The autumn wind blew outside the window. I opened the ajar window and a cool breeze swept into the hall.
Lin Shan looked at Gu Zhengchen in astonishment and replied eagerly: "County Lord, as far as I know, all those who were actually sentenced to prison terms or exiled were handed over to the officials of the Ying government."
Gu Zhengchen chuckled, shook his head and said: "The word "real" is used well. Where did those people who were not really sentenced to prison or exiled go? Don't tell me, these people were also sent to Yingfu Mansion. Yamen!"
Lin Shan shook his head: "I don't know anything about this. We are just responsible for writing two files."
Gu Zhengchen looked at Lin Shan with sharp eyes: "When doing this kind of thing, wouldn't it be safer to write a dossier? Why create two dossiers of yin and yang?"
Lin Shan was filled with bitterness: "Your Majesty, those who have been sentenced to imprisonment, exile and death are all major cases in the county. If there are repeated major cases in the county, it means that the county magistrate and the county government are incompetent. They have not educated the people well, and they are guilty of dereliction of duty." , it is very likely that he will be demoted, removed from his post, or even prosecuted if he fails the test."
Gu Zhengchen understood.
One of the assessments of local officials is to check the handling of lawsuits and cases. If there are too many backlogged cases and frequent major cases, it will really not be praised.
Therefore, when reporting to Yingfu, there will not be too many exiles and prison sentences in one year. The number of more than fifty, let alone one county, even the entire Yingfu may not be able to sentence so many in one year.
However, these people who control the yamen must also use the name of exile or imprisonment to legally "disappear" Xu Erya and others. Therefore, a "reasonable" judgment must be kept in the county yamen, but the judgment is completely different from the file reported to the Ying government.
In this way, even if the newly appointed magistrate looks through these past files and only looks at the contents of the files, it will be difficult to find flaws and problems. In addition, since the matters were decided in the past, the new officials will not pay too much attention to them. Naturally, they will disappear and never see the light of day!
Gu Zhengchen realized that all operations were aimed at "people". As a result, Sun Erkou was robbed and disappeared, while Xu Erya was "exiled" and disappeared!
"Lin Shan, you should know something, right?"
Gu Zhengchen stood up and walked towards Lin Shan.
Lin Shan lowered his head, his eyes wandering, and he did not dare to speak.
Gu Zhengchen stretched out his hand, patted Lin Shan's shoulder, and said in a deep voice: "You are a scribe. You should know how to tamper with files and falsify official documents. According to the law, a hundred sticks are worth three thousand miles. Over the years, you should help Chen Zhong, Zhao Doubei and the others must have forged many files. The case is serious and the crime has been increased to second degree. They can be reported to the court and sentenced to death!"
Lin Shan's face turned pale, and he slumped on the ground. He stretched out his hand to grab Gu Zhengchen's lapel, but failed to catch it twice. He begged: "Your Majesty, save me, save me. I still have my parents, my wife and my children..." "
Gu Zhengchen walked behind Lin Shan, put his hands behind his back, and said sadly: "I can't save you. As I said before, I will be lenient if you confess. If you can tell the truth one by one and explain clearly, I will remember that your conscience is still intact. If you are not the mastermind, you can express your feelings to the court."
"Me, all of me!"
Lin Shan knew that he was guilty of a serious crime and could not care about anything else, so he confessed in one go: "The classic historian Chen Zhong, the chief registrar Zhao Doubei, the county magistrate Liu Boqin, and the former county magistrate Wu Youyuan, in order to satisfy their own interests, cooperated with Jurong's powerful clans and large households in the countryside. They preyed on the common people, started disputes without permission, and severely sentenced the common people in the county government trials, embezzled the common people's fields and homesteads, and divided the profits 50-50 with the big families..."
Gu Zhengchen sat back at the desk with a grim look on his face: "So, Guo Jie has repeatedly had disputes with Sun Cai, Wang Daxiu, and Wang Erniu. Each time, two fingers were broken. It was also a fake injury. It's just that In order to severely sentence Sun Cai and three others?"
