Chapter 83

Angie pelis frowned beautifully and said to song TIANYAO, "your last sentence is really... Vulgar. It's the deputy director of the Department of industry and Commerce and his wife."

"Can you tell me that I guessed wrong?" song TIANYAO asked Angie pelis.

The wife of a deputy director does not cover up and does not exclude any different brokers from passing on some news through her. This is already very abnormal. Although the deputy director may have some money needs temporarily because he joined the Hong Kong Association to buy internal bonds, according to the behavior style of the British, especially the Anglican believers, It is impossible to be so unscrupulous and take a posture of refusing whoever comes.

It can only be said that the deputy director is using this method of willing to take the bait to find the collaborators he really needs, and his requirements are very high. An official who is short of money already has colonial status, so all he needs is money. So many people lined up to give money to fill his appetite? Of course not. There is only one explanation, that is, this guy wants both money and a good reputation. His frequent contact with these people is just screening the one he is satisfied with.

"That's what you think." Angie pelis put down the wine glass in her hand: "Tomorrow evening, deputy director Shi Zhiyi and his wife will have dinner at the mountaintop restaurant. In addition to us, they invited at least four other Chinese businessmen to average the waiting time before dinner, with an average of five to seven minutes at most. If we can't impress him, we should only retreat and invite middle-level officials from the customs to talk. I think we You can change the direction. Buy a middle-level customs official to take care of him. It won't take too much money to invest, and you won't only get five minutes of communication time. According to the current situation of Likang company, you can't give the deputy director the benefits and fame he wants. I can use the time of tomorrow's day to check the information of other middle-level customs officials. "

She thought that after listening to her words, song TIANYAO would decisively consider her opinions and get to know some middle-level British customs officials, but song TIANYAO didn't respond at all and looked at the red wine in front of him.

"Your thinking at this time is more like hesitation. You can't insist on thinking because of the identity of the other party's deputy director..." Angie pelice felt it necessary to remind the young employer in front of her with her reason as a lawyer. It was also a shopping strategy to resolutely give up the direction. After all, the current situation of Likang company could not meet any of Shi Zhiyi's needs for money and fame.

Unless we talk openly in front of Shi Zhiyi about Likang's plans to smuggle embargoes, it can definitely meet his needs in terms of money. However, at the beginning of the smuggling business, the good reputation he wants to maintain will no longer exist, and the evaluation will become as greedy as most colonial officials. Obviously, this is not what Shi Zhiyi wants.

Moreover, if Shi Zhiyi wants to get involved in the business of smuggling contraband, he doesn't need to meet so many people at all. He can completely solve it by meeting with a few British businessmen, and then just wait to collect the profits of smuggling.

"I don't know if I can satisfy the deputy director Shi Zhiyi tomorrow, but I can guarantee that if I can't do it, other businessmen in Hong Kong should and are unlikely to do it. It involves the problem of vision, but if the operation is good, he should be able to get the memorial arch he wants and the money brought by huge profits." song TIANYAO looked sharply at Anji pelis.

Angie pelis looked at the red wine in front of her and the seemingly confident employer: "confidence is certainly a good thing, but where confidence comes from is a problem."

"Of course, confidence comes from the legitimate business, huge profits and good reputation of Likang company. He wants it all, so he has to give me a little time, right? I'll help him draw a cake first and let him do something for us for this cake. That's the attitude of the partner." song TIANYAO picked up his glass, drank it slowly, tasted it carefully in his mouth and said: "Good wine."

Perhaps attracted by the confidence in Song TIANYAO's words, Angie pelice didn't find that song TIANYAO's hand trembled a little when he picked up the glass of red wine. After a little, it became as calm as iron again.

……

Today, Chu Yaozong did not go for a walk in the garden after dinner. Instead, he sat in his study and listened to the long family love and hatred story "Xiao Yuebai" told by Guangzhou Cantonese broadcaster Li I, which is being broadcast on the radio "Li's voice".

Chu Yaozong was one of the first Chinese in Hong Kong to install radios at home. At that time, it was 1929. The radio station had only one English station. It broadcast once a week, Monday and Friday, for three hours each time. At that time, when each radio applied for a listening license during installation, it was necessary to pay an installation fee of HK $25 and a listening fee of HK $10 per month, which was only 10 per month At that time, the listening fee of Yuan made all Chinese close their pockets. At that time, the worker leader of a large business firm worked hard and got no more than 100 Hong Kong dollars a month. He spent one tenth of his salary to listen to the ghosts of the British on the radio? Or was it more comfortable to buy rice and noodles.

In fact, Chu Yaozong didn't understand English, but he thought about a problem at that time. Since the radio was broadcast to ghost people, maybe it would broadcast some ghost people's business affairs. Therefore, in those years, Chu Yaozong specially hired a translator. His job was to stay by the radio two days a week, Monday and Friday, and translate all the broadcast words into Chinese characters for him to see. Later, it developed into At that time, all English newspapers in Hong Kong were bought and translated into Chinese characters for him to read.

It is precisely in this way that Chu Yaozong can understand more quickly than other Chinese businessmen what the British need and what business he should do to make profits. The British or Hong Kong colonial government has demand for food. He made grain and oil, and increased demand for cloth, so he made textiles. The British said that the pharmaceutical industry of western countries was greatly damaged during the war and the recovery was slow, There was a great shortage of Western medicine in Southeast Asia. He immediately opened Likang and won the agency rights of two pharmaceutical companies in the United States and Germany to sell drugs to Southeast Asia.

