Chapter 30: Watching the Laugh
In the past, the Wang family lived in poverty and had little savings every year. It was only in the past two years that the family became wealthy and saved some money. If it weren’t for Su Wan’s wages, Mrs Wang would have to pay for clothes and servants from her own savings.
Wang Luoxue said: “There is nothing we can do about it. The Duan family hired her to do work, so how could they possibly let her recover from her illness? Let her recover from her illness at the Shen family for now.”
After hearing Wang Luoxue mention the Duan family, Mrs Wang said to Wang Luosheng, “Su Wan fainted. I don’t know if she has received her salary from the Duan family. Go to the academy today and ask Master Duan. If Su Wan has not received her salary, go to the Duan family and get her salary back.”
Mrs Wang was anxious to cut off ties with Su Wan yesterday, so she no longer cared about Su Wan’s wages. After all, if she wanted to get Su Wan’s wages, she would have to pay Su Wan’s seven taels of medicine money, which would not be enough to cover her expenses. Mrs Wang would not do such an unprofitable deal.
Now that it seems that the Wang family no longer needs to spend money, Wang Shi starts to covet Su Wan’s money again.
Wang Luosheng heard from Duan Jingtian yesterday that Su Wan had received her wages, but Duan Jingtian did not say how much. Wang Luosheng told Mrs Wang that Su Wan had received her wages.
Mrs Wang’s heart ached. After a while, Wang said to Wang Luoxue, “Luoxue, if there is anything you need at home, go to next door and ask Su Wan to come over. She likes your brother so much. If she knew that our family is willing to let her in, she would be very happy.”
Wang Luoxue nodded, that was exactly what she meant.
~~~~~~
The Shen family.
After Su Wan and the Shen family finished breakfast, Shen Lin went to work in the fields. Su Wan walked around the yard and found that the Shen family’s house was tidy. Even if there was work to be done, it was very simple. As Su Wan walked around, she tidied up the parts of the Shen family that were not done well.
As a result, the Shen family’s already smooth courtyard became even more smooth.
Su Wan walked into the Shen family’s woodshed and saw Shen Yaya carrying a large bamboo basket. Shen Yaya said, “Sister Su Wan, I’m going to go out and dig some wild vegetables. You can just rest at home.”
Shen Yaya is so small, but the bamboo basket on her body is so big. Su Wan knows that Shen Yaya not only needs to dig some wild vegetables for them to eat, but also some grass to feed chickens and pigs.
The Shen family raised three chickens and a pig. Because they could only eat wild grass, the chickens and pigs in the Shen family were very thin.
Su Wan said, “I see there are some wild vegetables for chickens and pigs to eat here. Don’t go digging for now. Let’s go to the county town. When we come back from the county town, we will go digging wild vegetables together.”
Shen Yaya naturally yearned for the county town, but she felt that it was not a good idea to let Sister Su Wan go digging wild vegetables with her.
Shen Yaya then said that she couldn’t let Su Wan go with her to dig wild vegetables, and it would be bad to let Su Wan do so much work.
Su Wan smiled. This little girl really doesn’t know how to protect her own interests. Su Wan said, “It’s only natural for me to eat and live in your house and help you with some chores. There’s no need to be so polite.”
As Su Wan was talking, she took off the bamboo basket from Shen Yaya, asked Shen Yaya to change into the new clothes that she had bought for her some time ago, then she tied two beautiful little buns for Shen Yaya, and then put the flower headband that she had bought for Shen Yaya that day on Shen Yaya.
Shen Yaya was originally pretty, but she used to wear tattered clothes, which concealed some of her beauty.
Now dressed like this by Su Wan, Shen Yaya’s features are as pretty as a painting, just like the little boy in the painting, pretty and cute.
However, the only drawback is that Shen Yaya’s skin is too dark, just like Su Wan’s before. Some time ago, Su Wan cooked at Duan’s house and was not exposed to the wind and sun every day, so her skin became white, but Shen Yaya’s skin was still dark. Su Wan decided to buy some moisturizing ointment for Shen Yaya after going to the county town.
The Shen family was so poor that apart from the neat house, all other appliances were old and shabby, and the cabinets for storing food were almost empty of rice and noodles. As for seasonings, there were none at all, so Su Wan planned to go buy some ingredients.
Food is the most important thing for people. The Shen family is so poor that they have to keep things simple when it comes to meals.
Su Wan also wore a neat set of clothes without patches and took the beautifully dressed Shen Yaya to the county town.