"Also, the three family members were forced to sell their land to redeem their punishment."
Lin Shan lowered his head.
Gu Zhengchen finally understood that the so-called fights were all fake. Putting people in prison was not the purpose, the purpose was their family's fields!
For the common people, fields are the foundation of their lives.
For a wealthy family, land is a symbol of the clan. If there is less land, what kind of family is it?
When people in the Ming Dynasty talked about property, they would not ask how many houses you had, how many in the city, or how many in the country. Instead, they would ask how much land you had, whether it was hundreds of acres, thousands of acres, or tens of thousands of acres.
The source of land for powerful clans is very simple. They either buy it, half-buy and half-seize it, or plunder it skillfully.
The operation of Jurong County Government refreshed Gu Zhengchen's understanding of the methods of officials. This group of people not only took advantage of the tyranny, but also teamed up with the county government to give it a "legal" appearance, causing the people to suffer losses and hardships, and even complained. There is no way out!
Such a grand and blatant "robbery" scene happens in Jurong year after year. It is shocking!
Gu Zhengchen picked up the tea bowl, threw it to the ground, and shouted: "Gu Cheng!"
Gu Cheng walked in hurriedly.
Gu Zhengchen wrote a letter and ordered: "Send a message to the government officials and go to Hezhuang to arrest Guo Jie!"
Gu Cheng took the letter and left.
Gu Zhengchen looked at Lin Shan and sternly said: "Well, besides the 50-50 benefit, why did the county government cooperate with the big families and sentence a group of young people to prison terms or exile? In other words, how much money do these people who have been sentenced to prison terms or exile get? After being dealt with by the government, how many of them were kept secretly by the county government? If these people are not in the prison cell, where have they gone?"
Lin Shan shook his head: "My lord, as a scribe, I don't know where these people have gone. I only know that these people may have been sold."
"sold?"
Gu Zhengchen's face changed, his eyes were a little shocked, and he gritted his teeth and asked, "What do you mean selling it, and who did it sell to?"
Lin Shan looked at Gu Zhengchen and did not avoid Gu Zhengchen's sharp gaze: "Shortly after Xu Erya was imprisoned in the prison cell, I accidentally heard Chen Zhong and Zhao Doubei arguing about how much taels of silver Xu Erya was worth."
"That's unreasonable!"
Gu Zhengchen punched the table, furious, and said coldly: "Who did you sell it to?"
Lin Shan shook his head slightly: "These things are all handled by Chen Zhong, Zhou Hong and others, and they are mostly done at night. We don't go out at night, so we don't know about it."
At this moment, Yang Liang and Zhang Pei hurried over: "Mr. County Lord, it's not good, the former prison chief Zhou Hong is missing, and the former prison chief Chen Zhong hanged himself at home."
Gu Zhengchen looked at Zhang Pei with stern eyes.
Zhang Pei nodded slightly: "Chen Zhong died about an hour ago."
Gu Zhengchen clenched his fists, rolled his sleeves and said, "Take me there!"
The Chen family is located in the west of Jurong City, with a second courtyard.
Chen Zhong's body was already lying on the reed mat, covered with white cloth. Chen Zhong's wife Chen and daughter Chen Jing, dressed in white clothes and with white cloth wrapped around their heads, knelt beside him and wept.
Gu Zhengchen comforted him with a few words and glanced at Song Er. Song Er stepped forward and lifted up the white cloth to examine the report carefully: "Your Majesty, the deceased has rope marks on his Adam's apple, which are purple-red and extend to behind the left and right ears. His jaw was clenched, there were no other injuries on his body, and his clothes were clean and tidy. It is initially judged that he hanged himself after tidying up his clothes."
Yang Liang, the yamen servant, took out a rope and said, "This is the rope for hanging yourself."
After Song Er checked again, he found that he had indeed hanged himself.
Gu Zhengchen looked at the dead Chen Zhong. This man was quite capable and knew how to share interests equally. He was a capable man. It was somewhat unbelievable that such a man would hang himself.
