238 Elder Ma’s Suggestion
“Our family will collect all of the excess crops in the village? Would we be able to finish selling them?” If they accepted all the food that the entire village wanted to sell, it would not be a small sum.
Now, the price of the grain outside was nine coins a dan.
If the grain was at a high enough standard where it could be used to pay tax, the price would be one tael of silver.
The village was having a bumper harvest now. Even if each family only sold 10 dans of grains, it would still cost 10 taels of silver to purchase them. There were more than 100 people in the village, which would make it more than 1,000 taels.
If they could not sell these 1,000 taels worth of crops, their family would suffer a huge loss!
“You don’t have to care about anything else. Go and tell the village chief. If there are young people who want to spread the news, bring them along.”
With so much crops, Wang Chuanman was definitely not going to be able to transport it alone. Someone had to follow him.
Moreover, that person had to be reliable.
The way to Shopkeeper Zhou’s residence was long, and transporting the crops there would probably take more than ten days.
When they returned, they would be in time for the planting of the next batch of seeds in the village.
Old man Wang knew that Old Madam Wang was not the kind of person who did things without thinking, so he immediately went to Village Chief Hu to tell him about this.
Village Chief Hu and the others were still worried. When they heard that the Wang Family wanted to buy up all the excess grain, Village Chief Hu was shocked.
“Does your family have so much money?”
Old man Wang said, “Shopkeeper Zhou is a kind person. He first gave us a sum of money and asked us to see if there was anything suitable to buy. We’ll use that money to deal with the emergency first. Our village has a bumper harvest now, and it’s not easy to sell these crops locally. We want to transport it elsewhere and let Shopkeeper Zhou take them in and cover this matter up. This matter will be settled that way.”
“Is that Shopkeeper Zhou reliable?”
Old man Wang thought for a moment and said, “Our family saved his life.”
“Then that’s fine.” In Village Chief Hu’s eyes, saving someone’s life was a huge favor.
Just like in the eyes of the villagers of Hu Family Village, Little Ah Yu was now a lucky star who had saved their lives.
It was also because of this that they spared no effort to protect Little Ah Yu.
Village Chief Hu could not make up his mind alone and went to discuss with Old Master Hu and the others.
“Old man Wang’s family is really a kind family. This move can really resolve the urgent matter.” Old Master Hu stroked his beard, his eyes filled with approval. It was not that they had never thought of this method, but there were too many crops in the village. They might not be able to find a way to sell it.
At that time, if they lost money, it would not be a matter of a few taels of silver.
They did not expect the Wang Family to be willing to take this risk.
Elder Ma had a different opinion. “You only want others to take the risk, but you’re not willing to take the risk at all? It’s not that simple to transport crops. There are also bandits along the way. Ordinary people have to be on tenterhooks when on the road. If the Wang Family transports the crops, won’t they be putting their heads on their belts?”
These words made Village Chief Hu’s expression change.
Yes, they had not really thought of this.
The disaster had just passed not long ago. Even if there were no bandits, what if those vicious villages discovered them and another Shanyang Village appeared?
“Then what should we do?” An elder was anxious. “We can’t starve to death guarding the treasure mountain!”
In the past, they did not have any food and had to worry about how to eat their fill every day.
Now that there were a lot of crops, they actually had to worry too. What was going on?
“Since the Wang Family is willing to do it, it means that they have plans. There’s no need to refuse their help. However, we can’t just let them take the risk alone. Otherwise, if word gets out that our Hu Family Village doesn’t treat the Wang Family well and only wants to take advantage of them, where will our old faces go!”
Old Master Hu looked at Elder Ma. “Then what do you think we should do?”
“We’ll collect only a deposit of 10% for the crops first. When the Wang Family kid sells the food, we’ll ask for the remaining 90%.”