Looking at the serious expression on the Lieutenant Colonel's face, Fang Lang knew that his chance had come.

"Okay, then I'll tell you a place where you can hire ships that dare to sail to Brazil. We should be able to dispatch three ships of about 5,000 tons now, but I estimate the freight may be very expensive. After all, the routes are now full of German submarines." Fang Lang was of course talking about the three cargo ships he had just purchased from Commodore Jackson.

He had originally been planning to use these three ships to carry goods back to Brazil to sell. Now that he no longer had to send empty ships to Brazil, that was of course the best thing. Originally, Fang Lang could have sent a ship to New York to purchase goods directly and ship them to Italy, but the Port of New York is now occupied by the transshipment of military supplies, and it is difficult for civilian ships to find berths.

The most important reason is that Fang Lang’s uncle Yang Zong runs a small private workshop-style cigarette factory in Sao Paulo, Brazil, and his business has not been very good.

At this time, Fang Lang wanted to invest in his uncle's cigarette factory, expand the scale of operation, and develop the cigarette factory through this rare opportunity. As an important tobacco production area, Brazil has very low purchasing and labor costs, so the cost of purchasing cigarettes in Brazil is lower than in New York. There is no reason for Fang Lang not to take care of his own business.

Here I would like to introduce Fang Lang’s mother’s family. His grandfather’s father, Fang Lang’s grandfather, was a survivor of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom who came to Brazil with Fang Lang’s great-grandfather. His ancestral home is in Hunan, but my grandfather got married late and had a daughter, Yang Xiuer, and a son, Yang Zong. It is obvious that Yang Xiuer is Fang Lang's mother.

In his early years, the old man bought land and became a landlord like his great-grandfather. When Fang Lang's grandfather was young, he didn't want to be tied to the land, so he started doing business, buying tobacco in Chinese planting areas and reselling it. Later, he listened to someone's trick and bought a set of small cigarette rolling equipment to open a cigarette factory. However, the cigarettes produced by the cigarette factory had no special features, so they were all half-dead. When it was passed to my uncle, he tried many times to sell the cigarette factory, but no one took over, and the people working in the factory were all old employees, and he didn't want to cut off everyone's livelihood, so it became the useless state it is now.

My uncle Yang Zong married a Portuguese wife and had two sons, neither of whom wanted to take over my uncle's cigarette factory. The eldest son, Yang Gan, now works as a clerk in the São Paulo City Government. He wants to pursue a career in politics and is unwilling to return home to work at a half-dying cigarette factory. The youngest son, Yang Kun, is still studying at university. In Fang Lang's impression, Yang Kun also has little interest in the family's cigarette factory and instead wants to be a teacher.

So Fang Lang considered going back to buy the factory or investing in shares, and let his uncle continue to manage it, so that his grandfather's family business would not disappear. After it becomes bigger, he will see if his two cousins ​​have any ideas to help manage it.

...

...

Lieutenant Colonel Graham was extremely excited when Fang Lang said that there was a ship available for hire that could sail to Brazil. He said quickly, "Money is a small problem. We'll pay in US dollars. Let's go and have a chat with the other company now!"

Unfortunately, Fang Lang hadn't greeted Mr. Coburn in advance, and he hadn't gotten the ship yet, so he certainly couldn't take him there right now. He could only shirk his responsibility and said, "Don't worry, sir. Colonel Attilio Parisi just asked me to go to the U.S. Navy to handle the ship handover procedures, so I have to go receive the ship first. How about this! I'll book a table at the Cantina Restaurant tonight, and then invite him to come with you, and we can eat and chat, okay?"

When Lieutenant Colonel Graham heard that Fang Lang still had a mission to complete, he was helpless, after all, military orders were as strong as mountains. At the same time, Fang Lang said that he would invite him to dinner at the famous Cantina restaurant in Naples tonight, and he was relieved, and said quickly: "Of course, no problem, don't worry, this kind of official reception does not require you to treat, it can be directly used as the reception fee of our logistics department. I will arrange for my adjutant to reserve a table immediately, and we will see you tonight!"

Fang Lang had not expected that there would be food and entertainment expenses in Brazil at this time. Of course, he would not mind being able to eat and drink at the Brazilian government's expense.

