Seeing Cai Xiang agree, Li Hao felt relieved. After all, an old fox like Cai Xiang was well-informed and not so easy to be deceived.
So he ordered someone to call An Lingxu in and introduce him to Cai Xiang.
Then he said to An Lingxu: "This is Judge Cai. He used to work in Kaifeng Mansion. This time he came with me to inspect the salt tax and try the prisoners.
I will leave it to Judge Cai to contact you about what you just said. He can't help but hope you won't make a mistake. "
After hearing this, An Lingxu replied: "Don't worry, sir. I will definitely cooperate with Master Cai."
Li Hao then motioned for Cai Xiang to speak to see if he had anything to say.
After receiving Li Hao's permission, Cai Xiang said, "Master Li just said that your family was involved in the private salt trade. So first, please tell me which routes you usually take and which officials you come into contact with."
Hearing this, An Lingxu looked at Li Hao.
But Li Hao ignored him and said directly: "I said, you will contact Mr. Cai next, and you will answer whatever he asks."
At this time, An Lingxu said: "The private salt in Huainan is basically available in other places except the southwest area.
My family's business is not big, basically only tens of thousands of shi a year, and it's all business on Jiangnan East Road and Jiangnan West Road.
As for the officials I have direct contact with, most of them are the cargo supervisors and local officials in Yangzhou and Jiangnan. "
After hearing this, Cai Xiang asked, "Then how do you get your salt? Do you go directly to the salt field to pick it up?"
An Lingxu replied: "No, the salt farm will not have direct contact with us. Usually we get the salt locally."
Upon hearing this, Li Hao and the others immediately became energetic. Cai Xiang immediately responded: "You are saying that in Yangzhou City, there is a warehouse where a large amount of illegal salt is stored. Where is this place?"
An Lingxu said: "This warehouse is not inside the city, but outside the city in Yangtze Town, next to the dock.
However, the salt in that place is official salt with a salt lead, so there is no fear of search. "
Cai Xiang said: "You said those are official salts?"
An Lingxu explained: "Yes, those are official salts. As long as the salt does not come out of Huainan, there will be salt.
Only after we leave Huainan will the salt be considered private salt. As for the quantity, it can be easily controlled. There are accounts to be found when entering and exiting. If we directly replenish the corresponding salt, the accounts will be even.
Moreover, information on salt yards and cargo handling in various places is open. Unless all storage yards are found and all accounts are sealed, a one-by-one inventory may be able to find the problem. "
When they got here, everyone immediately understood the difficulty, because even Li Hao couldn't do this.
Firstly, there are not so many manpower, and secondly, if the problem is not found within a short period of time, Li Hao will not be able to bear the consequences.
Afterwards, Cai Xiang asked many questions, and some even laid traps.
But An Lingxu could answer them all, which made everyone believe that he had sincerely surrendered.
So after agreeing on the contact information, Li Hao asked someone to send An Lingxu away.
After the others left, Li Haocai said: "I underestimated these two Huai salts at first. I thought Huai salt would only account for four percent at most, which is great.
But now it seems that Huaiyan accounts for at least 60%, and even squeezes the sales of salt in Hebei. These people are quite powerful. "
Yang Wenyuan said: "Isn't this a good thing? It means that as long as we can successfully eliminate these corrupt officials and female businessmen, the mission will basically be completed."
Li Hao thought about it and felt that this was right, and he suddenly felt motivated.
So Li Hao inspired Cai Xiang and asked him to keep in touch with An Lingxu to look for suitable opportunities, and asked Yang Wenyuan to assist at any time.
As for Li Hao himself, he continued to live a leisurely life.
Of course, in Li Hao's words, this was to confuse the Huainan officials and make them confused.
As for the others, Li Hao naturally couldn't leave them idle.
So Sheng Hong and the others
So he was sent out to keep interviewing officials and wealthy salt merchants from various places, trying to muddy the water in Huainan.
However, Li Hao was not idle for long, and the result of the memorial delivered to Beijing was returned.
It first praised Li Hao and others for their decisive actions and remarkable results, and at the same time encouraged everyone to make persistent efforts, and explained that after the Huainan salt tax chaos was sorted out, rewards would be unified.
Next, Li Hao was ordered to deliver all the prisoners who had been detained, together with the verified evidence, to Beijing for further trial by the Ministry of Punishment and Dali Temple.
Of course, at the end of the edict, we did not forget to give orders to the forwarding department and the officials who were responsible for the cargo affairs.
For example, Wang Youqian was demoted and temporarily retained as the transfer envoy. When his term expired, he would be transferred to a remote rural area.
Regarding this result, Wang Youqian went out of his way to thank Li Hao and did not add insult to injury.
Of course, it was Cai Xiang who came to Li Hao first. As soon as he heard this order, he came over and said, "Sir, you can't send these prisoners away. They are important witnesses for paying the salt tax.
