Chapter 111: Informed
The good news is they escaped, the bad news is their commitment to completing the mission was too strong, they wanted to exchange the remaining military scrip for gold US dollars to take back to Chongqing, so they went to the underground merchant again to exchange money, but the underground merchant was also Zhang Xiaolin’s man.
This time they were ambushed, three people, two were caught, only the one who was carrying yesterday’s money box and standing guard outside escaped in the chaos.
The men were brought before Sha Shun.
Military Statistics Bureau’s people all thought they were going to die, but they found the person standing in front of them was actually a foreigner, not from Agent Headquarters.
Sha Shun asked them very politely, “How much more of this money do you have on hand? I want as much as you have.”
“None left.”
“None left? Then you must still be able to produce it, I very much appreciate your technology, we can cooperate, I can take as much goods as you have.”
The two Military Statistics Bureau men understood the foreigner’s demand, but they were just in Shanghai for short-term work, they didn’t know anything about counterfeit currency technology at all.
“We need to go back and report to find out.”
“Of course you can, you can leave anytime, I just want to know, which side are you people from?”
Among the two, one said: “Let us go and I can tell you.”
“No problem.” Sha Shun had no interest in capturing them to begin with, he politely escorted them downstairs, facing the concession he said: “This is the concession, you are very safe, you can go out anytime.”
Seeing him keep his promise, one of them said: “Chongqing.”
Sha Shun let out an “oh” with an expression that paused for one or two seconds, an answer unexpected but reasonable.
“Military Statistics Bureau?”
“What do you think?”
Sha Shun smiled, thought for a moment and said: “Can you contact your person in charge, let me talk to him? I have a big business.”
“This…” The two exchanged a glance, feeling that Sha Shun at least hadn’t made things difficult for them, it wasn’t hopeless to talk, so he said, “I need a radio.”
“I have one here.”
Gu Yansheng learned of this news the next day.
“What, Sha Shun proactively contacted Director Dai, wanting to buy counterfeit currency?”
“Yes.” Liu San reported, “Yesterday a group was caught by Sha Shun’s people while delivering goods, Sha Shun had them contact Chongqing, wanting to buy counterfeit currency from us, Director Dai asked me to ask you, is trading with Sha Shun okay?”
“…It’s okay.”
Gu Yansheng listened and wanted to laugh, how did this matter circle around to Sha Shun, skipping several circulation links.
But as long as it causes trouble for the Japanese, Sha Shun making money isn’t bad, not to mention Gu Yansheng had a share in this money.
He thought for a moment and said: “Then sell it all to him.”
“Okay.”
The trading lasted two days.
On the third day, Economic Department staff after exchanging for foreign merchants, someone casually said: “Foreigners have little confidence in military scrip, many foreigners and foreign enterprises have been exchanging these two days, I just checked the warehouse, the money is almost all exchanged.”
Someone nearby casually replied: “If I were a foreign merchant I wouldn’t trust it easily either, but actually the Japanese are willing to exchange for foreign merchants, so they have no risk, they just don’t believe it, it’s the Japanese’s own credibility problem and so on, what did you say? The money is almost all exchanged?”
His brain short-circuited for an instant, feeling something was wrong, but couldn’t figure it out for the moment.
“Yeah, I just heard from the warehouse, foreign currency is basically gone, only some silver dollars and legal tender left, not much quantity.”
“That’s not right, how could so much be exchanged” The one who felt it was wrong thought for a moment, frowning and muttering to himself: “Reasonably speaking, we issue military scrip in batches, more and more people using it on the market, demand for military scrip increases”
As he spoke he looked at the other: “The more military scrip we give out, the more foreign currency and silver dollars we should get back, how could it possibly be exchanged out completely?”
With him saying that, the person nearby also reacted, puzzled: “Yeah, how could it possibly be exchanged out completely?”
“Report it immediately!”
The official in charge of daily affairs didn’t dare conceal it, directly reported to Director Su Xiwen.
Su Xiwen listened and didn’t understand for a moment, “What’s going on? Exactly where is the problem?”
The official originally wanted to explain the economic principle to him, but thought better and decided to say it straightforwardly, “Director Su, we received counterfeit currency, a large amount of counterfeit currency.”
Su Xiwen understood this time, his face changed greatly, “How could there be counterfeit currency? And in your hands? Didn’t you check when exchanging?”
“This…” The person in charge really found it hard to explain, if responsibility was pursued, they couldn’t escape blame, “Because this batch of counterfeit currency is of very high quality, and our staff have short contact time with military scrip, lack of experience, so a bit”
“You want to get me killed!”
