The atmosphere that permeated Cuban cigars and fine red wine did not seem too tense, but was always in a relaxed state, and everyone occasionally made a few jokes when talking about national affairs, so that the political talks went on in laughter.

At most, they only talked about some superficial things, mainly focusing on some questions asked by the consuls of various countries, and these questions were mainly focused on testing Chen Jingyun's attitude towards the interests of various countries in China, such as the issue of recovering concessions, which is now in a uproar, and the issue of tariff autonomy and the treaties of the former Qing Dynasty, and so on. We didn't talk too carefully about these issues, most of them just said a few words, and now it is not necessary to say too much detail, everyone just knows each other's attitude.

What Chen Jingyun wants to know is whether the great powers will maintain a neutral attitude toward the current war between the Nationalist Army and the Beiyang Army, and whether they will maintain a neutral attitude toward the Chinese civil war belligerents like last year's recognition of the southern revolutionary provinces.

What the great powers need to know is whether Chen Jingyun, the great warlord who controls southeastern China, and this young warlord who is very likely to rule China in the future, maintains an xenophobic attitude towards other countries.

As for specific matters, the issues that really involve specific interests will be the two sides sitting down to talk in secret, and they will not be in such a public setting.

When everyone finished the meeting and went downstairs, the sky outside the window had completely darkened, and the cocktail party downstairs had become extremely lively, all kinds of men and women dressed in good manners were talking in small circles, there were three or five men talking about business affairs together, some people gathered together to discuss things about the Chinese civil war, some people talked about the increasingly thick war clouds over Europe, and of course, people inevitably discussed Chen Jingyun curiously.

Speaking of the current Chinese, there are not many that really attract the attention and attention of foreigners, the first is naturally Yuan Shikai, and then the second is Sun Wen, who has been running for more than ten years to overthrow the Manchu Dynasty, and now, Chen Jingyun has to be added.

Among the three, Chen Jingyun, a young warlord who was declared by many Chinese newspapers to be one of the two heroes of the south, became the most powerful warlord among the warlords in southern China and the biggest obstacle to Yuan Shikai's unification of the southern provinces. Now that Cai Yi has gone north, Tang Jiyao, who succeeded as the governor of Yunnan, although he vigorously expanded the army and marched into Sichuan, making the strength of the Yunnan army more huge than in the Cai Yi era, but in terms of political influence, it is far inferior to the previous Cai Yi, let alone compared with the current Chen Jingyun.

A month earlier, the Fujian and Zhejiang military groups led by Chen Jingyun not only occupied most of the eastern part of Guangdong, but also mobilized five divisions of more than 60,000 troops to fight the Beiyang Army in southern Jiangsu. It doesn't matter who started this war first, but what happened was that the Nationalist Army and the Beiyang Army had been fighting fiercely in southern Jiangsu for more than a month.

Although people can see a large number of wounded soldiers of the Nationalist Army everywhere in Shanghai, they can also see batch after batch of Nationalist recruits rushing to Shanghai and Hangzhou from several recruit training camps in Fujian and Zhejiang, and then replenishing the various Nationalist Army units with heavy casualties, especially in the direction of Zhenjiang, even the ninth batch of students in the Fuzhou Military Academy who have not yet completed their studies have graduated ahead of schedule and are then replenished to the front-line troops to replenish the grass-roots officers who have suffered great losses. An English-language newspaper in Shanghai quoted various public sources and some hidden information from other quarters to speculate that the number of casualties of the Nationalist Army had exceeded 5,000 since it marched into southern Jiangsu on 19 October, and the number of wounded could not be counted, but the number of wounded soldiers detained in various medical facilities in Shanghai alone was at least 7,000 or more, which shows how great the casualties of the Nationalist Army were.

Although this figure is exaggerated, it also proves from the side that the casualties of the national army are not small.

