Chapter 1
Xie Zeyuan had asked to marry me on the strength of my celebrated virtue.
Before I married, whenever my stepmother suffered from the summer heat, I attended to her bath three times a day.
When my little brother was bullied at school, I escorted him there every morning.
Even the mistress my father kept outside the house, too timid to bring her home, received a daily visit from me to pay my respects.
Who in all Ganzhou didn’t call me virtuous?
Xie Zeyuan spoke to me through a curtain.
“My father died young. My widowed mother raised me alone, and it was no easy task.”
“I ask no great dowry of you, Miss Zhou. It is your virtue I value, and the hope that you will be a dutiful daughter to my mother.”
He sounded so sincere that even the official matchmaker kept praising this fine gentleman’s devotion to his mother.
The Xies were a good family, one to whom a woman could entrust her whole life.
I studied him carefully through the curtain. Broad shoulders, a narrow waist, and a towering eight chi tall.
Handsome, too, with a fine nose and bright eyes.
His was one of the wealthiest families in Ganzhou, and the betrothal money was generous.
The only thing I’d heard was that his mother, widowed for many years, might be difficult to serve.
That was why daughters from distinguished families generally declined to marry into the Xie household.
But without that drawback, such a match would never have come my way.
Strictly speaking, we Zhous were marrying above our station.
A grand household was bound to have rules. That was only proper.
I could see the advantages, and decided to accept him.
After the wedding, I met my mother-in-law.
She was almost forty, and had taken good care of herself.
Her figure was slender, her skin fair, with only a few fine lines at the corners of her eyes.
No wonder her son had inherited her looks.
As soon as I entered the household, she gave me the household tallies and keys, saying pleasantly,
“A woman running a household must know when to turn a blind eye and a deaf ear, or the younger generation will resent her.”
“I leave the Xie family’s domestic affairs to you. So long as you two live happily together, I shall want for nothing.”
With such a kind, accommodating mother-in-law, I had become mistress of the household practically on my wedding day.
Everyone in the house marveled at my good fortune.
Even my maid Xiaocui was delighted.
“Miss, at last you’ve escaped that den of wolves back at the Zhou house. Now you can live in peace.”
I only smiled. Even a rabbit looked around before making its burrow.
It wasn’t so easy to make yourself queen of someone else’s hill.
Sure enough, trouble came on the third day.
Nanny Du, my mother-in-law’s attendant, complained to Xie Zeyuan that I was undutiful.
“The old madam is frail with age. She has never asked for luxury, only two qian of edible bird’s nest each day. It’s long been her regular allowance.”
“On her very first day in charge, the young madam decided to stop it.”
“The old madam thought that, being a new daughter-in-law, she might simply have overlooked it. But now several days have passed, and still none has arrived.”