Chapter 223

The prince's tax official, viscount teness, came after him. He first saluted Judy, who was unhappy, "beautiful lady Judy, I'm sorry to disturb you."

Victor patted his little hand on his arm and said, "honey, go back first. I'll find you later."

Judy turned her anger into joy, gently twisted her skirt and saluted tnis. She waved her willow waist gently and walked away. Looking at the slim and graceful figure getting on the carriage, tnis praised sincerely: "what an excellent beauty."

Praising a noble partner is not frivolous, but a compliment. Victor smiled and said, "Tanis, I'm going to visit you sometime."

Tnis was embarrassed. Victor is his business partner. He should have been the first to visit in order to do his host's friendship, but it's very impolite to greet him until now. Fortunately, the nobility has always had a thick skin. Tnis sincerely explained, "my friend, no one will disturb you before Prince Edward returns. With my current status and qualifications, I dare not act willfully at such a moment. Please forgive me for my disrespect. If I miss this opportunity today, I'm afraid you don't even have time to talk to me."

Prince Edward returned safely, and the political dust of Gambis was settled. As the representative of York family, Victor is bound to be warmly entertained by the royal nobles. Various banquet activities will follow. He really doesn't have time to meet with tnis alone.

Victor looked at the sky and said with a smile, "I can understand your difficulties, but it's getting late. I have an appointment with the beauty, so the dinner is free. Why don't we go to the trade area and talk while walking."

Tnis was overjoyed and called in an accompanying carriage. They boarded the carriage, the coachman shook the reins, and the open carriage drove to the inner city.

There are no shops in the aristocratic District of brinor, and the ladies and ladies of the royal capital have no habit of shopping and leisure. When they want clothing and jewelry, they will summon top designers and tailors to come to the door for customized services, and housekeepers will naturally purchase daily necessities. This habit allows Victor not to go shopping with his women, which reduces a lot of trouble and fun.

"Tanis, I always don't understand why the annuity I need to pay every year is so high? I'm afraid the annuity received by the Marquis doesn't have 20000 gold sol? Such a large sum of money really makes me very difficult." Victor complained to teness.

Tnis asked in amazement, "did you pay the 20000 annuity yourself?"

Victor's heart moved and nodded silently. Tnis pondered for a moment and said, "according to the Kingdom's annuity system, local lords have to pay 20% of the territory's property and a fixed amount of gold coins every year. The fixed tax paid by the Viscount is 3000 gold sol, and your tax paid by 20000 gold sol is not only higher than that of the Marquis... The Duke is just 15000 gold sol."

"How could this happen?!" Victor was surprised and angry. 20000 gold sol was not a small sum of money. If he hadn't made a windfall from the unlucky assassin, he really couldn't pay it. However, the annuity would be paid every year, and the windfall wouldn't be there every year.

"Don't worry." Tnis smiled bitterly, shook his head and explained: "You should have heard that the vassal is not my vassal! Therefore, the kingdom can only collect an annuity from the independent Lord, and the property paid by the Lord refers to the Lord's own income, which does not include the 20% harvest of the people and the self income of the family vassals. In this way, the Lord can't pay multi-year money at all. But even so, the Lords around the world still pay Trying to avoid paying an annuity. It is common to canonize vassal lords and vassals. "

"The York family is the best example. Most of the Lords of the man horse hill are the vassal lords of the York family. They do not have to pay an annuity directly to the Kingdom, but only offer 50% of the property to the York family. This means that the kingdom can only collect 10% of the property from other vassal lords except the Duke of York, and they do not have to pay fixed taxes. The Duke of York then grants, Return 20% of the offerings paid by the vassal Lord, so as to achieve the purpose of tax evasion. "

"We don't have any good way to do this by the great lord..." Triniston paused and sighed: "In fact, what the Kingdom wants to collect most is the products of various territories, including grain, ore, high-quality wood, animal tendons, herbs, spices, leather, linen, bacon, etc. the kingdom does not care much about fixed taxes. In order to urge local lords to pay materials, the Kingdom stipulates that those lords who cannot pay materials in full will be fined ten times."

"I really haven't paid any property... You know the situation of Randall's collar. You can't even be self-sufficient. Is there any property to pay?" Victor stood up and asked with flashing eyes, "but even a ten fold fine wouldn't cost 20000 gold sol?"

"My friend, you won't deliberately Miss purple cane wine and crude sugar? As for coffee and snow sugar, I didn't levy it at all!"

Tanis said with a smile: "the value of purple cane wine is amazing, and the share of purple cane wine sold by the Marquis Sophia has only paid half to the kingdom. The Kingdom calculates your fine according to the total trade volume of purple cane wine."

"That's not as much as 20000 kinsol!" Victor was silent for a moment and threw out a hard sentence.

"Really not so much!" Tnis nodded and said positively, "the main reason is the financial difficulties of the kingdom! According to the original vote of the Senate, the York family guarded the hills, and the Kingdom exempted its annuity for 20 years. But Randall collar is not included, because you are not the vassal Lord of the York family. So..."

"So, I'm paying taxes to the kingdom in disguise for the whole human horse hill and Sophia's chamber of Commerce?" Victor pointed to his nose and looked like a wronged head.

"Er... If the York family pays the annuity normally, the kingdom can receive at least 150000 gold sols of fine iron only by relying on the fine iron ore resources in Renma hill. Now, the Kingdom has made great concessions by only collecting a fine of 20000 gold sols." Tnis politely said that he had given a discount, shook his head and said with a smile: "I just didn't expect that you were paying the money alone... Of course, it's your housework. It's inconvenient for me to talk about it."

