Chapter 93: Manuscript  3/3

But he wasn’t very good at speaking. After he arrived, he didn’t know what to say after putting down his things. Fortunately, Li Laogen could speak: “Laosan, have you seen Xiaoye’s gold earrings? They’re made of real gold! She’s also wearing a gold ring…”

Li Laogen boasted to Zhao Laosan and started talking about what they had for dinner last night, then invited Zhao Laosan to have a meal at their home.

Zhao Laosan treated Li Laogen’s house as his own, so naturally, he agreed. Then Li Laogen took him to chop wood and fetch water.

Letting guests do chores was something only Li Laogen could do, but Zhao Laosan also enthusiastically joined in!

Shortly after Zhao Laosan arrived, the Jin family also came. Jin Xiaoshu had already agreed with Jin Xiaoye that they would come to her house on New Year’s Day to finish the leftovers from the Li family’s meal, and on the second day of the New Year, Jin Xiaoye would take Li Qingzhi back to her mother’s house to finish the leftovers from the Jin family’s meal.

The Jin family had quite a few relatives, but Jin Xiaoshu planned to cook fresh dishes for them when they came.

“Sis, you look really beautiful today,” Jin Xiaoshu praised Jin Xiaoye when he saw her.

Jin’s mother couldn’t help but comment on Jin Xiaoye’s new clothes and jewelry, saying, “Our Xiaoye is even more beautiful than Moli now.”

“Of course! I have money now,” Jin Xiaoye said in a particularly good mood.

Jin Dajiang didn’t say much, just smiled amiably, then took out two strings of copper coins and gave one to each of Li Damao and Li Ermao, and also took out two small silver bracelets for them.

Li Damao and Li Ermao had been hearing people praise Jin Xiaoye’s beauty all day, so much so that they also wanted jewelry. Now that Jin Dajiang gave them silver bracelets, they were extremely happy. “Mom, Mom, we have bracelets too!” they exclaimed.

Jin Xiaoye asked, “Dad, why did you give them bracelets?”

Jin Dajiang smiled apologetically, “Xiaoye, we didn’t give them anything when Damao and Ermao turned one, so we’re making up for it now.”

In their family, when a child turned one, grandparents and other relatives would often give them some silver jewelry. Wealthier families would give silver locks or silver bracelets, while less affluent ones might give a silver bead for the child to wear on their hand.

They had originally planned to give Jin’s grandmother two silver peanuts, but Jin’s grandmother disagreed and didn’t allow them to do so. Worried that Jin’s grandmother would find out, they ended up not giving anything and only secretly gave Jin Xiaoye some food.

Jin Dajiang would often receive some food when he went out to serve liquor at banquets. Whenever he got his hands on some, he would immediately bring it back to Jin Xiaoye’s house. If it weren’t for this food, Jin Xiaoye wouldn’t have had enough milk to feed her two children at the time.

As for why they were making up for it now… Jin Dajiang had worked at the new dock for over a month before the New Year, and everyone there had gained weight. In the end, the cook even gave him three taels of silver and asked him to come back next year.

Three taels of silver! The quality of this silver was also very good!

After discussing it with Jin’s mother, they went and had two silver bracelets made for Li Damao and Li Ermao.

“Not every family gives these, why are you making up for it? Damao and Ermao already have bracelets…” Jin Xiaoye wanted to return the silver bracelets to her parents.

Li Damao and Li Ermao already had silver bracelets from the Zhu family’s gifts. There were four silver bracelets for children among the gifts they received, but Jin Xiaoye was afraid that the two children would lose them, so she didn’t let them wear them.

“We still need to make up for it,” Jin Dajiang said.

“Xiaoye, let the two children wear them,” Li Qingzhi smiled, then looked at Jin’s mother. “Mom, what a coincidence, I also bought you a bracelet. I haven’t been honoring you for so many years, so I’m making up for it now.”

When Li Qingzhi had someone make jewelry for Jin Xiaoye, he thought about how Jin’s mother didn’t have any jewelry, so he also bought some for her.

He chose a common style that people in the village often wore for Jin’s mother: a silver bracelet, a pair of silver earrings, and a silver hairpin.

These three items didn’t weigh much and didn’t cost him much money, but they were perfect for giving as gifts at this time.

Li Qingzhi took out the items and asked Jin Xiaoye to style Jin’s mother’s hair and help her put on the hairpin, bracelet, and earrings.

Jin’s mother declined, but Jin Xiaoye insisted and pressed her onto the stool. Fang Jinniang saw that Jin Xiaoye wasn’t skilled at styling hair, so she took over and styled Jin’s mother’s hair into a hairstyle commonly worn by old ladies in the city.

On New Year’s Day, Jin Xiaoye and her daughter were definitely the envy of the women in the village. Someone even brought eggs specifically to ask Fang Jinniang to teach them how to style their hair.

In fact, Li Qingzhi was better at it, but it wasn’t quite appropriate for a man to teach hair styling…

The New Year celebrations in ancient times were truly lively.

From the first day of the New Year until the fourth day, Li Qingzhi didn’t study at all. At most, he would teach the two children and Jin Xiaoye a little. He would chat with people in the village, play with the two children, and on the evening of the fourth day, he moved the Eight Immortals table to the door and prepared things to “welcome the God of Wealth.”

Everyone in the village welcomed the God of Wealth on the evening of the fourth day.

Their leisurely days continued until the fourth day.

On the fifth day, the whole family went to the county town.

Jin Xiaoye and the others were going to tidy up the shop they had just bought, while Li Qingzhi was going to visit County Magistrate Gou, Zhu Qian, and Li Xiucai.

He had originally planned to wait a few more days to do this, but on the third day, Zhu Xunmiao came to visit him.

He spent the morning chatting with County Magistrate Gou, went to Zhu’s house for lunch, and in the afternoon, he went to Li Xiucai’s place.

Li Xiucai had gone to the countryside for New Year’s a few days ago and had just returned today. When Li Qingzhi went over, Li Xiucai had just emerged from a pile of children, with messy hair.

“Qingzhi, you’re here,” Li Xiucai greeted Li Qingzhi with a gentle smile, then asked someone to make tea for Li Qingzhi.

He appeared very refined, but that hair… Li Qingzhi tried his best not to look at him, lest he burst out laughing.

As they chatted, Li Xiucai suddenly said, “Oh, Qingzhi, you lost some of the manuscripts you gave me before.”

The manuscript Li Qingzhi had given to Zhu Qian for his autobiography, he later said he wanted to revise and copy it, so he took it back and gave it to Jin Xiaoye to practice reading.

The manuscript on Li Xiucai’s side was the story of County Magistrate Gou that he had written with his left hand. When Li Xiucai took it to have it copied a few times, he left the original manuscript in his study. Now, it was missing.

Because it wasn’t anything important, Li Xiucai didn’t realize it was missing until he was preparing to go home for the New Year at the end of last year.

“It’s lost, so be it. I can’t even stand to look at those characters,” Li Qingzhi said. At the time, he had written with his left hand, so the words were written very roughly and hastily, and they were quite ugly.

Now, his left-handed words were much better than before, but as for his right-handed words… according to County Magistrate Gou, his handwriting ranked first in Chongcheng County.

Hearing Li Qingzhi’s words, Li Xiucun also let go of the matter and chatted with Li Qingzhi about other things.