After the whole family was swept away, I lay down flat

Chapter 607 Countermeasures
Haitang carefully recalled every detail of the needlework she did at the Jin family.

There was nothing wrong with the needle technique, and there was nothing wrong with the words, so... there was a mistake when closing the needle? !

Haitang remembered. At that time, Ma asked her to embroider a few stitches on Ma Shangyi's needlework so that the latter could see her needlework skills. She couldn't resist for a moment, so she had to do it. However, she was very careful in her heart, fearing that if she used a special technique, it would be discovered. Therefore, she used the common needlework in Chang'an, the one that was everywhere, and embroidered a few lines of stitches very carefully.

But when Ma Shangyi came back, she heard footsteps in the room, so she quickly closed the needle and handed the needle and thread back to her grandmother. She closed the needle with her usual method, which happened to be a needle method she learned in the palace, created by an old palace maid in the needlework room of the Cining Palace. It was simple and beautiful, and could perfectly hide the thread ends.

She has been using this needle-removing technique for twenty to thirty years and has become so familiar with it that it's as easy as breathing. She doesn't have to think too much about it and just does it subconsciously.

Could it be that this was what aroused Ma Shangyi's suspicion? Did she think that a girl who grew up in a border town shouldn't be able to understand this unique technique created by the palace?
If this is the case, Haitang can only consider herself unlucky. It is true that she was a little careless, but the small stitch was enough for Ma Shangyi to spot the flaw. This retired female official had sharp eyes and was really suspicious. For this little doubt, she actually gave so much fabric and fur to the little girl next door and asked her to make new clothes for her. What if the clothes were not made well, wouldn't she have to pay for the fabric and fur in vain? These materials are worth at least dozens of taels of silver, right?
But it is not difficult to evade this matter. This method of closing the needle was invented by the palace maids, but it has been more than 80 years since its creation. It is quite popular in the palace. The palace maids who left the palace also introduced it to the people, but it is not common. After all, this is not an embroidery school, but just a trick of closing the needle. No one will specifically promote this needlework method.

The old palace maid who created the needle-retracting technique had four apprentices in the palace, one of whom left the palace sixty or seventy years ago. The remaining people in the palace continued to accept apprentices and teach the art. Haitang herself was one of her apprentices in her previous life. Therefore, any old palace maid who left the palace after that could have mastered this little skill. And they would not be taboo if they taught it to anyone. There was no way to investigate this kind of thing.

Ma Shangyi must have been in the palace for a long time and had never seen anyone who mastered this kind of acupuncture technique among the common people, so she thought Haitang should not know this little trick, right?

Haitang understood what was going on and thought of a way to deal with it, and she immediately became much calmer.

She took out the cut fabric and began to sew it carefully. She no longer used the common needlework that was common in the streets, but a style that was popular in the palace sixty or seventy years ago, but mixed with the folk characteristics of Chang'an and the northwestern border city. The stitches looked similar to her usual needlework, and similar to the needlework techniques used by her grandmother Ma, but those who knew the business could see the difference between it and the common needlework techniques in Chang'an.

Nothing happened all night.

She did her sewing until her usual rest time, then simply washed up and went to sleep. The next day, she asked her brother Haijiao quietly while eating breakfast: "What did Brother Jin talk to you about? When I saw him yesterday, he looked very excited, as if he had heard some big news and was uneasy."

Hai Jiao said: "I roughly know what happened. Although he said it was nothing, he was still very upset in his heart. I slowly asked him questions and he finally told me."

It is said that the emperor secretly sent more people from the capital, and he did not really mean to let Jin Wu and Jin Miao's wife and daughter who went to Shuzhong to seek refuge with relatives go free. He just did not want everyone in the second branch of the Jin family to die near Chang'an, which would arouse suspicion, so he sent people to follow them and wait for an opportunity to act. Jin Jiashu had been kept in the dark before, thinking that only a few adults in the second branch of the Jin family who knew about it would suffer. Yesterday evening, he accidentally ran into the people sent by the emperor to track and assassinate and talked with Ma Shangyi. Hearing Ma Shangyi's private complaints, he felt a great shock. Ma Shangyi actually felt that the emperor's killing was a bit too much. It was impossible for several children to know about it. Even Jin Miao's wife, because of her not harmonious relationship with her husband and parents-in-law, could not know the big secret of the second branch of the Jin family. The death of Liu Dainiang was related to the second branch of the Jin family, not to mention that they later used her death as an excuse to frame her husband, Mr. Hu, and seized the property of the Hu family. If Jin Miao's wife knew about this secret, why wouldn't she use it to threaten her husband's family and her husband to change their attitude towards her and her daughters?

But it was meaningless for Ma Shangyi to disagree. This was the emperor's will. The emperor had already issued an order and sent people. How could she disobey it? She could only speculate: "Could it be that the Sun family had done something to anger the emperor?" She told the visitor where the scattered survivors of the second branch of the Jin family were, and let the man take his men to carry out the order.

Haijiao whispered to Haitang, "Xiao Jin couldn't tell me the truth, he could only reveal a few vague words, but I guess it was more or less like this. He always felt that it was his idea that harmed Aunt Jin, and now Jin Wu and his aunt and cousin have been involved, he feels even more guilty. However, I think he is still calm, I guess he has let it go. This is the emperor's order, and it was the Sun family who angered the emperor first, which implicated the second branch of the Jin family, it has nothing to do with him. He doesn't need to take all the responsibility on himself."

Haitang didn't mention that she had already counseled Jin Jiashu once, and only said, "Brother Jin has come to his senses this time, but he has been hiding his secrets from us, and he always breaks down after hearing news from the capital. I'm really worried that he will get sick. Brother, please counsel him more often and let him focus on other things instead of always paying attention to the second branch of the Jin family."

"I will." Haijiao sighed, "This kid is just too soft-hearted. The second branch of the Jin family is not a good person. Even if the little ones haven't done anything evil yet, they won't do anything good in the future. If they die early, maybe they can hurt fewer people. Why should he be sad?"

Haijiao had experienced the most glorious time of the second branch of the Jin family in his previous life. He watched them go from poverty to prosperity to desolation and then to complete failure. He knew the stupidity each of them had done and the people they had harmed. He had no sympathy for the people of the second branch of the Jin family. Instead, he thought it would be better for them to die earlier so that they would not have to go to Beijing to stir up trouble.

It was a pity that he couldn't tell Jin Jiashu these words directly, otherwise he would have persuaded the latter to stop feeling sad for those vicious idiots.

Ma came out from the inner room and said, "What are you two talking about? If you don't eat, the food will get cold!"

Haijiao came to his senses and quickly swallowed the half-eaten bun in his hand. Haitang also quickly lowered her head and drank the millet porridge.

After finishing the millet porridge, she raised her head and said to Ma as if casually: "Grandma, I don't quite understand how to make some parts of the clothes I made for Ma. I'll bring them to you later and you can teach me, okay?"

Ma smiled immediately: "Okay, call your Aunt Ma over later. She is an expert at sewing and is much better than me in making clothes!"

(End of this chapter)