Yang Chengzu said: "Big brother, look, this cadre has recruited clearly, and the person who contacted them was a well-known leader of the Red Silk Society in Jiangxi named Ling Eighteen. The ordnance they purchased several times was delivered to the Red Tassel Society. And those who escorted the ships were all well-known green forest masters of the Jiujiang and Nanchang generations, and the rivers and lakes were water cowards. ”

"The Red Tassel Society? Ling Eighteen? Zhang Jiayin shook his head and said, "No, this is not right." ”

"It's really not right, no matter how good the Red Tassel Society is, it's just a local gang in Nanchang, what are you doing with so many firearms? Gangs in the rivers and lakes fight each other, mostly with swords, and if they don't use some bows and crossbows, they have to prevent the imperial army from coming to kill people. If firearms are used, they are killing themselves. Besides, these people are transporting ordnance, and they are responsible for killing heads and stealing families, and the price is high, Hongying will buy these ordnance, I am afraid that the income of a year will not be enough, so what are they buying this for. ”

"My brother is right, a group of rivers and lakes are reckless, buy a few firecrackers or iron armor for self-defense, but I have never heard of buying so much. Besides, they also buy flags, official uniforms, these things are also used by the gangs? In this way, is our clue broken again? ”

"Not necessarily, big brother, you see, at least we can be sure that this buyer is in Jiangxi. And he bought so many ordnance, and can use so many ordnance, he must be strong all the way, according to this line of thinking, I believe it is not difficult to find people. Of course, this has to be a matter for Jiangxi, and we can only do our best to obey the destiny of heaven, and we can't control much else. ”

He could basically be sure that the buyer of this ordnance was Zhu Chenhao, the king of Ning, but this certainty came from his foreknowledge of the future. He couldn't tell Zhang Jiayin that he knew that King Ning would rebel, so he was sure that the buyer of this batch of ordnance was him.

It's one thing to know one thing, it's another thing to convince others that you know about it. Moreover, he thinks that he has solved this problem to this point, which is already perfect, and as for the subsequent analysis and the determination of the candidate, it is the business of the superiors.

If you do everything yourself, it will be too perfect, and you will feel too much pressure as a superior. And a subordinate who creates pressure on his superiors will not have a good time no matter how he looks at it. Besides, in the final analysis, this matter is Jiangxi's business, and as long as you do a good job in Henan, when you go to the constitution to investigate it in the future, you will have no end in hand.

Zhang Jiayin obviously supported his idea, looked at the confession and nodded: "With this confession, no matter how big the mess is in the future, we can also protect ourselves." Speaking of which, last time the White Lotus thief was in trouble, the county magistrate of Jixian County fought a few lawsuits with me, but the dust has finally settled, and your reward has come down. ”

Last time, Yang Chengzu rescued Zhang Jiayin, and cut those thieves into the White Lotus Sect in a neighboring county, handed over the case file, and waited for the reward to be issued. However, as a neighboring county of the White Lotus Sect, Ji County, but suffered a lot of injustice, and the two counties already had some old grievances.

In the end, it was Zhang Jia who endorsed the confession of Jinyiwei, and then he was a native of Sichuan, and he was a fellow townsman with Yang Tinghe, the first assistant. The townspeople who wanted to come to Shoufu must be telling the truth and not lying, so in the end, Zhang Jiayin won this pen battle. And Yang Chengzu's reward was also awarded, and he just arrived at Yamen today.

Yang Chengzu said: "I don't think I'm in a hurry to give me the silver, it's better to ask for silver than to ask for food now." While the price of grain has not risen yet, we have to collect grain. Otherwise, there will be more and more refugees, and when the price of food comes, we will not be able to withstand it. ”

Although Zhang Jiayin lacks experience in getting close to the people, he is really not slow in his brain, and he quickly understood. "My brother is very knowledgeable, indeed, if there is a problem with this grain, it is indeed a big problem. However, there are several big families in our county, and I think they will also come forward to help the victims, after all, if the disaster victims, their families will bear the brunt. ”

"The eldest brother is right, they will indeed come forward to help, but we can't count on the conscience of these big families. You're the parent of this county, you know better than I know what this guy is. They may open a warehouse for relief, but their purpose is not to save people, but to occupy land. They would give alms, and some of those victims would become tenants of their own families, and from then on, in the yellow and white albums of the Ming Dynasty, these people did not exist. Daming's taxes were reduced and had to be apportioned to others. ”

"Of course, this is Huguang's business, and it has nothing to do with us. But this matter in Henan has something to do with us. When they give relief to the people, they will also raise the price of food, and then say that this is a matter of going with the market and there is no way to do it. Natural disasters have always been an excuse for price increases, not to mention military disasters? They will say that the freight has risen, the labor has risen, even if it has not risen, the price of grain in other places has risen, and if they do not rise, they think that they have suffered a loss, so in the end they will still rise. And this rise, the target is not those refugees, but the people of our county. ”

The price of grain in the Ming Dynasty was set independently, and the imperial court did not interfere with the system, so every disaster year, big businessmen and big households joined forces to hoard Juqi and raise the price of grain. Flood-stricken provinces like Henan have suffered this kind of suffering, and Zhang Jiayin is also very clear about this.

It's just that the Ming Dynasty limited the authority of local officials, and it was difficult for him to interfere in these matters, not to mention the intertwined relationships between those gentry and big households, and it was not something he could definitely interfere with if he wanted to interfere with a county order.

"They don't want to provoke a popular uprising, and they don't have to rely on how much money they sell for food, but they are most concerned about land. As long as the people could not afford to buy food, they had to go to them for a loan, and if they could not afford it, they had to pawn the fields. They can take the opportunity to eat the land and turn these self-cultivated fields into private land in their own names. And most of the fields under their names are not taxed, and in the end, there are fewer and fewer taxable fields in our county, and the county order is becoming more and more difficult. ”

Zhang Jiayin was deeply distressed by money and food, and greatly agreed with what he said. "In fact, the national dynasty has long been customized for the preferential exemption of fields, even if it is a product of Beijing officials, the preferential exemption of land is only 10,000 acres. We are a big family in Huaxian County, and the family has raised people at most, so we are not eligible to enjoy so many tax-free fields. It's just that their family has a big business and many clansmen, and we can't measure his field, so we have to admit that we are unlucky. But brother, I understand what you're saying, but how do you deal with it? ”

"I'm afraid I won't be able to deal with them myself, I'm a military minister, not a civil official, so it's inconvenient to do this beforehand. If you are willing to lend a hand, the two of us will join forces to fight a food war with these big households, I am not sure that no one will starve to death, but I am sure that the fields harvested by those big households this year will be reduced by at least seventy percent. It's just that this is something that offends people, Brother Zhang, do you have this liver and gallbladder? ”