Chapter 314: Contending for the Pang Family

In the main hall of the Jiang estate, more than ten wealthy merchants of Jinling—the Lis, the Zhaos, and others—had gathered. The matter under discussion was the distribution of the Pang family assets.

No one had expected that Pang Zhongqian, a man who stood at the pinnacle of the merchant class and was a hero of his generation, would directly take over the hot potato that was the Tax Office. Even more unexpected was that the Pang family, the greatest fortune in Jinling, would decline overnight.

Pang Zhongqian had only a few scant lines of record in history—described as "decisive in matters, possessed of economic talent"—but from the files of the Embroidered Uniform Guard, Chongzhen learned that this man was far more clever than the histories recorded.

The Chongzhen Emperor was greatly distressed for a time. By all logic, a man as intelligent as Pang Zhongqian could not have failed to know the dangers lurking in the task he had been given, yet he had still come without hesitation.

This was ample proof of the Pang family's utter loyalty to the court. Now that the Pangs were being carved up, Chongzhen naturally could not sit by and do nothing.

When Pang Zhongqian first entered officialdom, his achievements were remarkable, and he won out in the struggle among the Pang sons. At that time, the Pang family was merely one among many wealthy merchants in Jinling. The previous heads of the family, to avoid trouble, had paid lip service to the court while acting otherwise, lacking that original sense of "serving the court in every generation."

But from the time Pang Zhongqian became head of the family, he openly declared himself a vanguard for the court. That the depot and guard had been able to resolve the lingering troubles and assets left by the Eight Great Shanxi Merchants so quickly was in no small part thanks to the Pangs.

The Pang family had originally been an official clan. By the generation of Censor Pang Shangpeng in the Wanli reign, when all others hesitated, they decisively took up the court's money-shop business, and from then on gradually became exclusively merchant-officials.

Thereafter, with the court's funding and support, the Pang family gradually became the leader of the money-shop trade in Jinling and indeed throughout all of Jiangnan.

Now in the nineteenth year of Chongzhen, under Pang Zhongqian's leadership, the Pang family's enterprises spanned all of Jiangnan, having become a behemoth that none of the great financial powers of Jinling could afford to ignore. Pang Zhongqian's own ability and temperament were extremely strong—this was precisely an important reason Jiang Dejing had recommended the man upon taking office.

In history, when the Qing army besieged Nanjing, the Pang family scattered all its wealth. Not only did Pang Zhongqian and his steward die on the city walls, even the women and children took up clubs and died fighting. This family's loyalty to the Great Ming was truly rare.

When Wu Weiye heard that Pang Zhongqian and his two sons had died in the capital, he grieved for a while over this towering figure of commerce, and wrote:

"In former days, the Pang family was the foremost of Jinling's great fortunes. Rising from the money-shop trade, every generation served the court—truly the hero among wealthy merchants."

Clearly, Wu Weiye also did not believe that the Chongzhen Emperor, who had always been muddle-headed and cruel to his ministers, would care whether this wealthy merchant lived or died. The other merchants shared the same view. Judging by Chongzhen's past character, by now he would probably already be shrinking back.

Nearly ninety-nine percent of the entire court had received bribes and assistance of various forms from these merchants present. The most likely outcome of Chongzhen's laughable so-called commercial tax reform was that the court would retreat once again.

After all, in their view, making an enemy of the wealthy merchants was making an enemy of the whole world.

"Hahaha, the Pang family really tried to steal a chicken and lost the rice instead!"

The first to speak was Jiang Zheng, head of the Jiang family. Dressed in a light purple silk robe, he was gaunt of frame yet exuded an air like a vulture seeking prey.

In Jinling, the Pang family stood alone at the top, with the Jiangs close behind. One family worked for the court, the other for private gain—they were irreconcilable as fire and water.

The Jiang family's roots lay in the Jiajing period, when family head Jiang De grew rich in the border tea-horse trade. Throughout the Ming dynasty, the tea-horse trade was an even more violently profitable business than the salt trade, and had always been strictly prohibited by the court.

The Hongwu Emperor Zhu Yuanzhang suppressed the spread of the tea-horse trade. Even when the one who dabbled in it was Ouyang Lun, the Imperial Son-in-law of Princess Anqing, born of Empress Ma, he insisted on executing him, disregarding the pleas of both his courtiers and his own daughter.

On this point, even the current Chongzhen Emperor did not know whether he could do the same. Last time, Gong Yonggu, the Imperial Son-in-law of Princess Yong'an, had been trapped and fallen into the snare of the private salt trade.

