Novel Bin Chapter 83 - She had enmity toward her father
Chapter 83 She had enmity toward her father
“It doesn’t matter, Yi. There are plenty of good teachers at home, and they will teach you how to read! As long as you can study hard, after 2 or 3 years, even if Qiong is still outsmarting you, you would at least be as good as Shao!” Madam Luo comforted He Danggui, “Here’s something new. Shao is interested in the new drama ‘series’ of the capital, and you’re not at home. She often said it was boring to stay in the study, so she hasn’t listened to the teachers for months. It’s the best opportunity for you to catch up with her and then surpass her!”
He Danggui asked worriedly, “Is it okay for the fourth sister not to go to class? I heard from her that you always wanted her and the second sister to study for a few years in Chengxu Academy.”
Thinking of this, Madam Luo sighed and said, “Alas, I’m a born worrier. Their parents don’t care about their study, but I do. Although given our family background, Qiong and Shao definitely won’t need to worry about finding husbands in the future, I just want them to learn more and have genuine talents. It’s good to learn all the skills a little bit, for one day those skills will come in handy. Actually, we have connections to get them to the academy. When the Senior Lord was the President of the Imperial Academy, he had a subordinator, Director Wei, who is now the Vice-President of the Academy, but…at least Qiong was able to write…as for Shao’s writing, I’m so embarrassed to speak out to Vice-President Wei!”
“Grandma, don’t worry. Actually, the fourth sister is cleverer than me. She is just young and naughty and doesn’t like sitting in front of desk to study.” He Danggui comforted Madam Luo with her soft voice, “Maybe she will be a female scholar once she falls in love with reading and writing!”
Madam Luo could not conceal a snort of laughter. She touched He Danggui’s head and said, “Girl, you’re really good at comforting people! But there is no ‘male Juren’ in the East Yard of Luo’s Family, not to mention a ‘female scholar’!” Thinking of that letter written by He Danggui, Madam Luo hurriedly asked, “Yi, I find your handwriting makes a great progress after you had the accident. How did you get such a great progress just within a month?”
He Danggui lowered her head with humility and smiled, “Not as good as you said, Grandma. Actually, my handwriting is so illegible. I would be ashamed to show my words but for the urgency of this matter. As for the method of practicing words, I need to appreciate the masters in the Taoist temple. I was bored in the mountain. Seeing most of them copying the scriptures, I copied them, too. And then I became familiar with some words. Although it’s still illegible, I could write some words without looking them up on the books!”
Madam Luo felt both delighted and worried. She was delighted because Yi’s writing was good, but she worried that this method could not be suitable for Shao. So, she shook her head and said, “But Shao isn’t patient like you. Even if there are 10 maids writing in front of her every day, she will not learn from them. Alas, one day she’ll get married and become the wife in charge of the family, then she has to write and draw in her daily life...”
Hearing Madam Luo keeping talking about Fourth Miss’s bad handwriting, but ignoring her big mistake, Mammy Tang abruptly interrupted to ask He Danggui, “Third Miss, are your hands still itchy? I have Qingdu Baihuo Powder given by Jiu Gu. Although it’s not very useful, your hands will only feel itchy every 2 hours and you’ll not feel uncomfortable like now!” She gave a small porcelain medicine bottle in blue to He Danggui.
“Mammy, it was because you only got a little of the poison, the symptom had subsided slowly, and it has nothing to do with Qingdu Baihuo Powder.” He Danggui said silently in her heart, then she lowered her head and smiled with appreciation, “Thanks for Mammy’s kindness. I’ll receive it then.” She opened the bottle plug and applied some on her hands, then she gave it back to Mammy Tang.
Madam Luo touched He Danggui’s tiny shoulder and extorted her in a low voice, “Yi, I’ve heard this incident from Hong Jiang. She persuaded me to tie Shao down with restrictions on the way to the Taoist temple just now. She also said Shao should be sent to the Taoist temple for 2 months to change her temper. But Shao is young after all, even one year younger than you. It must be the cunning maids who egged her on buying these bad medicines. I’ve been watching her growing up since her childhood. She is straightforward and easy to spill her mind, also she is kind-hearted, which is the same quality of her mother...”
He Danggui slightly lowered her head and listened to what Madam Luo said in a soft voice. In the previous life, Madam Luo was quiet and didn’t always share her thoughts with He Danggui. Every time when Madam Luo suddenly spoke a lot to her, she had something to persuade He Danggui, and most of these matters had something to do with the Second Branch. He Danggui lowered her head deeply while listening, then she faintly smiled. After all, Shao was Madam Luo’s sib granddaughter, so she could not bear to criticize her. This was just human nature.
6 months ago, the legendary Third Miss, He Danggui, came to Luo’s Family, Madam Luo also treated her as equal as Luo Baiqiong and Luo Baishao, so she was asked to join the two to be taught by the same female teacher.
