Chapter 45: The Earthen Sugar Mill, Part Two

The sugar they produced, however, was a disappointment—a coarse, dark substance, closer to black than the rich brown he had expected. The viscous, blackish liquid that oozed from the funnels was molasses, a substance Wen Tong knew well. As the sugarcane juice was boiled and crystals formed, this dark mother liquor was the inevitable remainder. It still held a considerable amount of sugar, but extracting it economically had been impossible before the 1970s. For now, it was merely a byproduct. Its most promising application was distillation; rum, after all, is born from molasses.

The workers called the drippings “slop sugar.” It could, they said, be further boiled into a kind of black rock sugar, suitable for cooking but worthless for export.

Wen Tong shook his head. This black sugar was a dead end; its economic value was negligible. It would be better served as the base for spirits. “Does anyone here make white sugar or rock candy?” he asked.

The workers all shook their heads. Liao Dahua translated, explaining that the mills in Xuwen and Haikang produced only this reddish-brown sugar. Some also fashioned sugar bricks by boiling the cane juice into a paste, stirring it in a large iron basin until it crystallized, then pouring it into molds to be cut into blocks. The bricks were wrapped in dry sugarcane leaves and packed fifty to a bamboo basket.

Wen Tong found this perplexing. The technique for producing white sugar by washing it with yellow mud water had appeared in the late Ming Dynasty. It wasn’t a complex process, so why was it absent here?

He ran the numbers on the mill’s entire operation. The daily output of this reddish-brown sugar was a paltry 100 kilograms. The scale was pitiful. Furthermore, the lead stoker, though familiar with the process, lacked the finesse of a true master. He hesitated in controlling the fire, timing the extraction, and adding the lime. The resulting sugar was of poor quality. Several batches had been scorched due to the stove’s flawed design, and sugar was lost when the sediment was discarded prematurely. The room for improvement was vast.

As he pondered this, a group of local sugarcane farmers was ushered in. Wen Tong questioned them one by one. Their plots were all small, the largest a mere forty mu. Each mu, they claimed, could yield over three dan of sugar. They grew the cane and brought it to the mill for processing, for which the mill took a forty percent share. Other mills charged a fee, but the cost came to roughly the same.

The sugar, they explained, was transported to Haian Street in Haikang and sold to merchants, mostly from Chaozhou and Guangzhou, who specialized in exporting the local product. From Haian Port, the sugar was shipped out to distant markets.

“How much do you actually earn from this?” Wen Tong asked.

“One mu can net about six or seven thousand wen,” a farmer replied. “Taxes are heavy, but the income is respectable. The real killer is the interest. After we pay our debts, there’s little left.”

“Interest?” Wen Tong was surprised. “You have to borrow money to grow sugarcane?”

“Here, you see our hardship,” the farmer said with a bitter smile. “Sugarcane is profitable, but it thirsts for water and fertilizer. Fertilizer alone is a great expense. Without rain, we must hire men to water the fields. At harvest, we must hire more laborers. The cost for one mu is at least four or five thousand wen. We country folk have no ready cash, so we must borrow.”

The interest rate, at fifteen to twenty percent, seemed high but not ruinous. The true cruelty was in the terms: after the sugar was processed, the farmers had to split their profits evenly with their creditors. Their income was instantly halved. The terms were so outrageously exploitative that both Wen Tong and Chang Shide were taken aback.

“I see,” Wen Tong said, nodding slowly. “As the new owner, I wish to extend a benefit to you all. For this harvest season, anyone who processes their sugar here will be charged only a thirty percent share.”

“Thank you for your kindness, Manager!” The farmers were overcome with gratitude, on the verge of kneeling. A ten percent reduction was a fortune.

After dismissing the farmers, Wen Tong returned to the main hall, his retinue trailing behind him.

“Manager Liao,” Wen Tong began, feeling a pang of guilt, “you are the head of the branch here. We’ve kept you for days. Your duties in Haikang—”

“It is no trouble, no trouble at all,” Liao Dahua insisted. “The Haikang branch exists to serve Patron Guo. I will, of course, do everything in my power to fulfill his instructions.” Liao Dahua was not a martial artist or an escort, but a bankrupt merchant. The Leizhou branch was not for guard duty but for facilitating business, making him the perfect man for the job.

“His Lordship,” Wen Tong mused. Guo Yi was certainly putting on airs. “We are short-handed and require your assistance. We need a foreman and a skilled sugar master. These are urgent matters. We are strangers here, so we must rely on you.”

Although he had already identified numerous flaws in their process, technological upgrades could not happen overnight. They required new equipment, new infrastructure. Time was a luxury he didn’t have. With the harvest imminent, the only practical course was to follow the old ways and begin production at once.

“Of course,” Liao Dahua nodded eagerly. “Leave it to me. I will have it done within three days.”

“Do not skimp on the wages. We need good people. Also, if you can find any long-term laborers, or if any are selling themselves into servitude, select the honest and reliable ones and bring them here.”

“Yes.” Liao Dahua stepped closer, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper. “If there are any suitable girls, should I purchase a few to see to the daily needs of you and Master Chang? The two women from Guangzhou are a bit… coarse. I fear they cannot serve you well.”

