Li Mao found Jiang Daoqi, not for anything else, but to talk about water politics.

After all, Zhang Nuo is worried at home, although he can come out at any time, but he, like Li Mao, is a first-class filial piety person in treating his father, so naturally he can not break the rules without breaking the rules. Zhang Nuo even built a thatched hut at home, wore sackcloth, and ate vegetarian food for his father's filial piety.

Li Mao thought a little evilly, it has been rainstorm and wind in the past few days, I don't know if his thatched hut is still fine, and whether there is a bruise on his face.

Li Mao's every move was watched by someone, and it was easy for him to tell anyone he saw in a restaurant or a house or even a brothel, but he couldn't go to Zhang's house and Jiang's house, so he made an appointment outside.

Jiang Daoqi was very curious when he heard Li Mao ask him. The alliance between the two parties was not long ago, but except for Li Rui's matter, Li Mao never approached them through some channel, although he did compromise several times in the court.

"Li Guogong has something to invite, it must be a big deal? Jiang was flattered. Jiang Daoqi arched his hand like a famous person.

Li Mao secretly rolled his eyes when he gave up his hand. If it weren't for the fact that he was the head of the Jiangnan clan, who would come to him.

"Patriarch Jiang is polite, what I want to discuss, no one in the world can solve it except Patriarch Jiang."

Li Mao's gentle pat suddenly hit Jiang Daoqi's self-esteemed appetite, and the two sat down in the hall of the residence and began to talk about the heavy rain in the south.

Li Mao raised his concerns about the flood and his demands on the clan.

There are many hidden households in the world, even in order not to expose these hidden households, even if they get a disaster, they will not report the disaster, so the loss will be much more tragic than that of ordinary people, and the hidden family is not guaranteed, it is okay to evade taxes and avoid labor under the family on weekdays, but once there is a natural disaster*, the government will not care about these people.

"What I mean is that the Jiangnan clan can let the hidden households in the clan avoid disasters first. From the news obtained from Qin Tianjian and various places, this embankment burst is only a matter of time, although the hermit is not your tenant, but after all, it is also an ordinary person, the tenant has nothing and can come back, the hermit is a free people, once it is broken, there will always be a risk in desperation, and it will not benefit you. In order to convince Jiang Daoqi, Li Mao really worked hard, moved with affection, understood with reason, and lured him to benefit, and exhausted everything.

Jiang Daoqi glanced Li Mao up and down, and said with a smile as if he had suddenly discovered something interesting:

"I only now understand that Li Guogong is not loyal to the king, but loves the people. This is not something that a loyal minister would say, and the one on the throne is afraid that we will suffer great losses for our family, and that the hidden households and tenants will be wiped out and flooded. ”

"To be honest, I've always been at a loss for what interests, balance and officialdom are all about." Li Mao put on a very honest appearance, sighed and said, "I only remember my father's instructions, if I want to become an official, I must try my best to make the Great Chu chaotic and the people of the Great Chu not suffer." I often feel like I'm going it alone, but even so, I still have to do what needs to be done. ”

"That's why I'm allied with the world. If it's just for my nephew, I think even if our whole family suffers misfortune, our house won't dare to use Da Chu to protect our wealth and wealth. ”

Jiang Daoqi is very strange, he is a gentleman, but he is different from Lu Yuanhao's kind of gentleman, although he thinks very highly of himself, he admires people who have their own ideals and morals in their hearts. Li Maocai's intelligence and discerning eyes can see it, and he heard that he is often speechless when asked in the court, but he is stunned to step out of a green cloud road, and everything he does is for the benefit of the country and the people.

This is no longer explained by luck, this person must have some "faith" in his heart to be so persistent.

Jiang Daoqi's favor came so suddenly, so what he said to Li Mao was also very sincere.

"Li Guogong, if you tell me the truth, I will tell you the truth. This flood will not hurt my Jiang family. My Jiang family has been operating for generations, from the end of the Jin Dynasty to the present has been hundreds of years, the big flood and waterlogging do not know how much the road has experienced, there are drainage ditches around the manor, and the important dock forts are built on high places, even if the embankment on both sides of the bank bursts, it will not suffer too much loss. Jiang Daoqi saw Li Mao nodded, and said:

"As for the hidden households you mentioned, although we have them in our family, there are very few of them. For the sake of our Jiang family, there is no need to accumulate hidden households to increase the amount of land endowment. In the past, the hermits were either turned into our tenants, or they were accepted as domestic slaves, and those who did not want to let them go out to be commoners. ”

Li Mao showed a surprised expression.