"Ms. Chen, do you know why Chen Zhong hanged himself?"
Gu Zhengchen turned around and looked.
Mrs. Chen was filled with grief and choked with sobs: "My lord, today I was reading in the study. No one was allowed to disturb me. Later, when the government officials came to the door, I entered the study. I didn't expect that I was already..."
"Take me to the study."
Gu Zhengchen walked not far and reached the study room, where the door was open.
When you walk into the room, you can see a high stool tilted to the ground, a long table, and bookshelves along the wall filled with age books.
On the table, there is a tea bowl.
The paper spread out is still blank, the brush is placed next to the inkstone, and the ink has been developed.
Gu Zhengchen sat on the chair and looked at the "Spring and Autumn" beside him. He saw that it seemed to be holding something, and it was slightly bulging. He opened the book, looked at the paper, and frowned slightly.
"This is?"
Yang Liang was a little surprised.
Gu Zhengchen unfolded the paper bit by bit and spread it on the desk. He saw two lines of words written on it:
Knowing that my sins are serious,
The only way to apologize is to die.
Gu Zhengchen looked at the wrinkled paper and frowned. This handwriting should be Chen Zhong's.
"Your Majesty, it seems that Chen Zhongzhi chose to commit suicide after his affair was exposed."
Seeing this, Yang Liang said from the side.
Gu Zhengchen put away the paper, clamped it in the book again, put the book in his sleeve, and looked at Chen: "Will Chen Zhong have any visitors today?"
Mrs. Chen shook her head: "We were in the backyard and didn't hear any trouble."
Gu Zhengchen stood up, opened the tea bowl on the side and looked at it. He didn't drink much tea and it was already cold. He walked out from behind the desk, looked down at the ground, took out his handkerchief and picked up something that looked like a bamboo leaf from the ground.
"tea?"
Gu Zhengchen looked at it and found that it was still a little wet. He got up to check it, said "My condolences" to Mrs. Chen and left the Chen family.
Back at the magistrate's house, Gu Zhengchen sat in the yard, looking at the paper left by Chen Zhong in trance.
Zhang Pei asked with some confusion: "Master, then Chen Zhong hanged himself. This should be correct. He committed suicide out of fear of crime. There is nothing to think about, right?"
Gu Zhengchen glanced at Zhang Pei, smiled, and shook his head: "You are only half right. Then Chen Zhong hanged himself. This should be correct. But committing suicide out of fear of crime is not always the case."
Zhang Pei's face was full of confusion: "If he didn't commit suicide out of fear of crime, how could he hang himself? Isn't this a contradiction?"
Gu Zhengchen shook the paper in his hand: "I know that my sin is serious, so I can only die to apologize. This is indeed written by Chen Zhong, but it is also Chen Zhong who is telling me that someone is forcing him to hang himself!"
"What?"
Zhang Pei was shocked.
Gu Zhengchen looked at the paper left by Chen Zhong and said slowly: "Zhang Pei, imagine a dying person, a person who commits suicide in fear of crime. He writes a suicide note and last words. Why do he have to fold it multiple times and stuff it into the book? He already knows The sin was so serious, why not just leave this piece of paper on the desk so that people can see it at a glance, wouldn't it be more clear that he had repented before his death?"
"this……"
Zhang Pei thought, this behavior is indeed suspicious.
Gu Zhengchen stood up and continued: "The last words left by a dying person will not be concealed and hidden in a book. You must know that this is not a family letter left to Chen's mother and daughter, but to the county government. It’s for my own eyes! You can be sure that Chen Zhong’s extraneous move was not superfluous, but meant something! You still remember that piece of tea, right?”
"Remember."
Zhang Pei nodded.
Gu Zhengchen's expression was solemn: "The tea leaves are consistent with the tea leaves in Chen Zhong's cup, but the tea in Chen Zhong's tea bowl has not been touched at all. It is impossible for the brewed tea leaves to fall on the ground, unless there was another person in the study at that time. And that person is the real culprit who forced Chen Zhong to commit suicide!"
