novelhk Chapter 1335
Chapter 1335
But what happened next explained all the strange and illogical things.
Not long after the two servants left, a barely perceptible sound suddenly came from the stove in the kitchen.
Immediately afterwards, a crack appeared at the bottom of the fire pit under the stove, and this crack continued to widen.
It turns out that the stove had long been hollowed out, and was simply used as a partition by a movable wooden board.
After the wooden planks were completely pulled apart, a hole as wide as a person was revealed underneath, and the hole was a small sloping slope.
Meanwhile, there was another person in the cave. After the partition boards were completely pulled open, he immediately crawled out of the cave.
The man moved with great skill; after crawling out from under the stove, he immediately went to the wooden box containing the silver.
He braced the wooden box with his hands and his legs against the wall behind him, and with a forceful push, he sent the box into the hole.
At the same time, because the cave was a slope, the wooden box slid down the slope after entering, without any effort.
After finishing, the person who crawled out of the hole quickly crawled back into the hole and put the plank back in place.
All of this was accomplished in just a few seconds, which shows that this wasn't the first time this person had done something like this.
And just like that, a whole thousand taels of silver vanished without a trace, and nobody knew where it went.
Moreover, this kind of thing didn't just happen in Suzhou, but in all the major cities within the Ming Dynasty.
No, it can't be called a large city; it should be said that this scene played out in every city within the Ming Dynasty that had a bank.
Some cities have reported the situation because they can no longer sustain the expenditure of cash, while others, like the shopkeeper in the east of Suzhou, are simply holding on.
Time passed slowly, and an hour quickly went by, but the money shop clerk guarding the gate had not made any progress.
So he stopped waiting idly and went back to the money exchange to report the situation to the manager.
Of course, he didn't know much, he just mentioned where the carriage finally stopped.
However, after he finished speaking, the shopkeeper looked puzzled and then looked at the waiter to confirm.
"Are you sure that person's carriage stopped in front of that house?"
"Yes, shopkeeper, I can't be wrong."
Upon hearing the waiter's words, the shopkeeper immediately frowned.
The shopkeeper was a local from Suzhou and knew a lot about what was happening in the city, especially about that house.
The original owner of that house divorced his wife and took a concubine because she was infertile, but was then retaliated against by his wife.
In a fit of rage, the wife poisoned the house owner and all the servants, then hanged herself.
Because of this incident, rumors have circulated that the house is haunted, and because it is a haunted house, it has always been vacant.
This is why the shopkeeper frowned; who would spend money to buy a haunted house that everyone in the city knows about?
Combined with the fact that the owner of the haunted house had come to his shop several times to exchange silver, the shopkeeper immediately felt a sense of foreboding.
"No, this is a serious problem. We can't delay any longer; we must report it!"
After those words popped into his head, the shopkeeper immediately spoke to the accountant:
"Let's get a heads-up with the people in the west of the city! This matter is serious; we have to report it!"
Although the manager was in charge of the money shop, he did not have absolute power; most decisions required the participation of the accountant.
Although the two are in a superior-subordinate relationship, they also supervise each other to prevent the manager from embezzling.
Therefore, when deciding to report the matter, the shopkeeper would look at the accountant and tell him about it.