Chapter 87 third quarter

In Rong Desheng's case, the "meat ticket" was tied up, and the family paid a huge sum of money to redeem it. Then the case was solved and the criminal was punished. This is the "serious drama" of the kidnapping case.Let's take a look at a "comedy" of kidnapping, that is, Zhang Yuanji, chairman of the Commercial Press, was kidnapped in 1927. For scholars, the Commercial Press is famous.It was founded in 1897, and its main business is to publish textbooks; ", "Fiction Monthly" and other important publications, and large-scale ancient books such as "Four Series", "Series Collection", "Continued Ancient Yi Series", "Bai Naben Twenty-Four History" and other large-scale ancient books come from this large publishing organization. They also published academic classics and foreign novels translated by Yan Fu, Lin Shu and others, which had far-reaching influence.

To this day, the Commercial Press is still a giant in the publishing industry. Even those who do not study, as long as they go to elementary school, they must have been exposed to the products of the Commercial Press—"Xinhua Dictionary" is published by the Commercial Press. However, although it is a flagship enterprise in the publishing industry and has a very high status in the cultural publishing industry, the profit in the book industry is mediocre, and it is not an industrial, commercial and financial company with a lot of money.At its peak, the capital was 1.5 million yuan, which was incomparable with the Rongshi Group's capital of over 100 million yuan.Moreover, the Rong family holds the majority of the shares, while the Commercial Press has many shareholders, and the board of directors is elected, and no one takes the majority.

Zhang Yuanji, who became a shareholder in 1903 and presided over the compilation work of the Commercial Press, is a philologist and publisher, but not a capitalist; his income comes from salary and dividends. Although it is not low, it is still far from the "standard" of being kidnapped. . Therefore, Zhang Yuanji was kidnapped and performed a comedy scene in the endless kidnapping cases in Shanghai. On the evening of October 17, 1927, a car stopped in front of the gate of Zhang’s house at No. 40, Jisfeier Road (now Wanhangdu Road). He forced the servant who opened the door into the concierge, and rushed straight into the dining room on the second floor of Zhang's house.

60-year-old Zhang Yuanji was having dinner with his wife, son and nephew when he suddenly saw several big men rushing in aggressively. He picked up Zhang Yuanji, dragged and hijacked him downstairs while Zhang's family watched in extreme horror, stuffed him into the car at the door, and drove away. Zhang Yuanji's kidnapping caused a sensation in Shanghai, and newspapers of all sizes, including Japanese newspapers, published the news.The Zhang family immediately went to the police station in the concession to report the case, but on the same day Zhang Yuanji was kidnapped, two major cases occurred in the Shanghai concession, where the general manager of the Shanghai Salt Industry Bank, Ni Yuanfu, and the wealthy gentry Xue Shunsheng of Ningbo were kidnapped. Enthusiasm and energy.The Zhang family and the colleagues of the Commercial Press could only contact the kidnappers to discuss.

After Zhang Yuanji was stuffed into the car, the kidnappers covered his eyes with a black cloth and made a detour all the way to the suburbs.When he was taken off the car and took off the blindfold, he found himself in a heavily guarded farm house. The next morning, two kidnapper leaders came to Zhang Yuanji, one claimed to be Ye and the other Li.They cut to the chase, saying that 300,000 yuan was redeemed. "With you, the big boss of the printing house, it's just a drop in the bucket." Zhang Yuanji opened his eyes wide: "300,000? Big boss? I'm just a shareholder, business is not my private property!"

"Aren't you the chairman?" "The chairman is not the big boss." The kidnapper got impatient and said, "Whether it is or not, it is impossible for a famous person like you to have no money. Last year when you married your daughter, the dowry was 300,000!" Hearing this, even in the dangerous situation of being kidnapped, Zhang Yuanji couldn't help laughing: "I have a daughter, but she hasn't married yet. Where did the 300,000 dowry come from! If you don't believe me, please check again." "What?" The two gangsters Ye and Li looked at each other suspiciously, feeling as if they had missed their eyes, and then said: "Then, 200,000, write back quickly, 200,000, you can't lose a penny!" After finishing speaking, they walked away up.