Victor was speechless. The reality was that he was paying for his predecessors and current employees. Well, according to Chinese tradition, it's not a great thing to pay for your women. Hatefully, Sylvia didn't hum from beginning to end, and just put him in, which made Victor a little angry.

Considering that he had also concealed the secret silver mine, Victor had a lot of balance in his heart. As for Sophia, after all, she was his former lover and nominal wife. Now she is in trouble. She doesn't know whether she is alive or dead, and Victor can't care too much.

"Do I have time to join the York family now?" Victor asked expectantly.

Since you can't argue with your own women, you can only dig the corner of the Kingdom, although there is little hope.

Sure enough! Tnis exclaimed with exaggeration, "that's all right! You're now a registered independent Lord! And... Famous!"

"Is the Kingdom financially difficult?" Victor looked around and timely changed the topic.

"Really nervous." Tenet said solemnly: "The Kingdom has been actively preparing for the war since the people and horses suffered from the ant disaster in the hills. The northern counties once resettled 150000 refugees, registered all these people, and trained 80000 militia and 8000 soldiers. These people's food, drink and wages do not count, and the kingdom is overwhelmed by armaments and materials alone. Coupled with the upgrading of the legions' equipment, the Minister of finance has been afraid to go out... Lord golon Lord lord sent people to squat him every day... "

Victor shook his head heavily, sighed deeply, and said nothing.

It's no surprise that the Gambis family has a big business, a large expenditure and financial difficulties. Even if Marquis golon chopped the chancellor of the exchequer, he couldn't squeeze out a few liang of oil. However, this dilemma can't be solved. The Kingdom has no money, but the Lords and nobles have money! Even the free people who have been doing business for generations are very rich, not to mention the big family that has been inherited for hundreds of years? As long as the Kingdom takes annuity as its burden Insurance, issuing treasury bonds and paying interest can solve the urgent problem. But victor will never mind his own business.

If I don't tell you, I won't tell you! Folk wealth is concentrated in the hands of the royal family. Who else can free businessmen earn? You are poor and I am rich, very good!

Unknowingly, Victor and tnis had arrived at the trade zone. At this time, it was getting late, most shops had closed, and the carriage drove directly to the door of tnis family shops.

Seeing that tenes was visiting with distinguished guests, the shop steward quickly asked the waiter to open the door and light thick butter candles. Victor entered the shop and found a large number of goods everywhere. He found that the shelves were full of luxury goods, amber, beeswax, honey, gemstones, spices, high-quality leather goods, exquisite handicrafts and so on, except coffee.

"Why don't you have coffee and snow sugar?" Asked Victor, frowning.

"No coffee." Tnis said slowly, "the coffee and snow sugar you sold me were divided up on the way. Every time the family caravan passed through a territory, the Lords took money. They didn't want money, just coffee. When the caravan arrived at the king's capital, there was little coffee left... I couldn't resist all kinds of human contacts and all kinds of door-to-door requests!"

"The coffee trade makes you lose money? You're not going to do it again?" Victor asked with a smile.

"No! I need to buy more coffee, even if the price is a little higher." Tanis said seriously.

"Isn't that more?" Victor was noncommittal.

"To tell you the truth, coffee has the affinity effect of fire element. It can help us scholars recover their spirit and clear their minds. It is a very rare beverage. Although I lose money in coffee business, human feelings are priceless. I hope you can increase the share of coffee trade. I can increase the price by 20%... If it is higher, I can't help it." Said tnis with a bitter smile.

The annual output of Randall's coffee can reach up to 8000 pounds. Victor's share of coffee is 200 pounds per year, 5 gold sols per pound, and 300 pounds per year, 4 gold sols per pound to the chebman family. On the market, the purchase price of coffee is 40 gold sols per pound, but it can hardly be sold. Victor, tnis and count chebman don't make much money on coffee, Tnis was even losing money. Victor expected that.

How can coffee make money through normal trade channels and layers of exploitation by the lords? Victor sold coffee to the two families at a low price and limited quantity, just to raise the value of coffee and spread the reputation of coffee in the knight circle and scholar circle. If he really wanted to make huge profits, he had to rely on free civil and commercial routes. Strictly speaking, the value of smuggling channels is much higher than that of any goods.

The channel Victor is already under construction, but the terminal is equally important, and the terminal of private goods is of course the black market. Songlin town led by chebman is a black market. Now it's time to build a black market in Wangdu.

"It's dark. Let's go back." Victor looked at the steward and man standing next to him and turned out of the shop.

Tenet felt a move in his heart and followed him out. The two got into the carriage, and when they drove to a quiet place, the breeze began to rise, and Victor's fine voice reached tnis's ears.

"I said, listen."

Tnis turned his head quietly, and Victor continued: "The coffee trade makes you lose money. It's not a friend's way. I have a suggestion... I'll double your coffee share, but the price of the extra coffee is 18 gold sol per pound. You can let the caravan manager try to carry these coffee, such as hiding in the wall of the car. After these coffee are transported to Wangdu, you can try to sell it at a high price. It's best to cultivate agents among the free people in the outer city People, let him come forward to sell, so that you will not offend your colleagues and lords along the way, but also make profits from it, and you don't have to lose money to earn favor... "

Victor's whisper was like the temptation of the devil, which made tnis's heart beat.