No one had expected Shen Rujian to react this way. Li Chi was baffled — even Yu Jiuling and the others were baffled.

Shen Rujian walked unhurriedly to the doorway. She pointed outside and said, “If you can’t explain yourself properly, go stand out there. When you can explain yourself properly, we’ll talk about you coming back in.”

Yu Jiuling burst out laughing. *Serves you right, boss,* he thought. *You’re the one who tried to take advantage of Mister Shen — saying you’d have her pretend to be your wife. Well, now the time has come for the mistress of the house to exercise her authority.*

Yu Jiuling laughed until his mouth wouldn’t close. Master Ye was laughing too. As Li Chi’s friends and subordinates, seeing their boss get his comeuppance was deeply satisfying.

Li Chi walked out with his head lowered and stood there, hunching slightly and looking rather sycophantic as he said, “Just go through the motions, won’t you? How about it?”

Shen Rujian said, “You should know by now — I never do anything half-heartedly.”

Li Chi sighed. “I changed clothes because I got into a fight last night. Things got a bit dirty.”

Shen Rujian frowned slightly. After a moment she asked, “How badly are you hurt?”

Li Chi shook his head. “Nothing serious.”

Shen Rujian gave a soft acknowledgment, then said, “You know — standing outside for a while is good for you.”

Li Chi continued to nod and bow obsequiously. “I know, I know. Good for me in all kinds of ways.”

Shen Rujian glanced at him, then turned and went back inside.

While the two of them were talking, Yu Jiuling stood inside listening. It occurred to him — if it had been Miss Gao, would she have noticed at a glance that Li Chi had changed his clothes? And if Miss Gao had noticed at a glance, would she have immediately guessed that Li Chi had been injured?

Thinking that, he looked at Shen Rujian — and found himself thinking that Miss Gao was still the better one.

—

About half an hour later, at General Meng Kedi’s residence.

Meng Kedi sat behind his writing desk, listening to a subordinate’s report, then smiled and set down his book. “Who would have thought he’d be henpecked.”

Roughly half a li from the compound, on the far side of the street, stood a stone pagoda. Meng Kedi had stationed men at the top of it to keep watch over the compound’s every movement with a spyglass.

The man making the report smiled. “The moment he came home, his wife made him stand outside the door as punishment. We couldn’t hear what was said, but judging by his manner, that young Master Li was entirely meek and compliant.”

Ding Shengjia laughed. “A man who treats his subordinates well ought to treat his wife no worse.”

Xue Chunbao stood off to one side, curling his lip. “I still don’t understand why you hold him in such regard.”

His tone was dismissive. “You say he’s bold and daring — yet the way I see it, he’s a coward at heart. You call him a true man — and then he gets made to stand outside by his own wife…”

Meng Kedi smiled. “Still, this at least confirms it — that woman is genuinely his wife.”

He looked at Ding Shengjia. “Go back to the Young Marquis’s residence for me later. On my behalf, ask him when he might have time to go fishing together.”

Ding Shengjia understood the general’s meaning perfectly. Earlier at the general’s residence, the Young Marquis had clearly spoken up in Li Duidui’s favor, and the general had not agreed on the spot.

Given the Young Marquis’s temperament, he might well have taken some offense at that.

“The Cao family’s people are troublesome.”

Meng Kedi sighed. “The Prince… is also henpecked.”

The moment the words were out, he felt the impropriety of them — but there was no taking them back.

Ding Shengjia and Xue Chunbao didn’t dare laugh aloud, though inwardly they both found it utterly funny. Prince Wu — a man who had spent his whole life on the battlefield, utterly dominant in every campaign, never once defeated — and yet before his wife, his manner was just as gentle and accommodating.

“Though it’s not quite the same thing.”

Meng Kedi quickly furnished himself with a way out of the comment.

“When the Prince fell on hard times, the Princess never left his side. Even when he was being suppressed, she stayed with him. So the Prince feels he has failed her — which is why he defers to her in all things.”

