Southern Rose [Gone with the Wind]

Victor didn't understand what that meant.

Emile asked: "What? Who wrote the letter?"

Josephine quickly took back the letter and crumpled it up, "Nothing."

She suddenly became pale and restless, and soon went upstairs and lay down.

Emile asked: "What was written in that letter?"

"There is only one sentence, in French, summer 5 years ago... I forgot." Victor was also a little disturbed, 5 years ago?He doesn't understand.

Emile pondered: Josephine was still in Paris 5 years ago, and Victor was just over 1 year old. They should have just returned to the United States from Paris at that time. Hastings was not in France at that time and went to India. Come back at the end of the year.But then they got a letter saying Hastings was in India--what was that?Missing or dead?In short Josephine was a widow before the end of the year.

What is the meaning of this letter?

Emile was very puzzled, but also faintly uneasy.

She could understand Josephine when she was a teenager, but when Josephine arrived in France, she felt that she and her daughter were not as close as they had been in America.Josephine... seemed to have changed, but she couldn't figure out what had changed.

Maybe just growing up?

She went upstairs and slipped into Josephine's bedroom, where the curtains were closed and not a ray of sunlight came in.

She put the candle cup in her hand on the bedside table, and carefully sat on the edge of the bed, "Josephine?"

Josephine said nothing.

"Is there something? I mean, when you were in Paris. Was it... your husband?"

"I don't know." Her voice was a little terrified, "Hastings...I mean, many of the things Raphael did in India were very dangerous. I don't really understand how he does business. His The partners are all... desperadoes, and I'm terrified."

"My God! What should we do then?" Emile asked anxiously: "You... I really don't know what to say. You were too young and shouldn't have gotten married so early. But now no matter what It's too late to say anything, and I don't want to say those useless words, I just want to ask, do you know who wrote you the letter?"

"do not know."

"What did the letter say?"

"Nothing was said. That's bad!"

"I don't understand. You haven't done anything dangerous, have you?"

"No, what can I do? But I don't know if Raphael has done anything dangerous." Josephine sat up and leaned against the head of the bed, "He may offend someone, and then that person will think that I He knew something, so he wanted to threaten me; or Rafael had hurt others, and now, that person, or those people are coming to revenge his wife and son. Mother!"

She panicked. "Let's get out of Marseilles! Back to Savannah! No, back to Boston!"

The servants packed their luggage in a hurry, and boarded the passenger ship bound for Lisbon, Portugal the next afternoon, preparing to transfer to the ocean liner bound for Boston in Lisbon.

Once on board Josephine had to lie down all day again.

People who can only lie down have a lot of time to think.

She didn't even dare to go back to Paris. Although Emile felt a little strange, she persuaded her that the first priority was to go to a safe place. They didn't know anyone in Marseilles, and faced someone who was hiding in the dark. , or safety first.

Emile was relatively innocent and was easily persuaded.

Who is the one?Who knows what happened 5 years ago?She thought she did it very secretly, and no one knew what she did.

She recalled the situation again, trying to remember what had gone wrong.

The second letter, delivered in the morning, still spelled out a sentence in letters cut out of a newspaper: 100 million francs for your life.

Hastings left a lot of money, but half of it was real estate, and she couldn't afford 100 million francs.Since it was extortion, she was not so worried. If the other party was just asking for money, she would not go to extremes.But Emile insisted on leaving after reading the letter. She was worried that something would happen to the two children.There are so many things like kidnapping children and asking for ransom, so many that ordinary people can't even imagine how common it is.

It was Cynthia's first time on a ship, and it was very fresh, and she was in high spirits all day long, and running up and down on the deck of the first-class cabin was really worrying, lest she fall overboard.Lydia is not at all worried about Manny, a girl under 17 years old, and always feels that she can't take good care of the little lady.Josephine asked her to follow the little lady every step of the way and not to talk to strangers.

Lydia didn't understand what his wife was afraid of. Neither of the two wives explained to her why they left Marseilles suddenly. She heard from her husband, Sheldon, that it had something to do with the wife's previous affairs in Paris.She was busy remembering what happened in Paris. There were many things to say. First, Miss got married and became Mrs. Hastings; He was not at home for more than half a year, and he left after the child was born. When the young master was able to speak, the husband hadn't come back yet.

And then—someone came back from India with bad news of Mr. Hastings, was he dead, or missing?

