When the patrolling soldiers blew their whistles, the tightly covered carriage, surrounded by several fast horses, had arrived at a grain warehouse in the west of the Trade City.
A group of people, including Pavlov, the owner of the grocery store, rode into the yard eagerly. Four men lifted up the animal skins and debris covering the sled, revealing the two men below who had their hands and feet bound and their mouths gagged with towels. Female and male.
"Pavlov, where is the tunnel?"
"In the stables, follow me."
After hearing this, Major Ragutin asked his men to carry Fan Tong and others, and followed Pavlov straight to the stable.
Fan Tong was dazed because of the stick on his neck, but with the ups and downs of the Cossack carrying him, the other person's shoulders pressed against his abdomen, making him shake. Almost out of breath. Just when Fan Tong felt that he was about to be suffocated to death, the man beneath him stopped. Just as he was feeling dizzy, a strand of horse tail mane brushed over his head.
Fan Tong turned his head vigorously, trying to find Ushiha and Polya, but he saw nothing except a trembling black velvet.
Pavlov peeled off the hay piled on the ground in a corner of the stable. Underneath was a tan wooden board about sixty centimeters long. He moved the wooden board away, revealing a deep dark passage about eighty centimeters in diameter. Because people often came and went in the past, the edges of the secret passage were worn very smooth.
Then, he took an extinguished pine oil torch from the stable wall, lit it with flint, and then climbed down the steps dug in the wall of the secret passage shaft very skillfully.
After Pavlov went down, Major Ragutin also climbed down. Then several of his men connected the ropes tied to Fan Tong and the other three with a thick rope, and let the three of them down from the hole one after another.
When Fan Tong was first put down, he struggled instinctively and stuck his chubby body at the entrance of the hole, trying to delay time. But who would have thought that a Cossack picked up a stick and hit him hard on the stomach. Fan Tong groaned in pain. As soon as his feet relaxed, his body slipped down the three-meter-deep secret passage. Not to mention the dirt on his face, he even sprained his foot when he fell.
When he woke up a little, he heard the Pavlov talking to him viciously. He didn't need to guess to know that the other person must be warning him.
Fatty Fan straddles two time and space, and has never experienced anything like this before. After being beaten once, all he could think about now was fear. He breathed hard through his nose. The dark space and the feeling of suffocation made his ears buzzing, and his heart was beating wildly, as if it was about to jump out of his chest. At this time, he didn't dare to move anymore, for fear that the other party would jump over the wall and stab his leg and arm, which would be too bad.
After Ushiha and Polya were also hung down by ropes, Pavlov held a torch and walked forward. Major Ragutin took out his dagger and scolded Fan Tong to get up and follow him. When Fan Tong stood against the wall, After getting up, I noticed that the height of the secret passage was about one and a half meters high.
It is said that as long as there is cross-border trade, smuggling trade will definitely exist. During the reigns of Kangxi and Yongzheng, the Manchu Qing government strictly prohibited the export of raw silk to Russia, and violators were punished with death. But even so, a large amount of raw silk is still transported to Kyaktu through smuggling every year.
Although there is a Kyaktu River between Russia City and Merchant City, the water here is only more than two meters deep. In addition, the distance between the two sides is only more than 100 meters, which provides conditions for digging a secret tunnel for smuggling.
However, it is precisely because Tsarist Russia is dependent on Sino-Russian trade that the previous Kyakhta officials turned a blind eye to this. Anyway, no cent of the tariffs that should be paid should be paid.
In recent years, Sino-Russian border smuggling involves many commodities, ranging from local specialties such as cattle, horses, camels and mules that are abundant in Mongolia, to tea, cloth, daily necessities, etc., covering almost all types of commodities traded between China and Russia. The goods smuggled by Shanxi merchants to Russian merchants were mainly tea, tobacco, cloth and daily necessities, while the goods smuggled by Russian merchants to Central Shanxi merchants were mainly various types of fur goods, horses and camels, etc.
Of course, large-scale smuggling operations will definitely not be in Kyakhta. The Qing-Russia border area was long, vast and sparsely populated. The cattle and horse trade definitely could not go through secret passages. The main thing in Kyaktu was small-scale tea and fur goods smuggling.
Fan Tong, Wu Xiha and Polya staggered along as they were pushed forward. In the dim light, they noticed that the dark passage had a gentle slope going down, and they walked about dozens of meters away. After that, it is a gentle slope upward again.
During this period, he wanted to look back at Ushiha and Polya, but as soon as he turned around, he was pushed hard by the Cossack behind him, and his head hit the wall of the tunnel, which made his head hurt. At this time, Fan Tong heard the "whining" sounds of two women behind him, and he felt relieved.
After what seemed like a long time, the road finally came to an end. Fan Tong was leaning against the wall of the secret passage, breathing hard. He heard the voices of several people talking above his head, but they were all speaking in Russian, and he had no intention of distinguishing what they were saying at the moment.
After a while, a rope hung from the top of his head, and Major Ragutin, who was walking in front, tied the rope behind Fan Tong by the light of a torch. Then the rope tightened, and Fan Tong's fat body began to rise slowly.
"What did this guy grow up on? This is too heavy!"
