Chapter 261 — Doubts
Purple Streets of Chang'an · Page 4 of 4
"Is that so?" Song Yan said, abashed, his feet in their shoes frozen where they stood, an awkward look of being caught between advancing and retreating written across his brow.
Watching him, Dou Yan felt as though a stone had been dropped into the lake of her heart, and the ripples spread outward in ring after ring.
Song Yan was the heir of the Yingzhen State Duke's household—what sort of friend, serving at the Fengtai camp, could make him go in person to pay a visit there?
She seemed once more to see that handsome youth in the chrysanthemum field, sweating profusely as he dug up chrysanthemum seedlings for her.
"Still," Dou Yan said, gazing at Song Yan with a smile, a tenderness in her eyes of which she herself was unaware, "this is in fact just the right time to build a flower shed. We might even manage to get in a crop of radishes. Come the New Year, packed in little bamboo baskets, they would make the finest of holiday gifts."
Was she rescuing him from his embarrassment? Or could one truly grow a crop of radishes now?
Song Yan gazed at Dou Yan, and the smile in his eyes spilled over into his brows.
"Can you really grow radishes in a flower shed?" He put his shoes on properly. "How is it I have never heard of such a thing?"
"Which only shows you know nothing of farming!" Dou Yan said, walking out of the inner chamber shoulder to shoulder with Song Yan. "Otherwise, where would radishes and little cucumbers come from in the depths of winter?" She addressed Song Yan in a tone of consultation: "Shall we try our hand at it this year? And if they come up, we can send some to Princess Ninghuai, Old Madam Lu, and the rest of the relatives. What do you think?"
"Wonderful!" Song Yan understood nothing of such matters and naturally deferred to Dou Zhiwei in all things. "Should we bring someone in to help...?"
Talking as they went, the two passed through the connecting hall and made their way to the small garden.
Suxin, following behind them, could not help lowering her head and smiling to herself.
The young mistress had the least patience in the world for coaxing people, yet she could never resist coaxing the heir.
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Begging for pink votes!
o(n_n)o~
ps: Recommending a book to everyone.
"Lanxiang Yuan" by He Yanshan.
Book number: 2723760
Synopsis: She was the granddaughter of a Grand Secretary, and her family was convicted when it became entangled in the struggle for the succession.
She and her newly wed husband both died on the road to exile.
She was reborn with her memories intact, becoming Chen Xianglan, a bondservant born into the Lin family, a prominent clan of Jiangnan.
In this life, Xianglan has four suitors.
One she cannot have,
One she will not have,
One withered before it had properly bloomed,
And one more... ah, nothing but trouble...
This is the story of a little maid who wants to escape the inner quarters but cannot.
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