Lydia can't remember clearly, it seems that it was all said by the lady. The day before, she said that Mr. Hastings had been missing for several months. A few days later, she changed her words and said that Mr. Hastings died in India. The relatives of the Hastings family came to ask for the property, but the young lady didn't know how to deal with it, and kept the young master's property.

Hmm... At that time, there was a Mr. Wolf, who seemed to be an Austrian. He visited the lady several times, but the lady didn't see him again after dealing with the inheritance. Mr. Wolf was very angry at the time, and they quarreled. In a fight, the lady called him an arrogant bastard, and Wolfe said that the lady was a woman who deserved a beating.

It's messy anyway.

She knew that Sheldon and Posy helped the lady go out on errands respectively, and the two checked what they did in private, but they still didn't figure out what the lady did in the year Mr. Hastings died.Miss is very playful, but she has never done anything unruly. Mrs. Jenkins is a rigid and serious housekeeper. Even she feels that Miss is a widow at such a young age. Things that have been done have always been acquiesced.

In Lisbon, Josephine received a third letter: I am watching you.

hateful!Who is it? !

Emile was now convinced that the ill-fated Hastings' dishonest business was causing the trouble.

"We gave this 100 million, so it should be able to solve this matter?"

"Who can guarantee that there will be no trouble if I give the money? I didn't bring my jewelry, otherwise I should be able to make up the money if I sell it—" She stopped suddenly: 100 million francs, which is almost the Raphael she got All of Hastings' property.Raphael is not dead?Or does anyone know how much money he actually has?

She didn't tell Emile the whole truth, which can't be regarded as "lying", but she didn't tell all the truth.Hastings can get a lot of jewelry in India, and bought several gem mines with others.Gem mines do not mean that you can dig out gems from the ground with your eyes closed after you buy a vein. It requires a lot of people to mine and rummage.Gemstone mines are not like metal mines. Darcy’s gold mine can produce a few pounds of gold a year, and a worker in the gemstone mine may not be able to find a gemstone over 1 carat in a year.

Most gem mines produce fine gemstones, and large gemstones are always rare. Because they are rare, they are precious and valuable.

If you want to make money and make a lot of money in such a chaotic place in India, you are basically like the East India Company, where the government leads, big aristocrats, and big capitalists invest, and hire a large number of mercenaries to protect the interests of the company, or you just run away after making a wave.In fact, she still hasn't figured out what happened to Hastings in India. The person who brought the letter didn't know about Hastings' business in India. It is impossible for Hastings to write the letter, but it is said that he Written by a partner.

The letter was thrown at Hastings' home in Paris. She doesn't remember the details of what was written in the letter, but she only remembers that it was an ominous funeral letter.

Enclosed was Hastings' wedding ring, and a small bag of rubies.

Now, she wondered again, what happened to Hastings in India?How did you die?

In the evening, she wrote a letter and sent it to Vienna, the capital of Austria.

Mr. Wolf is a handsome young Austrian nobleman.

Emile had to admit that the men Josephine had met were all good-looking men.Before seeing Wolfe, she thought that Wolfe would be a middle-aged fat man with a big beard that is typical of the Germans. In fact, it was just the opposite. Thomas Wolfe was too young. Josephine said that Wolfe Golf is 26, but looks 22 or 3 years old.

His face was very cute, his facial features were delicate and soft, he had a pair of bright gray-blue eyes, he looked very innocent when he smiled, but at this time his expression was serious and somewhat resentful.

"You shouldn't be so suspicious of me."

"Who would that be?"

"I don't know. You should have told me when you received the first letter." Thomas Wolfe said impatiently: "I will help you solve this problem, you stay at home."

"I want to go back to Boston."

"I thought you rejected me because you didn't want to get married again. You're going to die as soon as you get on the boat, and you're not allowed to go back."

This domineering president is nothing like that, and he can't speak. Who is going to die?

"You can control me?" Josephine said casually.

Emile was at a loss at the side, she had never seen young men and women talking like this, it was like—by the way, just like when Charles and Josephine quarreled when they were young, Charles thought he was an older brother, and Josephine, as a younger sister, should You listen to your brother in everything; and Josephine has a bad temper, you can only coax her to obey her, and if you order her, she will get angry.

Philip would never have said that to Josephine.Don't talk about Philip, Darcy, Butler, no one can talk to Josephine like this.