There aren't many hidden households in the Jiang family? Could it be that this was used to paralyze him?

But Jiang Daoqi really didn't look like he was lying.

"Now Li Guogong should not persuade me the most, but the Lu family, your in-laws in the house. After this summer, the Lu family will fall. A smug expression appeared on Jiang Daoqi's face.

Li Mao couldn't say a word.

It's so tiring to talk to these smart people that a few words make me seem ignorant.

But he was thick-skinned and asked if he knew it.

"I don't know what Patriarch Jiang means......"

In fact, in the eyes of several of our big families, the hidden danger of the hidden family will not last long, and we have a lot of slaves, so why bother to attract attention for that little money? If it stimulates the holy, then it is called a disaster. However, many of the clans destroyed under the iron hooves of the Hu people will absorb hidden households when reviving their family business. Jiang Daoqi continued, "The Lu family was the most damaged in Jiangnan back then, and after the founding of the Great Chu Dynasty, the Lu family and the Sun family have been recovering, and the number of hidden households of the two families is the largest among the families in Jiangnan." ”

"Not only that, their fields and manors were divided by the major clans back then, and when the emperor recovered Jiangnan, he also took the opportunity to collect a lot of land in Jiangnan, and the original business of the Lu family was not left behind, so they had to re-operate."

"They occupy rivers and lakes and blindly reclaim them, so that the water veins are destroyed, the area of the lake becomes smaller, and the reservoirs on both sides of the river for flood storage and drought prevention cannot discharge water normally. In the event of a flood, the waters upstream will be clogged up and their polders will be washed away. If there is a major drought and they cut off the water veins, there will be no water to store downstream, and they can only release water through the fields to facilitate the downstream. ”

"I saw the stupid things they did ten years ago, and I kindly sent someone to remind them, but Lu Yuanhao is too much worse than his father, not only is he self-righteous, but he also thinks that he has fallen to the royal family and has become our opponent, and I mean to harm him." Jiang Daoqi snorted coldly, "During the Yin Dynasty, everyone said Gu Lu Jiangsun, I think the four clans in Jiangnan, and only the Gu family can be compared with us. And the two families of Lu and Sun, with a blind eye and no vision of their ancestors, are about to be destroyed. ”

Li Mao sat on a stool and couldn't speak for a long time.

He didn't know about the farming in Jiangnan, but he probably knew what the situation was like in the reclamation of the Lu Road. The south is full of paddy fields, and good paddy fields are rare, and some families will dig lakes to release water to irrigate the fields, and then use dikes to block the water in them, and artificially create fields.

Reclamation will not only solve the contradiction of scarce land, but it is difficult to affect the reclaimed land in times of drought and flood.

But the area around the reclamation is difficult to say.

"Really?"

"Naturally, it is serious. I'm afraid that the saints today won't know too much about this matter. The land obtained from the reclamation of Zhanhu Lake is not official land, and there is no need to report to the government. Otherwise, with the support of the Holy Lord, the Lu family would have an advantage in business at most, how could they operate so prosperously? Where do their fish and beads come from? Where did you get so much land to grow mulberry trees and food? ”

Jiang Daoqi said with some disdain, "There are few people who are proficient in calculation and finance in the Manchu Dynasty. Not only that, there have been a lot of traces of privately minted money many years ago, and you can't know it in Beijing, but in the past few years, the market has gone from seven or eight hundred wen silver to one tael of silver to one tael of silver now, and now it can only be exchanged for one tael of one or two of a thousand wen, and it has expanded so quickly that no one can detect what the reason is, which is simply all stupid. ”

Li Mao was choked by Jiang Daoqi's words.

I'm sorry, he's one of those fools.

Jiang Daoqi looked at Li Mao's embarrassed expression, and said with some amusement: "Li Guogong is not strange, I just have this mouth that is too bad, so I can't be an official, I think the world is stupid, and I am destined to not be an official." ”

"It's normal for us nobles from poor backgrounds not to understand these things, but there are so many family members in the court, many of them have the position of patriarch, and there are also household departments, Ling Di Jiang Daoyi is the household servant, so many years, why hasn't anyone raised it wrong?" Li Mao couldn't help but speak.

