Pingyang Fu of the Red Chamber

Chapter 334 A little thought

Yangzhou City,
The Yanzheng yamen has long been covered in white, extremely bleak, and the sad atmosphere is extremely bleak.

After Zhang Jinyu settled Lin Daiyu to sleep in the west wing room and Lin Daiyu's boudoir, she closed the door and walked out of the west wing room.

Back in front of the hall door,
In the mourning hall,
Seeing that his brothers were keeping vigil on his behalf, he asked his bodyguard to call the kitchen and prepare some food for the brothers. Yehan had something to warm up.

Just about to go back to rest, Ji Qianhu ran over from the middle courtyard, saw Lord Hou, and shouted;
"Master Hou, Master Hou, there is someone outside the door asking to see you."

"It's so late, who is it?"

Zhang Jinyu then asked, now that it is almost midnight, who else comes to the door. The city of Yangzhou has been cut by his own knife, who else is so bold and dares to see him.

"Back to the Marquis, it is Cheng Zhiying and Huang Zhichun, the other two salt merchants in Yangzhou, who are asking for an audience."

Ji Qianhu came to him and whispered back.

Zhang Jinyu laughed out loud, it was those two people, but he had completely forgotten about them.
"I almost forgot that there are these two salt merchants. Let's go and meet them together."

"Yes, Lord Hou."

Ji Yunhui was leading the way. Just as the two were about to leave, Zhang Jinyu looked around and asked;

"Eunuch Zhao is resting, why didn't you see him?"

"Back to the Marquis, the Grand Eunuch was too sad today and was mentally exhausted. He is now sleeping in the wing in the middle courtyard."

With Ji Yunhui carefully accompanying him, Zhang Jinyu couldn't help feeling a little fond of the old eunuch. Although he was greedy for money and vicious, he was much better than those pious people.

"Brother Zhao should take a good rest, thanks to his help, otherwise those rebellious officials and thieves would have killed many loyal and good people."

"What Lord Hou said is."

Ji Yunhui bowed again and responded with respect.

"Okay, let's go."

After the two of them finished speaking, they continued to walk to the front yard and arrived at the main hall of Yanzheng Yamen. Ji Yunhui opened the door and said;
"Master Marquis, the two of them are inside. They also brought many boxes and put them inside."

"Oh, interesting."

Zhang Jinyu stepped into the threshold with his personal guards. As expected, he saw boxes of various sizes placed on both sides of the hall, dozens of them. At the front were two thin middle-aged men, who kept standing in front of them. Walking back and forth, they turned around when they heard movement behind them.

I didn't see anyone clearly, so I knelt down and worshiped, and shouted;
"Cheng Zhiying offends the people, Huang Zhichun meets the Marquis,"

Zhang Jinyu looked at the two people kneeling on the ground, ignored them, walked directly between them, came to the hall and sat down at a high table.

The two people below, sweating profusely, crawled on the ground and turned around to the back, continuing to kneel without daring to move at all.

Zhang Jinyu saw how honest the two salt merchants were and said;

"Get up, tell me what crime?"

"Thank you, Lord."

The two of them kowtowed heavily and stood up fearfully. Cheng Zhiying was sweating profusely and said tremblingly;

"Master Hou, whatever you say will be whatever you say. I will listen to you, little one."

Huang Zhichun, who was standing to the west, was not slow to respond and hurriedly agreed;
"That's right, Lord Marquis, whatever you say is what you say, little one, be obedient."

"Oh, if you had been obedient and you would have been in trouble today, Mr. Lin would have ended up like this. Hmm!"

After hearing this, Zhang Jinyu slapped the table with her hand, and even let out a cold snort, and the two cried and knelt down;

"Master Marquis, Master Marquis, I don't dare to harm Mr. Lin. Half of my share of Yanyin belongs to the Wang family. How dare I be disrespectful to Mr. Lin? I have to pay a lot every year. I really don't have the guts to do so. The murder of Mr. Lin was all done by Wang Yinghan."

