The Concubine's Survival Manual

Chapter 198

These two female accountants are both in their forties, and their manners are moderate. Even at this age, they look pretty and have a bit of charm.The two greeted Qin Niangzi in a proper manner, and one of them brought up a new account, sent it to Qin Niangzi, and said softly, "Mrs. The account book written by the young lady. There are two copies, one in Suzhou code and one in official simplified characters, please look over it, young lady."

At that time, officials and folks used Suzhou codes for all bookkeeping, which was difficult for ordinary people to understand. It was even more unnecessary for a young lady from a wealthy family to deal with such humble words. Although Seventh Lady had ideas since childhood, she didn’t Have access to codes in Suzhou.Not to mention that the ancient ledgers are not like modern tables, the entry and exit are clear at a glance, and various charts can be made to help understand.Picking up this account book, the format is complicated, and the fonts are colorful and green like a scripture. It is difficult for non-professional accountants to see the way of it. Naturally, it gives many opportunities for those who are interested.

When Seventh Lady opened the account book and looked at it, her eyes lit up: these two accountants are really extraordinary.

They were ingenious and did not use the vertical bookkeeping method. Instead, they listed the tables from left to right and wrote them horizontally like later generations. They all used simplified Chinese characters to represent the numbers. Come, except that the numbers are not Arabic numerals, the expenditure and income are clear at a glance.Purchasing, gold and silver utensils... Various columns have also sorted out several corresponding parts of the accounts. The comparison between the small account in the purchasing hand and the large account in the accounting room can be seen at a glance, and some discrepancies Places are ticked with a black pen, even a layman like Qiniangzi will not be able to say that it is difficult to read this account.

"Sure enough, he was born in a salt merchant's house. It's just that the work of doing accounts is hard to come by!" She didn't hesitate to praise her - such a professional talent with special skills, even if they are from a high family, there is no such thing in front of them. Too many shelves.

The two female accountants looked at each other and smiled slightly, and one of them said, "I have an ordinary appearance and learned to keep accounts since I was a child, so I have a place to live. This ability makes the young lady laugh."

Listening to her tone, Seventh Lady already knew that this was a medium-sized horse among Yangzhou's skinny horses. Because of her poor appearance, she learned how to keep accounts at an early age. Going out is much more convenient to use than the accountants outside. There are even ten or twenty such female gentlemen around those wealthy salt merchants.These two people can be selected to dedicate to Mr. Ge, and they must be the best among the female accountants.

Her heart was moved: In this way, in the future, to fill the counting room with manpower, you can go to Yangzhou to buy some young daughters like this and come back to train them...

Qin Niangzi quickly pushed this idea aside, now is not the time to think about it.

She flipped through the account books, closed the heavy book again, and ordered Li Xia, "Make tea for the two gentlemen—gentlemen, sit down."

The two female accountants sat down on the embroidered pier generously, and passed the names with Seventh Lady. One of them was surnamed Zhuang and the other was surnamed Ji, and they were both over 40 years old.While talking, several servant girls brought tea again, and Li Xia took the lead, and filed out of Xici Room.

Qin Niangzi took a sip of hot tea, looked at the two accountants again, and then smiled, "When the two gentlemen were in Yangzhou, they must have accounted for it... but I don't know what accounts they were doing. ?”

There are ways to make household accounts, and there are also ways to make business accounts. The proficiency is different, and of course the eyesight is also different.The two female accountants exchanged glances, and Zhuang accountant said, "We all do household accounts for the Gao family."

The salt merchant Gao's family can be said to be the richest man in Huaiyang, a name even Seventh Lady has heard of, she nodded. "There must be a lot of factions in the family!"

"The concubine alone has more than 20 rooms, not to mention the respectable second room wife." The accounting room suddenly laughed. "It's not that my young lady and I are boasting. Thanks to my elder sister Zhuang and I being careful about the family account, otherwise we would have to spend tens of thousands of taels a year just for the household."

The Gao family is rich in gold and silver, with a net worth of more than a million, and the extravagant life is even better than that of the princes and nobles. Of course, the factional struggles in the family are very fierce, and the wives have no other skills. It goes without saying that the two accountants have rich experience in managing the internal accounts well in such a complicated environment.Seventh Lady finally made up her mind, she nodded, and said with a smile, "Okay, those two gentlemen tell me, is there anything tricky about our Xu family's account?"

The purpose of bringing the two of them here from Yangzhou is actually this answer, and the two accountants will not fail to understand.If the Xu family was peaceful and harmonious, why would Seventh Lady bother to search for someone from the south of the Yangtze River? They looked at each other, but fell silent for a while. After a while, it was the accountant who spoke first.

"Returning to the young lady, there is no account in this world that can't find faults. Especially for a family like yours, the usual expenses are as numerous as a cow's hair, and no matter how capable the accountant is, it is impossible to cover everything..."

