Chapter 130: Zhao Yingong's Private School

When Mei Lin saw Zhao Yingong walk into the study, dressed in a blue lake-silk robe, holding a gold-inlaid fan, and wearing a scholar’s cap, looking indescribably suave and elegant, he couldn’t help but feel a pang of envy, jealousy, and hatred. Fortunately, Fenghua’s appearance was uninspiring, otherwise Mei Lin’s heart would have been even more unbalanced.

Zhao Yingong had no idea what was going through Mei Lin’s mind. Since they were both Yuanen, he didn’t bother with pleasantries: “What is it?”

“I just came from the construction site. Have your little girl pour me a glass of water.” Mei Lin was in a bad mood, and his words and actions became somewhat crude.

Being a man of great refinement, Zhao Yingong immediately sensed the nuance. Without a change in expression, he rose and opened the liquor cabinet, taking out a bottle of kvass. He opened it himself and brought it to him.

“The weather is getting a bit hot. It’s better to drink a cool beverage.”

Mei Lin took the glass bottle and downed half of it in one go. He wiped his lips, caught his breath, and said:

“The work on the bookstore is pretty much done. There are still some small odds and ends, just waiting for the goods from Lin’gao.”

Zhao Yingong nodded. “You’ve been busy all these days. It must have been very hard.”

“Hard or not doesn’t matter. I want to go to Nanjing again,” Mei Lin said bluntly, getting straight to the point.

Zhao Yingong frowned inwardly. There was no one available to go to Nanjing at the moment. If he let Mei Lin go alone, he really couldn’t rest easy. After all, Mei Lin was on a temporary assignment and hadn’t received much training for foreign deployment; it would be easy for him to blow his cover. If he caused some trouble in Nanjing, it would be very difficult to handle.

However, Mei Lin had contributed greatly to the infrastructure construction of the Hangzhou station, working with utmost dedication. If he refused him outright, it would seem too heartless, and Mei Lin would surely hold a grudge when he returned. In the future, he would still need a lot of help from the General Construction Company…

But he couldn’t spare anyone to accompany him to Nanjing for the time being. Zhao Yingong pondered for a long while. He thought of the “Nine Surnames” boat girls on the Qiantang River and the flower boats on the West Lake. It might be better to host a banquet on a flower boat locally and invite Mei Lin and the other Yuanen on assignment to enjoy it. It would be killing seven or eight flies with one swat, taking care of everyone. As for whether the other Yuanen would be interested in the boat girls, that was their own business.

“Nanjing is not possible right now—there’s no one. Let’s have a banquet on the West Lake. Can the beauties of Hangzhou not compare to the rouge of Qinhuai?” Zhao Yingong said, waving his fan. “I’ll charter a painted boat on the West Lake, specially to entertain everyone. Besides, one of the Eight Beauties is long dead, and the other seven are very young. Some aren’t even in Nanjing. You’d go all the way to the Qinhuai River and might not even see them…”

“It’s because they’re young that…” Mei Lin said sullenly. Suddenly, he realized that saying this might make people think he was a pervert, so he quickly stopped. “Young people are easy to educate. Once they formally debut, it will be very difficult to change their thinking…”

“Old Mei, think about it. If you educate them according to our way of thinking, would they still be the Eight Beauties of Qinhuai?” Zhao Yingong pointed out. “The environment they grow up in is the most important thing. If you transplant them into our social environment, how different would they be from the female students at the Lin’gao National School?”

Mei Lin was helpless. Zhao Yingong’s words were full of reason, and he couldn’t think of a rebuttal. In fact, he wasn’t particularly obsessed with women; he just wanted to experience the “dream scenes” he had fantasized about when he was a student.

His interest waned. “Alright, you can arrange it as you please.”

Zhao Yingong smiled. “The Eight Beauties of Qinhuai aren’t going anywhere.” He changed the subject. “There’s no time like the present. Since the bookstore is finished, and the Dragon Boat Festival is in a few days, let’s go watch the dragon boat races on the West Lake and indulge ourselves.”

Mei Lin had no objections. Zhao Yingong immediately called for a sedan chair and went with Mei Lin to the residence in Qinghefang.

Qinghefang had been under renovation for the past few months, so Zhao Yingong had moved to Phoenix Mountain Manor—the Hangzhou station was located there.

The sedan chair returned to Qinghefang. Cai Shi was at the door, supervising the craftsmen and laborers as they moved debris and various objects. The street, which had been muddy and littered with rubble, had been cleaned up, and the entire street, which was originally just paved with loose stones, was now paved with bluestone slabs. This grand gesture made the neighbors around Qinghefang look at this “Master Zhao” with new respect.

Originally, there was only one main gate and one side gate. Now, there were two main gates. The left side was the original residential part, and the right was the “Culture Bookstore.” This completely new bookstore occupied most of the original residential garden and adopted a front-shop, back-workshop design. The front was the bookstore’s business space, and the back was the printing workshop. Behind the printing workshop were the workers’ dormitories. On the side of the bookstore was a small garden for customers to browse, drink tea, and chat.

