It was inconvenient to say anything on the painting boat, so Li You asked the painting boat to go around the city along the moat and return to Dongguan Ferry. It was late afternoon when he re-boarded the boat, but he still urged the boatman to move quickly and moored in another place.

Because Li You was worried that he would be found by others, he would not be able to live in peace, and it would be difficult to go back to Suzhou first.

"No one is allowed to leak this matter without authorization, everything is up to me!" Li You warned his subordinates that everyone naturally knew what this matter was referring to, and even the newcomer Mr. Cui was quietly reminded by Zhang San.

It was not the night at the inn, and everyone was huddled in the cabin to rest.

said that Cui Jing and Zhang San were in the back cabin together, and they kept hearing Master Li next door sighing, and he seemed to be very worried.

Cui Jingxin felt something and whispered to Zhang San: "The proprietor said that he went to the secluded garden alone, and he must have had an unhappy relationship with Jin Million. ”

Zhang San nodded and said, "What Mr. said is good, but it is not only unpleasant. In my guess, the lord must have swept away the face of the golden million, and it was like the autumn wind sweeping the leaves. ”

Seeing Zhang Sanyan's chiseling, as if he had seen it with his own eyes, Cui Jing was surprised, "Where did you know that?" ”

"With the surname of the master, if he is bullied by the golden million, at this time, the sky will drop a handle, and he will definitely be overjoyed, and he will take revenge to come back, how can he be worried? Since the old man is so uneasy, he is obviously mercilessly humiliating Jin Million, worried about the embarrassment of bringing Aunt Jin to meet her juniors in the future! ”

Zhang San said proudly, his voice raised slightly, probably maybe it might have been transmitted outside the cabin.

Suddenly, a scolding voice came from next door: "What kind of tongue is Zhang San chewing?" A one-year fine! ”

Zhang San subconsciously shrunk his neck in the darkness and didn't say anything more. In fact, he is not distressed, the lord is in charge of a county, he is the chief and the uncle does not know how many gifts to receive every year, what is the monthly silver of the house slave.

Cui Jing suddenly felt that a certain sentence was very reasonable-there must be a master, there must be a servant.

After a night of silence, the boat went on the road early the next morning.

After bypassing the city of Yangzhou, the canal branched off to the south, commonly known as the Sancha River. Two directions can enter the river, one is the ferry in Yizhen County, and the other is the Guazhou ferry in Jiangdu County, which is also the place name that appears in many poems.

Li You crossed the river from Guazhou, and there has been no natural danger since then. All the way smoothly from the canal to the Xuhe River, Yu Jinghe eight years of April on the ninth day, arrived at the "goodbye" for seven months of Xujiang County.

Since Lord Li left Suzhou Mansion and traveled to the palace, the wife and concubine of the whole family also moved out of Fucheng and returned to the house in Fuxin Lane, Xujiang County to live with their in-laws.

When Li You returned home, the slaves and maids in the house gathered in the vestibule to salute under the leadership of the chief housekeeper Li Si.

"Master, Aunt Guan gave birth to a son in the first month." Li Si was the first to report the good news. Li You Dayue nodded to Li Si and entered the front hall.

Li's father and mother Zhu were sitting upright in the hall, their complexions were not bad, and the wives and concubines of the three rooms and the maids and nurses of each room were lined up. Li You hurriedly said that he was "unfilial" and stepped forward to meet his parents, and Cheng Xiaoniang and Xiaozhu also followed.

Zhu Pan'er was anxious, and grabbed in front of Father Li and said, "My son got up, I heard that he was beaten against the emperor on the Jinluan Palace?" No wonder he's so haggard, poor little two..."

Father Li turned his head and blew his beard and glared, "How many times have I said to you?" Xiao Er is also a person with great status now, and he can't be so commensurate in the future! Besides, that's not the emperor! ”

After his mother spoke, Li You got up. glanced at the wives and concubines who had been absent for a long time, but they were meeting a few pairs of passionate eyes, as if they were about to melt him alive from a few feet away.

Rao is a master of a hundred battles, and Master Li also felt a tightness in his scalp. I can't help but secretly rejoice in my heart, thanks to Huai'an Mansion, I began to cultivate my surname, and I should be able to eat it in the past few days... In the future, you will really have to take it easy.

Retracting his eyes from the woman, Li You was talking to his father, and he accidentally caught a glimpse of an extra plaque in the hall, with three big characters on it: "Jieyi Hall". He asked, "Who wrote this?" ”

"Chen Xundao of Fucheng." Father Li twisted his beard and said, his tone slightly revealing a little pride, "After he learned that you received the court staff, he wrote a plaque and sent it over." ”

Li You charged for Elder Xu in the capital, and Chen Xundao, as a disciple of Elder Xu, should naturally express himself after hearing the news. Promoting the same party and toppling the other party can also be regarded as the norm in officialdom.

Father Li remembered something again: "Then Chen Xundao also asked, have the elders of the clan ever picked up words for you?" ”

Li You didn't expect Chen Xundao to ask about this, although he has developed in the past two years, he really doesn't have a sense of urgency to pick up words.

First, his family is not a scholarly family, and he doesn't have this habit. Second, he is not very old, and now he is only nineteen. The literati of the Three Dynasties used more names than words, and the words were much less used. Fourth, he is a person in the officialdom, and the aliases and nicknames of the official name can replace the use of words in a sense, such as Chinese books and the like.

Li You thought for a while and asked, "How did my father answer Chen Xundao?" ”

"My father said that the Li family is a small family, and no one can write for you. As for whether you have a character in Beijing, I don't know. ”

Li You didn't say anything about it anymore, Chen Xundao's meaning was self-evident, of course he understood.