Su Xiwen didn’t want to listen anymore, strode out, “To the warehouse!”
In the warehouse, piled like mountains of banknotes, when the person in charge took out counterfeit currency for Su Xiwen to see, Su Xiwen’s face was ashen, he grabbed a handful of counterfeit currency and smashed it fiercely to the ground.
With a fierce expression, he thought and said: “According to what you say, you can’t distinguish it either, is it possible to exchange all this money out?
You should understand, as long as the money is not in our hands, everything is fine, but! If so much money causes problems in our hands, I may be fine, but you wait to be held accountable by the Japanese!”
The person in charge panicked, sweating profusely, urgently thinking said: “There is still a way, we can issue this money down to the lower Finance Bureaus, let them handle exchanges with citizens, but the repayment has to wait until they finish exchanging to hand up to us, we can wait, but…”
“But what!”
“But… what if someone comes to exchange again? The people below say those coming to exchange are all foreigners, this counterfeit currency must be the foreigners’ doing.”
“Then isn’t that perfect to catch them!”
“If we catch them, won’t the news still spread?”
The person in charge had a cautious expression, Su Xiwen fell into a fierce silence.
“…Let me think, first seal everyone’s mouths.”
“Yes.”
The next day, the person in charge didn’t see Su Xiwen, facing foreigners coming to exchange, could only grit his teeth and exchange.
The third day, still didn’t see Su Xiwen, phone calls didn’t connect, no one at home, the gold vault’s foreign currency was all exchanged out, this time he couldn’t endure, gritted his teeth and reported to Fu Xiao’an.
City Government meeting suddenly convened.
Gu Yansheng was summoned to the meeting.
Fu Xiao’an entered the meeting room almost with an ashen face.
Just as all the directors didn’t know why Fu Xiao’an was angry, Fu Xiao’an said coldly: “Economic Department has a major oversight, received a pile of counterfeit currency, not tens or hundreds of thousands, but millions!”
Wow, the directors below widened their eyes and burst into exclamations.
“How could this happen?”
“Can’t they detect the counterfeit currency?”
“Millions, no way? How much money is that?”
“Where is Vice Mayor Su?”
“You’ve hit the key point!” Fu Xiao’an’s face muscles twitched with hatred, “Su Xiwen knows he can’t escape responsibility, he already ran yesterday!”
“What, ran?”
Even greater astonished exclamations rose, everyone simply couldn’t believe what they heard.
“No, staff negligence, even if he has responsibility, why run?”
“Yeah.”
“Did you forget Sheng Wenyi’s fate?” Fu Xiao’an glared at him, spat out a sentence.
“Hiss”
Now everyone felt Su Xiwen really should run, and he ran very decisively.
“Then what to do with this matter now?”
“What else can we do? All wait to get scolded!” After Fu Xiao’an spoke he fell silent.
All the directors then discussed in low voices.
Not long after, a group of rifle-armed gendarmes rushed in, Iwasa Taro arrived aggressively.
That look including at Gu Yansheng and others was full of disgust and ferocity.
If he wanted to kill everyone present now, Gu Yansheng wouldn’t doubt it.
Iwasa Taro had already been blamed by Nanjing over the drugs incident, now the only other military scrip incident also went wrong, Shanghai’s economy couldn’t improve, this man was certainly going to take the blame.
Iwasa Taro slapped the table, his fierce gaze swept over everyone’s faces, “You people are simply trash! Such a perfect plan ruined by you into this state, still calling yourselves Shanghai’s elite, outstanding talents, your brains combined aren’t as good as a wild boar in the mountains.
Trash!
Think! All think of ways! How to solve this matter!”
Iwasa Taro suddenly drew his pistol and slammed it on the table, “If you can’t think of anything, no one leaves this door today! Soldiers!”
Click, the gun bolts behind were pulled, could see the Japanese soldiers opposite had aimed at everyone’s chest.
The meeting room atmosphere suddenly tensed, everyone faces taut, never expected the situation to develop this seriously.
Everyone knew it was impotent rage over Su Xiwen’s escape, but didn’t dare shift blame to Su Xiwen at this time.
“How about pretending not to know, exchange to citizens?” Finance Bureau Chief said deeply: “As long as it reaches ordinary people, we exchange back silver dollars and legal tender, our losses at least solved, after that, we handle the counterfeit currency problem, collect all and burn.”
“You still have some ideas.” Iwasa Taro gave him a cold look, waved at the soldiers behind him, then to the next: “You!”
