A rice storm pushed the small Longtan County outside Nanjing to the cusp, and the originally small county suddenly became busy, and the market was also shoulder to shoulder. But even so, the price of rice is still extremely expensive, and the poor people still have no rice to cook. On the other hand, the high rollers from all over the world crowded the few inns in the city to the brim, which was a waste of money and frightened others. For a while, chaos and prosperity appeared strangely here.

After several fluctuations, the price of rice began to climb slowly, and after an in-depth investigation, the people sent out by Li Xin found that the rice in Longtan County was only accumulated in the hands of a few large households, and generally did not exceed the number of two hands, including Hu Liu, the cheap brother-in-law of Longtan County.

Li Xin's eyebrows jumped, and he immediately understood that Hu Liu was the puppet that the county ordered Chen Wenzhi to put in Qiantai to trade high-priced rice, didn't he already tell Chen Wenzhi to sell all the high-priced rice in his hand, why was he still hoarding Juqi?

Mi Yan added on the side: "Although Hu Liu can also be ranked in the top ten, there is a difference of thousands of miles between him and the top five. At best, it can only be regarded as indiscriminate, and the only big households that can really affect the price of rice are the top three. ”

Hearing Mi Yan's words and the topic, Li Xin no longer paid attention to Hu Liu's matter, and his eyes suddenly coldened. "Can the background of these three rice merchants be investigated?"

"Clear! The first is the owner of a rice shop in Nanjing. He has sent someone to investigate on the spot, but the conclusion he has reached is very surprising, this person's family is not more than 10,000 taels of silver, but he can do such a big thing that stirs up the entire Ying Tianfu. ”

"There's nothing surprising about this, it must be a marionette chosen by a certain gold owner at the front desk, and he has done an investigation behind the scenes of this rice shop owner?" Li Xin asked the key point, Mi Yan moved his body a little unnaturally, "I have investigated several times, and there has been no substantial progress, but this rice shop owner is in Longtan County right now, and it seems that he can start with himself." ”

Li Xin rejected this construction, "It's not suitable to startle the snake now, and besides, we don't even care about Ying Tianfu and the Six Divisions of Nanjing about this matter, so it's inconvenient for us to go beyond the bounds, just watch." Then the latter two, what is the result? ”

"This brother and sister seem to have an inextricable relationship with a cabinet minister in Beijing!"

"Who is it?"

Mi Yan still hesitated to answer: "I don't dare to be sure, according to various signs, I privately speculated that it was Liu Yuliang." ”

Why not Zhou Yanru? This is Li Xin's first reaction, and then the second reaction is that since the second person in the big family is not, the person who ranks first is likely to be Ruan Dacheng behind the scenes, thanks to the memory of his previous life, he knows that Ruan Dacheng has already served Zhou Yanru, and even Zhou Yanru can successfully reinstate as the first assistant of the cabinet this time, and this person has contributed a lot of money.

"And the third-ranked big family?"

Mi Yan was embarrassed again, today's matter was not solid, and in the face of Li Xin's one-on-one questioning, he was really a little unaccustomed to the feeling that this kind of errand could not be done well.

"This rice merchant is a little strange, there is no trace to follow before this turmoil, only to find out that this person is from Datong, maybe a certain Jin merchant can not say."

Speaking of Jin merchants, Li Xinxin's head moved, seven or eight out of ten Jin merchants in Datong, Shanxi Province have joined the United Chamber of Commerce, and the power of the Chamber of Commerce is in the hands of Guo Binghuan and Huang Sheng respectively.

Except for a few of the United Chamber of Commerce, all the rest of the Jin merchants could be said to hate Li Xin's shareholding, because when he was in Shanxi, he punished those who refused to cooperate or colluded with the Tartar wolf. These people will definitely not come to Jiangnan to visit them, but they will never help each other secretly, and even send military rations for nothing.

Who is this man? Li Xin pondered for a long time and didn't figure out a clue.

On the afternoon of this conversation, for the first time, the rice market in Longtan County was in short supply, and many high-rollers who came from other state capitals complained that they had no trade and no money, so they had to suffer until some people were willing to sell the rice in their hands, so they came up to loot it, and the result was still that there were more monks and less porridge. This situation lasted for three or four days, and at the same time the price of rice began to decline slowly.

Li Xin didn't care at first, but the situation happened in this seemingly extremely dull situation. On the tenth day of the first month of March, that is, seven days before the beginning of summer, hundreds of thousands of stones of grain were suddenly thrown out of the market at the same time, and the transaction volume was comparable to the sum of the previous month.

Almost overnight, rice that has been in demand for several days can be seen everywhere in Longtan County. Some high-rollers, who held a large amount of rice arrears, suddenly discovered that almost all of them, who were begging to buy some rice yesterday, were selling it almost simultaneously today, and some of them were quickly drowned in the sea of people.

