Shi Yin had put careful thought into choosing this grain shop.
Even though all of them were grain shops, the ones here in Changfeng were mostly large merchants with branch offices scattered across various prefectures and commanderies.
By now, joining forces, they had long driven the price of white flour and wheat rice up to ten taels of silver per *shi*.
Yet this particular shop refused to sell either of those two items; the counter displayed only affordable, coarse grains like soybeans, millet, and buckwheat.
When she first entered the shop, Shi Yin had probed with her words—this grain shop was not a large commercial firm; the shopkeeper was himself the proprietor, with no formidable backing behind him, and on ordinary days he could only manage dealings with low-ranking petty officials.
Therefore, since the early signs of the chaotic times had appeared, he no longer hoarded fine grains, turning instead to trade in ordinary coarse grains that common people could still afford.
In this way, he avoided piling up inventory, and his capital turnover was much nimbler.
Being able to survive in the cracks among the throng of large grain merchants showed that the proprietor was certainly no fool.
A shopkeeper who was this shrewd, pragmatic, and had his own quiet calculations was precisely the business partner Shi Yin had her sights on.
Naturally, she would never lay her cards on the table too easily; the method of cooperation still needed to be discussed over the long term.
Shi Yin smiled slightly and said in a gentle voice, “Shopkeeper, please rest assured. You only need to help me deliver the grain to the boat; I have my own way once we disembark. Not a single cash of silver will be missing, and furthermore, next month I have another deal to discuss with you.”
“Next month?” the shopkeeper asked, perplexed. How could people exiled to Heishan Island possibly leave the island?
“What do you mean by that?”
Shi Yin explained patiently, “I will first list the items I need and pay a ten percent deposit. Next month, when the official government ship sets sail for Heishan Island, you can find a hand to help me deliver them to the island, and I will pay the remaining balance then.
In this way, as long as you open up the route of the official ship, I might just become your regular customer. Is this business not profitable?”
“Ah—”
Hearing this, the shopkeeper shook his head, feeling it was somewhat ridiculous: Were official ships something anyone who wished could board? And a regular customer, no less? Did she know that this round trip would take at least six days? If the wind direction was unfavorable, he didn’t even know how long he would be stranded out at sea! Little lady, this was by no means a good bargain.
Shi Yin was not in a hurry either: “What if I buy fifty taels of silver worth of grain from you?”
“Fifty taels!” This figure startled the shopkeeper somewhat.
Calculated out, that meant fifty *shi* of soybeans, or one hundred *shi* of black beans!
In the current world, that could be considered a major transaction!
The shopkeeper narrowed his eyes suspiciously, scrutinizing this young married woman closely.
She was not tall in stature, her figure was slender, and her looks could not be called stunning, yet she excelled in her bearing.
Indeed, hidden within this young woman’s eyes was always something that others lacked, making her entire demeanor exceptionally different.
How should he put it…
The four characters “crisp and decisive” suddenly surfaced in his mind.
The shopkeeper was thirty-five this year, had been toying with the abacus beside his father since he was five, and had independently kept this grain shop afloat before he was twenty.
Struggling to survive in the cracks among the crowd of large grain merchants at Changfeng Wharf until now, he could also be considered well-traveled and experienced.
Yet the young woman before him gave him the feeling of a wise, courageous, and resourceful youth right in their prime.
A mere woman, yet possessing such bearing—if she were not being exiled to Heishan Island, she might not necessarily fail to carve out a name for herself.
Pity… in the end, she still retained a bit of a woman’s naivety.
Just as the shopkeeper was about to shake his head and refuse, a soft, childish voice suddenly traveled over:
“Uncle—ah, uncle—”
Ronger clapped her little hands, her long eyelashes fluttering and making her pupils exceptionally dark and bright, looking at the shopkeeper with her eyes slightly narrowed in a sweet, naive, and charming manner.
Hearing the sound, Shi Yin turned her head and looked affectionately at Ronger, while Chengzhou beside her said in pleasant surprise, “Little sister just said the word ‘uncle’! That’s wonderful!”
The figures of the three of them froze in that instant, reminding the shopkeeper of his wife and child who had died in the war eight years ago!
At that time, his pair of children were also just about this age.
His heart softened, and after hesitating for a moment, he offered a few words of caution: “Little lady, even if you could have fifty taels of business every month, taking the route of the official ship still cannot be considered a good bargain.
Not to mention how much silver it would take to grease the wheels, what the official ship carries in the first place is grain meant for trading salt. If I were to bring grain aboard and sell it to the people of Heishan Island, that would be tantamount to cutting into the government’s business.”
