Chapter 205: Telephone
Meanwhile, Gu Yansheng was resting at home.
The telephone rang.
Ring ring, ring ring.
“Hello.” Gu Yansheng picked up the phone.
Ding Mocun’s voice came over the phone, “It’s me. I’ve found something, but it’s not convenient to talk on the phone.”
“Then let’s meet.”
Gu Yansheng arranged a meeting place with him and drove there.
Jisiweier Road Tea House.
Gu Yansheng praised him as soon as they met, “Tang Huimin has high efficiency.”
Ding Mocun smiled, took out a document and handed it over, “It’s not like catching an agent. Checking bank information—what difficulty could there be? We even have the name of the bank. Tang Huimin went to the Commerce Registration office under the pretext of investigating a bank case, and found it right away. The staff remembered it. This is the base file.”
Gu Yansheng pulled out the document and looked at the registration personnel information on it.
“Chen Junhui, native of Nanjing—who is this?” Gu Yansheng had never heard of this name.
Ding Mocun took a sip of tea, “I’ve checked for you. If it’s not a case of same name and surname, then this Chen Junhui should be that Minister of Commerce and Industry in the Nanjing Reform Government.”
“Someone from Nanjing?” Gu Yansheng was greatly surprised. He thought for a moment and murmured, “Then this matter gets interesting. I thought it was the Shanghai Gendarmerie Headquarters that lost financial power and wanted to play some tricks. I even wondered if the Greater East Asia Ministry had opened some new channel. I really didn’t think this would be related to Nanjing.”
A Japanese enterprise compensated such a large sum of money to the Japanese Military Department, and the Japanese Military Department turned around and gave it to the Nanjing Reform Government.
This matter has an explanation.
“Coming to our territory to open a bank—truly interesting.” Gu Yansheng shook his head with a sneer.
Ding Mocun just drank his tea, “I don’t understand what they’re here for, but this matter can only be traced this far for now. To go further, we’d have to investigate the Japanese. I think this was assigned by the Japanese—it wouldn’t be Chen Junhui’s individual action.”
“That’s certain.” Gu Yansheng nodded. Such a large sum of money must involve Japanese from Nanjing, and not in low positions.
“Do you need me to send someone?”
“Not for now.” Gu Yansheng waved his hand: “Investigating in Nanjing—who knows how long that would take. Is this Chen Junhui still in Shanghai?”
“No, he has a house in Shanghai, but Tang Huimin checked it out—no one’s been living there these past couple of days. Asked the neighbors—someone was there a few days ago, but not seen these past two days.
Their registered bank address is in Zhabei. The storefront is rented, a ready-made house that can be used right away. It’s under renovation these past couple of days, no sign up yet, so no office staff either.”
Gu Yansheng thought for a moment and said: “Is his house in the urban area or the concession?”
“Right on Yuyuan Road.”
Traitors really like living here—villas are nice, plenty of alleys, close to the concession, sold at non-concession prices, super high cost-performance.
“That’s not far from here.” Gu Yansheng pointed at the telephone, “Can you check the calls he’s made in the past few days—what numbers, who they were to.”
“You want to find out who he’s contacting from the phone records?”
“Exactly. He’s come to Shanghai to supervise this matter—I feel he must have reported it. The Nanjing Reform Government’s phone is definitely there. Whether there’s a Japanese one is luck of the draw. Don’t know if this Minister of Commerce and Industry has independent reporting authority. If he does, we can get it all in one step.”
“Not difficult. I’ll check it for you right now.”
The telephone lines in the cross-boundary road section are operated by the Concession Telephone Company. In theory, they can’t check them, but in theory is just in theory.
We can disregard reason.
We can also spend money.
Concession Telephone Company staff also need to earn extra income.
Ding Mocun picked up the nearby phone and called out—to Tang Huimin’s office, “Hello, it’s me. Immediately find that informant at the Concession Telephone Company. Help us check all incoming and outgoing calls recorded for that house in the last half month. Yes, detailed, right now. Mm, I’ll wait for your call.”
Ding Mocun hung up the phone, checked his watch, “Even if he’s at home, within two hours to go and get the info, I can absolutely get it.”
“Are they expensive?” Gu Yansheng casually inquired about the market trend.
Ding Mocun pursed his lips, sat down and said: “Not cheap. If you find those little people, ordinary staff, maybe ten or twenty silver dollars, and they’ll check for you.
But efficiency is slow—they have to find time to check, avoid people.
But if you find manager-level ones, it’s fast—done in a few hours, but won’t go below twenty US dollars. That’s still long-term cooperation price. For just this one trip today, fifty US dollars for sure.”
“Not cheap. I won’t reimburse you then—go ask Minister Zhou for it later.” Gu Yansheng joked.
Ding Mocun cast a playful glance at the inkstone on the nearby table: “No reimbursement is fine, but then I’ll confiscate this inkstone.”
He stepped forward to pick it up and play with it.
Gu Yansheng immediately blocked him, “In your dreams. This is a Dongpo Inkstone.”
“Su Dongpo’s?” Ding Mocun’s eyes lit up, even more reluctant to put it down, turning it over and over to look.
