Chapter VIII. Incidents

　　Dou Zhao had the intention of suggesting a few words to her mother, but when she thought that there was still a room full of maids and daughters-in-law who hadn't been disposed of in the other room, she felt a headache. 　　She giggled and got up, sitting on the bed and loudly calling out "Father". 　　If her mother was smart enough, she should have had the bright idea to carry her to her father. 　　If Grandfather blamed down, as long as the responsibility to her a push, Grandfather is not still and a child who does not understand the matter is not? 　　However, she obviously overestimated her mother's wisdom and her own influence. 　　Seeing her making a fuss, her mother frowned unhappily, "It's so late, why isn't this child asleep?" Then she instructed Sister Yu, "Carry Sister Sister down! She's making so much noise that I have a headache." 　　Sister Yu smiled apologetically at her mother and helped her dress with nimble hands and feet, "Fourth young miss, be good, Sister Yu will carry you to the nursemaid! Don't you cry ......" 　　Dou Zhao was tempted to follow the example of those village women from the fields and roll her eyes at her mother to show her disdain. 　　Why was mother so childish? 　　If she were like her mother, I'm afraid she would have been eaten to the bone long ago. 　　Dou Zhao hugged the curtain draped over the side of the bed and cried out for "father", but was eventually forced by Sister Yu to carry her to the warm pavilion at the back of the inner room. 　　Without her mother, Dou Zhao also calmed down and wilted as Sister Yu placed her on the bed. 　　Sister Yu silently helped her straighten her messy hair, looked at Dou Zhao's gaze a bit dazed, and said in a low voice: "Do you also feel that today's events are a bit unusual? I'm going to take a sneak peek, so you stay here obediently and don't make any noise, okay?" 　　Dou Zhao was instantly energized. 　　What a real person! 　　It's hard to see that Sister Yu is so shrewd and capable. 　　Her eyes opened wide and she nodded her head like a chicken pecking at rice. 　　Sister Yu froze for a moment, then smiled serenely and said with some emotion: ''Our fourth young lady is really smart, at a young age, but she has everything in her heart. Unlike the seventh grandmother ......" Said here, she violently lurched, muttering to herself, "I and a child to say these what what what ......" and then turned around and Called a maid in, "Hanyou, you stay here with fourth miss, I'll go to Crane Shou Tang to take a look." 　　Hanyou was seventeen or eight years old, with a circumspect appearance and a gentle, steady look. 　　Hearing Sister Yu's words, she was surprised, but quickly answered "Yes" with a straight face, and very eloquently said, "If there's anything, I'll immediately have Shuangzhi go and call you." 　　Sister Yu nodded her head in satisfaction and quickly walked out of the warm pavilion. 　　Hanyou and Dou Zhao got onto the hot bed, seeing that Dou Zhao didn't cry or make a scene, and was calm as an adult, she smiled faintly and softly asked Dou Zhao, "Fourth Miss, is it okay if I pat you to sleep?" 　　Dou Zhao shook her head. 　　Smiling, her smile grew more and more intense as she said, "Then, is it okay if I accompany you to flip the rope?" 　　Could it be that she enjoyed flipping ropes? 　　Dou Zhao shook his head. 　　Hanyou smiled and said, "Then what do you want to do?" 　　"Wait for ...... Sister." Dou Zhao said. 　　Hanyou looked at Dou Zhao in surprise. 　　Dou Zhao ignored her, pulled a large welcome pillow over and leaned on it. 　　Hanyou lost a smile, and helped Dou Zhao build a thin quilt. 　　She is from the father to treat the mother's attitude to feel strange, Sister Yu is from what place to see that something is not right? 　　What else did she not know? 　　Dou Zhao pondered, her eyes growing heavy. 　　No, we have to wait until Sister Yu returns. 　　She needed to know what had happened! 　　And Tuo Niang, what kind of person was she? 　　Dou Zhao shook her head, forcing her upper and lower eyelids apart. 　　But after a few breaths, the eyelids drooped again of their own accord. 　　