After dinner, Ma Feng and the other three went out to collect junk.

Zhao Yanran and her sister also went to the kitchen to clean up.

Li Le took the letter and opened it, and it turned out to be Lou Bancheng looking for him.

After thinking about it, Li Le decided to go to Lou Bancheng at night, at least to maximize the benefits.

To be honest, since cooperating with Lou Bancheng, Li Le can be said to have made a lot of money.

Although the three-axis linkage machine tools sold by Lou’s Steel Rolling Mill are very cheap, that is relative. Compared with those abroad, they are much cheaper, even extremely cheap.

In addition, the domestic demand was too great, and even though the Lou’s Steel Rolling Mill worked overtime, the machine tools it produced were not enough to buy more.

Public-private partnership is the general trend and Li Le has no choice, or even anyone can change it.

Anyway, I have earned most of what I should have earned, so there is no point in keeping it.

Li Le would not keep any shares or anything. As a person who knows what is going on, he would only keep the shares if he was kicked in the head by a donkey.

Besides, he didn’t have any shares. He just signed an agreement with Lou Bancheng.

As long as he gets the agreement back, it will have nothing to do with him in the future.

However, after such a long period of cooperation, Li Le still has to remind people. As for what Lou Bancheng will do, it has nothing to do with him.

After reading the letter, Li Le came out of the house and said to Zhao Yanran and her sister in the kitchen, “I’m going out to collect junk.”

“Okay Le brother, come back soon.”

“understood.”

Li Le pushed the tricycle out and rode away from home.

Coming out to collect junk was just an excuse. Li Le mainly wanted to see what the situation was like outside.

First, Li Le went to Chaoyang Market. As the saying goes, whether there are fish in the river can be seen from the market, and Chaoyang Market can reflect the current situation of the imperial capital.

Chaoyang Market is not far from Li Le’s home. After more than 20 minutes, Li Le arrived here.

Of course, this is the time it takes to ride a tricycle. If you walk, it will probably take more than an hour to get there.

After arriving at the market, Li Le frowned, because the market seemed very busy and there didn’t seem to be a shortage of anything.

Wait, that’s not right. It seems that other things are not in short supply at this time, only food is rationed.

After taking a look around, Li Le left the market.

“Collecting junk.”

“Selling broken ones?”

Li Le shouted while going into various alleys, because Li Le had some understanding of that era.

The reason why he went into the alley was to see if there was a pigeon market.

Unfortunately, after wandering around for a whole morning, I didn’t see a single pigeon market.

Li Le patted his forehead and then he remembered that there seemed to be no such thing as Pigeon Market at that time.

Because the land is now distributed to each household, there seems to be no shortage of food and drink in the countryside; the real shortage is in the city.

As long as there is a market in the city, the pigeon market cannot exist.

At noon, Li Le did not go home, but rode his tricycle to Grandpa Liu’s house.

When we arrived at Mr. Liu’s house, the door was closed but not locked, which meant that Mr. Liu was at home at that time.

He parked the tricycle in front of the gate and locked it, then went over and picked the door knocker and knocked a few times.

“Who?”

“Master Liu, it’s me.”

As soon as Li Le finished speaking, the door opened and Mr. Liu’s face appeared in front of Li Le.

“You kid, you haven’t been here for a while.”

Li Le scratched his head and said, “I have been busy recently, so I haven’t come here.”

“That’s right.” Master Liu nodded and said, “Come in!”

“Ok!”

After Li Le went in, Mr. Liu looked around and quickly closed the door.

At this time, if there is no fan, the room will be hotter than outside. Outside, at least there is wind blowing.

There is also a big tree in Mr. Liu’s yard, and half of the yard is covered by the tree.

Obviously there is no fan in Mr. Liu’s house. To be honest, Li Le doesn’t know what Mr. Liu is thinking.

A fan doesn’t cost much, and to Master Liu, it’s nothing.

But Mr. Liu didn’t buy it, and not only in the living room, but also in the bedroom.

Master Liu brought Li Le to the stone table, poured him a cup of tea and said, “You’ve come so far, have some tea!”

“Ok!”

Li Le picked up the cup and took a sip. He immediately felt much better, mainly because he was really thirsty.

