Chapter 33 Financial Constraints

"Chen Hong, how much silver is still available in my inner treasury, these gold bricks should be exchanged!" There was nothing to do, Emperor Longqing wanted to go to the imperial garden to relax, but he thought that he found that the floor tiles along the way were damaged a lot, and his good mood was disturbed by this thing.

Li Fang passed away not long after Gao Gong's return to the court, and he walked very safely, but the people in the palace were all the same, no matter whether they received the holy favor during their lifetime, it was almost impossible to have that kind of good thing after death.

And Li Fang is only the confidant of the first emperor, although Emperor Longqing is also very respectful to him, the most important thing is that there are many things that need to rely on him to guide him, and the relationship between the two is not considered to be very deep, if Emperor Jiajing is still alive, it may be possible for him to do a lot of things for him for the sake of serving him conscientiously for decades, but now that Emperor Longqing is in power, it is absolutely impossible, so what happened after his death is surprisingly ordinary, just found a place with good feng shui outside the city to be buried, did not create the kind of big formation that shook the government and the opposition, and after such a period of time, there are still many people who do not know the news that he has passed away.

As soon as Li Fang died, the position of the eunuch in charge of the seal of the celebrant was vacant, and Feng Bao was the most likely candidate to take over this position, but it was a pity that he and Gao Gong did not deal with it, and Emperor Longqing liked to let Gao Gong pay attention to everything on his behalf, so it became cheaper Chen Hong, who had been temporarily acting as the master of ceremonies for many days.

This news naturally couldn't escape Feng Bao's ears. Although he can't wait to extinguish the evil spirit of Gao Gong, but as a person with a good face, he will never do this, once he makes things bigger, then this matter will definitely make a fuss, and the matter of losing for a while will be known to the world, so where to put his old face.

Because of this, hearing Song Qingyang's report that Gao Gong had attacked his own people, Feng Bao was so angry, and immediately decided to launch a counterattack to retaliate against Gao Gong.

Chen Hong became the eunuch of the master of ceremonies, and immediately became the leading nobleman in the entire palace, all kinds of power were in his hands, and the inner treasury of Emperor Longqing was also taken care of by him, and all income and expenditure had to pass through his hands.

Listening to Emperor Longqing's question, Chen Hong's face immediately became bitter: "Master, in fact, the servants have long been thinking about repairing all parts of the palace, but the silver in our inner treasury has been distributed as early as March, and it is really impossible to squeeze it out at all!" ”

Speaking of which, I have to sigh that Chen Hong's life is bitter, originally after becoming the eunuch of the master of ceremonies, he also had some ambitions, that is, to do his best to improve all aspects of the palace, no matter what, let Emperor Longqing not find the slightest mistake.

But when I opened the account book of the inner treasury, I was immediately dumbfounded, the list of expenditures and the various arrangements in the palace for the third year of Longqing had already divided the silver recorded in the accounts last year, not to mention that there was no surplus, and it seemed to be stretched everywhere.

If you don't know the price of firewood and rice, it was only then that Chen Hong knew the pain behind Li Fang's scenery over the years, this family is difficult to do!

Emperor Longqing couldn't help but be dumbfounded when he heard this, and asked with some disbelief: "You mean that there is no silver in my silver treasury!" "It's no wonder that he is. Although he knew the tax expenditure of the entire Ming Dynasty well, after a long time, Emperor Longqing, who had been living with his mouth open, had never cared about how much silver he still had in his inner treasury.

"Master, it's not that there is no silver, but at the moment, this bit of silver is barely enough to pay for the second half of the palace expenses, if these gold bricks are replaced with silver now, then you have to make up from somewhere else!" Chen Hong said helplessly, saying that the people are living in difficulty, and in his own opinion, the emperor who is rich from all over the world is the real troubled person.

Emperor Longqing was not angry, he just sighed and stopped talking, in fact, he also knew in his heart that the treasury of the household department was nervous to death, how could his inner treasury be rich, but he didn't expect that it would be trapped to such a point, such an emperor, it was really a little pitiful!

