Farming with Taobao - C55
Chapter 55 Nameless Dining Hall (5)
The second day after the restaurant at the shoal was opened, it was similarly overcrowded.
Li Yannian was completely convinced that they were all here to eat. What the hell were they thinking?
Qi Laosan knew what she was thinking just by looking at her. He raised the bowl in his hand and said proudly, “I was afraid that your shop would be like yesterday, unable to supply the bowls. We brothers have all brought them from our own homes, and we even saved you the time to wash the dishes, isn’t that great? ”
Li Yannian thought, wasn’t it the same if she just remembered to bring a bowl and not chopsticks?
Even though they had opened an hour earlier today, it was as if they had grown legs thanks to yesterday’s booming business. Not only did everyone in Clear Water Town know that this cheap restaurant was open for business, even people in Du Jia Village had specially come to watch the show. As a result, the Li family’s restaurant exploded once again.
After working so hard, Li Yannian was so tired that she could not even stand up straight. Even her throat was hoarse, but she still saw a customer still wanting to sit in the shop. Zhang Bao gave her a wink. “It’s going to be over soon. We can’t let anyone else in, or we’ll have to go for dinner.”
Li Yannian also agreed, she was just about to hang up a sign for them to close up, and then she saw a few constables dressed like yamen constables heading towards their shop.
The leader saw Li Yannian hanging up his signboard and asked suspiciously, “Is the shopkeeper ready to close the shop?”
Before Li Yannian could even speak, Zhang Bao welcomed them with a smile: “Originally we were prepared to rest after entertaining this group of guests, you constables, it looks like you’ve only just started eating at this hour? It was too hard! “Please come in quickly, please come in. The best rice is still warm, but the store only sells rice and no dishes. If the constables don’t mind, do you have some of the sauces we eat?”
The leader impatiently counted out a few copper coins and threw them into his hand. He waved his hand and said, “Don’t bother with those useless things. Just serve me a plate of food.”
Even so, Zhang Bao very politely sent a plate of rancid milk and pickled vegetables to their table. Due to the sudden arrival of a constable in the shop, the commoners were afraid of him. Even though he had never done anything shameful in his life, he was still cautious when facing a constable. The customers who were eating and chatting at the three to five tables suddenly quieted down. They hurriedly finished the bowl of rice in their hands, wiped their mouth and put it down, then ran away.
If not, they might not have been able to return to the Li Village before New Year’s Eve. Seeing that First Uncle was watching them, Li Yannian and Black Bean started to clean up the tableware.
Zhang Bao was at the counter, paying attention to the police officer’s movements. He was prepared to rush up at any moment. Amongst them who were in the business world, the most sinful were the Shangguan Family s, and even the yamen constables.
As the saying goes, a Yama is better than a small ghost. Since ancient times, a constable was a lowly person. Once a constable possessed someone from the same profession, they could not become an examiner for three generations. Most of these yamen runners had to earn some gray income by relying on other means. For example, when there was an unknown female corpse on the premises, before the case could be formally investigated, a constable had brought a bailiff to throw the female corpse in front of the door in order to extort and extort money.
This kind of thing happened everywhere in the government office. People without any connections or sense of shame wouldn’t be able to do such a wicked thing, so when ordinary people couldn’t live on, no one would want to go to the government office and find a job.
Sometimes, a hooligan and a constable were the difference between not wearing a set of black clothes and boots.
Thus, Zhang Bao was worried that Li Yannian, a little girl, would come forward and greet him. He was preparing himself as if he was facing a great enemy, afraid that he would offend her if he was not careful.
The policemen were used to the strange looks from the others, so they didn’t take it to heart. The round-faced man with the family name Da Zhuang was already starving. Before he could fill the bowl with rice, he had already stuffed a big mouthful of rice into his mouth.
Tall Mighty was still chewing rice and exhaling hot air while exclaiming, “Eh, Old Xing, did I lose my head from hunger or something? Why do I feel like this meal is so tasty?”
The person called Old Xing had a squarish face, long and thin eyes, and an extremely astute appearance. He was also extremely hungry, but he still had the reserved attitude of a scholar. He leisurely filled his bowl with half a bowl of rice and blew on it to cool it before finally picking it up and putting it into his mouth.
The other triangular-eyed Fang Dahai answered on behalf of Old Xing, “It’s not that you’re too hungry, the food in this shop is really delicious, and the price is also the cheapest. “Old Xing, we’ll come often in the future!”
Ancestor actually came often in the future! Zhang Bao was still wailing in his heart. He didn’t know whether it was his imagination or not, but he kept having the feeling that the triangle-eyed old Xing would still come back often after he finished speaking.
He hurriedly squeezed out a smile and said, “The best way for you all to eat is to confirm our store’s identity. Welcome to our store in the future …”
The youngest of the four laughed, “Alright, look at him. Our leather clothes scared away his business.”
Black Bean looked at Da Bao worriedly when he heard him. Li Yannian had never experienced such a scene before, so she did not know what to say. From the way these people spoke, especially the person called Old Xing, who seemed to be following the rules. Gradually, he no longer feared them as much as before.
