Transmigrated Farmgirl's Scheme to Get Rich - Chapter 189
Dagan’s Marriage (II)
Every single word Mrs. Liu said attacked her husband’s weak spot. Even the most even-tempered man in ancient China wouldn’t be able to withstand this assault.
Mrs. Liu’s husband threw the bowl of rice in his hand onto the floor with one hand, “Women, have you not been beaten enough?! You say I’m incompetent, at least I have enough competence to marry you. You’ve never done anything productive, aside from gossiping about people in the village, what do you know?”
Mrs. Liu was naturally unwilling to lose this argument, and when she heard her husband push the blame on her, she instantly became furious, “I was blind to have married someone as worthless as you initially. You still have the face to blame me?!”
Her husband raised his hand, and slapped Mrs. Liu’s face with a deafening bang. She started sobbing as she clawed him, and while the two were fighting, Dagan suddenly stood up to separate the two, “Stop it, we can’t blame our family’s poverty on anyone, and it’d be useless to blame anyone. However, our family conditions can only improve if we all work together and do our best as a collective. The more we argue amongst ourselves, the poorer we get!” [1]
Dagan was unable to marry a wife after he grew up due to his poverty. As his parents, they had always felt worried about this and felt like they had let their son down. Dagan’s father didn’t have any skills to earn a living off, so he subsisted off the few acres of farmland their family had. Their family had three sons, all with large appetites, so the grain harvested from their fields was barely enough to feed the entire family with almost nothing remaining.
Mrs. Liu was unwilling to just have taken a beating without retaliating, and she went to claw at her husband while sobbing, but was forcibly stopped by a hug from Dagan, “Mum, stop it!”
Mrs. Liu wasn’t able to retaliate against her husband, so turned her ire against Dagan, and started hitting him while sobbing, “I’ve suffered for so many years while married to him, and which family’s daughter would be willing to marry to a family as poor as ours? Xiaoyue is a young lady with good conditions, and with our family conditions, there’s no way you’d be able to marry her even after eight lifetimes.”
Although Mrs. Liu was a shrew, her words were reasonable, and her husband knew that with their current family conditions, it would be difficult for his sons to get brides.
Her husband raised his head and said, “The matchmaker really said he wouldn’t be considered a live-in husband?”
Mrs. Liu brushed tears off her face, “Do you think she was lying? We could always ask Pingshun.” [2]
It still hadn’t gotten to the point where the two families would sit down to discuss the marriage, so there was no reason to ask him directly.
Her husband furrowed his brow for a brief second before saying, “But it’d just sound like Dagan was a live-in husband if he stayed at his father-in-law’s, and it’s so hard to accept!”
“Then what do you want to do? Marry Xiaoyue into the family instead?”
“How about letting them build a house elsewhere in the village? We can say that it’s our dowry for Xiaoyue, so our son would no longer be considered a live-in husband.”
When Mrs. Liu heard that, she even forgot the pain from her husband’s slap, “That’s right! It’s a perfect solution!”
Dagan let go of his mother and sighed, “Why are you trying to get every advantage possible? Do you think I’m descended from royalty?”
Mrs. Liu said joyfully, “However, they were the ones who wanted this marriage to happen!”
Dagan sighed again and shook his head as he returned to his room. His mother called behind him, “Tomorrow, go to town to tell Matchmaker Wong our decision, and ask her to send word to the Wu family.”
“I won’t go, I’d be too ashamed to open my mouth.”
“If you can’t even do this, how could you help out with your work in the workshop? I raised an inarticulate bottle gourd!”
Mrs. Liu’s husband gave her a look and ordered their two younger sons to clean up. He dragged her to their room to talk about how they should negotiate this marriage.
Coincidentally, the next day was a market day, so Mrs. Liu used the excuse of going to the market to personally seek out Matchmaker Wong. When Matchmaker Wong heard her condition, she couldn’t help but laugh out of rage, “Dagan’s mother, you’ve thought this through? If word spreads that the other party rejected your offer, your reputation in the future will not be good.”
“We’ve talked this through, and I’ll have to request that you make another trip to the Wu family’s house.”
Matchmaker Wong brushed her clothes and said coldly, “There’s nothing wrong about me making a trip for nothing, after all, my legs aren’t worth anything. It’s just a shame that a good marriage won’t be able to happen!”