At this time, the men in the village were all working in the fields, and the women were cleaning up at home. Su Wan and Shen Yaya didn’t meet any villagers on the way. The two of them walked out of Qingshi Village and walked for a while. They came across an ox cart going to Qingyun County. Su Wan paid two cents and got on the ox cart with Shen Yaya.
The Wang family had planned early in the morning to use Su Wan’s money, hence the whole family was very happy.
After breakfast, Wang Luosheng went to study, his father went to work at the mill, and Mrs Wang and Wang Luoxue asked the maid to do these housework.
Su Wan is no longer a member of the Wang family. What makes Mrs Wang most uncomfortable is that she doesn’t know whether she can still get Su Wan’s wages. If not, she can only fire the two maids, and then she and Wang Luoxue will do the housework together.
In the past, Mrs Wang said that the meals cooked by Su Wan were cooked by Wang Luoxue. After Su Wan left, the Wang family hired a maid to cook not long after. Others could see that the Wang family’s food was not as good as before, but they just thought it was because the maid cooked and Wang Luoxue stopped cooking, and did not suspect any other reasons.
Mrs Wang was very dissatisfied with the two old women. Old woman Wu was very slow in doing her work and she didn’t clean up very cleanly, which made Mrs Wang very angry.
Originally, Wang Luoxue was planning to call Su Wan directly to come over to do the work, but Mrs Wang said that she had to observe het for a few days first and let Su Wan recuperate at the Shen’s house first, to prevent Su Wan from fainting in her home again and causing trouble for the family.
The two old women were so confused by the orders given by Wang’s mother and daughter that they were totally going blind. One told them to go east while the other told them to go west.
Mrs Wang asked Mrs. Wu to sweep the yard. When she was halfway through sweeping the yard, Wang Luoxue asked Mrs. Wu to go into the room to clean it. Mrs. Wu had to put down the half-sweeped yard and go in to clean the room.
Wang’s mother and daughter were just ordering the maid to do some chores when they heard a commotion outside the door. It turned out that a few women who were on good terms with Mrs Wang came to visit.
Now the crops in the fields have been harvested, and the remaining work such as farming is the work of men. The women have some free time, so they have time to come to the Wang family today.
These women only have free time after harvesting the crops. The Wang family runs a mill, and Mrs Wang has always been idle. Not only does she not have to work in the fields, but this time the Wang family hired a maid, so Mrs Wang doesn’t even have to do housework. The women are jealous and envious of her.
Just as such a farce happened in the Wang family yesterday, these women wanted to come to the Wang family today. On the one hand, they wanted to see what kind of fairy-like life , Mrs Wang who had hired a maid, was living, and on the other hand, they wanted to chat with Mrs Wang about what happened yesterday.
In any case, it was not honorable for the Wang family to ignore Su Wan, and these women secretly felt a little ashamed of Mrs Wang’s thoughts.
Mrs Wang opened the door and let the women in.
Several women entered the Wang family’s home and were a little surprised. They had originally thought that the Wang family, which had hired a maid, would have clean windows and neat yards, but upon first glance, they found that the Wang family’s yard was not even as good as before. When Su Wan was still there, the Wang family’s yard was always clean and beautiful.
Now, the Wang family’s yard is no different from their yards. Mrs Wang didn’t feel embarrassed at all. She herself was not tidy to begin with, and she thought it was normal to tidy it up like this, so Mrs Wang didn’t feel the grumbling in the hearts of these ladies.
Well, come to think of it, it’s probably because the old woman didn’t do the rough work well. In the past, Su Wan did the rough work of sweeping the yard quite well.
Among these women, there was one named Sun, who couldn’t stand people showing off in everything and was not on good terms with Mrs Wang. When Mrs Sun saw the messy Wang’s yard, she felt relieved.
Mrs Sun said to Mrs Wang, “Sister Wang, among all the sisters, you are the most blessed. Your family can afford to hire a maid. We are not as lucky as you.”
Mrs Wang smiled and said, “I hired a maid because the work was too tiring. Otherwise, who would be willing to spend that much money?”
When talking about the wronged money, Mrs Wang felt heartbroken. She had originally planned to use Su Wan’s wages to hire a maid, but now Su Wan had severed ties with the Wang family. Before confirming with Su Wan, she had to spend her own money.
But she couldn’t fire the maid all of a sudden. Besides the fact that there was no one to do the housework, she couldn’t afford to lose face. The whole village within a few miles knew that Mrs Wang had a maid, and they were all envious. But if now she didn’t use her anymore after less than a month. Those who knew her would say that the maid was not helpful, while those who didn’t would think that she couldn’t afford the maid again. Mrs Wang had always been used to showing off in front of others, and she couldn’t afford to lose face.