However, although people know that the casualties of the Nationalist Army are not small, they cannot deny the fact that the Nationalist Army is still holding on to southern Jiangsu so far, and Zhenjiang is still firmly controlled by the Nationalist Army, and together with the Nationalist Army in the direction of Lishui and Jurong, the Beiyang Army moving south has been blocked. Later, he sent troops to cross the river to fight against the Beiyang Army in Nanjing, and some well-informed people had already learned through some gossip that the war in Nanjing had entered the incandescent stage, and it might not take a few days to tell the winner.

No matter how the war develops in the future, the current situation is that the Beiyang Army and the Nationalist Army are in a stalemate in southern Jiangsu. After paying a large number of casualties, the Nationalist Army declared to the Chinese people and even foreigners in China the fact that the Beiyang Army was not invincible, and that the Nationalist Army had the determination and confidence to stop the Beiyang Army's southward movement.

It can be said that this fact is out of a lot of surprises, and most people have maintained a pessimistic attitude towards Chen Jingyun before, thinking that Chen Jingyun will not say that he will march into southern Jiangsu, and it is even very likely that he will not be able to hold on to northern Zhejiang, and the biggest possibility is to abandon Hangzhou and then retreat to the mountainous areas of southern Zhejiang, so as to attract the Beiyang Army to go south and break away from the railway line, and fight with the Beiyang Army after pulling in the supply of the Beiyang Army. There are even more pessimists who think that Chen Jingyun will lose all of Zhejiang, but as for Fujian's hometown, no one thinks that Chen Jingyun will lose it, thinking that no matter how bad the Nationalist Army is, Fujian should still be able to hold it. Before the war in southern Jiangsu, the Nationalist Army was full of a pessimistic atmosphere, and even if Chen Jingyun personally came to Hangzhou to boost morale, it had little effect. However, they did not expect that the Nationalist Army troops not only did not lose Hangzhou, northern Zhejiang, but took the initiative to advance the battle line to the north, and finally fought fiercely with the Beiyang Army in southern Jiangsu for a month.

Yuan Shikai's status and power came from his Beiyang Army, and Chen Jingyun's status also came from the Nationalist Army, and the performance of the Nationalist Army on the front line directly affected outsiders' perception of Chen Jingyun.

Now that the Nationalist Army is playing well in southern Jiangsu, and there are even signs of victory, the impression and attitude of outsiders towards Chen Jingyun have also changed greatly, and this can be seen from the eyes of everyone looking at Chen Jingyun tonight.

There is curiosity, there is appreciation, there is admiration, there is hatred, there is anger. Hate it or like it, but no one dares to ignore the current Chen Jingyun and show disdain for the current expression.

Generally speaking, among such a large group of people downstairs, the vast majority of people who are curious about Chen Jingyun occupy the majority. In just one year, a young soldier built an army of 100,000 men and occupied most of southeastern China. Such a person will undoubtedly arouse curiosity.

As soon as Chen Jingyun walked into the banquet hall with the consuls, he had already seen everyone's eyes on him, and Chen Jingyun didn't want to make himself look arrogant and rude, so he had to continue to maintain a stiff smile. At this time, the rest of the consuls also dispersed and blended into the surrounding crowd, the British consul Sir Fareth also wanted to leave, but at this time, a blonde lady in a big red dress walked over, Sir Fareth saw it and immediately took two quick steps, with a smile on his face: "Countess Granter, I didn't expect you to come too, why didn't you inform me in advance, so that I could send someone to send a car to pick you up earlier!" ”

The Countess of Grantor seemed to be well-maintained and had undergone meticulous make-up, and it was impossible to tell how big she really was, maybe thirty, maybe forty. The woman smiled and nodded slightly at Sir Fareth and Chen Jingyun, as if she was accepting compliments from her subordinates, which made Chen Jingyun, who had been in a high position for a long time, feel very uncomfortable.

