According to normal thinking, Jing Zhe is too "foolish" right now.
Without even seeing any strong liquor, he had just given away three thousand taels of silver. If the other party really ran away, he would have nowhere to turn for help.
But Jing Zhe wasn't afraid. His biggest worry was that Zhang Xuehou wouldn't dare to accept it. If he did, things would be much easier from there.
After leaving the distillery, Zhao Wei, along with several members of the interview department and Xiong San, the head of the life department, hid in a nearby alley. Their furtive behavior suggested they were not good people.
After Jing Zhe left, Zhao Wei asked, "President Jing, our newspaper is under His Majesty's jurisdiction. Why do we have to act like thieves? Can't we be more open and aboveboard?"
Jing Zhe kicked him: "What do you know? There are two kinds of interviews: overt and covert. Overt interviews are for interviewing positive people, while covert interviews are for interviewing people who do bad things. If you go over there openly, won't everyone run away?"
Xiong San quickly said, "President Jing is right! We're going to a casino today, and the other side is very vigilant. Besides, I've observed their house; there are three doors! If there's the slightest disturbance, they'll escape through the other two doors!"
Like a cunning rabbit with three burrows, the people in these casinos are not only highly vigilant but also have a strong sense of crisis. They have thought of all sorts of escape routes in advance. The three doors are located in different alleys. If there is any disturbance outside, they only need to guard one door and they can run away with the stolen money through the other two doors in a short time.
This information is undoubtedly very important.
Jing Zhe patted Xiong San on the shoulder with satisfaction, "Minister Xiong is indeed very observant. Don't forget to tell Prefect Li about this important clue later. We can't afford to come up empty-handed!"
"Yes, President Jing!"
Upon receiving a compliment, Xiong San's face lit up with joy.
In no time, Zhang Xuehou came out of the distillery.
Seeing this, Jing Zhe first sent Zhao Wei to the yamen to inform Li Haoyun to bring his men over, while he and the rest of his men quietly followed.
...
Because he was carrying a large sum of money, Zhang Xuehou moved with a light step.
In the past, he would deliberately take detours to see if anyone was following him, but today he was completely unguarded, his mind already on the gambling table, ready to win big.
He arrived at the Du family casino with practiced ease. After exchanging a few simple words in slang, the casino door opened. The gatekeeper, seeing that it was Zhang Xuehou, did not let him in immediately.
"Didn't you just lose all your money this morning? Why are you here again? I've told you, we don't lend you any money here!"
Zhang Xuehou snorted coldly and threw the silver note out.
"Who do you think you are? Open your dog eyes and see if this silver note is enough for me?"
"Enough, enough, enough!"
The gatekeeper could tell at a glance that the amount of silver notes was considerable, and his attitude immediately changed: "Uncle Zhang, please come in!"
As he spoke, he ushered the arrogant Zhang Xuehou inside. Jing Zhe peeked out from the corner of the wall and saw that the silver notes Zhang Xuehou was showing were the two thousand taels he had just given him. He was a little surprised.
Logically speaking, as Su Xinping's puppet, even if Zhang Xuehou received two thousand taels of silver, he should only receive a small portion, with the lion's share going to Su Xinping.
How dare he bring them all out?
Aren't you afraid of losing everything and not being able to explain it to Su Xinping?
This makes me even more wary of people who are addicted to gambling: when they lose heavily, they really go crazy and don't care about anything!
Luckily, he found this casino. Otherwise, if he had lost all his money and they had caught him and taken over his winery, it would have cost him three thousand taels of silver!
It must be heartbreaking.
So Jing Zhe became much more cautious and was still pondering. Since the casino was going to be shut down, he figured he might as well ask for more than three thousand taels of silver, since the money was ill-gotten anyway. He could use the extra money as a bonus for the newspaper to reward everyone for their hard work recently. Wouldn't that be wonderful?
Thinking this, Jing Zhe took out the two deposit slips from his body and handed them to Xiong San behind him.
"Let's find a place and renovate this place."
He pointed to the numbers on the deposit slip and said, "Change this one to two, and this two to three."
"..."
"What are you staring at? Don't you understand?"
Jing Zhe glared at Xiong San with displeasure.
"Understood, absolutely understood!"
After saying that, Xiong San took the deposit slip and ran out, his admiration for Jing Zhe flowing like a never-ending river...
President Jing is truly wasting his talents as president!
If we appointed him as the Minister of Revenue, the national treasury of Anguo would be overflowing...
...
In about fifteen minutes, Li Haoyun arrived with about a hundred constables. Every constable was fully armed and looked very energetic.
Jing Zhe was a little confused: Although it was my suggestion to bring more constables to arrest people, we don't need so many people!
But he still reminded him first: "Prefect Li, I heard that besides these two gates, there are two smaller gates on the other side of this house. Prefect Li, please allocate some troops to guard those two gates as well, to prevent them from escaping!"
Li Haoyun smiled and glanced at Jing Zhe: "Don't worry, President Jing. The other two gatekeepers have already sent people to guard them, and their numbers are about the same as theirs. None of them will be able to escape!"
As he spoke, he pointed to the more than one hundred constables.
Jing Zhe was completely dumbfounded.
More than two hundred constables were dispatched at the same time; it seems that everyone from the Jingzhou Prefectural Government Office came out!
Li Haoyun, on the other hand, was very pleased with himself.
As Jing Zhe said, this is indeed a time to increase performance.
The laws of Da'an explicitly prohibit gambling, yet it persists despite repeated bans.
Moreover, those who run casinos are very cunning. Not only do they choose particularly secluded locations for their casinos, but they also usually buy up and leave empty the houses around the casinos, just in case they are reported.
Just like getting into the Du family's casino, you need to use various coded phrases before you can enter.
Therefore, ordinary people who don't participate in this kind of thing have no idea that such places exist. If there are no informants, it is also difficult for the government to find out. Even if they do find out, they can arrest one person, and then a second or third will pop up. So every prefect has a headache after taking office.
Li Haoyun had only just taken office, and he wasn't even a familiar face in the court, let alone among the common people. So when he heard that Jing Zhe wanted to boost his performance, he was overjoyed!
Such a great opportunity, with newspaper publicity too. Although there was no concept of live broadcast in this era, he still experienced that feeling. So after Jing Zhe left, he pulled out all the constables who could move in the yamen, held a mobilization meeting, and mobilized them all!
Looking at Jing Zhe, he laughed even harder.
I need to work on our relationship with him better in the future, so that he'll think of me more often when good things happen to him.
He needs publicity, and Jing Zhe needs official help—it's a win-win situation!
————
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