Zhang Bao immediately walked over with an apologetic smile and said, “Masters, you sure are joking. Normally, the store would not be able to look forward to a rich person like you. A few of the lords often came to the shop to look after the business, and none of them dared to have any ideas about our shop. If the lords are still satisfied with their meal, they will definitely come often. ”
Old Xing then said lightly, “Shopkeeper is too polite.” It wasn’t easy for them to get back at each other. Did you make these dishes in your restaurant? Instead, it’s the food. ”
Zhang Bao immediately gave Black Bean a meaningful glance, telling him to bring more food to Back Chef, while smiling apologetically: “The countryside people casually cook rough food, it’s good that you guys don’t mind.”
Old Xing had seen a lot of things in the world. The spicy red oil was quite unusual and did not taste like a dogwood.
When he was young, he had been to Sichuan with his family. The people there loved spicy food, and there was usually a spicy taste of dogwood in their dishes. There were also some people who had mentioned that dogwood was made into red oil for cooking. At that time, he was the father of the supervising army of the Dingxiang Army and had yet to be framed by his comrades. However, he still had to pay four to five silver taels a month. How could a man be careless? A six or seven year old child was unable to eat spicy food. Seeing that he was tear-filled from being spicy, he stuck out his tongue and fanned himself. Then, he even raised his head and laughed …
However, that day disappeared twenty years ago.
Zhang Bao saw that the leader, Old Xing, was staring at the red oil curd and cried in his heart, This is bad! Could it be that there’s something wrong with the pickled vegetables?
Constable Xing came back to his senses, and asked Zhang Bao: “Shopkeeper, how many red oil curd do you have? It’s good that I’m eating. How about selling some to me? ”
The few constables who were reaching out their chopsticks to taste the soy sauce immediately turned their gazes towards her. Seeing that Li Yannian looked to be only around ten years old, a smile appeared in their eyes, it was quite pleasing. The triangular-eyed Fang Dahai immediately cried out, “Oh, that mouth of yours. Old Xing, he said that he’ll send you the pickles as long as you come. We won’t be able to leave you in the future.”
Li Yannian laughed: “This grandpa’s words are heartbreaking, if we want to gift this crude food to you, you will like it, right? As long as the lords like it, anyone who comes to eat will be sent off. ”
Fang Dahai liked her cleverness in her words, and wanted to tease Li Yannian a little, but he was stopped by Old Xing.
“Hurry up and eat. After you’re done, you have to return to the yamen to report back. It’s not easy for people to do small businesses. Stop fooling around.”
The young man who spoke earlier smiled faintly, “Old Xing is still the most stable. I did not misunderstand when I told you about this matter. ”
Li Yannian secretly sized up the youth’s dressing, she clearly also looked like a constable. However, the meaning behind his words was as if he was in cahoots with the other three. And judging from his age, he was clearly the youngest. In terms of seniority, the other three should be above him. But when Li Yannian saw them enter the shop with their words and deeds, this youth seemed to faintly occupy the upper hand.
But after that, the few of them did not say anything, and even the red oil curd that Old Xing asked about did not finish.
Zhang Da Bao looked at Li Yannian, not knowing if she should make a pot for him. Li Yannian shook his head and went to Back Chef. After a while, she brought out a small jar that was wrapped in oil paper and placed it on the most eye-catching part of the counter.
In the meantime, all the other guests had also left. The four of them quietly finished a plate of rice, wiped their mouths, and got up to return to the yamen. Zhang Laobao caught up with him at the right time and handed the vat to Old Xing.
Old Xing turned around and looked at him, then looked at Li Yannian. The corner of his mouth pulled, and he took out a piece of crushed silver from his waist and threw it into Li Yannian’s hands.
“Keep it, the things in your store are worth this money.”
As he said this, he chased after the three people in front of him without looking back. With big steps, he soon left.
“This …” Zhang Bao had never seen a constable giving money to a constable like this, so he was momentarily stunned.
Li Yannian, on the other hand, put the crushed silver away peacefully. She had a premonition that this Chief Constable Xing would come back often in the future. It might be a good thing for her to befriend someone who could speak with the yamen.
“Don’t think about it, Uncle. “Hurry up and settle the score. If it’s too late, Big Brother and I will go home in the dark.”
Zhang Bao replied. He quickly hid behind the counter and started to calculate. Not long later, he reported his total income: “Excluding the 30 yuan we spent to buy firewood, today we charged 437 yuan. Good boy, so much money!”
Black Bean and Aunt Zhang had already cleaned up Back Chef, and when they heard this number, they were a little shocked, and said at the same time: “That many?”
Li Yannian looked outside and was curious why the Uncle Li had not bought an ox cart yet. She then said to the rest of the people, “That’s not strange, there’s still three days worth of incense in the new latrine. After all, we set a cheap price, and there are a lot of people here. “When the original price is restored tomorrow, there won’t be so many people left. When that happens, we can relax a little.”
Zhang Bao thought that his niece’s words made it seem as if she wanted the store to have a bad business.
As usual, Li Yannian split today’s income evenly into four parts: “For the instructions from the boss, everyone doesn’t need to decline, there will be no such treatment tomorrow. If our performance at the end of the month is not good, then we might even have to deduct our wages. Therefore, everyone has to focus on doing their job well. Don’t lose the heart that the boss had for us. ”
Zhang Bao was actually very curious about Li Yannian’s so-called boss. He endured it and took the lead to promise: “Hong Dou, just let our boss be at ease. We will definitely take care of this shop.”
Aunt Zhang also nodded. “I will cook.”
hurried to follow up: “I’m fine too, don’t worry, boss.”
Just as he was speaking, a familiar laughter was heard from outside, “Aiyo, what are you doing?”