Chapter 1242: Plotting Countermeasures
My dear mother, how come we have become the leaders? ! How come we have become the chicken that kills the chicken to scare the monkeys? !
Both Shopkeeper Tai and Shopkeeper Lu collapsed on the ground in fear, cowering in fear. There was no trace of blood on their faces. The cold sweat on their foreheads couldn't stop flowing down, and they couldn't stop their fat bodies. He trembled and shivered like chaff, as if he had been electrocuted at the same time.
In the eyes of Shopkeeper Tai and Shopkeeper Lu, the smile on the guard's face next to them was like the smile on the prisoner's last beheading meal, eerie and terrifying.
A breeze blew by, like a ghost howling. The clear sky seemed to suddenly turn dark, and the surrounding air seemed to turn into a bloody mouth, swallowing the two of them alive.
There is no rain in the clear sky, only the two of them are dripping with rain!
God knows how Shopkeeper Tai and Shopkeeper Lu got to the county government office, even they themselves can’t remember.
When they arrived in front of the gate of the county government office, their minds went blank. When they walked across the threshold of the county government office like zombies, they stumbled and almost fell to the ground.
"Shopkeeper Lu, please go this way, shopkeeper Tai. Wait a moment inside, and the county official will come after handling official business."
The officer made an invitation gesture and led the two people to the county A prison room on the left side of the Yamen Wai Yamen.
"Hey, thank you, thank you..."
Shopkeeper Tai and Shopkeeper Lu clasped their fists tremblingly and thanked them, their voices trembling.
Treasure Shopkeepers Tai and Lu looked up at the squad room in front of them. In their eyes, the squad room seemed to suddenly come to life, turning into a black ghost squatting and grinning. It opened the two doors. The mouth is so wide that it can go in but not come out!
"Please."
The guard stood at the door, making a gesture of invitation, and wanted to watch the two people walk into the squad room.
"Hey..."
Under the gaze of the guards, shopkeepers Tai and Lu opened the door of the class room with trembling hands.
I'm going to die, I'm going to die...
Pursers Tai and Lu were trembling all over, and walked in with the mentality of stepping into the execution ground.
The sun was shining brightly outside, but the room was a little darker. The light difference between the inside and outside was so big that the two of them seemed to be blind the moment they entered.
"Hey, aren't these Shopkeeper Tai and Shopkeeper Lu? They're all here now, come on, sit here."
As soon as they entered the door, they heard a familiar voice before they could get used to the light difference. .
“Old Xing?!”
Shopkeepers Tai and Lu immediately recognized the owner of the voice and spoke in surprise.
Lao Xing is another grain merchant in the county, but he is not on the same street as them. Due to the distance, the three companies do not have a direct competitive relationship, and their relationship is relatively good.
Is Lao Xing there? !
What does Lao Xing mean when he says "everyone is gathered together"? ! Does this mean there are other people in this room? !
In an instant, thousands of thoughts and emotions flooded into the minds of Shopkeeper Tai and Shopkeeper Lu. They hurriedly stretched out their hands to rub their eyes, adapted to the light difference in the room, and looked up to see the room. Among the group of people sitting inside, the one at the front was Lao Xing who just spoke.
Behind Lao Xing, there were more than thirty people sitting, and they all looked familiar. These thirty people were all grain merchants in the county, some from the county, and a few from the town below. .
The two took a quick glance and found that basically all the grain merchants in Jingnan County were gathered in this room, including the shopkeepers of the three largest grain merchants in the county.
It turns out that all the grain merchants in the county have been invited! It’s impossible for the county magistrate to kill them all, right? !
So, in this way, we are not the first sheep or the chicken that was killed to scare the monkeys? !
Shopkeeper Tai and Shopkeeper Lu looked at each other with surprise and a feeling of escaping from death.
"Hehehehe, everyone is here. I, Old Tai/Old Lu, are late, please forgive me, please forgive me."
Shopkeepers Tai and Lu clasped their fists at the grain merchants. Finally I laughed again.
"Hahahahaha, Shopkeeper Tai and Shopkeeper Lu, look at how bad you two were just now. If you didn't know, you would have thought you were going to the execution ground."