The two of them kept accusing Wang Yinghan of what he was doing and how heinous his crimes were. Zhang Jinyu looked at the performance of the two of them and found it funny. They were nothing more than mere wallflowers.

"Wang Yinghan has already bowed his head. If you tell me who knows, even though this person conspired against him, he may not be a good man. He didn't betray his master for glory. You two know who you are doing for yourself. This Marquis doesn't want to know now. Talk about Yanyin, every year How much of the profit can you get?"

When the two of them heard Hou Ye's question, they were also resentful.

"Go back to the Marquis, you can take [-]% of the silver, and the rest will be divided."

"Well, I'm not lying. From now on, your salt quota will be distributed by the next salt inspector of the imperial court. However, I want half of your profits to be exchanged for Yangzhou tea bricks and grain to be sent outside the customs. That's it. How about that?" "

Zhang Jinyu had no intention of confiscating the property of the two of them. If the salt merchant died, the Dawu court would no longer have any income, and they would be left to stabilize the Jiangnan salt industry.

Half of the salt merchants will be killed, and the rest will immediately fill in the gaps. Even those small families will advance by leaps and bounds. In the near future, there will be another eight major salt merchants. What is missing is the leader, not those small families. How would the two kneeling on the ground know? What the Marquis was thinking was immediately overjoyed when he heard this. He kowtowed heavily on the ground and kept saying,

"Thank you Lord Marquis, thank you Lord Marquis."

"Get up and go back early. There is still a salt tax and we must not slack off. The court is watching."

"No, no, I know in my heart that I must not shortchange the court's taxes."

The two waved their hands repeatedly, claiming that they did not dare to evade taxes.

Seeing this, Zhang Jinyu got up and prepared to go back. After a day of exhaustion, his body was exhausted and he must be a little sleepy, so he sent the two of them back.Seeing that the Marquis was about to leave, Cheng Zhiying and Huang Zhichun looked at each other. After standing up, they hurriedly stopped the Marquis and quickly took out a sandalwood box from their arms and handed it over. Cheng Ziying offered it with both hands, respectfully Said;

"Master Marquis, you come to Jiangnan. I have nothing to send you to the Marquis. It's not respectful at all."

"Yes, it is not easy for the Marquis to come to Jiangnan. He needs to bring some specialties back. The boxes in the hall are full of worthless specialties. The Marquis can take them back and enjoy them slowly. It is also a little thought for the two of us."

He also stood there holding the sandalwood box in his hands, vomiting lotus flowers, and served carefully.

Seeing the two people's flattering faces, Zhang Jinyu took one of the boxes and turned it around in his hands. The weight was not clear, so he opened it and looked at it. Good guy, there is a stack of 10 taels of silver notes, at least 100 million. Two pieces of silver, and the same goes for opening another one.

He put it away silently, led his guards down the high platform, came to the boxes, opened one of the boxes, and saw only the jewels inside, a rare blood coral exuding a faint light inside, this is A worthless thing may be priceless.

Looking back at the two people's restrained figures, Zhang Jinyu closed the box, then casually took out two waistbands and threw them over.
"You two are quite knowledgeable. When you get outside the customs, you can keep safe by taking this card. Don't forget what I told you, and don't tell anyone about it."

"Yes, yes, Lord Marquis, I know."

The two of them did not dare to look at the tokens carefully after receiving them, and hurriedly stuffed them into their arms as if they had received some treasure. Zhang Jinyu ignored them and walked out of the main room.
Seeing Ji Yunhui still outside the door, he said;

"Send the two of them out, and then keep an eye on the things in this room. We'll talk about it tomorrow."

"Yes, Lord Marquis, nothing will be missing."

Ji Yunhui knew that the boxes inside were full of treasures, belonging to the Marquis and the Grand Eunuch, so he didn't dare to think too much about them.

"It's good to know, Benhou will go back and rest."

"Congratulations to Lord Marquis."

