A Girl Traveling Through Troubled Times

I don’t know if Miss Shen noticed that the two ladies were teasing Sha Yanyao, but she didn’t say anything and was in a bad mood after she went back.

Then, while eating, he told his wife and Sha Yanyao at the table that he wanted to do charity to help the orphans in the orphanage.

The lady said, "It's good that you have such a kind heart. It can bring merit to our Sha family, but you have to hurry up and expand your family."

Miss Shen was stunned for a moment, smiled unnaturally, and said nothing.

After finishing her meal, Guier took out an exercise book, flipped through a few pages, tore off a page, and wrote on it: Go find Wu Mingqiang and ask him to tell his second brother that Jiangcheng is preparing supplies for Kafeng City, and ask him to be more careful and take precautions.

After finishing writing, put it back into the exercise book, then pull it out a little bit so that a corner of the page with the writing protrudes.

After that, he looked around and saw that there was no one around, so he took the homework book to the servants' quarters, found Ah Cheng, and said, "Brother Ah Cheng, I don't have enough homework books like this one. I need to go buy a new one. Can you go and buy a new one?" Then he handed the homework book to him, deliberately twisting the protruding corner as he handed it to him, and said, "I want to buy an identical one like this one."

She made sure that Ah Cheng had seen her action, and then handed him the money again. Ah Cheng smiled and said, "Okay, Miss, I'll go right away."

Gui'er nodded and went back to her room. Dingxiang saw her and said, "Miss, why did you have to run down to tell me? Just let me give it to Ah Cheng."

Guier smiled and said, "It's just a small matter, it's okay." Then she went back to the house to wait.

After waiting anxiously for about two hours, Ah Cheng finally came back. He took out two exercise books, handed them to Gui Er and said, "Miss, I'm sorry to have kept you waiting. I bought the exercise books."

Gui'er opened the book that had been given to her before, and the note with the words on it was gone. She glanced at Acheng.

Ah Cheng smiled at her innocently and nodded. She knew that the work had been done, so she smiled and said, "You have worked hard. Go back and rest."

However, there was no news from Sha Yanxiao, and Guier was very worried. The next day after school, when Ah Cheng came to pick her up, she immediately asked about what happened last night.

Ah Cheng said, "I saw the words you put in your exercise book, but I can't read. So I went to the bookstore and saw some children buying books. I thought they must know how to read, so I asked them to read it to me."

Gui'er was a little worried that the news would leak out and said, "He's just a little kid. If this news gets out it will be very disadvantageous to us."

Ah Cheng smiled and said, "Don't worry, Miss. Those kids are there to buy comic books. They are not even as tall as my knees, so they probably don't understand those things."

Gui Er finally felt relieved. She said to Ah Cheng, "Did you hear any news about my second brother when you went to Wu Mingqiang's place yesterday?"

Ah Cheng sighed and said, "I was too busy yesterday and didn't have time to ask. If you want to know, I'll make time to go over there in the next two days and ask Brother Qiang."

Gui'er nodded. Seeing that Ah Cheng was already in his early twenties, while Wu Mingqiang was only eighteen or nineteen, she smiled and said, "Be careful when you go to see him. Don't expose yourself. Speaking of which, Wu Mingqiang should be younger than you, Ah Cheng, right? Why do you call him brother?"

Ah Cheng scratched his head and said embarrassedly, "I have no ability. I am not like him. He is literate, skilled, ruthless and experienced. When he first came to marry the young lady, everyone looked at him because he was thin and small and bullied him. But now everyone respects him in their hearts."

Gui'er nodded. It was indeed the case. No wonder Sha Yanxiao was willing to trust him.

Two days later, when Ah Cheng picked up Gui'er from school, he told her that he had asked Wu Mingqiang, who said that everything was fine on Sha Yanxiao's side, but he was still worried that something might happen on the eldest wife's side, and that contacting Gui'er would make things difficult for her, so he stopped contacting her. He also said that the people Gui'er had arranged to go to the farm and Fengcheng had arrived on time, and that Sha Yanxiao told Gui'er to go to school with peace of mind and not to worry.

Only then did Gui'er finally feel relieved. However, when she occasionally strolled around the Marshal's mansion and walked to the vicinity of Sha Yanxiao's original courtyard, she still felt sad to see that things and people had changed. Although the fifth and sixth concubines had moved in, they were not on good terms. They quarreled every other day over who occupied an extra room or whose daughter always occupied a good position in the living room.

Gui'er shook her head, too lazy to pay attention.

Now, Miss Shen goes to the orphanage whenever she has time. Sometimes she brings snacks and steamed buns, and sometimes she buys some clothes for the children. Gui'er will also go with her when she is on vacation.

Guier discovered that two-thirds of the babies at the orphanage were girls. The nanny in charge explained, "Boys generally have some sort of illness. If they're healthy, many people are willing to adopt them. Girls, however, are not so popular. They're usually raised until they're seven or eight years old, then introduced to wealthy families as domestic servants. Nowadays, they're also taught to read. Girls like these, who can write and count, are more likely to thrive in their hosts' homes."

Gui'er thought about how she could also write and count when she first came to the Song family, but it was still very difficult. So she asked the nanny: "After you send your children to work as servants in wealthy families, will you still visit them and follow up on their living conditions?"

The nanny smiled wryly and said, "Miss, you're joking. Look at how many babies we have in our orphanage. There are five or six who can just walk, a dozen who need to be fed, and some who are five or six years old. We've already arranged for them to help take care of the younger ones. We only have four people in the entire orphanage, and after the last war, suddenly a lot of people sent their children here. We said we didn't have enough supplies to support them, but they didn't listen. Some just left without any clothes to wear. Only kind people like you can ease our predicament by sending us things."

Gui'er sighed. Those young girls who were sent to work as servants in wealthy families were undoubtedly part of human trafficking. But there seemed to be no other solution. And on a darker note, some of them might be sold to brothels or similar places, but she was powerless to stop that.

Some of the children in the orphanage were already 6 or 7 years old. Seeing Gui'er coming here often and getting familiar with her, they would chat with her. After learning that Gui'er was an adopted daughter and could go to school, they were very envious. One or two of them even expressed their desire for Gui'er to take them to the Marshal's Mansion as servants, saying that if possible, they would be the luckiest and most promising person in the orphanage.

But Gui Er didn't dare agree, and Miss Shen didn't agree either. She said, "It's too much of a responsibility to take on someone's life."