readx; In the early morning of the next day, a caravan of up to three or four hundred people left Beijing with hundreds of mule carts and went to Xuanfu for trade. Pen, fun, pavilion www. biquge。 infoThis team belongs to the Luliang merchant gang, and there is only one kind of goods on the car: rice.

Jingshi was a place where merchants from all over the country gathered, and goods came and went extremely frequently every day, and this caravan was only one of them, so it did not attract any attention. Now the western wall of the outer city of the capital is still under construction, and there is not even a city gate, and the caravan slowly moves forward after the opening reserved for the city gate, until a few miles later, when turning a forest, the leader of the caravan, that is, the person called the "head of the line", shouted: "Give me full speed, I must rush to Xuanfu within three days!" ”

The guys of the caravan immediately swung their whips and whipped hard on the butts of the mules. This animal, which has a docile temperament but is born unable to reproduce, suffers and immediately trots down the official road with a heavy truck. More than 100 carts started together, kicking up dust.

After the caravan was gone, a few passers-by from the roadside tea stall hurriedly paid for the tea and followed not far behind. One of them whispered to the man beside him, "Have the brothers been sent out?" ”

"Lord Qiqi Qianhu, after getting the news last night, fifty brocade guards have gone out of the city overnight with tokens." The man also whispered, "More than two hundred and fifty miles from Jingshi to Xuanfu, one person is distributed every five miles to ensure the whole process of monitoring." ”

"Hmm." The questioner nodded solemnly and said, "There are still too few people." You go back to Beijing immediately, and another hundred people will be transferred to follow quietly. Don't think we're dealing with these caravan guys, maybe there's still hard stubble! ”

The person who spoke was none other than Shi Chunhu, a thousand households in Jinyi. He is the nephew of Shi Biao, a veteran of the Qi family's army, and has just turned 20 this year, but he has already participated in a series of battles such as the Battle of Zunhua, the Battle of Ningyuan, the Battle of Qinwangzhuang, the Battle of Luoyang, and the Battle of Futao, and he can be regarded as a veteran of a hundred battles.

After Zhu Youzhen ascended the throne, he abolished the East Factory, transformed the Jinyi Guard, and enriched a large number of Qin soldiers into the Jinyi Guard. A few days ago, Yin Ruan Dacheng of Shuntianfu was forcibly stopped on the street, and yesterday he pretended to be Li Zicheng and infiltrated "Man Tingfang" from people, all of whom were young generals.

Last night, he personally followed Qiao Yuliang, the leader of the Luliang Business Gang. On the way back to his luxurious mansion, Qiao Yuliang muttered a few words to one of his subordinates: "His grandmother's, these grandchildren are really cunning enough, and no one will lower the price." If we really want to reduce the price more, we will steal it all in. Others can't sell it, but we have somewhere to sell it! By the way, is the caravan ready? ”

The subordinate hurriedly replied in a low voice: "Ready, I will leave for Xuanfu early tomorrow morning." ”

"Hmm..."Qiao Yuliang seemed to be still intoxicated by the beauty and alcohol, and said vaguely, "Be careful on the road, the wind has been a little tight lately..."

Their conversation was not loud, but it was all heard by Shi Chunhu, who was secretly stalking.

Ever since the burial goods from the Liaojin tomb were found at auction, Zhu Youzhen suspected that some of the merchants in Beijing were secretly in contact with the Mongols or the Jurchens. If it is true, it means that there are businessmen who collaborate with the enemy and commit treason, act as spies or even directly fund the enemy, which is extremely serious in nature.

Therefore, this matter aroused Zhu Youzhen's great attention, and he immediately ordered Jin Yiwei to set up a task force. He originally wanted Yan Zhengang to take charge of the envoy of Jinyi Weibei Town, but Yan Zhengang had just rushed to Chengdu a few days ago to arrest Zhu Zhishu, the king of Shu, and time waited for no one, so Zhu Youzhen handed over this important task to the rising star Shi Chunhu.