Once we let them go, we lose the chance to get the truth from them. "
Li Hao replied: "This is the intention of the officials and the great ministers. We can't go against it, and they haven't said anything yet."
Cai Xiang said: "They have not spoken now, but as long as the person is in our hands, there is always hope.
But if they were handed over, there would really be no hope at all.
The great ministers should know this, so why don't they stop it. "
After hearing Cai Xiang's complaint, Li Hao explained: "It's not the Grand Prime Minister's fault, the salt tax is quite sensitive.
I don't know how many people in the court were watching this matter openly or covertly, and the princes were also under pressure.
Instead, they were escorted to Bianjing, and they were not ignored. The current minister of Dali Temple, Huang Sheng, was an upright official, and he would not let these criminals go easily.
And this is also an opportunity. I will send people from the Dianqian Division to escort you.
During this period, if someone communicated with them privately, they might be able to follow the clues and find clues. "
However, Cai Xiang obviously did not give up so easily and still wanted to argue.
Li Hao simply said: "This matter has been decided, and it is not something we can change."
Then he ended the topic and asked: "Okay, how have you been communicating with An Lingxu these days? Has he provided any valuable information?"
After hearing this, Cai Xiang knew that Li Hao would not change his mind, so he stopped talking.
Instead, he replied: "There is news from his side that there was a large amount of private salt planned to be shipped to Hebei last month, totaling 150,000 shi.
But later, because of our arrival, we stopped temporarily. "
When Li Hao heard this, he opened the map he carried with him from the side and said: "If it is transported from here to Hebei, it must be transported by water, so it must go from Surabaya."
After talking about the location of Suqian, he added: "But my troops happen to be stationed in Suqian. They probably don't have the guts to transport smuggled salt from under my nose."
Cai Xiang said: "Yes, it should be because of this reason, but it is a pity.
An Lingxu said that he did not know the location of this batch of private salt, otherwise it would not be easy for them to balance their accounts with such a large amount of private salt. "
Having said this, Li Hao asked: "You have been in contact with An Lingxu for some time. Do you think this person has taken refuge with us?"
After hearing this question, Cai Xiang thought for a while and said, "I found opportunities to test him, and he told the truth several times. And for this, we really got the right person.
But I always feel that there is something wrong with him, but there is no evidence, or maybe I am too worried. "
This made Li Hao confused. Didn't it mean that although I had no evidence, I had an intuition that there was something wrong with him.
Li Hao didn't expect that Cai Xiang still had this side, but since there was no evidence that there was something wrong with An Lingxu.
Li Hao was still inclined to believe him, so he said: "Then Judge Cai thinks, if I move the people of the Palace Division away from Su and make way for them, will they be able to transport this private salt out?" .”
Cai Xiang thought for a moment and replied, "It's possible to lure the snake out of its hole.
I heard An Lingxu say that for such a large order, they will take deposit, usually about 20%.
If they cannot complete the transaction on time, they will have to pay double the deposit and will offend old customers.
So we just need to make them believe that our people were not transferred deliberately, and they will take this risk. "
After confirming that this idea was feasible, Li Hao said, "In this case, we have to help An Lingxu show his face. You ask him to offer to smuggle a batch of private salt to Jiangnan West Road.
Then the news was naturally heard by us, so it was natural for us to send people down to intercept it. "
Cai Xiang replied: "This method is feasible. It will not only allow us to move people away from Suqian openly, but also use this incident to help him clear away the suspicion of colluding with us.
Maybe this would allow him to find out something useful at this time.
Then leave this matter to me and Yang Wenyuan to discuss how to make it realistic. "
Li Hao had no objection to this and asked Cai Xiang to find Yang Wenyuan.
Of course, Li Hao can't be idle next, he also has to take care of the personnel transfer.
In order to escort all the prisoners into Beijing together, Li Hao commandeered more than a dozen prison cars in Yangzhou and loaded them all into them.
Then to escort the team, Li Hao also assigned troops from both cities and recruited part of the local command battalion to assist in the escort.
After everything was arranged, Li Hao personally led the escort team out of Yangzhou before returning to the mansion.
After returning home, Zhang Fu, who quietly sneaked into Li Hao's entourage on the road, went to talk to Li Hao.
Just listen to Zhang Fu say: "I have visited all the command camps in Huaixi, and I can confirm that they are basically involved in the illegal salt incident."
Hearing this, Li Hao couldn't help but said: "It seems that Huaixi is really a piece of metal, covered by rain and dew."
But after sighing, I still have to ask about business: "Thank you for your hard work on this trip. Based on your situation during this trip, is there anyone in these command camps who can be roped in for our use?"
Zhang Fu said: "I'm afraid this won't work. Although I didn't directly ask the leaders of the command camp this time, the people below can tell.
They have been greedy too much from the salt tax in recent years, and it is not just them who are greedy, but the people under them are also greedy.
