The night in Bianliang is always so fascinating.
The river flows slowly, the city is filled with the fragrance of osmanthus in August, and even the moon is a bit fuller than before.
Zhao Jun was strolling on the way home at this time, raising his head and looking up at the night sky.
He just went to Fan Zhongyan and asked Fan Zhongyan why he provoked Kaifeng Mansion, but the other party avoided his advances.
Unexpectedly, Fan Zhongyan not only told him the two previous conjectures, but also told him another possibility.
Those were the middle and lower-level officials of Kaifeng Prefecture, who obviously wanted to use Ding Du, the governor of Kaifeng Prefecture, as their spearhead.
After all, Ding Du is a confused official, and he always thinks what is said below, and he has always been rigid and pedantic. When he heard that the Imperial City Division was seizing power in the Kaifeng Mansion, he would probably go directly to Zhao Zhen to complain.
Cunning villains are easy to deal with, but it is difficult to deal with such a righteous and confused minister. Because they already have their own understanding, they are in high positions, and their personal ethics are quite good.
A guy like Ding Du, who is less than fifty years old, is an official in Bianliang. He has been living in a shabby house with no wives and concubines. He lives a simple life. After receiving his salary, he helps the poor. He cannot be beaten, and he is too embarrassed to scold him, so he can only Just show him the facts.
So Zhao Jun felt that his head hurt. Why was Zhao Zhen causing so much trouble for him? Can a corrupt official or someone smart and capable be replaced as the governor of Kaifeng? If you have an upright and confused official, isn't that just looking for trouble for yourself?
However, Fan Zhongyan still had to side with them, at least on the surface, to maintain the interests of the entire bureaucracy, so as not to be squeezed out before the Qingli New Deal was launched and unable to help him persuade Ding Du.
Therefore, if Ding Du is really used as a spearman by the people of Kaifeng Mansion, basically only Zhao Zhen and Zhao Jun can resist this pressure.
Forget it, let’s do it step by step.
Zhao Jun returned home. At this time, there were several police officers waiting at his door.
Seeing him coming, they all raised their hands and saluted, "Greetings to Chisi."
"Well, come to the yard."
Zhao Jun asked.
The people arrested during the day were brought back to the government office, and he did not have much time to interrogate them personally.
There are countless cases that happen in Bianliang in a day. If he needs to be involved in everything, then he might as well just try cases every day, and he can't do anything else.
So he asked one of Cao Xiu's confidants to handle the matter. Fortunately, Cao Xiu was quite capable. If the Imperial City Department were all people like Wang Shilong, and the orders he gave were followed and violated, nothing would be accomplished.
The group of people followed Zhao Jun into the courtyard. Zhao Jun sat on the stone table under the big tree in the courtyard. The leader of the team came over to salute him.
"Have you asked clearly?"
"After asking clearly, the old woman said that the woman came to Zhongmou a few months ago, saying that she was helpless and married to the old woman's son. After a month or two, everything was fine, but the old woman's son was suddenly beaten to death. The county magistrate ordered her to pay her taels of silver, and soon after, the woman took the money and ran away."
The escort told what happened, and then said: "The woman denied it flatly, and said that she was not from Bianliang, and that the two men were her brothers. She came to Bianliang this time to return to her hometown. But before asking her, Where he went and where his hometown was was vague. We interrogated him separately. The man said he was from Gyeonggi Road, but the woman said she was from Caizhou."
"It seems that there is a problem between this woman and those two men."
Zhao Jun knew with his toes that there was a big problem, which meant that the woman was not careful in doing things. Unexpectedly, she ran to Bianliang and was discovered by the old woman. She did not collude with the two men in advance to give a confession, which led to separate interrogations and immediately Reveal your flaws.
"Yes."
Abban said: "And today a brother told me that he knows those two people."
"Let him come over."
"Qian Li, the governor wants to ask you something."
The escort waved back.
Immediately from behind, a policeman came over, bowed his head and cupped his hands and said, "Young man Qian Li, I have met Zhisi."
