dtnovels Chapter 125 The Strange Sunjiagou
Chapter 125 The Strange Sunjiagou
"Alright, let's go write the contract now. So, what about this rice candy...?"
“One thing at a time, Mr. Liu. I also have people who need to eat. What happened before will remain the same. But I can guarantee that any new pastries that come out will definitely be available at the pastry shop, since I am also the owner of the pastry shop,” Song Jiaojiao said with a smile.
Liu Xuewen said yes on the surface, but in his heart he was thinking: They say there are no merchants without cunning, but I have seen someone even more cunning than me.
After the two signed the agreement, Song Jiaojiao led her people straight to the general store. This time, they went to the general store owned by Wang Fuyou, the second son of the village chief. They didn't know about it before, but now that they did, they naturally wanted to give the business a lot of support.
When I arrived at the shop, Wang Fuyou was there guarding it. "Brother Fuyou," I said.
Song Jiaojiao stepped forward and greeted him. Wang Fuyou looked at the well-dressed woman in front of him with a puzzled expression. She seemed familiar, but he couldn't recognize her at first.
"you are?"
"I am Song Jiaojiao. I heard from Uncle Wang that you run a general store in town. I need to buy some things."
Song Jiaojiao? Wang Fuyou suddenly remembered that Wang Chi's wife in the village was named Song Jiaojiao. Some time ago, his sister came back, and he went back to the village. He heard a lot of news about Song Jiaojiao in the village, but unfortunately, Song Jiaojiao went to the county town during that time, so he did not see her.
"So it's Wang Chi's wife. Is there anything you need today?"
"I've come to buy grain. I wonder how much polished rice and glutinous rice cost?" Song Jiaojiao stated her purpose.
“Refined rice and refined flour are the same price, 15 wen per jin. Glutinous rice is slightly more expensive, at 18 wen per jin. We don’t grow glutinous rice here; it’s all brought in from other places,” Wang Fuyou explained.
"Okay, how much polished rice do you have here? How much glutinous rice do you have?" Song Jiaojiao thought about buying more at once.
"We currently have about 2000 jin of polished rice and about 300 jin of glutinous rice."
"Okay, then please deliver them all to Qingshui Village for me."
Upon hearing this, Wang Fuyou's eyes widened, and he said, "Wang Chi's wife, are you sure you can finish buying all of this?"
"Not much, it'll be gone in ten days at most, Brother Fu. You need to hurry up and get more, I'll need quite a lot more later."
Upon hearing that Song Jiaojiao would be gone in ten days at most, Wang Fuyou was numb and didn't want to say anything more. Thinking about what the villagers had told him about Song Jiaojiao's actions, he thought it was an exaggeration.
"How about this, since you want a lot, I'll charge you 14 coins for the fine rice. Glutinous rice really doesn't make money, and we might not have any more later. How about I send it back to you tomorrow?"
"Okay, help me move two hundred catties onto the carriage first. I'll take it back today." Song Jiaojiao thought that the yin rice needed to be prepared in advance.
"Alright. This totals 33 taels and 4 mace."
Song Jiaojiao paid the money, and Wang Fuyou called over a waiter to help Song Jiaojiao load the fine rice onto the carriage.
Afterwards, Song Jiaojiao went to the cloth stall. She had almost become a regular there. There was no other way; most of her family's business required gauze. So, she asked the shopkeeper for five more bolts of gauze. Song Jiaojiao had basically bought all the gauze in the stall. After paying, she went to the market to see if anyone was selling winnowing baskets. Her family's winnowing baskets were really not enough. It was probably too late to have the villagers make them now, so she could only try her luck and buy as many as she could.
It was almost noon, and there were hardly any vendors in the market. The carriages weren't crowded at all. Song Jiaojiao spotted an old man who was about to pack up and go home, so she quickly went over to him.
"Grandpa, how much is your winnowing basket?"
The old man saw people coming and replied with a smile, "A winnowing basket costs 40 coins. My winnowing baskets are all handmade by the old man himself. They are very tightly woven and can last for three years without any problems. Moreover, my price is the same as others, but my winnowing baskets are a size bigger than others."
Seeing that the winnowing basket in front of her did indeed look much larger than the one at home, and that it was woven very tightly, Song Jiaojiao smiled and asked, "Grandpa, how many winnowing baskets like this do you have?"
"There are only five here for now, but I have quite a few more at home, which I make when I have nothing else to do," the old man said.
Song Jiaojiao realized that she really needed it urgently, so she asked, "Grandpa, where do you live? Well, I happen to have a car, I'll take you home, and we can buy the winnowing basket then."
The old man looked at Song Jiaojiao's clothes in front of him, and then at the carriage behind her. It was not easy to see a carriage in town. After thinking about it, he agreed.
"The old man is from Sunjiagou. Sir, please wait while I put my things away."
The old man had a cart on which all his woven goods were kept. When Song Jiaojiao saw this, she asked Meng An to come down and help the old man by tying the cart to the back of the carriage and letting him get on the carriage.
The old man refused to go inside the carriage, preferring to sit on the edge. Song Jiaojiao didn't force him, but when they passed a steamed bun shop, she asked Meng An to buy him a lot of steamed buns for lunch.
It took the carriage almost an hour to reach Sunjiagou, which was much farther from the town than Qingshui Village. Most importantly, the road conditions were poor, and the latter part of the journey almost made Song Jiaojiao's bottom and buttocks split into eight pieces.
Of the two thatched huts that appeared before Song Jiaojiao in the old man's house, only the old man lived there.
The old man first poured two bowls of water for Song Jiaojiao and the others before bringing out all the winnowing baskets in the house.
“They’re all here. These are all things I make. My family only has one acre of land, so I can only make a living by weaving things.”
Song Jiaojiao looked at the winnowing basket in front of her; it was clearly made by a patient person.
"Grandpa, count how many there are, I'll take them all."
“There are 17 here, plus the five on the cart, making a total of 22.”
Song Jiaojiao nodded, took out eight qian and eighty wen and handed them to the old man. She then asked Meng An to tie the winnowing basket to the carriage. After tying it up, she said goodbye to the old man.
After Song Jiaojiao and the others left, the old man noticed two untouched bowls of water on the table, and his eyes darkened.
Song Jiaojiao had no idea that her usual habits had saved her life. Her mind was filled with disbelief at the terrible road; she felt like her bones were about to fall apart.
“Madam, there’s something I’m not sure if I should say?” Meng An’s voice came from outside.
"what's up?"
Meng An thought for a moment and decided to speak up. "That village we just talked about, we heard about it from other villages when we were buying sweet potatoes. They said the people in that village weren't good people, and that many people who went into that village never came out again. The government has investigated, but they haven't found anything." So Meng An didn't touch the water the old man brought. When he first heard that it was in Sunjiagou, he suspected that it was the village he had heard about before.
Once they entered the village with the old man, they confirmed that it was the village those people had told him about last time.
Hearing Meng An say this, Song Jiaojiao also thought that when she entered the village, no villagers came out to watch. Logically speaking, it should be rare to see a horse-drawn carriage in a village. Thinking about it this way, it really was not normal.