The cicadas in midsummer are deafening.

Shao Qing raised his head, looked at the fine sunlight shining through the lush leaves for a while, and pushed open the courtyard door of his new house.

The maidservant Ye Rou greeted her: "Shizi." ”

Shao Qing frowned: "I said, when no one is around, you can't call it that." ”

Ye Rou was stunned, looked down at the food plate in her hand, and said softly: "Yes, sir." ”

Shao Qing glanced at the mung bean soup with barley added to it, softened his tone, sat down on the stone bench in the courtyard, waved his hand and said: "I poured a belly of porridge in the tea house, this mung bean soup, you can drink it, get rid of the heat." Kaifeng is not as cool as over there, your sister just came back then, and it was this season, she and Lu Gang were both seriously ill. ”

Ye Rou's heart flashed with a hint of joy, put the food plate on the table, picked up the bowl, and took a big sip.

These soups of the southerners, Ye Rou was not used to drinking them at first, neither fragrant nor sweet, which was comparable to the buttermilk of her hometown, and she didn't want to drink it a few times, but she also felt that it was better to be bitter first and then sweet.

Shao Qing saw her put down the bowl, and Fang asked again, "What about Lu Gang?" ”

Ye Rou said: "After Mr. went out this morning, Lu Gang and I went to meet with the officials, and sent some melons and fruits to the neighbors on the left and right, as well as the dolls' entertainment. The officials and neighbors also pointed out some rules of the workshop, which was very polite. Then, Lu Gang went to the north to do the second thing that Mr. instructed. ”

Shao Qing nodded: "Friendship climbs first, Fushun Fang was originally the place where Kaifeng bamboo carpenters and medicine stone merchants lived, check slowly, maybe suddenly, there is nowhere to find the iron shoes, and it takes no effort to get it." ”

Ye Rou listened with a solemn face, and added: "The neighbors heard that my family is a private school for Mengxue, and they all want to send children to study, and there are a few of them, even if they want to stuff the teaching fees into me and Lu Gang." ”

"Okay, let's clean the classroom first."

"When you go to Xingli Bank, exchange the silver deed of fifty times, deposit it in Yuanlong Bank, and get the silver deed back."

"On the fifth day of the first month of next month, I will replace you in the temple, listen to the news of everyone, and report it to me."

After Shao Qing finished confessing one by one, he got up again and wanted to go to the study.

Ye Rou's joy turned into coolness.

He still cherishes his words like gold, and although his words are clear, they do not have half a point of warmth. The words that made him pay attention to the summer vacation were probably just like the commander-in-chief before the battle, telling the sergeants to eat and sleep well during the truce, so as not to lose their troops for non-combat.

Ye Rou looked at Shao Qing's back, plucked up the courage and said: "Sir, Ye Rou has not been in the south for a long time, if there is any difference, Mr. must be punished, so that Ye Rou can remember deeply and no longer make mistakes." ”

Shao Qing looked back and stared at her: "Lu Gang told me that you are very smart, not inferior to your sister." It's just that in this Kaifeng city, there are too many smart people, and you have to be careful in everything. ”

After that, he turned around and left the last sentence: "When you don't have an errand, go to the streets and listen to how the people in the south talk." ”

……

After sunset, Shen Fuzhi and Meituan returned to the house with beads of sweat and fireworks.

"Meituan, you don't have to take the money you have saved in the past few days to the bank, tomorrow my mother-in-law will come to collect the rent, just to pay her. This old woman loves to count money the most, and the more fragmented the money, the more copper it is, the happier she is. ”

After Shen Fuzhi instructed Meituan, he raised his eyes and looked into the courtyard, oops, his fairy-like niece stretched out his hand again.

I saw that on the stone table in the courtyard, three dishes, one soup and one staple food had been properly arranged.

The three dishes are ginger and shrimp, tiger skin chicken feet, and Chinese onion with lettuce and shredded radish. The soup is a lotus seed soup with a pinch of minced ham. The staple food is salted and mixed with Chinese cabbage juice.

Light orange shrimp, reddish-brown chicken feet, green and white vegetarian cold vegetables, red glow reflecting the blue stream-like soup, crystal clear cold noodles...... Shen Fuzhi was overjoyed, and the fatigue accumulated all day in the restaurant disappeared in an instant.

"Seeing such a table in the summer, Qiong Yao is beautiful and jade-like, even the meat dishes are also refreshing, Sister Huan, my son, if anyone marries you, it is really a blessing that the Three Emperors and Five Emperors began to cultivate."

