After buying this forest, neither of them had looked through it carefully. Seizing the rare opportunity, they were not in a hurry to go home. Hunting was secondary, they mainly just wandered through the forest.
"When there's time, we should ask Dr. Huang to come and have a look. He often collects herbs, so he should know where the herbs should be planted." Li Qinghe said with a smile.
Zhou Chengkang was indifferent. He was not afraid of hard work, especially when it was with Li Qinghe. Even if it was tiring, he still felt secure. This was a dream he wouldn't have dared to think of in his previous life. "Okay, whenever we want him to come, I can go and fetch him."
Li Qinghe turned around and looked at him, smiling. "Actually, I feel that you are quite pampering me."
Zhou Chengkang looked around and saw that there was nothing but trees. He reached out to embrace her and said, "It should be." His tone was natural.
Li Qinghe immediately laughed. The two of them roamed around for half a day and eventually they caught a rabbit. The forest here wasn't deep and they didn't go far, so they were very happy to catch a rabbit.
There was only one rabbit, so they didn't think of taking it to town to sell. After taking it home, they cleaned it up and stewed it, then sent a bowl to Li Fu's place.
Whenever going back to Li's home, the yard was always spic and span. Soon after sitting down, hot meals and dishes would be served. Mrs. Liu was really very diligent.
Li Qinghe carried the meat back and saw Mrs. Liu in the yard, cutting clothes. Seeing her come in, she smiled and said, "Qinghe is here?" In a blink of an eye, seeing the bowl in her hand, she smiled and stood up, "What delicious food did you bring us back again?"
Mrs. Liu smiled and took the bowl, flipping the meat into her own bowl, and then took the bowl to the well in the yard to wash it, saying, "Your father went to your uncle's house."
After being with Liu Shi, Li Fu often went to eat at Li Xingwang's house, and occasionally invited his whole family to eat. In fact, compared to Qian Shi, Liu Shi was really a woman who knew how to live a good life. Her clothes and hair were always kept neat and clean, and she was not like Qian Shi, who didn’t work behind Li Fu’s back.
When Li Qinghe entered the house earlier, she was alone at home and was making clothes. Previously, Qian Shi wouldn't do this. When Li Fu was not at home, she wouldn't do any work most of the time. When Li Fu came home, she would start making clothes, and then Li Fu would be responsible for cleaning the courtyard.
"I won't look for him." Li Qinghe was reluctant to turn around and leave, so she sat down at the stone table and noticed that the fabric in the basket had been cut into small pieces, which surprised her. She asked, "Is Linhua pregnant?"
Mrs. Liu wiped the bowl in her hand and smiled, "No, this dress is for Xiyu. I made it with the fabric your father bought."
"If Linhua was pregnant, it would be great." She had a trance-like expression.
As if thinking of something else, she smiled as she looked at the sky, squinting her eyes due to the strong sunlight. She soon came back to her senses and walked back to the stone table to sit down. "Qinghe, sometimes I wonder if I'm dreaming. Will I wake up and find out I'm not at the Li's and still there... I especially like sunning quilts. This quilt is warm and soft, not the one from before that was hard and smelly."
It seemed she was talking about her former husband's family. It was heard she had been widowed for three years. Looking at Linhua's original name, the mother and daughter must have had a difficult time before.
"Qinghe, if I do anything wrong, you must tell me." She spoke earnestly, "I'm not afraid of working hard, I'm just afraid of going back to the old days."
Li Qinghe nodded mutely, "That's good." Suddenly she felt a bit strange. She had been in the house for more than a year and was doing well, why was she saying this? She asked tentatively, "Did something happen?"
Mrs. Liu put down her needle and thread and sighed, "Is it so obvious?"
Indeed, it was very obvious. Mrs. Liu used to greet people with a smile and wasn't very talkative.
Wanwan’s mother has been to the house several times recently. Mrs. Liu's voice became lower and lower, "The neighbors around say that your father should still want to live with me, but I am not as good looking as her, nor as good at crying as her."
Hearing the word crying, Li Qinghe's eyelids twitched. Could it be that she came here to cry again? "Don't think about it, I won't let her in from my side if she wants to enter again."
While the two were talking, someone came from outside the fence again, and Li Qinghe saw Qian Shi at a glance.
It turned out that Mrs. Liu was not exaggerating at all, she really came here.
Mrs. Liu lowered her voice and said, "She has been coming every day recently, and the two of your uncle's family were repairing the courtyard, so I asked your father to help out." She couldn't hide her slyness.
After she finished speaking, she got up and opened the door.
Qian entered the door and said, "Where's Li Fu? I'm looking for him."
When she stepped in, she saw Li Qinghe sitting at the stone table, looking at her with a cold gaze.
"Qinghe...you're back." Qian quickly reacted, "I'm looking for your father for something."
