The talks lasted for most of the day, and when it was close to dusk, Zhu Niang came out of the official post with her son.

"Xiao Hao, he borrowed the silver, why did he give more?"

Zhu Hao said: "With our current situation, is it possible to borrow money locally in Anlu by mortgage deed?" ”

Zhu Niang thought about it and shook her head categorically.

"He'll lend it to us...... If it was true, he must have suffered a loss from his grandmother, and knew that we had borrowed money, so he was eager to send the money to him. Zhu Hao smiled.

"Why is that?"

Zhu Niang still looked puzzled.

"When it was due, we paid the money and cured my grandmother, and he was able to breathe out of his heart; If not, the house will belong to him, and this breath will be more enjoyable...... Left and right don't suffer, he is such a shrewd person who will not settle accounts? ”

Zhu Niang was completely speechless.

Zhu Niang originally wanted to say something, but when she looked around, there were quite a lot of pedestrians, and Yu San was still carrying the burden of more than two hundred taels of silver to follow, so she could only hurry back to the shop first.

When the mother and son returned, Aunt Li saw that Zhu Niang's face was not good, her heart sank, and she hurriedly closed the door panel when she said goodbye to Yu San, and came over and asked in a low voice: "Madam, has the business not been negotiated?" ”

Zhu Hao bowed: "It's okay." ”

Aunt Li was pleasantly surprised: "Then you should be happy, madam......"

Zhu Niang didn't answer Aunt Li's question, but looked at Zhu Hao: "Xiao Hao, it's hard to say on the right road, it's okay to borrow money, but what kind of salt separation do you talk to Su Dangjia about, if you are caught by the government, it will be treated as selling smuggled salt." ”

Aunt Li was taken aback.

I talked about business with the brother-in-law of the political envoy of Huguang Zuobu, who was engaged in the official salt trade, and in the end it was actually negotiated to sell illicit salt?

If you don't even know what a sin it is to sell illicit salt, stop it as soon as possible.

This belongs to the business of pinning the head to the waistband of the trousers, and if you don't know the law, you still want to sell salt, how many lives are there?

The "Da Ming Law" stipulates: "Merchants are not allowed to sell salt, and those who violate it will be chased after each other with private salt." Those who do not pay the return within five days after the sale is completed, the rod is sixty. The old allusion to salt goods is the same as private salt. Forge the introducer, chop. The people who buy illicit salt reduce the crime of selling private people by one degree, so the traffickers are hanged. ”

The so-called "salt introduction separation" means that in the process of selling official salt, the official salt and the salt introduction must be together at all times, and must be returned to the government within five days after the end of the sale.

The so-called "old allusion to salt goods" is to take the official salt that has been sold out, and use it as a basis to sell salt of unknown origin, which is equivalent to selling smuggled salt.

"Mother, we didn't sell smuggled salt, you may not have understood the details of my discussion with Su Dongzhu, right...... He is so shrewd, if we sell illicit salt, he is to receive illicit salt, and he will do things that know the law and break the law? He's smarter than anyone else. ”

Zhu Hao smiled and comforted his mother.

Zhu Niang's brows were tightly locked, still ignorant at this time, Aunt Li hurriedly asked, "Madam, young master, what the hell is going on?" ”

Zhu Hao said: "That is to say, the owner of Su handed over his official salt to us, along with the salt lead, and let us 'sift' the coarse salt into refined salt and then sell it to him, but when we sell it back to him, the salt will not be returned." ”

"Huh? This...... I'm afraid not, right? Young Master Hao, as Mrs. said, if you don't give them salt, we are selling smuggled salt, and if we are caught by the government...... It's going to lose its head. ”

Although Aunt Li didn't know much about the specific content of the Daming Salt Law, she also felt that Zhu Hao's business with Su Xigui was dancing on the tip of a knife.

Immediately, Aunt Li thought of another question and asked curiously: "We dry our salt, and after we finish drying, we give the salt and salt to the surname Su, why do we keep the salt alone?" ”

Don't say that Aunt Li doesn't understand, even Zhu Niang doesn't know why.

Zhu Niang looked at her son, hoping that Zhu Hao could give a reasonable explanation.