This garden was currently empty and undecorated. The landscape architect hired by Sun Wangcai had not yet arrived. When it came to building traditional gardens, Mei Lin thought it best not to make a fool of himself—Jiangsu and Zhejiang were the main stage for the top landscape architects of the time.

The layout of the original residence had also undergone several modifications. The space was re-divided according to modern architectural concepts, improving the lighting and plumbing. After all, this was Zhao Yingong’s “storefront” for his activities in Hangzhou. In the design, Mei Lin tried to retain traditional elements as much as possible, so that it would not be too shocking to the world while ensuring sufficient comfort for those living inside.

Zhao Yingong walked and looked, feeling very satisfied. He only had some slight doubts about the extensive use of glass windows—even in Guangzhou, this was something only the gentry and large households used. The flat glass for lighting produced in Lin’gao was very expensive. Was it a bit too shocking for him to use so much of it in Hangzhou at once? But on second thought, if he wanted to make a name for himself in Hangzhou, he had to have something that set him apart.

After passing through the main courtyard, Mei Lin led him to the side, through a moon gate, into a small side courtyard. There was only one small room, with two magnolia trees and two osmanthus trees planted in the yard. There was another moon gate in the yard. Mei Lin led him through, and inside was a different world—a rather large courtyard with high walls. The building inside, however, was a modern-style two-story blue brick building. The center of the courtyard was paved with yellow sand mixed with white lime. There were also flower beds and fitness equipment around, much like a primary school.

This was the dormitory where Zhao Yingong housed the orphans he had taken in. Zhao Yingong planned to personally teach a group of orphans. For the convenience of teaching them day and night, he had attached this courtyard to his residence in Qinghefang as the Hangzhou station’s school.

The school, along with Zhao Yingong’s inner study, bedroom, and meeting room, was located in the deepest part of the residence. The environment was extremely quiet and secluded, and with heavy doors and locks, no one could enter without a special guide.

“This place can accommodate up to forty-eight children, half boys and half girls,” Mei Lin explained. “The upstairs is the dormitory, with a maximum of six people per room. I designed it with separate left and right staircases, and a partition in the middle to separate the boys and girls.”

Downstairs, there were classrooms, a dining hall that also served as an activity room and reading room, and a small library. Next to the small building were a separate kitchen, laundry room, and storage room. There was even a large classroom intended to be used as a handicraft workshop. It was well-equipped, practically a small, independent world.

This school at the Hangzhou station was, in effect, Zhao Yingong’s “private school.” His plan was to personally cultivate twenty or thirty children here as his future minions—or, one might say, adopted children. Of course, only the smartest, most perceptive, and most loyal to the great cause and to him personally would have the chance to bear his surname.

Zhao Yingong was very satisfied after seeing it. Although the construction of the Culture Bookstore and Phoenix Mountain Manor had consumed most of the funds he had brought, and many of the materials and equipment used for the project were transferred from Lin’gao for free, he firmly believed that as soon as the Culture Bookstore project opened for business, his tight financial situation would improve.

The branches of Wanyou, Qiwei, and Delong in various parts of Jiangnan, led by the Hangzhou station, had opened one after another. Once these branches were up and running, they could also provide some financial support to the Hangzhou station. The Colonial Trade Department planned to sell Australian goods directly in Jiangnan through Wanyou. Once sales began, silver would roll in.

Once he had established a network of relationships among the gentry and had the ability to protect himself, he would directly get involved in the silk and tea business—even if there were no local customers, the appetite of the Colonial Trade Department in Lin’gao was huge. Si Kaide had sent him a telegram a few days ago, asking him to investigate the annual quantity of raw silk and silk that could be purchased in Hangzhou and the silk production capacity. In addition, the Colonial and Trade Department was also very interested in Zhejiang’s tea. In the telegram, they asked Zhao Yingong to report on the local tea supply quantity and market prices, and also inquired whether it was possible to set up a factory there to produce brick tea.

Although the Europeans of this time did not drink tea, the demand for tea from the Later Jin was quite strong. Due to the Ming Dynasty’s blockade, they could only obtain some tea through small-scale smuggling channels and from Joseon, at a high price. Tea could not only serve as Lin’gao’s main export commodity to the Later Jin, but also be sold to Mongolia through them.

Thinking of silk and tea, he suddenly remembered something—he could start a sericulture school in Hangzhou—in this time, it could be called something like a poor people’s vocational school. The Heaven and Earth Society should have experts in sericulture. He could invite one over to teach a teacher training class first, and then use the students from that class as teachers—Fei Xiaotong had followed a similar model when he established the women’s sericulture college.

By running a sericulture school, the students could of course be kept for his own use, but the biggest benefit was that he could legitimately recruit and take in large numbers of children and women from the refugee population. Then he could set up an internship workshop, promote semi-mechanized silk reeling… His mind began to spin with countless ideas.

Mei Lin knew his thoughts and shook his head, saying, “Don’t let your imagination run wild. Eat your meal one bite at a time. Let’s get the bookstore business sorted out first.”

Startled by his words, Zhao Yingong snapped back to reality and gave a few dry laughs. “Let’s go, let’s go see the bookstore.”