“My love, as long as you’re happy, forget one servant—even ten servants would be fine!”
Hans said as he sidled up to Ye Tang’s side, wanting to take her hand and kiss the back of it.
But before he could touch Ye Tang’s hand, that rough, ugly hand—utterly unlike that of a rich man—picked up a cup right in front of his eyes.
“Since Hans, you’ve said that much, then I’ll just hire a full ten servants.”
Ye Tang calmly sipped the honey milk in her cup, showing not the slightest intention of putting it down.
Today’s breakfast was made by the servant woman. The food was simple and hardly exquisite, but fortunately, the servant woman obeyed Ye Tang’s words and didn’t just boil some porridge because Ye Tang was still ill. The breakfast had vegetables, meat, eggs, milk, and white bread. Vitamins, fiber, protein, amino acids, and carbohydrates—all the nutrients the body needed were present.
Ten…!
Sweat instantly dripped from the back of Hans’s head. He forced a stiff smile. “My love, this house doesn’t need that many servants, does it…?”
Hans had been in business for over a decade, and even his own caravan only had five or six people. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to expand his caravan; it was just that people’s hearts were hard to read. Hiring one more person meant guarding against one more person, lest someone in the caravan take the small share, resent him for taking the big one, and in a fit of malice, kill him and run off with the money.
“That child has already arrived in the city, hasn’t she?”
Ye Tang picked up her knife and fork again.
With her villainous face, she slowly cut into the chicken breast in her salad. That motion, that demeanor… it was as if what lay beneath her knife and fork wasn’t a piece of meat, but a live little chicken.
Hans’s scalp tingled, and chills ran through his body. But he was, after all, a successful merchant. Even if the other party in a deal terrified him to his core, he could still swallow his saliva and try to calm his emotions.
Scrape—
As the metal fork tore through a piece of chicken, it also emitted a piercing scrape against the porcelain.
With the aura of a vengeful female spirit from a horror movie about to kill her husband in the next second, Ye Tang slowly speared a few strands of chicken breast, then raised the fork to her eyes, twisting the end of it as she asked Hans, “Are you planning to have me personally make the bed for that child, personally wash her clothes, and personally cook her meals?”
Feeling that if he answered “yes,” he’d become the shredded meat on that fork in the next second, Hans hurriedly waved his hands and shook his head like a rattle. “Of course not, my love! Hire as many servants as you want! Didn’t I often urge you to hire help before?”
That was true enough.
The original Anna Rochel doted on her two daughters immensely. If there was gold, she wouldn’t let her daughters wear silver. Her daughters’ dresses had to be the most fashionable styles of the season, and the jewelry they wore had to be set with the largest gems.
But Anna Rochel was reluctant to hire servants.
When she had first married Hans, the young couple only had her modest dowry. Anna Rochel was used to living frugally, just to save money for Hans’s business.
Later, when Hans made money and the Hedelin House’s standard of living improved, Anna Rochel still hated to spend on hiring help. She would still personally cook soup, clean the house, and tend the garden. Each week, she only spent six copper coins to have someone wash clothes three times. Even then, Anna Rochel considered washing the clothes herself to save those six copper coins and buy her daughters an extra chicken to stew for soup.
Ye Tang stopped twisting the end of the fork. She speared a few vegetable leaves along with the chicken and put them in her mouth.
She chewed slowly, only speaking again after swallowing completely. “Then the servants’ wages—”
Hans hurriedly patted his chest and guaranteed Ye Tang, “Of course, I’ll pay them!”
“Sigh…”
With a troubled sigh, Ye Tang held her face in one hand. “I’m clearly the lady of this house, yet I’m not even the one paying the servants’ wages… Knowing I’m not the one who pays them, the servants will surely fawn over that child and neglect Dia, Lia, and me.”
Hans’s throat tightened, and he could only say again, “My love, you know I’m often not home. It’s still better if you pay the servants’ wages. It saves some paupers thinking we’ll delay their pay when I return late.”
“Mm.”
This time, Ye Tang’s expression toward Hans improved quite a bit. Hans breathed a sigh of relief and hurriedly untied a money pouch from his waist, handing it toward Ye Tang.
Ye Tang didn’t take the money pouch.
“This afternoon, Dia, Lia, and I will not only pick out a few servants to bring back, but also buy some other things. I don’t want that child thinking her sisters are shabbier than her.”
Hans had no choice but to place the money pouch full of silver coins on the table, then fish out a small money pouch from his bosom.
He was rather reluctant to part with this pouch of gold coins.
In this country, a hundred copper coins equaled one silver coin, and a hundred silver coins equaled one gold coin. There were only twenty gold coins in this small pouch, but many commoners might never earn that much money in a lifetime.
Ye Tang didn’t look at the money pouches. She only asked Claudia and Gloria, “Dia, Lia, my darlings, what do you want to buy?”
