(1)
The appointed day is approaching, and the Zhao brothers and sisters, who are still far away in Yuyi Town, have already made full preparations and are ready. They only hope that there will be one or two good news from the front, and that Bai Feng and Murong Yan can return in triumph.
During the roughly two months that the heroic couple traveled, the Zhao brothers and sisters did not stop living their original lives.
As the eldest son of Zhao, Zhao Kuo is bound to inherit the family business and become the head of the family. Therefore, now he is running around with his father Zhao Wei all day long, receiving and welcoming distinguished guests from far away. At the end of the day, he only has some leisure time when praying to Buddha in the morning and after nightfall.
For Zhao Xiaomei, her original life was destined to get married and go to Woye Town. Since it is a marriage, the corresponding etiquette and customs must be studied carefully. For this reason, the little girl of the Zhao family spent almost every day learning how to be a wife and being a wife, surrounded by slaves and teachers. She looked casual and unfazed by it.
Everyone is afraid that Miss Zhao will bring the unruly and willful temper she developed in the Purdah Garden to Woye Town. If the marriage fails, it will ruin the relationship between the two families. Such a counterproductive result is really sad, and all the efforts have been wasted. .
Therefore, the more Zhao Xiaomei doesn't want to learn and cannot learn in her heart, the more the slaves and teachers around her will press harder and restrict her personal freedom. In the end, she can only sigh secretly and pretend to be a good daughter. The appearance of a good student is to learn the posture and manners in a decent way.
When taking a break from their busy schedules, the Zhao brothers and sisters would always invite each other to visit the house specially renovated by Bai Feng in the name of official business, urging the workers not to delay due to the approaching winter. Construction period.
The house was always in a mess before it was completed, and the Miao female supervisor would have various thoughts popping up in her mind from time to time, causing a lot of trouble for the boys under her.
At one moment Ajuan planned to carve two symmetrical black bird patterns on the door panel, at another he wanted to transplant other plants and flowers into the courtyard, and even planned to carve out half an acre of land here to plant a rhododendron field.
Faced with various unreasonable demands from the supervisor Ajuan, the workers who originally only had to follow Zhao Kuo's instructions to restore the mansion in front of them had to put a lot of effort into finding skilled sculptors from elsewhere and transporting precious stones from elsewhere. Rhododendron species. All in all, they spent more energy than they imagined. Without the mediation of the Zhao brothers and sisters, they almost renovated the old Taiping Taoist temple site into a Miao village.
One day, the Zhao brothers and sisters came to this Taoist temple for the usual excuses, intending to find the Miao girl Ajuan to rekindle their old friendship.
There happened to be a light snowfall yesterday, and the entire Taoist temple seemed to be covered with a layer of white gauze inside and outside. Pedestrians on the street also put on thick clothes. People with considerable financial resources usually choose to stay warmer. A comfortable coat made of mink or fox fur, with a brocade hat on the back.
The Zhao brothers and sisters were dressed like this. They were almost identical, except Zhao wore dark black and Zhao Xiaomei wore light red. The thick fur of the animal is sewn to the edge of the coat, which not only blocks the wind, but also provides warmth.
The brother and sister had visited more than once and were already able to come and go with ease. They couldn't help but feel happy when they saw that this dilapidated Taoist temple was now revitalized. Zhao Kuo even declared that he wanted to reward Ajuan well.
Little did they know that Ajuan had already put on the winter clothes Zhao Kuo had ordered for her and was shivering in the warm room. Nowadays, she wears Chinese clothes, a Chinese bun, and Chinese makeup, and she looks like a young lady from Han Dynasty.
The winter coat that Zhao Kuo ordered for him was not of a traditional style. It was not as solemn and elegant as the one worn by the younger sister, with wide sleeves and narrow trains. Instead, it borrowed heavily from Miao clothing and narrowed the sleeves. There are many clothes, the skirt is short and light, the undershirt is made of slim-fitting silk, and the edges of the clothes are also sewn with fur. Overall, when Ajuan wears this set of clothes, she won't feel at all restrained no matter how active she is.