"What nonsense, hurry up, hurry up!"
After a while, Fan Tong felt his eyes light up. When he was pulled up on his back and his feet came out of the hole, he realized that the space here was not big, and it was surrounded by walls made of wooden boards, which was about 20 meters. How flat it looks. There were five or six guys with half-covered faces standing around the entrance of the cave. They must have been the ones pulling the rope just now.
Although these people tried to hide themselves, Fan Tong was shocked when he saw the other person's bare forehead and the thin braid on the back of one guy's head.
"Manqing! Have I arrived at the trading city in the south?!"
Soon, Fan Tong saw Polya with a painful look on her face, her face stained with tears and mud. Her originally beautiful black swan dress had turned khaki, and her golden hair had also turned dull. Messy.
"Woo~" Fan Tong struggled to move towards Polya, but what followed was a kick that knocked him to the edge of the wooden wall. This kick hit Fan Tong's face, causing his nose to burst into tears.
Ushiha was the third one to be dragged up. Her fox fur cloak had been left in the grocery store before, and now she was wearing an emerald green silk singlet. Hezhe's little daughter-in-law is unruly and unruly. She has never suffered such a crime in her life. The first thing Ushiha did after she woke up was to stare at the people in the room with her big black eyes. Her gaze was chilling, like a hunter sizing up his prey.
When the last Cossack climbed up from the cave, as soon as his head came out, he said hurriedly: "Oh no, I heard voices, please block the entrance of the cave!"
The other people in the room panicked as soon as they heard this. If the Beihai Navy chased them, the game would be over!
At this time, Pavlov said in Russian to a Qing man whose face was covered: "Hurry up and block it with something, don't let them come up!"
"Follow me, there are stones and tools outside the door!"
Major Ragutin and another Cossack took out the pistols of Fan Tong and Ushiha from their arms and pointed them at the entrance of the cave. The other people pushed the door open and moved in a stone and log from outside the door, and then threw it at the entrance of the secret passage. Go down.
As more than a dozen pieces of stone and wood were thrown into the entrance of the secret passage, large pieces of soil on the secret passage shaft were smashed and fell down. After that, these people came in from outside the door with shovels and shoveled dirt one by one into the shaft. Seeing that the secret passage was completely blocked, no one could climb up!
At this time, a few exclamations and coughs were faintly heard coming from the bottom of the shaft, followed immediately by a burst of yelling.
Afterwards, the masked man left two people guarding the entrance of the cave, and then moved Pavlov, his party, and Fan Tong to a slightly larger warehouse next door. There are piles of sacks and wooden boxes stacked against the wall, and the air is filled with the smell of tea and rhubarb.
Only then did Pavlov and others heave a sigh of relief. He asked a guy with his face covered and wearing a coarse cotton coat: "Are the horses and clothes ready?"
The man said: "I've prepared one for you and two horses. Everything is on the horse mattress. I will send two people to take you away."
Ragutin nodded. He knew that with his appearance, he would be in trouble when encountering patrolling officers and soldiers. He turned around and motioned to one of his men to go out and take a look. After a while, the Buryat man came back and nodded to Ragutin. After seeing it, Pavlov asked again: "Where are the documents? Without them, we wouldn't be able to escape when we encounter your patrolling officers and soldiers!"
"Where's the money?" The masked man opened his hand toward Major Ragutin.
Major Ragutin and Pavlov each took out a heavy animal skin bag from their arms and handed one to the other first. The other person took it and opened it. It was filled with half a bag of gold sand. He said "hmm" to express his satisfaction. . After he finished examining another bag of gold sand, he took out an envelope from his arms and handed it to Pavlov.
Pavlov opened the envelope and took out the contents. He saw that it was a piece of paper with two pages connected, with a large red seal sealing the junction. In addition to the dense Chinese characters on it, there are also Manchu characters written on the back.
Ragutin came over to take a look and asked in surprise: "What is this?"
The masked man explained: "This is called a soldier's card. We paid three hundred taels of silver to get it from the trustee. The front is the main text, and the back is the tail. If you encounter patrolling officers and soldiers on the road, you must put it in your hand. Show this to them, the patrolling officers and soldiers will check the number of people according to what is written on the text, and then fill in the number of people to be checked on the final slip, and you can only go through after it is stamped."
Pavlov laughed, hugged the masked man, and said: "Tian, thank you for your help, otherwise this matter would not have been so easy. When I come back with the Queen's army, I will definitely thank you very much. .”
The masked man said: "I also work for the imperial court, but it's a pity that the secret passage can be used in the future. It's hard to say."
Ragutin urged at this time: "It's no longer a matter of time, we have to leave quickly!"
At this time, a group of people heard a cry of "Woo" coming from behind them. They turned around and saw that the fat man with a bruised nose and face was humming, signaling that he had something to say.
The masked man said solemnly: "You can take away the cloth, but you can't shout, otherwise you will be responsible for the consequences!"
Fan Tong nodded desperately after hearing this. When the cloth on his mouth was pulled out, he took a big breath and felt that his breathing was smoother. Then he gasped and said, "Here, bring them thick clothes. In such a cold weather, you will freeze to death if you ride a horse! They want, if something happens, you all will not survive!"
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