Southern Qi Fenghua Record

Following the clues of the mutton fat jade tablet and the Mausoleum Palace, Xia Houshu squatted near the Prime Minister's Mansion for half a month, and finally made a major breakthrough.

A coachman in the Prime Minister's Mansion was drunk and once mentioned to others that Yi Wu had a personal maid named Yinxiang, who was about the same age as Yi Wu and not outstanding in appearance, but she was smart and prudent in her affairs. By her side, Yi Wu has won Yi Wu's trust.Strangely, after Yi Wu's death, Yinxiang disappeared suddenly, and the Prime Minister's Mansion was also secretly looking for her these days.

Xia Houshu never expected that there would be fish that slipped through the net in this matter.She was so happy that she didn't sleep well all night, racking her brains to plan the next steps.

With new clues, Xia Houshu's investigation became clearer and progressed faster.

After many twists and turns, Xia Houshu finally found the maid named Yinxiang in the back kitchen of Shuyu Pavilion.

Shuyu Pavilion is the largest brothel in the capital, usually crowded with tourists and mixed with dragons and snakes, but it is not an easy task to enter the back kitchen.In order to successfully sneak into the back kitchen of Shuyu Pavilion, Xia Houshu spent two ingots of gold to bribe the elderly couple who delivered fresh fruits and vegetables to Shuyu Pavilion every day.

The elderly couple who delivered the food had kind faces. The man's surname was Qiu and the woman's surname was Hu.Although the husband and wife were doing business with Shuyuge, they did not have the tact and sophistication of other businessmen. Presumably this was the reason why Shuyuge chose to do business with them.

Xia Houshu pretended to be the daughter of an old couple with the surname Qiu, and lied that Aunt Hu, who usually came to deliver vegetables, was too cold to go out, and that Father Qiu was too old to deliver such a large amount of fruits and vegetables by himself, so he came to help.

Father Qiu delivered food to Shuyu Pavilion every day, and the concierge naturally knew him, so he didn't make things too difficult, but when he saw Xia Houshu behind Father Qiu, he still questioned him routinely.

At this time, Xia Houshu was wearing a light blue coarse cloth dress, a wooden hairpin was stuck in her hair, and her face was also smeared black on purpose. She looked like a farmer's daughter who worked all year round.The concierge did not suspect him, and lost interest after a few cross-examinations, but he half-jokingly and half-seriously told Father Qiu to take good care of his daughter. After all, this Shuyu Pavilion is not a place where good men and women live. The short-sighted benefactor took it as a girl here and molested it.

Father Qiu quickly thanked him, and turned to call Xia Houshu to move the vegetables on the wooden cart.

Xia Houshu is a martial artist, his strength is stronger than that of ordinary women, and he can easily carry a few baskets of vegetables.She followed Father Qiu as he moved basket after basket of fresh vegetables into the kitchen, and counted them with the nanny who was in charge of the purchase, while secretly keeping an eye on the situation in the kitchen.

There are about a dozen people in the kitchen. Those who wash vegetables, chop vegetables, stir-fry vegetables, plate them, and serve them each perform their duties. They are miscellaneous but not chaotic.Everyone was so busy that no one noticed whether Papa Qiu had brought a daughter.And Xia Houshu looked at it for a while, but couldn't tell which one was Yinxiang.

When Xia Houshu was carrying the fourth basket of vegetables, he suddenly heard a burst of cursing from the kitchen.She looked towards the source of the sound, and saw a few thick and fat cooks around the stove not far away, staring at a small figure at the mouth of the stove, yelling curses from time to time, the content was extremely ugly.After a closer look, there was a young woman squatting in front of the stove squatting in rough clothes, covered in oil, and with disheveled hair. She was trying to add firewood to the stove under the curse of the cook.

Father Qiu seemed to be used to such scenes, or he didn't want to cause trouble, so he turned a blind eye to the bullying and cursing in front of him, and carried his own food.

Since Xia Houshu was pretending to be Father Qiu's daughter, he naturally didn't dare to cause trouble, so he tried not to look over there as much as possible, and while continuing to help Father Qiu continue to carry the vegetables, he listened carefully and explained the whole story. I made a rough idea.

I only heard a cook with a swollen face poking the rough woman's face and scolding viciously: "What a cheap hoof! Do you think that after working as a maid for a few days in a rich family, you can treat yourself as the master? From my point of view, she is a cheap man." Trash, a born slave!"

The other cook next to her also spat at her, and then scolded: "If you want me to say, calling her a slave is flattering her, I think it's unlucky to bring me footwashing water. I've been here for so long, even a It’s not good to look at the fire, it’s useless at all, which big family dares to use such a person?”

"That's true, I don't know where the wild girl came from, she can dream! If she is really capable, why come to this dirty kitchen? It's not good to be an oiran lady in the front yard? No matter what, go serve the oiran lady You can also take a bath and comb your hair, and make the ladies happy, maybe one day, if the lady becomes a good person, she can really follow her to be a maid in a rich family." The fat cook agreed very much.In a blink of an eye, seeing the rough cloth woman was still sobbing, she suddenly raised her arm and slapped Yinxiang's face, cursing, "Cry! I cry every day, going to the funeral? You're so shameless, why don't you slap her to death?" easy?"

After hearing a series of insults, Xia Houshu concluded that the maid who set the fire was the Yinxiang that the prime minister's mansion was looking for everywhere.That Yinxiang was probably too sad to be scolded, so she was beaten suddenly, and she fell down in front of the stove, kneeling on the scattered firewood, sobbing softly and begging for mercy.There were deep and shallow wounds all over her hands, and it was impossible to see what she was injured by.

