The road to wealth of a peasant widow

Chen Cui had something on her mind, so after buying things she went to Hengtong Warehouse on the next street to inquire about the specific departure time of the convoy returning to Yinping tomorrow.

The charcoal selling business had not yet come to fruition, and she had not yet decided on a date for her return, so she did not discuss the return journey with the team.

Now that things have been settled, she is anxious to go back and make further arrangements, so the return trip must be confirmed as soon as possible.

At first she thought that the carriage and the driver were all from the Mountain Goods Shop. But when she heard them chatting on the way, she found out that in the team coming to the city, only Manager Lin and one of the drivers were from the Mountain Goods Shop, and the others were from the Hengtong Horse and Carriage Shop.

This carriage and horse business in Yinping is quite large. It owns more than a dozen carriages and specializes in transporting goods. It also has its own warehouse.

It is said that the major shops and wealthy families in the county choose them to help transport goods, and they have never been reported to have any problems. Their reputation is very good.

Like Lin’s Mountain Goods Store, they only have a branch store in Yinping County, and the city is their base camp.

It is said that there are more horse-drawn carriages in the city, so their warehouse can only be set up on the edge of the city gate. There is only one storefront on the busy street in the city, which is used to receive orders and handle daily affairs.

Chen Cui came to their store located on a busy street.

Although the shop is not big, just one store, the large gold-plated characters "Hengtong Chemahang" on the black sign are particularly eye-catching.

Coincidentally, as soon as she entered the door, she met the coachman Master Zhou. The carriage she took yesterday was the one driven by him.

"Hello, Master Zhou!" Chen Cui greeted quickly.

"Oh, isn't this Mrs. Liu? You're..." Master Zhou was also surprised. He had just finished shopping and was about to report to the bank that he would be returning tomorrow, when he ran into the person who took the bus yesterday.

"I'm planning to go back to Yinping tomorrow, so I came here to ask if I can still take our team's car back."

"Okay, okay, let's set off early tomorrow morning. Still the same price, what do you think?" Master Zhou said enthusiastically.

Yesterday was a special business trip for the Mountain Goods Store. The price was negotiated, and even if more people were added, the money was only given to the Mountain Goods Store, and had nothing to do with their carriage and horse business.

But this return trip was the business undertaken by their carriage and horse company, with goods from several families involved. If they arranged to add more people, the income would belong to the carriage and horse company, but if the people were introduced by Master Zhou, he would also get a commission, so he was so happy.

Chen Cui was delighted and agreed immediately, "Okay, then I'll trouble Master Zhou."

Immediately, Chen Cui paid the fare and got the receipt.

"Tomorrow morning at the beginning of the morning, meet at the gate of the west city where we came from. Remember!"

When she was about to leave, Master Zhou gave her such loud instructions, his enthusiastic attitude was a bit overwhelming.

It was not until the next morning that Chen Cui found out the reason why Master Zhou had treated her so warmly yesterday.

It turned out that each of the four horse-drawn carriages was only loaded with half of the goods, which actually only added up to the amount of two carriages. No wonder he wanted to bring back more business, it turned out that the transportation was not saturated!

This time there was no merchant escorting the carriage, only a few masters from the carriage company driving the carriages, and Chen Cui was the only person riding in the carriage. She chose Master Zhou's carriage, hoping to take the opportunity to strike up a conversation on the way and find out about the situation of the carriage company.

That's right. Ever since she learned about the existence of the Hengtong Horse and Carriage Company, she planned to use its carriages to help transport the charcoal to the city. However, how many carriages would be needed and how to negotiate the fees would depend on the situation.

On the way, she seemed to be chatting with Master Zhou unintentionally, but in fact she was inquiring about the operation and charging of their carriage and horse company. Master Zhou was bored driving the carriage alone and wished there was someone to talk to him.

Thanks to the man's strange self-esteem, even though this peasant woman, Mrs. Liu, was already middle-aged, he still had an indescribable vanity in front of this woman. Naturally, he kept telling her about his past experiences, and unknowingly, he revealed many things in the industry.

In view of Master Zhou's powerful intelligence output, Chen Cui treated the masters to a lunch break and added chicken legs to the noodles.

According to the accommodation and food standards of the carriage and horse company, each of them could only eat one bowl of vegetarian noodles, and the excess expenses had to be borne by themselves.

The coachmen are certainly reluctant to spend money on the road, and some will even save their own food rations to supplement the family income. Now that this sister-in-law has treated them to a meal and added chicken legs, everyone naturally praises them.

Chen Cui's action won thanks from several other masters, but Master Zhou felt a little uneasy.

He thought to himself, this sister-in-law kept talking to me in the morning, and was so generous at noon, could it be that she liked me and felt embarrassed to give only one chicken leg to me, so she gave some to everyone? !

That won't do. Although my wife has a loud voice and likes to nag, she is a down-to-earth person. She gave birth to four children for me. I can't do something stupid outside and let her down!

The more Master Zhou thought about it, the more he felt that Mrs. Liu's behavior was suspicious. In order to avoid suspicion, he stopped speaking actively in the afternoon, kept his mouth tightly shut, and concentrated on driving the car.

If Chen Cui knew what he was thinking, she would definitely say "Pah" at him. Master Zhou is in his thirties but looks like he is fifty, with a weather-beaten face and yellow teeth. She would have to be blind to miss him.

She had already found out what she should know, and had no intention of talking to him again. She was exhausted from trying to find topics to talk about in the morning, and after a morning of eating and drinking, she just wanted to rest in the afternoon.

Therefore, Chen Cui leaned against the cargo, leaned against the carriage, and fell asleep with an old mattress covering her body.

Until it was getting dark and they arrived at the county town, Chen Cui didn't say anything to Master Zhou, which made Master Zhou feel relieved but also a little disappointed.

He wondered, could it be that she gave up because she saw that I ignored her?

Chen Cui already knew the location of the carriage and horse company. As it was getting late, she was in no hurry to go there. She planned to stay in the inn for one night and then go to discuss the transportation of the goods tomorrow morning.

The next morning, Chen Cui went there.

Upon learning that Chen Cui had 20,000 kilograms of charcoal to be transported to the provincial capital half a month later, the person in charge of Hengtong Horse Racing in Yinping County came out in person to receive her.

After all, in this county, it is considered a big business and worthy of his attention.

The person in charge was named Chen, and everyone called him Manager Chen. Although he was a little surprised to see Chen Cui dressed like a peasant woman, he was only surprised for a moment and then looked normal.

After listening to Chen Cui's request, he picked up the abacus, fiddled with it quickly, then wrote and drew a few strokes on the paper before finally giving a quote.

"Twenty thousand catties of charcoal requires ten carriages to transport, which is almost the entire transportation capacity of our carriage and horse company in Yinping. If we help you transport the charcoal, we will have to put aside other work for two days. We will have to eat and eat a lot along the way, so the freight to the capital city will be at least ten taels of silver. If it is less than this amount, we can't take this job."

Chen Cui smiled, thinking that she didn’t understand the ins and outs here, so he used these words to fool her and gave her such a high offer. Was he looking down on her? Was he looking down on her?