Chapter 165

Chapter 165

After taking a couple of sips of tea, the Princess Consort suddenly felt a bit nauseous.

But she was always composed, never showing her emotions on her face, and calmly handed her teacup to the person beside her.

The first to arrive were the people from the main kitchen.

Three people in total, standing in a row from the manager to the cook and the vegetable-washing maids.

Manager Wu wiped the sweat from his forehead and hastily said, "On the way here, this old servant heard that the Fifth Young Master had an upset stomach, and was scared half to death. I quickly brought Mama Deng, who's in charge of the wet nurse's meals, and the young maid Chiyun here!"

Mama Deng's face was pale, clearly frightened the whole way here: "I honestly don't know!"

"I've always been in charge of the wet nurse's meals. It was the same before as it is now—nothing's changed."

The young maid responsible for washing vegetables and doing odd jobs echoed the same words.

The Princess Consort gave Manager Wu a faint glance. "This is the best you can give me?"

Although the main kitchen was under Fang Yuaner's management, Manager Wu was the Princess Consort's man, and Fang Yuaner wouldn't dare lay a finger on him.

Now, one word from the Princess Consort carried more weight than a hundred from Fang Yuaner.

Upon hearing this, Manager Wu broke out in a cold sweat.

He immediately said, "On the way here, this old servant specifically asked these two. After thinking it over, I'm afraid the problem doesn't lie with our main kitchen."

"Then where's the problem?"

Manager Wu glanced at the two maids beside him, hesitating, but finally confessed, "I'm afraid it's Miss Qiulu."

The moment anyone heard a maid's name starting with "Qiu," everyone knew she must be someone close to Fang Yuaner.

Xie Run felt a dull, resigned feeling.

From the moment the wet nurse's meals were tampered with, she'd already guessed Fang Yuaner might be involved.

But precisely because Fang Yuaner managed the main kitchen, she wouldn't do something so foolish—which made it obvious someone else was pulling the strings.

One scheme wrapped in another—the hardest kind to untangle.

Especially in this household full of sharp minds... who knew where it would finally land?

After Fang Yuaner moved into Songya Courtyard, it wasn't actually far from Chunshan Courtyard.

But she was busy handling the household's affairs at the moment, so she'd taken her time getting there.

The moment she entered the main courtyard, she overheard Manager Wu's words.

Her smile stayed fixed—bright and unreadable. "Manager Wu speaks without thinking, slinging mud at my people. Got any proof?"

Fang Yuaner, dressed in a bold, eye-catching outfit, glided over with poise and said with a smile, "Everyone knows the whole kitchen staff sings your tune!"

"If it's just the kitchen staff's word, I won't buy it!"

She sat down, her presence just as commanding, and the room went several degrees quieter.

Xie Run spoke up slowly: "Sister Fang has a point."

"Manager Wu says it's Qiulu—but where's the proof?"

The young maid Chiyun was scared stiff by the scene, sobbing as she said, "Ever since Consort Fang took over the main kitchen, Sister Qiulu would always hang around the kitchen when she came to fetch meals. She said she was supervising the kitchen's work, but really, she'd always grab stuff—food and everything else."

"No one else walks past the wet nurse's food every single day."

"Even maids from other quarters only pass by once in a while."

As luck would have it, Qiulu had come with Fang Yuaner.

Hearing this, she shot a vicious glare and snapped, "You rotten little wretch! Slinging mud at me like that—watch it, or you'll lose that tongue of yours!"

"You say I put medicine in the Fifth Young Master's wet nurse's food—did anyone actually see me do it?!"

"With all those eyes in the kitchen, if I were drugging the food daily, you'd all have to be blind to miss it!"

"Then you all deserve to be punished too—all of you blind?!"

Chiyun was so frightened she kept backing away, crying with tears and snot all mixed together: "But I'm not lying!"

"These past days, you're the only one who's been hanging around the kitchen all day. Even if you don't believe me, all those maids who came for meals must've seen it too."

"Miss Qiulu, you're high and mighty—don't scare this poor girl. We're lowly folk with weak nerves—we can't take the fright." Mama Deng, kneeling nearby, was a wily old hand herself.

She feared the masters, but didn't fear Qiulu one bit, and immediately shot back: "These past days, you've been throwing your weight around thanks to Consort Fang's backing, bullying everyone. Whenever you were in a bad mood, you'd take it out on the kitchen staff."

"The moment you said you were inspecting the masters' meals, who'd dare look you in the eye? Everyone just wanted to keep their heads down, scared you'd nitpick their cooking!"

"You—" Qiulu fumed, "I was indeed inspecting the masters' meals!"

But even she didn't sound convinced.

In truth, as Fang Yuaner's Senior Maid, using the time when Fang Yuaner ran the kitchen to skim off perks was perfectly normal.

Fang Yuaner had sent her to oversee the kitchen with tacit approval of such behavior.

This was the kind of thing nobody noticed unless someone made a fuss.

But among Fang Yuaner's maids, Qiulu was the least able to keep her cool. After a few days of strutting, she'd gotten cocky and earned the resentment of the kitchen maids and matrons.

Now that someone was using it against her, she really couldn't defend herself.

Fang Yuaner also frowned. "Qiulu, is what they said true?!"

Qiulu's face had lost its earlier bravado, and she quickly said, "Master, of course not!"

"How could I possibly poison the Fifth Young Master's wet nurse?!"

"First, the main kitchen is under your charge—if anything happened to the Fifth Young Master, you'd be held responsible no matter what. Second, as they said, this servant went to inspect the meals every day. If any master had a problem, I'd be the first one they'd suspect. No matter how dumb I am, I wouldn't do something like that!"

Fang Yuaner's eyes darkened as she realized she'd been set up.

She'd rehearsed a whole speech on the way here, but having her own people targeted and framed caught her off guard, leaving her no way to wriggle out of it now.

"Kneel!" Fang Yuaner suddenly barked sharply.

Qiulu knelt without another word.

Fang Yuaner: "What the kitchen staff said is right. These past days, only you've been hanging around the kitchen every day, making you the most likely to have had the chance to slip something in—so naturally, you're the main suspect!"

Fang Yuaner then bowed to the Princess, saying, "This girl has been carried away by her own arrogance and has been caught red-handed... Alas, I am at a loss for words to defend myself now. I only beg the Princess to punish me!"

Fang Yuaner's words kept condemning Qiulu while begging the Princess for punishment, yet she never once admitted any involvement herself.

If it wasn't her doing, then was someone framing her?

If she actually claimed she was being framed, no one would believe her.

By half-admitting guilt in such a vague way, she cleverly left the dilemma to the Princess.

Without solid evidence, should the Princess punish her or not?

Just then, Li Shufei also hurried over with the wet nurse.

She bowed to the Princess and said, "I came in haste upon hearing of Fifth Young Master's illness."

"These past days, Princess Duanmin has also been suffering from bloating and night terrors. I initially thought it was normal, but upon hearing about Fifth Young Master, I realized something was amiss. I've brought the wet nurse here to have the household physician examine her as well."

After Prince Jing returned, he also requested a title for Third Miss, which was Duanmin.

Fang Yuaner suppressed a surge of anger and smiled, saying, "What? Did someone drug Princess Duanmin's wet nurse's food too?"