One day in 1902, Qin Ying, the wife of Chen Guan, came to the Hexingdang shop and took out a silver ticket of 11,000 taels from her body, and she wanted to redeem a pair of treasures that she had given to the store.
It turned out that a month ago, Qin Ying dressed as a handsome man and came to the Hexingdang shop. Only to see him come to the counter, take out a small wooden box from his body, and after handing it to the treasurer, he said that he would be ten thousand taels, and he would redeem it in a month.
The box is made of rosewood, and when the treasurer Bao Chuming saw the box, he thought that it must be a very valuable thing. However, when he opened the box, he did not expect that it was a pair of slender nails lying inside. The nails were about three inches long, shiny and translucent, with two small diamonds set in the middle.
Bao Chuming said dismissively to the handsome man: "This rosewood box is also worth three or five hundred and two pieces of silver, but if this pair of nails costs ten thousand two, then you think I have no vision!" ”
The handsome man seriously asked the treasurer to think again, this is not an ordinary nail. But Bao Chuming still refused, and suggested that the handsome man could go to another pawnshop to try.
The handsome man saw that the treasurer insisted on not wanting it, so he thought that the treasurer really "had eyes and didn't know Tarzan", and was about to get the box.
"Slow down!" I overheard a woman's voice in the back hall, and then walked out of a middle-aged noblewoman, she glanced at the nails in the box, and looked at the handsome man, and then said: "Take the goods down, give him ten thousand taels." ”
This noblewoman was Bao Chuming's wife, Fucha. Seeing Madame say this, Bao Chuming was stunned.
However, Bao Chuming did not dare to do anything, this Fucha clan was the sister of the pro-noble minister Delun, and it was not small. Ever since Empress Dowager Cixi returned from fleeing west, she criticized Delun for not serving well, so she was punished to see the city gate.
Because the Fucha family Yu Wei was still there, Bao Chuming had to rely on what the lady said, so he took out the money he deserved ten thousand taels, and handed it to the handsome man with interest of one thousand. The handsome man first signed his name Qin Ying on the note, and then took the money and left in a hurry.
Bao Chuming thought that this eleven thousand taels of silver must have been lost.
Unexpectedly, today, the handsome man really took the money to get the nails, Bao Chuming thought to himself, this nail must be extraordinary, so he was busy calling people to take out the goods. But the next man came out and said that the thing was missing, and he couldn't find it when he looked around.
When the handsome man heard that his treasure was missing, he thought that Bao Chuming wanted to take the treasure for himself, so he reported Bao Chuming to the Gate of Suncheon Province.
Suncheon Fu Yin (the administrator in charge of the Kyoto area is called Fu Yin) is named Zheng Hongjie. After he asked the reason for the case, he persuaded the handsome man with a kind word: "The matter has come to an end, it is better to let the store compensate you according to the original price, okay?" ”
However, the handsome man refused to live or die, so Zheng Hongjie pulled down his face and said to the handsome man: "You are a little girl, you dare not show your true face, I am afraid that there is a secret that this treasure is not willing to tell, right?" ”
Qin Ying saw that Fu Yin recognized his true face, and had to tell the truth: "The lord is right, I am indeed a woman, named Qin Ying, the wife of chen official of the Military Aircraft Department." ”
Zheng Hongjie listened, and his heart was shocked, knowing that Chen Guanguan was originally a feudal official, who had recently been ordered into Beijing by Lafayette Xiang and wanted to be entrusted with a heavy responsibility, and he had heard that he had married a young lady in the chaos, and he could not imagine that it was the one in front of him.
So he immediately changed his tone and said to Qin Ying, "It turned out to be Lady Chen, disrespectful and disrespectful." However, the subordinate official has a sentence that he does not know how to ask inappropriately, that is, this pawn thing, I don't know if Lord Chen guan knows? ”
Qin Ying was silent for a moment, and had no choice but to tell the truth of the matter, and everyone present was taken aback.
Qin Ying said that half a month ago, Chen Guan came to the capital with his family's small wind and dust servants, but when he came to the Chongwen Gate, he was stopped, saying that he needed to pay the entrance fee. The amount of payment and the amount of payment need to be determined according to the size of the official title, while Lord Chen is a taifu, and the official occupies an important position, and the pricing is naturally high, and it is necessary to pay 30,000 taels.
Lord Chen did not eat this set and resolutely did not give it, so the two sides were deadlocked, so that the Chen official's family had to stay in a hotel outside the city, until the 5th day, the gatekeeper found Qin Ying and offered to reduce it from the original thirty thousand two to ten thousand two, and only need to pay ten thousand two to enter the city.
Since he didn't have so much silver with him, Qin Ying had to come to the Hexing pawnshop in disguise with the treasure and become ten thousand taels of silver before letting the whole family enter the city. However, that nail, Qin Ying said that it was passed down by her grandmother in order to leave memories for her family.
