Chapter 5: Who is Lin Dafu?

November 22nd. Ding Suian spent the most anxious and prolonged day of his life.

He watched helplessly as the last trace of light outside the paper window diluted into the night, but the decree he had been hoping for never arrived.

As the sky turned completely dark, Hansu gradually lost heart.

The accumulated fear and anxiety from the day and night, coupled with the consequences of being rained on and freezing, surged forth all at once.

At hai hour that night, Lin Hansu developed a high fever.

Her cheeks were flushed with an unnatural, alluring crimson, her cherry lips were bloodless, dry skin peeled and cracked, and her eyes were glazed over.

Even this sick, she didn’t forget her promise. “Young Master, I might not be able to give you the Medicinal Pill, but my second sister’s husband is the Director of the Bureau of Supplies and Equipment in the Ministry of Works. Don’t look down on his small official post; he has plenty of graft. If you are not implicated by me this time, go find my second sister after returning to the capital. I’ll write you a letter, asking her to give you silver as a small compensation.”

After speaking, she actually forced herself to rummage for writing materials, seemingly intending to draft a letter on the spot.

“You should save your energy.”

“Alas, I’m afraid I won’t be able to escape this time.” Lin Hansu propped herself up against the table with her elbow, trying to lift her increasingly heavy head, but her body was soft and weak. She simply continued lying on the table and muttered, “If The Du Family comes again, Young Master, just hand me over. Ah, living is just suffering; it would be better to die.”

“Your ancestors were Great Merchants of Jiangbei. Logically, you should have been raised in silk and fine food since childhood. Where does the suffering come from?” Ding Suian was somewhat curious.

Lin Hansu rested her cheek on her arm, her lifeless eyes unfocused. She didn’t answer Ding Suian’s question for a long time.

After a long while, Lin Hansu, now almost semi-conscious, closed her eyes and murmured, “Young Master, if you see Lin Dafu, help me curse him: that old turtle deserves to never have a son in his life.”

“Who is Lin Dafu?”

Lin Hansu offered no reply. Her elegant, delicate nostrils rapidly flared, and the air she exhaled was burning hot.

Ding Suian quietly admired her stunning Face. Even under the double blow of desperation and sickness, Lin Hansu rarely showed self-pity. Instead, her delicate brows were tightly furrowed, as if she were defiant and still wanted to fight this damned fate.

She was quite strong-willed.

November 23rd.

Beginning of Chen hour.

The continuous gloomy rain finally stopped, and the rising sun was visible for a rare moment.

It looked like it would be a good day.

Yet, the damp Prince Lanyangs Estate was permeated with a decaying, moldy scent of imminent demise.

At Xincui Pavilion in the inner residence of the Princely Estate, Prefect of Lanyang Li Fengrao sat in the head seat. Second Master Du and Third Master Du sat below him on the left and right, with Steward Hou standing attendant nearby.

Everyone looked haggard, staring at the muddy embroidered shoe on the desk, silent for a long time.

Yesterday, Second Master Du found Li Fengrao, saying that a female relative of their family had fled to the prefectural yamen and requested his assistance in searching for the person.

Li Fengrao initially didn’t want to get involved in this affair, but the Prince Lanyangs Estate had been operating and thriving in Lanyang for three generations and over forty years; it was deeply entrenched, and there was no need to offend them needlessly. So, he patiently conducted a search.

The search itself wasn’t the issue, but they actually found a lost embroidered shoe in the back residence of the yamen. The night patrol runners of the yamen were usually lax and sloppy, so it wasn’t impossible for someone to have hidden there.

In order to give the Prince Lanyangs Estate an explanation, Li Fengrao had no choice but to lead the yamen runners in a thorough search.

After a day and a night of commotion, apart from the embroidered shoe, they didn’t find a single hair.

But because of this embroidered shoe, the two Young Masters of The Du Family had fixed their gaze on him.

“Lord Li, I’ll be frank with you. The woman who fled into the yamen is no ordinary maidservant—she is the Princess Consort of Lanyang!” Third Master Du, who was the first to lose patience, judged others by himself, convinced that this hypocritical Prefect Li had hidden the woman after witnessing the beauty of his widowed sister-in-law.

“Before my elder brother, the Prince of Lanyang, passed away, he specifically left a dying instruction requesting the Princess Consort to follow him in death. This is both proper and reasonable.”

According to the rites of the State Religion, for a principal wife to be buried with her husband, one of two conditions must be met: first, the husband must leave a dying instruction; second, she must be ‘childless’.

Lin Hansu met both conditions, so her accompanying him in death was indeed compliant with ritual law.

However, as the Prefect of a prefecture, Li Fengrao’s insight was naturally incomparable to those fools who blindly believed in the ‘great benevolence’ of the Old Side Consort, Madam Wu. In his mind, there were only two reasons why the Princess Consort was being forced to die.

One was her family background—wealthy but powerless.

The second concerned adoption and succession. Since the Prince of Lanyang died without an heir, succession required the adoption of a relative’s son.

