After being a widow for half my life, I found out that my husband was not dead.

Liu Zhang had his hands on his hips, looking like a little bully. He seemed to be sure of his thoughts and shouted very loudly.

"You are beggars and you are thieves!"

Xingyi curled his lips, picked up a piece of ribs with chopsticks, shook it deliberately to Liu Zhang, and then took a bite: "You can only call others thieves if you can't eat them. That's all you can do!"

"Wow! I don't allow you to eat ribs, and I don't allow you to eat roasted lamb legs. Give me these delicious things!" Liu Zhang sat on the ground and cried loudly.

Liu Yunxiang thought the crying was annoying and said to Jinyan, "Give him a bowl of meat."

Jinyan responded and just picked up the chopsticks when Mrs. Cheng ran over and saw her son sitting on the ground crying. Without asking what was going on, she immediately shouted to Liu Yunxiang: "Auntie, you bully a child, how shameless are you?" Got it!"

Liu Yunxiang waved his hand to Jinyan and said, "Feed this bowl of meat to the dog later."

Jin Yan chuckled, "Okay."

When Liu Zhang heard this, he cried even louder, "I want to eat meat! It's all mine! They are not allowed to eat it!"

When Ms. Cheng heard what her son said, she took another look at the dinner table and knew what was going on. She flattened her mouth and rubbed her neck and said: "My child is young, what's wrong with eating a few pieces of your meat? After all, we are all a family, why bother?" The calculation is so clear."

Jin couldn't help but say, "It was the second wife's grandma who suggested eating separately. For the first two meals, you ate meat and we ate boiled vegetables. Why didn't you say that the family shouldn't care about each other at that time?"

"When the master is talking, you, a slave, dare to interrupt. You really have no rules at all!"

"I'm not your slave!"

"you!"

"Sister Jinyan is not a slave, we are a family!" Xingyi shouted.

"Auntie, look at how unruly these people are, you..."

"I think they are right." Liu Yunxiang looked at Mr. Cheng, his eyes cold, "It's not your turn to interfere in matters in our courtyard."

Mrs. Cheng was so angry that she couldn't really break up with Liu Yunxiang. She immediately pulled her son to leave, but Liu Zhang was unreasonable and insisted on taking away two plates of meat and vegetables for him to eat alone.

"Okay, Mom, just ask the kitchen to cook it for you tomorrow, don't be embarrassed!"

"But mother said we don't have much money, so we can only eat a small plate of meat for each meal!"

"you you!"

Mrs. Cheng was embarrassed by her son, so she stretched out her hand and twisted her son's arm, which made Liu Zhang cry even louder.

"You go ahead and cry, I don't care about you anymore."

As she said that, she walked out and took a few steps before she remembered something.

"That's not right, aunt. Logically speaking, if you are a woman with a child, you will have to rely on your parents' support when you return to your parents' home. How do you have the money to buy these?"

Liu Yunxiang raised his eyebrows, "Why, you still want to check my family background?"

Mrs. Cheng was choked and speechless, leaving Liuzhang to continue crying here while she waved her sleeves and walked away.

Liu Zhang was really capable of crying. He cried so much that his head was buzzing. Zijin got angry, picked up the child and threw him out. Jin Yan looked at him crying so pitifully that she still gave him the bowl of meat.

"From now on, when you eat meat, you must give me a bowl, a big bowl!" Liu Zhang said arrogantly while eating.

Jinyan took a sip and said, "Who gave you the face!"

Early the next morning, Liu Yunxiang went to Lingyun Grain Store.

Zhang Qi said that since spring, floods have occurred in several southern states, tens of thousands of people have been displaced, and crop fields have been flooded.

"There will definitely be a huge increase in food this year, but I don't know if the food produced in our large field in the north of the town can be transported here to alleviate the famine that is coming soon."

There was no need to worry before. The owner was the princess of Zhenbei, and no one's caravan would get stuck there, nor would they get stuck in Lingyun. But now the situation is different, I'm afraid they just have food and can't transport it.