Zhu Hao said: "The price we negotiated with Shopkeeper Su is basically the cost price, and at present, the official salt is imported from him for ten yuan a catty, and the selling price is sixteen yuan." ”

Aunt Li thought for a while, nodded and said, "We can earn six wen for a pound of salt, is this price okay?" ”

"It's not good."

Zhu Hao shook his head, "Removing the cost of labor and site, plus the impurities removed in the purification of refined salt, as well as the loss of leakage in the process of drying salt, it is not bad to make a penny for a pound of salt after tossing it around." We have to pay forty taels of silver to our family every month, how much can we have left? I'm afraid it's a loss to make money! ”

Aunt Li asked puzzledly, "We ...... before Isn't business doing well? ”

Zhu Hao said: "Auntie, it was an extraordinary period, and the times forced us to pour salt into the backyard pool, which was purely a last resort...... But Ping Suzhen dissolved the official salt and sold it, which is really more than worth the loss...... There are many impurities in official salt, sometimes it is deliberately done by salt merchants, they mix sand in official salt, sometimes a pound of salt may have two taels of sand, do you think about how much loss is after purification? ”

Zhu Niang said: "Then we are still the same as before, selling the official salt that the owner of the Su wholesaled to us is...... This time, the official salt granted to us by the Su Dongzhu was a little lower than the purchase price from the big salt merchants in the city before. ”

Zhu Hao shook his head: "After last night's incident, we offended the yamen of Anlu Prefecture and Changshou County at the same time, and the patrons dare not patronize it again, and the premise for the owner of Su to continue to do business with us is that we sell snowflake salt to him, if we don't sell it, how can he sell official salt to us at a low price?" ”

"That'...... That ......"

Zhu Niang and Aunt Li were speechless.

Originally, they all thought that Zhu Hao came back to purify the official salt, but when they heard this, they realized that this road was impassable.

Zhu Hao put his two hands on the shoulders of Zhu Niang and Aunt Li respectively, and said in a firm tone: "Mother, don't ask, listen to me." ”

"We purify salt, in fact, there is no need for official salt, there are many salt nests in Anlu that are specially dried for livestock to eat, we just buy salt brine and come back to dry, and the effect of official salt is the same. We can even hire people near the salt nest to dry the salt for us, so that we don't have to sell salt or make salt, and we can make the difference as middlemen, and we will not be found at either end. ”

Zhu Hao knows that Hubei's salt resources are particularly rich, and later generations are the main production areas of rock salt, and there are extra-large rock salt deposits and underground brine deposits near Anlu Prefecture.

Zhu Hao has a special "salt washing" method to extract refined salt from salt brine, so there is no need to purchase official salt to be dissolved and then made into snowflake salt, so the cost is naturally greatly reduced.

Listening to Zhu Hao's plan, Zhu Niang was shocked: "Xiao Hao, the salt produced by our local salt nest often has accidents when eaten by livestock, and it is ...... for people to eat."

Zhu Hao said: "Mother, you said that the salt in the backyard pool before us is better than the salt produced in the salt nest?" Didn't you become the snowflake salt of the white flower in the same way? ”

Zhu Niang was stunned.

My son is going to fly to the sky, and he can actually use the bitter brine of the salt nest to dry the snowflake salt of white flowers?

Appalling.

Aunt Li said: "Even if this is the case, these salts are also private salt, and we don't have salt to attract them." ”

"Who says no?"

Zhu Hao said, "Don't we have the salt guide given by the owner of the Soviet Union?" We traded with the Su Dongzhu, no matter whether we bought or sold, there was salt, and the local government couldn't do anything with us at all.

"When the transaction is completed, because the salt is in hand, we can also resell the official salt purchased from the owner of the Su, and the price of the salt that the owner of the Su gave us is one or two cents lower than the general wholesale price per catty, which is easy to sell."

When Zhu Niang heard this, she didn't come back for a while, no matter how she thought about it, she felt that there was something wrong with her son's words, but she didn't know where the specific problem was.

