1416 Spot On
Shao Zhuang smacked the table angrily and said, “Who are you calling a dog!”

“Oh my! Your ears are quite sharp if you can hear my elder sister gossiping. Didn’t you say that you won’t speak until my grandfather comes? Then hold it in and don’t say anything,” Qiao Mei said.

“Didn’t you say you want to discuss this issue with us? Then let’s talk about it!” Shao Zhuang looked at Qiao Mei and continued, “Today’s banquet was clearly a setup by your Xia family to frame us! You deliberately buy so much liquor to get my younger brother and my nephew drunk so that you can fabricate stories about our family!”

“Uncle Shao, listen to what you’re saying. The amount of liquor we prepared was based on an estimate of half a bottle per person. Moreover, we even prepared less than what we estimated since there are more women here today! It was your younger brother who insisted on drinking even after we ran out of liquor and asked my helper to go out and buy some more. Everyone who was present at that time knew about this,” Qiao Mei said.

“You’re talking nonsense! What proof do you have that it was my younger brother who asked you to buy more!” Shao Zhuang questioned.

“The liquor that we served today is Moutai and all specially bought for today. Every bottle of Moutai is numbered. If you go to the shop to do a check, it’s not difficult to find out the exact timing when we bought all the liquor. The liquor that you drank later on is just normal liquor sold at the shop at the entrance of the alley. The taste is surely different. Those liquor bottles are still under the windowsill! We can go and bring them in later,” Qiao Mei said.

“Even if we were the ones who wanted to drink more, you bought way too much. Besides, you kept forcing them to drink! Otherwise, why would the two of them keep drinking!” Shao Zhuang said accusingly.

Qiao Mei picked up the tea bowl beside her and took a slow sip of tea before saying, “You know very well who drank more, my eldest brother or your younger brother and nephew. My eldest brother drank so much that he became giddy and only managed to recover after resting in the backyard for a while. During this period of time, he kept saying that he wanted to leave the banquet but all of you held on to him and asked him to continue drinking. Is this what you mean by us forcing you to drink?”

“It’s so obvious that it was the three of you who forced my brother to drink! Don’t lie about it!” Xia He said.

“If you still want to say that we’re the ones who force you to drink, we can all go to one of those professional organizations to take blood samples and do a check on who has more alcohol in their body. This way, none of us will be able to shirk responsibility. However, your Shao family will have to pay for this service,” Qiao Mei said seriously.

Xia He had never heard of such an organization in her life. Qiao Mei was just trying to scare the Shao family. Such technology was not widely available yet and it would be a long time before everyone would be able to afford it. It was still in the research stage during this era and families like them could only hear snippets about the progress. It would be impossible for them to get the help of those researchers.

The costs of running each round of tests was not a small sum!

In any case, the Shao family was illiterate and probably did not know anything about professional tests. They did not have much money anyway. All their current expenses were being paid for by the Xia family!

“That fellow Xia Wen is a really good drinker! In the end, he was the only one sober while all of us got drunk. He tricked my younger brother and nephew into going to the backyard and then knocked my nephew out. My younger brother already drank too much and could not see clearly who was beside him, so he fell for the trick!” Shao Zhuang said.

He was actually spot on. Other than the first sentence about how Xia Wen was a good drinker, everything else he said was almost exactly the same as what actually happened. However, Shao Zhuang did not have any evidence! There was no use in making wild guesses!

“I only know that my eldest brother is drunk right now and resting in the backyard! He already vomited a few times during the day! How can he have the strength to harm others! My eldest brother drank twice the amount of what each of you drank!” Xia He said angrily.
If not for Qiao Mei being around to help, Xia Wen would probably be in the hospital by now. How could anyone drink baijiu, such a strong distilled spirit, like water? In the past, when Xia Wen was in the army, he did not touch any alcohol at all. Later on, when he became a university professor, he started to drink a little. His current capacity for alcohol was honed only after working in the government sector.

He had to attend many functions as part of his job given that there were always people who wanted to treat him to meals and drinks. He could not turn down any of these invitations and used to get drunk after each function. At that time, Tan Jing was still busy thinking about how to have children! She did not care about Xia Wen’s condition at all. Xia Wen had such a tougher life then compared to now!