The business of this incense and candle shop is that only during certain festivals or when someone's family is old, they will do business.
It was almost noon at this time, so there were almost no people on the whole street. Even the boy in each store only had one left to guard the store.
This Qianji Incense Candle Shop is no exception. A young man wearing gray cloth and coarse clothes is sitting on the threshold and basking in the sun.
Jiang Nianjiao thought that when this kid saw her coming, he would probably get up to greet the guests.
Unexpectedly, the boy just sat at the door like an old man, not even moving his buttocks, but his eyes followed Jiang Nianjiao's movements rather unscrupulously.
As a female guest, Jiang Nianjiao was somewhat unhappy to be looked at like this.
If she had met such a person before, she would have probably asked Cui Qiao to teach him a lesson directly.
But now she was here to do something, and Cui Qiao wasn't around, so she could only try her best to ignore the boy's following eyes.
She only pinched the incense candles. The incense candles were a little soft, and the polished surface was not smooth. There were even some incense candles that did not even have the bamboo stick inserted in the center of the core. It was obvious that the craftsmanship of this batch was extremely rough. It seemed like something made at random for quick processing, and when I went over to smell these incense candles, I found that there was still a strange smell.
Could this be the incense candle from the Royal Palace? This thing is not even as good as the incense from other ordinary incense candle shops on the market.
Jiang Nianjiao felt confused and called out, "Is the boss here?"
She regarded the waiter as a customer of the incense and candle shop. After all, no waiter would take the initiative to introduce someone when a customer came to her door.
Unexpectedly, she called out several times, and the waiter at the door slowly stood up and said, "Stop calling, our boss has gone to dinner. If you have anything to ask, just ask me."
When talking, the waiter didn't seem very enthusiastic. This attitude didn't look like business at all. Jiang Nianjiao frowned, but still didn't say anything.
She just pointed at the incense candle and said, "Are there any other good products for this incense candle? I want to buy a lot of them."
Even after listening to Jiang Nianjiao's emphasis, the waiter showed no interest, "No, the goods sold here are the same as those in the warehouse."
"Then I wonder how to sell these incense candles?" Jiang Nianjiao heard the waiter say that the goods here were the same as other stores, and she felt a little discouraged at that time. However, thinking of Li Bin's insistence, she still asked the waiter about the price. how.
Unexpectedly, the waiter didn't even blink and started telling lies, "Two red oil candles, twelve cents for big incense, six cents for small string incense."
The price is not only twice as expensive as other stores, but some are even several times more expensive than other incense and candle shops.
So when Jiang Nianjiao heard such a quotation, she quickly said, "Yours is too expensive. I think other houses are not as expensive as yours. Moreover, our family has to buy a lot, so yours cannot be cheaper."
As soon as he heard that Jiang Nianjiao wanted to bargain, the waiter immediately ignored her. He just said lazily, "Would you like to buy it? We don't have any extra goods here."
After listening to his words, it seems that this shop is really not lacking in business, but with such quality and price, the people who do business with them must be fools.
When Jiang Nianjiao was about to say something, unexpectedly, two people walked in at the door. The leader was a short, fat, middle-aged man dressed in silk and satin, and behind him was a noble, tall, thin young man.
As soon as she saw the young man, Jiang Nianjiao couldn't help being secretly surprised.
The reason was for no other reason than that she knew this young man. This person is Zhou Yunpei, the younger brother of Concubine Shu and the son of the Minister of Rites.
She had met each other at the spring banquet.
And she remembered that the Minister of Rites had not had many sacrificial activities recently, and there were no elderly people in the family.
So what is he doing here if he has nothing to do?
Jiang Nianjiao had doubts in her heart, but she didn't dare to let the other party recognize her.
So when Zhou Yunpei came over, she just turned around and pretended to carefully select the incense candles. Fortunately, Zhou Yunpei didn't pay attention to the movement here. He just followed the boss and asked softly, "Boss, where are all the things?" Are you ready?"
"That's natural. They are all kept in the warehouse. Do you want Mr. Zhou to test them?"
Check the goods, I guarantee that these items are in sufficient quantity. "
While they were talking, the two of them were already preparing to go upstairs, but at this time the shopkeeper finally noticed Jiang Nianjiao.
He just glared at the waiter and said, "Didn't I tell you to just guard the store? Who asked you to attract customers? Why don't you ask them out quickly!"
When the waiter heard this, he could only say, "She came in on her own."
The store owner glared at him angrily, "Aren't you going to say that our items have already been ordered and are not for retail sale?"
After saying that, the store owner hurried upstairs at Zhou Yunpei's urging.
The waiter also felt aggrieved. Other families wanted their waiter to attract more customers so that the business would be prosperous, but their boss would only drive the customers away.
However, the grievance is a grievance, and the boss's rules must still be implemented. The waiter stretched out his hand and said softly, "Girl, please, our boss said we won't accept individual customers. Besides, the incense candles here are expensive and not good. You can go to other stores." Look, it’s easier to keep than our house.”