Having said that, he promptly steered the conversation elsewhere.

“Tomorrow, have someone go and take stock of the medicinal herbs Li Duidui brought. Count the quantities properly before putting them in the stores. Out of respect for the Young Marquis, once the tally is done, send the silver to Li Duidui.”

Ding Shengjia bowed. “I’ll see to the arrangements.”

Meng Kedi made a sound of acknowledgment, then after a moment’s thought, added another instruction: “As long as Li Duidui doesn’t leave Anyang City, he and his people are free to move about the city — don’t obstruct them. But keep close watch at all times…”

He murmured almost to himself: “This man’s mind is far too sharp. And not everything he says is necessarily true.”

Meng Kedi turned to Xue Chunbao. “Tomorrow, dispatch some scouts to Jizhou. Have them dig up what they can about the Shen Medical Hall — find out whether it’s truly as he described.”

Xue Chunbao said, “I’ve always felt there’s something shifty about that fellow. We should definitely take a good look.”

Ding Shengjia was somewhat displeased, but didn’t dare say much.

He did the arithmetic in his head — this investigation was entirely pointless at this stage. Sending people all the way to Jizhou for a thorough inquiry into the Shen Medical Hall, and back again — a month would never be enough. Three months, minimum.

Never mind three months — in one month they’d need to begin preparations to raise troops. At the latest, two months from now they’d be marching out. Leave Anyang City in the sixth month, reach Jizhou before the seventh — otherwise the summer harvest in Jizhou would already be in.

In Ding Shengjia’s estimation, there was nothing to investigate at all. He had already learned most of what there was to know about the Shen Medical Hall during the trips he’d made escorting Yuzhou merchants on their buying trips. The hall had branches throughout the major cities of Jizhou — he’d heard all about it from the merchants.

Unless Li Duidui had nothing to do with the Shen Medical Hall at all, there was nothing suspicious here.

And the matter was actually quite difficult to look into. The teams that transported the Shen Medical Hall’s medicines were all Li Chi’s people — going to ask them about the hall was the same as asking nothing.

Shen Rujian almost never showed her face in public. No one knew that the proprietor of the Shen Medical Hall was in fact a woman.

Even back in Jizhou, when the local officials were being won over, Shen Rujian had never appeared in person. Someone like her — how could she possibly have dealings directly with those Jizhou officials? All of that had been handled by Lü Qingluan’s people.

—

At the same time, at the Eastern Forest Garden.

This was a vast park covering more than two hundred acres — the largest and most famous garden in Anyang City. It was now where Cao Lie resided, and both within and without, it was staffed entirely by Cao family people.

Upon returning to his quarters, Cao Lie’s expression was still sour.

He had a certain contempt for Meng Kedi’s character.

To tell the truth, it wasn’t only Meng Kedi he had contempt for. The vast majority of officials, he held in low regard.

As he saw it, those who served in office were invariably hypocrites — and beneath the hypocrisy, utterly mercenary. Mercenary ambition and political scheming were where the human heart turned most ruthless. That was why he disliked dealing with such people.

“Pass word down.”

Cao Lie gave the order: “From tomorrow, no one is to go looking for trouble with Li Duidui or any of his people. Anyone who disobeys my orders can work out the consequences for themselves.”

Having said that, he closed his door — no one was to enter without leave.

He sat in his study and stewed for quite some time.

But he also knew that Meng Kedi hadn’t done anything wrong, just as he himself didn’t make a fuss over his father spending little time with him. He wasn’t going to make a fuss over Meng Kedi not agreeing on the spot.

Meng Kedi was a general. Generals had to think about what generals needed to think about.

After brooding on it for a good while, he felt a growing impulse to do something for Li Duidui. He was a young man who had always done as he pleased, and his ideas tended toward the unbounded — who could say what he might come up with.

—

The next day.

Li Chi was practicing in the courtyard, but his shoulder was particularly uncooperative — the punch from Cao Lie’s bodyguard had landed quite hard. Given how strong his body was, that blow could easily have shattered his bone if he’d been any less fit.