Though the Chongzhen Emperor had been furious at the time, in the end he could not bring himself to act against this Imperial Son-in-law, who had been loyal to the state throughout history. He ordered him to hold no further substantive office and to return home to retire.

One can imagine how heavy a resolve Zhu Yuanzhang had made when he killed Ouyang Lun back then.

"Exactly! He should have just stayed in Jinling and run his money-shop business. Without the diamond, don't take on the porcelain work. Now look—Pang Zhongqian and his two sons are dead in the capital, and the Pang family is finished!"

The next to chime in was Zhao Man, head of the Zhao family. A potbellied middle-aged man in a pale yellow silk robe, his face was so greasy it looked utterly revolting.

The Zhao family was the foremost in the cloth trade in Jinling. Indeed, the Pang family's assets and branch shops could be found throughout Jiangnan, yet the so-called number one cloth house of Jiangnan was precisely this Zhao family.

After Zhao Man finished speaking, Li Liangzheng gave a cold laugh. He was the only one among these great households who had not taken any share of the Pang family assets, and he had always felt things might not be so simple.

"Are you all in such a hurry to carve up the Pang family? What if the court comes to intervene—then what?"

"Hahaha."

Hearing this, everyone present laughed as if they had heard the world's greatest joke. Jiang Zheng snorted and said flatly: "Your Li family made its own blunder—money lying on the ground and you won't pick it up. What business is that of ours?"

"That fatuous ruler can't even manage his own affairs—how would he bother with our Jinling?" One family head laughed loudly and said: "What's more, we have our people in the court. At the slightest sign of trouble, before the court has even done anything, we'd know about it first."

The other merchants nodded in agreement. At a time like this, having mere money truly counted for nothing. Even Shen Wansan, whose wealth rivaled a nation's, hadn't been done in by Zhu Hongwu?

In the current situation, these merchants present had not only money but also power—most of the court was under their control. In Chongzhen's view, the so-called "remote manipulation of court politics" did not actually refer to those Donglin scholars, but to these financial magnates behind the scenes.

Speaking of everyone present, there were truly few whose business dealings could withstand scrutiny.

The Pang family was one. The Li family, which had not participated in dividing the Pang wealth, was another. Of the remaining somewhat larger ones, the Jiang family profited from the tea-horse trade, and while the Zhao family was the big name in cloth, it also had considerable holdings in private salt, tea-horse, and other enterprises.

Now that the Shanxi merchants had fallen, the Jiang and Zhao families had discussed the matter and jointly taken over the business of shipping money, grain, weapons, and various military supplies beyond the passes, reaping enormous profits and splitting them evenly.

It had to be said—the old path by which the Eight Great Shanxi Merchants had grown rich off national calamities really did work well.

Now that Dorgon had lost the Shanxi merchants' supplies and was in a state of anxiety, the Jiangnan merchants coming to him on their own initiative was naturally something he could only wish for. At once it was a case of a turtle eyeing a mung bean—they saw eye to eye.

In the old days, the Shanxi merchants had great power, and with no depot or guard overseeing them, the merchants euphemistically called it "running trade." They paid a bit of money and swaggered straight out through the passes by land. Those with the power to stop them wouldn't bother, and those who wanted to stop them lacked the power.

This was no longer the Hongwu era—court prohibitions could always be resolved with money.

Now it was different. Henan and Shanxi were full of battle zones between the roving bandits and the government armies. Nine times out of ten, traveling merchants would be robbed. Since the Shanxi merchants' fall, to get out through the passes by land, one either had to go through Xuanfu and Datong, or through the capital region.

Now Xuanfu and Datong were respectively defended by Chongzhen's lackeys Gao Jie and Bai Guangen. With continuous victories, their troops' pay, weapons, and armor had all been made up, and they were frequently rewarded. There weren't so many people willing to risk everything for money, and getting through wasn't so easy anymore.

The capital region went without saying—that was where Chongzhen's claws were thickest, and the home base of the depot and guard.

These three depots and one guard weren't to be trifled with these days. It was said that the great households of the capital were all like sickly invalids—unable to flee, unable to sleep.

And indeed—those depot and guard agents, hated to the point of gnashing teeth, could investigate even when you went out whoring and how long it lasted from start to finish, and report it all in detail. The moment you so much as had the thought, it would be on Chongzhen's imperial desk that very night. How could anyone play that game?