"What do we want to talk about?" Jiang Daoqi asked indifferently. "Your Excellency and Your Majesty all think that our clan is a moth of the society, a faction that only knows how to chase fame and fortune, and is selfish, and these businesses we are good at are all experiences of looting the people's fat and people's ointment, isn't it?"

"This ...... Patriarch Jiang's remarks were a bit biased. If it is for the prosperity of the country......" Li Mao said with some hesitation, "these things should not be concealed. ”

"You can now go and ask the Lu family and the Sun family, if they dig a dam, release water and flood water, and wash away thousands of hectares of fertile land in the clan to benefit the people on both sides of the river, will they do it?" Jiang Daoqi looked at Li Mao's expression and said sarcastically, "You also know that it is impossible, don't you?" And supporting the Jiangsun family to suppress other clans in Jiangnan is a strategy set by the emperor, even if the current saint knows the Tao, he can only eat this dumb loss and will not publicize it. ”

"What about silver and copper?" Li Mao really couldn't agree with Jiang Daoqi's point of view, and stood up with a hint of anger, "Private coinage does not have much impact on us dignitaries and clans, and the taxes of the treasury are also exchanged for silver, and there is no impact on the treasury, but it is the people who suffer." Seeing that their money has shrunk, how should these people live? ”

"The clans, the nobles, and the court, everyone treats the people as nothing! What's wrong with this world! ”

"Li Guogong, I have some appreciation for you, but it's a pity that you are the queen of the nobles, otherwise it must be very interesting for my two families to become in-laws." Jiang Daoqi also stood up, "But this is the way things are, if the emperor wants to sit firmly on that chair, he has to sacrifice a lot, including himself; If the family wants to last for several generations, it must compete with the people for profit; If you have to stand up, you have to attach yourself to the emperor. Commoners? Where are the people? The people are nothing more than pawns and tools for everyone to fight for. ”

"I appreciate you and your thoughts, but after all, you are still young and have not seen the court and the world clearly."

Jiang Daoqi said a little tiredly.

"I have accepted your proposal, and I will also lobby the Jiangnan clan to let the hermits take refuge first, and at the same time open a canal to release water. But the Lu family and the Sun family are beyond my reach. Li Guogong, on the one hand, the in-laws, on the other hand, the people, whether to take the people to give up their in-laws to lead the two families to turn against each other, or to protect the in-laws and relatives and the people to become an alliance from now on, you choose for yourself. ”

"I have a good conversation with you today, but it is getting late, so I will say goodbye."

Li Mao didn't know what kind of mood he was in when he left the house.

He looked up at the sky, only to see that the sky was dark, and there were even more clouds, and he suddenly felt a gloomy feeling in his heart, which could not be dispelled.

I don't know if all people in politics have such a feeling as him, and he always feels that he can do something big, but he finds that it is not so easy to do something big.

All kinds of intrigues, intrigue, selfish desires and interests, and even just personal likes and dislikes, and momentary anger can hinder the continuation of things.

As the emperor, he is not only happy to see the people below fighting together, but also afraid that it will be too fierce to shake the fundamentals. And the so-called root is not the people, but the power and control.

His family was also from a poor family, and he was also one of the thousands of chess pieces in the world. They were unwilling to be only made into pawns, so they achieved what it is today.

And now? Now they are also chess players, but shouldn't the chess pieces be respected?

Chess pieces are also dignified and have a life, okay?

Chess pieces can also turn over and become chess players at any time!

He looked around, and the house in Dongcheng was surrounded by alleys, and the narrow alleys were dark and unlighted, as if they would choose someone to devour them at any time.

"My lord, it's time for us to go back." A homekeeper flashed out of a corner to remind him.

Since Qiu Lao Taijun and Li Rui were assassinated, no matter which master of the Xinguo Mansion goes out, there are at least ten families guarding them. There are a lot of them secretly.

Li Mao glanced at the general hiding in the shadows, and let out a faint "um".

"Let's go home."

Li Mao returned to the house and first went to Zhiyun Temple.

Seeing the orange light in the distance in the cloud holding courtyard, his heart seemed to warm up.

