came out for a walk. Sister Zijuan, why are you carrying so many things? Let me help you."

Zijuan smiled and nodded, "Thank you very much, Third Miss."

"No thanks, no thanks."

As the two of them were picking up the trash, Zijuan soothed them, "It's okay, just make do for one day. The mansion itself was not designed to accommodate so many people, and with so many people here at once, it's a bit crowded."

Tanchun lowered her head, too embarrassed to ask about what happened in the room, and just nodded gently.

But when he lowered his head, picked up a book, brushed off the dust on it, and turned to the title page, he saw three big characters written on it: "Spring Palace Picture".

Zijuan realized something was wrong and was about to snatch it back, but Tanchun threw it into her arms first, jumped up with a scream, and ran away again.

Looking at Tanchun's back, Zijuan looked apologetic and said to herself, "The third lady must have been frightened. I'd better throw this thing away. There are so many girls in the room. I'd better do my own thing honestly and don't think about these indecent things."

After running a hundred steps, Tanchun stopped again, holding onto the pillar, her voice choking, "Sister Zijuan wasn't like this before. Why are you still watching that kind of thing with such fanfare? Is this the unknown secret of Marquis Anjing, and the origin of the rumors?"

"Then, what a lustful man the Marquis must be!"

Tanchun suddenly felt a gray haze in front of her eyes, and her heart became increasingly restless.

Just as she was hesitating, Xueyan came around and ran to her side with a happy face, "Third Miss, dinner is ready in the hall, come quickly, we are waiting for you."

Tanchun raised her head and forced a smile, "Okay, let's go."

Smelling the aroma of food coming from the hall, Xueyan swallowed her saliva and said, "Third Miss, do you know what the Marquis's greatest strength is?"

"Master Hou?"

When this person was mentioned, Tanchun could no longer calm down and asked timidly, "What is it?"

Xueyan turned around with a look of longing and said, "The best thing about the Marquis is that he can cook delicious dishes. Even my daughter, who is so picky, can eat a lot. Anyone in this room who has tasted the Marquis's cooking skills loves him."

Tanchun twitched her lips and thought to herself, "So this is how the Marquis controls you? Did he add some kind of seasoning to the dishes?"

(End of this chapter)