Chapter 551: No Merchant Is Not Cunning, Indeed!

Has he gone mad?

He must have gone mad!

Another one gone mad.

Yao Daqiao's wild joy was met with several sympathetic glances.

That was understandable! Because anyone who saw his wealthy-merchant getup knew at once that this was a profiteer. Profiteers generally registered their land under the names of respected gentry to evade taxes, so they held no title deeds.

Without title deeds, there could be no compensation!

Moreover, any gentry who received compensation had to renounce their examination degrees, settle permanently in Wuhan, and were forbidden from acquiring property in their native places; their houses and shops in their native places also had to be given up entirely!

This meant the profiteers' local protectors would be gone as well, and without their protectors, the high-interest loans they had put out would naturally be unrecoverable.

The losses were so great that many profiteers of limited means would be ruined; going mad would be the least of it, and no small number would probably throw themselves into the Yangtze rather than live with it!

Ye Jiaxin was frightened by the look of Yao Daqiao — this man was his meal ticket in Wuchang, after all; he must not actually go mad. So he hastily dragged him toward the Hanyang Gate, thinking to pull him over so the ladies of the house could comfort him properly.

Dragged along like that, Yao Daqiao could only stumble after him. Ye Jiaxin was a big rich peasant, full of strength, and though the profiteer Yao was fat, it was flabby fat — how could he break free?

Only after the two of them got inside the Hanyang Gate did Yao Daqiao find a chance to pull his arm free. Rubbing it, he grumbled, "What are you doing? What's the hurry? We haven't even seen the notice yet — this is a chance to make a fortune!"

"Make a fortune?" Ye Jiaxin was at the point of tears. "What fortune? Everything's gone."

All his land was registered under other people's names; he held no title deeds, so there would be no compensation.

Yao Daqiao patted his chest. "You've got me! I still have capital. Come with me — let's find a tavern, and since your big brother here is in a good mood, we'll talk as we drink!"

Seeing that Yao Daqiao did not seem mad after all, Ye Jiaxin could only follow him to a small tavern, where they casually ordered a little wine and food and began to talk as they drank.

"When you get back, pack up. We'll set out together, following the Crown Prince's troop ships!"

Ye Jiaxin asked, "What are we following the troop ships for?"

"To buy rice! I've gotten hold of a few more five-hundred-liao boats these past days, enough to carry three or four thousand shi of rice." Yao Daqiao laughed. "Didn't you say last year's harvest in Huguang was decent? The harvest was good, no one went to collect rents, and the trade routes were cut off, so the farmers in Huguang must be sitting on a great deal of rice right now. We need to buy it up fast. If we wait until the notice posted outside the Hanyang Gate today is posted everywhere, the price of rice is sure to rise a good deal. We'll go to your home county, Jing County, to buy rice!"

"Right!" Ye Jiaxin was a rich peasant, and of course he was cunning too (rich peasants were merchants as well). "How did I forget? The Crown Prince is going to let Huguang's farmers redeem their land with rice, so the rice in their hands will have somewhere to go — the price is bound to rise!"

Yao Daqiao said thoughtfully, "The rice merchants from the southeast have already sailed their boats up to Wuchang Prefecture. Once we bring the rice back, we'll sell it off immediately, then split into two routes. I'll go buy more rice. You take some capital and go to Huainan to buy wheat seed, rice seed, plow oxen, and hire strong laborers!"

"Buying wheat seed, rice seed, plow oxen, and hiring strong laborers is for... renting land?"

Yao Daqiao nodded. "Exactly! Renting land. If it weren't for the Crown Prince's rice-for-land redemption scheme, a good deal of land in Huguang would certainly lie fallow over the next few years. Because Li Zicheng's method of equalizing land by headcount was far too crude, and many of the farmers who received land may be unable to work it.

If they weren't under pressure to pay rice to buy their land, they might not rent it out. But now they certainly will, and the rent won't be too high, because Huguang has just been through chaos, the population has fallen sharply, and there won't be many willing to rent land and farm it."

Li Zicheng's headcount land grants consisted only of "granting land," with no distribution of movable property — the movable property had all been taken by Li Zicheng and his veteran camp soldiers, including plow oxen and farm tools (the tools were all iron, which could be forged into weapons or used on the veteran soldiers' own estates). So in the four prefectures of Jingzhou, Chengtian, De'an, and Hanyang, there was sure to be a surplus of land and a shortage of production tools such as farm implements and plow oxen.

Moreover, the standard of four to five mu per head was also very "crude." For whether that "head" was a strong man or a woman or child, a farmer or a town dweller, the officials of the Shun court never bothered to ask — they just handed out land at random.

