Section 53 The Mistress of Ziming Tower

The crowd was angry. Not to mention 600,000 taels, even if 300,000 taels are raised now, you will have to fight a famine with the Guangdong Domain. As for Guangxi's treasury, Guangxi's garrison itself still has to rely on Guangdong's assistance, and it can't be counted on at all.

Lu Yizhong saw that the atmosphere was a little depressed, so he quickly diverted the topic: "How many men and horses and ships and cannons will be used, it must be decided by the Lord of Taiwan, Lord Futai, and He Zhen." Let's put this matter aside and discuss the rest first. ”

At that moment, the staff discussed where to call for men, how to march troops, how to cross the sea, how to communicate with the local garrison, and so on. Lu Yizhong's mind was not on this, after he was perfunctory, he shirked that he still had urgent matters, entrusted the meeting to Li Xijue, and resigned first.

As soon as he left the Governor's Palace, he only felt relaxed, and his mood was very happy and excited. Because the opportunity I have been waiting for for a long time has finally arrived.

He has been secretly planning this matter for a long time, just waiting for such an opportunity to come. Although he expected the opportunity to come soon, he just didn't expect it to come so quickly.

At this time, he was calm on the surface, but he was still a little anxious in his heart. When he got into his four-person sedan chair, he stomped off the sedan board impatiently:

"Ziming Building."

The sedan chair man was just about to get up the sedan chair, Lu Yizhong felt that it was inappropriate, and stomped his foot again: "Go back to the mansion"

He felt that it was inappropriate to go to Ziming Building at this time, and now the news that he was going to enter Lingao had not yet spread, and it would naturally spread after the meeting was dispersed for a while. When Miss Pei and Guo Dongzhu were in a panic, they would naturally come and invite themselves.

Thinking of this, he was very calculating about his thoughts. Let this proprietor Guo hesitate for a while, and when the city is full of wind and rain, he will naturally understand.

In addition, although Guo Yi has only been in Guangzhou for two or three years, he has traveled extensively, and the gentry and officials in and outside the city of Guangdong have basically passed through the road. If there is any ruthless character behind him who does not show up, this knock is enough to make the other party show up. lest you be too anxious and hit a wall in vain.

The near-noon sun shines on the carved window lattices, and the glass embedded in them reflects the light on the snow-white whitewashed walls. The room is furnished with rosewood tables, chairs and furniture, and a gorgeous lacquered gold painting of flowers and plants; One of the most extravagant household goods in the city of Guangzhou, a life-size crystal mirror, is mounted on a finely carved red sandalwood frame, and is covered with a brocade mirror cover; two shelves of spotlessly cleaned thread-bound books; A Western enamel smoker decorated with animal shapes is spitting out heavy wisps of smoke, and a faint, vague fragrance wafts through the room.

On the wall hangs a hanging scroll by an unknown landscape painter, which seems to express the owner's unusual taste. Below the painting, there is a simple and elegant guqin, and you can see that it is an authentic Tang and Song guqin by looking at the simple pattern. It's worth a thousand dollars.

This neat and comfortable boudoir is decorated with silk brocade and gold and jade utensils, which looks luxurious and opulent. At this time, the owner of the room, Pei Lixiu, the hostess of Ziming Building, was leaning on the moon-hole door-covered shelf bed with tasseled tulle, leaning on the white satin saffron soft pillow.

The sun shone on the walls near noon, and the originally dim and comfortable light in the room gradually brightened. Finally, she opened her eyes, as if she was not used to the light in the room so bright. She closed her eyes again for a moment, and slowly stretched out a snow-white arm from under the big red cloud satin quilt, and then stretched out another one and stretched her body leisurely.

Although the complexion of the arms was snow-white, it was slightly rounded, and the two twisted silver bracelets tightly bound the wrists. The bracelet is topped with a thin chain of small emerald gemstones.

"It's annoying sunshine." Pei Lixiu muttered, slowly got up from the bed, and yawned without a ladylike demeanor.

