It is less than half a month from the first snow, the second blizzard is coming one after another, the north wind is howling, the heavy snow is raging, the heavy snow has fallen for three days and three nights before stopping, after the heavy snow stops, the whole Shaanxi Road has become a snow-capped world, Jingzhaocheng is also covered in silver, extraordinarily delicate, the streets and alleys, everywhere are the joyful laughter of children.

"Xiaolian, come to Daddy!"

In the yard, Li Yanqing squatted on the ground and gently clapped her hands to her daughter, Xiaolian is already one year old, just learned to walk, and her staggering little figure can be seen everywhere in the yard, perhaps because she was born in the north, the little guy is not afraid of the cold, and is especially interested in the snow outside, although her mother resolutely does not allow her to play in the snow, but she still can't resist her yearning, and allows her to play hide and seek with her father in the corridor.

Maybe it's because the father loves his daughter more, although Xiaolian is an adopted daughter, but watching her grow up from a baby day by day, her emotions have gradually integrated into her blood, Li Yanqing also regards her as a child who has become his favorite baby bump,

Xiaolian is born to laugh, and her giggles can be heard everywhere, but at this time she was attracted by the snowman in the yard, which was a snowman built by several maids, with eyes made of broken charcoal, a small sharpened wood on the nose, and a hat, it looked like a chubby snowman, no wonder Xiaolian was attracted.

"Daddy ....."

Xiaolian pointed to the snowman and said something vaguely in her mouth, but the word 'daddy' was very clear, Li Yanqing hurriedly stepped forward to pick up her daughter, held her cold little hand, walked to the yard, and put the child next to the snowman.

The little guy touched the snowman lightly, and suddenly understood something, so he grabbed a handful of snow and wiped it off the snowman.

'What a clever boy! Li Yanqing praised in his heart.

At this moment, the little one threw himself in the snow and rolled happily, giggling like a happy little chubby penguin.

"Little Lotus!" There was an exclamation from behind, Li Yanqing turned around, only to see Guo Sisi looking at the father and daughter in front of the window dumbfounded.

"Husband, how did you take Xiaolian to the snow, pick her up quickly, she will catch a cold!"

Li Yanqing hurriedly picked up the little guy from the snow, the little guy struggled to go to the snow, Li Yanqing hurriedly carried her back to the corridor, the two maids hurriedly stepped forward to shoot off the snow on her body, Li Yanqing quickly pinched a snowball and handed it to his daughter, the little guy settled down, holding the snowball, and the red and glamorous little face smiled.

"Xiaolian, show it to your mother!"

The little one immediately stumbled into the house with the snowball in his hand, and as soon as he reached the door, he was picked up by his mother, who had run out of the house.

"You little fool, it's cold outside!"

Sisi kissed her baby daughter's little face lovingly, "Mother, Qiuqiu!" "Children usually hand snowballs to their mothers.

"Xiaolian, give the ball to Daddy, let's go into the house, and my mother will tell you a story."

Listening to stories is also Xiaolian's favorite, she handed the snowball to her father, babbling a few words, Li Yanqing took the snowball, nodded with a smile, "Daddy knows, help you put the ball away, and play with you later!" ”

Sisi glanced at her husband, and then went into the house with the child in her arms.

At this time, Li Yanqing saw a maid poking her head at the door, "What's the matter?" Li Yanqing asked.

"Official, there are guests outside, the housekeeper invites you over!"

"Who is it?"

"It seems to be surnamed Joe."

Li Yanqing knew, it must have been Qiao Zhong'an coming, "Sisi, there are guests outside, I'll go socialize." ”

"Go ahead!" Sisi is telling a story to her children and doesn't want to be interrupted by her husband.

Li Yanqing walked quickly to the front yard, and after a while, he came to the guest hall and saw Qiao Zhongan drinking tea on the fire in the hall.

"Zhong'an, when did you come back?" Li Yanqing walked up to the hall and asked with a smile.

"Just came back yesterday." Qiao Zhongan hurriedly got up and saluted.

Li Yanqing smiled and waved his hand to ask him to sit down, he sat down and asked, "With such a big snowfall, there is no road closure on the road?" ”

"It's also my luck that as soon as I got out of the valley, the blizzard came, and I'm afraid I will really be trapped in the middle of the blizzard a day later."

Qiao Zhong'an had just returned from Western Xia, although after the surrender of Western Xia to the Jin State, the relationship with the Great Song Dynasty suddenly became cold, but for some of the Song Dynasty big trading houses that were conducive to the expansion of Western Xia's financial resources, Western Xia was very tolerant and gave them special tokens, so that they could cross the Song-Xia border at will, one of the Qiao firms.

