When Father Ye and Ye Yaopeng returned toward evening, they all went over to the old house to sit down and settle the accounts.
There had been six tables at the banquet. Each household kept the cash gifts from their own friends and the wives' families, while the gifts from family relatives went toward the expenses.
Since they had kept some of their own seafood, they hadn't needed to buy much. The ingredients, the cook's and helpers' wages, and the rental of tables, bowls, and chopsticks came to a little over eighty yuan altogether.
They had received around fifty yuan from relatives, so in the end, Mother Ye only asked each household to contribute another ten yuan.
They had come with money ready, and once Mother Ye finished the accounts, the three daughters-in-law readily handed over what they owed.
At just ten yuan per household, it was very cheap. They still had the gifts from their friends and the wives' families, so they hadn't lost anything; they had even come out ahead.
Once the accounts were settled, they went their separate ways. Mother Ye had already divided up the dried goods they had stored that morning, along with one sack of unhusked rice per household. There was no more to spare. The family's grain had been eaten up while they were building the houses, and even this rice had been bought from the neighbors. Once it was gone, each household would have to fend for itself.
Now that the family had split up and everyone had moved out, Mother Ye was glad to have an easier time. Not having to arrange meals for a whole crowd every day saved her a lot of trouble.
After leaving the old house, Ye Yaodong took his wife and children back to their new