Although my aunt is skilled in dealing with outsiders, when she arrives at home and relaxes, she sometimes speaks open-mindedly. As soon as she said the second half of the sentence, she realized that something was wrong, Huan'er's marriage, is it a topic that can be talked about?

Xiao Ruzhou, who was arranging the dishes and chopsticks, immediately looked at her sister Yao Huan with her two black eyes.

Yao Ruzhou, a little fart, was three years old in Qinzhou, and witnessed his sister and the "brother-in-law" who later died holding hands and kissing under the moon, and that picture was so unique that it defeated many scenes he experienced in the years after growing up, and it was deeply rooted in his mind.

Before last year, Yao Ruzhou had no worries about food and clothing, and his parents were both, but in addition to kissing his mother when he ate and slept, he loved to stick to his half-sister Yao Huan, who was more than ten years older than him.

In his eyes, the eldest sister is gentler than his father, quieter than his mother, more interesting things than the eldest child who is the best at playing in the neighborhood, and more beautiful than the ladies he has seen in Qinzhou City.

What happened later, Xiao Ruzhou felt like a snow that was getting heavier and heavier, at first it was just that Grandpa was seriously ill and left, but slowly he watched this snow, falling and stopping, stopping and falling, and finally crushed his small and beautiful childhood dreams.

Finally, Xueji is gone, and my sister is still by her side.

Xiao Ruzhou, who had a few more holes than the doll next to her, lived in the Shen Mansion and found with some confusion that her sister Yao Huan, the shadow that had been shrouded in her face after her husband's death and her father's death was gone. Yes, it's not faded, it's gone.

However, because Ru Zhou has regarded his sister as his only support, he is particularly sensitive to the topic of his sister's marriage. He is not an adult after all, how can he know how to analyze his own thoughts, he just can't hide this kind of thoughts. For example, this morning, that Shao Langzhong taught him to be vigilant, and he was disgusted because of vigilance.

At this moment, when he heard that his aunt didn't open which pot to mention, Xiao Ruzhou was very nervous. What would he do if his sister really stopped keeping the festival and married another man next to him?

Fortunately, but after a while, my sister Yao Huan replied generously: "Such a blessed man, wait until the next life to marry me." ”

Because in order to relieve my aunt's embarrassment and guilt, I took the initiative to divert the topic, pointed to the tiger skin chicken feet and cold salad and said: "Auntie, at this time, there are many people in the summer, I heard the neighbors in the alleys of this workshop say, they all say that their own stoves are not very open, and when they eat the morning, if they want to eat some, they go to the market to buy ready-made." Since my aunt praised me and Meituan for the chicken feet last time, Huan'er wanted to try to set up another stall at the door of the restaurant to sell some cold meat and vegetables, not only to do the dine-in business of the shipwright, but also to buy food and drink for the officials and ladies of the surrounding families and bring them back to the house, okay? ”

Shen Fuzhi listened and took the chopsticks offered by Xiao Ruzhou, and put a chicken claw into his mouth.

The chicken feet are still deboned, compared with the last time Yao Huan cooked with bean sauce hawthorn, the claws seem to have been boiled first, then fried, and then stewed with condiments for several processes, not only soft and glutinous, but also a little more oily, but the juice is in place, and the entrance does not feel greasy.

Shen Fuzhi studied it again, and suddenly realized: "This pattern is like the fur of a big insect." ”

Yao Huan laughed: "So I named it tiger skin chicken feet." A hundred people have a hundred tongues, and some people can't live without oil and water for a day, even in the hot summer. Therefore, let's sell chicken feet, soy beans, spicy, salty, sour apricots, plus this fried and red stew, not to mention that everyone's tongues are comfortable, at least the guest officer feels fresh at a glance, and then looks at it and feels that we are doing business with heart, maybe we will pay for it quickly? ”

The complexion of my aunt's face, which was white and red with sweat, changed from a moment of listening to it to more and more serious consideration.

"Huan'er, everything, plan for three points, work hard for seven points, since you have to do it hard, you will do it well. It is a stall, and the pots and bowls must be clear and well-organized, and it is best to let the carpenter make a sturdy, beautiful and easy to push and collect food trucks, and there can be my shop sign on it. After such a tidy up, I estimate that it is enough to make it decent and refreshing. ”

After the aunt finished thinking one by one, she looked at her niece with a smile, looking like "I can still afford to invest this money, old lady".

Yao Huan gave her aunt a bowl of lotus seed soup, and said, "Don't worry about your aunt's expenses, Shao Langzhong will ask for money for me and Ruzhou." ”