The Third Elder waved his hand and said straightforwardly, “Okay. I’ve informed you about the details of this matter. You all have a voting machine in your hand. You can vote now.
“If you agree to get back the antidote from the Fraser family, press one. If not, press 2.”
All the attendees immediately pressed on the voting machines.
Finley failed to suppress his anger. He patted the table and stood up in anger.
“Wrong, so wrong! Your words were full of personal grudge towards Young Master, which was completely bias. You didn’t tell the truth at all. You even asked the attendees to vote before making things clear. It’s so unfair to Young Master.”
The Third Elder seemed to have expected this situation earlier.
He said calmly, “I’ve told you all the facts without hiding anything.
“Master plans to suppress the Fraser family, but Young Master disagrees. Did I say it wrong?”
“It’s correct, but…”
“Since you said it’s correct, that’s real,” the Third Elder interrupted Finley solemnly.
“All the people here today have put aside their businesses to the attend this meeting. Their time is valuable. After voting, they need to rush back to work. Of course, we should tell them the most important issue. Stop talking about irrelevant things to waste their time.”
He implied that what he said was the most important, but the actual fact had become an unimportant matter instead.
“Brother, you think you can hide the truth from other family members because of your sharp-tongue? Believe it or not? I can kill you.”
“Gee… Finley, I know you are Young Master’s follower now, so you don’t respect Master any longer. Do you want to kill me just like Young Master did?”
His voice was loud, so all the attendees heard it.
His words rose an uproar again.
Someone exclaimed, “What? Has Young Master killed an elder?”
The elders in the Turner family were the most superior men with the highest authority besides Master and Young Master. All the Turner family members were obedient to them.
However, they had never expected a superior elder to be killed.
They panicked in disbelief.
A sneer flashed through the Third Elder’s eyes.
He put on a sorrowful face and spoke, “I shouldn’t have told you, but it’s my fault. It’s a slip of tongue. Please don’t blame Young Master. He wanted to protect Stanford Fraser, so he accidentally killed the Fourth elder and injured the Fifth elder.”
The whole audience was in an uproar again.
They all looked over at Ernest in disappointment. They hadn’t trusted him so much earlier, but now, they suspected him more.
How could he kill an elder of his family because of someone from the other family? They wondered if such a man could indeed become the future master of the Turner family.
If he did, would he protect some strangers instead of his actual families like what the Third Elder said? Would he sacrifice the Turner family’s interests to fawn on the Frasers?
Would he be willing to let the Fraser family continue threatening and suppressing the Turners’ later generations?
All of them discussed in low voices, “Young Master has gone too far. For the future of the Turner family, I agree to attack the Fraser family to avoid future trouble.”
“I support Master, too.”
“Me, too.”
Even though they were just murmuring, it was clear that almost all of them supported Theodore.
Finley pointed at the Third Elder in anger. “You… You purposely did it!”
The Third Elder didn’t mention what Ernest had done to the Fourth and the Fifth elders but disclosed it now; there by, accusations were turned into the so-called truth which convicted Ernest as guilty.
Finley wasn’t sharp-tongued. He wanted to fight back but couldn’t find any proper words. After all, Ernest did kill the Fourth Elder for real.
The Third Elder smiled complacently and reminded others, “Please start voting.”
The attendees pressed the buttons.
Sweat oozed on Finley’s forehead. He looked over at Ernest in a panic. “Young Master, he has brain-washed those attendees. They will surely vote for Theodore. What should we do?”
Ernest was always sitting there calmly as if the vote had nothing to do with him at all.
He picked up the teacup and took a sip.
Then he said slowly, “Let’s wait for the result.”
“But…”
Finley almost hopped up. He couldn’t sit and wait without doing anything. He was sure they would lose.
However, Ernest was so calm that Finley couldn’t convince him. He didn’t see that Ernest intended to do anything.
He wondered if Young Master had given up after hearing the Third Elder’s slander.
If so, he shouldn’t have believed in Kevin’s words and agreed to hold this open family meeting.
It wasn’t an open meeting at all. It was a meeting for the Third Elder to brainwash the attendees and take this chance to make Ernest hated by the whole family.
If so, Theodore would convince other family members, and it would be easy for him to convict Ernest’s guilt as betraying the family.
Finley believed that Ernest had set himself up.
“Alas!” he heaved a sigh deeply, sitting on the chair in depression.
Looking at the voting machines in the attendees’ hands, he became spiritless.
“The vote ends.”
The Third Elder waved his hand. Silence blanketed the meeting room again.
He looked over at Theodore in determination eagerly.
He said, “Let’s project the voting results to the screen.”
The voting results were recorded by a particular computer, so he didn’t know the outcome.
However, he was confident that Ernest would lose this time.
Later, Ernest would fail soon and die.
As soon as he finished speaking, a servant pressed the mouse to show the results.
Instantly, a bar chart appeared on the massive screen behind the Third Elder.
The Third Elder turned around to check happily. However, when seeing the rising bars, he gaped.
He thought he had an illusion, so he rubbed his eyes before checking on again. The two bars were almost the same height.
He wondered what had happened.
Ernest won almost the same votes as Master did.
There were three thousand attendees in total, but 1295 people voted for him and 1305 voted for Theodore. The rest abstained.
Since they were in such a big meeting with thousands of attendees, the difference among ten votes didn’t make sense.
Hence, the number of supporters of the two sides were pretty much equivalent.
“Master, this…”
The Third Elder looked over at Theodore in confusion and dilemma. The situation was out of his expectation, so he didn’t know how to carry on the meeting.
They ordered all the attendees to vote for Theodore on his behalf earlier and reminded them to support Theodore for sure.
Even the Third Elder deliberately picked up the facts that impacted Ernest negatively. Besides, he also focused on the attendees’ interests. Generally speaking, they shouldn’t have voted for Ernest.
The Third Elder wondered what happened to those 1295 attendees.