Chapter 803: Chapter 803: Lu Sanzhu was Buried
The old lady felt that it wasn’t a big issue. Madam Li was quite annoying, but she wouldn’t harm her own daughter.
So she did not express any opinion about Lanhua’s marriage, allowing Shu Yu to continue.
There wasn’t anything particularly special about the subsequent matters, but for some reason, Shu Yu still sensed something odd from the lines in Daniu’s letters.
This odd feeling wasn’t clarified until she later read the letter written by Dabao.
Daniu’s letter was very brief, and after Shu Yu finished reading it, she went to read Dabao’s letter.
Right after reading his first complaint, upon seeing the second sentence, she suddenly lifted her head, looking at the Lu family and said, “I suddenly feel, letting Third Uncle stay in the village to work indeed buried his talents.”
The old lady frowned, “How did it bury his talents? What did he write in the letter?”
Shu Yu, “Dabao said, Third Uncle’s wages have increased by a hundred coins again.”
The Lu family members fell into collective silence.
After a long moment, the old lady gravely said, “Now that you mention it, I also feel we’ve buried his talents.”
My goodness, two letters, and each time the wages increased by a hundred coins. They all began to suspect that by the time they returned to Jiangyuan County, Lu Sanzhu had already become the steward.
The old lady had always thought him lazy, deceitful, and shirking his real duties; the fields were left neglected, which broke her heart.
Yet surprisingly, while he was no good at farming, as a clerk in the county town, he managed to get his wages raised twice in such a short period.
“Did he mention how he managed to get the raise?”
Shu Yu continued to read and then raised her eyebrows slightly, “Third Uncle said there was a customer who frequently visited the peach forest lately, reciting poetry even in the bitter cold. The other staff thought this person was mad, but Third Uncle accidentally discovered that this customer was a good friend of their boss.”
Thus Lu Sanzhu would occasionally step forward to express his concern, even offering his own coat and warm water when it was windy, positioning himself as a clerk who empathetically noticed the customer’s needs. The next day, in front of that customer, he secretly sneezed several times.
The customer felt terribly sorry, and gave Lu Sanzhu two taels as a reward so he could buy medicine.
After that, he got a raise.
The Lu family members fell silent once again; the old lady cursed, “I knew he wouldn’t do it honestly.”
But to say he did anything bad wasn’t really the case either; he simply put on an act, used a bit of cleverness, without harming anyone.
Thus, the old lady scolded him once and said no more.
Shu Yu smiled wryly, continued reading, then her eyebrows tightly furrowed.
She looked troubled, causing the Lu family to also become anxious, “What’s wrong?”
“Dabao said, Eldest Aunt already knows the real reason we came to the southwest.”
The letter did not mention the word ‘banishment,’ but the implication was very clear.
Shu Yu had finally understood why there was that bit of strangeness in Daniu’s letter. Daniu probably wanted to express it too, but since he had someone else write the letter and considering how to start, coupled with it concerning his mother, he hesitated.
Lu Sanzhu, however, had no such reservations, spitting it all out, whether it should be said or not.
In fact, Shu Yu had expected this; in the Lu family, Lu Sanzhu’s wife from the second branch had already come to the southwest.
Eldest Uncle and Daniu from the first branch were also aware, and Lu Sanzhu and his wife from Lu Sanzhu’s branch knew all of the circumstances.
Not only them, but Tang Wenqian and his family knew as well.