There is a shopkeeper named Han among the grain merchants, who can be regarded as the same as the two of them. Old acquaintance, he said with a smile.
"Come on, Old Han, you were no better than the two of them when you came in. When the crow falls on the pig, no one can blame anyone."
Shopkeeper Han just finished speaking. , and other grain merchants laughed at him in the same tone.
Hahahahaha...
There was a burst of laughter in the room, and the atmosphere suddenly became cheerful.
Except for the seven or eight grain merchants close to each other in Xifang, the county seat, these merchants thought they had been chosen to be the ones to stand out and scare the monkeys when they first received the notice from the guards about the invitation from the county officials. , in panic all day long. After seeing other grain merchants in the wooden house, they breathed a sigh of relief and cleared away the gloom. It was impossible for the county magistrate to drive out all the grain merchants.
"You said, why did the county magistrate invite us here?"
Shopkeeper Liu of Fushu Grain Shop is cautious. He first stepped on the chair and looked out the window, then lay down After listening for a moment at the door to make sure no one was outside, he said to everyone.
"Aren't you squatting in the latrine and asking about the smell? Are you asking questions knowingly? What else do you think this stall should be for, other than the price of food!" Shopkeeper Han rolled his eyes and said angrily.
"The county magistrate invited us here to lower the price of grain!" Several grain dealers present replied without thinking.
"You said that if the county minister comes later and asks us to lower the price of food, what will we do?" Shopkeeper Liu asked.
"How much? Now the price of food is rising three times a day. Based on the external price of food, we can still reduce it by three or five cents per stone. If it is reduced by much, it will not be possible! These days we It is becoming more and more difficult to purchase food. It is difficult to buy food in the south of the Yangtze River. You can only go to Bashu in the west or Shandong in the north to buy food. Not only is the distance long, but the local food has also increased due to the wind. The horse chews consumed along the way plus shipping costs are a lot of money, and the road is also unsafe. Yesterday, our manager was robbed when he came back. A group of bandits who looked like refugees came roaring in. If they hadn't been accompanying the nursing home and tried their best, The food we have worked so hard to transport can’t be saved... The cost is so high, how can we not increase the price? If the price is reduced, why do we have to work so hard!
"No surrender?! Do you still want to die? The beheadings of shopkeepers Mi and Wang in Taizhou Fucheng are a lesson to the past! In Taiping County, I heard that shopkeeper Zhang from Zhangji Grain Store was also arrested. , they said they would drive to Linhai County at noon tomorrow! The city also arrested three grain dealers and sent them to prison... We, the county magistrate, are polite before fighting. If we agree to reduce the price, it's okay. If we don't agree, I'm afraid we will learn from the magistrate's thunderbolt tactics!" A shopkeeper next to him listened! After that, he shook his head and smiled bitterly.
"Hmph! If we advance and retreat together and grit our teeth, I don't believe he can still kill them all! Now the court is obviously unable to rescue them. Without us grain merchants to transport grain, the people in the whole county will starve to death!" Shopkeeper Wang sneered and said, he is money-hungry and is unwilling to lower the price, even if the price of one stone of grain is reduced by three or five cents.
"How can we, with our flesh and blood, fight against the government?" The shopkeeper who just spoke said with a wry smile.
"Confrontation, why should we fight? There is no place for me to stay here, I have my own place to stay! If the price is forced to lower, then I will not sell grain in Jingnan. There are many places in Jiangnan where there are disasters. I will go Just sell it elsewhere." A tall, thin shopkeeper with a beard on his chin sneered.
He is one of the three largest grain merchants in the county. His name is Yang Zhen. He is the shopkeeper of Yangji Grain Store and the most influential grain merchant in Jingnan.
"Yes, what Shopkeeper Yang said makes sense. The bustle in the world is for profit, and the hustle and bustle in the world is for profit! Why do we work so hard to transport food, other than to make money. If he Even if we force him to lower the price, we won’t go against him, lest we get caught and beheaded. There is no place for me to keep you here!” Upon hearing this, many grain merchants’ eyes lit up and they agreed. (End of this chapter)