Chapter 126

Chapter 126: The Couple’s Inference

Feeling unsettled, Xin An mulled it over for a long time without finding an answer. That evening, while cooling off outdoors, she told Tang Mo about it. He stood in the courtyard with his hands behind his back, gazing at the moon, his brows lightly furrowed; [he clearly was not actually taking in the moon at all]. After a moment he said: “Have you noticed that everyone up and down the residence is treating me differently?”

He turned his head and added: “Not just in the residence. It is the same outside.”

Xin An fell silent for a beat, then said: “Now that you mention it, yes. At the banquet yesterday Father even praised you at the table.”

Tang Mo asked with a dry irony: “A sudden pang of conscience?”

He shook his head and said: “Since I was small he has never praised me. Even if he did, it was against his heart. These last few days, though, he has grown quite fond of doing it.”

He continued, calm yet perplexed: “I have neither rendered merit nor achieved anything. It makes no sense.”

[In his previous life he might have told himself the old man’s conscience had awakened, but now he was not that naïve. Pies do not fall from the sky for no reason.] He said, measured and cold: “He knows what task I am busy with, and he knows I have run into trouble. If he truly valued me, would he not lend a hand?”

He knew perfectly well how the old man treated Tang Rong.

Xin An raised an eyebrow and said: “Empty words without action are a sham. That praise is likely insincere. He has an ulterior motive.”

Tang Mo confessed that until he understood it he would not feel at ease, then said: “You rest first; I will pay Mother a visit.”

Summer was drawing to a close, yet the heat only grew heavier, with the night breeze carrying a scant trace of coolness.

As he walked, Tang Mo carefully retraced the events of recent days, searching for what he might have missed. Turning it over and over, he still felt that everything had started after his mother returned from the Count of Chang Ning’s residence.

That night Tang Gang was, yet again, drinking outside and had not returned. Madam Wang was just about to turn in when Tang Mo arrived; she looked at him and asked: “You come so late at night. Do you have business?”

Tang Mo was tongue-tied for a moment; [ever since his mother gained a daughter-in-law, this son of hers no longer seemed to count]. He pulled himself together and said: “I do. Something important.”

Madam Wang had Ping Qiu keep watch by the door, and Tang Mo spoke of Tang Gang’s abnormal behavior: “When has he ever praised me, and at a time when I have done nothing at all?”

He added with a wry twist: “He even sent over several bottles and jars.”

Madam Wang could not help a laugh and said: “And is your father praising you such a bad thing? Was that not what you most longed to hear?”

Tang Mo pouted and said: “I stopped caring about it long ago. Mother, when things are this out of character, there is always a catch. Tell me, on the day you went to the Count of Chang Ning’s residence, what exactly did the Countess say?”

For such a small affair, several people had gone, one after another, to apologize. It was highly irregular.

These past two days Tang Rong had also worn a perpetually aggrieved look; even his usual hypocritical smiles were rarely seen.

He had heard that Tao Yi Ran had grown attentive of late as well. Truly, everything felt strange.

Madam Wang, worried he might be impulsive, had not wanted to tell him. But Tang Mo said: “Mother, you must tell me. You know my temper. If I cannot learn it from you, I will ask everywhere, and I might spoil things.”

Once he said that, Madam Wang, who had still been hesitating, no longer concealed anything. She had him lean close and whispered everything to him, then cautioned him: “I admit I feel a touch of schadenfreude, but in the end we must consider the marquisate’s reputation. Your father fumed for several days and then accepted it. He is thinking of using this to completely get a hold on the Tao family. It is contemptible, but the best option.”

“We cannot let the marquisate suffer in silence.”

Tang Mo did not speak for a long while. Madam Wang sighed and said: “Bodhisattva bless us; if there had not been a mishap back then, if the person had entered your bridal chamber, I truly would not know what we should have done afterward.”

She added, guessing aloud: “As for your father, is it that he is disappointed in Tang Rong because of this, and so has turned his attention to you?”

There was wishful thinking in her words. Tang Mo was unsure and said: “Why not test him, Mother?”

“How would I test him?” she asked.

Tang Mo said: “Words of praise alone will not do. There needs to be something substantive. I remember once when Eldest Brother attended a banquet and improvised a poem that took first place; he earned the praise of several grandees. When he returned, Father gave him several men, household troops Grandfather had left behind.”

Old Master Tang’s men were, of course, all good hands. To this day there were still about a hundred. They were loyal to the marquisate and under Tang Gang’s control, the marquisate’s trump card.

They were far more important than a few bottles and jars.

[When he went back he would have to ask Xin An whether any of those men had ended up in Tang Rong’s hands.]

He concluded: “Besides that, Mother can also help me ask for some concrete benefits. Whatever his motive, if we gain something real, we have not lost out.”

Madam Wang agreed and again warned him not to spread the Tao family’s affair, then sent him back to rest.

He agreed readily, promising he would not tell anyone. But after returning to Qiu Shi Courtyard he told Xin An everything, detail by detail. She was startled and took a while to digest it, then quickly landed on a possibility, saying: “Favoritism is a kind of stubbornness that defies reason and is extremely hard to change. In a situation like this, Father is very likely to pity Tang Rong all the more and to favor him even more.”

They had discussed this topic before and reached the same view.

Tang Mo quickly caught on and said: “You mean Father is using me to knock Tang Rong into line. He has never bothered to hide his dislike of Tao Yi Ran, and now he has learned of the Tao family’s affair. If I were him, my first thought would be to get rid of Tao Yi Ran, and then to marry his beloved son to a better wife.”

The more they analyzed, the more likely it seemed. Xin An picked up the thread and said: “We must remember that Grandfather set the marriage between me and Tang Rong. Father must have been dissatisfied; otherwise, when he learned of the spouse swap, he would not have let Tang Rong off so easily, nor would he have gone all out to suppress it.”

Tang Mo nodded and said: “If Tao Yi Ran is removed and there is no longer Grandfather’s will pressing down from above, that outstanding son of his will no doubt marry a Princess.”

“But Tang Rong will not agree,” Xin An said, who understood Tang Rong exceedingly well. “He treasures his reputation. Besides, the Countess of Chang Ning is probably still lying in wait to watch a joke. He will absolutely not take that risk. Instead, he will use this matter to get a firm hold on the Tao family and a firm hold on Tao Yi Ran.”

“If our guess is right, Tao Yi Ran will soon become the me of the previous life.”

She would be drained of her dowry by Tang Rong, used up completely, and then thrown away like a worn shoe.

“This is a man who does not easily reveal his true thoughts,” Xin An said. “Father must have misunderstood him.”

Tang Mo said that outside people often called Tang Rong a hero who faltered at the hurdle of beauty, then added: “They say he is obsessed with women. Father has probably heard that too. In that case…”

He frowned deeply. Xin An looked at him and asked quietly: “You…?”

“Most likely I am only a tool for him to temper Tang Rong,” he said.

They reasoned it out between them, and by the end Tang Mo’s face did not look good. He had always known he was not valued, but he had not expected to have no standing at all.

Xin An found him somewhat pitiful. Their situations were different: she at least had natal kin who truly kept her in their hearts. Her father’s attitude set the tone for the entire Xin family, and within it she had never suffered the least grievance.

As for Tang Mo, his father did not love him; his stepmother had long had too many scruples; add to that a scheming Tang Rong who ruined his reputation; in the previous life she herself had opposed him at every turn, and Tao Yi Ran had dragged him down as well. It truly was…