Reborn in the last years of Kangxi

Chapter 1322 Reunion

From Tongzhou back to Beijing, all the way is the official road.

It is inevitable that there will be family members of officials in the traffic.The carriage that Chuyu was riding in was built inside and decorated with elegant decorations.

Most of the officials and family members they met avoided.

At this time, the ranks are strict, and the carriage here shows that the female relatives are traveling here, so there are no irrelevant people coming to the camp, only two outside officials who were born in the palace of the Chun Palace met head-on and recognized him as the big princess of the palace The chariots and horses flew off, and strode over to say hello.

When they got closer, the two saw Cao Yong in ordinary clothes again.

They can recognize Chuyu's carriage, they often go to Prince Chun's mansion, and it is not unusual to recognize Cao Yong, the Heshuo son-in-law.

Cao Yong had to say a few words of congratulations. Zhang Yi was alert. Seeing this, he had already prepared to send Cheng Yi to him.

The two were very grateful, and watched Cao Yong and his party drift away before turning around and heading towards Tongzhou.

Zhang Yi rode a horse and followed Cao Yong, saying: "Master, it seems that it is better to come to Tongzhou less often. Whenever you come here, don't send seven or eight copies of Cheng Yi."

Cao Yong laughed and said: "Reciprocity is reciprocal, reciprocity is reciprocal, don't be afraid to send it out, as long as you don't take back too much."

Zhang Yidao: "Only the master is afraid of receiving heavy gifts. Other Beijing officials are eager to send a penny and come back with thousands of gold."

Cao Yong just laughed and said nothing, and Beijing officials have to divide their lives when they are poor.

The low-ranking ones are filial to the top, socialize with colleagues, appease subordinates, and ask for money everywhere.Coupled with the high price of goods in the capital, there are not just one or two officials who go in and out of pawnshops on weekdays.

Those of Cao Yong's rank don't have such worries. The subordinates of the yamen "three festivals and two longevity" are filial piety, foreign officials come to Beijing to respect ice and charcoal, and local taxes are distributed when they enter Beijing and put into the warehouse.

At this time, I am really not afraid of not receiving the gift, but really afraid of the heavy gift.

Under the courtesy, you must ask for something from others. If you accept it, you must take responsibility, and if you refuse, you will offend others.

The official career is dangerous, who knows that any "little stone" can affect the whole family and make mistakes.

Like Zhang Tingyu, it is a way to directly explain to the concierge that gifts exceeding 100 taels of silver are not accepted at all; like Cao Yong, no matter how heavy the gift is, he will ask people to return it with a similar gift.

When the outside world talked about the two ministers of the Ministry of Household Affairs, some praised it, and some made sarcastic remarks.

It is nothing more than that the Zhang family is collectively known as a rich man, with hundreds of thousands of hectares of land in the family, and there is no shortage of this little money in official communication; it is also said that the Cao family's father and grandfather have run Jiangning weaving for two generations and have accumulated a large amount of property.

After walking for a while, I saw a carriage parked by the side of the road.It's not like seeing a nobleman backing down, but that something went wrong and the horse has already been unloaded.

In addition to this broken carriage, there is also a mule cart, which looks rougher and should be prepared for the servants.

Outside the broken carriage, there were several servants and a middle-aged man in ordinary clothes, with a young man standing beside him.

Is this a broken carriage?

Zhang Yi knew that his master was not nosy, so he looked away.

Cao Yong squinted his eyes at the middle-aged man in front of the carriage, with a faint smile on his face.

The man seemed to sense that someone was looking at him, and looked up in this direction.

At this moment, Cao Yong and his party were only less than ten feet away from the man. Even Zhang Yi and Cao Man could see that the man in front of him had a kind face.

"It's Young Master Biao..." Cao Man was surprised in a low voice.

The man also recognized Cao Yong and his party. He was taken aback for a moment, then immediately walked forward a few steps, approached Cao Yong's horse's head, greeted him with a big gift, and said: "Nephew... I have seen Uncle Yong, nephew, please Yong." Uncle Ann..."

It turned out that it was none other than Gu Na.

Cao Yong reined in the reins, got off the horse, and helped Gu Na himself.

The handsome boy back then has become a middle-aged man.

He is only a few years older than Cao Yong, but now he looks like he is more than ten years older.

Even though he already knew that Gu Na would return to Beijing to see him, it can be seen that at the moment of seeing Gu Na, Cao Yong's mood was still agitated, he nodded and said, "I'm safe, is Yu Rong safe too?"

"Yurong" is Gu Na's character, which was given by his mentor and father-in-law Cai Shengyuan in his early years, and it means "abundant and tolerant".

Gu Na nodded without hesitation, and said in a loud voice: "Thanks to Uncle Yong, my nephew is doing well, living a very happy life."

Due to bumps and bumps and a lot of fate, Gu Na often had a depressed look between his brows and eyes in his early years, and because of frequent frowning between his brows, he had deep "Sichuan character lines", looking lacking in vitality.

After being outside for several years, although he was tanned, his body is still strong, and he looks a little rich, and the "Sichuan character lines" between his eyebrows are much lighter.

The temperament exuded by the whole person has changed a lot from before.

Cao Yong has let go twice, so he knows the freedom of "the sky is high and the emperor is far away".Even though the government affairs are complicated and the responsibilities to be borne are great, the days away from the center of the court and the struggle of power are tiring, but the heart is relaxed.

Thinking that he had a rough half of his life, and finally he could live a happy life, Cao Yong was also happy for him.

