The pretty boy of the landlord's house

Before the person Uncle Wu was looking for came, something happened in Zhuangzi.

After the autumn harvest and the separation of the Du family, the two families have been working on rent collection for several months. After everything is settled, they will start preparing for the land lease next year.

Du Yukun and Shen Bojun have been married for nearly 20 years. Most of the Du family's land is the dowry brought by Shen Bojun. Du Yukun took advantage of Shen Bojun's family background and bought some properties by himself. Now the family members have taken them away. By the way, Shen Bojun was taken away. layer.

Nowadays, many of the two people's land is in the same village. It is reasonable to say that the villagers in the village are enough to rent for the usual needs. Next year, they will only charge two stones per mu for renting their family's land.

According to the harvest of previous years, two seasons can be planted per mu of land, and each harvest can be harvested at three or four stones. If the harvest is based on [-]%, it must be handed over to the landlord's family for at least three stones.

Especially this year, Nanzhou had a bumper harvest, and each mu of land was handed over to the landlord's family for a harvest of at least four stones, so Du Yukun's family did this, and the farmers immediately went to grab Du Yukun's family's field to plant.

Those who did not rent the land could only choose from Shen Bojun's house, and they were naturally dissatisfied, so they immediately sent the village representative to talk to Shen Bojun about this matter.

Naturally, Shen Bojun would not directly agree to this request, so he asked to go to the village to see the situation and talk face-to-face, but the land was scattered, and Shen Bojun was incapable of doing it all by himself, and it would take time to go back and forth.

So Du Zhou was also sent to talk to some of the village chiefs.

It was the first time for Du Zhou to deal with this kind of thing, and he was nervous and apprehensive. On the first night when he went out, he looked through the books in the study, looking for convincing evidence from the rent collected in previous years.

Du Zhou was finally relieved. When he came out of the house, he found a black shadow at the corner of the courtyard wall. He seemed to be talking just now. He thought he was hallucinating and rubbed his eyes.

"The Young Master's family is still asleep?" Zhao Fengye greeted him first, with a lukewarm voice.

Du Zhou said with a smile: "It's you, why don't you rest in the house, it's not good to catch the cold when you come out."

Zhao Fengye came out from the darkness, his whole body cold, and he didn't know how long he had stood in this cold courtyard. He stared at Du Zhou's slightly flushed cheeks with his eyes half down. His eyes looked at Du Zhou without blinking. Looking at him with a smile, there seemed to be stars crushed in his eyes.

"I heard from the people in the yard that someone will come here tomorrow, saying that they are looking for your husband's family?" Zhao Fengye asked.

When Du Zhou heard this, he was obviously stunned for a moment, patted his forehead and said: "I forgot about this, I will go to Yujia Village early tomorrow morning, I will ask my father what to do about this person."

Zhao Fengye suddenly hooked the corners of his lips, and smiled faintly. Du Zhou glanced at him, thinking that he looked so pretty when he smiled, so he couldn't help but take another look.

"What are you looking at?" Zhao Fengye asked suddenly.

Du Zhou quickly looked away, scratched his head, and said: "I'm going out tomorrow, you should take medicine and eat well at home."

"You take me out together, isn't that all right?" Zhao Fengye said very naturally.

"Ah?" Du Zhou sized him up. Although he was in better health now, he still clearly remembered how this man was about to die before.

Seeing his stupidity, Zhao Fengye reached out and touched his head, and said, "You're just kidding, you should go to bed earlier."

After Du Zhou went back to the room, he realized, did he think he didn't want to take him with him?

Du Zhou tossed and turned, and finally thought about explaining to him tomorrow, so he fell asleep in a daze.

Zhao Fengye returned to the room, opened the letter in his arms, looked at the secret report sent by his subordinates by the light, and frowned involuntarily.

Early the next morning, Du Zhou got into the carriage and went to Yujiacun with Xiaohu and Chief Zhou. Shen Bojun also brought a few family members to prepare to set off.

Seeing that Du Zhou was poking around in the carriage, as if he was waiting for someone, Mr. Shen Bo said, "Uncle Wu didn't come back so early, and you will be able to see someone after you finish your business."

"Oh." What does this have to do with Uncle Wu?

Du Zhou didn't know why, so he closed the door of the carriage and went out.

The weather was sunny and although it was a bit cold, they arrived in Yujia Village early.

Du Zhou had just entered the yard he wanted to see, and the mother-in-law hadn't even boiled the tea, so people from the village rushed over after hearing the sound, bringing their own benches, and immediately filled Du Zhou's yard to the brim.

People in Yujia Village had already received the news that they were from the Young Master's family. Seeing that Du Zhou was young and gentle, everyone felt that this time they would definitely win a big victory, and maybe they could talk about it. The rent is cheaper than Du Yukun's.

Du Zhou said hello to the elders in the village, with a slight smile on his face, he said, "Everyone came so early, the hot tea hasn't been made yet."

"I won't drink tea. The purpose of our visit today is to talk to you about rent reduction." The village chief waved his hand and said it directly.

"Rent reduction?" Du Zhou said patiently, "Isn't this reducing your rent every year?"

When the harvest is not good, the rent will be reduced for them.