Mrs Sun said, “Sister Wang is so lucky. We are so envious of her. Let me see the maid you hired. I am a person of limited experience and have never employed a maid before. It would be a good idea for me to take a look.”
Several other women echoed this.
Mrs Wang welcomed several women into the house.
Several people walked into the house and were a little surprised. They originally thought that since the Wang family had hired a maid, the house would be cleaner and tidier than before, but now it seemed that the Wang family’s house was still a mess.
Mrs. Li, the housewife in charge of sweeping the house, was folding clothes for Wang Luoxue in her room.
There is no taboo for country people to visit each other, as they are all women, so they pushed the door of Wang Luoxue’s room. It was a bit unexpected when they went in, as Wang Luoxue’s room was also a mess.
Everyone in the entire Qingshi Village knows that Wang Luoxue is best at doing those delicate housework. Logically speaking, even if she didn’t hire a maid, Wang Luoxue should keep her room tidy. Why is Wang Luoxue’s room so messy?
Looking at the two maids hired by the Wang family, it seemed that they were not very efficient in their work.
This Mrs Wang is, after all, different from the wives of wealthy families, and everyone’s attitude towards Wang Luoxue has also changed slightly. Luoxue is a girl, she should just clean her own room, why does she need a maid? And the maid’s cleaning is not very good either.
Among these women, several of them hoped that Wang Luoxue could be their daughter-in-law, and for this reason they always tried to get close to Mrs Wang.
Now these women have also changed their minds about Wang Luoxue.
The house was not tidy enough, and Mrs Wang also felt it. She immediately scolded Mrs Li and said that Mrs Li was not doing her job efficiently and attentively.
The old woman felt very aggrieved, and immediately said that the Wang family’s house was too messy inside and outside. Even if she cleaned it up herself, she would have to clean it up one item at a time. If she cleaned it up every time, the Wang family would be able to keep it well and it wouldn’t be so messy.
Mrs Wang was so angry that she got furious at Mrs. Wu. Fortunately, there were other women nearby to hold her back, otherwise Mrs Wang would have really dared to go up and hit Mrs. Wu a few times.
Several women pulled Mrs Wang out and went to the main room to chat with her. As soon as they sat down, Mrs Sun started to talk about something else. She said, “Sister Wang, in my opinion, although Su Wan is a little ugly and a little clumsy, she can still help you a lot when she was at your house.”
”The way you treated her yesterday was really inappropriate, and it might have hurt her feelings.”
The ladies all said that Mrs Wang shouldn’t have treated Su Wan like that. Mrs Wang naturally didn’t want to be criticized, so she held her neck and said, “You are talking without any pain. When Su Wan was in my house, she ate my food and used my things, and she couldn’t do any work. My family has raised her until now, and we have done our best.”
”If I hadn’t been supporting Su Wan, my family would have been able to build a brick house by now.”
In Qingshi Village, building a brick house is a symbol of honor. Back then, Shen Lin’s family built a brick house, which made people in the whole village jealous and envious.
But now Shen Lin’s family is extremely poor except for a brick house, and there is nothing for others to envy.
Mrs Wang blamed Su Wan for the reason why her family did not build a brick house, making it seem like she had done her best for Su Wan and allowing herself to stand on the moral high ground.
One of the women said, “My dear sister, I saw that when Su Wan was at your house, she was very busy every day. Even if she didn’t have any merit, she must have worked hard. You can’t say that about her.”
Mrs Wang didn’t like what she said and frowned, “That’s not what I meant. You don’t know. The reason I don’t let her go back to the Wang family is not because she’s sick, but because she’s a jinx. Since she came to my house, many bad things have happened to my family. Tell me, with a jinx like this, can I still keep her at home? Of course I can’t.”
Mrs Wang recounted some of the unfortunate things that had happened in her home since Su Wan came, and she described them with detail and details.
Mrs Wang said this to avoid people talking about her being heartless and cutting off ties with Su Wan when Su Wan was sick.
In order to make her words more credible, Mrs Wang added at the end: “Su Wan is a child with a bad fate. Whoever takes her home will be unlucky. If you don’t believe me, just wait and see. If the Shen family takes her home, they will probably live an even more miserable life than before.”
Speaking of the Shen family taking Su Wan back home, the women all said that it turned out that the Shen family really took Su Wan back home.
Yesterday, Shen Lin showed up and said that he was going to pick up Su Wan. The villagers all thought that Shen Lin was joking. His family was so poor that they could barely afford food, so how could he afford the seven taels of silver?