After receiving Zhang Yuanji's letter, the Zhang family and the colleagues of the Commercial Press received two more phone calls from the kidnappers, asking if Qian Beiqi was there.Where the Zhang family can get this huge sum of money, they propose negotiations.At the negotiating site on Yuqiaqing Road (now Middle Tibet Road), the bandits Ye and Li seemed to know that they were not tying up big fish, so they lowered the ransom to 150,000 yuan; , the negotiations reached an impasse. Zhang Yuanji, who was imprisoned, was ordered by the kidnappers to guard four people. Two of them, one old and one young, seemed to be ill and coughed continuously.Zhang Yuanji was arranged to sleep on a broken bed, while the guards slept on the ground, and could only cuddle up to keep warm at night in late autumn.

Zhang Yuanji chatted with them, and asked them that they must get a lot of money from this kind of business without capital, right?The old guard sighed, this matter is immoral and frightening, but how much money will we have in our hands?If there is no other way to survive, who would want to do this? At home, they always talk about doing small business outside!Zhang Yuanji observed him, and said with concern that you look sick and you should see a doctor.The old man sighed even more, saying that poor people have no money to see a doctor. Zhang Yuanji felt very sympathetic to him, and said, "I have a rough knowledge of medicine, so I'll prescribe you some secondary medicine and try it." He picked up the pen and paper that the kidnapper asked him to write, and wrote down a prescription for the old man.The old man took it with trembling hands, tears streaming from the corners of his eyes.

The other guards all had respect for Zhang Yuanji, and they also talked about their own backgrounds. They were all poor people who were born as beggars and had been unemployed for a long time.Zhang Yuanji expressed deep understanding and sympathy for them, and advised them to wash their hands as soon as they found a way, and they repeatedly said yes.During this period, the guard found that there was a hole in Zhang Yuanji's sweater. He didn't look like a rich man. He felt that the leader had tied the wrong person this time, and he felt guilty for his affection for Zhang Yuanji. On October 21, Ye and Li held Zhang Yuanji's handwritten letter to negotiate with Zhang's family.The letter said that he was given preferential treatment during his imprisonment, so there is no need to worry; now that the ransom has been reduced to 20,000 yuan, please try to raise it as soon as possible.

The kidnappers really didn't expect such a "rich man" to be kidnapped this time. Although he is so famous, he still can't make up 20,000 yuan!The Zhang family sold everything that could be sold, and only raised 5,000 yuan; colleagues from the Commercial Press also donated money to help, and finally managed to raise 5,000 yuan, a total of 10,000 yuan, which is less than half of the price offered by the kidnappers! Zhang Yuanji's nephew handed over the 10,000 yuan to Ye Bandit, begging for redemption.Annoyed at kidnapping the wrong person, the kidnappers saw that there was nothing to squeeze out, so they released Zhang Yuanji on October 23.

After spending 6 days in the tiger's mouth, Zhang Yuanji was free.When he was about to leave, his guards held Zhang Yuanji's hand tightly and said to him reluctantly, "I'll see you when we get back from our evil ways!" Zhang Yuanji couldn't help but laugh at his own experience. He wrote to his friend Gao Mengdan during the kidnapping period: "It's very different to pretend to be an 'fancier' with the status of a younger brother." From the asking price of 300,000 yuan, down to 200,000 yuan, then down to 150,000 yuan, then down to 20,000 yuan, and finally redeemed safely at 10,000 yuan, it is really dumbfounding for the kidnappers, which is also the key point in the kidnapping case. It is a rare case; during the period of being kidnapped, the "meat ticket" actually formed a friendship with the gang guards and influenced them, which is even rarer.Therefore, the kidnapping of cultural celebrity Zhang Yuanji is a "comedy" in the kidnapping case.