Left with no choice, Madam Shi summoned two senior servants.

“Take these two maids into a room and examine them—determine whether they have that kind of disease.” The room was still full of female family members, and Madam Shi found herself speaking with some discomfort.

At the sight of this, Yangliu and Yangzhi immediately cried out their innocence. “Madam, we have no disease!”

“Enough, stop screaming. If you have the disease or not, an examination will settle it. If you’re clean, no one will wrong you.”

Yangliu and Yangzhi exchanged a glance. When the two servants moved to take them, both women leaped to their feet and bolted for the door.

But the servants were no weaklings—in a few swift steps they caught up and pinned both women down.

“We don’t have the disease!” Yangliu and Yangzhi screamed as they were dragged away.

“Take them inside,” the Marshal said with an impatient wave of his hand.

Yangliu and Yangzhi were pulled into an inner room, and the main hall fell into dead silence.

Madam Shi wrung the handkerchief in her hands, trying to calm her inner agitation. She believed Xu Shiyong was simply seizing an opportunity to extort them. After all, when she had arranged for Yangliu and Yangzhi, she had already had them examined herself—there had been nothing out of the ordinary.

“Mother,” Yan Qing said softly to Luo Huaimeng, “I’m so frightened.”

Luo Huaimeng gave her an irritated look. “What are you frightened of? Madam will handle everything.”

Even so, Yan Qing still appeared uneasy. She lowered her head, pressing her lips tightly together.

After a short while, the two servants emerged from the room. They first glanced at Madam Shi, then caught the Marshal’s severe gaze. “What is the verdict? Speak truthfully.”

Startled, the two immediately answered without hesitation: “Yangliu and Yangzhi both have red rashes in their lower areas. It appears to be… that kind of disease.”

“That’s not true, it’s not true!” Yangliu and Yangzhi protested frantically. “We don’t have that disease—we truly don’t!”

Yangliu crawled on her knees to Madam Shi’s feet. “Madam, please stand up for us sisters!”

When Madam Shi heard the verdict, her head swam.

“Madam, we’re your people! You said that no matter what we did, you would protect—”

Crack!

Shuangxi, the maid at Madam Shi’s side, delivered Yangliu a powerful slap. Shuangxi was tall and solidly built, striking with full force. The blow sent Yangliu crumpling to the ground, one side of her face swelling rapidly.

“You shameless women—you carry this disease and you dared conceal it!” Shuangxi stood with her hands on her hips and let them have it. “Now that you’ve been found out, you want to drag Madam down with you? Who gave you the nerve?”

Madam Shi looked at the two women on the floor with visible revulsion. “Send them back south. They are never to set foot in the northern territories again. This is absolutely unacceptable.”

Yangliu and Yangzhi were still trying to argue in their own defense, but two servants had already stepped forward and clamped their mouths shut, dragging them out of the main hall.

Once the noise had died away, Xu Shiyong—who had been watching the spectacle with great interest—finally spoke up: “Madam, those two women were employees of your household. Surely you owe me an explanation for this matter.”

“You were the one who brought them here from the south. How is this our responsibility now?”

“I don’t care about that. In a moment I’ll go back out and tell all those onlookers that the maids of the Marshal’s Mansion have contracted that disease—who knows which male master of the house they’d been carrying on with…”

“Enough.” The Marshal’s face darkened as he cut Xu Shiyong off. He turned to the butler: “Take him away. Whatever conditions he wants to negotiate, you deal with him. And if a single word of this leaks out, I have plenty of ways to make a person disappear.”

Xu Shiyong immediately bowed with clasped hands. “Marshal, rest assured. I only want a little money for cigarettes. Besides, it wouldn’t do me any good for this to get out—I’d like to keep finding women in the future.”

The Marshal turned away with an expression of disgust and waved his hand dismissively.

Once the butler had led Xu Shiyong away, Madam Shi quickly turned to face the Marshal. “Marshal, I will deal with this matter properly.”

“Now you think about dealing with it? When you brought those two people into this house, why didn’t you properly look into their backgrounds?” The Marshal swung his hand, sending the teacup before him flying off the table. It struck the floor with a crash and shattered to pieces.

Madam Shi was badly shaken and immediately rose to kneel before the Marshal. “Marshal, please calm your anger. It was a moment of foolishness on my part—I misjudged people. I promise to be more careful in future.”

“You expect there to be a next time?” The Marshal’s furious glare bore down on her. “Xingzhi is my son. You installed two women with a venereal disease in his courtyard. What were your intentions? Were you trying to cut off the Shi Family line?”

“I have been wronged, Marshal. I truly did not know. Had I known those two women carried such a disease, how could I have placed them in Xingzhi’s courtyard? Marshal, my loyalty to the Shi Family is as clear as the sun and moon.”

“Marshal.” Shi Guang quickly rose from his seat. “Mother only felt that Seventh Brother’s courtyard was short-handed and meant well by finding him two maids. Her intentions were good—she had no other motive. Marshal, please consider this fairly.”

“I ask the Marshal to consider carefully.” Shi Qian also stood to plead on Madam Shi’s behalf. “Mother works hard managing the inner household. She naturally cannot attend to every detail. This incident was purely accidental.”

