Chapter 61: The Anonymous Letter

"This is an anonymous letter, and you still tried to open it!"

Heifu pressed down on Ji Ying's hand as it reached for the straw cord and rebuked him sharply. At the same time, he noticed that Li Xian had made the same move, but seeing that Heifu had already stopped Ji Ying, Li Xian silently withdrew.

"I…" Ji Ying was badly startled by their reactions. He stood stunned for a long moment, and then finally remembered what the previous old postman had told him. Instantly, he broke out in a cold sweat.

As it turned out, Qin statutes specifically stipulated: if you receive an anonymous letter, you must not open and read it! If you open and read it, you break the law and must pay a fine of two suits of armor…

If Ji Ying had let his hands get the better of him and opened that letter just now, he would have had to pay a fine of over two thousand cash. Like the village head, as a low-level public servant, a postman also drew a base salary, but it only amounted to fifty shi of grain rations a year. Calculated at the grain price that had dropped after this year's autumn harvest — "forty cash per shi of rice" — he would have to work for nothing, neither eating nor drinking, for a whole year just to pay it off.

"Thank goodness, thank goodness, otherwise it would have been a disaster."

As Ji Ying stood there wiping sweat and counting his blessings, Heifu took the wooden tablet letter from his hands and examined it with a frown.

Because Qin's relay postal system was very strictly inspected, an anonymous letter would basically never be allowed to travel between multiple locations. So there was only one possibility: someone had secretly slipped this letter in while Ji Ying was midway through his delivery route.

Although Heifu did not know the contents, it was most likely a tip-off letter, meant to be delivered into the hands of the authorities via the postman.

Though Qin statutes were harsh and encouraged commoners to report wrongdoing, they also imposed strict rules on accusations. If an accusation proved false or exaggerated, the accuser would face "reciprocal punishment for false accusation."

Therefore, the Qin government's attitude toward anonymous tip-off letters was unequivocal: if they acted on the letter's accusations, arresting and punishing people, the entire Qin state would likely descend into universal fear and suspicion. Thus, they could not encourage this kind of denunciation that cost the accuser nothing. Anonymous tip-off letters were uniformly rejected — they would not even so much as glance at one…

Unless you had already captured the person who delivered the letter; only then could you open it, compare testimonies, and get to the bottom of the matter.

"Ji Ying, do you know who slipped this in?" Heifu asked.

"How would I know…" Ji Ying felt deeply wronged. "I didn't even know there was a letter like this in my back basket until just now."

"Village head, since we haven't caught the person who delivered it, we'd best just burn it."

Like Heifu, Li Xian knew this statute. The recommended method of disposal in the statutes was to "burn it." Keeping the thing would be like holding a hot potato — no matter what was written inside, burning it would be clean and done with.

Heifu, however, seemed to have his own plans. He told everyone to stay calm for a moment, then sent Dongmen Bao to call Old Man Pu, Xiao Tao, and Yu Liang over to the main hall. As village head, he was going to hold a small all-hands meeting…

…

A quarter hour later, inside the modest hall, every member of the Huyang police station sat on straw mats.

Constable Dongmen Bao, village father Old Man Pu, postman Ji Ying, and station soldiers Li Xian, Yu Liang, and Xiao Tao — seven people in all, counting Heifu.

And on the low table before them lay that anonymous bamboo-slip letter.

"So that's how things stand."

Heifu briefly recounted the sequence of events, his gaze sweeping over the six of them.

"As Li Xian said, the statutes stipulate that if you encounter an anonymously delivered letter and have not captured the deliverer, you must not open it. Burning it is the best course."

Everyone nodded, thinking this was the proper way to handle it.

Heifu paused briefly, then continued: "But you should also know that the statutes further say: if you can capture the person who delivered the letter, the reward is two male and female slaves!"

"A reward of two slaves?"

At these words, everyone's expressions changed — except for Li Xian, who had known the rule all along.

"Male and female slaves" meant exactly that: male slaves were called chen, and female slaves were called qie.

Qin was not the "progressive feudal state that abolished slavery" touted in later history textbooks — quite the opposite! This state's statutes were very advanced in some respects, but in certain other respects, they were quite backward. Qin's slaves and convict laborers made up the largest proportion of the population among the seven warring states!