Can't sleep! 　　If she fell asleep, maybe she would go back again. 　　What if she went back to that dream of the Wisteria Flower? 　　"Hanyou," Dou Zhao opened her eyes vigorously, "Sister, look!" 　　"No!" Hanyou gently waved her hand, "I'm going to stay here with you." 　　"I, obey!" Dou Zhao said. 　　Hanyou pondered for a long time, and seeing Dou Zhao's expression grow more and more determined, she hesitated, "Alright, I'll go see what Sister Yu is doing." She then called Shuangzhi to come in. 　　Shuangzhi was a little girl with a round face, and she accompanied Dou Zhao without saying a word. 　　Not long after, Hanyou smiled and folded back, "Fourth Miss, Sister Yu and madam went to the old master's place." 　　"Oh!" Dou Zhao told Hanyou to go find Sister Yu. 　　Hanyou refused no matter what: "If ...... is found out, the slave girl will shed her skin even if she doesn't die." 　　This is also true. 　　Dou Zhao was in charge of the house and knew the power of this. 　　She could only wait for Sister Yu and her mother to come back, hating why she was tied up instead of doing whatever she wanted like in another dream with wisteria flowers. 　　Little by little, time passed, and with no sign of her mother or Sister Yu yet, Dou Zhao's eyelids stuck together, no longer separable. 　　She fell into a sweet and sound sleep. 　　As if it was only an instant, and as if there were millions of years, Dou Zhao woke up. 　　Without thinking, she jumped up. 　　Someone shouted "Fourth Miss" from the side. 　　Dou Zhao opened her eyes and saw Shuang Zhi's smiling face. 　　She let out a long sigh of relief. 　　It was still a dream. 　　Suddenly, she realized that she was on solid ground and asked Shuangzhi, "Smiling? Sister? Mother?" 　　"Hanyou was called by Sister Yu." Shuangzhi smiled as she helped Dou Zhao put on her clothes and told the little maid to pour hot water in. 　　The warm pavilion came alive. 　　Only then did Dou Zhao realize that the sky was already bright. 　　Her eyes narrowed slightly as she asked Shuangzhi, "Hanyou, where is it?" 　　Shuangzhi laughed, "At the old master's place." As she said this, out of the corner of her eye, she saw that the warm curtain had been lifted by a slit, and someone was looking in. 　　Her face sank, and she whispered, "Who is outside the warm curtain, sneaking around?" 　　Immediately, a little maid went to lift the warm curtain. 　　The person behind the warm curtain had nothing to hide, twiddling his fingers uneasily, "I, I'm looking for the fourth young lady ......" and then bluffed and yelled, "It's the fourth young lady who asked me to help her inquire about someone... ..." 　　Dou Zhao looked over at the sound and saw Vanilla. 　　Her heart moved slightly, and she shouted, "Vanilla." 　　Shuang Zhi and the little maid were full of confusion, but still let Vanilla in. 　　Vanilla proudly raised her chin towards Shuangzhi and the little maid, and doggedly ran in front of Dou Zhao, saying in a low voice, "Fourth Miss, the Tou Niang you spoke of, I've found it." After she finished speaking, her tone paused slightly, and her eyes looked at her with a certain amount of expectation. 　　Dou Zhao smiled faintly. 　　In the Jining Marquis' residence, she had seen many maids like this. 　　In order to get ahead, as long as they could see a glimmer of hope, they would do everything in their power to grab it. 　　She did not resent such people or such practices. 　　If everyone was content with the status quo, what was there to live for? 　　It was only that Vanilla acted too impetuously, pinning her hopes on a small child who didn't know any better, and was less thoughtful about the situation. But she still had to thank Vanilla. Otherwise, how would she have gotten news of Touniang? 　　Dou Zhao said to Shuang Zhi, "Reward, Vanilla!" 　　Shuangzhi couldn't decide. 　　As the master of the house, the fourth young miss is also a little too ...... young! 　　Should we go and ask Grandma Seven for a sign first? 　　