“Buy what…”
The little sisters exchanged a glance. The older sister mumbled, “Pretty dresses, maybe…” The younger one tilted her head. “Gems wouldn’t be bad…”
Where could silver coins buy gems? Though it pained him to the point of bleeding inside, Hans still handed the gold coin pouch to Ye Tang.
“Oh my, dear, isn’t this the pouch you use for gold coins?”
Ye Tang feigned surprise. “You’re really giving me and Dia and Lia this many gold coins?”
Hearing that “dear,” Hans’s smile instantly became much more sincere—merchants needed credibility in business, and credibility was as good as money to a merchant. Even though the Christa family had cut off all ties with Anna Rochel because she eloped with him, he could still use the Christa family’s wealth to vouch for himself.
Anna Rochel was still useful to him.
“My love, if these twenty gold coins aren’t enough, you can always come to me for more money.”
“The money should be enough for now.”
Having Claudia come over to hold the small pouch of gold coins for her, Ye Tang herself picked up the large pouch of silver coins.
“Thank you, dear.”
Hans’s face paled a bit upon seeing Ye Tang take both money pouches, feeling even more pained.
“As long as you’re happy, my love… Then Cinderella—”
“We can’t have her arrive and still stay in some outside inn, can we? If someone saw that, wouldn’t I be cursed as a shrew?”
…
Ye Tang was certainly happy, having gotten twenty gold coins and over three hundred silver coins for free.
This not-insignificant sum was enough as startup capital for her.
As for Cinderella… she had no intention of abusing that girl who had lost her mother, nor did she plan to cozy up to the future crown princess’s thigh—Cinderella becoming crown princess was fantastical enough to begin with, and wasting energy currying favor for something so uncertain was far less reliable than putting that energy into becoming the thigh herself.
With Claudia and Gloria in tow, Ye Tang left the Soho District for Hope Road.
The Soho District was something like a mix of [upscale shopping districts]. The people living there generally had some wealth or social standing, and some self-proclaimed “upper-class” high-end taverns and pleasure houses were also located in the Soho District. It wouldn’t be wrong to call the Soho District the pinnacle reachable by commoners.
Given that this was an era where taverns and pleasure houses weren’t separated, virtually every tavern offered special services on the second floor. The difference between a tavern and a pleasure house was that a tavern was more like a modern nightclub, while a pleasure house was like a high-end club doing flesh trade.
The people living in the Soho District were arrogant. Beggars weren’t allowed here, nor were job seekers, leaflet distributors, or street performers.
But just one street over from the Soho District lay Hope Road, which had the most “job agencies.” “employment agency” was just a nice way of putting it; in truth, these “job agencies” should have been called “black-hearted labor brokers.”
The job seekers waiting here to be picked had no dignity, no human rights—they were just slabs of moving meat. They owed money to the “employment agency” for various reasons, and any customer who gave money to the “employment agency” could take away any job seeker, even if that person was a pleasure house madam.
One could say the kind of work job seekers got all depended on luck. Some people’s luck was truly awful; no sooner had they entered the “employment agency” than they were selected—
“Yaaahhhhh!!!”
Ye Tang and her two daughters had just arrived at Hope Road when they heard the scream. Ye Tang almost instinctively headed toward the source of the scream.
Ahead was a bridge, and under the bridge flowed a river thirty meters wide. Someone had jumped from the bridge to commit suicide, only to be hastily fished out of the river by “employment agency” people and thrown onto the riverbank.
“Wake up! What are you playing dead for!?”
“Useless trash! Get up!”
The one who jumped was a boy not of age, looking only about eleven or twelve. Likely because the river wasn’t deep enough and his forehead had been cut by a rock after jumping, the boy had a shocking wound on his forehead, from which blood oozed, gradually staining half his face red.
The “employment agency” people didn’t care if the boy was injured. They were furious that he dared to jump into the river—the boy had been selected by the Mixed Pleasure House owner, and he was supposed to be sent to the Mixed Pleasure House to “work.”
The Mixed Pleasure House owner paid a lot of money to the “employment agency,” and boys working at the Mixed Pleasure House could eat good food and wear nice clothes. But this ungrateful little brat not only jumped into the river and played dead, but also left such a huge scar on a face that could have been put to good use earning meals.
How could they spit out meat they’d already swallowed and give it back to the Mixed Pleasure House owner? If the owner didn’t come, wouldn’t they lose a major client!?
Thinking of how that well-connected Mixed Pleasure House owner, who had ties everywhere, might badmouth their “employment agency” as incompetent in front of other rich, powerful, or influential nobles, cutting off their premium clientele in the future, the “employment agency” thugs were filled with hate and rage.
One burly black man in particular grabbed the boy by the collar and slapped him hard across the face, making the boy’s head loll and spit out some water.
“Get up, you dog bastard!”
Such vile cursing scared Claudia and Gloria pale. The sisters clung tightly to each other, their clasped hands slick with sweat.
“Doing that will only kill this child.”
What nearly made Claudia and Gloria faint was that Ye Tang walked out from the crowd. Under the “employment agency” thugs’ glaring eyes, she walked to the boy’s side.