The Marshal raised his gaze to Shi Ting. “Xingzhi, what do you say?”

Shi Ting replied with an even composure: “Elder Brother and Second Brother are right. I trust this sort of thing will not happen again.”

The Marshal let out a sigh. “Have a doctor come and examine you thoroughly later.”

“Yes,” Shi Ting replied with a nod.

“And your courtyard—every place those two women have touched should be disinfected and treated.”

“Yes.”

When the Marshal had finished, he turned a furious glare on Madam Shi. “I put you in charge of the inner household—not to fill it with this kind of unsavory element. Let this incident be a lesson to you. If there is a next time, you need not bother managing the inner household any further.”

Madam Shi was so frightened she trembled. “Marshal, rest assured. There will never be a next time.”

“All right, stop standing around.” The Marshal waved his hand. “Everyone go about their business. Tell the servants to keep their mouths shut. If a single word of this gets out, you will answer to me.”

With that, the Marshal rose and strode out of the main hall in long, purposeful strides.

After the Marshal left, Madam Shi finally released a long breath. She told herself that this matter must absolutely not reach the Old Madam’s ears. The Old Madam had always placed great importance on the continuation of the Shi Family line. If she found out, there would undoubtedly be another round of sharp reproaches.

Once she was helped to her feet and had calmed herself somewhat, Madam Shi lifted her gaze—only to meet Shi Guang’s eyes at that very moment. Shi Guang gave her a slight shake of his head.

Only then did Madam Shi come to her senses. The whole thing had happened so suddenly. Thinking it over carefully now: if someone had not arranged this in advance, how could Yangliu’s original buyer have found his way to the door so easily? And not only did he show up and make trouble—he had chosen precisely the moment of the Shi Family’s reunion banquet, as though his aim had been to make the whole affair as public as possible.

Her gaze drifted involuntarily toward Yan Qing. She saw her tugging at the sleeve of Luo Huaimeng’s garment, her face etched with worry. “Mother, I need to be examined as well.”

Luo Huaimeng wrenched her hand away with undisguised exasperation. “Timid as a mouse—you’ll never amount to anything.”

Madam Shi thought it didn’t quite seem like Yan Qing’s doing. She had appeared more worried about her own health than anyone else in the room. And if she had known all along that Yangliu and Yangzhi carried that disease, how could she have been at ease letting them serve so close to her?

Then who? Shi Ting?

When Madam Shi glanced toward Shi Ting, he looked utterly composed, as though the whole affair had nothing whatsoever to do with him.

Could it have been Du Linghua?

But Du Linghua was always the most inscrutable of them all. At this moment she wore a faint, ambiguous smile, her thoughts impossible to read.

Madam Shi decided that scrutinizing their expressions would get her nowhere. She could only let the matter rest for now and investigate further later.

The reunion dinner ended on a sour note, with everyone retreating to their separate courtyards carrying their own private thoughts.

Upon returning to her courtyard, Yan Qing immediately set about a grand disinfection with Murong and Jing Zhi—going so far as to throw out everything Yangliu and Yangzhi had ever used.

Word of her sweeping activity quickly reached Madam Shi.

“The Seventh Young Mistress has practically gutted the entire courtyard. She looks genuinely shaken—it doesn’t seem like she knew about this beforehand.”

Madam Shi pondered for a moment. “This matter worked most in her favor, yet by all appearances she wasn’t the one behind it. Have someone look more closely into that Xu Shiyong.”

While Madam Shi was occupied with finding the person behind the scheme, Yan Qing had already finished a thorough sweep of Shaolan Garden.

Whether a courtyard was clean or not came down to whether it held people she found disagreeable. Now that the pair of twin sisters was gone, the place was indeed a good deal more peaceful.

Shi Ting was reading documents in his room. When he saw Yan Qing enter, he beckoned to her. “My lady has worked hard.”

Yan Qing walked over, and with one pull of his large hand she tumbled into his arms. She quickly threw her arms around his neck to keep from falling.

“What are you doing?” Yan Qing glanced toward the door. He had been growing increasingly brazen lately.

“Nothing much. I just want to kiss you.” Shi Ting leaned in, only to be blocked by her outstretched hand.

“I haven’t even washed my face yet. Aren’t you afraid of getting a mouthful of dust?”

“When it comes to anything that belongs to my lady, I have no objections whatsoever.”

Yan Qing pinched his cheek. “You’ve been eating from a honey jar—your mouth is far too sweet.”

“Haven’t I just been eating from my lady’s honey jar?” He blinked at her meaningfully.

The remark made Yan Qing’s face flush scarlet instantly. Even though she had long grown accustomed to his shamelessness, faced with such blatant teasing, she still couldn’t help the embarrassed color that rose to her cheeks.

“Shi Xingzhi, have you no shame.”

“What is my lady thinking? Was it not my lady who personally mixed a cup of honey water for me this very morning?”

Yan Qing: “……”

Was this truly the same stern, commanding Director Shi who commanded such reverence in public?

“Today’s affair—was that my lady’s handiwork?” Shi Ting dropped the teasing and pulled her closer by the waist.

Yan Qing sat up straight in his arms, her clear eyes curving as she looked at him. “Why doesn’t Director Shi try and guess?”

—