Seeing his father-in-law, Li You immediately entered a state of alert and braced himself, stood up and stepped forward to greet him: "Old Taishan is here to greet me. My son-in-law has come to welcome you from far away. Please forgive me for my sins. Please take a seat."
"No need to be polite," Inspector Liu waved his hand.
Li You looked around and scolded his fellow clerks: "What a look! Why don't you serve Mr. Liu tea!"
Wang Gui and Yuan Ming decided to go out.
Inspector Liu smiled and said: "I am here to pay a visit to the county magistrate this time, but I remembered that I wanted to find a good son-in-law for a small matter, so I came to see him first."
What could he ask for? It was probably a trap. Li You asked cautiously, "What's the matter?"
"Not long ago, you arrested a steward of Mr. Yan's family. He is still in prison. Mr. Yan asked me to entrust him to me. I couldn't save my face and agreed."
Li Youcai remembered this incident. When he went to his uncle's place to quell a fight a few days ago, he caught the Yan family's manager Fang and threw him into prison. Then he forgot about this person. It's so good, so good, it seems that this person
There are still people who are barely surviving by delivering food.
"For this trivial matter, Lao Taishan can just go to the jail and pull the person out. He is not a convicted felon, so why should he come to joke with his son-in-law." Li You said. A patrol inspector doesn't even have this ability? Who would believe it.
Inspector Liu seemed to be loyal and said: "As a foreign military official, I should avoid suspicion and should not interfere in the government affairs of the county government at will."
Li You cried out in his heart, "Bah!" In this place with a radius of less than a hundred miles, how can there be so much care? Do you think you are a leading general and dare not interfere in the government's affairs?
If Li You hadn't already guessed his father-in-law's trump card, he might have fallen into a trap at this moment. He has now concluded that Inspector Liu is deliberately doing things through him, deliberately owed a favor, and will also deliberately use it to send gifts.
Take the bait.
If he didn't know the inside story, Li Youzhen might burst into tears of gratitude, thinking that the old man had good intentions and came up with a way not to hurt his face.
Li You, who was disapproving, didn't answer, turned to the outside and shouted: "Why haven't you served tea for so long?"
"My dear son-in-law, let go of the steward. I have a great gift for you, and it will be used as a dowry. I guarantee your satisfaction." Inspector Liu said mysteriously.
As expected, Li You secretly thought, he hasn’t figured out how to deal with it yet, so he can’t ask him to tell him. The old man is pretending to be mysterious, so I’ll just pretend that I don’t know for the time being. After making the calculation, he said, “I’ll kill my son-in-law.”
, don’t mention any gifts or not. Old Taishan just goes to see the great master, and I will release him right away, but please don’t worry.”
After saying that, Li You walked out, really going to the prison to release people.
It is said that things in the world are unpredictable, and life is unsatisfactory 10 times. When the time comes, the heaven and the earth work together to transport the hero to freedom, but he goes to the tiger mountain even though he knows that there are tigers in the mountain. In short, Li You and Li Dianshi would never have imagined that at this time, within a few days,
He was about to take the father-in-law's bait.
Li You went to the prison and beat up the manager Fang who had framed him, and threw him out, thus giving face to his father-in-law. On the way back, he passed through the atrium of the county government office and met Mr. Huang. He saw that the fourth master was half drunk.
He woke up, his face was very serious, he must have been invited to drink. And from the vacillating state of his steps, Li You judged with great experience that the fourth master had also enjoyed the attentive service of the prostitute.
When Mr. Huang saw Li You, he tried his best to make up his mind and said: "Today, Qianhuang Chamber of Commerce, which is responsible for the stone materials, will send a stone strip sample. Please accept it and ask an experienced stone worker to survey it."
Hearing Master Huang mention Qian Huangshang, Li You knew in his heart that Master Huang was probably entertained by Qian Huangshang last night, but he was a little afraid that he would cause trouble. He couldn't help but persuaded: "Old sir, Qian Huangshang's conditions are very good."
It’s suspicious that you only need 50,000 silver taels to buy all the stones. We haven’t figured out the key yet, so we must be careful, lest we miss the important event of the county magistrate.”
"I am also thinking about these. Qian Huangshang promised to deliver a sample of materials today, and he will continue to provide materials in this way until the river work is over. There will be no mistakes." Master Huang then ordered, "I think you accept it.
