Chapter 44: Conflict
In the afternoon, Gu Yansheng already had an office of his own in this building.
Looking out the window.
Now that this puppet government has moved back to the SH urban area, City Hall was renovated and completed on the basis of the original unfinished City Hall of the National Government.
The exterior is not some modern building, but in the form of traditional Chinese architecture, that is, palace style.
The appearance is still very beautiful.
Ling Xianwen helped him find a south-facing office on the second floor, with desks, chairs, stools, sofa, tea sets all fully equipped, and a German coffee machine was even pulled in on site.
Just from this treatment, one can know what it means to have someone in court makes things easier.
Gu Yansheng brewed a cup of coffee, returned to his seat, and looked at documents.
For any position, the first thing is to understand the personnel files.
The power structure of the Judicial Department is not complicated: one Judicial Section responsible for trials, one Prison Management Section responsible for prisons, one Legal Section responsible for law revision, and then auxiliary departments like secretary, personnel, general affairs.
The organization looks small, but the power is great, especially the power of life and death.
A pile of prisoner files in the archive room; theoretically, as long as one wants to kill, just sign and they can be killed.
Similarly, as long as one wants to release, just sign and they can be released.
Not to mention revolutionary activists arrested for certain reasons, even if it’s just an ordinary person who got into trouble and was caught, as long as one loosens the hand, making money from this would be too easy.
Of course, the premise is to bear the consequences, that is, the subordinates do not turn against you.
This position has a very high money content.
Looking at the resume files of the subordinates entering the government, this time the Japanese institutional reform did not affect them; in the Judicial Department, except for the chief official being removed, the middle and lower levels are basically kept as is.
Gu Yansheng pressed the red button next to the telephone, soon the door was knocked, and the young female secretary walked in, hands clasped in front at her belly, respectfully nodding her head.
“Division Chief.”
“Liu Xiaolou, I’ll call you Xiao Lou. I see in the files that you know foreign languages?”
“Yes, I studied foreign language department. I know English and French; my French level is a bit worse, not as good as English.”
Gu Yansheng leaned back in his seat and smiled, asking, “Then you are also a rare talent. Logically, with your level, if you make a living in the concession, even as a translator you could get a decent income. Why enter the government?”
Liu Xiaolou thought for a moment, kept smiling, but still shook his head slightly: “Division Chief, actually it’s not like that. I tried being a translator, but the concession is now run by foreigners who don’t need translators; the ones needing translators are our businessmen.
They particularly like drinking when doing business, and after drinking, sometimes those people look at me strangely, so I couldn’t continue that job.”
“I understand.” Gu Yansheng nodded: “How many people here know foreign languages?”
“Many, because our jurisdiction may involve many cases with foreigners, so there are five people in our department who know foreign languages. In terms of numbers, we rank second only to the Secretary-General’s secretary section. Sometimes for large events, like press conferences, we might be called to serve as temporary translators.”
“I see, okay, I got it. Help me notify everyone: in twenty minutes, all section-level personnel meet in the meeting room.”
“Okay.” Liu Xiaolou bowed his head and went out, closing the door.
Gu Yansheng continued looking at the personnel files. Now that he had entered the puppet government, work matters were not urgent; the most important thing was still to find a way to help Lu Bowen and the others shake off the tracking by No. 67.
Previously he didn’t know which department he would enter, but now that it’s set, he can use all the resources at hand, adapting to local conditions.
One major premise: these two need to live long-term in Shanghai, so the method he thinks of must make the No. 67 people give up tracking on their own initiative.
Twenty minutes later, meeting room.
Seven section chiefs, plus twelve deputy section chiefs, all arrived.
When Gu Yansheng entered the government, they might not have been in the office, but when the Secretary-General entered the office, unless deaf, they should have received the phone call and returned.
At present, without Gu Yansheng, the meeting room was quite lively, discussing Gu Yansheng.
“What background does this guy have? Suddenly a deputy division chief comes, isn’t this making everyone wait in vain?”
“Don’t know him.”
“You guys don’t know him? I heard the new deputy division chief is quite formidable, a top lawyer. A couple days ago in the British concession court, he beat the British big lawyer with no power to parry.”
“How do you know?”
“A legal student from our department went to watch. He recognized him right away. Haha, that admiration; from his tone, he wished he could go up and apprentice.”
“No way, that exaggerated? Still in a lawsuit a couple days ago? Now already deputy division chief?”
“Say you’re deaf and your eyes are blind too. The newspapers have been buzzing with that news these past two days, you don’t know?”
“Tch, that defamation case? With Japan and France on the same side, how could that lawsuit lose? If I were the lawyer, I could win it too.”
Bang, the meeting room door was pushed open, Gu Yansheng walked in, followed by secretary Liu Xiaolou. The meeting room went silent in one second; everyone immediately stood up.
Of course, some saw Gu Yansheng so young, and after the habitual tension, relaxed a bit.
Gu Yansheng walked to the main seat, scanned everyone present. Although it was the first time meeting, as long as he matched their appearances with the photos in the files, he knew who was who.
“My surname is Gu, the Gu of the Gu family, Gu Yansheng. From today, we are all colleagues. As colleagues, I hope everyone cooperates sincerely, because the mayor gave me only three days; in three days, I need to produce a judicial reform plan to solve the drawbacks left by the previous government.