According to the rules of the big families in the Ming Dynasty: a hostess like her does not need to be summoned, as long as there is a slight sound, the outer close-fitting ring will immediately appear, while saying some gossip about the Venerable Master's joy, while serving her to change clothes and wash. But Pei Lixiu's boudoir implements a strict system of non-transmission and no entry. No servant or maid was allowed to enter her boudoir without being summoned.

She sat on the bed in a daze for a long time, and then seemed to suddenly wake up, lazily got off the bed, dragged a pair of embroidered slippers, and walked slowly to the bathroom.

The bathrooms are completely decorated in a modern style. Except for the lack of shiny stainless steel, which is much more luxurious than stainless steel, and is all bronze plumbing hardware.

She hastily undressed, took out a plastic hair mask that had been used many times from a drawer, and carefully coiled up one of her black hairs. I looked in the mirror again and again to see where there was no hair exposed, and then I stood in the bathtub.

Used to show the status of the roof tank, the hands of the brass bell, which is a bit like a ship's clock, are displayed 70% of the way, and the water in the tank is enough for her to take a comfortable shower. Otherwise, she would have to pull the handle of the bell. The servants below would quickly take the oxen out and drive the oxen to run and drive the animal power pedal machine to the water. This process takes at least 15 minutes. Although there are modern bathroom equipment, the supporting facilities are still too backward.

After taking a shower, she sat in the powder room outside the bathroom. Looking at herself in the washing mirror, her eyes were swollen - she was already drunk after just a little socializing between the boxes yesterday. It's all because the rum cocktail in Ziming House has been too successful. Rum, mixed with kvass, plus a variety of fruit juices, distilled flowers, fruits, grass and leaves, make this fashionable drink ever-changing, and suddenly fascinate the nobles and nobles of Guangzhou. Everyone who goes to Ziming Tower is proud to have a drink.

Fortunately, my head doesn't hurt anymore. The effect of the decanting soup is still good. Pei Lixiu noticed a slight wrinkle at the corners of her eyes - a dark frown, reminding herself to make a cucumber or fruit mask once in the evening, or like Su Ai, Gao Shunqin's favorite concubine, introduced to her, using egg white to make pearl powder to apply to her face.

Pei Lixiu pondered this question for another ten minutes, until the mahogany floor clock in the room struck eleven times one after another. She suddenly woke up, today is the day of the "salon", or according to the words of this time and space, it is called "Yaji".

This elegant gathering is specially organized for the ladies who come to Ziminglou for recreation. Pei Lixiu got acquainted with many concubines of local dignitaries and eunuchs. This kind of concubine Taiduo is half of the famous Ji in Guangli, and there are also many famous Ji who are returned by the owner in Jiangnan Liangzhu. Whether it is appearance, posture, or talent and knowledge, it is a hundred times stronger than ordinary women. Most of these women are clever and cunning, and they are smart-minded. I have seen all kinds of scenes. has been in the mansion for a long time, although he has fine clothes and food, and he calls slaves and maids, his heart is very empty. Ziminglou, a place full of new things, has become a magnet for them.

Pei Lixiu took advantage of the opportunity to follow Guo Yi to "pull relationships" and "find a way", and met many such women. Although Pei Lixiu doesn't know anything about poetry and songs, she still won the favor of many people by relying on her identity as the hostess of Ziminglou and her hearty and bold temperament. After coming and going, he took the relationship between many concubines in the house and became a handkerchief.

The relationship to the inner house is very useful for Guangzhou Station, first of all, to absorb deposits, concubines of large families, have a little bit of their own savings on hand, and hope to make money on the existence of a solid brand. Pei Lixiu used her connections to bring a lot of deposits to Delong's Guangzhou branch. When something was difficult to deal with at Guangzhou Station, Pei Lixiu held her handkerchief and handed them over an opportunity to blow the pillow wind, almost invincible.

Because of her fruitful work, Guo Yi basically responds to her various requests. There are endless new gadgets in Ziminglou - many of them are specially made in Lingao and Zizhenzhai. Pei Lixiu's "elegant collection" has slowly become more and more famous, so much so that recently, the wives and young ladies of some families are also thinking of ways to squeeze into this invited list in order to pull some relationships for their husbands and fathers.