His wife and children are in the North Garden, and if he comes back not too late, he has always visited his mother first, and then went to the wife and children's room to bathe and change clothes, rest for a while, and then go back to the East Garden.

Gu Qing sent Zhang Xuan away in the afternoon, and he was always haunted by the "bloody case" and "prison disaster" that Zhang Xuan said, so he waited for Li Mao to come back and ask what happened.

When Li Mao entered the house, Gu Qing withdrew everyone, including Mama Hua, and then pulled Li Mao and asked:

"What's going on in the bloody case of Linglong Pavilion? What happened to Li Rui's imprisonment? What are you hiding from me? ”

No wonder he came back with insect bite marks all over his face!

Li Mao didn't want to hide it for too long, he knew that the old lady would only send Zhang Xuan away in the afternoon, and this matter should have been mentioned by Zhang Xuan.

He thought that Gu Qing had already had a psychological construction, so he explained this matter clearly from beginning to end, even how the emperor set up a situation, how he let him enter the world, how he decided to use the world clan as an alliance, and he would travel between the emperor and the world clan in the future.

He was afraid that Gu Qing didn't know why he had to choose this way, so he had to explain the reasons why he chose this way in detail, such as knowing how to hide all the birds, and their shallow foundation, but they made enemies on all sides, if they no longer looked for allies, there was only a dead end, and so on.

Gu Qing doesn't know much about politics, but she has watched a lot of TV series and history books since she was a child, so she naturally understands Li Mao's scruples. Thinking that he was a man in his early thirties and now trying to survive in the cracks, it was really not easy, so he had to pat him on the back and sigh:

"It's really not easy, if you can't hold it, don't hold it, our family has enough money and food, why bother wading into this troubled water, if you think it's really laborious, it's better to go home." Otherwise, you can set up a back road first, and when I go one day, you can just get out of trouble......"

Li Mao was very moved when he heard the front, for him, the most precious choice is not to do whatever he wants, but not to do what he doesn't want to do. But when he heard this, he began to panic.

"Mother! What do you say! When you say such things, the sky is falling for me! My son's hard work and patience are all for you and the whole family to live well, you have to have a case, what's the point of me choosing this! ”

Gu Qing also mentioned casually, she felt more and more that her body was not as good as when she first came two years ago, and she always felt that she was afraid that one day her blood vessels would burst. She herself looks at it open-mindedly, but she forgets that in this world, filial piety comes first, and no matter how evil she does on weekdays, she may be a filial son, not to mention that Li Mao is really filial to his parents.

"Birth, old age, sickness and death are common sense, I don't know why you are so evasive. Forget it, let's change the subject. You said that the Zhang and Jiang families formed an alliance with you, is this verbal alliance also an alliance? ”

In Gu Qing's impression, it seemed that the verbal alliance was very empty. Maybe the ancients were more trustworthy? But human nature is all about good fortune and avoiding evil, and this credit is not bound by other things, how useful can it be?

"......" Li Mao paused for a moment and said with some shame. I haven't told my mother about this yet, so I really can't say it. ”

"I agreed to the Zhang family's request for marriage......"

"What? You said...... Which lady of the Zhang family do you want to marry? What should Fang Wan do? Gu Qing's eyes widened and he looked at Li Mao incredulously.

I didn't see that this Li Mao is a scumbag!

"Mother, where do you want to go! If the Zhang family wants to marry, they won't marry their daughter-in-law to me as a concubine! Li Mao shouted angrily, "It's not a son!" ”

"Then who is Li Ming going to marry?" Gu Qing thought that Li Xiaodao was only ten years old and was actually sold, and suddenly despaired of this arranged marriage in the world where he couldn't even see the bride's face.

If it's Lu Jun again, how can these two guys live!

"It's not Ming'er. It's Rui'er. Li Mao blushed and said, "I received the Zhang family's marriage book and life box, and I also gave Rui'er's life box to go and close." Miss Lu and my family are engaged, and the two families have not exchanged eight characters, and now for this chaotic situation, they are still treacherous......"

"Wait, I heard you right, right? Li Rui? Hasn't he already decided on Miss Lu? Can the family affairs set by the emperor be returned and replaced? ”

Gu Qing was overjoyed. Can Lu Jun not get married? She has never hated a child so much when she is so old, this Lu Jun can be regarded as a precedent. So self-righteous and proud girl, I don't know if Lu Dao is the norm of the world.

