Chapter 222: 222. Chapter 220 Chat and Newspaper and Attitude

222. Chapter 220 Chat and Newspaper and Attitude

"You mean Jack?", Patricia looked at Lanse. "I remember you met last time, at Barbara's birthday party."

Speaking of Barbara's birthday party, Patricia revealed a kind of faint envy.

Barbara's life was what she yearned for. Perhaps this was the idea that most good girls had had.

They longed to put on those long skirts that church schools didn't allow girls to wear, didn't allow them to dress up, didn't allow them to laugh or cry loudly.

The gradual withdrawal of church schools from the historical stage was not just a change produced by the improvement of women's status, but more of an awakening of society, an awakening of human nature.

As a management-style school that at least deprived some people of human nature, it no longer fits the development of the times and the liberation of thought.

Now people pursue personality and freedom, not wearing skirts to the instep, half-sleeved shirts not exceeding the elbows, and not smiling like nuns.

Lanse drove the car away from the roadside. "It's him, do you have his phone number?"

"Of course, do you have something to find him?"

Lanse nodded. "Some work matters.", although this excuse wasn't too good, Patricia seemed not to have discovered that Lanse and Jack had no contact environment at work.

She didn't think of this, and wouldn't think in this direction.

The lazy sunshine by the sea shone on people. When you are with the person you like, the whole world is shining.

Patricia and Lanse talked about interesting things at work, interesting things encountered by young boys and girls.

Actually, from Lanse's angle, these stories weren't so interesting, very ordinary, but he still showed the side of being interested in these.

This of course wasn't deceiving Patricia, but respecting her, because the "narrow" and even not interesting world she described was her everything!

The two didn't go back immediately. Lanse took Patricia to a cake shop in the city center and bought her a single-serving fruit cake.

This made the girl very happy. Sweets and love can make people feel comfortable. She also shared some for Lanse to eat.

Then they called Emily, saying that Lanse would also go back tonight, which made Emily complain about not saying it earlier, while letting them play outside for a while.

She needed to prepare ingredients.

William had been full of passion and energy during this period, which made Emily feel like returning to youth!

When he worked in the City Hall before, she sometimes had needs, and William just dealt with it perfunctorily, once making her suspect if William had any diseases that most middle-aged men would have.

But now, she knew that the gray life of a pool of stagnant water made him lose his color.

Now he was like he was when he was young, and even like a male dog that was in heat at any time, at any time, in any place!

A few days ago, he suddenly came back in the afternoon, picked her up while she was arranging flowers, threw her on the sofa in the living room, and even used dirty words in the process!

The Lawrence family, as a typical representative of the local middle class, all received a good education, and almost never said dirty words in the family.

This also included the sex life between husband and wife. They respected each other, so they wouldn't say those dirty words. No one needed to teach them this. They understood this truth after becoming adults.

At that time, listening to William say some dirty words or obscene words, Emily didn't even feel uncomfortable, but felt very exciting!

A brand new experience, and brand new passion, so she was very grateful to Lanse. These were changes that happened after Lanse came here.

"My mom let us play outside for a while. She is going to buy food for dinner now."

The girl's eyes were a bit scattered. She rarely came to the city center.

Emily and William didn't have time, and she and her colleagues... couldn't come out.

Actually, she was very good, but to some people who were very familiar with her, they would feel she was very boring.

She never wore too trendy clothes, always so "conservative," which made those young and beautiful girls who liked to pursue fashion not really willing to play with her.

Lanse held her hand and went to many places. There were many fun places in the city center, eating some delicious food, or watching street magic performances for a while.

Patricia would laugh simply because of delicious food, and would also reveal an unbelievable expression for those street magic with obvious flaws...

In the evening, after seven o'clock, the two drove back to the Pulixiya District. When they pushed the door, William and Emily were busy in the kitchen.

After hearing the sound of pushing the door, William poked his head and his upper body out from the kitchen, wearing a red and blue plaid apron, looking very busy.

"It will be ready in fifteen minutes. You can sit for a while first."

Emily also poked out half of her body, her flexible fingers greeting Lanse as if playing the piano in the air. "Hi, there is cut fruit on the coffee table. You rest for a while, it will be ready soon."

Both soon returned to the kitchen, a sound of kitchenware colliding pinglingdanglang.

Patricia went to change into casual clothes, and Lanse read the newspaper for a while.

A copy of "International News."

Speaking of this "International News," it is actually a bit interesting. During this period, the Federation's economy is in a stage of rapid development. Although people don't notice that the bottom-level workers can't support the life they want through labor.

But the rapid progress in the financial field made some financial figures shout the slogan "The best ten years have arrived," inflating the blind and stupid self-confidence of the Federation people to a degree that cannot be understood!