Soon, the high rollers turned from being at a loss to worrying, so some people took the lead in starting to sell at a lower price, not seeking to make more money, but only to recover the capital. But no one expected that since the first high-roller price reduction, the market of the entire rice market has been like a waterfall for thousands of miles, until it was dark, and it fell from 1423000 silver to 8 taels of silver and 10000 silver.

At the time of the lantern, the high-rollers of the various families left and returned to their lodgings to rest and recreation, but today almost no one left, and they all gathered in a large warehouse in the city that had been vacated by the deal, anxiously waiting for a miracle to appear. It must be known that many people bought it for 14 taels of silver and a stone, and now they have fallen for 8 taels of silver. And the price of two silver and one stone is only priceless. If it weren't for a few big families leaving after dark and trading suspended, I was afraid that it would continue to fall.

After dinner, Li Xin convened a meeting of several leaders in the army as usual, and at the same time learned the news of today's sharp drop in rice prices, and was ready to discuss countermeasures. However, he thinks that this is not necessarily a bad thing, and even thinks that the decline is not big enough, and the people involved in it are basically either rich or expensive, and the loss will be lost. At this moment, he suddenly got a report that the county magistrate of Longtan County had an urgent matter to see.

I saw Chen Wenzhi enter the Chinese military tent in a panic, and when he saw Li Xin, he knelt on the ground with a puff and cried without waiting for him to speak. Seeing this situation, Li Xin had no choice but to help Chen Wenshan up, and let him go to the study behind the account to ask him what happened. In fact, even if Chen Wenshan hadn't opened his mouth yet, he had vaguely guessed the reason.

"The Marquis of Zhen, save me! Hu Liu's lard was blindfolded, and he bought rice at a high price with all the silver sold for grain behind my back, and now the market is collapsing, once the market opens tomorrow, I am afraid that I will lose all my money......"

Among these silvers were the treasury silver from the county treasury, as well as the 100,000 taels of silver sent by Li Xinjie to buy military rations, and the rest was 200,000 yuan earned in the rice market. The 200,000 yuan he earned later was lost, but the county treasury and the silver of the Three Guards were lost, and he couldn't afford to lose even if he had ten heads. Thinking of this, Chen Wenshan's sorrow came from it, and finally he couldn't help crying loudly.

Li Xin smacked his tongue after hearing this, regretting that he had forgotten to remind Chen Wenzhi for a while, so that he also invisibly became a victim on the ship. For this Chen Wenshan, Li Xin has lost his temper, this kind of person has more than enough success or failure, if it weren't for the fact that there were too few civil officials in the bag, how could he let him do this money and food?

But the matter has come to this point, even if he scolds him with a head and face, it will not help, so he has to soothe him with good words, tell him that there is no endless road, go back to rest and rest, and then discuss the rest in the long run. After saying it, Chen Wenzhi left the barracks and returned to the city with tears in his eyes.

In fact, Li Xin has no way, he is just a spectator in this kind of matter, he has no million silver dollars in his hand, and he doesn't want to participate in it, but if he loses 100,000 taels of silver, he will lose it, and it is far from the point of breaking his muscles and bones for the Three Guards.

Just when Li Xin was stunned, he didn't even notice when Mi Yan came to his side. It wasn't until Mi Yan coughed that he came back to his senses.

"The investigation has the results, today's wild sale on the shelves is the owner of the rice shop in Nanjing, he had negotiated with a stranger yesterday, and the stranger also left the city that night and returned to Nanjing. It is also a person whose hard work pays off, and it was Ruan Dacheng who met him after returning to Nanjing. Zhenyu Hou guessed that it was really not bad! ”

At the end, Mi Yan praised it and continued to report.

The rice merchant who pointed directly at Liu Yuliang in the background also sold some today, and then Xu felt that the situation was not good, so he stopped selling. However, the strangest thing is that the third-ranked rice merchant has not sold a stone, and if he continues, he is afraid that he will lose all his money. ”

Li Xin Huoran got up, feeling that this person had sent carbon in the snow, and he categorically did not sit idly by, no matter what, he had to help if he had the ability, and he had to help if he didn't have the ability. "Come and don't be rude, we have to help him, otherwise wouldn't it be too unrighteous?"

Li Xin rarely said such things about the habits of the rivers and lakes, Mi Yan thought it was funny, but he didn't dare to laugh, so he asked, "Does the marquis of Zhenyu have a plan?" ”

Li Xin also made a temporary decision, so he got up and walked a few steps in the house, and when he felt stuffy, he came to the bed and pushed the two windows open. At this moment, a flash of inspiration flashed in his mind, and he actually had an idea.

"The reason why the high rollers sell their rice is because they have lost confidence in the market, which can give them a little confidence! Rice prices are bound to pick up. ”

Mi Yan was confused, "How do you give them confidence?" You can't buy the rice in their hands at a high price in the name of the government, right? ”

Seeing Li Xin nodding with a smile, Mi Yan only felt a little difficult to accept, not to mention whether this idea was suitable or not, even the Three Guards couldn't take out so much silver to buy rice in the market right now!