The return of the son-in-law

The place where the general judge works is in the room on the left side of the government office. There is a lock in front of the door, and there is a little dust on it.

Hao Yun took out the key, stepped forward to open the door, pushed it to Guo Zhanan's side, and offered the key with both hands: "My lord, this is your key."

Guo Zhanan took it and walked in first.

Because no one has been in or out of the place for the past three months, the first time you enter, the room is full of flying dust.The sun shone in from outside, and the decayed smell in the house became more and more obvious.

Rao Hao Yun is such a clever person, he was also stunned at first sight.He didn't expect that Shi Guogan didn't send someone to clean the house. It was clear that he didn't want to see the new Chief Judge!

It took Hao Yun a long time to say: "My lord, why don't you go out first and come in to work after I clean the inside?"

Guo Zhanan nodded, then thought of something, pointed to the stack of paperwork on the table and said, "I saw a pavilion in the nearby garden, I'll go over there and look at the paperwork first, after you clean it carefully, call me again."

Hao Yun responded, first he accompanied Guo Zhanan to the pavilion over there, and made a pot of tea by Guo Zhanan's hand, then called three or four servants, found a wooden bucket filled with water, and cleaned the house little by little with a rag .

Hao Yun himself untied the cotton curtain hanging at the door—this curtain was used to keep out the cold wind outside in winter. The northwest wind was always strong, and in winter the wind was still mixed with a lot of sand.The curtains had more or less absorbed water during the winter, and they hadn’t seen the sun for several months, so they were already in tatters. The cotton wool inside was turned out, and black spots appeared in many places.

Hao Yun couldn't help but shudder—fortunately Master Guo didn't see this thing, if he saw it, I'm afraid another storm would be inevitable.

He was recruited two years ago, so he was lucky. A servant in the government office suddenly fell ill and died, because the servant's work was not lucrative, and relatives like Shi Guogan and others looked down upon him. That's why Hao Yun, who had no background, was recruited.

For the past two years, Hao Yun has been doing simple menial work and running errands in the government office. He is a clever man. So never make futile fawning.

Now, he was sent by Shi Guogan to serve as Guo Zhanan's subordinate, which was considered a promotion for Hao Yun.However, he also knows Shi Guogan's attitude towards Guo Zhan'an, and knows that he is just randomly selected by Shi Guogan, and he is specially against Guo Zhan'an!Hao Yun understands that with Shi Guogan, he will never get ahead!His only support now is Guo Zhan'an.

Hao Yun wanted to please Guo Zhan'an, so he led the servants to clean up the inside and outside of the house, and wiped the floor three times before going to the pavilion to invite Guo Zhan'an.

As Guo Zhan'an had seen and guessed, there were very few official duties related to irrigation and water conservancy in Xuzhou, and it took him only a moment to finish reading the official duties left over from before.

Now that it is approaching the end of summer, it is obviously too late for the water conservancy that has been accumulated for two or three months. From this point of view, this year's harvest will not be good.

Xuzhou is an important border defense town, suffering from chronic drought and lack of water, so the local crops are all cold and drought tolerant.But that's the case, because Xuzhou itself has very little land suitable for farming, and the annual harvest is only barely adequate, and the rest has to be distributed by the Ministry of Households.

As usual, what was issued by the household department is also the responsibility of the general judge, but there is no trace of this part in the documents in Guo Zhanan's hand.Obviously, this was intercepted by Shi Guogan.

Guo Zhan'an only sat in the room for a while, then packed up the documents, got up and said to Hao Yun, "Take me to see Mr. Shi."

Hao Yun thought for a while and said: "Master Shi may not be in the government office at the moment, if you have something urgent, I will go out and look for it."

Just as Guo Zhan'an wanted to nod his head, he thought of something, and changed his words: "Now it's time for work, Mr. Shi is not in the government office, where did he go?"

Hao Yun hesitated for a while. He was actually not sure where Shi Guogan went, but he had only heard it mentioned occasionally.If this matter is told to Guo Zhanan, it will give Guo Zhanan a big handle.But Shi Guogan knew that he told Guo Zhanan, would he let him go?

After thinking about it for a while, Hao Yun finally decided to tell the truth: "Master Guo likes to go out on the first day after taking a bath. Sometimes he sits in a restaurant facing the street for a long time. It is said that he is observing the people's sentiments."