"Tell me about it."
"Those two are from the beggar gang in the city."
"Beggars gang?"
Zhao Jun was surprised. He didn't expect that the things in Jin Yong actually existed in reality.
It was also that he didn't take "History of Beggars" when he was in school, otherwise he wouldn't be surprised at all.
The Beggar Gang first took shape in the Northern Song Dynasty. The boss was called Tuantou. The beggars at the bottom were in rags, but the Tuantou was wealthy.
According to historical records, in the early years of the Southern Song Dynasty in Hangzhou, there was a beggar gang leader who had been hereditary for seven generations - "Big Brother Tuantou Jin". He has jurisdiction over the beggars in Jincheng, Hangzhou, collects their regular money, and takes care of the beggars' lives accordingly.
"Boss Jin" has a status like a patriarch and enjoys considerable authority among beggars. With the support of many beggars, he has earned a wealthy family with "a lot of grain" and "more money in his pocket", and even "a moneylender" , although he is not the richest man in the city, he is still one of the richest people in the world.
It can be seen from this that the underground underworld in the Song Dynasty was so exciting. There were dozens of large and small forces such as the Beggar Gang, Wuyou Cave, Ghost Tower, Ghost Market, etc., and their relationship with the Kaifeng Mansion was also intricate. There was often a certain person behind these forces. A big shot or powerful person in Kaifeng Mansion.
"Yes."
Qian Li said: "Those two people are the blue poles of the Beggar Clan, who specialize in doing shameful things. They will find a girl, and when they see a family with a young son and no power, and cannot marry a wife, they will arrange for the girl to marry. Then he encouraged her husband to make trouble with the powerful, and after being beaten to death by the powerful, he reconciled with others, took the money and ran away."
"ah?"
Zhao Jun was shocked by this outrageous criminal method and said, "Is that husband so stupid that he dares to make trouble with powerful people?"
Qian Li said with a smile: "So the people they pick are mostly stupid men, and they will not directly provoke the powerful, but go to the shops owned by the powerful to cause trouble. Sometimes these blue-blooded men are even hired as thugs. When a man is instigated by his mother-in-law to cause trouble, he will deliberately beat the person to death and then run away. The trouble will be left to the powerful to deal with it. The powerful don't want to make a big fuss, so naturally they can only pay for it and settle the matter."
Zhao Jun's face darkened.
In addition to the beggar gang, it also involves the magistrate of Zhongmou County protecting the powerful. After beating someone to death, it turned into a minor incident, so he compensated the old woman with some silver coins, and the silver coins were even taken away by the woman. No wonder This old woman wants to come to Bianliang to complain. Her son really won't die in peace.
"This is a secret, how did you know?"
Zhao Jun was a little puzzled.
This criminal method was something Zhao Jun could never have imagined. How did Qian Li know about it?
Qian Li looked embarrassed.
Zhao Jun thought for a moment, then did not ask further questions. He nodded and said: "Well, you did a good job. Remember, those three people tortured you severely. You must ask for all the details about the beggar gang, and it is best to find evidence of the crime. "
"yes."
Everyone agreed.
Zhao Jun was about to wave them away when he suddenly noticed something strange about Qian Li's face. Guessing that he might have something to say to him, he said, "Let the others handle the case. Qian Li will stay. I still have some details about the Beggar Gang." I have to ask you."
"yes."
Qian Li bowed his hands and bowed, and the others left.
Soon only Zhao Jun was left in the courtyard, surrounded by guards such as Di Qing and Zhou Xin.
Zhao Jun said: "These are my confidants and people I can trust. If you have anything to say, just tell me."
Qian Li then knelt down and said: "Zhisi, the villain deserves to die. The villain knows this because he saw his boss shielding them before, so he recognized them."
"oh?"
Zhao Jun said with great interest: "Then why do you dare to tell me? Aren't you afraid that your boss will retaliate against you?"