It is indeed not easy to endure such humiliation.

Xia Houshu saw everything in his eyes, and he was sure that Yinxiang must know something, otherwise she would not have left the prime minister's mansion suddenly and hid in this dark place, living a life of inhumanity and ghostness.But she didn't intend to fight for Yinxiang's injustice at this moment, but planned to wait until Yinxiang was cornered, and then show her a clear way.After all, when people are most vulnerable, it is easier to defeat the psychological defense.

Amidst the increasingly ugly insults from the cook, Yinxiang became more and more restless, the firewood in the stove still failed to ignite as if against her, and smoke filled the room instead.The cooks, who were aggressive just now, were coughing and cursing, holding up their skirts and running outside, as if there was a scourge inside.

Yinxiang herself was so smoked that she burst into tears, but she kept adding more firewood to the stove. For a moment, she made up her mind to die with those who bullied her.

The thick smoke in the kitchen was getting bigger and bigger, and the sparks jumped onto the dry grass that supported the combustion, and immediately caught fire.While calling for others to help, the cooks took buckets, wooden basins, clay pots and other things that could hold water to the well to fetch water and pour it into the smoky kitchen. The whole back kitchen was in chaos... …

Father Qiu didn't want to stir up trouble, but the cook who was in charge just now had been lecturing the useless servant, and didn't have time to reconcile with him, so he didn't dare to leave rashly, after all, these baskets of fruits and vegetables were carefully prepared by him and the boss. Cultivated and carefully selected, it is worth a lot of silver.But looking at the current situation, he didn't dare to ask more, lest he would run into bad luck, so he could only stand not far away from right and wrong with all his heart and wait for the next sentence, and winked at Xia Houshu from time to time, telling her to find a way to leave quickly.

Xia Houshu was also very anxious.Yinxiang was a new clue that she had spent a lot of time finding. If she was buried in the flames like this, wouldn't all her work be wasted?

However, her current identity is Father Qiu's daughter, and she dare not act rashly in front of so many people, otherwise she will expose herself as a trivial matter, and will implicate the old man's family, bringing them endless disasters, even life-threatening .

Xia Houshu thought over and over again, and decided to wait and see what happened.So she reached out and patted the old man's arm, and signaled with her eyes that he should not panic, and let's wait and see what happened.

Seeing that Xia Houshu didn't want to leave, and didn't want to get involved in the kitchen, Father Qiu couldn't help suspecting her real intention of pretending to be his daughter to sneak into Shuyu Pavilion, and felt more and more uneasy.

Father Qiu came from a farming family, and the whole family relied on the few acres of thin land left by their ancestors to grow vegetables and sell vegetables in exchange for some silver. thing.Even so, Father Qiu also knew in his heart that it was useless to be anxious, he might as well wait and see what happened like Xia Houshu.He quickly took a few steps back to a safer place, so as not to block the crowd who were rushing to fetch water and put out the fire, and he was even more afraid of accidentally getting himself hurt.

The kitchen was smoky and smelled pungent.In the billowing smoke, Yinxiang suddenly opened her eyes, and immediately burst into tears, as if a handful of embroidery needles had been stuck in her eyes, and her mouth and nose could hardly breathe.Based on her memory, she slowly groped for the large water tank next to her, scooped up a few ladles of water, and then poured it on her head, completely soaking through.

More and more people came to fight the fire, buckets of cold water were poured on it, the smoke gradually became smaller, and finally even a spark was not seen, everyone was relieved, and stood there in embarrassment. Gasping for breath, he no longer has the strength to curse.

An obese cook suddenly threw away the wooden bucket in her hand, rolled up her sleeves and rushed into the kitchen puffed up. After a while, she pulled out the wet Yinxiang like a chicken, and threw it on the ground. Then he slapped him in front of everyone, kicked him a few more times, and cursed: "You bastard! You don't want to live and want to drag us to be buried with you? See if I don't beat you to death!"

Yin Xiang, who was dizzy from the thick smoke, was suddenly slapped and kicked a few times, only to feel that all the senses in her body were tingling, and she was actually quite awake.With red eyes, she glanced at the cooks and handymen who were staring at her like hungry wolves, wishing to tear her into pieces. The sadness in her heart gradually turned into anger, and she suddenly grabbed the fat cook who was restraining her. He bit his arm hard, and then ran out desperately while the cook was in pain.

The chubby cook didn't expect that Yinxiang, who usually swallowed her breath like a mute, would resist, and howled earth-shatteringly while hugging a fat arm.

Everyone didn't react for a while, and they all stood and watched in a daze.

Someone yelled, "Grab her!" Everyone woke up like a dream, and chased after Yinxiang in the direction in which she was fleeing.

Xia Houshu knew that the opportunity was coming, so he told Father Qiu in a low voice: "You go to the back door and wait for me first, if someone asks, you just say that you helped the back kitchen to catch the person who set the fire and got separated from me, you have to wait for me go back."

Father Qiu was stunned for a moment, then nodded wildly, and was about to run to the exit of the back door.

Xia Houshu suddenly stopped him again, and continued: "Father Qiu, don't forget that I am your daughter now, if you leave me here alone in a hurry, and you run away, Not only will it arouse suspicion, even if I promise you the tail gold, you won't be able to get it."

Only now did Father Qiu understand Xia Houshu's intentions, and he also knew that Xia Houshu's words were not just a simple threat. He paused for a while, nodded heavily, and ran away without looking back.

Xia Houshu hooked the corners of his mouth, and took advantage of the chaos to walk quickly to a corner.