The twenty-sixth day of the fifth month was clear.
Wu Youcai had returned from Chuzhou, and with him came a massive shipment of celadon.
Early in the morning, martial instructor Zhang Neng set out for the docks to meet the vessel, flanked by three or four sturdy young shop assistants and seven or eight hired hands, all brandishing weapons.
Shao Shuyi watched it all in silence.
He had been at the shop for some time now and had picked up vague hints of Zhang Neng's tangled social connections and wide circle of acquaintances. For this boat receipt, Zhang had drawn two ingots of paper currency from the accounts, claiming the funds were needed to hire robust men to unload and transport the celadon at the wharf while guarding against any unforeseen trouble.
This was an exorbitant price, but since the shopkeeper had agreed, Shao Shuyi raised no objections, simply completing all the required paperwork to the letter.
Just as before, Zhang Neng had been displeased, because Shao Shuyi clearly itemized the headcount and labor, allowing anyone to calculate each man's daily wage. Marked with Zhang Neng's ink thumbprint, it stood out glaringly.
Shao Shuyi knew full well that part of those two ingots of paper currency would be pocketed by Zhang Neng, while another portion would go toward hiring his cronies at inflated rates—a perk tossed to his little brothers so they wouldn't drag their feet whenever he needed them in the future.
Another thing that astonished Shao Shuyi was how openly these men carried weapons as they went about, with truly no one bothering to stop them.
He had once asked someone: hadn't the imperial court forbidden Han people and Southerners from carrying weapons? Those he asked had only stared blankly back at him: "Don't know. Who told you that?"
Shao Shuyi quickly understood. Laws were laws, reality was reality, and between them lay a process called "enforcement."
The Great Yuan dynasty's enforcement was utterly feeble. Countless statutes were applied selectively at the middle and lower levels—enforcing what they pleased, and meeting what they didn't with passive noncompliance and soft resistance until the decree came to nothing.
It was said that seven or eight years ago, the powerful minister Bayan had petitioned to execute everyone in the realm with the five most populous surnames—Zhang, Wang, Liu, Li, and Zhao. An absurdity of that magnitude naturally could never be carried out; it had not even become policy, having been rejected outright by the emperor.
After the men departed, Shao Shuyi sat quietly in the shop, waiting alongside Shopkeeper Wang Sheng.
This shipment came directly from Chuzhou—over ten thousand pieces of celadon, large and small, enough to fill nearly all the remaining warehouse space. It was also their final large-scale restock of the year. Whatever the market conditions turned out to be, these under thirty thousand pieces were all they would have; once sold, that was that.
After sitting for a while, Wang Sheng welcomed a visitor, who turned out to be his old acquaintance Sun Chuan.
Smiling, he rose to greet him. "Any news?"
"Ahmad's ship has already reached Qingyuan. In a little over a month, it will arrive at Liujiagang." A greasy sheen of sweat coated Sun Chuan's face, showing he had rushed over in haste. "But this price—"
"Let's speak in the back room." Wang Sheng cast a subtle, fleeting glance at Shao Shuyi.
Sun Chuan nodded. Having an outsider who wasn't in league with them suddenly appear in the celadon shop was genuinely inconvenient.
One behind the other, the two stepped into Wang Sheng's quarters.
Wang Sheng looked all around first, making sure no one was nearby before shutting both the doors and windows. Turning back, he took a seat across from Sun Chuan. After a moment's hesitation, he said, "Squire Sun, between honest men, let's speak plainly. There have been changes at the main residence. The old master rarely even visits the yamens these days, and he lacks the energy to manage family affairs. The Third Young Master is in charge now. He isn't particularly polite toward us old hands, so some matters won't be as easy to handle."
Sun Chuan looked as if he had anticipated this all along. His expression did not change in the slightest as he asked lazily, "So, are you doing it or not?"
Wang Sheng hesitated.
"Look at that pathetic look on your face," Sun Chuan scoffed. "Out of the thirty thousand celadon pieces in the storehouse, how many are official kiln masterworks?"
"About a third," Wang Sheng replied, his eyes flickering.
"What are they worth?"
"I haven't tallied it up in detail," Wang Sheng shook his head. "Four thousand ding at the very least."
Porcelains differed in origin, shape, and size, so naturally their prices varied.
Cheaper items, like bowls produced by official kilns, went for merely three to five hundred wen—though the ceramic bowls used by ordinary folk in the Great Yuan were even cheaper, often obtained for a few dozen wen, but those were generally not for export.
Plates were slightly dearer, usually over five hundred wen, while those with greater renown or finer quality approached one guan.
Other shapes and designs were hard to price offhand, ranging from a few guan to dozens, or even hundreds of guan for fine pieces.
If an official kiln received a commission to produce porcelain for the imperial palace or high-ranking nobility and secretly held back a few pieces upon firing to sell on the open market, the price would be astronomical. Such masterworks used rare raw materials presented as tribute from the Western Regions; their craftsmanship was intricate, their production cost sky-high, and they rarely circulated on the market, practically priceless and unobtainable.
The foreign merchants who traded regularly were discerning judges of quality; knowing these were superior goods that could be presented to nobles back home, they were more than willing to pay lavish sums. A single piece fetching thousands or even tens of thousands of guan was hardly unusual.
