Bab 1146: Chapter 1148: Investigation_1

Yang Chuxia almost laughed from exasperation, recalling that the Zhou Family did own a few shops; it turns out that the Zhou Family was also the maternal family of Madam Zhou. Just a few shops, and yet they're pretending to be the Old Master. And this Principal Clerk Zhou, taxing the Shoutao Village an extra forty percent, could it be that other villages were also overtaxed?

The taxes submitted to the county were certainly according to the imperial allocation, so the extra portion must have gone into Principal Clerk Zhou's private purse. She had suspected that despite being a mere principal clerk, he was able to acquire property, maintain a mistress, even afford a carriage. With his annual salary, minus the cost of food and drink, he wouldn't have enough to buy even one-third of a carriage.

In his ten years of service, who knows how much he has extorted from the people?