Chapter 494 — Year's End

Song Yan frowned. "Does Chen Jia not know how to look after A'yan?"

"It is not that he does not know how to care for her, but that he cares for her too well," Dou Yan said with a pursed-lip smile. "I fear Sister Yan will suffer when her time comes."

Jiang Yan's constitution had always been somewhat frail; lying about this way, eating and sleeping and being waited on hand and foot, what strength would she have left when she went into labor?

Song Yan understood and instructed Wuyi to summon Chen Jia.

Dou Yan stopped Wuyi and said to Song Yan, "You need not poke your nose into everything. Let A'yan live her own little life."

Song Yan barely restrained himself from speaking to Chen Jia about it.

The next time Dou Yan went, she found Chen Jia supporting Jiang Yan on a stroll through the courtyard.

She could not stop laughing.

When she got home she told Song Yan about it and said, "Well? Did I not say they would live their own little life?"

Song Yan said nothing, and the next time he saw Chen Jia his expression softened somewhat.

Liu Zhang told Dou Yan, "Someone has been running roughshod over the village and beat a man to death; he is held in the yamen and wants to use the Second Master's connections to have the sentence commuted to a fine. The Second Master has been running himself ragged over this these past days!"

Dou Yan gave a cold laugh.

That Song Han—true to form, not a single good deed to his name.

She instructed Liu Zhang, "Do not let him get his way!"

Song Sui said, "If he goes begging to the Prince of Liao's household, and the Prince of Liao's household is willing to speak for him, then we should not interfere."

Dou Che understood.

Song Yan said coolly, "Only after he has been rebuffed on every side and finds that the Prince of Liao's household alone can help him will he throw himself into the Prince of Liao's camp without a second thought and serve him with utter devotion!"

This was indeed a fine stratagem!

Dou Yan smiled brightly, and from this she thought of Song Cen.

She reminded Song Yan, "Tell me, will the Lord Defender of the Realm help Song Han?"

"That depends on his fate!" Song Ke said with sarcasm. "Given his character, so long as there is a chance to strike at me, he will certainly not let it pass."

When the Prince of Liao's affairs came to ruin, the fates of Song Han and Song Cen could well be imagined.

Dou Yan took Song's hand.

Song Yan smiled faintly. Leading Dou Zhiwei by the hand, he went to Yuan Heng's room.

Yuan Heng was playing kickball with a little maid; seeing his parents come in, he came running pitter-patter with the ball and held it out to Song Yan. "Daddy, play!"

Song Yan chuckled and took the ball from his son's hands.

Dou Yan went to the main courtyard.

There was more than a month to go before the New Year, and she had a great deal to do.

Lady Cai suddenly came to call.

Dou Yan received her in the warm pavilion with some misgiving.

In a mysterious manner she asked Dou Yan, "It is being said outside that your Second Master committed adultery with the Lord Defender of the Realm's bedchamber maids, and that the Lord Defender beat both maids to death over it—is there any truth to this? If not, you had best find some way to quash the rumor! It is being told outside with all the particulars, as if eyewitnesses had seen it."

So the matter had finally reached Lady Cai's ears?

One bedchamber maid had become two.

Dou Yan barely managed to keep from laughing aloud.

She sighed and said, "How is one to quash such a thing! My sister-in-law is still living out at the farmstead, and says she will not be back for the New Year either."

Cai Shi's eyes went round as saucers.

"So it is true, after all!" she blurted out.

Dou Chi neither confirmed nor denied it.

Cai Shi fled in a fluster.

As Song Yan had foreseen, Song Han found no way in anywhere he tried; and the man who had sought his help kept flattering him to his face as "the Second Master of the Yingzhen Ducal Estate—why, even the Empress treats you like her own nephew," and pressed five thousand taels of silver on him for greasing palms. Gritting his teeth, Song Han went begging at the gates of the Prince of Liao's estate.

Before long, the family of the man who had been beaten to death paid a thousand taels and the matter was closed.

And so Song Han's reputation spread.

Four Lane was at once thronged with carriages and horses, bustling with life.

Yet the year's end was drawing near as well, and Song Cen, Song Yan, and Dou Yan would all be going to the palace for the New Year's Eve reunion feast.

Dou Chi thought, without any ill intent, that it would be just as well if someone were to ask about Song Han.

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Sisters and brothers, here is today's update.

o(n_n)o~