“Boss, you want to make a big stir in Anyang, right?”

Yu Jiuling crouched nearby, speaking in a very low voice. “Just tell me privately — what exactly is the big stir? I’m absolutely dying of curiosity.”

Li Chi smiled. “I said it before we came. We’re here in Anyang for two things.”

Yu Jiuling thought back. Before they’d set out from Jizhou, Li Chi had indeed said there were two things to do in Anyang City.

The first was to get money. The second was to make trouble.

Getting money was easy enough to understand. The crux of the matter was the making trouble — how, and what kind.

Seeing Yu Jiuling’s suffering expression, Li Chi couldn’t help laughing. “You can go start on the money business right now.”

Yu Jiuling’s eyes lit up. “Start on what?”

Li Chi said, “You’re the head manager of our Shen Medical Hall’s Anyang branch. Naturally you need to be running about seeing to the branch’s setup.”

Yu Jiuling sighed. “But it’s not really real…”

Li Chi said, “You know it’s not real, but the people outside don’t. So you need to make it look as real as possible.”

He thought it over for a moment, turned it through in his mind, then said to Yu Jiuling, “In a bit, take a gift and go to the Anyang Prefectural Office. Ask about land.”

Yu Jiuling said, “What kind of gift should I bring?”

Li Chi said, “Go and request a meeting with the prefect of Anyang — his family name is Liu, given name Yao.”

Li Chi coached him: “Find a jewelry box and fill it with gold leaf. Say it’s some jewelry you’ve picked out for Madam Liu.”

Yu Jiuling’s eyes went wide. “We haven’t made any money yet, and we’re already sending that much out?”

Li Chi said, “You can’t catch a wolf without risking the bait.”

He knew Yu Jiuling wasn’t good at dealing with people from official circles — but the air of the jianghu that clung to Yu Jiuling would actually make him less suspicious in others’ eyes.

He looked at Master Ye. “Mister Ye, go along with him. Anything Nine-er can’t think of, you can remind him.”

“Better to let Lü Qingluan go.”

Shen Rujian stepped out of the room, tea cup in hand, her voice unhurried. “Master Ye doesn’t know the medicine trade either — if someone asks about it and he can’t answer a single question, that’ll raise suspicions.”

Lü Qingluan glanced at her, feeling slightly uneasy. He was reluctant to leave her.

Shen Rujian saw through Lü Qingluan’s thoughts at once. “I’m not going out. What are you worried about?”

Lü Qingluan thought it over and conceded the point, nodding. “Then we’ll go quickly and come back quickly.”

Li Chi shook his head. “You can’t go quickly and come back quickly.”

He called both Lü Qingluan and Yu Jiuling over, lowered his voice, and gave them a thorough and detailed set of instructions. The two of them listened and nodded as he went.

It took Li Chi a full half-hour to finish. Only then did the two of them leave the compound.

They took the prepared gifts and headed straight for the Anyang Prefectural Office.

While Li Chi was giving his instructions, Shen Rujian had remained quietly at his side, listening throughout.

When she finally understood Li Chi’s plan, the look she gave him turned somewhat complex.

Li Chi seemed to guess what she was about to say, so he gave a self-deprecating laugh.

“I came from the jianghu as a swindler.”

Shen Rujian nodded. “It’s certainly a swindler’s method.”

She said that, then turned and walked back inside — but paused at the door and looked back at Li Chi with a slight smile. “Though a very elegant one.”

She rarely smiled. When she did, it was genuinely lovely.

Li Chi shook his head. “I expected you to say it wasn’t above-board — that these were jianghu tricks.”

Shen Rujian answered calmly, “I’m a merchant. I only look at results.”

Li Chi gave a quiet sound of acknowledgment.

He let out a slow breath.

When it came to making money, he had always been very serious about it.

At home he had someone like Tang Pidi — a child who spent silver like running water. Li Chi felt the weight of an old father’s weariness.

—