She pondered, saw vanilla eyes light up, has bent the knee to Dou Zhao salute to say thank you, and then came to Dou Zhao in front of the chattering: "Touniang is the small maid in the backyard washing room, is the seventh grandma to Da Ci Temple incense picked up, I asked all the people in the house to find her. What do you want from her? Do you want me to call her for you? She's easy to talk to. In the laundry, she does all the dirty work, and the sisters-in-law love her. As soon as I inquired, they led me to Touniang ......" 　　Dou Zhao suddenly realized. 　　Those who could work beside their mother or her were all the dignified servants of the Dou residence, so how would they know the coarse maids of the washing room? On the other hand, as a servant girl of the Doufu family, she was not involved in what really happened back then, but only heard about it afterwards. This also explains why Tou Niang s words do not match the facts ...... 　　Her eyes jumped. 　　Facts! 　　Could it be that, in her heart of hearts, she believed that what was happening in front of her was real? 　　And where was she then? 　　Some thoughts that she had ignored earlier re-spun in her mind, causing Dou Zhao's heart to jump and chills to run through her body. 　　A little maid rushed in. 　　"Sister Shuangzhi, something big is wrong." She looked panicked, as if she was on the verge of an attack, "Heshou Hall, it's making a scene!" 　　Dou Zhao's heart snapped. 　　Shuangzhi had already hurriedly said, "What happened?" 　　"The Seventh Master was charmed by a woman when he was in Kyoto," she blanched, "He wanted to take that woman in, and even invited the Third Master of the East House to speak. The old master was so furious that he rattled his sword to kill the seventh master!" 　　"Ah!" The room was a mess, "What happened afterward?" 　　"Luckily the third master didn't leave and stopped the old master." The little maid said, "But the seventh master was determined to let that woman in, in the middle of winter, kneeling in the snow to beg the old dowager to agree. As a result, the seventh grandma looked for it, and the seventh master begged the seventh grandma. The seventh grandma was so angry that she not only didn't agree, but also cried and scolded the seventh master for being ungrateful, and even the old master couldn't get a word in edgewise. When Third Master saw this, he had Da Fu quietly invite Third Grandmother over." 　　"No wonder Sister Hanyou disappeared after being called by Sister Yu!" 　　"Is that woman even better looking than Seventh Grandmother?" 　　"Has the old master agreed to let that woman in or not?" 　　"Then won't there be another head of the family?" 　　The eight maids chattered away, with no one paying attention to Dou Zhao. 　　Dou Zhao sat there dumbfounded like a clay figure, incomparably shocked. 　　She had been confused ever since she had presided over the Jining Marquis' household's feeds, becoming the head of the household, how could third uncle, as an elder of the Dou family who was highly respected by the Dou clan's children for his skillful management of the commoner's affairs, go to the field every now and then to visit his grandmother, who was a concubine and who didn't have much interaction with the Dou family at all? 　　It turned out that he was visiting her. 　　Tuo Niang said that mother was forced to hang herself. 　　Being the third uncle's mother who had helped father with his arguments, his heart should have been filled with unspeakable guilt towards her, and that's why he was like this, right? 　　Dou Zhao thought of the way her third uncle looked at her. 　　Always loving with a few moments of pity. 　　There was also the will that Third Uncle left behind after his death, to leave her all of the several paintings and calligraphy of celebrities from the previous dynasty that he had collected. 　　At that time, the Dou family has not been divided, the third uncle did not have private property, leaving his own son Dou Fanchang, Dou Hua Chang brothers are only a few inkstones and jade. 　　She had always thought that it was because her third uncle was particularly fond of himself. 　　Visible people see is not necessarily the truth, hear is not necessarily the truth, or even feel, is not necessarily the truth. 　　Dou Zhao hoarsely said, "I want it, Tou Niang!"