Seventh Lady understood her concerns, she smiled and waved her hand.

"Don't worry—it's over here, I'm going to let you go back to Jiangnan, and take care of the accounts of several farms in Jiangnan for me, and I won't let you stay in Jiangnan for a long time!"

But all people have selfish intentions. We all work as accountants and may work together in the future. The two of us will be more cautious when speaking, lest we offend future colleagues.Qin Niangzi is very clear about the twists and turns inside.

Sure enough, when she said this, the atmosphere in the room became much more relaxed.The accountant groaned for a moment, arched his body and took the account book from Qiniangzi's hand, flipped through a few pages, discussed with Zhuang accountant, and then explained to Qiniangzi.

"Slaves and maidservants are accountants, and they usually have the meaning of keeping money for the master's family, especially outside the Gao family's house. There are hundreds of relatives and friends who often live in Gao's house, and they take care of the house in different ways. Usually hand If you want to be more relaxed, the money will flow out like water. To keep the money, not only the family affairs must be clear, but the servants and maidservants must also find out the prices of all household department stores in the market outside."

"Since I knew that I was going to work under the young lady's hand, I was flattered and trembling. It was out of habit. During the more than a month I lived in the alley, I sent people to the streets to inquire about the market every day, and even visited in person. Several hundred-year-old stores have a rough understanding of the department store market in Beijing."

As soon as the experts make a move, they will know if there is any. Just looking at the logical explanation of the two accountants, they know that Qiniangzi specially asked the elder to send someone back to the south of the Yangtze River to search for it, and it was not in vain.

"In the past two days, I have looked at the various account books of the family for the past five years, and they have been done in an orderly manner. Although there are occasional alterations, the number of discrepancies is not too large. When the first person took over the account, there was 2000 in the account. 3000 taels of cash, as of the end of this month, the cash on the books is [-] taels, which is not a big difference, and it is reasonable." The accountant Zhuang smiled slightly, "Young Madam chooses to settle the bill at this time, It can be seen that it is also the Fang family."

After the autumn harvest, the farms in various places sell their grain and pay the bills, and then all kinds of businesses have to pay the money one after another.But before the autumn harvest is the time when money is the tightest, if there is any problem, it is at this time to check the accounts, and it will be most clearly exposed.

"The income and expenditure of the family for a year are roughly even from the internal account, which is 5000 taels of cash. In April, a happy event took over 200 taels from the internal account. The officials allocated more than [-] yuan, and the servants carefully calculated this account, and compared the large account from the accountant's hand with the details in the buyer's hand, the income and output were about [-] taels."

In other words, for this happy event, the benefits for the buyers are only 300 taels, which is not too much compared to the total expenditure.Seventh Lady nodded and listened carefully to Zhuang Accountant's continued analysis.

"Using the 200 taels of silver as the yardstick, comparing the difference between the small accounts and the large accounts in various places over the years, the difference is not bad, that is, this amount. Young Madam also knows that when the water is clear, there will be no fish..." She unexpectedly Pulled a sentence, "The mothers in the mansion are tired all the year round. The master has always turned a blind eye to this discrepancy."

Seeing that Seventh Lady didn't intend to interrupt, she continued. "If you only check this far, this account can be said to be quite clean, and there is nothing to make a fuss about."

The Zhuang accountant paused, and then said, "It's just that the slaves also read the accounts sent by you six or seven years ago... In terms of silver, how much is the annual cost, how much is it for getting married, adding people? , Buying dowry, honoring the nobles in the palace, these are unspeakable expenses, but, in the past five years, the annual expenditure of silver taels is nearly 6000 taels more than in previous years."

She said the number 6000 taels calmly, and Qin Niangzi didn't listen to it calmly. In fact, even a middle-level family outside would have to take a breath of air at this number.6000 taels a year, 3 taels in five years, and 6 taels in ten years of being in charge of the family - the average official family has 6 taels of property, which is already considered very rich.

"In the past few years, there have indeed been some large expenses, and the prices of department stores have risen year by year. It is not obvious from the books." Zhuang Accountant's tone remained calm. "It's just from the figures we inquired. The harvest has been good these years, and the rice price in Beijing has been very stable. Just like the rice price in Yangzhou, it hasn't risen much, and it hasn't fallen much."

Without her explaining, Qin Niangzi already said to herself, "The price of rice is the barometer of all prices."

In Daqin, rice was the oil of future generations. The rise and fall of rice prices could even be said to be a barometer of world politics. In a truly prosperous and prosperous year, the price of rice would naturally be cheap.The past few years are said to be prosperous times, but in fact, they were the years when Xu Fengjia fought in the northwest, and the price of rice was ridiculously expensive. In the north, there were so many people who had worked hard for a year. In the end, it was the father and son of Pingguo who had no surplus food. After that, the price of rice gradually fell, and over the years, it has remained stable at five renminbi a stone.