Now that they had received a positive answer from Mrs Wang, all the ladies were a little curious about the situation at the Shen family after they brought Su Wan back.
Mrs Wang snorted, “The Shen family is really overestimating their own capabilities. Their family is already unlucky and poor, and they brought back such a jinx. I wonder how they will live in the future.”
Several women were chatting freely about how prosperous the Shen family was in the past, and how destitute it was now.
This time, Su Wan was brought back as a patient, and life in the future would be even more difficult.
After all, they were talking about other people’s affairs. When the women talked about these things, they were not serious at all, and there were even some laughs.
As they were talking, one of the women was really curious and said, “I don’t know how Su Wan is doing now. Anyway, we are just visiting, so why don’t we go next door this afternoon to see Su Wan and also visit Sister Shen.”
The women had nothing to do, so they hit it off immediately and decided to go to Shen’s house in the afternoon.
It was already noon, otherwise the women would have gone to the Shen family immediately.
Also, the time for cooking was tight, and there was not enough time to chat for a long time at the Shen’s house, otherwise several people would have gone to the Shen’s house right away.
Mrs Wang was also very interested in going to the Shen family. In the past, Mrs Shen was better than her in every way. Now she wanted to witness with everyone how miserable Mrs Shen’s life was.
A few years ago, Shen Lin’s family was the richest family in Qingshi Village, and Mrs Shen’s clothes and accessories were better than any other woman in Qingshi Village. Later, Shen Lin’s father died, and Shen Lin’s family was divided up by his grandparents. In addition, Mrs Shen got sick and needed expensive medicine, so the Shen Lin’s family fell into decline and became the poorest family in Qingshi Village.
The Shen Lin’s family suddenly went from being the envy of everyone to being looked down upon by everyone.
Since the Shen Lin’s family fell into poverty, the door of the Shen Lin’s family has been closed all year round, and Mrs Shen never went out of the main door. These women have not seen Mrs Shen for a long time. Now that Su Wan is in the Shen family, these people can go there in the name of seeing Su Wan, and Mrs Shen naturally cannot refuse.
In the afternoon, these women went together and knocked on the door of the Shen family.
Speaking of which, although the Shen family has fallen on hard times, this gate is still the most imposing one in the village. The courtyard wall and the gate are so solid that you can’t see inside from the outside. This is why these women haven’t seen the Shen family for a long time.
The women knocked on the door and called out, “Sister Shen, we heard that Su Wan is sick. So we came to see her.”
Someone said, “Sister Shen, we know you are at home, just open the door. We are not here to make fun of you, we are here to see Miss Su.”
Hearing this, several women were stunned. Oh, doesn’t it seem like they are here just to watch a joke?
Mrs Shen, who was recuperating on the kang in the room, was a little surprised. When she was not sick, these women would often make sarcastic remarks to her. She and these women did not get along and did not interact with each other often. After she fell ill, she closed the door to visitors and did not want to listen to their sarcastic remarks. Why did they come to her door again on their own initiative now?
Mrs Shen wanted to get out of bed, open the door, tell them that Su Wan had gone out, and ask them to come back another day, but Mrs Shen’s body and legs had always made it difficult for her to walk out of the door.
As Mrs Shen was thinking this, she moved her legs unconsciously. A strange feeling came over her. She found that moving her legs was not as strenuous as usual. Mrs Shen tried to move it again, but to her surprise, it was still not very strenuous.
Mrs Shen suddenly felt as if she could control her body.
Mrs Shen moved her legs step by step with difficulty and actually reached the front door.
Several women were getting impatient waiting and kept loudly urging Su Wan and Shen inside to let them in.
Suddenly, the door creaked and it was Mrs Shen who opened the door.
Seeing Mrs Shen, who looked old, skinny and hunched, the women were stunned. They had always known that She was ill, but they had no idea that her illness was so serious.
Mrs Wang was the first to speak: “Sister Shen, how did you become like this?”
Everyone was surprised at Mrs Shen’s decadent state, but in her heart she was happy that she could walk from the room to the door by herself.
Mrs Shen took a breath and said slowly: “It wasn’t like this a few days ago, but today…”
When Mrs Wang heard this, she quickly followed up Mrs Shen’s words: “Sister Shen’s illness was not so serious a few days ago, but it is only serious today, right?”
Mrs Wang turned to the ladies and said, “Look, sisters, what did I say? Su Wan is a jinx. She just came to Sister Shen’s house and Sister Shen became so sick.”
The women were all stunned. Originally, they did not believe what Mrs Wang said about Su Wan being an unlucky star, but now it seemed that Su Wan really was unlucky for the people around her.