Qian Li said: "The villain knows that Zhi Si will definitely do something big, so he is willing to help. Moreover, Zhi Si ordered the villain to investigate some things, but the boss secretly leaked the news."
"good."
Zhao Jun said happily: "There is an old saying in China that a man who knows the current affairs is a hero. If you can turn from darkness to light, it means you are very smart. Go back and continue to monitor your boss. If you can make a contribution, I will definitely use you again."
"Thank you, Chiji."
Qian Li was overjoyed. He was taking a big risk this time.
After all, the Imperial City Division's inspectors don't have much luck, and they all make money by selling information, so the Imperial City Division is also in bad shape internally.
This time, Zhao Jun deliberately spread the word that he was going to investigate some powerful people. The people below quickly went to tip off the news, fabricating false information and reporting it back.
Qian Li originally planned to do this, but he was lucky. He had a cousin who was one of Cao Xiu's confidants. At the same time, this person was also the spy who had been protecting Zhao Jun when he was traveling.
This person knew very well that Zhao Jun had the power to enter and leave the palace at will. Even after entering the palace, the officials ordered Zhao Jun to take charge of the Imperial City Department the next day, and gave the Imperial City Department the ability to arrest, examine, and set up courts. , the power can be described as overwhelming.
So he immediately understood that the situation in the Imperial City Division was about to change, and he quickly ordered his cousin and close friends in the Imperial City Division not to continue to deceive their superiors, lest they cause serious trouble.
And it's not just him. There are more than a hundred Chazi spies following Zhao Jun, and there are many smart people among them. Seeing Zhao Jun's treatment, he also guessed a bit.
Everyone had friends and relatives, and the news spread quickly.
Soon in the next few days, as expected, many people came to tip off the spies Zhao Jun had sent out to investigate.
There were even spies who had colluded with the people under investigation who knew that they had been reported, which caused panic within the Imperial City Division. Many people felt that a disaster was imminent. There were originally many factions and struggles inside, but now it became even more chaotic.
Zhao Jun did not take action immediately after getting the letter, but suppressed all the information, because if he took action now, at most he would only be able to catch the surface, and the big traitor hidden inside would not surface.
So he decided to calm down and continue to delve deeper as originally planned. He would wait until all the investigation reports came out to deal with them again, so as to catch them all in one go.
at the same time.
August 14th is the Mid-Autumn Festival.
This is the seventh day after Zhao Jun was appointed as the Imperial City Chief Magistrate, and there are only three days left before Qiu Wei locks the courtyard.
The time of Autumn in the Song Dynasty was not fixed, and was generally calculated based on the distance from Bianliang.
Because it is necessary to give the successful candidates enough time to go to Bianliang to participate in the spring examination of the following year after passing the examination, so in places like Guangxi, Lingnan, and Fujian, the autumn examination is often held in June.
Bianliang is a little later, usually taking exams from August 15th to September.
For example, the exam for the fourth year of Emperor Renzong's reign in the Song Dynasty was held on August 19th. This year it is August 17th. On that day, all the scholars who participated in the Qiu Wei Festival will go to Gongyuan. However, Gongyuan will be locked and the exam will be held for three days. , food, clothing and accommodation are all there.
Zhao Jun did not reject Lu Yijian's proposal to participate in the imperial examination. Instead, he pretended to deal with it based on the principle of not letting the other party know that he knew their intentions.
Anyway, it doesn’t matter whether you pass the exam or not. In the past, I thought I wanted to go deep into the officialdom to understand the officialdom. Now after forming an alliance with Lao Fan, and with Lao Fan, an old official who has been in the officialdom for decades, what are you afraid of because you don’t know the shortcomings of the officialdom?
But he doesn't plan to completely fall out with Lu Yijian and the others now, unless the other party is so stubborn that he can't bear it, so he should deal with it perfunctorily.
In the past two days, he pretended to be reading, and continued to investigate secretly during the day. He saw a lot of social darkness, and slowly learned a lot about the criminal methods of these underground forces and the methods of the powerful people behind them to make money.