So many of the farmers who received land were in fact incapable of working it, while the rich peasants who were skilled at farming and had cultivated large tracts suffered catastrophic losses under Li Zicheng's headcount equalization, and many of them had fled.

Therefore, for some time to come, the four prefectures of Jingzhou, Chengtian, De'an, and Hanyang in Huguang — and perhaps Xiangyang Prefecture as well — would see a surplus of land.

For a merchant like Yao Daqiao, who still had some capital in hand, this was an opportunity!

Yao Daqiao calculated: "We'll rent as much as we can, contiguous tracts of land, and sign long-term leases. I'll put up the capital, and I'll handle the sale of the grain we grow. Everything else is up to you. When we make money, we split it seventy-thirty — seventy for me, thirty for you!"

"Fine!" Ye Jiaxin was naturally delighted. He was empty-handed now, with even meals a problem, so he was in no position to say no!

Still, he was a little worried, and asked in a low voice, "Brother Yao, following the Crown Prince's troop ships... will it work? Will they let us follow?"

"It'll work!" Yao Daqiao patted his chest. "I have connections!"

His connection was Chen Yongxi — the very same Princely Establishment Rectifier of the Dai princedom who had gone from Shanxi to Li Zicheng's court as an envoy and then drifted on to Nanjing. Because he had spent some time with Li Zicheng, he had been transferred by Li Yan into the headquarters adjutant bureau and had come along to Wuchang. Inside Wuchang city he had run into Yao Daqiao, who was looking everywhere for connections, and the two had become drinking companions.

But Yao Daqiao would not be going to ask Chen Yongxi for help; rather, Chen Yongxi was the one coming to him for help — help buying rice!

It turned out that not long before, Chen Yongxi had been transferred again to the Jiangdu garrison headquarters as Grain Storehouse Commissioner, and had been assigned by Liu Kongzhao the task of mobilizing rice merchants.

So from the fifth month onward, Chen Yongxi had been constantly begging Yao Daqiao for help. And Yao Daqiao, putting on the look of a man terrified of death, demanded rich rewards as encouragement, and even made an outrageous demand: the loan of ten five-hundred-liao wooden boats (these were the boats he had mentioned to Ye Jiaxin) and a large plot of vacant land on Hanzheng Street — he held the title deeds and house deeds for Hankou Town, but Hankou Town had been destroyed in the war and had to be rebuilt, so the deeds could be exchanged for vacant land. But where the exchanged land would be located was hard to say; it would not necessarily be in the original spot, because all the streets of Hankou were to be redesigned and replanned.

Yao Daqiao had already worked it all out: once he got the vacant land on Hanzheng Street, he would immediately mortgage it to the Salt Merchants' Bank, take the money to pay deposits on cloth and charter boats, use the cloth to trade for rice, and then sell the rice to the garrison headquarters grain storehouse. That way he would make a profit and have the capital for bigger ventures.

The truth was that this profiteer had also been driven to the brink of bankruptcy by Li Zicheng, and had only been struggling to keep up appearances.

"Commissioner Chen, I truly don't lack money. I have plenty of money. Why would I covet some fat profit? I'm just helping friends, right? You're a friend, and those big farmers too (not just Ye Jiaxin — several of them) are all my friends... I can't let them down either!"

In a side room of the Jiangdu garrison headquarters, Yao Daqiao, waiting to go sign the contract with Liu Kongzhao, showed not the slightest sign of joy. He merely sighed as he spoke with Chen Yongxi, whom he had just fleeced (though the one actually being fleeced was Zhu Cilang).

After seeking instructions from Liu Kongzhao, Chen Yongxi had agreed to all of Yao Daqiao's conditions, and was now quite grateful to him — the man was so wealthy, yet still took such great risks going into the countryside to buy rice, and had even signed a contract for two hundred thousand shi of white rice. He truly was a loyal friend!

Although Chen Yongxi had been badly fleeced, he had secured a very reliable big rice merchant, so it was still worth the price. He had thus rendered meritorious service and was now in quite a good mood.

"Don't worry," Chen Yongxi said in Shanxi-accented Mandarin, "with naval troop ships going with you, what could possibly go wrong? And this deal is rock-solid. As long as you have connections in Huguang, you needn't fear failing to profit. If you really can buy two hundred thousand shi of white rice, I can even recommend you for an official post before the garrison commander."

"That would truly bring glory to my ancestors — wonderful, wonderful." Yao Daqiao finally showed a trace of a smile. He did want an official status; after all, it was a talisman of protection! And if he could get the status of an imperial merchant, that would be even better!

(End of Chapter)