Daily life in Kaifeng dormitory

There was a snake pattern totem, and everyone was thinking for a moment that the death of the housekeeper and the death of the young master of the Xie family were indeed related, maybe one person killed them all.

"What the hell?" The second lady didn't know the snake pattern totem, she frowned and raised her head to look at it, and said, "Could it be some kid drawn by the housekeeper to curse me? Let me tell you, this old man is not dead." The thing and the lady who always pretends to be a good person are definitely not clean, maybe they have done something shameful behind the master's back."

Ni Yexin looked at the snake pattern totem in his hand, and listened to the words of the second lady, and felt that the second lady might have held grudges against the eldest lady and the housekeeper for a long time, and what she said was too subjective, and there was no reference at all.

Ni Ye ignored the chattering second wife and quickly walked to the butler's room.

Murong Changqing, Chi Long and Zhao Yin all went in with him, and the second wife also wanted to fish in troubled waters, but was stopped by the officials.

The second lady quit after seeing it, and said with wide eyes: "What's the matter with you? This is my house! Why can they enter, but I can't enter! You are too shameless to bully me, a woman who just died. People, you!"

"enough!"

The officials didn't dare to touch the second lady, and they didn't dare to scold the second lady. At this moment, someone suddenly gave a low drink, accompanied by the sound of coughing.

The second lady was startled, and when she looked back, it was Mr. Xie who had come.

Master Xie was accompanied by a servant girl, supporting Master Xie.Master Xie coughed badly, his face was a little red, and he looked angry.

The maid hurriedly said: "Master, it's windy here, why don't you go back!"

Master Xie waved his hand and said, "This house is already messy enough, how messy do you want to be?"

The second lady was scolded by Master Xie, she didn't dare to speak out, and immediately put on a delicate and weak expression, with tears rolling in her eyes, she said: "Master, you have wronged me, I am... ..."

"Go back to your room!" Master Xie just said without listening to her explanation.

The second lady wanted to say something more, but seeing Master Xie's expression was really bad, she finally bit her lip, lowered her head and left, sobbing.

The maid who supported Master Xie looked to be in her twenties. She was already a big girl before she got married at this age.

The second lady walked over with sobs, and when she passed by the maidservant, she gave her a hard look, then raised her foot and wanted to step on the maidservant's foot.

The second lady's vicious expression all the way, made anyone who looked at her think she was uneasy and kind, the maid was already on guard, the second lady naturally didn't step on her, but was hooked by the maid, almost fell to the ground .

The second lady yelled, she didn't bring a maid, and she didn't have anyone to support her, she staggered a few steps in embarrassment, and finally stood still.

The maid let out a muffled "Oh".

Master Xie immediately became even more unhappy when he heard the movement, and said with a sullen face, "What's going on here!"

The second lady immediately screamed and said: "Master, it's this little bastard, she actually..."

The servant girl Liu Mei frowned tightly, her face distorted due to the pain, and said: "Master, it's not good to be a servant. When the second lady passed by, I didn't see it, and tripped the second lady."

Master Xie was even more annoyed when he heard this. He glanced at the gate of the courtyard and said, "The road is over there, why did you trip over someone?"

The maid lowered her head, as if she had done something wrong and dared not speak. The second lady was excited and wanted to explain, but this made Master Xie even more unhappy.

Master Xie didn't want to listen to her anymore, and said: "Go back to your room, don't come out without me."

"Master..." The second lady was taken aback for a moment, and this time she was really crying. She cried so hard that she screamed at the top of her lungs. She waited for the servant girl and said viciously, "You little rascal who seduced the master will be killed sooner or later." Already!"

After saying that, the second lady turned around and left, Master Xie was so angry that he trembled.

The sound of this farce was not small, not only the officials guarding the yard heard it, but also all the people in the house.

Ni Yexin couldn't help but shook her head, glanced out, and said: "This second lady has a tricky and mean personality, and she can't stand a little grievance. She has an impulsive personality and is easy to guess. She must have made many enemies. Sooner or later, she will be punished very badly."

Murong Chang glanced at him affectionately, and said, "You observe carefully."

Ni Yexin immediately smiled and said, "Thank you, hero, for your compliment."

Murong Changqing: "..."

Murong Changqing originally wanted to ridicule him, but Ni Yexin took advantage of it, and was speechless immediately.

Zhao Yin lowered his head silently, turning a deaf ear to their flirting and cursing while investigating the case.

Ni Yexin clicked her tongue twice, and said, "I haven't seen the maid next to Mr. Xie before. Who is that?"

Chi Long said: "Oh, it is the personal servant girl who serves Master Xie. I heard that she has been in Xie's house for almost ten years. She has been serving Master Xie since she came to the mansion."

"Oh?" Ni Yexin said, "It's tricky just by looking at it."

"What?" Murong asked affectionately.

Ni Yexin said: "The maid looks like she is in her 20s, she is not too young, why isn't she married yet?"

Generally, little maids will be released to marry when they reach their age, but it is really rare to see such young maids still in the mansion.

