Great Tang Idyll

The waiter filled the wine goblet again. He looked for which food Magistrate Jia wanted to eat, and helped push the food forward.

After Magistrate Jia drank three goblets of wine in a row and ate a few mouthfuls of food, he took a look at the characters he wrote. He then turned to ask the waiter, "Have there been any outsiders causing trouble here recently? Since I need to protect the county, I must not let bad people cause trouble in the Tu'qiao Village."

Magistrate Jia actually wanted to know if anyone was causing trouble for the Zhang and Wang families. If there was, then he could ask to see who were the people behind them. If they were powerful, he could team up with them.

The waiter nodded and said, "My lord is really amazing. You knew that someone came here to cause trouble. Yes indeed. In the past few days, there have been at least four troublemakers."

"Hmm? Someone actually dared to come? Tell me, what kind of people are they?" Magistrate Jia spoke angrily with a stern face.

"I will tell you now. The first was the day before yesterday. I was on the second floor with nothing to do, so I thought of wandering around on the first floor, but guess what? There were three people sitting by the window, quarreling with the waiter. The waiter did not argue back. It was just those three people speaking. Guess what they said?"

The waiter looked nervous, as if he had encountered a very difficult task. Magistrate Jia listened carefully, and then asked without thinking, "What did they say?"

"Those guys were very fierce. They were asking why weren't they allowed to eat the food, why weren't they allowed to eat the rice, and why weren't they allowed to take away other people's leftovers? In the end, we had no choice but to give the three of them some leftover steam buns. They left afterwards. At that time, I was frightened to death. They…"

"I see. So three beggars came, and they left after they were given steam buns? Then there is no need to talk about them. Talk about the second time then."

The waiter nodded. "The next time? Then that would be the noon before yesterday. While I was waiting on the second floor, a few people came up. Their attire was decent. The first person directly gave me six coins. I was thrilled and I introduced a few signature dishes to them.

But when I served the dishes, guess what? You definitely won't be able to guess. Man, those few people took a look at the dishes and then took a look at me. Then they took a look at me and then back at the dishes. This made me wonder if I was myself or if the dishes were me. I didn't know if those dishes were dishes, or… "

"Talk about the important part." Magistrate Jia frowned.

"Okay, the most important thing is that they thought that I was harming them and that I wanted to feed them worms. Man, their eyes looked like they wanted to eat people. It was like they wanted to eat me. But I'm not food. I'm myself, and the dish is….Hmm, my lord, don't be angered. I will keep speaking. I'm too used to speaking like this.

What happened? My lord, you must have never imagined that this dish is innkeeper worm stir fried with chives. Innkeeper worm is a worm. It grew in the ocean. When the Zhang Manor sent people to help fight the locust plague, they collected some from there. The live ones were raised and the dead ones were dried. When eaten, they just need to be placed into warm water.

This thing is delicious. The manor's master said that it's good for the body. Those people didn't know about this. They ended up making me eat the entire plate of innkeeper worms. The taste was great. Normally, I wouldn't be able to eat this. How about we serve you this dish later? "

The waiter spoke enthusiastically. Fortunately, he finished talking and Magistrate Jia's expression turned back to normal.

"What happened later?" Magistrate Jia mainly thought about whether the few people got into conflicts with the restaurant, to what extent, and what their background was like.

"Later, they said that they had mistakenly blamed me, and then they gave me another six coins, so in total they gave me 12 coins and they paid for the meal. My lord, do you really not want to try to eat that innkeeper worm? Although it looks kind of scary, once you eat it, you would want to eat it again next time. A plate only costs 10 taels of silver."

The waiter gesticulated as he persuaded Magistrate Jia to eat. Magistrate Jia felt uncomfortable when he heard about it. It was worms. Who would eat that kind of thing? He waved his hand dismissively, "No need, I'll save your restaurant some money. Talk about the last two times."

The waiter showed a look of regret. He rearranged the dishes and said, "The third time was yesterday. Yesterday afternoon, when it was almost evening, there was someone eating on the first floor. That person was from the market; he did not have much money. He only ordered some dried tofu, and a bowl of wine.

When he finished eating, he said his stomach hurts. He ran to the latrine in the back and began to empty his bowels. He went so many times. He insisted that our tofu was bad and wanted to sue us. But our dried tofu has always been the best so it's impossible for it to have problems."

"What happened next? He died?" Magistrate Jia asked excitedly.