A country is essentially no different from a person at some times.

A country is composed of people, and people are composed of cells. They will all give birth to a collective consciousness based on collective consciousness.

So the Federation has developed quite well over the years, just like a poor relative in the countryside suddenly becoming rich, which led to them urgently wanting to share with the international community and get international recognition.

Many middle-class people have started to be dissatisfied with focusing on domestic news, and they have also started to discuss international events. It seems that the Federation plays a very important role in the entire international community.

If you walk on those streets dominated by finance, if you don't hold a copy of "International News" or "Financial News" in your hand, many people might think you are a poor boy from the countryside!

Lanse doesn't know much about this newspaper, nor does he believe it—in this era of backward communication, the way and speed of message dissemination are equally backward, you can't confirm whether an event happening thousands of kilometers away is really as it introduced.

People's channels for obtaining intelligence are single and cannot be verified. This is one of the reasons why scammers are very easy to succeed in this period.

Opening the newspaper, the headline on the front page read "Imperial Situation Changes Again, Tyrant Emperor Afraid of Losing His Life!"

The thick and big exclamation mark attracted people's attention. Although Lanse heard from Ma Duoer (the leader of the old veterans who smuggled over from the Empire) that the Emperor was actually living very well now.

He just used "who will become the next emperor" as bait, letting several rebel armies that forced him to a dead end kill each other first.

They didn't even care if the Emperor had escaped the encirclement, because they felt that they could surround the Emperor once, and they would definitely be able to do it a second time.

But in fact, Ma Duoer and the others were deeply uneasy about the Emperor's breakout this time. It would be almost impossible to create such a good opportunity next time.

Because of the infighting of the rebel army, it was difficult for them to encircle the Imperial army from multiple aspects. This might be the last glorious moment of the rebel army.

And the stance of some nobles and big capitalists in the Empire also started to sway—it wasn't that they didn't support the rebel army, but this group of people was really trash!

Once these people who can truly decide the direction of this war are shaken, then it is very likely that this uprising will be like countless uprisings before, becoming a not-so-glorious page in Imperial history.

But this newspaper and the writer don't think so. They think that the rebel army is just "integrating," and after the integration ends, the Emperor will give up his crown and scepter.

The reporter used the tone as if he had witnessed it with his own eyes, saying that at this time the Emperor had crawled into the velvet quilt and shivered, completely forgetting that his big butt exposed outside was facing the rebel armies...

The report tried its best to uglify the image of the Imperial Emperor, making him look both cruel and stupid.

This is the so-called political correctness, because many people were very terrified when the Emperor declared war on the Federation. They were really afraid that war would break out.

At that time, they were so terrified, now they hate this Emperor who might have no ability in military affairs but is absolutely a master in politics.

So reports describing him as wise and martial won't be read by anyone, but if it says how stupid and how bad he is, then readers are willing to take out five cents for it.

The second page describes the military friction and conflicts between several countries on the Tanfeite continent this year, as well as the trends that may develop.

It has to be said, if it weren't for the latter part of this newspaper, about one-fifth of the content describes the lace news of celebrities from various countries, as well as some erotic short stories related to current politics.

Lanse is still willing to treat it as a serious reading material!

"Dinner is ready, come over, Lanse!"

Lanse walked to the dining table. Emily came over and gave him a hug. This is the privilege of ladies, and William just shook hands with him.

Perhaps men don't have the habit and idea of hugging.

Patricia also came out of the room. She even took a bath and changed into a set of clothes.

The table was full of sumptuous dinner, but it was clear that Patricia might not be able to eat too much today. "We ate some things in the city center."

She was a bit embarrassed, because these were carefully prepared by William and Emily. Emily looked quite indifferent. "There is a cake shop over there, the taste is very good, I hope you didn't miss it when you passed by."

The process of this kind of family dinner is often like this, opening the topic from a simple, daily content, and then gradually deepening.

Lanse watched the mother and daughter chat for a while about the cakes they ate and the things they bought, before William gradually shifted the topic to Lanse.

"Hope she didn't cause you trouble."

"No, we are very compatible together."

William smiled. "Just now you said you wanted to contact Jack?"

Lanse nodded. "I need him to provide me with some intelligence."

Emily suddenly became interested. "Are you planning to do smuggling business?"

Smuggling business is also a good business, and the profit is not small.

The federal government, under the control of capitalists, in order to protect the domestic market, will impose higher tariffs on some cheap commodities from abroad that have obvious advantages, protective tariffs.

Simply put, the price of a roll-brim hat in the Federation might be three dollars to five dollars. This refers to the kind of hat sold to ordinary people in ordinary stores.