Uh, it seems that the Zhang family is a bigger name than the Lu family?

If this is the case, then Li Rui was scooped up from the pit and pushed into a bigger pit.

"That's what I thought, and I didn't want to say yes at first. But the Zhang family and the Jiang family vowed that the Lu family would definitely withdraw from their relatives after this summer, and this marriage letter was only concluded early. The emperor didn't think so, thinking that the marriage was nothing, and asked me to agree first. ”

Li Mao shook his head, "Li Rui was originally prepared by His Majesty for the eldest prince to contact the Zhang family, even if he doesn't marry the Zhang family this time, His Majesty will find a way to let the Zhang family have a connection with him in the future, and now the Lu family has become an irrelevant position." ”

Li Rui's marriage back then was to appease the Lu family. Now that the Lu family has been pacified and submissive for a long time, it doesn't matter if this family business still exists. His Majesty is the best at weighing the pros and cons, and the Zhang family has greater benefits, so he completely ignores the fact that a sister-in-law of the Xinguo Mansion has set up two family affairs, and if it is exposed, it will be a big scandal, and don't think about the marriage of children in the future.

The Zhang family also wants to hold the marriage book because of this. If the Lu family has not withdrawn from his relatives, he will only be anxious about the Xinguo Mansion, and when the time comes, he will have to ask the Zhang family for help, and find a way to withdraw from this family, which is another handle in hand.

The clever tricks played by these smart people are often interlocking, and he can see it, and the Zhang family and the emperor are not afraid of him seeing it, because they are all playing yang conspiracy, and they are sure that he will not resist and cannot resist.

He had this frustration at any time, but the tenacious side of his personality would jump out immediately, always clamoring for him to endure it, and one day he would give them a little color.

Naturally, he couldn't tell his mother about this kind of rebellion, so he had to continue: "It's just like this, it's really our family's fault, and doing this kind of treacherous thing is even a divine order......"

"I'm so happy." Gu Qing said suddenly. "Otherwise, Li Rui is so happy to marry the girl from the Lu family, and marrying back is the trouble."

"What's the matter, my mother is not satisfied with Miss Lu at the flower party?"

"How dare I be dissatisfied with others, I am a bad old woman from a poor family, and it is Miss Lu who is not satisfied." Gu Qing said angrily, "Let me tell you, on the day of the flower party, I had just been assassinated, and when I was in shock, the Miss Lu family came to me and said that she had something to inquire about......

Gu Qing repeated what Lu Jun said. She originally didn't want to sue, but she was just a child, and she didn't have the consent of adults, so she was afraid that it was just a "princess disease" attack, and she couldn't ruin her life because of this bad reputation. Besides, is it very face-saving to tell outsiders that the future granddaughter-in-law dislikes her own family?

But now she sees that Li Mao seems to be very guilty about this family business, which is more important than the face of outsiders or the mood of her own family, it is self-evident here in Gu Qing.

Li Mao frowned and listened to Gu Qing's words.

His tolerance for this matter is much lower than Gu Qing's, after all, he is a native of ancient times, and he is subject to the ancient etiquette guidelines, Li Rui has been hard enough in this life, if he can't meet a good wife again, his family will be restless in this life.

The Lu family is a family of many generations, and Lu Jun's mother is the daughter of the Gu family. Thinking of Lu Yuanhao's tone that he wanted to tilt his nose to the sky every time he talked to him, Li Mao realized.

It turns out that this is also the origin of family learning.

"No wonder Jiang Daoqi said that the Lu family thinks very highly of themselves, and they only care about the ...... in front of them" Li Mao remembered the Lu family's encirclement and occupation of the lake, and muttered in a low voice, "Such a family, it is indeed a disaster to get married." ”

Li Mao didn't know that the Lu family was not so eager for quick success, if Li Meng and the Xinguo Mansion were behind them, they could naturally figure it out. It's just that Li Meng and the former emperor, who have always supported them, died, and the current emperor didn't seem to be very interested in their family, and they were left cold since they ascended the throne, and the Lu family began to gradually think of other ways to revive the family business by themselves.

