Chapter 6
Lady Cheng’en still refused to give up.
For a time, she sent people daily to ask after the children,
and rare gifts arrived every few days.
She seemed afraid anyone might fail to notice how much she missed her grandchildren.
One afternoon, I was reviewing the accounts.
Jinxia lifted the curtain and came in, her face white.
“My lady! The imperial eyebrow pigment on your dressing table has been switched!”
My gaze hardened. I rose and went to the dressing table.
The exquisite little pigment box stood open.
Instead of its precious blue-black contents, it held a sticky mass giving off a strange, fishy stench.
There even seemed to be pieces of some insect mixed into it.
Jinxia was nearly crying.
“I was tidying your cosmetics, and this was what I found when I opened it.”
“It looks as though someone mashed up a toad and mixed it with filth!”
The other maids in the room were too frightened to make a sound.
My expression did not change as I looked at the ruined pigment.
“Investigate,” I said lightly. “Find out who has entered this room in the past two days.”
Jinxia soon returned with her report.
“My lady, the young lady’s maid Xiaoque was lurking outside our courtyard this afternoon.”
“Then Matron Li, who serves the young master, came in on the pretext of delivering embroidery patterns.”
I understood.
The marquis’s family could not reach inside my household,
so they had goaded the children into disgustingly petty tricks instead.
“Bring the young master and young lady to the main hall, along with Xiaoque and Matron Li.”
The air in the main hall was heavy.
Xiaoque knelt on the floor, shaking uncontrollably.
Matron Li stood perfectly straight, with a trace of arrogance on her face.
The two children were brought in,
their eyes carrying a hint of anticipation for the spectacle.
I wasted no words as I looked at the kneeling Xiaoque.
“Speak. Who told you to do it?”
Xiaoque merely kowtowed, tears and mucus streaming down her face, and stubbornly insisted she knew nothing.
At that, Matron Li stepped forward instead, her tone sneering.
“Why must your ladyship make things difficult for a little maid?”
“When our late mistress was alive, she never made such a fuss over questioning servants.”
I rose slowly and walked over to her.
“Oh? Are you teaching me how to manage my own household?”
“Matron Wang has only just been sent to the estate, and already you can hardly wait to cause trouble.”
“Are you so eager to join her?”
Matron Li’s expression changed, though she struggled to remain composed.
“I have served here for more than ten years. Even our late mistress treated me with some respect.”
“If your cosmetics were fouled, you should investigate your own attendants. Why summon Xiaoque and me? Are you trying to make us take the blame?”
I looked at the overbearing matron.
Then I laughed softly.
“Who told you my cosmetics had been fouled?”
That single question transformed her face.
After all, from beginning to end, I had never mentioned the pigment.
I turned to the two children, whose expressions had also changed.
I no longer spared their pride.
“You two fools! Someone uses you as their weapons, and you are pleased with yourselves!”
“If word of this gets out, people will say the duke’s legitimate children are malicious and beyond hope!”
“You will have disgraced your father and the entire family!”
Both children trembled at my shout, their faces deathly pale.