But in Xiang Yalan, a roll-brim hat of the same texture might only need fifty cents, or one dollar.

The distance from Xiang Yalan to the Federation is not far, and sea transportation is developed. The price of these hats arriving in the Federation will not exceed one dollar and ten cents per hat.

This will cause a devastating blow to local roll-brim hat enterprises in the Federation, because the production cost of the Federation is higher.

Those small vendors spend one dollar and fifty cents to sell them back, and then sell them for two dollars, which can crush local roll-brim hat enterprises in the Federation.

Even if these enterprises reduce the selling price and reduce profits, they will find it difficult to persist for too long, because the front of the essence of business is competition.

They can import those commodities whose terminal sales prices will be lower than local production costs, because they are more competitive, and competitiveness is reflected in sales volume and profits in the early stage.

So federal capitalists, in order to ensure that their interests are not crushed by cheap imported commodities, will impose protective tariffs on these listed commodities.

A one-dollar hat must pay two hundred percent tariff after arriving, which is clearly telling these people, don't think about making money from these hats.

Terminal sellers who got hats with costs of over three dollars cannot sell them for one or two dollars, so they cannot cause impact on local enterprises.

There are actually quite a few such commodities. With the continuous development of the Federation's paper economy, the cost of federal commodities is also constantly increasing, so as long as you can avoid tariffs and get things in, you will definitely be able to make money.

Jack chatted about many of these things at family gatherings. A certain smuggling group earned millions a year.

The middle class of the Federation, like other classes, is actually not so in awe of the law, otherwise Emily wouldn't have asked such a question directly.

But Lanse shook his head to deny it. "For the time being, we don't plan to do smuggling, liquor doesn't count."

He paused. "I'm looking for Jack because Liji Group plans to tear up the contract I signed, which caused me to lose at least hundreds of thousands."

"My God, so much?", Emily revealed a look of shock. "You should sue them."

William had a different view at this time. "Liji Group's net profit the year before last was over one hundred million. Ordinary people have no chance of winning against them in a lawsuit."

He turned to look at Lanse. "What do you plan to do?"

Lanse put down the knife and fork. "They do this kind of bulk agricultural product trade, they must have many warehouses and containers at the wharf..."

He said this and picked up the knife and fork again, slightly got up and took a piece of steak from the middle of the dining table and put it back in his dinner plate, and then cut a strip. "The taste is good!"

Introducing Jack to Lanse, this won't make William and Emily feel inappropriate, because this world is like this.

Everyone is thinking of ways to make money. If you make a lot, they will only envy you, not look down on you.

After dinner, Lanse and William went to William's study.

After William personally made a pot of coffee and brought it over, the two could finally talk about more serious topics.

"You plan to transport their things away?", Lanse didn't say what he planned to do at the dining table, which made William a bit itchy, he wanted to know the result.

Lanse tasted the coffee William made. The oil fragrance was very strong, slightly bitter, but the bitterness was very correct, the taste was very thick, he didn't hate this.

"Although I am a... leader of a criminal group in people's eyes, this doesn't mean we must retaliate against them through low-efficiency crimes."

"I can find someone to set up a company, and then order some commodities from them, and then find a way to make them breach the contract, and then claim compensation."

"There are lawyers who like this kind of business."

It's not just lawyers who like it, but also their competitors, and some middle-level enterprises that want to squeeze into the top level.

And Lanse's approach is not limited to this, including transporting their goods away.

He didn't plan to chat too much on this topic, because it didn't make much sense. "I met Mr. Qiaobafu the day before yesterday. The mayor asked him to run for Imperial District councilor, so we have the first competitor."

William, who was not so nervous, frowned after hearing this news.

He certainly heard of this "generous" Imperial banker, but it was precisely because he knew a little bit, so he knew this opponent was very troublesome.

He had a certain status and great influence in the hearts of Imperial people. If he participated in the competition, William, a candidate who was obviously not dominant, would find it difficult to get more support.

You have to know, the birth of a municipal councilor, besides party nomination and running for election himself, the most important thing is the votes of voters.

"Do you have any ideas?", thinking about it, William decided to throw the problem back to Lanse.

Lanse took another sip of coffee. "I talked to him and asked him to give up, but he refused."

"He thinks this is the first real opportunity he has encountered since coming to the Federation that can allow him to squeeze into the upper-class society. He is not willing to give up easily."

"So, William, you don't have to worry. When he refused me, it was destined that we stood on the opposite side."

Lanse's statement made William breathe a sigh of relief. If even Lanse didn't support him, then he would definitely lose!

Other districts are not impossible to choose, but there is no chance, only the Imperial District has a greater chance.