Hearing this, Shi Yin felt a slight sense of disappointment. She had originally thought that opening a grain shop in a place like Changfeng would allow her to establish some connections with the wharf and official ships; now it seemed that she had ultimately thought too superficially after all.
The shopkeeper figured that this woman must be the female dependent of some disgraced high-ranking official, as she likely knew nothing at all about the inner workings of the wharf, the salt fields, and the official ships.
It was better not to wade into this muddy water. Just as he was thinking of refusing, a sudden surge of curiosity prompted him to ask one more question.
“For what reason were you exiled to Heishan Island?”
After a brief pause for thought, Shi Yin truthfully recounted the case of the Marquis of Wuwei.
This place was far from Changchai, and news traveled slowly; by the time Li Bi and the others arrived next month, the matter of the Marquis of Wuwei would probably only then spread far and wide.
Upon hearing abruptly that the entire family of the Marquis of Wuwei had been executed, the shopkeeper’s eyes widened sharply:
“The Marquis of Wuwei… is dead…”
Seeing his strange expression, Shi Yin felt a slight trace of surprise, but the next instant she remembered that the current Marquis of Wuwei, Li Xi, seemed to have spent a period of time here in Qingzhou before inheriting his peerage.
Could it be…
Her guess was correct.
Eight years ago, during the Rebellion of the Eight Princes of the Great Jin, Xianbei armored cavalry entered Changfeng, and the shopkeeper’s pair of children carelessly bumped into them on the street. To protect the children, his wife was taken into the military camp along with her two little sons.
By the time he received the news and rushed over, he only found the corpses of his wife and three children.
At that moment, his heart was filled with nothing but revenge, and with his blade in hand, he was about to charge toward the Xianbei encampment.
At that time, Li Xi, serving as the County Captain of Changfeng County, stopped him, looked into his bloodshot eyes, and said in a deep voice:
“Killing your wife and children is a blood feud, but rushing in so recklessly is nothing more than throwing away another life! Better to keep it and bide your time, seeking an opportunity to slay the Xianbei with your own hands—that is what a real man should do!”
In the end, he was forcibly dragged back to the estate by Li Xi and locked up for a full ten days.
It was not until the Xianbei cavalry left Changfeng and struck straight at Luoyang that he was released.
Regarding this future Marquis of Wuwei, he had always held complex emotions in his heart—both grateful that the other man had saved his life, and resentful that he had blocked that suicide mission of mutual destruction.
With feelings of all sorts welling up, the reflection of his own wife surfaced in the depths of his eyes as he looked at Shi Yin.
After a moment, he let out a heavy sigh: “Forget it, I’ll think of a way regarding the November official ship. Think over whatever you need as soon as possible, and the day after tomorrow at the *yin* hour, the soybean grain you purchased today will be delivered right on time!”
Observing the shift in the shopkeeper’s words, Shi Yin knew in her heart that it was still the prestige of the Marquis of Wuwei that had earned her this convenience.
As for the history of the Western Jin, due to its extremely short duration and the fact that it was mostly a turbulent era, archives had suffered severe losses and were mostly compiled later in the Tang dynasty, with most events glossed over in a single stroke. Consequently, Shi Yin had not the slightest impression of this matter concerning the Marquis of Wuwei.
According to the records in the Li family’s scholarly lineage: the first-generation Marquis of Wuwei was a second-rank founding non-imperial duke with military merits, whose title descended with successive reductions, dropping to the fourth rank by the third generation under Li Xi.
Presently, the execution of the Li family was also vague, attributed merely to treason and rebellion, while more specific details were entirely lacking, which was truly quite peculiar.
As for the matter of transporting the grain today, it was indeed rather shallow of her, and fortunately she had relied on the favor of the Marquis of Wuwei to get her wish. However, it certainly allowed Shi Yin to firmly establish in her mind the merchant she would cooperate with in the future, which could also be considered a fortunate event.
“For this matter, I am deeply indebted to the proprietor’s assistance. Shi Yin expresses her thanks.”
She originally wanted to say a few more words, but seeing the shopkeeper’s heavy and gloomy mood, clearly reluctant to speak further, she had no choice but to cup her hands in farewell:
“We shall part ways here; see you at the wharf the day after tomorrow.”
Walking to the entrance of the shop, she suddenly turned back and asked: “I have yet to ask the proprietor’s esteemed surname and given name, so that we have something to address each other by when we meet in the future.”
The shopkeeper had already returned behind the counter and replied in a muffled voice: “My humble surname is Lü, with the single given name Cheng.”