Ajuan has never seen snow, let alone experienced white snow. After her skin touched this cold thing for the first time, she could never forget the chill that penetrated her heart. Like a conditioned reflex, she naturally curled up next to the burning charcoal stove and no longer wanted to move. .
But when Zhao Kuo and her younger sister arrived, she was no longer as enthusiastic as before. She called on her servants to clean the floor and the wooden table, and then made tea herself. The Zhao brothers and sisters saw each other curled up and sitting on the soft cushions like a little snake hibernating, staring blankly at the splashing flames in the charcoal stove, thoughtfully, and couldn't help but ask questions one after another.
"Ajuan, what are you doing?" Before Zhao Kuo finished speaking, the younger sister came to Ajuan's side with great interest, sat with him, and said: "Sister Ajuan, I miss you so much these days. Yeah, it’s so boring at home!”
Ajuan glanced at Zhao Kuo listlessly, then hugged the little girl gently for a while, and said with emotion: "What am I doing, and what do you want me to do? Anyway, people here don't listen to me... Only the little sister can do it." Say a few words to me."
Seeing this, Zhao Kuo pretended to be bold and sat down cross-legged, and replied: "How could it be possible? Who dares not to listen to you?"
"Them!" Ajuan pointed at the workers who were repairing the roof, and then pointed at Zhao Kuo and said, "And you!"
"Me?" Zhao Kuo said, "Didn't I prepare the winter clothes for you? What's wrong with Miss Ajuan?"
"How could something like this fall from the sky here! The slave family is freezing to death..." Before Ajuan finished speaking, he stretched out his red and swollen hand in front of Zhao Kuo and said, "Look, the slave family is freezing to death..." I said that I can’t live alone, but you still leave me here! And these people, how have they done anything about the slave family’s instructions and slave family’s requirements!”
Zhao Kuo looked in the direction of the other person's finger. It was a group of shocked workers. When they heard the young boss lady reprimanding him, they all stopped working and walked behind Ajuan.
"They didn't do anything wrong, right?" Zhao Kuo saw the expressions on each of these workers' faces. He thought that Ajuan must have made things difficult for others, so he wanted to defend them and said, "In my opinion, this house is now The work has been completed, but is there anything left that makes Miss Ajuan dissatisfied?"
"The slaves asked them to carve black birds and plant cuckoos, but they didn't do it well!"
Hearing Ajuan's cry, a young and mature man who had a lot of say among the workers stood up and explained: "Back to Miss Ajuan, this is all because no one has seen a black bird. Otherwise, how could we not follow the instructions?" Do as you ask. As for planting azaleas...how can we sow seeds now that there is heavy snow?"
"But..." Azalea was speechless for a long time, suddenly her eyes turned red, and she sobbed and replied: "In my home, azaleas are everywhere, and there is a beautiful black bird pattern in front of my house... there , there won’t be such infiltrating ‘snow’!”
After saying that, Zhao Kuo realized that the girl in front of him missed her family so much and had no one to rely on, so it was inevitable that she would behave like this. Then, he quickly dismissed the workers who were still unaware of the situation and told them not to delay the construction period because of this kind of thing. Then he and his sister chatted with the Miao girl until the dead of night.
Usually late at night, a servant from the Zhao family would come to urge the Zhao brothers and sisters to return home, but this night it was A-Bian who came.
As a member of the back kitchen, A-Bian cannot do the job of running errands and delivering messages every day. Master Zhao Wei sent him here tonight because the entire Zhao family was turned upside down by a piece of news.
It turned out that the Tong family father and son heard that Tong Yao had trumpeted in Woye Town that he had married a widow as his official wife, and then ignored his father and secretly issued a new decree to withdraw all foreign troops assisting Wuchuan.
In order to understand the details and stop such stupid behavior, the Tong family's father and son, who were temporarily living in Yuyi Town, had no choice but to leave overnight and return to Woye Town, putting aside the extremely important marriage matter for the time being.