“You’re saying that they won’t agree?”
Seeing Mrs. Liu’s questioning face, Matchmaker Wong said, “If you had a daughter, would you agree to these conditions?”
That single question stumped her, and she said in frustration, “If people are going to call my son a live-in husband anyways, why not make it official so their family has to give ours money instead. It’d be useful for helping my second son find a bride.”
When she heard this, Matchmaker Wong approved, “I think they’d agree to that!”
Mrs. Liu sighed, “I’ll have to wrong Dagan. He’s done so much for our family all these years.”
“When it comes to something as big as marriage, it is paramount to respect your children’s opinion. As long as Dagan doesn’t feel wronged, it’s fine. After all, it’s his wedded life you’re talking about.”
Mrs. Liu didn’t know what to do, so decided to find Dagan at the workshop to discuss the matter. When she entered, Dagan was wearing a canvas apron and was working with two other men in the workshop to brush tung oil onto raincoats.
She waved Dagan over, and he handed over the work he was doing to the other two men before walking over and asking, “Mum, why have you come?”
Mrs. Liu saw that the other two were looking at them, “I went to the market. Come on, I have someone I want to ask you.”
Seeing how secretive she was being, Dagan knew it had something to do with his marriage, so he took her to the back of the workshop to talk.
“Mum, what’s the matter?”
“I just went to talk to Matchmaker Wong, and even she thought we wouldn’t be able to use a new house as a dowry. I was thinking that since people would say that you are a live-in husband anyways, why not use the opportunity to get a dowry from them instead?”
Dagan was so angered that he shook his head while laughing, “Mum, it’s fortunate that governing official Wu doesn’t look down on me, but it seems like you’re trying to stomp my reputation down to the ground! Shame on you for trying to get a dowry from them.”
“But I feel like I’m wronging you by giving you the reputation of a live-in husband for nothing.”
“Mum, I’d be blessed to be married to Xiaoyue, and I don’t feel wronged at all. I know what you’re thinking, and even if I marry Xiaoyue, I will still help out at home.”
“But what if your dad doesn’t agree?”
“Give him a few days, he’ll agree.”
The two were talking when Xiuying came out from the toilet at the side. She had come to the workshop to hand in her work. Mrs. Liu felt a jolt in her heart, as she had probably heard what they were just talking about. This matter will definitely spread within the village, and Ms. Liang would laugh at them about it.
Mrs. Liu pretended she hadn’t seen Xiuying and deliberately raised her voice, “Other families can’t even dream of being in-laws with the governing official’s family!”
Dagan played along, “This isn’t the most important. What’s important is that Xiaoyue is gentle and a good person, I’ll be blessed for the rest of my life!”
Xiuying went over to greet them, and Mrs. Liu pretended to just have seen her before hastily leaving the workshop to go and find Matchmaker Wong.
She had just left when Mrs. Li came over to drag Xiuying to the side, “Ying’er, we should withdraw talks of engaging you to Mo Feng!”
Xiuying flung her hand away and asked, “Why, didn’t you already agree to it?”
Mrs. Li fixed her hair, “Madam Cao has returned!”
Xiuying didn’t understand, “So what? Is she not allowing me to get married to Mo Feng?”
Mrs. Li grabbed Xiuying’s hand again and said blissfully, “No, but she’s talked with Cao Zhang’s fiance, and as long as he’s willing to be married, she’d let him have concubines after the marriage.”
Xiuying flung her hand away again, “What, you want me to be his concubine? What are you thinking, you want me to throw away the position of a wife to be a concubine?”
“Cao Zhang is going to take the imperial examination and be an official, and what official doesn’t have multiple consorts? If you become his concubine, you can live in the metropolis and live a luxurious life.”
P.S. It’s good to have ambition, but being greedy will inevitably ruin your life one way or another. It’s important to be thankful for what you have.
[1] I assume it should go without saying, but neither the translator, site or author endorses domestic violence and if you are a victim, seeking help is the best solution. There are many apps to report domestic abuse which have functionality to be disguised as other, more innocuous apps if the person abusing you regularly checks your phone.
[2] On a less serious note, governing official Wu’s full name is Wu Pingshun. I typically go with governing official Wu as I think the members of the younger generation would call him that, while the rest would call him more casually by his name.