In these years, the number can be given indiscriminately, but a person's word is not something that anyone can give you, only your division commander has this qualification. Chen Xundao asked him if he had any words, which was a subtle question, and it would be too stupid if he couldn't hear it, just like King Chuzhuang asked about the importance of Jiuding.

Master Li, who has already become famous in all directions, is a peculiar existence in the officialdom who does not follow the usual path, has no fame, no teacher, and no three-no products of the same year, and it is simply impossible to use normal relational theory to study the origin of his heels.

If you have to borrow the existing concept, you can compare Master Li to Master Li's master in a sense, who has a direct chance to enter the center, who has a direct opportunity to enter the center, can be compared to Master Li's seat in a sense.

Yes, Chen Xundao is compared to Li You, as if the chief examiner of the township examination is compared to the admitted candidates, so he is naturally qualified to give Li You words. But Lord Chen can't open this mouth, mainly because he agrees with it in his heart, or whether it is worth deepening the relationship in this special way.

So what Lord Chen asked was not words, but relationships. The invisible thing of relationship is the real foundation of officialdom.

Unlike wine and meat in the 21st century, the communication of literati and doctors in this era can be called a kind of science, and it is enough to write books. It's a set of rules of its own, and it's not as simple as paying for a treat.

In communication, from identity to public opinion recognition, from title to etiquette, it is a complex but well-contexted system, each with its own head, each with its own "etiquette". For example, the same country, the same year, the same class, the same way, the same door, teachers and students, generations, old ... Even if the most unpleasant comrades are included, they have their own points and are very different.

In a ceremonial society, this is a kind of order. If you want to integrate into the ruling class, you must integrate your mentality into the system, and of course your identity must reach a certain level before you can qualify.

Taking Master Li's interaction in Beijing as an example, he is an indisputable fellow villager, junior, and disciple (not a protégé) of Shanglu Shangshu; For Zhao Zongxian, because Li You has the grace of survival and survival in the second room of the Zhao family, and has intersected with the second and third masters of Zhao, even if he is more than 30 years old from Zhao Dazhongcheng, he is still the old man of the house and the last of his peers; But the relationship between Li You and Xu Tianguan is the most complicated, and some context can be faintly pulled out from the benefactor Chen Xundao, but it is not clear, and it is also separated by a layer. But he is indeed reused by Xu Tianguan, so he can probably only be described by the word "party hen", and Zuo Bulang and others, who are also party henchmen, are considered to be the same way.

Li You dared to conclude in his heart that Chen Xundao had recently come to ask about the word, either Xu Cifu signaled it, or Master Huang asked for it... This is a very, very important matter, so important that Li You, who has just entered the house, temporarily put aside the thoughts of teasing his children and making love with his wife and concubine, and pondered in the hall.

The only person who can pick up the word for you is the division commander, and Chen Xundao, who is only twenty-eight this year, simply said that he was "long", and he was a little reluctant, so why was Li Youqing, a crossing man with a psychological age of twenty-three or four, embarrassed, and it would probably take a lot of effort to adapt. But Chen Xundao is definitely qualified as a "division", and he can be called a "division commander" when connected.

In fact, according to the etiquette law, it is not about the age, even if the examiner is younger than the candidate, the candidate has to call the examiner a teacher if he is admitted. If Li You goes to Jiangdu County to take office, the thirty or forty-year-old Xiucai in the county will have to call him an old parent when he sees him... The teachers and students in the officialdom are naturally different from the teachers and students in the school, which are directly related to your future and destiny, official qualifications and other very practical interests.

Li You thought about Chen Xundao's resume again: a high-ranking jinshi in a hard state, a five-grade real job in less than thirty, and a strong secondary background like father and son, he can enter Beijing at any time to make up for the potential of a forest official. Not to mention Lord Chen's incomparable protagonist temperament from birth to appearance to official position... It's the coolest ride for the protagonist.

Of course, with Master Li's tabula rasa education and a grade close to Chen Xundao, it is estimated that he will not be able to get along like normal teachers and students, and he is more like a registered disciple who is also a teacher and a friend.

Seeing that Li You was still in a daze, Father Li suddenly changed his face, and scolded at the case, "Stupid thing! I thought you had made some progress, but it still didn't work! What you can see clearly at a glance is still thinking and hesitating? I really don't know how you got mixed up in the capital, how to become a county master! ”

"People are not just selling you well and lifting you, although I don't know whose idea it is, but they must be testing your mind after becoming famous and dominant! To say that it is ugly is to see if you have hard wings, don't be unconvinced, people can also afford you if they have the heart to tempt! People all over the world are like this, if you dare not agree, it will definitely cause more or less suspicion! You are just a duckweed-like rootless official, can you afford it? It's as clear as window paper, but I still can't figure it out! ”

Lord Li, who scolded the invincible opponents all over the capital, was sprayed wildly by his father, as if he had been baptized by a storm, and the little sapling was crumbling. I can only shout silently in my heart: "We don't have no other foundation, we still have the big spare tire of the eldest princess of Guide!" It's not that I'm afraid that you'll be stunned, father, and you won't dare to say it..."

"You don't even need to think about it, you can't refuse it at all! After staying at home for a few days, I will go to Fucheng to bring the word back! It's really a worry-free thing. Father Li finally threw down this sentence, got up and went out, and went to the county government to do official business.

Zhu also got up and left the house with interest, leaving behind his son and several wives and concubines.

(To be continued)