For example, in Anlu County alone, there were several hundred male and female convict laborers and government slaves performing wall-building, fuel-gathering, and rice-pounding labor for the authorities. Beyond that, among private officials and rank-holders, nearly every household had one or two slaves. Wealthier households — for instance, Li Xian's own clan, the Right-Side Li lineage of this township — owned slaves numbering in the dozens…

A large portion of these slaves were from the surrounding barbarian tribes or were prisoners captured in war. Qin law stipulated: "Those who surrender in battle shall be made government slaves." When Qin warred with the other six states, the dead were beheaded and the living were taken captive; a great many became government slaves and flowed into Qin. Of course, there were also Qin people who became slaves after being implicated in crimes. Under the military merit rank system, as some rose, others fell, maintaining the equilibrium of this hierarchical pyramid.

The children of government slaves were likewise slaves. This caused Qin's slave base to grow ever larger. Only by earning merit on the battlefield could a slave redeem freedom for themselves and their family — that was the sole way out.

The status of slaves in Qin was extremely low. Although Qin statutes stipulated that slaves could not be arbitrarily killed or mistreated, they were regarded as property and permitted to be bought and sold. Throughout Qin, there was a phenomenon of "slave markets where they are penned together with cattle and horses." In the human market of Anlu County town, an adult male or female slave was worth 4,300 cash — equivalent to four suits of armor or one hundred shi of rice. Underage slaves were even cheaper, worth only 2,500 cash.

In other words, it took two adult female slaves plus a child to trade for a single plow ox or a good horse. Truly, people were worth less than livestock…

Heifu was instinctively repulsed by this system, but as he was now, merely a small village head, he could barely look after himself amid the tides of the era, let alone change the system.

He could only sigh inwardly and say, "Of course, two slaves — even two female slaves — wouldn't be enough to split among us."

At these words, aside from the unsmiling Li Xian and the aged Old Man Pu, the other four all laughed. Ji Ying's laugh was the lewdest of all. They were all hot-blooded young men; they understood perfectly. Only Xiao Tao still seemed a bit clueless.

"But converting them to cash is a different matter. Two slaves are equivalent to 8,600 in reward money. When the time comes, we can choose not to take the slaves, but to take the reward money!"

At the mention of such a large sum of money, everyone reacted differently.

Dongmen Bao, Ji Ying, and Xiao Tao were no strangers to this kind of scene; they exchanged knowing grins.

Old Man Pu's narrowed eyes widened. Yu Liang clenched his fists and licked his lips, visibly tempted.

Only Li Xian remained expressionless, as if he held such wealth in no regard at all.

Heifu took in each of their six expressions one by one and smiled. "So, I want to give it a try — see if we can catch that anonymous letter deliverer. If we capture him and get the reward money, it should be shared among everyone at the station!"

"Good! We'll follow the village head!" Dongmen Bao, Ji Ying, and Xiao Tao were Heifu's die-hard comrades and raised no objection. Yu Liang's family was poor and needed money, so he clamored in agreement as well.

Old Man Pu was the village father and did not take part in arrests. Though somewhat tempted, he ultimately shook his head, saying he was old and decrepit and would stay out of the young people's business.

Only Li Xian cupped his hands toward Heifu and said, "Village head, the reward for capturing an anonymous letter deliverer is set so high — far exceeding that for an ordinary murderer or bandit — precisely because the deliverer's movements are so hard to trace. As long as no one witnessed him, he can simply act as if nothing happened. It is not like a murder, where a corpse provides clues, nor like a theft, where one can track the whereabouts of stolen goods. How are we supposed to search?"

In Li Xian's view, this matter was extremely troublesome. If they could open the letter and read its contents, they might be able to roughly deduce the deliverer's identity. But as it stood, the letter sat there untouched, and they could only guess blindly. Catching the person would be exceedingly difficult.

Yet this difficulty did not seem to daunt Heifu. With the air of one who has a well-thought-out plan, he said, "Not so. This matter is difficult if you say it's difficult, but easy if you say it's easy!"

PS:

When there is a delivered letter, do not open it; upon seeing it, burn it immediately. One who can capture the deliverer shall be rewarded with two slaves, male and female, and the letter deliverer shall be bound, tried, and sentenced. What this means is: if the letter is seen but the deliverer is not caught, burn the letter and do not open it; if the deliverer is caught, the letter is not burned, and he shall be bound, tried, and sentenced. — Yunmeng Qin Slips, Legal Answers

Tenth month of the thirty-first year, on the new moon day yiyou, the Defender of Erchun Township

One adult male slave, value four thousand three hundred cash.

One underage slave, value two thousand five hundred cash.

Total value six thousand eight hundred cash. — Liye Qin Slips

(End of chapter)