Chapter 153 — On the Verge
Purple Streets of Chang'an · Page 2 of 4
Guard Meng was the one in charge of the Ying Ducal Estate's retainers.
At present they had only a handful of battered survivors left. If they did not quickly summon the skilled men under Guard Meng, and Song Yan used the pretext of thieves in the house to go on killing, these men of theirs would be no match for him at all.
And then there was the question of how to bring this affair to a close.
If they decided to move against Song Yan, then once Song Yan was pushed to desperation he would certainly go to the Emperor to pour out his grievances. They would then have to produce compelling evidence to prove Song Yan's misconduct; if they could not, they would have to find a way to quell the matter as quickly as possible.
At these thoughts, Song Cen shuddered involuntarily.
After Empress Wan had become mother of the realm, there had once been petty men who slandered the Crown Prince before the Emperor, saying he was unfilial. The Emperor flew into a rage and said, "A father's fault lies in lax discipline of his sons; a mother's in lax discipline of her daughters. Are you accusing Us?" He had every one of those who spoke such words dragged to the Caishikou execution ground and beheaded. Afterward he had said to him bitterly, "...These men do nothing but take advantage of the Crown Prince's loss of his mother in childhood. Nothing angers Us more than this!"
The Emperor held Empress Shen in the deepest respect. Only five years after Empress Shen's death from illness did he take the gentle and gracious Consort Wan as his new empress.
Lady Jiang had just passed away.
If Song Yan went before the Emperor to lodge a complaint, and he could produce no tenable justification, he feared he would have no good answer to give before His Majesty!
"You're right, you're right!" Song Cen wiped the sweat from his brow and hastily ordered Guard Chang, "Quickly, send word to Guard Meng to bring all his men..." As for what was to be done about Song Yan, he pursed his lips, his expression obscure.
To have become one of Song Cen's trusted confidants, Guard Chang must have had qualities that set him apart.
Some things could be said but not done; some things could be done but not said.
The relationship between the Song father and son belonged to the category of things that could be spoken of but not acted upon.
He could remind Song Cen, but he could not meddle in the affairs between father and son.
Guard Chang made his respects to Song Cen with due deference, dispatched a man to summon Guard Meng, and then, taking several guards with him, went off to deal with that heap of corpses that looked for all the world like so many naked challenges flung down before them.
The bloodshed in the main courtyard made Song Cen feel that the whole Ying Ducal Estate had become a slaughterhouse. Escorted by several guards, he took his rest in the side rooms beside the sedan hall where the bearers and grooms had once shaken the dust from their clothes.
By lamp-lighting time, Guard Meng arrived with more than twenty guards.
These guards were plainly more experienced at dealing with corpses than Guard Chang and the others. With their help, when the third-watch drum sounded—boom, boom-boom—the Ying Ducal Estate could, if one overlooked the faint smell of blood seeping through the water stains all over the ground, and overlooked the trembling looks on the serving women's faces, just about be counted as having returned to normal.
※※※※※
Song Dan, lying face down on the bed with a quilt over him and only a thin garment beneath, watched Song Han, who lay at the edge of his bed, with a smile: "It's so late, and you still haven't gone to sleep?"
Song Han squirmed at his brother's side. "Brother, I want to sleep with you!"
"No!" Song Dan said. "I'm in agony right now. What if you knock my wound in the middle of the night?"
Hearing this, Song Han carefully touched his brother's hand and said, "Next time Father beats you again, I'll go beg him to let you off!"