Chapter 260: Chapter 110: The Guest in the Wind and Snow_1
Lu Tong placed the oil lamp on the table and calmly asked, "They haven’t gone far; do you need me to call them back?"
He smiled noncommittally and glanced at the White Jade Guanyin in front of the small Buddha cabinet, his words carrying an implication, "Is this how you deceive people, a bodhisattva in front of others but a Rakshasa behind their backs?"
Lu Tong responded, "A royal guard before the Emperor, an escaped criminal behind, Lord Pei and I are not much different in weight."
She hadn’t forgotten that just a moment ago, Shen Fengying had said that an assassin had escaped from the palace.
Lu Tong smelled the faint scent of blood on Pei Yunmeng’s body, some things were not hard to deduce.
Pei Yunmeng was momentarily taken aback, then smiled, walked to the table beneath the window, and sat down, saying with a sigh, "Had I known Doctor Lu was so formidable, I wouldn’t have offended you earlier."
Lu Tong said nothing.
When Shen Fengying came to search the Renxin Medical Hall, because Pei Yunmeng had come out in a hurry, she had no choice but to let him hide in the room behind the wardrobe filled with clothes in her bedroom.
Yin Zheng and the other empty room were thoroughly searched by the Pawn Shop Soldiers, but Shen Fengying, due to a previous interaction, conducted a rather sloppy search of Lu Tong’s boudoir.
To cover up the faint scent of blood on Pei Yunmeng, she deliberately pushed several large porcelain jars with Yin Zheng to attract Shen Fengying’s attention. The poisonous substances in the jars gave Shen Fengying a scare, and amidst his alarm, he decided he was overthinking, and thus no longer questioned the integrity of Renxin Medical Hall.
Indeed, the successful deception was partly due to Pei Yunmeng’s own efficient hiding.
Seeing tea and a clean cup on the table, he reached out to pour himself some tea, but his movements were slightly slower than before. The change was minute, yet Lu Tong immediately noticed it.
Lu Tong looked up at him, "Are you injured?"
Pei Yunmeng paused in his pouring, not denying it, "Do you have medicine?"
Lu Tong turned and walked away, "Sold out."
She had no interest in playing the Living Bodhisattva, especially not for the escaped assassin who had arrived uninvited late at night. The night was fraught with dangers, and one false step could result in her being implicated by Pei Yunmeng, thwarting her long-term plans.
It was indeed hard not to be angry.
"Doctor Lu," Pei Yunmeng called out to her from the table with a smile, "didn’t you say that when you’re treating and saving people, you’re just a doctor?"
"At this hour, you should still be a doctor, right?"
Lu Tong paused in her steps.
That was what she had said at Prince Wen’s Mansion when she was helping Pei Yunshu give birth.
Pei Yunshu’s struggle and hope during childbirth reminded her of Lu Rou, and in a rare moment of softness, she felt a tender connection to Pei Yunshu, and because of that, she said those words to slightly soothe Pei Yunmeng’s agitation.
She hadn’t expected them to be used by Pei Yunmeng now.
After a moment of silence, Lu Tong walked to the cabinet in the room, found her medical box, took a bottle of medicine from it, and placed it on the table with a thud in front of Pei Yunmeng.
"Fifty taels of silver."
Pei Yunmeng: "..."
He looked up, "You’re jacking up the price because I’m sitting down, Doctor Lu."
"Seeking medical advice comes with a clear price."
"I thought you’d want to ask me for a favor," said Pei Yunmeng with a shake of his head and a smile, good-naturedly taking a silver note out of his pocket and placing it on the table.
Lu Tong took the silver note, a silver note worth a hundred taels; he was quite generous.
She took a copper scale from the cabinet, weighed some Pieces of Silver, and handed back exactly fifty taels to Pei Yunmeng, her tone level and unemotional, "The favor of a Marshal isn’t worth much, not as reliable as silver."
Pei Yunmeng looked at the pile of silver on the table, fell silent for a moment, and then commented, "Doctor Lu is very pragmatic."
Lu Tong stood at the table, frowning at him, and reminded him again, "Everyone outside is already gone, when does the Marshal plan to leave?"
Pei Yunmeng hissed with pain, and earnestly said, "Right now, in their eyes, you and I are accomplices. Bumping into them while going out, Doctor Lu, you won’t be able to get away either; it’s better to wait a bit longer."
His tone was casual, as if there was a deep friendship between him and Lu Tong, with no sense of stranger. However, it instantly provoked a thin layer of anger in Lu Tong’s heart.
Because her own actions were secretive, Lu Tong always preferred not to get overly involved with others. When Xia Rongrong moved into the courtyard, she tried to find ways to have Xia Rongrong move out.
Yet now, Pei Yunmeng had entered her bedroom, and it was uncertain how long he intended to stay.
The man was clearly cunning and calculating, yet he always managed to invoke the most innocent reasons, his righteous and stern demeanor making one feel irritable just by looking at him.
Lu Tong suppressed the chill in her heart and sat down on a chair beside another cot.
The courtyard was cold with snowy wind, the room warm like springtime. The north wind carried heavy snow past the window, and one could faintly see a sky full of shattered jade and flying frost. Meanwhile, the person inside the room cast a warm, shadowy silhouette of tea-pouring beside the floral window.