Wang Sheng's rough estimate of the shipment's total value exceeding four thousand ding was broadly accurate. And that was merely the local selling price—wouldn't they jack up the price when selling to foreign merchants?
For harsher dealings, when dealing with foreign merchants who didn't know the market, couldn't haggle, and had no local connections, they might sell at three to five times the price outright.
With a merchant like Ahmad, who had traded here more than once, understood the market relatively well, and had brokers to assist him, they naturally couldn't gouge that blatantly. Still, marking up the price by sixty or seventy percent, or even doubling it, was by no means uncommon.
Business, after all, was a contest between buyer and seller. Would the foreigners not hike the prices when they transported the goods back? They would likely mark them up even more ruthlessly.
All told, Wang Sheng was now looking at a massive deal worth seven to eight thousand ding. Although a descendant of the Zheng family would make the final call, that did not mean he couldn't exert his influence and line his pockets as an intermediary—in fact, he had done so more than once. The journey from initial timidity to his present greed had taken only a few years.
"A grand deal worth several thousand ding. Ease your grip just a fraction, and that's several hundred ding right there..." Sun Chuan said with a faint smirk.
"Keep your voice down," Wang Sheng snapped in a low growl, glancing subconsciously at the shut doors and windows.
"What's the big deal?" Sun Chuan sneered. "Who are you afraid of? That new lad?"
Wang Sheng was reluctant to admit it, but under Sun Chuan's pressing gaze, he gave a reluctant nod. "He was recruited by Young Master Zheng. On the surface, his background is just an impoverished boat household, but I don't buy it."
"Why?"
"He's skilled in bookkeeping and calculation, and writes a fine hand that bears something of the spirit of Duke Zhao of Wei."
Sun Chuan hesitated at that. Unless they came from a Confucian household, how many children from ordinary commoner, boat, artisan, postal courier, military, or fishing households knew literacy and arithmetic? To say nothing of having beautiful calligraphy.
Let alone tales of peeking into private academies to learn in secret—that was just hot air meant to fool fools, and Sun Chuan certainly didn't believe a word of it.
"Can he be brought over to our side?" Sun Chuan asked after some thought.
Wang Sheng's brow knitted tightly. "You saw it yourself—he wouldn't take a single ingot of tea money. Last month, when a shipment of celadon arrived, a few pieces were accidentally broken while moving into storage, and he even questioned where the shards had gone. Fortunately, Wu Youcai was keeping the accounts back then and forced the entry through."
"He's that blind to favors?" Sun Chuan said, his irritation rising.
Wang Sheng sighed.
In theory, the transaction with the foreign merchant Ahmad was nobody else's business. Wang Sheng was responsible for negotiating the price, and Shao Shuyi would merely record the entries, just as the silk shop's transactions were handled by Lu San.
Yet things were clearly not that simple. Shao Shuyi was the accountant after all, and could not be avoided on many occasions. Over time, with many mouths around, who could guarantee no slip-ups? In truth, even when Wang Sheng had previously run the hostel-store as tight as an iron drum, rumors had still leaked out. Otherwise, why did he think Shao Shuyi was here in the first place?
Furthermore, this new accountant was pigheaded. Even for ordinary breakage of celadon, he insisted on seeing the shards before letting it drop. Over time, who could bear that?
While Shopkeeper Wang Sheng could indeed rake in money through other channels, men like Wu Youcai and Zhang Neng were counting on writing off breakage of celadon. Cutting off that source of profit would certainly direct their resentment toward the new accountant, but as the saying goes, 'Men worry not about scarcity, but about inequality.' If the shopkeeper made a fortune while they got nothing, who would stand for that? It would inevitably blow up into trouble.
"Find a way, then," Sun Chuan said, abruptly rising to his feet.
Startled, Wang Sheng stared at him blankly.
Sun Chuan paced a few steps across the room, then asked suddenly, "Do you know any salt households from other prefectures?"
"Salt households?" Wang Sheng asked, puzzled.
Sun Chuan gave a cold sneer. "Salt workers north of the Yangtze often row boats across the river to peddle illicit salt. They're fierce, violent desperadoes. Matters awkward for us to handle can easily be handed over to them. Once the job is done, they can row straight back north of the river, leaving neither god nor ghost the wiser."
Wang Sheng jumped in fright and said hurriedly, "We're only after coin—why go so far?"
Sun Chuan's sneer deepened. "Don't think I don't know how Zhao Nan died."
Wang Sheng actually shrank from meeting his eyes, stammering repeatedly, "Accountant Shao has only been at the shop for barely a month. If something happens to him now, wouldn't it arouse suspicion? Inadvisable, most inadvisable."
Sun Chuan shook his head, looking utterly disappointed.
"There must be another way," Wang Sheng murmured. "Let me think it through..."
"Take your time thinking, then. I'll line up the men first, so we're not caught unprepared when the need arises." Sun Chuan snorted coldly. "Don't worry. The salt workers from Taizhou north of the river are far away. Once the deed is done, they'll row back to Taizhou that very day. No investigation could ever trace it back to them."
This time, Wang Sheng did not object, apparently acquiescing in silence.
Chapter 22