Some of Mrs. Zhou's actions may be disapproved of by the elder, but she dare not disobey them. However, there is one thing that she strongly agrees with. She does not allow Mr. Geng to support her natal family. It is not that he is stingy, but that the two brothers from Geng's natal family are too incompetent.

The eldest brother spends all his time thinking about getting rich and making quick money, no matter what he does, he will pay nothing, the second brother eats, drinks, whores, and gambles, and the wife marries one by one, but he doesn't know whether he was beaten away or sold out because of his false eyes.

But the most important thing at the moment is to invite Mrs. Zhou back, at least to get the property of Yongxiang Marquis Mansion in her hands, and keep the money in her own hands. As for this family, let Geng take care of it first, and wait for her daughter-in-law

After entering the house, let their mother-in-law and daughter-in-law jointly manage and supervise each other.

Before Mr. Xu could figure out how to act as a dutiful son and coax Mrs. Zhou back, several elders from the clan came in.

At first, Mr. Xu was worried that Mrs. Zhou had complained and that the patriarch had come to teach them a lesson. Unexpectedly, the patriarch, Mr. Xu Wu, took a stack of documents and said seriously: "Master Hou, this is what happened when Mrs. Zhou passed away."

The properties of the Yongxiang Marquis Mansion entrusted to our management are now all handed over to you. Seeing that your son is about to get a wife and the wife is getting old, I don't want to worry about it anymore, so you can do the math."

Hearing that it was the property of the Yongxiang Marquis Mansion, Master Xu immediately perked up, said a few polite words, took the stack of documents and the land deed, and started reading.

His face immediately changed when he saw this. Apart from an old house in his hometown and the land deed of this prince's mansion, there were only sacrificial fields and Yongye fields given by the imperial court. There were no other items. How much is this worth?

?

Moreover, the sacrificial field and the Yongye field cannot be sold, and the harvest of more than a thousand acres of land is only a few hundred taels of silver a year, which is not enough to cover the expenses of the Marquis Mansion for a month.

It is impossible that only these things are left in the Yongxiang Hou Mansion.

Seeing the disbelief on his face, the elders of the Xu family felt sympathy, but they didn't feel like saying anything. They exchanged a few pleasantries before leaving.

Mr. Xu came to his senses and hurriedly persuaded him to stay. He ordered the kitchen to prepare food and invited several elders to have a drink.

The kitchen received the order, but there was nothing good. It was too late to buy freshly made food at the last minute, so I had to ask Mr. Geng for advice.

Mr. Geng knew that several uncles from the Xu family must be here for important matters, and if they didn't show up at this time, they would definitely be punished, so he had no choice but to take out his personal money and go to the nearest Baxianlou restaurant to buy a banquet.

Have them send it over.

Mr. Xu took out the fine wine he had collected for many years and poured it down on several elders. When everyone was drunk, he asked about the affairs of the Marquis Mansion.

This question made me shocked again. It turned out that the old Marquis was addicted to wine and sex, and almost lost all the property of the Marquis. The couple quarreled and divorced every day. After all, they were in the Marquis's mansion, relatives of the emperor, and the clan's reputation was important.

Not pretty.

So some elders came out to make peace. At that time, Mrs. Zhou cried and complained that Mr. Hou had lost all her family property and wanted to seize her dowry. The Zhou family was also short of money at that time, so they thought of asking Mrs. Zhou to reconcile and take away the dowry.

After returning home and making a fuss, the old Marquis suddenly fell ill. It took him more than three years to go there. Before he died, he spent a lot of money on treatment and medicine, and owed a lot of debt. Logically speaking, this Marquis Mansion was not

It can be sold, but because the old Marquis has no children and no one to inherit the Marquis mansion, and such a disgraceful thing happened, everyone guessed that the title could not be kept, so they sold the house to pay off the debt after being deprived of the title.

.

However, she never thought that Mrs. Zhou was familiar with an old concubine in the palace. She asked for grace and said that she was willing to guard and adopt a child to support the entire Yongxiang Hou Mansion, just to keep the inheritance passed down from her ancestors.

title.

During that time, the trend of divorce and remarriage among the people was getting more and more intense. The court didn't like it, but it couldn't prohibit it explicitly, so it wanted to support a few role models. In those years, there were a lot of chastity arches, and families with chaste wives were greatly appreciated by the court.

Reward.

Partly because of the old concubine's plea, and partly to set an example, the royal family allowed the concubine to adopt an heir and support the family business. At that time, Mrs. Zhou had a daughter, and probably to avoid future property disputes, the clan took over the matter.

Calculating the property of the Xianghou Mansion, it is natural to find that there is almost nothing left in the Yongxiang Hou Mansion, and there is still a pile of debts.

Mrs. Zhou said again that she was unable to repay all the money. After all, her mother and daughter still had to live. She hoped to repay part of it first, and the rest would be repaid with the grain produced by the sacrificial fields and Yongye fields. With royal intervention,

What do those creditors dare to say? Even if they don't pay back a penny, they don't dare to do anything. They can only do this.

In order to show justice, Mrs. Zhou handed over the land and other properties to the Xu clan for safekeeping, and the clan also took care of the debts. How much food can be produced in the fields in a year? When natural disasters occur, some of it must be paid to the tenants. Isn't that right?

It took more than 20 years to pay it off, and it was only paid off last year.

After hearing this, Mr. Xu almost fell to the ground. He was less than 18 when he came here as an adoptee. A poor boy from the countryside suddenly entered this wealthy town and was dazzled. He never thought about the Marquis of Yongxiang.

The government is just an empty shelf, no one has ever told him these things.

The Qinghou Mansion has been using Mrs. Zhou’s dowry all these years? No, this is absolutely impossible. When Xu married off, Mrs. Zhou had already given a large dowry. No matter how prominent the Zhou family was back then,

The dowry would not be larger than the Xu family's, not to mention the Marquis's house for so many years.

I saw Mr. Xu’s appearance.

One of the uncles drank too much and looked at Mr. Xu with sympathy and said: "Eldest nephew, Mrs. Zhou is a hero among women. I have never admired anyone in my life, but I admire her.

It's a pity that she is a woman, otherwise she would definitely become someone like Shi Chong. Her ability to make money is too strong. She can achieve anything by cooperating with others. Let's just say it's a small village. Others can only collect some grain and vegetables. As for her, she grows fruit trees on it.

The chickens are raised below, and the chickens and ducks are not sold when the fruit is ripe. They are used to make wine. The wine is not only sold, but also used to open a restaurant. I don’t know the many recipes she got from there, and she is familiar with the tastes of the rich and powerful. The business is extremely prosperous.

She has made a hundred times more money in life. Mrs. Zhou has a very good vision. After the family business was built up, she was probably afraid of people's criticism, so she restrained herself a little. She lived by buying shops and fields and collecting rent. Now most of the land and shops in the Hou Mansion belong to Mrs. Zhou.

This was recorded in the clan back then and no one else could take it away. Of course, this was not a glorious thing for the deceased Old Marquis or even the Xu clan. The older generation didn’t even mention it, so most of the young people nowadays

I don’t know, but your wife was already married when you came here, so why didn’t you know about it at all?”

Speaking of this, the clan uncle was still a little grateful. He was a grown man and it was hard for him to do business with a woman. However, his mother-in-law used her dowry to do some makeup business with the dowager, and she made enough from bits and pieces.

The family's expenses and clothes for the four seasons are always earned. The reason why the clan members have been praising Mrs. Zhou in recent years is because after Mrs. Zhou stopped doing some business, she transferred it to the clan members, and everyone benefited.
Chapter completed!