"Okay, sir, see you tonight!" After saying that, Fang Lang did not linger any longer and hurried away. Even though the room was much warmer than outside, he was unwilling to stay in this room full of strange smells.

After leaving Lieutenant Colonel Graham's office, Fang Lang did not go directly to Brigadier General Jackson to take over the ship. Instead, he went to the office building of Global Trade first and brought Mr. Coburn and three Italian captains and first mates he had recruited. Then he entered the US Navy camp again and found Brigadier General Jackson.

After introducing Commodore Jackson to Mr. Cockburn, they went to the ship's berth together. There were four large transport ships moored at the berth at this time. Judging from the construction style of the ships, three of them were built in German shipyards and one was built in an Italian shipyard.

It is obvious that the ships of the German shipyard are newer than those of the Italian shipyard, and the designed carrying capacity of the transport ships of the German shipyard is 5,500 tons, while the Italian ship is exactly 5,000 tons. All four ships were powered by steam turbines, and their maximum speed was about 15 knots. Although this was lower than the Victory's maximum speed of 18 knots, it was higher than the 11 knots of an ordinary Liberty ship.

The ships were all intact captured Axis ships without any damage. After Brigadier General Jackson sent people to inspect and confirm, the ships were in very good condition. The US military had just carried out deep maintenance on the ships, and they were fully fueled and ready to set sail at any time.

Fang Lang directly handed over the three German-made ships to Coburn, and he took over the Italian-made ships for the Brazilian Navy. The better boat will definitely be kept for himself. When it comes to distinguishing between public and private, Fang Lang is very clear about it. There is nothing wrong with this Italian-made ship, except that its carrying capacity is slightly smaller and its age is slightly older, which does not affect its normal use.

After explaining to Mr. Cockburn how to deal with Lieutenant Colonel Graham that night, Fang Lang returned to the Brazilian Naval Base with the ship's information, reported the handover to Colonel Attilio Parisi, and asked the colonel to arrange for the entry of the commissioning information, officially assigning the ship to the Brazilian Navy's combat sequence. Of course, there were many cumbersome procedures that Fang Lang did not need to worry about.

All he needs is for Brazilian naval personnel to inspect and accept the ship tonight, and Fang Lang will become the official captain of the Brazilian Navy tomorrow.

Time soon came to 6:30 in the evening, and Fang Lang arrived at the Cantina restaurant early. In fact, according to the living habits of Italians, dinner is usually eaten very late and will not start before 8 o'clock. However, this time Fang Lang was acting as a middleman, so he had to arrive at the restaurant early. After all, as a Brazilian, Lieutenant Colonel Graham did not know that Italians' dinner was a real dinner.

Sure enough, when Fang Lang arrived at the restaurant, Lieutenant Colonel Graham's private car had already stopped at the restaurant door, and Lieutenant Colonel Graham, who was in casual clothes, was squeezing his fat body out of the passenger seat of the Willys Jeep. Seeing the jeep rebounding with great force after he jumped out of the jeep with great effort, Fang Lang believed that if the jeep could speak, it would definitely utter a curse.

Fang Lang went forward to greet Lieutenant Colonel Graham and said, "Sir, Italians usually don't start dinner until eight o'clock in the evening, so we are here a little early. Although I told them that dinner will start at seven o'clock, Italians are not punctual." Although it was not nice to say bad things about Italians behind his father-in-law's back, he had to make it clear that he was just a middleman.

Otherwise, I don’t know what my company will think when Lieutenant Colonel Graham finds out. After all, the current Brazilian government is a dictatorship. Fang Lang had thought about it long ago. All investments in Brazil would not be made by directly setting up a company in Brazil in his own name. Instead, investing in Brazil in the name of European and American companies would be safer and would not cause unnecessary covetousness.

When Ragham heard that it was an Italian, he couldn't help but frowned: "Italians are unreliable now. Are you sure this Italian can have three ships that can run to Brazil?"

"Don't worry, sir. I've learned about this company. The full name of this company is Global Trading Co., Ltd. Italian Branch. It is actually the Italian branch of an American company. That's why it has not been confiscated as enemy capital during this war. If you are worried, we will arrange our own soldiers and ships on each ship, and there will be no problem." Seeing that Lieutenant Colonel Graham was worried about the Italians, Fang Lang quickly brought up the company's American background.