And since the price of rice has not changed, of course other prices will not fluctuate too much. The two accountants have been making accounts for so many years, and they know the price changes in Yangzhou well. The price of rice has not changed, and what has changed is the hand of the mistress.

Seventh Lady suddenly pondered.

Unexpectedly, the fourth young lady's speculation flashed through her mind, "In my opinion, she got at least 5 taels of silver."

There was also the time when the Fifth Young Madam turned herself away to talk to Zhang Zhang's housekeeper. When the two of them met their eyes, the middle-aged mother in charge was rarely flustered.

The kinship between Little Rib and the steward mother.

The fifth young lady is anxious to take care of the family for half a year...

The accountant Zhang was transferred years ago.

Suddenly, all the clues seem to be connected, and there is evidence...

No matter how powerful the fifth young lady is, she still has no way to clean up all the traces. What she did can't hide from the two accountants I specially invited from Yangzhou!
She smiled slightly, leaned comfortably on the big pillow, and signaled the Zhuang accountant to continue the analysis.

"Thinking down from this line, it must be that the accountant and the purchasing department have co-operated. 6000 taels of silver a year is 500 taels a month. With the scale of the mansion, it depends on whether it is more than 500 taels or less than 500 taels. Unexpected things." The accountant Zhuang moistened his lips, and said again, "We re-read a few purchase brochures, and we can see some clues... Take Jizier as an example, there are two seasons in a year, and Jizier The price is doubled and going up...Young Madam, don't look at the smallness of this thing, after all, it is used in a large amount, and if you add up, it will add up to a lot, and every time you enter and exit here in a month, it will be as much as two silver."

Qiniangzi nodded, and then listened to the accountant's account, "There is also the loss of re-smelting the gold and silver vessels. If you look carefully, you can see something is wrong. Compared with the example of the Gao family, the fire consumption is also large. Some... But this is all on the account, and it can't be taken as the truth. Whether it is true or not, the young lady still has to see it for the truth."

How to record it in the account depends entirely on the accountant's pen, especially in economic issues, and you can't just listen to one side of the story.Qin Niangzi nodded frequently, and after thinking for a long time, she frowned tightly.

After a while, I was polite to the two accountants, "It's been hard work, it's really hard work, if it weren't for the two gentlemen's unique eyesight, there are some things that the accountants under my hands may not be able to see."

The accountant Zhuang and the accountant looked at each other, and said in unison, "Young Madam, I'm sorry."

The accounting office was even more intrigued, and added, "Actually, we are all good at accounting. When it comes to checking accounts, household accounts are the least checked. Even if someone else looks at it, they may not be able to see it." Touching her made her shut up.

Qin Niangzi smiled casually, and then told Li Xia, "Go and invite the old mother to talk!"

The old mother didn't go to Xiaotangshan with Madam Xu, of course it was to help Qin Niangzi when necessary, and she soon arrived at Mingdetang.

Qin Niangzi asked the two accountants to tell the old mother about the matter again - the old mother is a housekeeper, so she naturally sucked her breath through her teeth frequently.

She was much angrier than Qin Niangzi.

"I didn't expect that Lin Shan's family and Peng Hu's family are such ungrateful things!" The old mother's face was full of hatred.

These two mothers in charge are old people brought out by Mrs. Xu, and they have always been very polite to Qingpingyuan and Mingdetang.It is precisely because of this that I have been sitting in the position of kitchen purchase and warehouse management for so many years.Unexpectedly, in private, he would be ungrateful for profit in private, digging the corners of the Duke's mansion together with the fifth young lady, and filling his own pockets.Or was it discovered by Qin Niangzi, a daughter-in-law, that something was wrong, why can't the old mother be angry?
Seventh Lady had no choice but to appease the old mother, "Who doesn't see money..."

She smiled slightly, "However, if you can grasp this line, this home will be fine."

The old mother and the two accountants laughed along with Qin Niangzi knowingly: the most important thing for the new mistress to take the position is to make an example of others and to establish a prestige.With this handle, Seventh Lady can sit firmly in the position of mistress.

Not to mention that now that Seventh Lady has the handle of Mrs. Fifth Young Lady, if she reveals it when facing the scene, the fifth room will definitely be in chaos... There are so many articles that can be done here.

"But." Seventh Lady seemed to be talking to herself, and she seemed to be telling the old mother. "There are some things that we have to wait for the son to come back to discuss together."

She thought of the charming and in-depth conversation between the two last night, and she couldn't help but put a smile on her lips again.

This smile lit up the young woman's delicate face, giving her a rare youthful radiance.

(End of this chapter)