As soon as Princess Ancheng's words came out, Shen Wanqi instantly felt the eyes of the maids and nuns in her courtyard falling on him. His face froze, and he gritted his teeth and said, "Madam, I didn't mean that..."
Mrs. Shen became angry when she saw his weak look. She hit the ground with her cane again and said, "Listen to the maid below, did you order people to carry all the gifts given by the guests yesterday?"
Mrs. Shen frowned and scolded her: "The number of those gifts is not small, and they are all sent by prominent people in Beijing. It is clear that we must return them equally.
"Are these things shared by the Marquis Mansion? Or is it safer to put them in the treasury? How can we carry them all back to your courtyard?"
Princess Ancheng waited for her to finish speaking before she spoke slowly: "Grandma, how come your people can't even understand what they're saying? Isn't this a misunderstanding in vain?"
After saying this, she ordered the boy she sent to carry things over.
"Replying to the old lady, the congratulatory gifts that the eldest princess ordered us to bring back are the gifts specially given to the little princess by the emperor, the queen mother and several princes yesterday. They do not include the congratulatory gifts sent to the house."
As soon as these words came out, Mrs. Shen was stunned for a moment, and then her face turned red instantly as if she had been slapped out of thin air.
She took the steps that Princess Ancheng had laid for her, picked up the crutch and hit the maid closest to her: "You bastard, why can't you even understand the message!"
The maid was beaten hard several times, and she immediately knelt on the ground and began to admit her mistake.
But Princess Ancheng couldn't tell that some maid had conveyed the wrong message. Old Mrs. Shen had long known that the things she brought back were specially given to Shen Zhizhi, but she didn't expect that she would actually show up in front of so many people. Just slap her in the face and tell the truth.
Sure enough, after teaching the maid a lesson, Mrs. Shen still had no intention of leaving. Instead, she changed as a different person and started chatting with the eldest princess Ancheng. Her expression was so gentle that outsiders might think she was the eldest princess ancheng. Not her grandson-in-law but her own granddaughter.
As the saying goes, if you show courtesy for nothing, you are either committing adultery or stealing.
As expected, after chatting for a while, Mrs. Shen began to change the topic to the full moon banquet, and finally returned to Shen Zhizhi's gift.
"If you ask me, it's better to keep the things that were delivered on the same day neatly together. It would be unlucky to separate them the next day, so we can just have someone carry them away and put them in the treasury together. We won't carry them back until the children are older. It’s not too late.”
After saying this, he ordered Nanny Zhang to find someone to carry the things back to the treasury.
Princess Ancheng thought to herself that Mrs. Shen was so shameless for this thing that she could actually say that she would take the thing away first and then bring it back when the child grows up.
Once this thing is taken away, I'm afraid I won't be able to come back in this life!
Shen Zhizhi was also muttering while holding her golden lock.
[What a shameless great-grandmother, she even wants to be greedy for things belonging to the younger generation. 】
She stopped Nanny Zhang who was about to ask someone to carry something, and said calmly: "Anything that is auspicious or unlucky is just a troubling thought.
"Putting it in the treasury is troublesome and laborious, and you will have to carry it back when the time comes. Besides..."
She pinched Shen Zhizhi's chubby cheeks and smiled: "I am planning to carry the dowry from the treasury back to my yard in a while. If I carry the wedding gifts away now, I will have to carry them away in a while. Why bother carrying it back so many times? It's better to just leave it here."
As soon as Princess Ancheng said these words, Mrs. Shen and Shen Wanqi both started coughing.
[Mother, they have a guilty conscience! 】
Princess Ancheng glanced at the two of them with an unclear look, and then ordered the maid to fetch water.
Mrs. Shen took the water and drank it, then she stopped coughing. She held the crutch and nodded: "Ancheng, this is what you are doing wrong. Look at the property of couples who have not put it together since ancient times. , there is no reason to separate.
“Look at the wealthy families in Beijing, which daughter-in-law’s dowry is not kept in the mansion’s warehouse?
"The dowry must be kept together to show the unity of the husband and wife. If it is divided, people will laugh at it. Look, Mrs. Jin's wife has become a laughing stock in the capital because she divided the dowry into a private treasury and then had a dispute with her parents-in-law.
"The Jin family and the whole family are looked down upon by other aristocratic families in Beijing. This kind of thing must never be done. It will make our Hou family lose face!"
Mrs. Shen's words were full of warning. If it had been said before, Princess Ancheng would have been turned off by her words. However, she was no longer the Princess Ancheng who had been exploited by others and dedicated everything to the Hou Mansion. .
She smiled nonchalantly: "What's the matter? When I first came to Liang Dynasty, I changed the old marriage system. One of the provisions is that the dowry brought by a woman from her mother's family is private property and can be disposed of by the woman herself. This is legal. It’s clearly stipulated, so what’s there to be afraid of?
"Besides, when did I ever care about such things as face?" Princess Ancheng glanced at Mrs. Shen and Shen Wanqi faintly, their eyebrows twitching, and they felt that she had nothing good to say.
As expected, the next moment the two of them heard her say: "When I married Shen Lang, who came from a poor family, as the eldest princess of the Chu family, did I ever complain at all because of the shame?"
Princess Ancheng's words were like a slap in the face to Shen Wanqi from afar. It could even be said that she slapped him hard in the face in front of the maids, mammies and guards in the whole courtyard.
Shen Wanqi's face was ashen and he looked at Princess Ancheng in disbelief, but he could not refute because he knew in his heart that what Princess Ancheng said was the truth.
Ignoring Shen Wanqi's livid expression, Ancheng continued: "I'm sure my grandmother and husband don't know how those wealthy families discussed my marriage to a poor family in private, right?
"Calling me shameless is all implicit. What's even more outrageous is that I even scolded my brother. To put it nicely, I just lost my own face, but to put it harshly, I have ruined the whole world. The royal family has been disgraced."
Princess Ancheng sighed and said: "I have even lost the face of the royal family, so why should I be afraid of losing the face of the Marquis Mansion now?"
As soon as these words came out, Shen Wanqi couldn't bear it and said: "Yan Xi, how can you say such things? If you disgrace the Marquis Mansion, you are disgracing me!"
Princess Ancheng raised her eyebrows: "Husband, you mean that your face is more important than my brother's face? I can embarrass my brother but I can't embarrass you?"