It's just that the Jiangnan family is stable, and the court can't stretch its hand for so long, and it has always relied on the Lu family as the eyes and ears and the person who coordinates in the middle, but the emperor doesn't know what the Lu family has done. After all, with Lu Yuanhao's family in Beijing, he was very relieved.

And the people of the world were happy to see that this anti-water person was unlucky, except for the Jiang family who was slightly mentioned at the beginning and was ridiculed back, it was everyone who watched coldly and waited for their tragedy.

The Li family is also widely powerful in the army, so his subordinates are all over the imperial court, and there are many nobles in Beijing who support him, and his reputation among the people and scholars is even better, while the Lu family, who has completed all the fame and support of his family, is completely different from the Xinguo Mansion.

It is the Jiang family and the Zhang family that they will find Li Mao to form an alliance, but they will not look at the Lu family.

Li Mao was not angry that Lu Jun looked down on Li Rui, when Fang Wan married him, some people said that he was married. It took so much effort for his father to let Fang Wan meet him by chance, and then the two families worked together to have a relationship, if a teenage girl had a good impression of a "low-door" son from the beginning, it would be strange.

But there is a problem with the Lu family's tutoring, which is very serious.

It is important to know that a child's upbringing depends on the parents, and the mother plays a greater role. Li Rui lost his parents when he was a child, and he was more stubborn than Li Ming in terms of personality. If Lu Jun is unkind to her children and has a grudge against her husband, the family will be restless, and the children will become suspicious and jealous.

"Anyway, it's my family's fault in the first place. I will return the favor to the Lu family, if he can accept it, it will naturally be happy, if they are stubborn, I can only leave it alone, and both sides will be happy. ”

Li Mao sighed, and comforted Gu Qing again: "Don't worry, I have inquired about this plain clothes, when she was six or seven years old, she had a reputation of 'beautiful nature' in the clan circle, and later several major descendants of the Zhang family wanted the Duke of Jin to facilitate the marriage between this concubine and the eldest prince, and the old Duke of Jin let this girl in plain clothes 'recuperate from illness'." ”

Zhang Tianshi said that if she put on a phoenix robe, she would definitely die, and it would affect the family, so the old prince named her Suyi, and the meaning of this exhortation can be seen at a glance. Zhang Nuo would rather marry her to our family than marry the eldest prince, thinking that he really cherishes this daughter. ”

"Sounds interesting." Gu Qing likes to listen to these gossips the most, and then asked. "Doesn't the Zhang family have a door-to-door opinion?"

"The Zhang family has struggled for several generations to climb to the status of the first clan of Dachu today, which is not the same as the peaceful corner of the Jiangnan clan, and the children of the clan can get a chance to get ahead even if they are concubines. If their family opinion was so serious, back then, cough cough, they wouldn't have almost married my brother. Li Rui said a little uncomfortably, "Back then, there was no Xinguo Mansion." ”

Gu Qing patted his chest.

"It's okay, it's okay. It's just a little older, one year older than Li Rui. Uh, isn't that Rui'er going to get married at the age of seventeen? Gu Qing blinked.

It's good to get married at the age of seventeen.

"It's just engagement, it's hard to say whether this will be successful or not. If it's the Lu family, hey, ......" Li Mao sighed. "In short, don't let Rui'er know about Miss Lu and Miss Zhang's affairs, his young nature, and when he meets Chu Yingyuan, I am afraid that he will suffer blows one after another, which is not conducive to mental growth."

"I understand, I won't reveal it." Gu Qing nodded, and looked at Li Mao with an expectant face. "However, I'm really a little scared by the Miss Lu family, can you ......?"

"After the Lu family withdraws from the marriage, do you want me to see that plain clothes once? Even if it's just talking. ”

The author has something to say: Little Theater:

Gu Qing: Where did you find out about Zhang Suyi?

Li Mao: Jiang Daoqi.

Jiang Daoqi: Focus on exploring the news for a hundred years, there are hundreds of secret agents at home, footprints all over the north and south of the river, so far there are successful cases of &&......%......##, the above are real people and real things, please look for the "Jiang Bagua" brand secret agent, who uses it......

Author: Ahem, that, kowtow to spy on the armor, sell yourself to spy on B, and burn into Wang Erpozi's secret agent C......

Jiang Daoqi (ugly): ......