Chapter 5
After a long pause, a little girl stood up and pointed at the tray, declaring in a clear voice,
“The top row is the purchases. The bottom row is the gifts.”
Qingyan smiled faintly. “Correct.”
The heir stepped in front of the tray, his face dark as thunder.
“Enough! I’ll explain this in private. It isn’t what you think.”
Qingyan pulled the plain jade pin from her own hair and held it up beside the pink hibiscus pin she had just taken from Xianghe. Her question rang out coldly.
“Lu Chong’an, you gave me this plain jade pin for the Seventh Night Festival.”
“You told me I came from a scholarly family, that my father was the foremost civil official, and that I should be frugal and modest, an example to other women.”
“A plain jade pin was just right: simple and unadorned.”
“But this pin was merely the free gift that came with the pink hibiscus pin you gave Xianghe!”
His fingertips trembled slightly. The cultivated smile on his face froze completely.
“No!”
He was still struggling, still trying to argue.
“The pin may look plain, but the jade is of excellent quality. That pink hibiscus pin looks splendid, but it has nothing else to recommend it.”
“Most people have no eye for these things. They can’t tell a worthless imitation from a real pearl. But you’ve always had good judgment, Qingyan. Surely you can see that the jade pin is the proper purchase, and the pink hibiscus pin the gift?”
At his defense, a glimmer of resentment and anger passed through Xianghe’s eyes.
I couldn’t help admiring his ability to lie through his teeth.
If I hadn’t sold him the jewelry myself, he might even have fooled me.
His twisted reasoning made Qingyan laugh in anger.
She stripped the silver drops from her ears and the silver-and-shell ring from her finger and slapped them onto the tray.
She pulled a little too hard, and a silver wire chafed one ear red, but she paid it no heed.
“And these? Plain silver! Shell! Are they made from such wonderful materials too? Are they worth more than her pink gemstones and pink coral?”
“Lu Chong’an, did I trust you so much before that you now think you can make fools of everyone?”
Beside him, Xianghe instinctively tried to cover her jewelry with her hands.
But she had put on so much to show off today that she couldn’t possibly hide it all.
Surely, I thought, he couldn’t talk his way out of this one.
Then he spoke again.
“Qingyan, I admit the pieces I gave you and my cousin are different, but it’s only a difference in style. How can you insist without evidence that yours were free gifts? Just because they look inexpensive? That’s hardly a fair conclusion.”
Alongside the anger in Qingyan’s eyes were disappointment and scorn.
“You really won’t give up until you’ve run straight into a wall, will you?”
“As it happens, the shop owner who sold you these pieces is here today. Let’s ask her to come forward as a witness.”
I had been quietly enjoying the spectacle from the crowd. I froze.
What? How had this become my problem?