Qiao Jinniang was very worried in the carriage, afraid that the secret tunnel would be exposed, but when she smelled the fragrance of wontons outside, she put her worries aside.
“I haven’t tasted such nice wontons for a long time.”
Lu Chen ordered the driver to stop the carriage and had someone buy a bowl of wontons. The hawker hurriedly said, “Customer, we are a small business, so this bowl cannot be taken away.”
Gu Ming threw a tael of silver to the hawker and said, “Isn’t this enough to buy your bowl?”
The hawker said, “Master, you really can’t take the wontons away. You’d better eat them on the spot. If you take the wantons away, they won’t taste good in a short while. If you take it away and the wontons don’t taste so good, you may blame me for bad cooking skills.”
An official of the Ministry of Rites recognized Gu Ming and said, “Eunuch Gu, this hawker is very stubborn. He even refuses to deliver his wontons to our office. Even Tasty Pavilion offers delivery services, but he doesn’t.”
Lu Chen said to the outside, “Bring in the wontons and I’ll eat them in the carriage.”
When the hawker saw this, he finally gave the bowl in his hand to Gu Ming. Hearing the word “eunuch” and judging from the luxury carriage, the one in the carriage was obviously a royal family member.
No matter how stubborn the hawker was, he didn’t dare to offend a royal family member.
In the carriage, Qiao Jinniang was holding the steaming chicken soup wontons with a few spring onions floating on the surface. After she picked all the green onions aside, she gently scooped up a wonton with the spoon and tasted it. The wontons had thin skin, tender meat stuffings and delicious soup. It tasted really good.
Unexpectedly, there was such a small wonton stall in Chang’an.
After Qiao Jinniang ate two wontons, she handed a wonton with chopped green onion to Lu Chen.
Lu Chen tasted it and said, “It’s not as delicious as those you made.”
Qiao Jinniang smiled, and after eating the wontons, she left all the soup with green onions for Lu Chen.
Lu Chen tasted two mouthfuls, and really felt that it was not as delicious as the wontons made by Qiao Jinniang. Although this soup was delicious, he always felt that it missed something.
“Hey, have you heard that? Yesterday at the birthday banquet of Young Master Qiao in Duke Anyuan Mansion, Miss Zhou from the Duke Wu Mansion delivered the Crown Prince a doll while she was dripping wet.
“How pitiful. Why is such a beautiful little girl a fool? ”
“Yeah, she has such a noble identity. I heard that she had a high fever because she helped the Crown Prince out of a disaster. She literally saved the Crown Prince’s life!”
“The Crown Prince owes Miss Zhou a life-saving grace, so His Majesty treats the Duke Wu Mansion very well!”
“If Miss Zhou hadn’t become an idiot, she would have become a well-known woman in Chang’an by now. I’m afraid that the threshold of the Zhou family might have been stepped flat by her suitors.”
Qiao Jinniang asked Lu Chen in a low voice, “So, your good sister saved your life?”
Lu Chen frowned and said, “Don’t listen to those people’s nonsense!”
After Lu Chen handed the bowl to Gu Ming, he said to Qiao Jinniang, “The Empress Dowager really wanted to kill me back then, but I had already discovered it, and besides, I was surrounded by secret guards, so the Empress Dowager definitely wouldn’t have any chance to kill me. What Zhou Sisi did was just unnecessary!”
Qiao Jinniang said, “Then why is this matter being brought up again among the common people? It’s a scandal of the royal family after all. By the way, how dare the Empress Dowager do that to you? Did His Majesty punish her for that?”
Lu Chen said, “She is the Empress Dowager after all. How can we bring her down without sufficient evidence?
“Datang advocates filial piety. Without conclusive evidence, even Father can’t do anything to the Empress Dowager.”
Lu Chen said to the guards outside, “Zhou Sisi fell into the water because she was not careful. Come, arrest these people who slandered the royal family!”
The commoners dared to gossip about the royal family because Emperor Huilin never restricted the freedom of speech of the people.
But if they violated the majesty of the royal family, they could be arrested according to law.
Those who had not had time to spread the rumors fled, afraid of being caught.
Seeing this scene, a mammy of Mrs. Zhou hurriedly went back to the Zhou Mansion.
After returning to the East Palace, Qiao Jinniang pretended that she had stayed in the study all night. In order to make the act look more real, she even blamed Lu Chen for staying outside all night when he came in.
After returning to her own palace, Qiao Jinniang went to the kitchen to make wontons.
To make wontons delicious, the shrimp in the meat filling was essential. Lu Chen felt that the hawker’s wontons were not tasty enough because the hawker’s meat filling didn’t contain shrimp.
After all, in Chang’an, shrimp meat was far more expensive than pork.
Yuyan trotted in and whispered into Qiao Jinniang’s ear, “Your Highness, it has been widely heard from outside that last night, His Royal Highness slept with a maid from the East Palace who was sent by you to look for His Highness in Duke Rong Mansion! Did you send anyone over there last night?”
Qiao Jinniang: “…”
Lu Chen said that no one in the Duke Rong Mansion would know about it, but in such a short while, the rumors had even spread in the imperial palace.
Even Queen Zhou heard about it, and she quickly called Qiao Jinniang over.
Qiao Jinniang put a bowl of chicken soup in the food box and went to the Queen’s palace.
When she arrived at the Queen’s palace, there were quite a few imperial concubines in it, as well as Li Lingling, Consort Qi and some others. There was a woman standing beside Li Lingling who looked familiar to Qiao Jinniang. She must be Fourth Miss Qin who was Consort Huai’s concubine now.
“Greetings, Mother.” Qiao Jinniang saluted. “Unfortunately, I didn’t know that there were so many people here, so I only prepared a bowl of chicken soup wontons for Mother.”
Seeing that Qiao Jinniang was calm, Queen Zhou breathed a sigh of relief. She smelled the chicken soup wonton and said, “The wontons smell really nice. It smells a bit similar to Uncle Wu’s wonton on the main street.”
A mammy next to her coughed.
Queen Zhou hurriedly tried to make it up. “Well, but I haven’t tasted it for almost 20 years…”
Consort Qi said, “It turns out that Uncle Wu’s wontons have been around for so long? I remember when I was married, there was no Uncle Wu’s wonton.”
Queen Zhou said, “Maybe it was elsewhere before”
Queen Zhou tasted two wontons, her eyes lit up. “Jinniang’s cooking skills are really good. The wontons are even tastier than Uncle Wu’s.”
“Thank you, Mother.” Qiao Jinniang saluted.
Li Lingling didn’t care about the wontons. She smiled and said, “Crown Princess, I heard that His Royal Highness favored a maid of yours in the Duke Rong Mansion yesterday. This is really great news for the East Palace. After all, His Royal Highness only has one child…”
Li Lingling was not afraid of losing face now. As long as Qiao Jinniang could be embarrassed, she would be willing to do anything.
Qiao Jinniang said, “Oh, Sister-in-law, did you see it with your own eyes at the door? Yes, His Royal Highness only has one child, but the eldest brother doesn’t even have a child! I hope Concubine Qin can give birth to a son as soon as possible.”
Li Lingling gnashed her teeth and glared at Qiao Jinniang. She didn’t believe that Qiao Jinniang really didn’t mind it.
It had only been a few days since their wedding, but the Crown Prince had already slept with a woman outside the East Palace. Although Qiao Jinniang sounded calm, she must be very mad.