"What a coincidence, my father is not here." Li Qinghe looked at Liu Shi, "Aunt Liu, let me tell you something. In the future, if she comes again, don't open the door. Do we Li family not want a good reputation?"
Although it was a rebuke, but without any reproachful tone, Liu Shi instantly understood her meaning.
Qian Shi's reputation in the village is much worse than when she was with Li Fu. Mainly because of the things she did herself, she also caused people to gossip. She went to live with the couple Zhao Tianfu and his wife. Many people secretly said that the two of them were together, not to mention how embarrassing it was.
Hearing Li Qinghe's words, Qian Shi's face was not very good, "Qinghe, do you particularly hate me?"
Li Qinghe shrugged and said, "Do you need to ask? Isn't this obvious?"
Qian's face turned pale. "I'm not as lucky as you. I didn't have good parents or a good man. Is it my fault?"
Li Qinghe did not know if Zhao Tianfu was a good man, but Li Fu was good enough for her. It was her own fault that she messed up the little feelings she had for him. Now, Li Fu was not a good man.
But it was hard to tell who was right and who was wrong, and if Li Qinghe had known she was going to run into her today, she might not have come. She was getting impatient and said, "What do I care whose fault it is? Get out of here."
It was not a good feeling to be kicked out. Qian's face looked ugly and she said, "I need to talk to your father."
Li Qinghe frowned, "My father is not here, do you understand what I am saying? Why are you like a scoundrel, staying when you should be leaving?"
Seeing her face of undisguised contempt, Qian paused and explained, "Zhao Tianfu was taken away and when I woke up this morning, that woman had already left and the kid was crying from hunger."
It was a rare thing for a daughter-in-law to run away in the village, but upon thinking about her background, it didn't seem strange anymore. "She's gone, why did you come looking for my father?"
Qian hesitated, as if she had something she didn't want to say, or something she didn't want to talk to her.
Li Qinghe pushed her away, "Go back."
Mrs. Qian, frail and weak, was grabbed by her and walked step by step outside the courtyard. She said quickly, "I just want to ask your father if he wants to adopt the child? It's a boy, he looks well-behaved and healthy..."
She looked at Liu Shi on the other side, "The two of you don't have children, and it won't be long before you don't have children. You see how well Li Fu and I used to be, now we are just going our separate ways."
Qian Shi thought that she could let Li Fu raise Zhao Tianfu's child. Li Qinghe suspected that sometimes her brain was simply unclear. She dragged her out and said, "Actually, you don't have to ask my father, I can answer you on his behalf. He will absolutely not help Zhao Tianfu raise the child."
Qian walked away with a face full of disappointment.
Rather than saying it is to let Li Fu off the hook, it is better to say that she wanted to see how much emotion Li Fu still had for her and where her bottom line was.
"Okay, I'm going back." Li Qinghe picked up the bowl and turned to leave. Before she left, she said, "I definitely won't agree to my father raising that child. What's the point of raising a grandchild when there are already grandchildren? If he really likes children, I can take Xiyu over for a couple days and that's enough."
When she returned home, the grandparents and grandchildren were under the eaves to cool off. They were talking about how Zhao Tianfu's woman had run away. "The woman in that flower house had been relying on a man to get by and when she saw she couldn't rely on him anymore, she left, which is normal. Zhao Tianfu definitely won't be so easily coming back this time. He had even lost his house, only having a few acres of land for others to farm, barely enough to feed two mouths."
Mother Zhou shook her head, "It's so pitiful for the child."
Many people said it was a pity for the child, but the child was taken care of by Mrs. Qian. Half a month later, Mr. Zhou and his wife returned from the town with a few taels of silver, the rest of which had been spent.
The masterminds were two gamblers in the town, who had studied in their childhood. Occasionally, they heard people talking about whether the bracelet of Mei was real or fake. Many people said it was fake, but someone swore that the couple had a lot of silver, all left by Mrs. Liu, nearly one hundred taels, maybe the bracelet was real.
Whether the bracelet was real or not, the silver must be real. After discussing it, they found Yang Lanhong and they knew Zhao Tianfu themselves, knowing that he was short of silver recently.
Actually, the only one who did not know the details was Yang Lanhong. The three of them agreed right away. As to why they brought him along, it was simply because they thought that in case something happened, they could share the blame with one more person.
But they did not think that it would fall on him. But regardless of whether Yang Lanhong was there or not, Eldest brother Zhou would definitely go to the town mayor and eventually trace the trail of the people from the gambling house. Unless they did not pay back the money, but with the large amount of interest, that was impossible.
When the Yang family went, the whole family went, but when they came back, only the father and son were missing.
The old woman was also gone, reportedly selling it to pay off her debts. So, in fact, only Yang Lanrou and her husband with Yang's mother came back.