Ni Yexin said: "That girl has a shrewd look on her face. She would rather not get married and stay in the Xie family. She definitely has ulterior motives. Could it be that she wants to be the third wife?"

The others didn't seem very interested in the intrigue between the two women, so they didn't answer.

The officer had already brought a book from the butler's desk and said, "Lord Ni, this is the book."

Ni Yexin took it over and took a look, turned it over in his hand, and found that it was a blank account book with no words on it.

Ni Yexin frowned, closed the account book, and then reached out to touch the cover and back cover. They were very thin, and there should be no interlayer.

Murong Changqing asked: "What did you find?"

Ni Yexin shook her head and said, "It's empty, there's nothing there."

Murong Chang said affectionately, "Empty?"

Ni Yexin asked the coffin, "Where is this book placed?"

The official pointed at it immediately and said, "It's placed on the table, at the bottom."

Ni Yexin walked to the front of the long case. At first glance, it was a place for the housekeeper to handle business. There were a lot of things piled up, most of which were ledgers and letters.

Ni Yexin picked up all the letters on the top. They were some business letters. They were arranged in chronological order. Sent by a genius.

Ni Yexin opened the top letter and glanced at it. There was no important information in it. It was just a letter of greeting from a businessman surnamed Yan to Mr. Xie.After all, we all do business together, so we need to communicate for a long time, and it is inconvenient to communicate because of the distance, so we have to send letters, which is also a way to deepen the relationship.

Murong Changqing glanced at the letter and said, "This merchant named Yan is in the cloth business."

"Huh? Do you know him?" Ni Yexin asked.

Murong Chang shook his head affectionately, and said, "I saw his name in the account book yesterday, and he has been doing business recently."

"So that's how it is." Ni Yexin said, "Hero, your memory is really good."

As he spoke, he opened a few more letters, opened them one by one, and suddenly frowned.

Murong Chang said affectionately: "What's wrong?"

"It's a bit strange." Ni Yexin rolled her eyes.

Ni Yexin immediately pulled out a few letters from the pile of letters, put them on the table, and asked: "Hero, have you seen all these people in the account book yesterday?"

Murong Chang looked down at each of them affectionately, and said, "I have seen five of them, and I have no impression of the remaining two."

"It's so strange." Ni Yexin said.

When Chi Long and Zhao Yin heard Ni Yexin's words, they all came together and looked down at the letters.

A total of seven letters were taken out separately and put together, but they didn't see anything strange.

Some of these letters are simply greeting letters, some invite Master Xie to a certain place, and some talk about the harvest of the year, etc. The content of almost every letter is different.

"What's so strange?" Murong Chang frowned affectionately.

He looked it over carefully, but he didn't seem to find the strange point that Ni Yexin said. The letters were delivered at different times and places. The seven people who wrote the letters were not even in the same place, and the notes on the letters were completely different. Can't see anything related.

Ni Yexin said, "It's about the seal."

"Seal?" Murong was taken aback for a moment.

Ni Yexin said: "These letters all have seals, and the characters engraved on the seals are different, but you see, this letter and the two characters on this letter are so similar, it is likely that it was carved by one person. .And this person has a habit of cutting seals."

Many people think that it is an art to have broken or missing corners of the seal, so that it will not look so rigid.So when a new seal is engraved, they will deliberately carve a gap on the seal. This kind of gap is generally not easy to imitate, and it is also used to distinguish the authenticity.

Over time, when a person does this kind of behavior, it will become like handwriting, with certain rules to follow.

Ni Yexin found that the seals of these seven letters were not only missing, but coincidentally they were all in one place.

Murong Chang was taken aback, and said, "You mean..."

Ni Yexin said: "These seven people can't be such a coincidence, why don't they all find a seal engraver to engrave the seal?"

Zhao Yin frowned and said, "Master Ni is suspicious..."

Ni Yexin said: "I'm afraid the seven letters are all fake, forged by someone."

Murong Changqing took another look at the seven letters, the handwriting was different, it was impossible to tell if it was written by one person.He opened the other ledgers on the butler's desk and compared them with the butler's handwriting, but he couldn't tell.

Ni Yexin said: "We have to check the account books given by the housekeeper again."

The account book is at Xie's house, and the official sent it to move here soon.

Ni Yexin asked Murong Changqing to help find out the account books related to the seven letters. This was a big project, but fortunately Murong Changqing almost had a photographic memory, so it took some time to find it out.

The Xie family has business contacts with these people, but the types of business are very wide and varied, but having said that, these seven businesses are not big, they can only be said to be small and unspoken.

Murong Changqing looked at these accounts carefully, then suddenly smiled, and said: "It seems that there is really something wrong with the housekeeper, and the second lady is really right, his hands and feet are not clean."

Ni Yexin said, "What's going on?"

Murong Changqing said: "Looking at the books, there is no problem, and they are all normal businesses. But these businesses are all loss-making businesses."

"Business at a loss?" Ni Yexin raised his eyebrows.