"Master, why don't you talk to the people in the household department and see if they can come up with a sum of money to repair these gold bricks!" Chen Hong said cautiously.

Emperor Longqing shook his head: "No need, how can the household department have so much silver, this matter is like this!" Wait for next year you to make good arrangements and try to save a sum of money, alas! Sighing, Emperor Longqing was not in the mood to visit the Imperial Garden, and walked away with his hands behind his back.

"My lord, according to the news of the humble position, the people of the East Factory are secretly investigating the Tongda Carriage and Horse Shop in the past two days, but they are acting in concealment, what they want to do at the moment they have not been able to find out, but the humble position feels that they are acting so secretly, I am afraid that they are not good!" Chen Xiao, who had not appeared for many days, sat under Shen Chong's name and said.

Although this matter was carried out in secret, Jin Yiwei had been paying close attention to their every move, and it didn't take long for him to know about it.

Chen Xiao has always known that Tongda Carriage and Horse Shop has Shen Chongming involved in it, and he also knows that Tongda Carriage and Horse Shop can have such a scale as today, basically all of it depends on Shen Chongming's attention, and now Dongchang suddenly pays so much attention to Tongda Carriage and Horse Dealership, which is very likely to be aimed at Shen Chongming.

Shen Chongming frowned and thought for a while, and suddenly laughed, no wonder Song Qingyang didn't know whether he was alive or dead that day and came forward to speak for Jia Renyi, I was afraid that this Jia Renyi was also Feng Bao's person! Otherwise, a person like Song Qingyang, who is accustomed to protecting himself, would not take the risk of standing up for him.

If his guess is completely correct this time, then the purpose of why Dongchang investigated Tongda Che Ma Xing is very clear, Feng Bao, the dead eunuch, must be thinking of grabbing his pigtails to take revenge.

"Hehe, there is nothing to be afraid of when the soldiers come to block the water and soil, these days you arrange someone to find out what they are going to investigate? When the time comes, we will have a response," Shen Chongming said with a nonchalant smile on his face.

Chen Xiao admired it in his heart, no matter when Lord Shen was so calm, when he met such a person, he was afraid that Feng Bao's wishful thinking would fall through one by one.

"Yes, let's do it!" Without further ado, Chen Xiao got up and said goodbye to the commander of the yamen.

Dongchang: "Report to the Governor, this is the dividend account book of Tongda Carriage and Horse Bank in the past few years!" A fanzi held an account book and handed it to Feng Bao.

The name of the East Factory is well deserved, with the pervasive secret agent, in just five days, the relationship between all parties in the car and horse shop will be clearly investigated, and the dividend account book will be in hand.

Looking at the records in the account books, Feng Baoren couldn't help laughing, he guessed correctly, this Shen Chongming, Xiao Pengcheng, and that Shi Bingzheng, the three of them have added up to no less than three million taels of silver over the years, and at least 100,000 taels of taxes have escaped.

"Hehe, it's a big business, huh!" Feng Bao snorted coldly, raised his head and asked, "Is there anything else!" ”

Fanzi said with a flattering smile on his face: "Overseer, the spies arranged by his subordinates also heard a secret, it turns out that the person who led the way to the yamen to sue Ouyang Jingzhi Lianyun Buzhuang some time ago is Xiao Pengcheng, the owner of Tongda Carriage and Horse Dealers, so his subordinates guess that this matter is very likely to be Shen Chongming's Qianmo farmer behind the scenes to frame Lord Ouyang!" ”

Feng Bao raised his eyebrows and reprimanded: "What are you doing with these old things? Ouyang Jingzhi has already pleaded guilty, even if Shen Chongming frames him, we can't overturn the case for him! ”

"Yes, yes, my subordinates are stupid!" Fanzi hurriedly admitted his mistake, but he was complaining in his heart that he was in a humble position, and how could he know what happened in the court.

