Chapter 92: Is There No Way Around This Butcher?

When he went back to the city bureau to report on his plan to start a shoe factory, Wei Dong also raised a condition: Could the case involving You Qili be brought to a close? He did not seem to have any illegal activity worth keeping him locked up for anymore.

Unexpectedly, the reply came in the form of both an introduction letter and an appointment order: Comrade Ren Weidong is hereby appointed Director of the Office of the Reform Committee of Shangzhou Prefectural Committee...

That was right. What Ren Weidong got was not management rights to a factory, much less any shares.

In the eyes of the older generation of cadres, everything belonged to the state; private ownership was unthinkable, and the loss of state assets was a grave crime.

So the identity assigned to Ren Weidong was a post in the newly established Reform Committee. In effect, the old special task force on the trading company case was directly transformed into this committee.

The personnel who had previously come from the commerce bureau, the light industry bureau, the municipal office, public security, procuratorate, courts, industry and commerce, taxation, and other departments all became Ren Weidong's colleagues... and even his subordinates.

After all, the committee director was the senior leader, concerned only with results; the office director handled the practical affairs.

Standing in the city office, the secretary looked at the stunned office director and gently reminded him, "If you want to make any adjustments, you can submit a report for approval. But right now there aren't any achievements at all, so isn't it a little inappropriate to be talking about conditions?"

Damn it. Had You Qili become collateral for performance evaluation?

No—Ren Weidong suddenly realized something important. "I haven't become a civil servant. There's no official post for me, right?"

The secretary thought he was worried about that. "This Reform Committee has only just been established. Everything is still being felt out step by step. It counts as a temporary assignment. Naturally, the establishment and benefits won't be finalized until there are results. The leaders think very highly of you, so you're not the kind of comrade who nitpicks over personal gain and loss, are you?"

Ren Weidong nearly blurted out that he would not work for free, but at the moment everyone cared most about official status, and he wanted none of it. "Good, good. Since there really is no official post, then it can't affect me doing other things. This is just a business cooperation arrangement, a kind of secondment, right?"

Every year, the tax bureau compound also had other civil servants sent there for temporary assignments, and the old security guard would surely know all about that.

Even though there was still no explicit rule forbidding civil servants in the establishment from doing business, Ren Weidong absolutely did not want any leverage left in others' hands.

The secretary was genuinely surprised. "I didn't expect it, Comrade Xiao Ren. You really do keep public and private matters separate. The leaders have high hopes for you, so you must certainly complete your tasks successfully."

Ren Weidong smiled faintly, but in his heart he had already made up his mind: I was going to give Shangzhou a fine gift, but since you want to freeload off me, then don't blame me for handling this strictly by the book.

Dong Xueying was a little surprised, but only a little. "Not being an official is fine. You're still so young and capable. Why suffer all that frustration? Then does that mean you'll be living in Shangzhou for a while?"

Ren Weidong answered hastily, "More or less. But once I understand the situation, I'll definitely go straight to Jiangzhou to settle the equipment, the craftsmen, and the rest."

Dong Xueying would not question whether he understood how to make leather shoes. After all, You Qili and the others were even more fanciful than Ren Weidong.

At the very least, Ren Weidong was being more down-to-earth about it.

He first called Qin Jianjun, the manager of the army station guesthouse, and asked him to help apply for a shoe company on his behalf.

There were so many shell companies in the guesthouse; under the present reform and opening atmosphere, the whole place was a mix of good and bad. It was easy to register all kinds of companies under banners of invigorating the economy, and every procedure could be smoothed over through backdoor connections.

The guesthouse manager, who was good at putting up signboards, readily agreed.

Only then did he take the members of the Reform Committee to several factories for research and inspection.

Since Dong Xueying had once been detained during the special investigation, he did not take her along. Let the two brothers, Shitou and Maor, follow their elder sister down to the docks and feel more of the local atmosphere.

A five-seat vehicle that could really squeeze in six or seven people was packed tight. The same people who had once been the special task force, now members of various departments of the Reform Committee, all came along without exception.

Of course, their motives were not the same.

Most of them said little.

Like the young policeman, some wanted to speak but did not dare; others wanted to sneer but had no opening.

More were simply watching from the sidelines. Better than sitting at work reading the paper and drinking tea.

Who knew—they might even manage to pull out some results with him.

Ren Weidong was the kind of man who could wine and dine the waterfront gangsters without a fuss.

But with these people in tow, he showed no sign of entertaining anyone.

He simply made a high-intensity tour of each of Shangzhou's existing state-owned and collective-owned factories.

As it happened, the very first stop, the tannery, proved not to be what he had expected.

First, the whole factory was lively and busy, with no sign of needing rescue.

Just this alone was enough for Ren Weidong to decide he would not be sticking his hot face onto anyone's cold backside.

But since he was already here, he might as well learn the situation properly, after all, the shoe company had already been set up.

The factory leadership who received them were quite enthusiastic. "Our main business is foreign trade sales to Europe..."

Ren Weidong almost bit off his own tongue.

Fortunately, he had only spoken his thoughts in person to the old leader about wanting to start a shoe factory, and fortunately he had kept the habit of carefully investigating the real situation.

Otherwise this time he would have tried to act impressive and ended up looking like a complete fool.

This was not a place where he was going to be the one to lead a reform and salvation.