But Sir Faress stepped forward to speak with a smile on his face like a dog seeing a bone, and what he said was nothing more than nonsense about how beautiful you are tonight and how tastefully you dress, and the Countess of Grant occasionally replied with a sentence or two, which made Sir Faleith smile all over his face, almost forgetting that there was a Chen Jingyun beside him. Chen Jingyun on the side looked at the scene of the gentleman pursuing the noble lady in front of him, and at first he thought it was funny and interesting, but after a long time, he also felt bored, and when he was about to turn around and leave, the Countess of Grantor said: "Sir, don't you introduce me to this young man?" ”

At this time, Sir Fareth remembered that there was another Chen Jingyun beside him, and hurriedly introduced him after secretly calling out that he was rude: "This is the Countess of Granter, and she and her daughter just arrived in Shanghai a week ago!" ”

"This is the governor of Fujian Province of China, the commander-in-chief of the National Army, the general of the Chinese Army, and the Marquis of Chen Jingyun" Although Fareis still doesn't understand whether Chen Jingyun's lieutenant general plus general is a lieutenant general or a general, but in the spirit of politeness, people call Chen Jingyun a general, so he introduced it as such. Then this marquis is a little interesting, first of all, in the Republic of China, in addition to the royal family and Mongolian nobles left over from the former Qing Dynasty, there are no other noble titles, but after the establishment of the Beiyang political axe, there is a title order, although the name is a merit, two xun, it does not seem to be a noble title, but it is clearly stipulated that the comparison between the title and the title of the former Qing Dynasty, the big title is compared with the prince, the lord is compared with the duke, and the lord is compared with the marquis. Although the Chinese people don't care much about these honors now, they know that these are of little practical significance, and when it comes to honors, they also directly talk about the two honors. But it is difficult for foreigners, for them, the so-called first and second orders and dukes and marquis are only differences in Chinese characters, and there is no actual change, so now some foreigners naturally equate the title with the title. These circumstances are nothing for ordinary foreigners, especially the republican United States and France, but for a constitutional monarchy like the United Kingdom, there are some problems with the title, so Sir Fareis will become Chen Jingyun as a marquis on such a formal occasion.

After hearing Chen Jingyun's series of titles, the Countess of Grantor looked at Chen Jingyun with interest, and then stretched out her right hand with the back of her hand, Chen Jingyun saw that her gesture was a little confused, although he was confusing by Yuan Shikai and was regarded as a marquis by Sir Fareis, but he was not a nobleman or anything like that, and he didn't know anything about these so-called aristocratic etiquette, and it was also British aristocratic etiquette.

Seeing that Chen Jingyun did not move, Sir Nafares gave Chen Jingyun two consecutive glances before Chen Jingyun reacted, this was not a handshake, but a kiss and hand salute.

So after living for two lifetimes, seeing a lot of strange things and strange things, Chen Jingyun, who has kissed I don't know how many women, officially kissed the back of a countess's hand for the first time.

"Are all your Chinese generals so young?" The Countess seemed to be interested in Chen Jingyun and began to talk.

Chen Jingyun can be regarded as having lived two long lives, and it is the first time he has seen a living nobleman, although Faleith has the title of knight before, he is not a nobleman, and knight is just a low-level honorary title, not hereditary, and does not belong to the scope of nobles. This was just a few simple conversations with Countess Granter, and Chen Jingyun could easily feel that kind of aristocratic temperament, which was different from the feeling that anyone before had brought him, and standing with her seemed to make him feel that he had washed away the warlord aura on his body and made himself a gentle and polite gentleman.

Sir Fares, who was next to him, became more and more depressed, and at this time, a young blonde girl wearing a lilac skirt, white lace gloves, and a pair of red high heels under the calves of her slightly higher skirt broke into the middle of the three like a butterfly, and after taking the hand of the Countess of Grantor, she looked up at Chen Jingyun opposite, and her delicate little face showed curiosity and surprise: "You are Chen Jingyun?" ”