Since He Danggui was a “transfer student”, the female teacher needed to test her literary skill, so she was asked to write a thousand words essay titled by “fallen flowers”. He Danggui awkwardly told the female teacher that she couldn’t write. Luo Baishao tittered while Luo Baiqiong appreciated her nails and coughed consciously or unconsciously.
The female teacher frowned because she didn’t expect that He Danggui had such poor skills. After a while, the female teacher asked her to write an ancient-style essay in a hundred words titled by “spring water”. He Danggui grabbed her sleeves and lowered her head to tell the female teacher that she hadn’t learned any ancient-style essays, and only understood a little about “literary jargon”. Anything beyond these was beyond her ability. Luo Baishao rolled her eyes and turned her head to whisper with Luo Baiqiong, then she looked up and kindly told the female teacher, “She grew up in the countryside, so you should ask her questions about that!” In Luo Baishao’s eyes, the female teacher was just a high-grade servant, so she always talked to the female teacher with arrogance.
The female teacher felt uncomfortable with Luo Baishao’s authoritative tone, so she didn’t do what Luo Baishao said. Instead, she asked He Danggui to write a Five-character-quatrain titled by “father’s love”. He Danggui was confounded, then whispered to the female teacher that she could only write about 20 words in total, including her name, not to mention writing a poem. Actually, He Danggui was telling the truth about what she was capable of, but Luo Baishao suddenly shouted, “Teacher, she is lying! She thought your topic is bad, so she didn’t want to write it! She had enmity toward her father and she is not her father’s sib daughter!”
Hearing that, the female teacher was bewildered. No matter what the background of this new Third Miss was, now He Danggui and Luo Baishao disturbed the class, so she followed Madam Luo’s instruction about “be strict to them and ignore their identities”. She punished them to face the wall while introspecting their mistakes and hand in a thousand words essay titled by “father’s love” tomorrow.
In the previous life, He Danggui didn’t leave the countryside until she was 9-year-old. She worked in the fields during the day and ground tofu at night. She never studied before, and she couldn’t even write her name.
Later, Luo Chuanxiong was diagnosed with infertility, so she picked He Danggui, who was her first husband’s daughter, to live together with her second husband—He Fu. Although He Danggui followed her mother’s instruction and called those people “dad”, “grandma”, “aunt” and “uncle” without hesitation, all of them didn’t response her and showed unhappiness on their faces.
What exactly did Luo Chuanxiong mean? Normally, if a wife was barren, she should take a concubine for her husband at once. Why did she take a “drag” here? Did she want He Fu to raise other’s daughter? He Fu had no son right now. Did she want to cut off their offspring by doing so?
In fact, Luo Chuanxiong was 3 years older than He Fu, also divorced and had a child, so she felt very self-abased. Now she was diagnosed that she had taken a large amount of musk early and couldn’t give birth to kids for He Fu. She became more worried and definitely didn’t want other women to marry her husband. She thought in private, “Now that He Fu likes kids, what about picking my daughter up and living with us? Therefore, my daughter could cheer him up every day. When their feelings deepened, I could choose 1 or 2 obedient concubines for him to have a son. By then, with a son and a daughter, my family would be perfect.”
Bearing this good wish in mind, although people in He Fu’s Family showed their obvious unhappiness, Luo Chuanxiong still invited the best music master and dance master of Yangzhou City to teach He Danggui. The latter was asked to play the instrument, sing and dance day and night. Every time when Luo Chuanxiong heard the masters saying that her daughter learned new songs and dance steps, she would push He Danggui to He Fu’s study, and force her to sing, dance and play the instrument in front of him. She wanted to impress him and get his love back in this way.
At first, He Danggui was obedient to do these. Although learning those about music and dance was harder than working in the fields, it was interesting. Gradually, she was fascinated. However, when He Danggui sang and danced in He Fu’s study until the tenth month, she unconsciously grew higher and didn’t want to dance for her “father”. Because she was afraid of his deep and gloomy eyes when she came to the study every time.
He Danggui didn’t know how to explain to her mother, so she lied that she was tired of learning to dance and play the instruments, and she didn’t want to learn anymore. Her mother disagreed. He Danggui felt aggrieved and confronted with her mother. Her mother was so angry that she slapped He Danggui, demanding her to continue learning more pleasant songs and dances.
More than a month later, taking advantage of Luo Chuanxiong’s dowry, He Fu interceded the connections and got a position of Guarding Commander of the Capital, Eighth-Grade. He also purchased a house in the capital with the money. Before taking the office, He Fu bought 3 tickets and sent his mother, his sister and brother-in-law to the passenger boat heading to Yingtian Prefecture. Then he explained to his wife that they wanted to have a tour in the capital because they hadn’t been there before.
One night after a few days, He Fu in purple secretly went to He Danggui’s boudoir. First, he waked her up, then covered her mouth and nose to prevent her from making any sound. He told He Danggui that as her “father”, he would take her to an interesting place and asked her not to resist but follow him.