After Zhang Jinyu led the people to leave, Ji Yunhui went in and sent the two salt merchants out of the yamen. Just as he was about to go back, he was grabbed by Cheng Zhiying and thanked him in a low voice;

"Thank you, Qianhu, for sending me two. It's not a big deal. I apologize for causing you so much trouble today."

After saying that, he handed over a banknote. Although Ji Yunhui was puzzled that the two of them had frowned faces when they came in, now he was smiling. He also stuffed 1000 taels of banknotes and gave it to himself, but he didn't dare to ask any more questions. He took the banknote and fumbled with it. He put it into his waist and whispered;

"The two of you should go back to your home earlier. It's better to close the door these few days."

After speaking, he turned around and left, leaving the two of them at the door.

Huang Zhichun didn't care, touched the token in his arms, and secretly glanced at Cheng Zhiying's face. When he saw Brother Cheng's face full of smiles, he looked around and saw no one around, just saying thank you for a week;
"Brother Cheng, thanks to your plan today, you brought me here to apologize, otherwise we might have followed in the footsteps of the Wang family."

Cheng Zhiying quickly helped Huang Zhichun up. He wanted to speak, but he looked at the empty street and replied;
"Brother Huang, this is not the place to talk. Let's be careful and go back to discuss it in detail."

Huang Zhichun nodded hurriedly,

"What Brother Cheng said is absolutely true."

The two of them stopped talking, got on the carriage, and hurriedly left the Yanzheng Yamen with their servants.

Zhang Jinyu, who wanted to go back to the back hall to rest, turned around and didn't see Ning Bian. She turned back to look at the guards behind her.

"Did you see where General Ning went?"

"Come back, Lord Marquis, General Ning and his brothers are conducting a thorough search of the Wang family's property. The entire residence is occupied by Li Qianhu from the Imperial City Department and General Ning led the troops to ransack the property. It seems that there are a lot of things. .”

Zhang Jinyu, who was walking in front, had a thought and ransacked his home. The Wang family was the first of the eight major salt merchants in the south of the Yangtze River. How rich this family was, they definitely had tens of millions of taels of silver. Counting the family members, this trip was not in vain.

"Got it, tell General Ning to be quiet. If there are any books or rare things, they will be escorted to the building boat at the pier first. As for the money, don't touch it for the time being. Find a box and seal it and put it in Wang's house. Wait for me and Eunuch Zhao, let’s go discuss it together.”

"Yes, Lord Marquis, I will take your orders."

After Zhang Jinyu handed over his personal guards, he went back to a room not far from the west wing, went in closer to Lin Daiyu, washed up randomly, and lay down on the bed to rest.

The personal guards around him left the Yamen, arrived at Wang's house, and found General Ning;
"Report, General Ning, Lord Hou has an order that the Wang family confiscate books and rare things and ship them overnight, and the rest of the money and other things will be sealed up in Wang's house, waiting for Grandpa Hou to dispose of."

"I understand, does the Marquis have anything else to explain?"

Ning Bian rode on his horse and asked in the Wang family's house,
"Back to General Ning, it's gone."

"Well, go back, I will understand this matter."

"Subordinates retire."

The guards returned to the Lin Mansion after delivering the order, while General Ning pointed to the large boxes on the far left and gave orders to the border soldiers behind him;

"Come here, take those boxes out and transport them to the dock and put them on the ship. They are all books. Be careful."

"Yes, General Ning."

Then the soldiers of the Pioneer Battalion found a large number of vehicle frames and began to transport them. Many people from the Imperial City Division saw them, and some people sneaked into the backyard and hurriedly went to the backyard to look for Qianhu Li Yun.

The guards of the Imperial City Department were also searching the Wang family's house in the backyard for silver. They were knocking on the floor and walls of the house to see if there was a mezzanine. They even climbed up on the beams to check. The search was very thorough.

"Thousands of households, thousands of households, I have something to report to you in my humble position."

(End of this chapter)