The village chief glanced at Du Zhou, apparently not taking him seriously, and said, "Young master, you may not know that Du Yuanwai will rent our fields to us in the future, and the land will only cost two stones per mu every year. It costs four stones to give your family an acre of land, and if these grains are exchanged for money, my son will be able to afford the private school's Shuxiu."

Du Zhou thought for a moment, then said: "My father rents you two shi per mu of land every year. If there is a drought, you can't even harvest two shi per mu of land. What should I do?"

"Young master, don't talk about those things that are not true. The snow fell so early this year, and there will definitely be a good harvest next year." The village head vowed.

Du Zhou also said: "But the harvest varies from year to year. Last year, when the harvest was good, we paid four shi rents. When the harvests were not good a few years ago, we only charged you [-]%, or one and a half shi per mu of land."

"Young master, your family is so rich, it's meaningless to care about two sons like us." The village head put on an angry look, as if he didn't want to continue the conversation with him.

Du Zhou remained silent.

The village chief thought he had Du Zhou in his hands, and continued: "Our Yujia Village has also rented your land for so long, if the young master is willing to let some, then we can have a good talk."

Du Zhou asked Zhou Rong to come up with his own abacus, and began to settle the accounts in front of the village chief, saying: "There are 55 households in Yujia Village, my father has [-] acres of good land and [-] acres of wasteland in Yujia Village, and my father lives in Yujia Village. There are [-] mu of fertile land and [-] mu of lotus pond in Jia Village, and everyone has rented it out in previous years, if you don’t rent my family’s land, but only my father’s, your family will not even have one mu of land.”

"You...you ignorant child, even if we don't rent your field, we can go to the next village to rent the land outside Wang Yuan." The village chief said angrily.

Du Zhou nodded and said: "It is indeed possible, but as far as I know, the tenant rent of Wang Yuan's family is [-]% of the grain, and if your Yujia Village goes to Wangjia Village, the time spent on the road and the horsepower brought back from the harvest, all these It’s all about money.”

"Okay, okay, you just want to rent your family's field better than us." The village chief said angrily.

Du Zhou put away his calculations indifferently, and said, "I'm not forcing you. I came to talk to you carefully. You want to force me to submit because I don't understand anything."

"You, you, you... I want to see Mr. Shen Bo, even if he comes, he wouldn't dare to talk to us like that." The village chief and patriarchs became excited and shouted cursingly.

Zhou Rong hurriedly smoothed things over, saying: "My young master is just telling the truth, everyone calm down."

"There are no rules. If I reduce your rent this year and my father increases your rent next year, if I follow suit, will you say I'm heartless?" Du Zhou argues.

When the village chief heard this, he immediately blew his beard and stared, and said, "You don't know the heights of the sky and the earth, but rich man Du and rich man Shen have kind hearts, and you haven't learned anything. I want to talk to your father."

Du Zhou originally wanted to say a few words, but the pedestrian leaned on the stool and left in a mighty manner.

Seeing this, Zhou Rong couldn't help but said: "Young master, we can actually talk about it in a roundabout way."

"They thought I was weak and deceitful from the very beginning, and if I made more detours, I'm afraid they would gain an inch." Du Zhou said to Zhou Rong, "I don't know why my father wants to reduce the rent?"

"I know, I heard it was the second young master's idea." Xiaohu said immediately.

Zhou Rong couldn't help asking: "Then why did he do this?"

"Then I don't know." Xiaohu was a little confused.

Du Zhou nodded silently, without comment, but Cui'er said, "This Du Xu is really shameless. It doesn't count if you rob the young master's husband-in-law, even he can come up with such an idea."

"Let's go to the village to have a look later. The person who was going to be our accountant before seems to be here too," Du Zhou said.

Tweety replied: "Yes, that person's name is Yu Nineteen."

Du Zhou nodded and asked his mother-in-law to prepare lunch.

The food here is not as good as the one at home, and because he still has something to worry about, Du Zhou felt full after only a few mouthfuls.

Zhou Rong is the housekeeper of the family, and his family is also in Yujia Village. He took half a day off in the afternoon to visit his old mother at home, so Du Zhou took Xiaohu and Cui'er to the village.

There are 55 households in Yujia Village, and each household has at least four members. It is impossible for them to plant only one mu of land a year. Even if some families have land, they have to rent the land from the landlord’s family, otherwise they will starve to death.

Du Zhou felt that Du Xu's proposal for this rent reduction must have other reasons, and it couldn't be out of kindness, or because he really wanted to drag his family down.

In the winter, some vegetables were planted in the fields, and some were bare. When Du Zhou walked to the river, he suddenly saw a tall man. When he stood up, he was in a daze and fell directly into the icy river. .

Du Zhou hurriedly shouted: "Xiaohu, Cui'er, come and help, someone fell into the water over there."

Several people frantically fished him out of the water. His lips were purple from the cold and his whole body was icy cold.

"Whose family is this?" Du Zhou looked around.

Xiaohu also sneezed from the cold, and said, "Master, let's take him back first."

"Alright." Du Zhou nodded.

Xiaohu quickly picked up the man on his back, and ran towards the house very fast.

Just when the few people were about to reach the door of the house, a voice suddenly came from behind, saying, "Brother Chun, Brother Chun, what's wrong with you?"