The ledger records the time of doing business each time, as well as the type, and expenditure and income.Every time the Xie family shipped some goods to those people, or gave them some silver, but in the end the silver and goods they got would be less than what they had spent, and if they occasionally got more, it wasn't too much, almost negligible.

This kind of loss-making business has been in business for a year or two, and the longest cooperation has been almost 20 years.

However, this loss is completely behind the decimal point for the Xie family's monthly income, so no one cares.

Ni Yexin suddenly realized after hearing this, and said: "It seems that we need to continue to investigate whether this merchant really exists. If the housekeeper fabricated so many people and turned them around every month, then after so many years, it is indeed possible to get a lot of money. Less silver."

Ni Yexin asked the officials to help, and went out to check the whereabouts of these seven merchants, to find out whether they really existed and whether they had done business with Xie's family.

And whether the butler really just moved this account is really unknown. After all, there are many accounts, and those accounts that have been tampered with are all buried in them, and it is really difficult to find them.

Ni Yexin was going to go to see Mr. Xie, and ask Mr. Xie if he had seen such a few merchants.

Mr. Xie just returned to the room at this moment, and the eldest lady also came over. The two of them were talking, and the servant girl said that Mr. Ni is here.

Master Xie asked Master Ni to come in, and naturally Murong Changqing was also there.

Ni Yexin came in and sat down. Mr. Xie was very cooperative with the investigation and said, "Master Ni is here, do you have anything to ask me?"

Ni Yexin nodded, handed all seven letters to Master Xie, and asked, "Master Xie, do you have any impression of these people?"

Mr. Xie picked it up and looked at it one by one, shaking his head and said: "I have no impression. I have been in poor health over the years, so more than half of the business is handled by the housekeeper. Some friendships are too good to be avoided, so I will Handle it yourself. I told the housekeeper that if you don’t have enough money for a small business, you don’t need to ask me for instructions.

Ni Yexin nodded. It seems that Mr. Xie trusts the housekeeper very much. If the housekeeper tampers with the business, Mr. Xie will not notice at all.

The eldest lady was sitting next to her. She didn't understand business matters, but she was a little sad when she mentioned the housekeeper, and said, "My lord, our family is not peaceful recently. Do you want someone to come and see? Why are there so many..."

Master Xie patted the back of Da Furen's hand as a comfort.

Master Xie put down all the letters, and the eldest lady suddenly said "Oh?"

Master Xie asked, "What's wrong?"

The eldest lady picked up the trustworthy letter from the top and said, "Master, I have heard of this person before."

Ni Yexin immediately asked: "Madam, do you know this person?"

The eldest lady shook her head and said: "How can I know a businessman as a woman? I don't know him, but listen..."

When Da Furen said this, she showed a hurt expression, and said: "When Zhongnan was still alive, I heard him mention it..."

Xie Zhongnan is the name of Mr. Xie's youngest son. The first time Mrs. Xie mentioned it, Mr. Xie felt a little sad.

The eldest lady continued: "Before the master asked him to learn how to do business, Zhongnan would get up early and look at the account books every day. Just a few days ago, I heard that he hadn't slept until late at night, so I took the maid to give him After some supper, he was still looking at the account book at that time. He seemed unhappy. I thought he was tired. He told me that there was a man named Yan who had a strange business. I am a woman, and I didn’t Understood, I told him that it was too late, let him go to bed early, and it will not be too late to watch tomorrow..."

When Da Furen said this, her eyes were red, and she even started to cry, saying intermittently: "I didn't expect...not two days after that, Zhongnan..."

Ni Yexin and Murong Chang looked at each other affectionately, it turned out that Young Master Xie found out about the ledger.

Both of them immediately thought of the possibility of killing people to silence them.

The eldest lady cried so much that she almost fainted, and all the doctors ran over.

It was inconvenient for Ni Yexin and Murong Chang to stay, so they left Master Xie's room and came out.

Ni Yexin said: "It seems that the death of young master Xie's family has something to do with the housekeeper."

Murong said affectionately: "Could it be that the young master of the Xie family was silenced by the butler because he found something wrong with the account book? And we asked to see the account book, so the butler knew that the matter could no longer be concealed, so he committed suicide?"

Ni Yexin shook his head, and said, "We'll have to check again to find out."

Murong nodded affectionately.

The two were walking side by side, when Ni Yexin suddenly tilted his body and let out an "oops".Murong Changqing was taken aback, and immediately stretched out his hand to grab Ni Yexin's waist, holding him in his arms so as not to fall.

It's just that when Murong Chang hugged Ni Yexin affectionately, he heard Ni Yexin's malicious laughter.

Murong Changqing suddenly had veins bulging on his head.

Not afraid of death, Ni Ye raised his hand and patted Murong Changqing's butt, saying, "Hero, you react so quickly."

Murong Changqing was so angry that his face turned black, and he grabbed Ni Yexin's hand.

Ni Yexin immediately said pitifully: "Hero, I feel dizzy, flustered and short of breath. Is it because the wind and cold haven't healed yet?"