However, Zheng Hongjie always felt that Qin Ying's pawn must have been done in secret from Chen Officials, and there must still be secrets hidden in it, otherwise she would not have dressed as a woman.
Therefore, Zheng Hongjie persuaded Qin Ying softly and hardly: "If the treasures have been lost and things are big, don't say that you are alarmed by Lord Chen, and when the time comes, you will also alarm Lafayette to ask about this matter, it is better to make big things small, small things are small, and both sides are good." ”
When Qin Ying heard this, he felt that what Zheng Hongjie said was also reasonable, so he softened his heart and promised that Bao Chuming would pay another ten thousand taels of silver, and he would no longer ask for the nail.
Soon, Empress Dowager Cixi ordered a feast, and she wanted to invite the wives to the palace for dinner, in order to raise a sum of money. As the wife of Chen Official, Qin Ying was naturally also on the invited list.
On the day of the feast, before the opening of the banquet, the empress dowager sat in the first seat, and the grand eunuch Li Lianying held a gift book next to her, so that Cixi could look at them one by one. After reading for a while, Cixi's eyes suddenly stopped on a page of gifts, took a closer look, and then whispered a few words to the palace maid next to her.
I saw the palace lady walk out of the palace door, and after a while she came in with a small wooden box. Qin Ying saw the wooden box from a distance and was shocked: Isn't that the wooden box that he pawned for Hexing pawnshop? How did you get here?
Qin Yingzheng was wondering, only to see Cixi let people open the box, and after reading it, he suddenly pulled down his face and stood up. When everyone looked, the box contained a pair of fingernails three inches long.
Li Lianying understood, so she immediately shouted in a sharp voice, "Who sent this nail?" Only to see a middle-aged woman stand up in response. Qin Ying recognized that the woman was Bao Chuming's wife Fu Chashi, and it turned out that the pair of nails had been hidden by her.
At this time, the Fucha clan was saluting the empress dowager for peace. The Empress stared at her and asked, "Aren't you Dren's sister?" Where did this gift come from? Fucha replied in panic, "Back to Lafayette, the slave's family opened a pawnshop, and when they saw this treasure that day, they hid it." ”
The empress dowager asked, "Do you know where they come from?" Fucha nodded, "Every time you gave a feast before, the slaves could see it clearly." Later, I heard my brother say that your treasure had fallen. A month ago, the slave saw that they were very familiar, and thought that they should no longer be left in exile. ”
Then I heard the empress dowager say, "Well, you are still quite filial, and you should be rewarded again." ”
Seeing fucha clan quickly knelt down and replied, "Lafayette Saint Ming, the slave's brother was not thoughtful enough to serve you at the beginning, and was demoted to guard the city gate." I implore Lafayette to forgive my brother for seeing the filial piety of the slave. After saying that, he prostrated his head a few more times.
Only to hear the empress dowager hum, and then let Li Lianying take out a copy of the recital and say, "Read." Li Lianying then raised her voice again and read it.
It turned out that The Chen official's family was blocked out of the city until the fifth day, and the more Chen guan thought about it, the more angry he became, so he wrote a note the night before and reported the matter to the empress.
Fucha listened, his face pale, and his body was like chaff on a sieve.
The empress dowager sneered and looked at Fu Cha and said, "You are still worried about your mother-in-law's brother, but you don't know that his messenger is much fatter than my palace Ōnai!" If such corrupt officials are not severely punished, are they worthy of the ancestors of my Great Qing Dynasty? ”
After the empress dowager finished speaking, she got up angrily and went back to the palace. Fucha was paralyzed on the ground and could not get up, hoping to offer his fingernails to please, but he did not expect to be counted down, and blamed Brother Delun for being too greedy.
And Qin Ying saw the situation and also took the excuse to leave the table and go home.
On the second day, Chen officials happily told Qin Ying that the dirty officials who guarded the city gate had finally been punished, and Qin Ying also told qin Ying about his sneaking to the pawnshop and what happened on the day of the feast.
Official Chen inexplicably asked Qin Ying, "Since the nails belong to Lafayette, why should she be angry after seeing them?" ”
"Mentioning that bitter past, Lafayette was angry!"
Qin Ying continued: "In 1900, the Eight-Nation Alliance invaded Beijing, and in a panic, Lafayette changed into a peasant woman's clothes and fled from the city with his attendants, and the guards did not have time to follow. Unexpectedly, when a peasant woman was spending the night, Deren panicked and reported that a group of bandits had come after him. Lafayette got up and ran, but in the panic, her nails were broken by the door, and Lafayette died of pain, but he couldn't take care of so much. When he ran to a safe place, he asked the close palace maid to simply cut off both nails. ”
The close palace maid was Qin Ying, who specially cared for Lafayette's nails, and Lafayette treated her like a granddaughter. So Qin Ying collected this pair of nails as a thought.
Qin Ying originally wanted to never marry and serve Lafayette, but in this chaos, the master and servant were still separated. Shortly after their separation, Qin Ying married Lord Chen.