Seeing Li Le put down the cup, Master Liu said, “Thank you!”

“Uh! Master Liu, what are you doing…”

Li Le was really confused by Mr. Liu’s incoherent words and didn’t understand why Mr. Liu wanted to thank him.

“You kid, I’m thanking you for letting me store food.”

After hearing what Master Liu said, Li Le finally reacted and said quickly, “You are too polite. When I asked you for help, you never refused!”

What he said was right. Whenever Li Le went to Liulichang in the past, he would tell Mr. Liu and Mr. Liu would help him without hesitation and never asked for any compensation.

Master Liu shook his head and said, “This is different. This is saving lives.”

Li Le quickly waved his hand and said, “Master Liu, please don’t say that. It’s not that serious.”

What he said was right. Although the quantity is limited now, people will definitely not starve. It’s just that the food will be worse.

And as long as you have money, you don’t even need to eat badly, and everything will be fine as before.

Because Li Le knew that the situation would only become really serious in the next three years, and it would not be an exaggeration to say that it was saving lives at that time.

At this time, it’s really not that serious. At least you can still buy whatever you want.

Master Liu shook his head and said, “No, it is. It is definitely that serious.”

“Uh! Isn’t there a fixed quantity now?” Li Le asked Mr. Liu in confusion.

“You’re right, but the rations vary. Those who do heavy manual labor get more, while ordinary citizens like me who don’t have much to do don’t get much.”

After hearing what Master Liu said, Li Le remembered that it seemed to be true, and there were even fewer women and children.

Especially for children, the fixed amount is really small, but children do not eat less, and even eat more than adults.

As the saying goes, the little brats can eat their father out of poverty. They are very active and get hungry easily, and eating a steamed bun in three bites is like a piece of cake.

“Master Liu, are many people buying food now?”

Master Liu nodded and said, “Yes, there are quite a few people buying food. It can be said that there is a shortage of food.”

Li Le thought about it and realized that this was indeed possible. You know, not everyone in the imperial capital has a certain amount of food.

For example, if a city man marries a rural woman, not only is there no quota for the wife, but there are not even any children.

Of course, this refers to those who have not transferred their household registration to the city, and there are many such people.

Because the household registration is in the rural area, the land belongs to the city. If the household registration is moved to the city, the land will be taken back.

Therefore, many people who married into the city from the countryside kept their household registration in the countryside. After the food rationing, it was calculated according to the household registration. If you don’t have a household registration, you won’t get the ration.

So what should these people do? They can only buy food, such as buying food coupons, and then go to the grain store to buy food.

“Master Liu, is there anyone you know going out to buy snacks?”

“Of course there are, and there are quite a few. Many people have been eating well before, but suddenly they have to eat coarse grains, and they are not used to it.”

“Uh! All right!”

Li Le was speechless, but it was understandable. After all, they were old folks and they were not short of money. What was wrong with eating something good?
Besides, they didn’t rob it, but bought it with real money.

Master Liu took a sip of tea and said, “In order to conceal their tracks, even I followed them out a few times.”

“Uh!”

Li Le understood that Master Liu didn’t want people to think that he had food. After all, everyone was short of food.

If you go out to change, it means you are also short of food. If you don’t go out once, it will definitely attract other people’s attention.

“Master Liu, where do you buy your food?”

Master Liu thought for a moment and said, “There are many places like this. There are many alleys or broken courtyards. But one thing is that you have to go to the black market after midnight.”

“All right!”

Many people regard the black market and the pigeon market as the same thing, but they are not.

The pigeon market is populated by farmers from nearby villages who raise chickens and ducks at home, or lay eggs for them, and then take them to the pigeon market to exchange for things.

Barter.

Of course, there are also people who sell for money or exchange tickets, but no matter what, this does not constitute speculation.

Some tickets that are not used at home can be exchanged with others for tickets that you need.

Of course, you can also exchange money, this is allowed, you can’t not use it, you have to use it!
Isn’t this a waste? So trading in the pigeon market is basically allowed.

Of course, there are also things that are not allowed in the Pigeon Market, such as collecting tickets, food, or other things in the Pigeon Market.

After collecting the goods, they then sell them at a higher price. This is not allowed and is also speculation.