And as your superior, I have only one requirement: be meticulous in work. I come from a lawyer background and particularly value control of details.
Alright, sit down, let’s have the meeting.”
When Gu Yansheng said only three days, the atmosphere in the meeting became subtly odd; some exchanged glances, not daring to speak, but their eyes were full of shock.
The sitting actions were a bit more relaxed, and immediately someone bold asked.
“Deputy Division Chief Gu, you said the mayor gave three days; what step do you want us to reach?”
Gu Yansheng looked at the speaker: seat left one, thirty-two years old, Judicial Section chief, Du Yue.
Gu Yansheng told him straightforwardly: “Currently, the mayor’s biggest headache is the problem of foreign merchants’ ships recklessly transporting contraband supplies. In three days, the mayor wants us to produce a complete, feasible plan.”
“Three days?”
Gu Yansheng’s clear explanation caused even greater exclamations.
“This is simply impossible, Deputy Division Chief Gu. You don’t know, the problems here are huge. If it were just supplies transport, the Japanese have patrol boats; couldn’t they check and seize themselves?
But the Japanese don’t want to offend the British and Americans, don’t want to strain relations with them too much, so foreign merchants’ ships basically pass Wusongkou without inspection.
Then these things will definitely come ashore.
Once ashore, if we say they violated regulations and step in, would the concession court listen to us?
This matter, let alone three days; as long as the Japanese don’t handle it themselves, give us three months or three years, we couldn’t solve it. This problem is simply not in our scope to solve.”
“Yeah, Deputy Division Chief Gu, this job is tough; cases involving foreign merchants all go to international court, and the concession won’t rule in our favor.”
“I remember just recently that foreign firm?”
“Swire.”
“Right, Swire. At that time, a bunch of foreign firms transported contraband from abroad, and coinciding with increasing assassinations in Shanghai, the Japanese wanted to kill this trend, grab examples, so they seized all ships’ supplies.
How could the foreigners tolerate this? In a fit of anger, they sued Japan.
The lawsuit was in the concession; they said those things were for concession use, not intended for sale to the urban area. Japanese bans don’t apply to them, and even if they leak out, what’s it to them? It’s not them leaking it.
The lawsuit was lost; the court ruled for the city government to release. The Japanese were furious; at that time, Gendarmerie people directly held guns to the Anti-smuggling Section chief’s head, saying if they dared release, whoever released would be shot.
How could the Anti-smuggling Section people dare release? Of course they listened to the Gendarmerie.
But the consulate ordered them to release.
Saying the concession newspapers were denouncing, saying this would damage Japan’s international reputation; they would accuse Japan of affecting their concession rights in China, demanding reasonable seizure methods, or immediately release the goods, otherwise it would damage Japan’s reputation and he would be held accountable.
The Anti-smuggling Section chief’s head swelled hearing that; both sides were untouchables, release or not both meant eating bullets. At that time, it was tears and snot, begging Section Chief Du to give him a seal-up strip, let another department seal it again to delay a few days, delay as much as possible, let him figure something out.
Cough cough, both sides were people you can’t afford to offend; whether releasing or not, it was getting shot. At that time, tears and snot, begging Section Chief Du, to issue him a seal-up order, have another department seal it once more, to delay a few days, delay as long as possible, let him think of a way.
Section Chief Du, this happened, right?”
Left one’s Du Yue ummed and said: “Ask me to delay three days, just three days, and generously promised me a favor, an Anti-smuggling Section favor; buying fun stuff is much cheaper. But I didn’t agree at the time.
Issuing a seal-up order is a small matter; I was just afraid there was something fishy. If I issued the order and the seal-up becomes our department’s, then if he disappears, wouldn’t we be left hanging?
Deputy Division Chief Gu, this matter is indeed extremely troublesome to handle, mainly because the Japanese themselves internally haven’t reached consensus. They have conflicts, and we’re caught in the middle; no matter what we do, the result is wrong, and the more we do, the more wrong.”
Gu Yansheng had heard Wolf talk about this case, but from Wolf’s perspective, it was the lawyer’s view of how exciting the courtroom game of strategy was, not mentioning all these twists and turns inside.
No wonder the Japanese showed great mercy and released all that contraband; he wondered why the Japanese knowingly released contraband. Turns out in the end, it was the consulate acting to save face.
Thinking this way, Hase Jinagawa so urgently finding him probably also meant unable to withstand the pressure from Gendarmerie Headquarters; once or twice releasing is fine, but every time releasing, the Gendarmerie Headquarters’ temper would explode.
Hase Jinagawa hoped he could solve this problem, so generously gave the deputy division chief position.
Indeed, there’s no free deputy division chief in the world.
“Division Chief, can this matter be discussed with the mayor again? Three days is simply impossible.”
Among those present, there were naturally sharp-minded people; from the timeline, they could guess the new deputy division chief and the mayor probably weren’t in the same camp, otherwise why give such a tight deadline? Isn’t this purely making things difficult?
But now this matter isn’t just the deputy division chief’s alone; if it goes wrong, the whole department will face consequences.
