Chapter 1567 - The Maid at Home

"Don't be ridiculous—how could you possibly know they're lip-syncing?" Qian Duoduo asked.

"Oh, it's obvious. And even if they are actually singing, do you really think the Senators are there for the music?" Zhang Yunmi scoffed. "Men. They're all like the proverbial drunkard whose interest isn't in the wine. Did you hear? Director Fang actually went to Chairman Wen specifically to requisition silk stockings." She burst into laughter, unable to contain herself. "I can't even imagine what Chairman Wen's face looked like!"

"He was probably wearing his most serious expression," Lin Ziqi chimed in, "while secretly thinking: more legs to look at."

The girls dissolved into laughter together.

The carriage rolled to a stop at Gate Three of South Sea Farm. Lin Ziqi declined to have the school bus make a special trip into the farm just for her—it would mean circling around for half an hour and wasting everyone's time—so she got off here instead.

South Sea Farm sat entirely within the Green Zone, which meant Lin Ziqi could walk alone without concern. The security precautions were stringent: no naturalized citizens other than farm employees and their families could enter at all. Even naturalized personnel who came on official business could only access the administrative compound with a proper permit. Venturing anywhere else required a special pass and a designated escort. These protocols served a dual purpose—protecting the Senators who frequented the farm's café for leisure, and safeguarding the various seedlings and seeds from theft or sabotage.

"Please take care, Miss. Watch your step." The young Guard Company soldier politely steadied her hand as she descended the carriage steps.

"Thank you." Lin Ziqi flashed him a bright smile. The Guard Company soldiers these days were jointly selected by the General Staff Political Department, the Political Security Bureau, and the General Affairs Office. Beyond absolute political reliability—a minimum of two years' service to the Senate, family members with solid records residing and working in Lingao, excellent military training, quick reflexes, and actual combat experience—there were also exacting standards for appearance: height no less than 165 centimeters, well-proportioned features, a clear and resonant voice, and Mandarin proficiency of at least Level 2B.

These soldiers, tall and handsome by naturalized citizen standards, stood ramrod straight. Even in simple cotton uniforms, they appeared capable, upright, and dashing.

"For the Senate and the People!" The soldier snapped a salute and watched her pass through the farm gate before returning to his position on the carriage's rear footboard. Around him, three other soldiers maintained a state of alert, hands ready at their weapons.

Lin Ziqi acknowledged the Petition Police at the gate with a slight nod. Beyond the entrance stretched a tree-lined path. The windbreak forests planted on either side of the road had matured into modest groves. Farm workers in conical hats and work clothes streamed past in both directions, with horse carts and handcarts trundling by at intervals. Those who recognized her removed their hats from a distance to greet her, and she returned each greeting with smiles and kind words.

The walk was considerable—nearly half an hour on foot—but Lin Ziqi had declined her father's offer to send a rickshaw. She didn't consider the trek a burden. The fields, woods, and gardens flanking the road were like living paintings, and walking among them filled her with a quiet happiness, as though she were strolling through a work of art.

After more than half an hour, the farm's residential area finally came into view. From outside, it resembled a clean, pretty village nestled among woods and fields. The main cluster consisted of dormitories for the farm's naturalized cadres. Adjacent to it lay a smaller, separate district housing the Senators who worked at the Agricultural Committee, along with several Senators from the biology fields who had moved in during their early service to the Committee.

A Guard Company duty station stood at the entrance to the Senator residential area. Wu Nanhai had originally considered this arrangement somewhat disconnected from the masses and suggested using Petition Police instead. The General Affairs Office had disagreed, maintaining that close protection of Senators should remain the Guard Company's responsibility.

"Busy, Sister Ju?" Ziqi spotted Sister Ju, the maid at Wu Nanhai's house, spreading vegetables out to dry as soon as she entered the residential area.

Though every household here had its own courtyard, the maids still preferred to dry vegetables in the public square—more room to spread out, and better sunlight. All along the way in, dried vegetables lay spread along roadsides and in open spaces. If Wu Nanhai hadn't firmly prohibited it, there would also be large quantities of foul-smelling salted fish, fish sauce jars, and other preserved products curing here.

Sister Ju turned and saw it was Lin Ziqi. She hurriedly wiped her hands on her apron and greeted her with a smile.

"Oh, Ziqi—school's out?" Wu Nanhai emerged from the small church at one end of the residential area, wearing his genial smile.

Ziqi's expression brightened further. "Yes, Uncle Nanhai." She had always called Chu Qing "Sister," yet called Wu Nanhai "Uncle"—a small mischief of hers.

It wasn't even five o'clock. Though Wu Nanhai was one of the few "new good men" among the Senators, he rarely came home before work officially ended. His early return struck Lin Ziqi as somewhat odd.