The next was Construction Bureau Director, seeing this scene his soul was gone, if he knew it was one by one, he would have said this idea first.
Racking his brain desperately, a flash of inspiration: “We should also find the counterfeit currency makers, they will definitely come to exchange again, as long as they come, catch them, under interrogation definitely find the mastermind, from him we can recover the lost money!”
“You!” Iwasa Taro looked to the next.
Construction Bureau Director greatly relieved, Tax Bureau Chief was about to lose his soul again.
Straining to think, straining to think, the more anxious the less he could think, anxious to full head sweat, in desperation his eyes bulged, body started stiffening and twitching!
“Old Wang!”
“Old Wang!”
Iwasa Taro’s gaze shifted to the next, “You!”
Social Affairs Bureau Director did think of something, “I think we should pursue Su Xiwen, as Director he had the most power, whether he fled in guilt or it was his design from the start, who can say? Maybe this whole matter is his doing, find him, and we find the money.”
“You!”
Gu Yansheng was called.
He spoke: “I think the most urgent matter now is not what the directors just said, what we see currently is our military scrip being counterfeited, so we should replace this version, first curb the source, produce a new military scrip, then even if they have more counterfeit currency, we won’t worry.”
“You.”
Ling Xianwen was called, like Gu Yansheng very calm, “What Director Gu and Finance Bureau Chief said earlier, let me summarize, exchanging out the money, I agree, but placing it in Shanghai, I think is not good.
First, what we release, we have to take back or resolve, eventually it’s trouble, better place this matter in Suzhou.
Find this sum of money, transport all to Suzhou, have Suzhou local military police cooperate, use this counterfeit currency to promote military scrip, forcibly exchange ordinary people’s silver dollars and legal tender.
Then following Director Gu’s idea, promote new military scrip, this batch of old military scrip doesn’t need to be taken back, all invalidated, saves time and effort, and Shanghai’s economy can maintain relative stability.”
“You.”
Fu Xiao’an couldn’t escape being called.
Fu Xiao’an frowning said: “The ideas are mostly said, Commander Iwasa, I can supervise the execution.”
Iwasa picked up the gun on the table, fired a shot into the air with a bang, “The revision matter I handle, transporting to Suzhou you solve, don’t have more problems, look after yourselves!”
The large team of gendarmes withdrew, finally could breathe a sigh of relief, immediately someone checked on the twitching Tax Bureau Chief, turns out he was faking it, what a waste of feelings.
“Sigh, now I understand what the ancients meant by accompanying a monarch is like accompanying a tiger, too scary.”
“You say if we couldn’t answer, would the Japanese kill people?”
“With Mr. Hase it wouldn’t happen, but with gendarmes, really hard to say.”
“Damn, laboring for the Japanese, and they treat us like this.”
“Alright, no complaining, all get to work, cleaning up Su Xiwen’s mess, that bastard!”
Meeting adjourned, Gu Yansheng returned to office and called Liu San to come over.
“What did they say?” Liu San came in and asked.
“How much counterfeit currency left on hand now?”
“Not much, millions.”
“You exchanged too diligently, didn’t leave more for me.”
“This… Boss Dai’s side, heh heh, we can print more.” Liu San could only awkward laugh.
Gu Yansheng nodded, Boss Dai was a bit greedy, couldn’t blame Liu San, said: “Two things, first, print one last batch of money today, as much as possible, after printing no more printing, dispose of all tools, abandon the factory, store the remaining money somewhere, I’ll use it later.
Second, find a few newspaper companies, leak the news that military scrip has a large amount of counterfeit currency, and emphasize, City Government’s foreign currency on hand has been exchanged almost empty, if not exchanged soon it will be too late.
City Government also plans to exchange these counterfeit currencies back to citizens’ hands, using counterfeit currency to cheat citizens’ hard-earned money.
Say it today, in papers tomorrow.
Japanese want to transport money to Suzhou, we can’t let them scrape another sum there.”
“Okay, got it.” Liu San nodded, thought and asked: “Then should I notify Sha Shun?”
“No need, let his people get caught, only dog bites dog for a good show, British coming to exchange, don’t you want to see Japanese catch British?”
Liu San smiled: “Want to see, very much want to see.”
Gendarmerie Headquarters.
After Iwasa Taro returned he held an internal meeting.
He trusted City Government bureaucrats less than his own staff officer.
After discussing the matter, Tokko proposed, for investigation like this, better hand to Agent Headquarters, they are faster and more professional.
The proposal was agreed.
“Notify Agent Headquarters, must investigate this clearly, recover all funds!”
