Chapter 196: Official Operation

After a sleepless night, Zhou Shixiang sought out Song Xianggong the next day. Before he could even ask, Song Xianggong frankly admitted the fact that the grain rations allotted to the people of Xinhui had been reduced.

The reason Song Xianggong gave was "distinguishing between those close and those distant." The public granary had only enough stores to last two more months, and there was no telling when the Qing army would lift the siege.

After two months, it went without saying that the city would run out of grain. With no relief troops outside and no stores inside, the city's fall would be only a matter of time.

Therefore, to resolve this crisis — or rather, to buy the Taiping Army more time to await a change in the situation — Song Xianggong had, from the previous month onward, been forced to reduce the grain supplied to the people of Xinhui.

At first, the Xinhui people's ration was two-thirds that of the rear camp. Half a month later it was cut to one-half.

Now each person received only one thin flatbread a day, with everything else cut off entirely. More than two thousand people remained in the city, and regardless of man or woman, old or young, they survived on a single flatbread weighing less than one liang.

How could anyone live on that? Yet if they were given more grain, what would become of the Taiping Army's great household?

With too many monks and too little gruel, Song Xianggong could only harden his heart and strip the Xinhui people of their rations, so as to squeeze out more grain for the front camp and the rear camp.

Song Xianggong's words left Zhou Shixiang with nothing to say. By reason, although many of those Xinhui people were his fellow townsfolk, in sentiment the Taiping Army he had built with his own hands was the closest thing he had, and the force he most ought to preserve.

With food in short supply, abandoning the Xinhui people to preserve the Taiping Army's personnel was not unthinkable. Yet Zhou Shixiang, his conscience uneasy, still could not endorse Song Xianggong's position.

He insisted that Song share out grain to those people, but Song, as if he had swallowed a steel weight and turned to iron, gritted his teeth and refused to yield.

Zhou Shixiang, as Battalion Commander, managed the army; Song Xianggong, as general affairs and provisions officer, managed the civilians.

This division of labor had been fixed back in Luoding, and therefore Song Xianggong absolutely could not interfere in the Taiping Army's organization or command.

By the same logic, Zhou Shixiang could not interfere in any matter of the rear camp, unless his opinion did not harm the rear camp's interests — only then would Song Xianggong cooperate, as with the establishment of the rear camp security team and the public granary system.

Now that Song Xianggong stood firm and refused to yield, no matter how anxious or angry Zhou Shixiang grew, he could do nothing to him.

He could hardly summon the officers and camp elders to deliberate over this matter — Zhou Shixiang did not need to use his brain to know the outcome of such a deliberation would never be what he wanted.

If he used his authority as Battalion Commander to forcibly order Song Xianggong to release grain, that would violate the very purpose for which Zhou Shixiang had established the rear camp, and the decision would very likely run counter to the wishes of the Taiping Army from top to bottom.

Whether Bald Jiang He, the Ge Zheng brothers, Zhao Sihai and that lot would support him, the Battalion Commander, or support Song Xianggong — the answer needed no thought.

Zhou Shixiang was unwilling to play the ****, and even more unwilling to let this matter split the Taiping Army from within. But neither was he willing to give up on those two thousand-odd people.

He recounted what he had witnessed the night before, emphasizing again and again that a girl of eighteen or nineteen was worth only two large flatbreads.

"Without grain, these people can only starve to death — starve to death alive!"

"Can we truly bear to watch those people die like this? Die because of our cruelty!"

"We fight the Qing to save the Han people tormented by the Tartars, not to do the same things the Tartars do! If we let these people starve to death before our very eyes, what difference is there between us and the Tartars!"

"Last year — just last year — my parents, my wife and children were brutally killed by the Qing army. Now, Mr. Song, are you trying to force me to go kill other innocent people!"

"As long as I, Zhou Shixiang, live one more day, as long as our Taiping Army still exists, as long as Xinhui remains in our hands, I will never let the tragedy repeat itself!"

Zhou Shixiang's near-roaring outburst startled the personal guards outside the hall. They rushed in tensely, then looked at one another in bewilderment and quietly withdrew.

"Enough. Since you insist, Battalion Commander, it is no longer convenient for me to play the villain."

Zhou Shixiang's fierce reaction finally made Song Xianggong relent. He was not a man of iron and stone.

Just a few months earlier, when the Taiping Army had first taken Xinhui, he had offered counsel to Zhou Shixiang from atop the wall, hoping Zhou Shixiang would show compassion for the surviving people of Xinhui and not let too many of them die needlessly.

But Zhou Shixiang back then had shown none of today's womanly soft-heartedness, and had refused him without hesitation. Now the two had swapped places: the good man of that day had become the villain, and the villain now wanted to play the good man.

Just as Zhou Shixiang thought Song Xianggong was willing to release grain to those people, Song Xianggong instead laid out a different plan.

"The matter of human trafficking in the city was reported to me long ago by County Magistrate Liao.

Because it resulted from the grain reduction, I suppressed it and did not report it to you. Now that you know, Battalion Commander, and blame me for my hard-heartedness, I must do something to remedy it."

Finding Song Xianggong's words strange, Zhou Shixiang frowned. "Remedy it how?"

Song Xianggong said decisively, "Releasing grain is out of the question."

"Without releasing grain, how are the people to live?!" Zhou Shixiang was both angry and anxious. After all this circling, was Old Master Song just toying with him?