Liu Yunxiang thought for a while and said: "Let's put this matter aside for now. As long as we have food, we won't be afraid. By the way, you said there was a flood in the south and the people were displaced. Will the government provide disaster relief?"

Zhang Qi sighed: "The riots in the south had just subsided, but they were immediately hit by floods. The people's houses were empty, and the government was actually empty. The treasury must not be full, so there is not much money that can be invested in disaster relief. According to our work in the south, The shop manager and shop assistants said that the area in the disaster area was already full of people with hunger, but the situation was not yet at its worst. When the weather gets hot, there might still be plague, and then in the fall, there would be no food in the fields to harvest. People are just going to get more desperate, never mind winter."

"How much food do we have now?" Liu Yunxiang asked.

"Last year Zhenbei had a good harvest, and there are still almost [-] stones left."

Liu Yunxiang nodded, "Get ready, I need these [-] stones of food."

Zhang Qi didn't ask Liu Yunxiang what he was doing. He just nodded and said, "Okay, I'll go downstairs and prepare it for you as soon as possible."

After coming out of Lingyun Food Store, Liu Yunxiang asked Zijin to bring Su Rumeng a message that she wanted to see the queen again.

When she returned to the Minister's Mansion, she came in through the back door and arrived at the door of the west courtyard. Jin Jinyan came back from outside. His face was full of anxiety, but he was relieved when he saw her.

"Girl, the young master got into trouble with a few people in the front yard."

Liu Yunxiang frowned, "Who is it?"

"It is said that they are people from the gambling house who came to collect gambling debts."

Liu Yunxiang's mind suddenly changed and she guessed what was going on. She hurried to the front yard and saw Liu Yunxiang and several domestic slaves entangled with several sturdy men.

"What's wrong with your Vice Minister's Mansion? You can't not repay your debts!"

"I clearly promised that I would only owe ten days, but it's already been a month!"

"Servant Liu is in jail. If we can't get the money today, we won't even think about it in the future. If we come back again, your residence may be sealed!"

Liu Yunxiang walked over and shouted loudly: "Stop fighting!"

Following this sound, Liu Yunheng saw that it was her, and first asked the people around him to stop, and then took a few steps back.

"You are also from this family, but are you here to pay back the money?" The nurse from a gambling house looked at Liu Yunxiang and asked.

Liu Yunxiang ignored him and turned to Liu Yunheng, "But Liu Er owes a gambling debt?"

Liu Yunheng nodded solemnly, "It's him."

"This is the second room's business. Why are you rushing to the front? Besides, you should show up." Liu Yunxiang frowned.

"This is a family affair, how can I not show up?"

"What about the people in the second room?"

"My second uncle is lame and still lying on the bed. My eldest brother is on errands and my eldest sister-in-law has gone to my mother's place."

"You want money?"

Liu Yunheng nodded, "We have to get rid of these people first."

Liu Yunxiang told her brother to leave it alone and hurried back to her courtyard. After her brother left, she had an extra thought and asked the people in the gambling shop how much Liu Er owed them.

"1000 taels!"

1000 taels is not much, but Liu Yunchang cannot get 100 taels for a year's difference, let alone an ordinary person, whose annual food and clothing expenses are only 30 to [-] taels.

Liu Yunxiang asked Zijin to block these people. She went to the east courtyard where Mrs. Liu lived, and when she came to the door of the main room, she heard Mrs. Cheng saying to Mrs. Liu: "Madam, the people from the gambling shop are outside, saying that if you don't To pay back the money, they smashed up the front and back yards of our minister's house."

Mrs. Liu said angrily: "Every wrongdoer has his own debtor, and if they want to cause trouble, they should also cause trouble to the second child!"

"People don't recognize this, they only recognize us as a family."

"But it's only one thousand and five hundred taels. It's not like you don't know what's going on in the house. How can I come up with so much cash at once?"

Mrs. Cheng was silent for a moment and said, "Maybe my aunt can give me some extra. I think the West Side Hospital has a lot of meat and fish. She must be rich."