Cao Yong raised his head, looked at the hesitant young man not far away, and said to Gu Na: "Are you bringing your wife and children back?"

In the early years in the capital, although Gu Na had a personal relationship with Cao Yong and occasionally visited him, it was revealed in front of the world that Gu Na wanted to cling to the Cao family but was unable to do so.

After all, one of the two is attached to elder brother, and the other is determined to be a pure minister.

Therefore, Gu Na's wife Cai Shi and their children never went to Cao's house to ask for peace.

The reason why Cao Yong believed that the boy was the son of Gu Na was because the boy's appearance was somewhat similar to that of Gu Na when he was young.

Listening to Cao Yong's question, Gu Na realized that he was so excited that he forgot to introduce his son to Cao Yong, and hurriedly said: "It's my nephew's eldest son, Boping. The mother-in-law is old and misses her daughter and grandchildren, so my nephew took them The mother and son will go to Beijing, and the family will be able to get together." After finishing speaking, he turned his head and called the young man to come forward.

"Brother Ping, it's my father's cousin, your cousin, hurry up and say hello!" Gu Nayang said.

Gu Boping stepped forward as he said, without hesitation, lifted up his skirt, knelt down on the ground, and gave a big gift to this "cousin uncle" whom he had met for the first time: "Grandson has met cousin, grandson please ask cousin to police."

Although it was the first time he saw Cao Yong, he already knew who he was when he heard the word "cousin uncle".

He is the grandson of the great aunt of the Gu family, the Minister of the Household Department, and the second-class uncle Cao Yong.

Gu Na never hides his origin in front of his family. The glory of the Gu family as the leader of scholars in the south of the Yangtze River, the decline of the Gu family, and the youth when he lost his father and married his mother and was taken care of by the Cao family.

Gu Boping heard it in his ears and kept it in his heart.

As for why the two families were estranged in the early years, there were many inside stories, and Gu Na couldn't go into details with a child, only saying that they had different political views.

Gu Boping seemed to understand but didn't understand, he only felt vaguely or something like this.

Back then when Gu Na was demoted from the capital, Gu Boping was already in his teens, already a half-grown child, not only remembering things, but also making his own judgments.

He knew that his father's fault was "the elder brother attached to the party", and the reason why the grandfather's reputation was tarnished during his lifetime was "flattering the powerful" and "frivolity". One of Brother Nine's disciples is his wife.

Now, that disciple has long since been dismissed from office, and Cai's concubine sister has also died of illness.

He had heard all these vaguely, and he didn't dare to ask the reason in detail. He only knew what was going on after seeing him for the past two years.

No matter what difficulties father and grandfather have, standing in line is standing in line.

How many officials were involved because of Kowloon's seizure of the throne.

It makes sense for the cousin of the Cao family to alienate them.

However, even when the relationship between the two families is alienated, the uncle of the Cao family can still give advice and take care of his father regardless of the past, so that Gu Boping is not really grateful?

He was young after all, even though he tried his best to restrain himself, he couldn't hide the expression of gratitude between his brows and eyes.

Cao Yong stretched out his hand to help Gu Boping up, and he had to ask a few sentences about how old he was and what book he was reading.

Here uncle and nephew met, Chu Yu got the news in the carriage.

Just when Gu Na proposed to bring his son to greet Chu Yu first, Chu Yu had already sent his mother-in-law over, and said: "Master, Madam said that it is inconvenient to meet outside, after all, it is not cheap. Since the young master Biao brought a female family member, please invite the female family member." Come and return to Beijing in the same car, so we can talk on the way."

Although the words were tactful, what did Gu Na not understand?Such an arrangement was just because their carriage broke down, and they wanted to take them back to Beijing, and they were concerned about the face of their husband and wife.

Gu Na could only be grateful for such kindness, how could he be ungrateful?

He sent his son to pass the message, and after a while, two people got on and off the carriage, and a woman led a little girl and a little boy out of the carriage.

The woman was in her early thirties, wearing half-new clothes, with an elegant and calm demeanor.

The little girl was only six or seven years old, and she looked icy and cute, making people pitiful; the boy was even younger, only three or four years old.

Cao Yong glanced over from the woman, but was a little surprised when he saw the little girl.

As far as he knew, Gu Na had only two sons and a daughter, the son was the eldest and the daughter was the middle.The daughter died when she was less than one year old, one of the two sons was born in the capital, and the other was born in Gu Naren. Cao Yong asked people to prepare for the "hundred years old" and "anniversary", so I remember these more or less.

Now, how come there is an extra little girl?

At this moment, Cai has already brought two children forward, obeyed her husband's order, and respectfully brought the two children to Cao Yong to greet him.

Cao Yong could accept the courtesy of Gu Na and his son, but he didn't want women and children to kneel in front of him, so he ordered the woman next to him to support Cai, and took Cai and the two children into Chuyu's carriage.

Uncles and nephews have the same greetings as uncles and nephews, and the same is true between women.

However, Chu Yu is gentle with others, and the Cai family is from a scholarly family, so the two of you talk to each other, which is considered speculative.

Both Cao Yong and Gu Na had already mounted their horses, and before Cao Yong could ask questions, Gu Na honestly explained the little girl's background.

Although this little girl was not born to Gu Na and his wife, they were raised like their own daughters.The girl's parents are Cai's concubine's concubine's sister and concubine's husband, who married Ninth Brother, a powerful family member, to fill in the house...

(End of this chapter)