Chapter 270
270: The Foundling (12th Update)
The two of them got along quite harmoniously, their time together filled with warmth and beauty.
Li Hengyi went so far as to have Yuanbao move the tea set over, boiling water and brewing tea while he watched Xie Zhinuan tidy up their belongings.
He would occasionally call her over to take a sip of tea.
Xie Zhinuan turned with a smile, “Thank you!” She lifted the teacup, sipping lightly.
Her gaze shifted to the surface of the river.
A tiny black dot seemed to draw nearer, resembling a basin, and yet…
“Look, what is that?” Xie Zhinuan pointed.
Li Hengyi followed her gesture.
His brow slightly furrowed, “It looks like a basin!”
As it came closer, Xie Zhinuan also recognized, “Indeed, it’s a basin!”
Neither of them paid it much mind.
A basin, perhaps, had slipped from a young woman’s grasp while she was washing clothes and was swept away by the current.
Only when they heard the sounds of crying did Xie Zhinuan and Li Hengyi exchange looks, “Did you hear that?” asked Xie Zhinuan.
Li Hengyi nodded, “It’s the crying of a child!”
Coming from inside the wooden basin.
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Li Hengyi had barely realized what was happening when he leapt up, his toes skimming the surface of the water, rushing towards the basin. Upon seeing the child inside, he scooped it up along with the basin and brought it back to the deck.Yuanbao was already on his way, “Master!”
Xie Zhinuan stepped forward, looking at the bundle in Li Hengyi’s hands, she hesitated before saying, “Give the child to me!”
Li Hengyi silently handed her the child.
He had no experience with children.
Nor could he possibly raise this one.
Xie Zhinuan took the child, cradling and gently consoling him.
The baby was swaddled tightly, bound with cloth strips that prevented any movement. Now crying loudly, his sobbing grew more heart-wrenching upon laying eyes on Xie Zhinuan.
She hurriedly unwrapped the cloth strips and opened the swaddling clothes, immediately a foul smell emerged, clearly he had soiled himself.
“Yuanbao, get someone to prepare hot water, bring it to my room, and also…” Xie Zhinuan saw the child bawling and noticed he already had teeth, “cook some porridge!”
Carrying the child, she headed back to her room.
Lian Huai and the mute servant came in upon hearing the commotion, seeing Xie Zhinuan with a child, stinking and crying with a face swollen red with distress, they felt quite sorry for him.
“…” Lian Huai was extremely surprised.
They had picked up a child?
“Found him, I’ll clean him up first!”
She carried the child into the room, where Yuanbao had already carried in water. The mute followed inside and said softly, “Let me help!”
He still spoke somewhat awkwardly.
But Yuanbao was astonished.
He, he could speak? The mute could talk?
“Thank you, Uncle Mute!”
Xie Zhinuan undressed him, removing his pants, his body was covered in bruises, either from the cloth binding or seemingly from being pinched.
Then there was the fact that…
It was he, yet it was not he.
“Turns out he’s a Eunuch, no wonder he was abandoned!” Yuanbao said somberly.
With both sympathy and resentment.
Eunuch.
This was the first time Xie Zhinuan had heard the term.
She had never thought that a child could be abandoned simply because he wasn’t fully formed. But if there were so many places to abandon a child, why not leave him by the roadside, why throw him into the river?
Perhaps his parents still hoped he would live; otherwise, they wouldn’t have bound him with cloth, to prevent his struggling and falling into the river to drown.
Nor would they have raised him so long.
As Xie Zhinuan hesitated, the mute servant had already washed and dried the child with a soft cotton cloth, wrapping him up snugly.
Xie Zhinuan rummaged through the child’s clothes and swaddling, pulling out a piece of paper with his birth details written on it.
“…”
She exhaled softly.
Xie Zhinuan couldn’t quite articulate what she felt, only that it seemed oppressive, somewhat disagreeable.
Chapter 271