Jiang Nianjiao was just here to explore the area, but since the waiter said so, and now there was Zhou Yunpei here, she naturally had no reason to stay. So she only said to Lianying, "Lianying, let's go."
After saying this, Jiang Nianjiao left the incense and candle shop, and then went to visit several other merchants on the list to buy things.
However, these merchants have the same theme as the incense and candle shop. Not only do the items they sell are several times more expensive than others, but the key is that the quality is still poor. And if you want to bargain with them, they just respond with a tone of indifference.
Looking at their posture, Jiang Nianjiao couldn't help but feel that they didn't look like they were doing business at all.
After that, Jiang Nianjiao asked the owners of other nearby shops about the situation of these shops. It was okay not to ask, but once she asked, Jiang Nianjiao discovered that these people were indeed related to officials in the court and even the concubines in the harem, and this kind of unfairness Most of the shops with a large number of customers were private properties secretly purchased by officials or concubines in the capital.
Now that she had come to such a conclusion, Jiang Nianjiao was in trouble for a moment. If she didn't go to these shops to do business, then her aunt would not be offended just by a few concubines.
But if you continue to do business in these shops, you won't be able to save that money anyway.
Jiang Nianjiao thought about it and decided to make two preparations, so after returning home, she only asked her servants to go to a few trustworthy shops, ask about their current inventory, and verbally agree on a large order with them first.
After that, Jiang Nianjiao wrote another letter overnight, planning to tell Concubine Yuxian truthfully what she had discovered today. As for Concubine Yuxian's decision, that was her business. After all, she was just a solution provider.
Because of all this busy work, the sky was already dark when Jiang Nianjiao returned home, and Jiang Nianjiao did not eat much after returning home. She was only going to write a simple letter and let Yu Shisan, who was allowed in and out of the palace, , and sent the letter to Concubine Yuxian for herself overnight.
Therefore, after returning to Qinglan Courtyard, she only ordered Lianying to light the candles in the room for her.
When Lianying heard this, she was naturally only prepared to implement Jiang Nianjiao's plan, but she didn't want to. She just took out a red oil scented candle from her arms and lit it.
The candle suddenly exploded with a crackle, and then the incense candle fell instantly on the mahogany table with the flame, and it only lit up the letter on the table.
The room was also suddenly filled with a faint smell of sulfur.
And if Jiang Nianjiao hadn't had time to sit down, the candlelight might have hit Jiang Nianjiao's face.
Although Lianying quickly extinguished the candles on the table, Jiang Nianjiao still saw the scene at that time. She couldn't help but called Lianying in surprise, "What's going on with the candlelight in Lianying?"
Lianying felt a little guilty and said, "I don't know either."
"Isn't this the candlelight in our room?" Jiang Nianjiao continued to ask.
Lingying nodded, "I just took this candle out from that shop."
Hearing this, Jiang Nianjiao was about to reprimand Lianying, "This is someone else's thing. How can you just take it?"
Hearing this, Lianying only whispered, "I'm sorry, miss, I just think this thing is a bit weird. I wanted to take it back and have a look at it for some research. I didn't want to just confuse this candlelight with the candlelight we usually use, so That's what made this happen
Something comes. Please punish me, Miss. "
When speaking, Lingying was already kneeling on the ground.
Jiang Nianjiao did not scold her anymore. It was already dark and the room was pitch dark. Jiang Nianjiao was still counting on Lianying to light the candle for her.
So she just said, "Okay, I don't blame you. You're not hurt, are you? If it's okay, you can light the lamp for me first."
Lian Ying heard the words and naturally did as he was told, when the candle was lit again. Jiang Nianjiao only walked towards the incense candles scattered on the table.
The closer we got, the more obvious the smell was in the air.
Jiang Nianjiao always felt that this smell was very familiar.
After thinking about it carefully, she finally remembered that the smell seemed to be the same as the smell of a ship of gunpowder she found in the port.
So this incense candle is stuffed with gunpowder.
Once he had this understanding, and thinking back to the crackling candlelight just now, Jiang Nianjiao suddenly had a not-so-good premonition.
Most of the buildings in the northern suburbs are made of wood, and they are built halfway up the mountain. There are lush forests on the mountain, including many thousand-year-old trees.
In that kind of place, if there is even a little bit of fire, a small spark will develop into a big fire.
What's more, the location halfway up the mountain is inconvenient for getting water to put out fires. .
This kind of incense candle was extremely easy to explode and easily ejected sparks. One of them almost set her desk on fire.
If tens of thousands of incense candles were of this quality in the future, Jiang Nianjiao would hardly dare to think about what would happen to the group of people praying in the northern suburbs.
When Jiang Nianjiao thought about this aspect, she couldn't help but take a breath of cold air.