And while Zhao Jun was still moving forward steadily according to his plan, at this moment in Zuixiang Building in Yulin Lane, East City, several officials from Kaifeng Mansion were sitting in the inner room, talking about something.
When Fan Zhongyan came to Kaifeng Mansion, he had always enforced strict laws and cracked down on evil, so he was frightened for a while, and the security on the streets of Bianliang was much better than before.
To reach this level in the future, we have to wait until Bao Zheng, who is currently paying filial piety to his parents in his hometown, will gain access to Kaifeng Mansion twenty years later, so that he can once again eliminate the cancer within Kaifeng Mansion, and then devote himself to fighting against the evil forces, so that Bianliang can be the leader of the Kaifeng Mansion. One new.
It is a pity that both Fan Zhongyan and Bao Heizi can basically only keep the surface clean. Even in the Song Dynasty, they did not eradicate large-scale evil forces such as Wuyou Cave, Ghost Fan Tower, and Beggar Gang underground.
It was not until the Mongols in the Yuan Dynasty that they ignored martial ethics, defeated the Ten Hui and poured water into it crazily, and finally eliminated the Wuyou Cave that had been in Bianliang for hundreds of years.
At this time, as Fan Zhongyan was transferred, Zhang Yi took office too short, and Ding Du was a confused scholar. Without the Qingming officials to suppress him, the dirty gangsters below began to act again.
There are five Kaifeng Prefecture chiefs in the room right now, namely Liu Yuanzhi, Kaifeng Prefecture's promotion officer, Liao Yu and Li Dewen, judicial officers, and Zhang Pengfei and Zhan Wu, military officers.
As a rule, Kaifeng Prefecture has one governor, one general judge, two judges, and three push officials.
The Fu Yin is the actual person in charge, and the General Magistrate is the deputy. The magistrates are in charge of the left and right offices respectively, and the push officials are in charge of the Nansi Envoy Court part-time. Then there is the Fuyuan Department under it. There are six judicial and military officials in charge, and they are also six Boss Cao.
However, as the redundancy of officials intensified, the number of officials, large and small, in Kaifeng Prefecture increased sharply, although most of them held empty posts and had no right to know. But now it has expanded to the point where there are two general judges, three judges, five judges and more than ten government officials joining the army. The redundancy of officials is very serious.
This resulted in the fact that the Kaifeng Mansion was actually divided into several small groups and factions, competing for power and profit with each other, and their opinions were not unified.
The strength of Liu Yuanzhi's faction is quite good. Including Liao Yu and others, there are still several Liucao and Tiidian below. Moreover, in Kaifeng Prefecture, the resident officials are top-notch when they reach the rank of official and can stay for several more years.
Because these people were all civil servants, most of them came from the same family or were born with the same Jinshi or were given the same Jinshi. Although their official status was low, they could serve longer in lower-level official positions.
Those who reach the rank of magistrate or above are generally from Jinshi background, with high status, but they are just rank-and-file officials. They can only serve for one or two years at most, and cannot achieve long-term benefits.
Therefore, Kaifeng Mansion harbors filth and evil, and most of them are below the official rank.
At this moment, Liu Yuanzhi met with several cronies to discuss the Imperial City Secretary's behavior of overstepping his duties in the past few days.
"The Imperial City Division is becoming more and more arrogant now. Zhao Jun, who doesn't know his origin, is actually able to confuse the officials and give the Imperial City Division the power to arrest and judge."
"I heard that on the first day he took office, he hinted to his subordinates that he was related to the royal family. Could he be a son of the clan?"
"The clan cannot serve as an official. Your Majesty is breaking the laws of our ancestors by doing so."
"There is no word from the clan's mansion, which means that this person is not in the clan's jade certificate. Could he be the late emperor?"
"Don't think too much."
A few people first exchanged glasses and exchanged cups, and chatted about the situation in the Imperial City Division.