Guo Zhanan couldn't laugh or cry when he heard this.

If you really understand the feelings of the people, why do you have to go on the first day after taking a bath?When someone finds out the rules, what they see is an illusion deliberately created by the other party.Such a simple truth, others forget it, Guo Zhanan doesn't believe that Shi Guogan doesn't understand it even though he knows the state!

"Forget it, it's not a big deal, it's the same when Lord Shi comes back." Guo Zhan'an had just arrived, and he didn't intend to make a move before he had figured out the opponent's strength. Instead, he asked, "Where are Xuzhou's previous files? Go and see."

Hao Yun was a little disappointed. He thought that if he told Guo Zhanan such a big thing, he would at least get a reward, but Guo Zhanan seemed to have heard nothing.

Could it be that Mr. Guo is not Mr. Shi's deadly enemy?

Hao Yun became more and more confused.

Shi Guogan was used to being the local emperor in Xuzhou, with the fourth prince Li Shaojin behind him, even the third prince Li Shaojun didn't pay much attention to him, he didn't know how to restrain himself, let alone in his own government office?

In the past two days, Hao Yun also vaguely heard Shi Guogan and Wang Jiusan discussing how to deal with the new general judge.Hao Yun also heard about what happened to Wang Jiusan at the inn yesterday. He originally thought that Mr. Guo had the ability to suppress Mr. Shi so that he could please him, but looking at it now, Mr. Guo is really elusive.

While analyzing, Hao Yun took Guo Zhanan to the room where the archives of the government office were stored over the years.

The dossier is very important, every year the imperial court will send people to various places to check the dossier.After Guo Zhanan wrote and handed in the few files that were missing in Tonghua County, everyone who came to Tonghua County to escort Zhu Wenbin was interrogated.Therefore, even Shi Guogan would not dare to fake the dossier.

Although it cannot be faked, Shi Guogan put away several files related to the border defense military in advance, deliberately not letting Guo Zhanan see it.Even if Guo Zhan'an mentioned it in the future, he could say that he had something to look at, and Guo Zhan'an couldn't use this to judge him.

But Guo Zhan'an didn't care. Firstly, Xuzhou was an important border town, and all affairs were more or less related to the border military. Even if the most important file was gone, he could find clues from other files; secondly, the military camp Then there is Jiang Yannian, he does not need to directly intervene in the affairs of the military camp at present, what is more important is to find out whether the various funds allocated by the Ministry of Households, together with the military pay from the Ministry of War, have been embezzled by Shi Guogan.

Shi Guogan was not stupid. Of course, there was no straightforward evidence in the file to prove that he was greedy for this part of the silver and supplies, but Guo Zhanan more or less found some doubts.

For example, for the military camps, two sets of clothes and [-] shi of food were distributed every quarter. In the last quarter, they fought against some tribes in Tatar, and an additional [-] shi of food was added.In addition, there is also the amount of armor consumption reported every month. The Ministry of War will collect the old ones according to the amount reported by the barracks, and then distribute them according to the amount submitted by each barracks.

It is easy to cheat, Guo Zhanan recorded every number, and planned to ask Jiang Yannian when Xiu Mu came to Xuzhou next time.

In addition, the Ministry of Households distributes a certain amount of food, clothing, farm tools, etc. to Xuzhou every quarter, and these amounts are also clearly recorded in the files, but this part will be more difficult to verify than the ones at the military camp, because All of them have been distributed to the common people, and there is no way to count them unless we investigate the files of the household department.But Guo Zhan'an still wrote it down, and planned to find a chance to let Yue An or Li Shaojun in the capital go to the household department to check.

Guo Zhan'an stayed in this room for most of the day, until Shi Guogan came to look for him in a hurry.

"Master Guo, I heard that you are looking for me today?" Shi Guogan said while peeking at the row of bookshelves behind Guo Zhanan, "What's the matter, why don't you go outside and talk about it?"

Guo Zhanan noticed that Shi Guogan was uneasy, so he nodded and said, "Okay."

Shi Guogan made a gesture of invitation, Guo Zhanan did not make things difficult for him, and walked ahead of Shi Guogan.When leaving, Guo Zhanan took the opportunity to turn his head, and found that Shi Guogan was staring at the bookshelf on the left, and then carefully closed the door.