At this moment, Feng Bao, who was still full of anger just now, suddenly laughed: "Hehe, what a Shen Chongming, his ass is not clean, and he dares to impeach Ouyang Jingzhi for such a thing, hmph, let's let him also taste the bitterness of being sued to the Yamen this time!" ”

As he spoke, Feng Bao raised his head and instructed Fanzi: "Go, send someone to disguise yourself and go to the yamen to complain about Tongda Carriage and Horse Dealing, and then spread the news in the city, just say that Shen Chongming relies on his own identity, not only secretly opening Tongda Carriage and Horse Shop to collect money, but also illegally bullying ordinary merchants!" ”

"Yes, my subordinates will do it!" Fanzi happily responded, turned around and ran out.

"Hmph, if you can make Ouyang Jingzhi's reputation stink, our family can also make your reputation stink, and let you know what it means to eat the consequences of self-inflicted evil!" Feng Bao said to himself, he already had seven points of certainty in his heart that Shen Chongming would be impeached with this arrangement, and then not only would he have a bad breath in his heart, but he would also be able to break one of Gao Gong's arms, without his quirky disciple, it would be much easier to deal with Gao Gong in the future.

Feng Bao is in action, Song Qingyang, the pioneer of this matter, has not been idle, since Ouyang Jingzhi resigned and returned to his hometown, this imperial court is a piece of scattered sand, the new imperial envoy is not prestige enough, and originally it was just a national prince to supervise the wine, reading and writing articles, but it is far from being an official, and it is impossible to gather hundreds of imperial histories to his side.

But he is not, with the support of Gonggong Feng behind him, he used a little means to attract a group of these people to gather around him, and now to deal with Shen Chongming, their usefulness is immediately revealed, that is, everyone collectively wrote to impeach Shen Chongming, and with the large number of people, an unstoppable torrent was formed, so that Emperor Longqing did not dare to defend Shen Chongming wantonly.

If he was arbitrary and dedicated to protecting Shen Chongming, he only needed to spread the news with so many connections in Shilin, and the people in Shilin would definitely be scolded behind their backs, and maybe there would be that upright historian who would leave a mark in this record.

Holding the letter sent by Feng Bao just now, Song Qingyang said to several colleagues in front of him: "Ladies and gentlemen, according to the news obtained by this official, Shen Chongming has really done a lot of evil things with his power over the years, not only blatantly omitting to pay taxes, but also relying on his status to suppress his peers, otherwise the business of Tongda Carriage and Horse Dealer would not be so big!" ”

Although everyone here knows the truth, when he said this, Song Qingyang was still upright and awe-inspiring, and it didn't seem like he was doing that kind of unsightly deed at all.

He was like this, and the other officials were not bad there, all of them pretending to be righteous soldiers, and when they saw one of them take the case, they stated to everyone that Shen Chongming's other crimes were committed.

"Ladies and gentlemen, this emperor of Shen Chongming Province is very important, but he has made such a deed in disregard of the grace of the saint, he is a traitorous minister, if he is allowed to stay by the emperor's side, how can he be worthy of the responsibility of you and me!" This is a person who is jealous of Shen Chongming's official position.

As soon as this person's voice fell, another person continued: "This doesn't count, let's think about it, now the household department is unable to make ends meet, and you and my colleagues can only receive half of their salaries every month to survive, but now Shen Chongming violates the ban of the imperial court to do business, not to mention, he dares to skip paying taxes and silver, it is precisely because of people like him that the annual tax income of my Ming Dynasty is not enough for various expenditures, and I can only receive half of the salary every month!" "This is a person who is jealous of Shen Chongming's wealth.

"Hmph, if such a traitor doesn't drive out of the court, he is ashamed to teach the saint!" Another person stood up and said: "Lord Song, in the opinion of the lower officials, this time we must impeach Shen Chongming on this matter, and as soon as he reigns, we will impeach him once!" ”