Because the Jin merchants had a "criminal record" in smuggling transactions with the Mongols, and the gold masks in this auction also belonged to the Luliang merchant gang, Zhu Youzhen told Shi Chunhu to focus on the Luliang merchant gang.

After Shi Chunhu overheard these few words, he immediately realized that there might be something wrong with this caravan. For example, Qiao Yuliang said that others can't sell grain, but he has a place to sell, but Jingshi is already the place with the highest grain price, and although it is a long way to get trafficked to Xuanfu, it is not as profitable as in Jingshi. Then Qiao Yuliang said to be careful on the road, now it is true that bandits are swarming all over the country, but in the area of Jingshi, the ground is still relatively peaceful. If you're in a serious business, what's there to be careful about?

However, Zhu Youzhen learned the lessons of the former Chaodongchang and Jinyiwei, and the management of Jinyiwei was very strict, and one of the most important points was that it was necessary to obtain conclusive evidence and obtain Zhu Youzhen's approval before Jinyiwei could directly arrest the criminals, otherwise he could only secretly investigate. With just a few words, of course, Shi Chunhu couldn't confirm that the Lu Liang Merchant Gang was doing something illegal, so he arranged it overnight and secretly tracked it.

According to the general situation of this era, there was no need for caravans to travel for heavy goods such as grain, and it was almost the same to travel thirty or forty miles a day by land. However, the caravan of the Luliang Merchant Gang traveled day and night, walking more than 70 miles every day, and even a few mules died due to physical exhaustion. When the mule died, the grain cart naturally couldn't go, but the caravan left the grain cart and continued on its way, looking indifferent. This abnormal performance aroused Shi Chunhu's suspicions.

Three days later, the caravan arrived in Xuanfu. This Xuanfu is an important town in northern Beijing, one of the "nine sides", and it is also the closest border town to Beijing. In more than 200 years, the Mongols entered the Kou from the direction of Xuanfu many times, so the imperial court also attached great importance to the defense here, a small Xuanfu city, that is, there were 30,000 border troops, plus the various passes under the jurisdiction of Xuanfu, the total number of troops was not less than 100,000. Of course, it's not easy to count how many of them eat empty salaries.

However, due to the proximity to the outside of the city and the cold climate, there are not too many people in Xuanfu City. There are 130,000 registered households in the whole territory of Xuanfu, including more than 120,000 military households, more than 4,000 official households, and only more than 2,000 civilian households. The grain and grass of the border army was supplied by the imperial court, and the military households were barely enough to eat, so the grain was trafficked to Xuanfu, and there should be no market.

Sure enough, as Shi Chunhu expected, after the caravan entered Xuanfu City, it drove all the more than 100 mule carts into the branch of the Luliang Merchant Gang in the city, and there was no hurry to sell grain at all. The men of the caravan all slept in the big car shop, while several "leaders" frequently went in and out of the Qinglou in the city, spending all day drinking, and being unhappy.

This was the case for three days in a row, and the Jinyi guard, who was secretly surging, couldn't help but feel a little impetuous. A few hot-tempered hundred households found Shi Chunhu and asked them to secretly grab a "tongue" for interrogation. Shi Chunhu immediately rebuked: "Presumptuous! The Holy One has repeatedly warned us and others: You must not arrest people at will without evidence, isn't it a law enforcement violation for you to do this! ”

Several hundred households shrank their necks in fright, and were about to kneel down to ask for guilt, when a brocade-clothed guard ran over and said, "Lord Qianhu, there is a situation!" ”

"See!" Shi Chunhu was also very excited, "You might as well treat this mission as a hunting operation, we are hunters, and the people of the Luliang Merchant Gang are the prey." Hunting is not just about bravery, it also requires a lot of patience. Now that the prey can't hold its breath, let's go, let's go and see! ”

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