Chapter 201 The Fate of Betrayers
Mo Xuetong studied Mo Xueqiong and found the pride in her eyes. Mo Xuetong smiled coldly. She had thought her forth sister was simply petty, but, since Mo Xuemin had lost power, she’d started to show that she was truly cruel. Still, it was too early for pride. She hadn’t beaten Mo Xuetong yet.
“Who are you?” Mo Xuetong asked coldly.
“Third Miss, aren’t you the one who asked the servant to bring me here? You can’t have forgotten me so quickly. I’m Li Xiu’an. You came to buy flowers and told me you admired me. You even asked somebody to bring me here.” Li Xiu’an looked at Mo Xuetong with genuine affection. He pointed at a woman on the rockery he’d come down from. “Third miss, look, the servant you sent to get me is still here.”
I timied maid walked out of the rockery and knelt wordlessly in front of Mo Xuetong.
Several maids who recognized her screamed.
“Qing’er!”
“It’s Qing’er from Third Miss’s garden.”
Hearing the maids, the young ladies began to whisper and turned to look at Mo Xuetong with suspicion. A maid from Mo Xuetong’s courtyard had led him in. She’d really had an illicit meeting with this man.
Those nannies stopped scolding and beating Li Xiu’an, but Mo Ye kicked him again.
“Nonsense! How dare you frame our Third Miss!”
Mo Ye didn’t seem to put much effort into her kick, but she had the technique to make it hurt. When the kick connected, Li Xiu’an went pale. He couldn’t say a single word. Mo Xuetong hid her smile.
It was quite handy to have a maid who knew kung fu.
“Third Sister, do you really… How could you… Today, Grandma is so happy but you invited a man like that…” Mo Xueyan said, acting like she wasn’t sure what to do. Secretly, she glanced at Mo Xueqiong, then turned back to Mo Xuetong, trying to look genuine and helpful. “Maybe we can drag him down first and then let grandma deal with him. We…”
Mo Xuetong smiled and pushed away Mo Xueyan out of her way.
“Why should Grandma take care of it? I want to hear the story of how I seduced such a plain man like him and ruined our family’s reputation.” There was fury in her eyes.
Seeing her being so callous with the man, the ladies present couldn’t help looking at Mo Xueyan and Mo Xueqiong suspiciously. Being from noble families, they’d all had to deal with these sorts of struggles and schemes. If Mo Xuetong had not asked him to come, then the most likely person to frame her was the one of the two sisters currently defending her.
“Third Sister, this is such a scandal… dealt with in front of so many people… Is it alright?” Mo Xueqiong pretended to be worried, gentle holding Mo Xuetong’s sleeves. “We should wait until the guests are gone.”
Her reputation would be completely ruined by the time the guests had gone. Mo Xuetongg smiled coldly.
“You’re right, this is a scandal. And since it is, it shouldn’t be covered up. It should be seen exactly as what it is.”
By now, Li Xiu’an had managed to catch his breath.
“Third Miss, you can’t be so ruthless,” he said, protecting his chest from another kick. “You’ve even had someone bring me a token of your affection, but now you act as if I made up our relationship to humiliate you.”
From the bottom of her heart, Mo Xueqiong was happy, but she turned to the man in anger.
“Do you have any proof? You haven’t shown us any proof. Even if did, it can’t be true. It must be something you made up to frame Third Sister.”
Mo Xueyan watched her sisters fight with glee. She had disliked Mo Xuetong for a long time, and she had told on her yesterday. Now Grandma was watching her, and she couldn’t go near the inner courtyard. She’d heard some of the young ladies today had handsome and prominent brothers. If not for Mo Xuetong, she might have landed a good marriage.
Mo Xuetong deserved to be unlucky. She should have to marry that rascal!
Li Xiu’an pulled something from his sleeve.
“I have a proof, a token which belongs to Third Miss,” he declared, holding out the object. “You can decide then after you see this.”
Mo Xueqiong was glowing with pride, but she forced herself to look worried as she turned to Mo Xuetong.
“Ah, what should we do now? Third Sister, how could you…”
Mo Xuetong ignored her, still smiling that ruthless smile. She looked at the item in Li Xiu’an’s hands.
“Are you sure that’s mine?”
Li Xiu’an held the token tightly.
“Of course it’s yours. It’s your maid who gave it to me,” he said quickly.
Mo Xuetong looked at Qing’er who was still kneeling off to the side.
“Qing’er, what do you have to say about it?” Mo Xuetong spoke slowly, pausing at every word, and her voice was steady and clear.
Qing’er looked at her in fright and began to kowtow.
“Third Miss, please forgive me. Third Miss, please forgive me. I didn’t mean to… get caught by them…” she said, starting to cry. “I don’t know, I really don’t know.”
The crowd turned on Mo Xuetong with disdain and disbelief. If even her maid admitted it, it must be true. Still, how could Mo Xuetong, so pure on the surface, be the type to flirt with a man in a shop, then let him be beaten to cover her mistake? You really couldn’t just a person by their looks.
Mo Ye was so angry she started forward to kick Qing’er as well, but Mo Xuetong held her back.