But Pei Lixiu knew that it wasn't enough to attract them with an endless stream of modern gadgets and the like. They are all well-informed, and they will naturally get tired of this little clever trick after a long time. Broadly speaking, they resemble the literary young women of the twentieth century. There has to be something that makes them feel more than ordinary "laymen" to attract them.

Poetry and songs, piano, chess, calligraphy and painting are of course the weapons that they can laugh at and be proud of the vast majority of women in this time and space, but this aspect is Pei Lixiu's biggest weakness.

Pei Lixiu knew that if she didn't have the mysterious identity of an "Australian woman" and the hostess of this Ziming Building, which was full of new things, this group of talented women would probably not even look at herself.

Pei Lixiu knows that her knowledge is limited, and she may not be able to achieve anything if she wants to study these things in a surprise. They have to make a fuss about what they don't understand.

The most confident thing for me is first of all dressing, makeup and maintenance. But she has almost fallen behind in dressing, because she can only wear the women's clothes of the Ming people according to the local customs. Modern women's clothing, whether it is a skirt or jeans, is acceptable as a "boudoir taste", but if you really wear it, it will be "bad morals".

As for the secret recipe for makeup and maintenance, the ancients were no less than modern people in this regard - almost every woman from a large family has her own secret methods of makeup and maintenance. They are just more limited by the material: some cosmetics are toxic, while others are not very effective. The biggest bottleneck of ancient cosmetics and skin care products is that they are inconvenient to use and easy to deteriorate. The popularity of lipstick sticks, eyebrow pencils, perfumes and the like made with modern methods and processes is largely due to the convenience of use.

After careful consideration, Pei Lixiu decided to start from this aspect and set up a beauty salon or something. Engage in pure natural beauty maintenance. There is a wealth of information available in this regard for the Crossing Group. In particular, some people have a full set of video tutorials for beauty salons stored in their computers. In addition to a full set of beauty maintenance courses, there are also ear candles, sub* maintenance, full body massage, medicinal bath, aromatherapy bath, chest massage, etc., and even beauty enema.

After seeing it, she felt more confident, and immediately set about buying equipment, training personnel, and ordering all kinds of new gadgets from the Ministry of Light Industry. And Zheng Shangjie's arrival made her feel like a tiger. Zheng Shangjie can speak well, and she is higher than her in terms of strain dexterity, but after all, she is a person who has a husband, and according to the standard age of Daming, she is too old, so it is difficult to mix up with fame again, so she has to do backstage support and give advice to her. You can also greet people when necessary.

But things haven't all been in place yet. It's a bit difficult to communicate with people from the Ministry of Light Industry. Because there are all men in it, and they are all men studying science and engineering. It was difficult for her to explain to them exactly what she needed. Because she doesn't know the composition of these things, or the structure of these things. It can only be described in a few emotional words. Either the other party didn't know what she wanted, or the sample didn't meet the requirements at all.

A few days ago, Zheng Shangjie went back to Lingao and made a list of what she wanted. Zheng Shangjie said that as soon as she returned to Lingao, she went to the big library to check the materials and find out the pictures and structures of everything. If necessary, go directly to the workshop to describe it.

"I wonder how things are going?" Pei Lixiu muttered. Lazily changed into clothes. Today, she chose a peach-colored thin silk women's dress, with a purple lining, and eight purple flower trimmed Hunan skirts on white ground, which was very elegant. only has hair, she did not comb according to Da Ming's habits, but used a low-rise antique hairstyle that is common in costume TV dramas.

Dressing and changing are complete. She just tugged at the bell rope. Her personal maid Huan Chunliu tiptoed in from outside the door, this girl was bought by Guo Yi from the market a few months ago, because she was very beautiful, and almost fell into the hands of the old bustard. is also because of his outstanding appearance and "clever and good", he was assigned to the intelligence ***, and recently returned from Lingao to serve as Pei Lixiu's personal maid and secretary.