Gu Yansheng sipped his tea and said: “Beautiful, right?”
“Beautiful.” Ding Mocun sighed.
“Fake.”
“Ah?”
Ding Mocun’s eyes nearly popped out.
Gu Yansheng burst out laughing, “What were you thinking? If the Dongpo Inkstone were real, how could I bear to leave it here? I’d keep it at home. I bought this at the antiques market—got fooled, cost me 50 silver dollars. Thought I’d picked up a bargain, turns out it’s a previous dynasty fake.”
Ding Mocun had lost interest, but perked up again at that, “No wonder the workmanship looks so good. A previous dynasty fake—even now it’s an antique. Maybe made by a master forger—not without value. If you don’t want it, give it to me. I think it looks pretty good.”
“No.”
“Not even giving away a fake?”
“Just not giving it. I need to keep it to study carefully—what’s the difference between fake and real. Maybe next time I’ll pick up a real one. When I do, I’ll give you this.”
Ding Mocun sneered, didn’t dwell on the topic—it was just a joke anyway. He picked up another small trinket from Gu Yansheng’s table and said: “Hey, when did you get interested in antiques?”
“Forced into it. If others give me things and I can’t even tell real from fake, I’ll get fooled—how embarrassing for me?”
“Hahaha, you—always speaking the plain truth. Let me tell you, of ten officials who like this stuff, eight got into antiques for that reason.”
No gifts, where would they get so much money to buy them?
“You too?”
“Yeah.” Ding Mocun was frank.
They chatted about antiques for a bit, then the phone rang.
Ding Mocun picked up the phone, mm-hmm’d a couple times, “I’m at the tea house next to the West Shanghai Police Station. Bring it over right away.”
“Got the stuff.”
“Fast enough.”
Fifteen minutes later, his subordinate delivered the documents.
Gu Yansheng looked at the documents—outgoing and incoming phone numbers, operator registration times, transfer target areas, and phone registration addresses.
“What’s this blank one?” Gu Yansheng pointed to some registration addresses that were blank.
“Oh.” The subordinate looked and nodded, “Shanghai’s phone lines are divided into several. Calls from the International Settlement to the International Settlement can trace specific addresses.
But International Settlement to French Concession or Zhabei Hongkou—all need to go through the switchboard first, that’s this transfer target area. As long as it’s not a non-local area call, there’s no address record for local areas.
Like this Hongkou switchboard-7583, it means the call from the International Settlement went to Hongkou, but the phone company can only connect you to the Hongkou switchboard—that is, Hongkou’s phone company—then Hongkou’s phone company transfers to the HK area 7583 phone number.
Who exactly 7583 is, the concession doesn’t know—only Hongkou’s phone company knows.”
Gu Yansheng got it, “So to know whose household 7583 is, I still need to check with Hongkou’s phone company?”
“Yes.”
“Good, well done.”
Gu Yansheng wasn’t stingy, pulled out a few big bills and handed them over, “Buy the brothers some late-night snacks.”
The subordinate was delighted, “Thanks Director Gu, thanks Director. I’ll head out then.”
“No rush, wait a bit.”
Gu Yansheng handed the paper to Ding Mocun, “There are five calls transferred to Hongkou. I recognize one as Gendarmerie Headquarters. The other four I don’t. See if you’ve seen them?”
A Nanjing director calling Japanese in Hongkou during his Shanghai supervision period—that alone was suspicious enough.
Ding Mocun took it, looked, frowned and slowly shook his head, “Haven’t seen them. Definitely not headquarters, not Navy either.”
“Not Greater East Asia Ministry either—that means private.” Gu Yansheng continued, “Can we check?”
“Can. Go review records under pretext of checking spy phones—just look at the directory. Japanese won’t notice.”
“Good.” Gu Yansheng’s money wasn’t wasted. He said to the subordinate, “Know what to do?”
“Know.” The subordinate nodded.
“Good. Once you find who called here, you can go eat late-night snacks—no need to come back.”
“Yes.”
Gu Yansheng walked back and said: “Money lost by Shanghai Gendarmerie Headquarters, given by the Military Department to Nanjing Headquarters. Given is given, but the bank still has to open in Shanghai—what do you think Shanghai Gendarmerie Headquarters feels about that?”
Ding Mocun shook his head helplessly, “Still in the fog now.”
It’ll be clear soon.
An hour later, the subordinate called, reporting one by one the addresses and names corresponding to the phone numbers.
Mitsui Company person in charge, Mitsubishi Company person in charge, Sumitomo Bank person in charge, General Staff Office China Section Head Imai Takeo
“Imai Takeo?” Gu Yansheng raised an eyebrow, “Good, thanks for the hard work. Go rest.”
Gu Yansheng hung up the phone, looked at Ding Mocun, “Should be him. Given what Chen Junhui is supervising in Shanghai, no reason to contact this China Section Head.”
“Not a good sign.” Ding Mocun said.
Negotiating with the Wang Faction on one side, while General Staff Office China Section has the Nanjing Reform Government open a bank, issue military scrip—not like negotiations are about to succeed.
Gu Yansheng nodded, “Alright, I’ll go report to Minister Zhou.”