What is speculation? Hoarding goods at high prices, reselling and buying, this is speculation.

You just take the unused bills at home and exchange them for other bills or some money. Can this be called speculation? Of course not.

However, if you sell the tickets to speculators, it is also illegal. If you are caught, you will not only be criticized and educated, but your tickets will also be confiscated.

The black market belongs to the category of speculation and profiteering, because the people who sell things on the black market are either speculators or the goods are of unknown origin.

So the black market is also an area that is severely cracked down on.

Whether it is speculation or profiteering, it is illegal and criminal.

This is why the black market is held at night, basically from midnight to four in the morning.

The pigeon market is different. The pigeon market is during the day, and some pigeon markets are even crowded all day long.

Of course, each pigeon market is different from another. For example, the pigeon markets in the alleys of the city are cracked down from time to time.

Because there are many speculators in this pigeon market, it is completely different from the pigeon market outside the city.

But for now, there is no pigeon market, because the ticket era has just begun, and only a few things require tickets.

When more and more things require tickets in the future, the pigeon market will come into being.

Li Le did not leave at noon, but ate directly at Liu Ye’s place, with a plate of bacon and a plate of scrambled eggs with tomatoes.

The staple food is steamed buns, and they are white flour buns. I guess only Master Liu eats them like this now, others would really not be willing to do so.

After walking around outside in the afternoon, Li Le went to the scrap collection station to sell the collected items and went straight home.

At around nine o’clock that evening, Li Le left home and went to Lou’s house.

The Lou family is still a wealthy family in the imperial capital. Apart from anything else, the houses they live in are all small Western-style buildings.

Li Le’s arrival made Lou Bancheng very excited. To be honest, Lou Bancheng also made a lot of money by working with Li Le.

Only after following Lou Bancheng to the study did Li Le take off his disguise.

Before Li Le could say anything, Lou Bancheng asked anxiously, “Sir, what do you say we should do now?”

Li Le shrugged and said, “What else can we do? Let’s just form a joint venture.”

“Ah! Sir, if we go into joint venture, the losses will be huge.” Lou Bancheng said with a wry smile.

“Mr. Lou, you have made a lot of money during this period, right?”

“Uh!”

Lou Bancheng didn’t know what to say. He did make a lot of money, and much more than Li Le.

But who would complain about making too much money? Of course, the more money you have, the better.

“Mr. Lou, listen to my advice. If you can sell your assets now, sell them. If you really can’t, donate them all to the country.”

“Ah! Why?”

Li Le glanced at Lou Bancheng and said, “I hope you will forget what I said to you today, and we will no longer know each other after we leave this door.”

Li Le’s words made Lou Bancheng’s face turn pale instantly.

“Sir, you say.”

“Leave as soon as you can now, otherwise you will be miserable later.”

Lou Bancheng looked at Li Le and asked, “Sir, how much time do I have left?”

It is still more than ten years away from 1966, but few people know how Lou Bancheng has lived in the past ten years.

You have to know that after the public-private partnership, until he was arrested, he donated more than 90% of his wealth.

Otherwise, how could he have been safe and sound for the past ten years.

“Three years, at most.”

The reason why Li Le said three years is because the public-private partnership has not yet ended. After the public-private partnership ends, there will be a transition period, and it will still be very harmonious at this time.

“Where can I go?”

“Hong Kong.”

“I understand.” Lou Bancheng nodded.

Then two suitcases were taken out from under a cabinet. They were real leather suitcases.

“Sir, this is the dividend for this period, please check it.” Lou Bancheng said as he opened the two suitcases.

One of the suitcases contained cash, all in 50,000 dollar denominations.

There were quite a few yellow croakers in the other suitcase. No wonder Lou Bancheng had such a hard time carrying them.

Li Le closed the two suitcases and said, “No need, I trust you. Also, take out our agreement!”

“Sir, what are you doing…”

“From today on, the agreement between us is void. From now on, all the shares will be yours, and I will no longer ask for dividends.”

After hearing what Li Le said, Lou Bancheng made a decision, a decision that would affect his life.

Anyway, from that day on, Li Le never heard of Lou Bancheng’s name again.

Including Louzi.

Li Le knew that Lou Bancheng had made the right decision. (End of this chapter)