If the Princess Consort were alive, she, as the widow, could unilaterally decide whether to adopt and whose son to adopt.

If she died, wouldn’t Madam Wu be the one to decide whose child was adopted?

On the other side, Third Master Du, seeing that he had made himself so clear yet Li Fengrao still refused to honestly confess, grew angry. “Lord Li is a well-read man and should understand propriety, righteousness, integrity, and shame. The fact that my family hasn’t explicitly stated the matter is us saving Face for Lord Li.”

“What do you mean, Third Young Master?”

Li Fengrao’s Face hardened, his brow furrowing into the character for ‘Chuan’ (river).

Second Master Du, sitting opposite, feigned distress and pretended to be distracted, as if he hadn’t heard his third brother’s excessive remarks.

Although he didn’t quite believe Li Fengrao would do such a thing, the search radius had been expanded to the entire Lanyang Prefecture City yesterday, and they still couldn’t find anyone. This inevitably aroused suspicion.

After all, the yamen was searched by yamen runners, and whether they found anything or not was entirely up to Li Fengrao’s own word.

“Then I’ll be direct! It’s the absolute limit for Madam Lin, a woman, to escape to the prefectural yamen! If you didn’t hide her, how could she not be found? Can a living person just vanish into thin air?”

“Absurd!”

Li Fengrao roared, slamming the table and rising to his feet.

He had been dragged into this incident against his will and had been troubled by it for a day and a night.

I respect your family as founding nobles, but do you really think this official fears the title of your idle Princely Estate, which long ago lost its military authority!

Li Fengrao flicked his sleeve and prepared to leave.

“My Lord, please stay.”

As fate would have it, just as he reached the door, he ran straight into an Old Madam. Her black and white hair was neatly combed, she held oiled black wooden Buddhist prayer beads, and she wore a benevolent expression. Supported by a maid, she slowly stepped forward and curtsied a full obeisance.

“You mustn’t! Old Madam, you humble this Junior!” Li Fengrao hastily stepped aside to avoid the bow and returned a deep salute.

This Old Madam, whose expression mixed benevolence with sorrow and whose attitude was humble, was none other than the Old Side Consort, Madam Wu, famous in Lanyang for her ‘compassionate heart’.

“The Prince has just passed away, and Third Son is heartbroken, so his words were inappropriate. My Lord, please do not bother arguing with this fool.”

“Old Madam, please stop referring to me as ‘Fumu.’ This Junior cannot bear it.”

“Alas,” Madam Wu sighed deeply and said mournfully, “The Princely Estate is in chaos right now, and I am old. I implore Lord Li to preside over the Princely Estate and manage the Prince’s Funeral Rites.”

Since the conversation had reached this point, Li Fengrao could only steel himself and say, “The Princely Estate is the hope of Lanyang. This Junior will naturally do his utmost for the Prince’s Funeral Rites.”

In the end, he was unable to leave.

“Have the nearby areas been searched?”

Madam Wu settled back down in Xincui Pavilion, twisting the Buddhist prayer beads between her fingers. Her resolute and compassionate demeanor actually contained more Buddhist nature than the Guanyin Bodhisattva enshrined on the opposite altar.

Steward Hou quickly bowed and replied, “The entire prefecture City has been searched, except for the yamen side.”

Steward Hou cautiously glanced at Li Fengrao and whispered, “Lord Li arranged for the yamen runners to search the yamen side, and they didn’t find anything either.”

Seeing that the focus was shifting back to him, Li Fengrao’s expression darkened, but Madam Wu waved her hand and said gently, “Steward Hou, think carefully again. Was there an oversight? Don’t keep focusing only on that embroidered shoe. Madam Lin seems compliant, but she is actually full of tricks. Perhaps that embroidered shoe was a distraction she set up.”

Upon hearing this, Steward Hou immediately recalled the night before the second time they entered the West Courtyard. He hadn’t thought much of it then, first because the Dragon Guard Army had no connection to the Princess Consort and no reason to help her.

Secondly, the string of footprints, and the embroidered shoe discovered later, perfectly diverted everyone’s attention.

Now, with the Old Ancestor’s prompt, Steward Hou immediately said, “Old Ancestor, the Dragon Guard Army’s residence in the second West Courtyard has not been thoroughly searched.”

Third Master Du shot up, cursing, “Are you senile? Why didn’t you say something so important sooner!”

Madam Wu slightly lifted her eyelids and gave him a faint glance. Third Master Du immediately quieted down, closed his mouth, and sat back.

Then, Madam Wu slowly twisted her Buddhist prayer beads, saying calmly, “Take people over there and check. Search thoroughly.”

“Old Ancestor, but the West Courtyard is currently the residence of the Dragon Guard Army.”

“The West Courtyard is also part of the Princely Estate.” Madam Wu paused, her Buddhist prayer beads still, and spoke with undeniable authority, “The Dragon Guard Army cannot interfere with my Princely Estate’s family affairs!”