"No, there is a resident doctor in our restaurant. How could he die? The doctor came right away and diagnosed his illness. The doctor said that this was unrelated to our dried tofu. It was because he ate something else earlier. Later when we asked him, we asked him what he ate. That man, he didn't want to live anymore.

He bought some small shrimps at the market. In order to save money, he skewered them with twigs and ate them after roasting them. They were not cooked thoroughly and he also drank a lot of cold water. The doctor gave him medicine, and our restaurant paid for the medicine too. Good thing he went to eat at our restaurant. Otherwise, if he went home directly, he would probably die from diarrhea on his way home.

I followed the doctor to take a look at what he excreted. It was so stinky, a nasty fishy smell. I almost fell into it. My lord, let me tell you what that excreted thing looked like. If you look at it from a distance... "

"Stop talking. The fourth one." Magistrate Jia dry heaved. He tried hard to keep himself from thinking about it.

The waiter was obedient. Since he was asked to not talk about it, he did not talk about it. He cleared his voice and continued, "The fourth one happened this morning. Two people came to have a meal on the first floor. After the meal, they said that the dishes were not prepared well, and that the food was cooked at a temperature that was too high."

"The food was not stir fried. For breakfast, there was soy milk, and silken tofu, and we also gave out the restaurant's signature snack, rice crust, for free. It's the crunchy part that remains at the bottom of the pot of cooked rice– the rice was cooked with soup stock. They said that the cooking temperature was too high. If we knew about this beforehand, then we wouldn't have given it to them. My lord, do you think they are troublemakers? In the end, we didn't charge them for the meal. The two people happily finished their food, and did not leave behind any leftovers. They saved four coins."

The waiter spoke with a look of displeasure, as if he looked down on those two people a bit.

"That's all? Nothing else?" Magistrate Jia gave up on the last incident. How could he expect people who would cause trouble over four coins to accomplish anything?

"Nothing else. My lord, would you like to try that rice crust? You can eat it as a snack, and it's crunchy." The waiter continued to advertise the food.

Magistrate Jia was not in the mood to eat. He asked questions for this long for nothing. He shook his head and said, "No, you can leave now. After I finish eating, I will find a yard in the back to rest."

"Okay, my lord, please eat. I will frame the poem you wrote." The waiter didn't forget about the calligraphy. He walked over to roll it up, and left after saying a few words.

Magistrate Jia sat there, eating a few mouthfuls of food and drinking some wine. The more he thought about it, the more he felt like something was wrong. The waiter was a bit too talkative. This would be normal at other places, but how could the waiter not know that he and the manor master were standing on opposite sides? After the waiter heard the magistrate asked if there were troublemakers, there was no way the waiter would speak so freely. He must have lied.

He hated them even more in his heart. Even a waiter had the guts to deceive him. Magistrate Jia hastened his eating pace and after a short while, he put down his chopsticks. He got up and left. When he arrived at the first floor, the bailiffs had finished eating a while ago. It seemed like they also ordered wine. He knew without being told that they didn't have to spend a single coin. The Zhang manor would pay for the entire meal.

"My lord, are you finished? The yard is ready." Bailiff Tong leaned in and spoke with a low voice.

"Hmm, let's go." Magistrate Jia snorted, and was led by the bailiffs to the yard in the back. Someone had hung up lanterns here from early on and it looked really good. The snow in the yard was swept out and clean.

"My lord, please come inside. There is someone inside who will assist you." The bailiff did not plan to go in at this time.

Magistrate Jia nodded. Just when he raised his leg to step in, a greeting was heard coming from the side. "Isn't this the Magistrate? My lord, I didn't expect you to be here."

Confused, Magistrate Jia turned his head to look, but a bailiff stood in between them with a vigilant look on his face.

"Do you know this person?" Magistrate Jia looked at the person, but he didn't recognize him. He turned around to ask the bailiff next to him, but the bailiffs also shook their head, implying that they didn't know either.

"My lord may not know me, but I know you. When my lord took office, many people went to welcome you. I was among one of them. I'm not from the San'shui County; I'm from the Han Manor. I have some important matters to discuss with my lord."

Magistrate Jia was happy when he heard that. Disharmony. It was good that they had disharmony, very good. Make peace? He will definitely try to make peace. At this moment, he took at a glance at the bailiff beside him, and said, "All of you can go to rest. I will have a quick discussion with this person. Hurry up and leave already."

"My lord, then you have to be more careful. If anything happens, then it would be troubling." Bailiff Tong said with concern.

"Hmm, be careful. First search his body. And two of you can stay behind and stand guard outside." Magistrate Jia wanted to have a good talk with this person, and quickly urged them.