He quickly asked, "Shangzhou does foreign trade here? As far as I know, only hog bristles were sold to the Allies during the Second World War as war materiel. I never expected leather products to be exported too?"

The other side looked at him differently. "Oh, very few people know hog bristles were war materiel. Even now they are still Shangzhou's most important bulk export commodity. Our leather goods business was developed around the hog bristle trade."

With information so developed thirty or forty years later, one could search anything at will. It was hard to imagine how, in earlier centuries, every trade had been as distant as the mountains from one another.

The Reform Committee members, led by the young policeman, applauded the leader's broad knowledge!

Ren Weidong glanced at him, confirming he was not egging people on, merely that everyone really did admire him a little.

He did not even have time to feel disappointed about the shoe factory dream falling through before he racked his brains to give everyone a little popular science lesson. "During the First and Second World Wars, the gun barrels of artillery, and the mechanical parts of ships and tanks, all needed a material like hog bristles, just soft and hard enough, to make brushes. I hear that only the Shu region produces the best of them, so it became a prized item fought over by Europe, America, and both Japan and Germany?"

The factory leader spoke with even more pride. "Yes, more or less. The unique resilience of hog bristles makes them very effective for cleaning dusty, rusted mechanical parts or cannon bores. Across all of Shu, including the pigs raised in Rongdu, the animals were eventually brought to this river gorge for slaughter, bristle harvesting, and pre-processing. Then they were packed as high-quality export goods and shipped downstream to Huanghai and Hong Kong for sale around the world. By the 1920s and 1930s, international quality standards had already been established, and at the peak we held ninety-five percent of the world's market."

He even casually pointed to the telephone on the desk. "In the 1930s, the whole Shu region had telegraph offices only in Rongdu and Shangzhou; Jiangzhou didn't even have one, all because of this hog bristle trade. It was only during the wartime capital period that the center of gravity shifted to Jiangzhou."

Then he pointed outside the window. "Because hog bristles sold so well, we dealt with foreign merchants and foreign trading houses so often that all kinds of other export businesses followed. Sausages were sold exclusively to Britain for red sausages, pork was canned and sold to Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. Casings factories, tanneries, fur factories, and canning plants were all built around live hogs in this way."

The other Reform Committee members were amazed. Most of them had not realized that the factory district clustered on the edge of the city was mainly engaged in foreign trade. They were discussing whether this was because the past decade and more had left some break in continuity.

Ren Weidong, however, immediately noticed one phrase: "Canned goods from here to Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union have long been in production? Why would they specifically want canned goods from us?"

In the old legend, hadn't You used countless railcars of canned luncheon meat to trade for airplanes?

Was the root of it here?

How had this line been set up?

The explanation came: "Our nation's canning industry began expanding rapidly during the War to Resist America and Aid Korea, with plants and production laid out nationwide. Each region made different products according to its output. Because we've always had large-scale hog slaughter operations, we were assigned meat canning. After the war, there was suddenly a surplus of these cans, and the state organized sales to the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. Our pork cans were much loved by the Russians. Besides, wasn't the 1950s exactly the honeymoon period? Experts were sent here to make canned halal food to suit their tastes."

Only then did Ren Weidong understand. He had been out of touch with the world in the tax bureau compound of Shangzhou, and he really had not known any of this.

After touring the place, he discovered that the tannery's main product was actually luggage—fine-quality suitcases, the kind of hard cases seen in Hong Kong films.

They were produced according to order styles negotiated by foreign trade departments, not sold through Shangzhou's local channels at all, and even taxes were paid elsewhere.

That was that. The Director Ren, who had been planning to start a shoe factory, was a little dumbstruck.

Fortunately, he was already a mature businessman. If this place did not make cheap cameras, Xishan Factory could; if the No. 3 Radio Factory did not want to improve its research and development, the Postal and Telecommunications Equipment Factory could take it over.

So he steadied himself and looked around one by one.

Two or three factories a day, touring them in sequence along the line from the tannery onward.

At night he would return and summarize things with Dong Xueying: "Damn it, the whole street is filled with pig-related businesses, and every one of them is at an international standard!"

Foreign trade requirements naturally meant everything had been set up according to national standards. How could it be his place, as some second-rate fool, to spout nonsense?

While serving him food, Dong Xueying said in surprise, "Oh, right. Ever since I was little, I've heard that whole avenue was about pig business. You Qili seemed to have mentioned that Shangzhou had quite a bit of foreign trade, but it all belonged to the foreign trade departments. How could it be easily split out?"

Ren Weidong felt the comfort of having a capable wife at home. "Then I'll keep observing slowly. There will always be some business opportunity to find."

Dong Xueying no longer even let her gaze linger on his face, afraid she would not be able to tear herself away. "Mm, there will definitely be opportunities. Tell me anything else too. I like listening."

The baby in the carrier against Ren Weidong's chest waved its little arms and legs, babbling in agreement.

A rather heartwarming family dinner scene.

Shitou and Maor sat nearby, interrupting with perfect timing and without end: "Third Sister said our family used to do hog bristle business too!"

"Just now you said there was a pig slaughterhouse. Take me to see it. I heard slaughterhouses can easily produce masters..."

The two adults exchanged a quick look. Yes, the very thing that had made the two of them open up to each other was that butcher.

Truly, everything in the dark had its destined course.