Then Liu Yuanzhi looked around at everyone and said in a deep voice: "You may not know that on the first day that this magistrate took office, he asked the inspector below to secretly investigate all the officials in my Kaifeng Prefecture."
"I also knew about this, and someone sold the information to me that day."
Li Dewen sneered: "Zhao Jun is really interesting. On the first day he took office, he wanted to investigate my Kaifeng Mansion, but all the people under him came to find me."
"How many people come to you?"
Liao Yu asked.
Li Dewen said: "I'm afraid there will be more than a dozen people."
"Did you buy them all?"
"I don't have anything to do with buying so much."
"Confused."
Liao Yu frowned and said, "Aren't you afraid that those people will hold grudges and really investigate secretly?"
"hehe."
Li Dewen sneered and said, "Let them check it, whatever they can find."
"You are not careful in what you do, and you will be killed sooner or later!"
Liao Yu was very unhappy.
Although they both joined the army from the government academy, Liao Yu was admitted to the same imperial examination and had always looked down on Li Dewen, who entered the officialdom from a low background.
Now that he did something stupid again, it made him even more angry.
However, Li Dewen didn't know it yet and said coldly: "You don't know how big the other party's appetite is. I don't have that much spare money to buy a dozen copies of the same news."
"How stupid!"
Liao Yu couldn't help but curse.
"You"
Li Dewen was very angry.
"alright!"
Liu Yuanzhi slapped the case and said: "What are you arguing about? We asked you to come here to discuss countermeasures, not to quarrel. Now that the Imperial City Department has clearly targeted us, you are still fighting among us?"
The two of them stopped talking.
Zhang Pengfei pondered: "Brother Cen Gao (Liu Yuanzhi's nickname), in your opinion, what should we do?"
Liu Yuanzhi said: "What do you think? Tell us and listen."
"I heard from the people above that Zhao Jun is a new official who has been favored by officials for three reasons, so it is not appropriate to have a direct conflict with him."
Zhan Wu analyzed: "That's why we ordered the people below to be more cautious, but now they have put their hands on us. I suspect it is not only us, but also Ma Tuiguan and Gao Tuiguan. It is better to join forces with them." stand up?"
"Unite?"
Liu Yuanzhi smiled and said: "We fought to the death with them before, can we still unite now?"
Zhan Wu said: "It wasn't possible before, but now that we have foreign enemies, we really need to unite."
"Yes, if we really let the Imperial City Division continue to pursue this, there is no guarantee that something will be found."
Liao Yu also said: "After all, Ma Yi's brother is the censor in the Yushitai. If we can unite with Ma Yi and let the Yushitai impeach the Imperial City Division, we may be able to calm down Zhao Jun."
Li Dewen immediately confronted him and said: "In the past few days, have the Yushitai and Jiantai impeached the Imperial City Secretary a lot? The officials are clearly protecting Zhao Jun, what effect can it have?"
"hehe."
Liao Yu smiled and said: "If the Imperial City Division can find the case, it will be useless. But if the case cannot be found, or if the case is unjust or wrong, and others are falsely accused, then won't the Yushitai impeachment be useful? By then Officials are not easy to protect either."
"you mean?"
Liu Yuanzhi looked at him.
Liao Yu said: "It's very simple. If they want a case, just give it to them. As long as it's not a case involving us, we can even create a case for them."
"Well"
Several people looked at each other and smiled.
They may not be good at solving crimes, but creating cases is their specialty.
Only Li Dewen looked at Liao Yu with dissatisfaction. He had always been at odds with this guy. He was a Jinshi who broke with his peers and looked down on his family background. Now he was in the limelight, which made him very unhappy.
"The governor can also complain to him about how arrogant and domineering the Imperial City Secretary is now, and ask him to go to the officials and tell him."
"Well, Minghui (Liao Yu's name) is still wise, comparable to the ancient Cheng Yu."
Liu Yuanzhi was overjoyed.
If these methods continue, I will not believe that the Imperial City Division will not submit.
(End of chapter)