After a while, Zhu Niang frowned: "But the salt we gave to Su Dongzhu was not salted, he ...... What to do? ”

Zhu Hao smiled: "He has hands and eyes to the sky, do you think he will be afraid?" He transports more than a dozen boats of salt at a time, and he is the wife and brother of the political envoy, will anyone really go to check the salt introduction? ”

"And even if he checks him, he is not afraid, those who dare to meddle in the official salt trade in these years will have no extra salt on hand? There are many powerful people who are in their hands, and Su Dongzhu may have more salt in his hands than he has cashed out, and now the stove in the salt field is not considered private salt, so we should have given him a chance to exchange salt. ”

"Otherwise, why would he buy good snowflake salt from us at the price of sixteen yuan? This snowflake salt was transported to the provincial capital and the north and south capitals, and the price was at least ten times higher, and he could calculate the account himself! ”

Zhu Hao knows the urine nature of Daming salt politics.

If you play this salt method before Chenghua, you will definitely die.

However, in the second year of Hongzhi, the imperial court found that the salt in the hands of the salt merchants could not be redeemed for a long time, and the enthusiasm of the stove households to cook salt was not high, and there was often salt but no salt supply, so it was stipulated: "All merchants have no salt to pay, and let them buy the salt of the diligent stove, which is the beginning of the remaining salt." ”

Since then, salt merchants can buy salt directly from stove households, and after the stove households have paid the government ration every year, the surplus can be sold directly to salt merchants who hold salt but cannot exchange salt from formal channels, and the precedent of stove smuggling is from here.

During the Hongzhi period, there was the great eunuch Li Guang, and then there were Zhang Heling, Zhang Yanling, Zhou Yu and other imperial relatives, who received millions of salt quotations from the emperor through informal channels.

After Emperor Zhengde ascended the throne, the salt in the salt field was monopolized by these people, and there was a large number of salt but no salt, and the Ming salt government collapsed.

With such a historical background, Zhu Hao and Su Xigui's business can be a win-win situation.

Su Xigui seems to have suffered a little loss, and the salt released cannot be recovered, but in fact, he has a lot of salt in his hand, and he can buy snowflake salt at a low price and sell it to the provincial capital and even Liangjing, which can be said to be a big profit.

Because of this, Su Xigui gladly accepted Zhu Hao's conditions.

Zhu Niang and Aunt Li digested it for a long time, but they didn't figure out the joints.

The main reason is that they don't understand this era and the policies of the Ming Dynasty, but with the idea of small businessmen, they instinctively feel that honest business can gain a foothold, but they don't know that honest people are the easiest to suffer losses in these years.

In the law of the jungle, the first to be eliminated are those who follow the rules.

Aunt Li comforted: "Madam, it's better to listen to the young master, in fact, we have no way out, don't we?" If you don't do this, how can you keep the inheritance left by the master? ”

Zhu Niang bowed helplessly.

She is also aware of her own situation, and now she is almost forced to a dead end by the Zhu family, and she can only wait for death if she doesn't let go.

"Mother, we used to sell official salt, abide by the rules, and in the end, we didn't provoke official wrongdoing, and we were almost exhausted? There are no real rules in this world, and only those who have power can talk about rules. ”

Zhu Hao's attitude was resolute, and he also wanted to strengthen the confidence of Zhu Niang and Aunt Li: "And this time, mother, let's not come forward, find someone to act as an agent for us, and everything will be up to him. ”

"We are looking for Yu San to transport salt, nominally he was hired by the owner of the Su Dynasty, even if the people from the government find out about the salt flats and find the snowflake salt we produce, we can directly take out the salt and say that this is to buy the official salt of the owner of the Su and come back for processing and purification, which is unreasonable but legal."

"As long as we keep a low profile, there should be no accidents in a few years, because the salt produced will not be sold locally, and the fundamental interests of local salt merchants will not be touched...... In the future, he will be a man of the year in the DPRK and China, and there is no need to worry about his downfall and his political opponents will counterattack. ”

There is another reason why Zhu Hao has so much confidence to cooperate with Su Xigui.

In the future, Huang Zan made outstanding contributions in pacifying the rebellion of King Ning, so he had the reputation of "a product of cloth", and when Huang Zan was born, it was already the Jiajing period.

With such a promising partner, it is much more difficult to do business.