“An excellent idea,” Chang Shide chimed in, a little too eagerly. “And make sure they’re not too young. Or too skinny.”

Wen Tong shot him a weary glance. The man’s enthusiasm was unseemly. Not that he was opposed—the Executive Committee had authorized them to recruit locals—but such haste for female companionship would reflect poorly on them if word got back.

“I think we should wait,” Wen Tong said. “We’ve only just arrived. We have other places to visit and will likely be on the road for weeks. A maid would be an inconvenience. The two servant boys are more than sufficient.” At his words, the two boys standing nearby blushed and lowered their heads.

Liao Dahua paused, his eyes darting between the two men and their young, attentive servants. A flicker of understanding—or misunderstanding—crossed his face.

“Yes, of course. Forgive my presumption.”

Neither Wen Tong nor Chang Shide had any idea what he had “realized,” but they were too preoccupied to dwell on it. As evening fell, Liao Dahua and his men departed, leaving behind a contingent of escorts to guard the estate. Xuwen, as Liao Dahua had warned, was the most lawless corner of Leizhou, rife with bandits. A sugarcane plantation was a tempting prize. Zhou Shizhai and Li Biao took the room next to Wen Tong’s, ready to respond to any threat.

That evening, the two servant women from Guangzhou came to attend to them. Though not large, they were surprisingly strong. They brought in deep, newly-made bathing tubs, followed by a steady stream of hot water and soap beans. After two days of dusty travel, a bath was a welcome luxury. Wen Tong sank into the steaming water, soaking for a long while before climbing out. He sat on a bamboo stool and worked the soap beans into a lather. They didn’t spread easily, but where they did, his skin became smooth and slick, with a fresh, fragrant scent—a vast improvement over the soap issued in Lingao.

“Old Chang, help me with my back,” Wen Tong called to Chang Shide, who was soaking contentedly with his eyes closed.

“Ask Wen Xiu and his brother. Aren’t they our servants? That’s their job. Let me enjoy this,” Chang Shide replied, splashing blissfully.

Wen Tong conceded the point. He cleared his throat and called out. Wen Xiu entered immediately, barefoot and dressed in a short shirt and trousers.

“The Master’s body is truly sturdy,” Wen Xiu remarked, scrubbing Wen Tong’s back with vigor.

“Him? A skinny fellow,” Chang Shide snorted. “Look at my chest. This Ghost Head Saber isn’t just for show.”

Wen Xiu fell silent. “Where did you learn your Mandarin?” Wen Tong asked.

“From Head Steward Sun,” he replied. They knew from their briefing that this was Sun Chang, a key local staff member at the Guangzhou station.

“That Guo fellow certainly has a large staff.”

Wen Xiu hesitated, unsure if “Guo fellow” referred to the god-like Patron Guo. “Yes, dozens. We all learn Mandarin from Steward Sun. Patron Guo says it is to prepare for the masters who are to come.”

Chang Shide chuckled. “That Guo Yi knows how to live. We arrive in Leizhou, and we’re already fully staffed. Otherwise, we’d have no one to order about.” He yawned. “Today was dreadfully dull. Like watching a folk play. By the way, any plans for improving the sugar production?”

“There are improvements to be made, but no major changes for now,” Wen Tong said. He gestured, and Wen Xiu rinsed him with clean, warm water. “Tomorrow, we’ll inspect the fields, then visit the other plantations.”

“Come, scrub my back!” Chang Shide heaved himself from the tub. He was more robust than Wen Tong—overweight, but with a solid foundation of muscle from regular exercise and manual labor. Wen Xiu regarded his physique with a mixture of awe and envy. “Master has a fine build,” he said, and began to scrub.

“I think we should consolidate the mills,” Chang Shide mused. “Create a centralized factory. Easier to manage, and we could utilize the bagasse.”

“I had the same thought,” Wen Tong replied, “but the farmers prefer to process their cane locally. The roads are terrible. Who would travel for miles to sell their cane? We need to see how the plantations are distributed. If they’re too scattered, it will be a logistical nightmare.”

His thoughts ran deeper. He had a general sense of the Leizhou sugar industry now. The next steps depended on further investigation. Improvements would go beyond processing. He had examined the local sugarcane—bamboo cane, a native variety with a sugar content of only 9%, far below the 14% standard for modern varieties. The agricultural department had preserved seedlings of improved strains that could be tested here. And as for field management, the potential for improvement was immense.

“True… ah, that’s the spot. You’re quite skilled at massage,” Chang Shide groaned.

“We have been trained in all aspects of service,” Wen Xiu said, kneading his back with flattering diligence.

“What if we do the initial processing locally, then transport the brown sugar here for refining?”

“I’ve considered that. We need to assess the situation at each location first.”

After their bath, the servant women cleared the water and tidied the room, taking their discarded clothes to be washed. Dinner was served, accompanied by a local jackfruit wine called “Xuwen Liquid.” Liao Dahua and Zhou Shizhai joined them, though they drank only sparingly. Wen Tong was not much of a drinker, so Chang Shide polished off most of the bottle. He became pleasantly tipsy, and Wen Tong had Wen Xiu help the man to his room. His plans for a late-night strategy session were scuttled. It seemed he would be going to bed as soon as it got dark.