Overtime was routine in the Senate. Working several extra hours after official hours was the norm. Like the families of Lin Ziqi's neighbors, one usually couldn't see the masters of the house during normal hours at all—they came home in the small hours of the night. Whenever Lin Ziqi saw their maids sweeping the front steps or heading out to shop, she would speculate about their state of mind. Were they lonely and desolate? Neglected by their men? Experiencing all sorts of emptiness and isolation?

These speculations ended only when the maids of these households, one after another, developed swelling bellies—and then were seen cradling babies. Clearly, they weren't as empty and lonely as she had imagined.

She exchanged greetings along the way, carefully navigating around the toddlers "rampaging" everywhere in their tottering steps, and finally arrived at the gate of her own courtyard.

Lin Ziqi's father, Lin Fatian, had been a horticulture technician at a landscaping company before the crossing. After D-Day, he was naturally assigned to the Agricultural Committee as an agricultural technician. His current official titles numbered seven or eight, but Lin Ziqi hadn't memorized a single one. That her father was a Senator—a "Chief"—was enough.

The courtyard gate stood open. This was the one thing she couldn't stand about their Life Secretary: the door always open, never a knock before entering a room. No matter what you were doing, she'd just push the door open and walk in.

This Menglan—well, she wasn't bad-looking. That was precisely why Lin Ziqi had once given her "a very nice, very poetic" name. But her performance in the maid training class had apparently left something to be desired.

Still, if you scolded her, she'd just listen with her head bowed and tears welling up. If you grew harsher, she'd simply drop to her knees. Once, when Lin Ziqi lost her temper, Menglan approached with tears streaming down her face, holding a rattan cane, and knelt before her—presenting it with both hands. That day, Lin Ziqi learned what "bearing thorns to plead guilty" truly meant.

"Attitude excellent, absolutely refuses to change"—after several such episodes, Lin Ziqi couldn't be bothered to nag about this issue anymore and simply locked her door whenever she returned to her room.

Fortunately, Menglan was nimble enough with housework, and her cooking was quite good. The hygiene habits Lin Ziqi had worried most about were actually decent too—according to Menglan, they'd been "beaten into her" with the cane. Whenever Menglan spoke of her experiences in the training class—"who knows how many canes were broken," "beaten until she couldn't sit down, sleeping on her stomach every night," "tears shed by the jarful"—Lin Ziqi actually felt a pang of sympathy. When you thought about it, Menglan was only in her early twenties, just a few years older than herself. And though she naturally found her own father pleasing to look at, he was still a man in his mid-forties, tanned dark from working the fields—hardly some dashing figure.

If she herself had to marry a man of such appearance, Lin Ziqi would absolutely refuse.

Yet normally, one couldn't tell that Menglan had endured so much "suffering." She did her housework cheerfully every day, attended to her father with meticulous care, and when Lin Ziqi came home, served her the same way—if anything, even better. In short, no woman from the old spacetime, including her mother who had divorced her father, would ever serve a man this way. Lin Ziqi was beginning to understand why her uncles, as well as her father, had risked their lives to come to this other spacetime.

Passing through the gate, she found the courtyard small but clean and tidy. The center was paved with flagstones, flower beds lined the walls, planted with various flowers and ornamental plants. One bed contained an assortment of herbs—this was Ziqi's "little garden," though her father now tended it. In one corner stood a wisteria trellis with a round table and rattan chairs beneath it, where Lin Fatian often sat to smoke, drink tea, and relax.

Several long stone tables displayed various bonsai trees—Lin Fatian's hobby. He would pick up good stumps whenever he found them and pot a few. When he had too many, he'd give them away. His works were displayed in the Executive Committee and Senate office buildings.

Menglan was sweeping the courtyard. She was just twenty years old and had been Lin Fatian's Life Secretary for three years, living with them the entire time. She wasn't particularly pretty, but she was quite proper-looking, with a medium build. The black and white maid outfit suited her well. Though Lin Ziqi knew this was a quirk of the Senators, as long as it looked good, she didn't mind.

Spotting the rarely-returning Young Miss, Menglan immediately set down her broom and hurried over to receive her, taking Ziqi's canvas bag. "The Chief did mention you'd be coming back. I thought it would be a bit later. How long is your break? You must be hungry—dinner won't be ready for a while yet. Let me get you some snacks."

"No need, I had some treats on the way. I'm not hungry now." Lin Ziqi spoke as she walked. "I only have two days off. I may have to go back to school early. Is the bathwater ready?"

The hot water supply in the Senator dormitories relied on copper heat exchangers installed inside the stoves, using wood or coal briquettes to heat the tap water. Similar to a gas water heater—but since Lingao lacked high-calorie gas, they made do with stove fuel for heating. This type of stove required adding fuel and heating up before each use.

"Everything's ready. Would the Young Miss like to bathe now? I'll add wood to the fire right away." Menglan followed her through the courtyard into the vestibule, immediately kneeling down to bring out grass-woven slippers and help her change out of her shoes.

(End of Chapter)