“Bring me the token,” Mo Xuetong ordered.
“Yes, miss!”
Mo Ye walked forward and took the token from Li Xiu’an’s hand. It was a golden hairpin.
“This is the hairpin Old Madam gave to the young misses,” Mo Ye said. She turned it over “It can’t belong to my mistress. Her hairpin is on her head.”
Mo Ye pointed at Mo Xuetong’s hair which had been pulled into a topknot. All around, people turned to look. Her black hair covered half the pin, but the other half was visible. It was the same as the one Mo Ye held.
“The Old Madam gave one of these to each of the four young misses. Since Mo Xuetong still has hers, who does this one belong to?”
Mo Xueyan, quick to react, pointed at the hairpin in her own hair.
“It’s not mine, either. I’m wearing it too.” She didn’t own many accessories, so she was wearing basically everything she had today.
Mo Xueqiong hesitated.
She was going to point at her own pin, but her mother had bought her plenty of accessories recently. She’d worn them to try and look prettier than Mo Xuetong and left her old ones at home. Still, she’d told Qing’er to steal Mo Xuetong’s hairpin. How did she still have it? Was it possible Qing’er had stolen hers instead?
She turned around and glared at Qing’er like she wanted to tear her apart.
Qing’er was also confused. She’d snuck into Third Miss’s room and stolen the golden hairpin. How did Third Miss still have it?
Mo Xuetong looked icily at Mo Xueqiong’s.
“Third Sister, where is yours?”
Mo Xueqiong’s worry and confusion was genuine now.
“My, my… Mine is back in my courtyard…”
“Take some servants there and search her courtyard until you find the hairpin,” Mo Xuetong ordered, “and bring it here. Then Fourth Miss will be cleared.”
Mo Xueqiong had no choice but to send someone to look. She couldn’t believe Mo Xuetong had managed to avoid suspicion.
After a while, Mo Yan, Mo Xueqiong’s main maid, came breathing heavily.
“Fourth Miss, I didn’t find your hairpin. It’s missing!”
She hadn’t witnessed the previous scene and the maid who had told her to find the hairpin hadn’t explained things well. She thought Mo Xueqiong simply wanted to wear the pin and had come back to beg for forgiveness.
By now, Grandmother Mo had finished watching the show and was slowly walking back. When she saw the group of ladies blocking the path, she knew something terrible had happened. An older maid explained the whole thing to her, and she was becoming irritated.
She joined the crowd just in time to see Mo Yan report the missing hairpin to Mo Xueqiong.
Everyone present was shocked.
Mo Xuetong stood and knelt before the old madam, sweet eyes filled with tears.
“Grandma, Fourth Sister didn’t do it on purpose… She must have been misled! There’s no way Fourth Sister recruited this man. He must have stolen Fourth Sister’s hairpin. You should do her justice.”
Mo Xueqiong was dazed. She just opened her mouth as her face flushed.
Li Xiu’an saw the tide turning and spoke up again.
“No, it’s true, it’s…”
Mo Ye hated him so much that she just walked up and slapped him twice. This time, she didn’t hold anything back. She slapped him hard enough to leave him dizzy, face already starting to swell. Again, he was silent.
Everyone could picture what he would say. He would undoubtedly claim that Mo Xuetong framed him. It was easy to see this man was no thief. If he had snuck into the inner yard, somebody had led him. Fourth Miss had brought this man in intentionally.
She’d even used a maid from her older sister’s yard so that if something went wrong, she could push the blame onto Mo Xuetong. The man was from the outside. He couldn’t have known which miss made an appointment to meet him. Therefore, when he got caught, he mistook it for Third Miss.
“Grandma, Fourth Sister is still young and knows nothing about it,” she said, sounding heartbroken. “Please forgive her. She must have been tempted by the maids. You see, that third-class maid dared to talk with her. And the maid blamed it on me because she was worried that someone would know the truth… Grandma, Fourth Sister just made a stupid mistake!”
“Grandma, it’s not me. I didn’t do anything.” Mo Xueqiong also realized the picture everyone was starting to form. “I always kept my golden hairpin by my side. I really don’t know how it disappeared. I don’t know! It’s really not me!”
She hurriedly turned back and glared at Qing’er, but people just assumed she was trying to threaten a maid into silence.
Old Madam was furious and turned to the maid as well.
“Someone drag the maid outside and beat her to death. Beat the man hard as well. That should be fine as long as you leave him alive until he can be sent to the magistrate.”
After all this, she just wanted to keep this from getting in the way of her own affairs. Mo Xueqiong had never had a good reputation so this needed to be dealt with as soon as possible.
As two older maids began to pull him away, sticks in hand, Li Xiu’an started to shout.
“No, please! It wasn’t my plan to come here! Fourth Miss asked me to…”
“Cover his mouth up,” Mo Xuetong ordered. “How dare you slander Fourth Sister too!”
One of the servants shoved a rag into his mouth and he was dragged out. Qing’er had briefly fainted from fear. Now she had no strength to fight and could only beg for forgiveness, but there was little she could say. A maid who betrayed her own mistress was not allowed to live. No one would show mercy on her.