Song Xianggong gestured for Zhou Shixiang to calm himself and let him finish.

"I imagine you already know, Battalion Commander, that the women being sold all come from families in the city. But do you know who the buyers are?"

Zhou Shixiang asked, "Who?"

"All of them are soldiers of the front camp."

Although he had long known the answer in his heart, Zhou Shixiang could not help letting out a "Hmph."

Song Xianggong sighed. "Do not be angry, Battalion Commander. The soldiers buying women may not necessarily be doing evil. The truth may not be as utterly devoid of conscience as you imagine."

"What are you trying to say, sir?"

"Among our troops, some have families and some do not. From what I know, most of those buying women are the unmarried ones."

"The unmarried ones?"

"According to the rules you set, Battalion Commander, the front camp soldiers are fully supplied.

An ordinary soldier gets one jin and four liang of food a day, and officers get more than that.

Those with families have enough left over after feeding themselves to supply their dependents, and with the food allotted by the rear camp, although the army's stores are not large at present, no food has been withheld, so no one in the rear camp worries about going hungry.

The unmarried men in the army have no dependents to feed, so their own share is more than ample — they can even spare some to relieve others. But army grain distribution is an iron rule you set, Battalion Commander.

Even knowing a soldier has surplus food, I would not dare withhold it, lest I violate your great taboo and invite the troops' resentment for nothing."

"You did right in this, sir. With our army trapped defending a lone city, military morale must not be shaken."

Although the city's grain stores were already low, enough for only two months, only officers of platoon commander rank and above knew this; the ordinary soldiers did not.

If their rations were suddenly cut, it would very easily shake morale — which for a Taiping Army trapped in a lone city would be no good thing at all.

Zhou Shixiang appreciated Song Xianggong's prudence and felt grateful, but he did not see what any of this had to do with his demand.

"Since the soldiers have surplus food while the city's people lack grain — one side with too much, the other with too little — what do you suppose will happen, Battalion Commander?

Since ancient times, have there ever been few cases of people trading food for survival? The soldiers take their grain and buy those who are about to starve, giving them a way to live.

Is that not a good thing?"

"People forced to sell their daughters — how can that be a good thing!" Song Xianggong's reasoning left Zhou Shixiang not knowing whether to laugh or cry.

Unexpectedly, Song Xianggong said, "There is no absolutely good thing in this world, nor any absolutely bad thing.

If you had not witnessed that scene of people being sold, Battalion Commander, how much longer do you think these people could have held out — ten days, or half a month? Given a choice between starving to death and selling a person to stay alive, what would the people do?

They live because they receive the soldiers' food — how is that not a good thing?"

"What exactly are you trying to say, sir?" Zhou Shixiang was growing confused.

Song Xianggong stopped beating around the bush and said plainly, "Since the unmarried men in the army wish to buy women and start families, you should simply permit it, Battalion Commander.

That way, while reducing the food supply, we can also ensure that a portion of the people survive. Why should we oppose such a good thing?"

"The soldiers buying women — is it truly to start families?"

Zhou Shixiang said bitterly. Song Xianggong made it sound fine, but what soldiers buying women really intended to do — did he not know? What difference was there, to some degree, between these women and military prostitutes!

Song Xianggong, however, said indifferently, "Think of it however you wish, Battalion Commander. The facts are indeed as they are.

If you choose not to think so, there is nothing I can do. But releasing grain from the public granary is absolutely out of the question.

As the Taiping Army's provisions officer, I must guarantee the army's grain supply. With stores so low, I, Song Xianggong, do not mind playing the villain for once!"

Song Xianggong's words were blunt, even carrying a hint of threat, which made Zhou Shixiang deeply uncomfortable. Yet he knew Song truly was planning for the Taiping Army's sake.

After all, no one knew how long the Qing army would keep the city under siege, and every grain of rice saved now was a good thing.

What exactly to do — Zhou Shixiang hesitated.

The situation in the city was rather like the later American garrisons in Japan, Vietnam, and Korea: when the occupiers possessed far more material goods than the local residents, did the locals not send their women in droves to the beds of those foreign soldiers, just so the whole family could survive?

The Taiping Army was of course not the American army, and what it possessed was a hundred thousand miles short of the Americans. But however poor, it was still better off than the people of Xinhui.

Two flatbreads could buy a young woman — even an unmarried one. One could imagine what straits the people of Xinhui had reached.

His own intent had been to keep these people from starving to death.

The soldiers' intent was not exactly noble, but their actions did give a portion of the people a way to live — even if a very short-lived way, a very bitter and indignant way, it was still a way to live, and far better than starving to death.

With a full belly and warm clothes, one thinks of lust. A full belly and warm clothes, and one thinks of lust...

Zhou Shixiang gave a self-mocking smile.

An army trapped defending a lone city could actually produce this phenomenon — it struck him as laughable, and also pitiable, and made him wonder whether he had failed too badly, failed to educate his own men, failed to forge a people's army that would rather starve than seize grain, rather freeze than tear down houses.

Perhaps this was what a real army of this era looked like. Perhaps this was the true nature of the Taiping Army.

After a long while, Zhou Shixiang finally spoke to Song Xianggong. "Very well. I will not press my opinion further. But I ask you, sir, to take charge of this matter and turn it from a private undertaking into an official one."

"From a private undertaking into an official one?"

Song Xianggong was baffled.