Chapter 164
"10 million!" The brown-eyed middle-aged man was stunned as if his brain's storage unit could not accommodate such a large number.
After a moment, he suddenly laughed: "Haha, I see, the person you are talking about must be the king, right?"
Mara immediately shook his head: "No, Vals, you guessed wrong."
Ever since he had access to government financial data, he knew that even if the king wanted to, he would never be able to embezzle tens of millions. In fact, most of the time, it is the king who supplements the national treasury.
"It's Necker." Marat said solemnly, "Jacques Necker."
Vals was stunned for a moment, then laughed louder: "Mr. Necker? Haha, you said Mr. Necker is corrupt?
"Don't be ridiculous, Marat! He is the finance minister who cares most about the poor! He didn't even raise taxes when he was in office."
Necor spent many years in France, investing a lot of energy and financial resources to create an image of himself as a friend of the poor and helping the poor fight against the royal power. His efforts in this regard were fruitful.
"He didn't increase taxes." Marla nodded, "But that may just be because the increased taxes cannot go directly into his pocket."
Before Valls could refute, he immediately continued: "Not long after he took office, he signed a loan contract of 5 million livres with a Swiss bank on the pretext of 'filling the financial gap', with an interest rate of 23%.
"At the same time, there were many banks that were able to provide loans with interest rates much lower than this. I even saw in the documents that in the same month, the town hall in Brittany borrowed a loan from the bank with an interest rate of 19%.
"The reason Necker gave was that 'the credibility of the Swiss bank is more reliable.' Hey, the bank handed over its gold coins to the government, and it still had to worry about the bank's credibility."
Mara looked out the window at the cleaner who was handling Fashion Week posters: "While you were enjoying the Fashion Week event, I went to Switzerland and found out that the bank that originally provided the 5 million loan was opened by Necker's friend. . Oh, they also worked together to sell grain from England before.
“Of course, this is only the first of questionable loans that I have investigated.
"In the more than seven years since he served as treasury controller, the French government has borrowed more than 1 billion livres from major banks or big nobles. I suspect that most of them have problems."
Valls frowned and said, "Are you saying that Mr. Necker used unreasonable loans to obtain benefits from the bank?"
"That's probably what happened. If he only got 1% of the benefit from these loans, that would be over 10 million livres!"
"No, it's impossible!" Vals shook his head and murmured, "Mr. Necker will not..."
Mara was well prepared. He took out a few pieces of paper from his coat pocket, unfolded them and put them on the table: "These are the documents related to the 5 million loan that I copied. You will know after you look at them. If you still don't believe me, I I can take you to see the original.”
Vals turned the document straight with two fingers, looked sideways for a while, then retracted his hand as if bitten by a snake, and said in a low tone: "Why are you telling me this?"
"You were once the most powerful reporter on finance and trade, and you also had many friends in the financial system. Perhaps you can provide me with some information about Necker."
Vals pursed his lips and pondered for a few seconds, then shook his head and said, "I'm sorry, I'm afraid I'm going to disappoint you. In those years, I only focused on positive news about Necker, and I really have nothing of value to give you."
"Anything will do."
"Indeed not..."
Vals suddenly paused as he spoke, looked at Mara and said: "Wait, there is a person, he may have what you want!"
"who is it?"
"Carona, the previous finance minister." Valls said, "He had a lot of conflicts with Necker. It is said that his dismissal was related to Necker.
"He once said in public because of Necker's attack on his tax policy, 'Don't think I don't know what you're doing.' You know, your enemies are often the ones who know you best."
"Carona." Mara nodded thoughtfully, "Where is he now?"
"Have you forgotten? He was exiled to Lorraine."
"Thank you so much!" Mara patted the middle-aged reporter hard, picked up his hat, and turned around and walked out of the house.
…
In the office of the Royal Ordnance Factory on the southeast side of the Palace of Versailles, Joseph, who had just finished the "Production Management Class", rubbed his brows tiredly and looked at several documents in front of him.
On the side, a middle-aged man with a pointed chin pointed to the documents and said: "Your Highness, this is a routine work report. This is the special investigation report of the relevant officials of Fashion Week. This is the special investigation report of the Police Intelligence Department. This is Mr. Marra A report requesting additional manpower..."
Joseph looked through the signatures one by one and said casually: "Thank you for your story, Mr. Cross. Oh, by the way, why didn't Mr. Marat come today?"
This kind of work of submitting documents is usually done by Marat, and the person has never changed. After all, these later Jacobins are somewhat repulsive to the royal family.
Cross said: "Mr. Mara had urgent matters and went to Lorraine last night."
"Lorraine?" Joseph stopped writing, "Did he say what it was?"
"It seems to be related to the official he is investigating."
Necker? Joseph frowned, Mara didn't say a word to him about such a big thing.
"How many people did he bring?"
"As you know, the Impartial Investigation Unit is very short-staffed. There are only two of him and Mr. Evans."
Joseph suddenly felt something was wrong - Mara too underestimated the ruthlessness of those capitalists. Perhaps it is because Necker has been pretending so well that people subconsciously feel that he is a gentle and good person, thus reducing their vigilance.
He hurriedly turned to Eman who was standing not far away and said: "Count Eman, please notify Fouche immediately and ask him to send someone to find Mr. Marat as soon as possible and protect him."
"Yes, Your Highness."
…
Philadelphia, USA.
West bank of the Delaware River.
Outside Benjamin Franklin's estate, Thomas Jefferson watched the French envoy limping off the carriage and couldn't help but frown slightly. The French sent such an unknown and somewhat disabled envoy. Come on, it seems to be a slight to the United States.
However, as a diplomat from a small country, he knew exactly what to do. He immediately suppressed his displeasure, smiled, and greeted him, stroking his chest and saluting: "Welcome to Philadelphia, my dear Archbishop Talleyrand."
He served as ambassador to France for a long time and was very fluent in French.
The old man sitting in a wheelchair next to him seemed to be too old. He raised his hand and waved reluctantly: "Mr. Special Envoy, welcome. When I was in Paris..."
Talleyrand only nodded to Jefferson, then looked at the old man in the wheelchair with a smile:
"You look in good spirits, Mr. Franklin, God bless you. Oh, I heard a lot about you in Paris. You were a well-known figure at that time, and one of my good friends even has a portrait of you in his home. "
He knows very well that this 80-year-old man is the person who has the greatest influence on U.S. policy today - if it hadn't been for his hard work, last year's U.S. Constitutional Convention would have been difficult to hold smoothly.
Not long after, in the brick-red three-story villa on the east side of Franklin Manor, Jefferson looked at Talleyrand with great joy and said: "You mean, the French government wants to wipe out the Barbary pirates?"
Talleyrand straightened his back and looked very confident: "Indeed, our King has deep sympathy for the United States' encounter in the Mediterranean. In order to prevent your merchant ships from being slaughtered, he ignored the objections of several cabinet ministers and Decided to completely eradicate those guys who do all kinds of evil!"