In this case, even if they can really persuade the commander to repeat his behavior, the people under them will force him to continue his greed with guns and knives. "
After hearing this, Li Hao said: "It seems that we can't count on them, so you can rest in my house temporarily.
If I have anything else to do later, I'll come back to you for help. "
Zhang Fu naturally had no objection to this, and he happened to want to see Li Hao up close.
After talking about business matters, Li Hao was ready to talk about personal matters and see how he could please his father-in-law when he returned.
So he asked Zhang Fu about the British Duke. Of course, Li Hao had to find an insertion point first, so he first asked about the old ministry, which was also the reason for Zhang Fu's visit: "As far as I know, my father-in-law doesn't know You have been leading the army in the border areas, why do you still have many old troops in the south?"
Regarding this question, Zhang Fu proudly said: "The Duke of Guo often leads troops at the border, and he has helped many people as a result.
The guards at the border are on a rotating garrison system, and naturally there are people from Huaixi among them.
Of course, not all of them are ready-made. For example, the ones I came for this time are basically Dutou and the like. "
Hearing this, Li Hao laughed and said, "Then there are not many of these finished weapons!"
As a result, Zhang Fu became unhappy and said: "Who said that? There are many people in high positions among the people promoted by the Duke of Guo. The commanders of the Forbidden Army in Yizhou and Yanzhou near Huaixi were promoted by the Duke of Guo. .
And on the northwest border
, most of the generals there have been promoted by the Duke. "
Seeing that this situation was not right, Li Hao quickly reassured him: "I was just joking. Is my father-in-law's ability still worthy of doubt?"
After Zhang Fu softened his attitude, Li Hao started talking about other things.
After finally understanding his father-in-law's preferences, Li Hao asked Zhang Fu to rest in the guest room.
Next, Li Hao was not idle, and looked for an opportunity to find people from the Caobang.
After all, salt is transported by water, so the people on the Cao Gang should know the specific situation.
From the Caobang, Li Hao got the same answer as An Lingxu said. It was true that a huge batch of salt was going north last month, but it did not set off in the end.
At this point, Li Hao was quite relieved about An Lingxu, at least he did not lie to him about this matter.
The next step was to wait for Cai Xiang and An Lingxu's plan to unfold step by step. Soon Cai Xiang came to notify Li Hao and decided what Li Hao was going to do.
According to the plan, when An Lingxu's batch of private salt was about to be shipped out from Taizhou, Li Hao had already sent people from Suqian to Zhenzhou through Suzhou, Haozhou, and Chuzhou, and finally transported it to Dajiang. The private ship was blocked.
Of course, the final result was to stop all the illegal salt, but it was almost dusk when they were stopped.
Most of the private salt dealers who accompanied him jumped into the river and fled, so few useful people were captured.
For this reason, An Lingxu went to complain, saying why no one informed him that the Dianqiansi army was dispatched, and whether he was bullying his family.
Of course, the Salt Road officials were also unjustly accused. In fact, they knew that the people in front of the palace were dispatched, but they ran directly to Suzhou.
After making a big detour, they marched down again quickly, so no one could react for a while.
For this reason, the people in Yandao couldn't say much. For the sake of his brother, they could only comfort him and promise to compensate him, and then he gave up.
As for Li Hao, after confirming that he had seized the secret, of course he had to pursue the responsibility.
According to the itinerary that could be found upstream and downstream, Li Hao directly gathered all the relevant officials from Zhenzhou, Yangzhou and Taizhou to reprimand him, and asked Sheng Hong and others to go and investigate the source.
Of course, this salt can never be tolerated. After all, it is worth more than ten thousand taels of silver, so naturally it has to be bought back.
Therefore, after Li Hao left, Jin Chaozhong was ordered to take the people in front of the palace to escort the salt boat to Yangzhou.
But in fact, only a part of the people came back with the salt boat, and the rest were civilian husbands arranged by Li Hao in advance when they passed Jiangning Mansion.
Of course, the ship could not return to Yangzhou smoothly, lest the secret be exposed, so it was arranged to have an accident and temporarily stayed in Dantu.
As for the remaining members of the Dianqian Division, they mingled with the caravan going north and continued to return to the Huaiyang Army, preparing to ambush in Suqian.
After confirming that the people in front of the palace, except for the guards around Li Hao, everyone else was on the river.
Through An Lingxu's news, we learned that the batch of private salt shipped to Hebei was ready to be shipped. This time there were a total of 150,000 stones of private salt, worth nearly one million taels of silver. Of course, this was the official price, not the cost.
But as long as this amount of illegal salt is caught by Li Hao, the officials of the Huaihuai Salt Road will be able to rub it at will.
It's a pity that Li Hao has to stay in Yangzhou City to attract everyone's attention, otherwise Li Hao really wants to catch him personally.
Just when Li Hao felt that the matter was about to end, a piece of news from Caobang changed the matter.