In accordance with the regulations of the General Administration of Political Security, all the handmaidens, servants, stewards, and other close personnel of the Guangzhou Station have been transferred from the quarantine camp in Lingao, and the former personnel have also been transferred back to Lingao in batches to undergo political examination. Make sure that you are honest and reliable in order to continue to serve back to Guangzhou. Those who are considered to have potential are temporarily enrolled in various short courses to learn a variety of professional skills. For example, Sun Chang studied administration and personnel management at Lingao. For the time being, the indigenous personnel of the Guangzhou station have not yet been absorbed into the indigenous personnel system of Lingao, but the Civil Affairs Committee is already preparing their personal files.

The concubines of Guo Yi and others do not enjoy such treatment, they have only been closely examined and confirmed that they are not dangerous. There is no place for them in the future indigenous personnel system.

Chunliu brought breakfast to the hostess. There was only one bowl of white porridge and four side dishes on the lacquer plate. Although it was noon, she still prepared breakfast according to it. The hostess seemed to have a sense of fear of eating, and she was determined to eat anything.

Chunliu smiled and asked, "Madam, are you awake and slept well?" ”

Pei Lixiu did not answer. She glanced at the rosewood bookcase in front of the window from a distance. I don't know when a Xue Tao note was placed on it.

Xue Tao didn't have any poems on it—no one sang with her here, and everyone knew that Miss Pei didn't understand this—Xue Tao's note was her schedule for the day.

"Xia He has come in?" Pei Lixiu was still a little "angry when she got up", and asked angrily.

"How dare you?" Chunliu said cautiously, "You sent it in before you rested last night." Xu was dark at the time, so I didn't see it. ”

The schedule is written by Xia He, who is in charge of pen and ink by her side, and sent it in every night. Xia He is also a newcomer to Lingao, she turned out to be a talented only daughter, a robbery by bandits caused her parents to die, and the people in the clan forced her to sell her body and bury her relatives. This fell into the hands of Guangzhou Station. After being sent to Lingao for quarantine, he entered the administrative secretary training course because he was quite fluent in literature and ink, and this time he was transferred back to Guangzhou to serve as Pei Lixiu's secretary. Pei Lixiu's words are not only not elegant, but they are still a little ugly when they are taken out to see people. Xia He specially wrote books and invitations for her, and when necessary, she also translated Wen Crepe's letters. The administrative secretary training course now also comes with teaching some financial and accounting knowledge, so Xia He also doubles as Pei Lixiu's cashier. When she went out to visit guests, Xia He had to accompany her, so as not to make any rudeness to Pei Lixiu.

"Pass her in."

Because of her heavy tasks and responsibilities, some people at Guangzhou Station jokingly called her "Bingbi Yahuan", and some people called her "Ziminglou Case Yahuan".

Xia He was not pretty, and even a little rough - her father was just a poor talent in the countryside. She cautiously walked into the room, collected her clothes in a proper manner, and greeted the hostess.

"You're welcome, what's the matter today?"

Xia He began to explain the day's schedule.

Most of Pei Lixiu's schedule is spent in socializing. She doesn't just want to entertain the guests of Ziming Building. It also includes all aspects of the big names who are connected to the entire Guangzhou station. These people's marriages, funerals, favors, and birthday celebrations ...... All of them should prepare gifts according to the distance of relatives, or pay a visit in person or send someone to them. This was originally the main thing for the wife of a big family.

Guo Yi does not have an official wife, and since Pei Lixiu is named as his concubine, these things should be handled by her.

In the past, the scope of Guangzhou station was limited, and there was little need to take care of this aspect of things, but now it has become a heavy burden for Pei Lixiu. Every once in a while, there must be a level of etiquette waiting to be dealt with.

……

"The third son of the county order of Nanhai County is enrolled in his hometown, and he should prepare a gift to congratulate."

"I beg the lord that one of his aunts is dead, and he wants to send a funeral."

"Old Man Zhou's house on the patrol road is set for the eighth day of the first month."

"Master Liu's family has been returned to Lu, and he wants to send condolences."

……