A maid came in to serve tea, Li Yanqing shook the brazier at his feet and said with a smile: "How is the treasure box selling in Western Xia?" ”

"The price has risen slightly, the blue treasure box and the ancient white treasure box have each risen by five yuan, but the red treasure box has risen sharply, and it has risen to one hundred and twenty taels of silver, but the strange thing is that the monthly sales volume has actually increased slightly."

The risky price increase strategy of the red treasure box was decided by Li Yanqing, due to the cold relationship between the Song and Xia Dynasty, ordinary merchants have been unable to cross the line, only some large merchants have special tokens to transport goods between the two countries, Qiao's firm distributed Bao Yan Zhai rouge has actually formed a monopoly in Western Xia, Li Yanqing decided to increase the price in Western Xia, the price increase of the low-end treasure box is very small, but the price of the high-end red treasure box has increased by thirty times, and the pricing method has become silver, in fact, the price increase is far more than thirty times.

This is a bold decision of Li Yanqing, with the red treasure box are the rich women of the Western Xia, they are not sensitive to the price, and even the more the price increases, the more popular they are, in Li Yanqing's memory, the red treasure box was sold for two hundred taels of silver per box a few years ago, and later with the end of the war, a large number of small merchants poured into the Western Xia, so that the price of the red treasure box was quickly suppressed to 90 per box, but now the relationship between Song and Xia is tightening, there is an opportunity to increase the price.

"How much does the Ruby Box sell every month right now?"

"About 1,200 boxes."

Li Yanqing nodded, they sold it to Qiao's firm at the price of sixty taels of silver, and the profits of Qiao's firm and the Xixia agent were half, but for Jingzhaojun, there was an income of 72,000 taels of silver every month, and there was a large amount of income from the middle and low-grade rouge, and there was also an income of 80,000 taels of silver per month from the silver mine, so that Li Yanqing's army had a reliable guarantee.

Qiao Zhongan groaned and said, "Are the captured Western Xia intelligence officers still there?" ”

Li Yanqing nodded, "He is still being detained in the barracks." ”

"What is the attitude of the imperial court?"

"The imperial court doesn't have any attitude, let us deal with it ourselves."

Li Yanqing smiled and asked, "Why does the proprietor Qiao care about this matter?" ”

"Tongzhi, this matter is very important to me." Qiao Zhongan whispered.

Li Yanqing's expression became serious, and he said slowly: "A month ago, we submitted the report to the Privy Council, but the imperial court was not interested in this matter, and there was no reply. ”

"Then Tongzhi intends to deal with this group of intelligence officers in this way?"

Li Yanqing glanced at him vigilantly, "Why do you care about this." ”

Qiao Zhongan smiled bitterly, "I rushed back in a hurry this time, in fact, it was for this matter. ”

Li Yanqing took a sip of hot tea and didn't speak, waiting for Qiao Zhongan to continue.

Qiao Zhongan looked a little nervous, he swallowed his saliva, and continued: "Actually, I mainly care about that high-ranking intelligence official in Western Xia, his name is Li Yin, right!" ”

Li Yanqing nodded, "That's the name." ”

"He has two names, the name Li Yin is given by Li Qianshun, and he is actually surnamed Liang, called Liang Yin."

"Surname Liang?"

Li Yanqing showed a smile, "He won't have anything to do with Liang Anren!" ”

Liang Anren is the uncle of Li Qianshun, the emperor of Western Xia, the brother of the Empress Dowager Liang, the official king of Liang, and the relative of the real power faction of Western Xia.

Qiao Zhongan nodded, "Liang Yin is Liang Anren's only son, and he is the deputy director of intelligence in Western Xia, and now Liang Anren is very anxious, begging Tongzhi to spare his son's life no matter what." ”

Li Yanqing smiled and said: "When you go home, you can send an eagle letter to Xixia and tell Liang Anren that I have no intention of killing his son for the time being, and when the time is ripe, I will release him back to Xixia." ”

The second request that Qiao Zhongan received was to send Liang Yin back to Western Xia at all costs, but Qiao Zhong'an knew in his heart that the so-called means such as robbing prisons would not work, and the only way was to ask Li Yanqing for pardon. ”

"It's very simple, that is, Western Xia can abide by neutrality after the outbreak of war in Song and Jin, if Western Xia can do this, I will send all intelligence officers out of the country."