Guo Zhan'an thought about it carefully. There are not many files on the left bookshelf, and they are all related to lawsuits over the years.The people in Xuzhou are tough, and the people occasionally quarrel and don't like to go to the Yamen to reason, and they usually settle it in private.Guo Zhanan's main purpose today is to find evidence that Shi Guogan was embezzled in ink, silver and military pay, so he hasn't had time to read the files of the lawsuit.

Could it be that there is some secret in this?

Guo Zhanan didn't show his face, and followed Shi Guogan to Zhizhou's office.

As soon as he entered the room, Shi Guogan seemed to be a different person. Unlike before, when he barely suppressed his uneasiness, he became full of confidence. He sat down boldly and asked, "Master Guo, do you have any questions?" What's the matter?"

Guo Zhan'an had been prepared for a long time and asked: "Today, I checked the farmland taxes in Xuzhou in the past three months, and found that two months ago, a ditch was supposed to be dug in the south of Xuzhou, but the construction was not started. Does your lord know about this? "

Shi Guogan never took these things to heart, he waved his hand and said, "I never heard of it, these are all decisions that the general judge can decide on his own, probably the one in front was arrested and brought to Beijing before he had time to do it."

Guo Zhan'an was not displeased by Shi Guo's perfunctory attitude, and asked again: "More than a month ago, because there was no rain for more than half a month, half of the dealers in Xuzhou withered. What about this matter, my lord?" Did you know?"

Shi Guogan shook his head and continued to push the blame on the original Tong San: "This is also the responsibility of the Tong San, the original one didn't tell me."

Guo Zhanan smiled lightly and asked several more questions.In the end, Shi Guogan became impatient. He didn't even think about Guo Zhanan's next few questions, and he put them all on the original judge.

Guo Zhan'an didn't intend to pursue it at first, but when he saw that the time was almost up, he asked again: "Did your lord know about the grain and silver taels issued by the household department?"

Shi Guogan didn't even think about it, and said, "This is also the responsibility of the general judge, how do I know?"

"My lord doesn't know?" Guo Zhan said with a surprised look, "Farmland water conservancy can be decided by a single person, but the silver taels found by the Ministry of Households have to be approved and stamped by the prefecture before they can be distributed. If your lord doesn't know, where did all the money and food go? Could it be that someone was greedy for ink?"

Shi Guogan was shocked, he was tricked by Guo Zhanan!

The general judge in front only recognizes money, and these things are all handled from him.However, Shi Guogan was not worried that the original general judge would confess him, because this was the prefect's duty, especially when the general judge had seriously neglected his duties, it was reasonable for Shi Guogan to handle these official duties.

That man was already wearing a crime, and what he said was not trustworthy. He, Shi Guogan, was backed by the fourth prince, so he was not worried at all about any unfavorable news coming out of the prison.

Unexpectedly, this Guo Zhan'an was so full of bad things, he used some ordinary things to numb him first, and when he got impatient, he showed his fangs and bit himself hard!

Shi Guogan calmed down quickly, he had already done all the accounts, and he was not afraid of Guo Zhan's investigation.

Thinking about it this way, Shi Guo dared to turn his back on the customer, and took the initiative to confess: "I answered smoothly. I was indeed handling this part of the official business before, and the file is also here. If Mr. Guo wants it, I will give it to you now."

Guo Zhanan's purpose is not here, but since Shi Guo dared to hand it over on his own initiative, he is also willing to accept it: "Master Shi has worked hard before, these official duties are originally the responsibility of the general judge, so I don't bother Master Shi in the future, just leave it to me .”

Shi Guogan handed the dossiers to Guo Zhan'an with a smirk, and said: "Master Guo is new here, and I'm afraid there are still many places he is not familiar with. It doesn't matter if you leave this part of the official duties to me first. Master Guo has other important things to do." Do."

Guo Zhan'an shook his head and said: "The responsibility should be fulfilled even if you die, not to mention that there are not many official duties in Xuzhou's farmland and water conservancy. This year's harvest is not good, and the household department should take good care of it, so as not to suffer from hunger in winter. "

Shi Guogan was helpless, facing Guo Zhanan's few words, he could only reluctantly hand over the rights he had finally obtained to Guo Zhanan.