Now, there is no need to translate the English radio for him every day. There is already a Chinese channel in the radio, and it began to be broadcast all day. Therefore, Chu Yaozong has lost his previous interest in the radio. For him, the radio has changed from a tool for him to a dispensable pastime.

"Master, Mr. Du Zhaojian, Mr. Du is coming." Uncle en, the housekeeper of the family, appeared at the door of the study and said a gentle reminder.

Chu Yaozong stood up from his seat and said, "I'll meet him in the hall."

When he came to his lobby, a mentally healthy old man just stepped down from the back seat of a Rolls Royce. Chu Yaozong took a few steps to meet him outside the door. It was rare to change his usual expression like Gujing, with a smile on his face and a joke in his mouth: "Must you come so late? Do you think the food in my house is too bad, or do you think the cook in my house is too ugly? Or don't want to visit me and send one of your workers to deliver it."

The visitor is the shareholder of Hang Seng Bank, the boss of Yau Ma Tei Ferry Company and Kowloon bus company, the first chairman and permanent adviser of the Tung Wah Third Hospital, and the prime minister and chairman of the Po Leung Kuk of Hong Kong. Du Zhaojian is 50 years old. He wears a traditional long shirt. After getting off the bus, he takes two steps and stands side by side with Chu Yaozong, patting each other on the shoulder.

"You don't know my habits. Even if it's a charity dinner, I rarely open my mouth to eat for fear of frightening others." Du Zhaojian explained as he walked towards the door with Chu Yaozong.

Behind them, uncle en was responsible for greeting the driver who accompanied Du Zhaojian to the small hall to rest.

When Chu Yaozong went out to meet Du Zhaojian, sister Hong, the self grooming maid of Chu Yaozong's house, had already prepared tea and fruit in the study. When Chu Yaozong and Du Zhaojian came in, she quietly withdrew and helped them take the door of the study from the outside.

Du Zhaojian sat down and saw the tea label of Cuiheng village next to the tea set. He said to Chu Yaozong, who was helping them make tea: "it's rare to be a guest in your family in the future for more than a year. Sister Hong still remembers that I like Cuiheng village's tea. Zhong specially put the tea label out for me to see."

"She's afraid of you." Chu Yaozong looked up at Du Zhaojian and said four words slowly.

Du Zhaojian is called "more than three gentlemen" by their old friends, which means Du Zhaojian has more kindness, more money and more quirks.

The first two are easy to understand. Although the rich in Hong Kong have regarded the hat of a philanthropist on their heads as the standard, and do not want to be teased as a lonely rich man, Du Zhaojian has always been a stable banker, whether it is the annual public welfare fund-raising or the biannual re-election of the Prime Minister of the Donghua third house.

Du Zhaojian has donated about HK $5.45 million since he founded the Donghua third hospital with Chinese businessmen in Hong Kong at the age of 27. He is definitely the first philanthropist in Hong Kong.

As for money, the Kowloon bus company, Hang Seng Bank, Yau Ma Tei Ferry Company and some hospitals bring Du Zhaojian more wealth every year than Chu Yaozong's grain, oil and textile business.

Du Zhaojian has many quirks. For example, Du Zhaojian never wears foreign clothes, only traditional Chinese clothes, and always only wears Tang clothes or robes, whether it's a medal or a Hong Kong Governor's dinner. Moreover, he never wears watches, including pocket watches. Chu Yaozong or other Chinese businessmen have the experience of being asked by Du Zhaojian about time in public. He never brings a wallet and uses paper for change The quality letter is sealed and put in the long shirt pocket. When you buy some vegetable food, you must round up the money into a lucky number, such as 18 yuan, 28 yuan, 188 yuan, etc.

When eating, you must have two cups of white water on hand. One cup is used to rinse your mouth. Du Zhaojian rinses his mouth three to five times a meal. The other cup is used to wash greasy food. For example, when eating barbecued pork, you should soak the meat in a water cup and remove the greasy surface before eating. When you go out to meet British people, there is a designated coffee shop for coffee, a designated western restaurant for Western food, and you must go to Cuicui for tea In chaliao, hengcun, people are invited to Chinese food, and the banquet guests must be located in Zhucheng restaurant.

So now he occasionally goes out to a friend's house, and the other party will go to the chaliao of Cuiheng village to prepare a black tea there in advance.

Du Zhaojian took out a paper envelope from his pocket and slowly put it on the tea table between them: "I'll have the principal of HK $7 million Hang Seng Bank and six-year interest delivered tomorrow."

"Forget it, I'll donate the interest to your Baoliang Bureau. If you want to repay the interest, you'll repay it long ago." Chu Yaozong gave Du Zhaojian a cup of tea and said.

Du Zhaojian said slowly, "without the money you borrowed after the war, I wouldn't breathe so quickly."

"If you're grateful, you've said it many times when you took the seven junk cars left by the Japanese. Although you wear long shirts all day, you learned from the West and don't understand the skills of Chinese businessmen in Taiji pushing hands. It's better to get straight to the point. In short, even if you scold today, I won't turn my face." Chu Yaozong picked up his tea cup and said to Du Zhaojian: "Come and have tea."

"These local old friends pushed me out to explore the tone of the three of you. Everyone felt that we couldn't let the businessmen from Shanghai make trouble anymore." Du Zhaojian was broken by Chu Yaozong, so he stopped covering up. He simply picked up the tea and drank it all at once: "good tea."