After carefully inspecting the stone strips, if there are no problems, we will make a contract with Qian Huangshang. This will be the standard from now on. In the end, we will not suffer any loss. If he breaks the contract, no wonder we don't give him face.
, at worst, we’ll blow up mountains and get rocks.”
Li You thought about it and found no loopholes, so he agreed.
In the afternoon, someone sent a stone bar half a foot long by boat. Li You directed the servants to carry the stone bar from the water gate of the government office to the public house, and then sent someone to call the masonry.
The stonemason called was named Ma. He was about fifty years old. He was considered the most experienced stonemason in the county and was often used by the government. Li You retreated out of caution, leaving only Ma mason and himself.
Mason Ma walked around the big stone bar several times, carefully knocked and rubbed it, and then took out a ruler to measure it. After completing the inspection, he said to Li You: "This stone bar... is a little special."
Li You couldn't tell, so he asked, "What's so special?"
Mason Ma took another look and said, "If I'm not mistaken, this seems to be the material used for the seawall in Zhejiang."
Why is it related to the Qianli Seawall in Zhejiang? The confused Li You asked again: "Are you sure?"
Mason Ma gestured: "Twenty years ago, the imperial court built a large-scale stone seawall in Zhejiang, and I was recruited as a craftsman. I know that the stone bars used in the seawall are five feet long, and the width and thickness are one and a half feet, and this stone bar
The length and size are exactly the same. Moreover, after careful identification by the villain, the stone material is indeed produced in several counties in Zhejiang, and the stones for the seawall are all obtained from here."
"Are you sure?"
Mason Ma raised his hands and said: "I have been immersed in this industry for many years, and I still have good eyesight. It is undoubtedly a seawall stone."
Strange, how could it be the material used for seawalls to withstand tsunami surges? Who would be so full that they would be able to make exactly the same stone strips to use on inland embankments? Li You really didn’t understand the process, so he asked the professional masons
Asking for advice: "In addition to building seawalls in Jiangnan, does anyone build this kind of stone?"
"With my experience in this industry, I have never heard of such a thing."
"Let me ask you again, given 50,000 taels of silver, can you get at least 5,000 square meters or even 10,000 square meters of this kind of stone?"
Ma Shijiang shook his head and said: "At this price of five thousand square meters, maybe we can give it a try, but ten thousand square meters is absolutely impossible."
Could it be that Qian Huangshang and his gang were so bold that they dared to dismantle the stones from the seawall and transport them for sale? No one is so smart as to cause such an obvious catastrophe. It is impossible for things like stone strips to be transported over long distances. Qian Huangshang must
It was obtained from the Jiangnan area. After thinking about it, Li You frowned and said, "Since no one has made it, where else in South Zhili and Zhejiang can such stone be found?"
"This villain has built a seawall and knows a thing or two about it." Mason Ma said: "The seawall needs to be repaired every year, so a lot of materials are stored in the Linhai area of Zhejiang. Last year, the villain was recruited to build the city wall in Fucheng and the southern wall.
When chatting with colleagues, I heard that the governor of Zhejiang had scrapped a large amount of seawall materials and disposed of them because the materials were unqualified..."
Hearing this, Li You was shocked, his heart was so shaken that he fell down on the chair. He suppressed it for a moment and said to Ma Shijiang: "Don't let a word of what you say today be leaked to others!"
Although Mason Ma didn't know what was going on and why Li You asked him to analyze the stone, he had been used to doing construction for many years and knew how powerful it was, so he still agreed: "Don't worry, sir, even a villain is afraid of death."
, I will never dare to say a word, I will just pretend that I have never been here today."
After sending Ma Shijiang away, Li You sat motionless, his mind filled with confusion.
The whole thing is about to come out - the Zhejiang side (mostly led by the governor) falsely claimed that it was unqualified and scrapped, misappropriated the spare stones, and then sold them for corruption. Qian Huangshang was also one of them. If he got 50,000 taels of silver this time, look
It seems like a loss, but in fact the cost may only be a few thousand taels in shipping costs! No wonder, no wonder!
He is just a small county official, how can he bear such a big case? If he is involved, once the incident is revealed, the whole family will suffer. And he is also the kind of little person who must be dealt with severely in order to demonstrate official law.
But there is no amulet, and there is no official network to protect him.