That night, Xu Hanchao did not return home. Yurong waited until late at night, growing increasingly worried. Hanchao had left before dawn, saying he was going to find silk. Going to Li Town should have been a round trip in one day. Even if finding silk took some effort, he shouldn’t be out this late, right?
She ordered people to search for Hanchao in Li Town overnight, and she waited anxiously. But after waiting through an entire night and day, until after noon the next day, Hanchao still had not returned. The people sent to find him came back, saying no one in Li Town had seen Hanchao’s carriage.
Yurong panicked and hurried to find Madam Xu. As soon as she saw her, she began to cry, “Mother, Hanchao left early yesterday morning and still hasn’t returned. I’ve been worried sick all night.”
.” She couldn’t bring herself to finish the sentence, afraid that her worst fears might come true.
Yu Yi had just woken up from her afternoon nap, with a maidservant still behind her fixing her hair. Without turning around, she looked at Yurong’s blurry reflection in the mirror and asked, “Where did Hanchao go?”
Yurong hesitated, not daring to speak. After a moment’s hesitation, she bit her lip and concealed the truth: “I do not know where Hanchao went.”
Madam Xu, having been in the Xu family for many years, naturally had several trusted confidants. The night before, Yu Yi had already learned about the dispute in Yin Yiniang’s courtyard and knew that Tianxiang had secretly passed a message to Hanchao.
Although she couldn’t clearly see the hesitation on Yurong’s blurry face in the copper mirror, her hesitant response was crystal clear. Seeing that Yurong was unwilling to reveal Hanchao’s trip to Li Town, she said calmly, “Don’t worry unnecessarily. Perhaps Hanchao went far to collect silk and couldn’t make it back in time, so he’s staying overnight. Maybe someone will report his safety soon.”
With Madam Xu’s words, Yurong could only withdraw timidly.
After the maidservant finished fixing her hair and left, Yu Yi slightly lowered her head to look at the copper mirror before her. Although the copper mirror was blurry and slightly distorted, one could still see the cold expression on the aging face in the reflection.
