The next day, Lin Yuchan grandly invited Norton I to have breakfast at the restaurant next to the hotel.

His Majesty hadn’t enjoyed such a sumptuous English breakfast in a long time. With smoked sausage in his left hand, fried bacon in his right, and a mouthful of hot coffee, he mumbled his response to Lin Yuchan’s thanks.

“Ruling for the people is a duty within my responsibilities, no need for excessive courtesy!”

Lin Yuchan smiled as she presented an envelope, explaining that this was a thank-you letter written in a personal capacity by Chen Lanbin, the first Minister of the Qing Dynasty to the United States, thanking “His Majesty Norton I, Emperor of the United States and Protector of Mexico” (originally addressed to Mr. Joshua Norton, citizen of San Francisco) for speaking up for the Chinese people, and welcoming him to visit the Qing Dynasty when he had time.

It was just a ceremonial letter, but Norton, I treasured it like a precious gem. He carefully read the brush calligraphy, traced the large ministerial seal several times, was delighted beyond measure, and carefully stored it away, saying he would deposit this letter in the national treasury as a treasure to be passed down through generations.

“I will certainly consider it, hoping that when official duties are not busy, I can travel by ship to meet the noble Chinese Emperor and Empress Dowager, continuing the friendship between our two nations! By the way, Mrs. Lin, where do you plan to give birth? I can introduce you to a midwife – she’s warm-hearted and highly skilled…”

Truly, the thoughts of a mentally ill person leap far and wide, instantly jumping across a Pacific Ocean in thinking. Lin Yuchan hastily cut off his words, saying that once the railway opened, the mission would head to New England, and she couldn’t accompany His Majesty, which was truly regrettable.

Norton, I was quite disappointed, then said: “No matter, I have loyal subjects on the East Coast too! Like the owner of the ‘Broom and Pot’ grocery store in the old district of New Haven, who has maintained correspondence with me and can sell you discounted milk. And that humorous traveler, Sam, who just got married – I can introduce you…”

…

The “imperial meal” lasted half an hour, during which Lin Yuchan trained herself to Level 8 Western accent listening comprehension. His Majesty finally ate and drank his fill, said official duties were pressing, wiped his mouth, and rose to patrol the district.

Lin Yuchan indicated that the bill should be charged to her account.

The restaurant server understood and respectfully saw him off with his hat removed.

Lin Yuchan casually picked up a copy of the Daily Alta California. Looking up, Su Minguan walked over leisurely, sat across from her, and smiled.

He wore a loose robe that covered the messy work pants and bloodstained shirt sleeves underneath, his entire bearing composed and upright. Only the bloodshot corners of his eyes revealed that he had barely slept all night.

Lin Yuchan asked quietly: “How did it go?”

“Calm seas and gentle winds.” He unceremoniously took a slice of bread from her plate, spreading butter and orange marmalade with a knife. “Three injured, one captured. Police came in the latter half of the night, transferred the bandit to the police station for interrogation. This morning, a railway company representative came, delivered compensation money, and negotiated terms for returning to work. Everyone got an extra two months’ pay.”

Lin Yuchan beamed with joy, picking up her coffee cup to clink with his.

“Well done!”

Su Minguan looked at her gently.

“You worked hard too.”

He had to ensure the safety of his Chinese worker brothers, staying vigilant at the work site all night. Leaving her alone to maneuver at that banquet for so long, he had actually worried so much he barely slept a few minutes.

She insisted she didn’t need his accompaniment and instead uniquely invited that eccentric old madman as her companion. Because of her words, “don’t control me,” Su Minguan hesitated for a long time and didn’t interfere. He only reminded her to bring her pistol.

Using his years of sharp intuition for reading people, he felt that aside from being somewhat obsessive, Norton I was fundamentally kind-hearted and quite popular in the city. For the sake of His Majesty’s face, even if Lin Yuchan did something outrageous, people probably wouldn’t make things difficult for this foreign girl.

If she had chosen any familiar acquaintance as her male companion – Su Minguan himself, Rong Hong, or even Minister Chen Lanbin (if he were willing) – it might not have achieved last night’s dramatic effect.

Moreover, Norton I was the only outsider who knew she was pregnant. He even thoughtfully helped her deflect several drinks.

This America truly produced remarkable people. A’Mei’s judgment was quite accurate.

Seeing Su Minguan lost in thought, Lin Yuchan waved the newspaper in front of his eyes.

“Guess how much Central Pacific Railroad’s stock dropped at opening?”

Su Minguan took a sip of American coffee, not quite used to the taste, smiling with a furrowed brow.

“I thought you’d already placed a sell order.”

“I’ve decided to remain as a mole within the capitalist ranks.” Lin Yuchan smiled radiantly. “A cunning rabbit has three burrows.”

After Mr. Stanford’s emergency public relations effort, the newspaper only reported yesterday’s shareholder banquet debacle in a very small section, and sparingly published Central Pacific Railroad’s announcement promising to improve worker benefits, calling for railway workers to quickly return to work and restore transportation order.

The few sentences were carefully worded, and the ending even boasted about the company’s performance, quite like turning a funeral into a celebration.

However, on the same page, “Southern Railroad Company” simultaneously published an announcement condemning the Central Pacific Railroad Company’s abuse of Chinese workers and collusion with criminal elements, calling for a federal government investigation.

From these evasive fragments, sharp speculators could sniff out details and reconstruct the entire incident with near certainty.

For profit-driven railway companies, “workers striking due to abuse, the company forced to accept conditions” was undoubtedly major bad news.

News from the New York Stock Exchange reported that Central Pacific’s stock price opened with a heavy fall, dropping to around $15.

New shareholders who bought at high prices might complain bitterly. But for Lin Yuchan, whose average cost per share was less than one dollar, she still had over ten times the profit. This small drop couldn’t hurt her at all.

However, selling stocks today would be too disadvantageous. Lin Yuchan figured that this kind of black swan event, causing stock prices to plunge, wouldn’t affect the company’s fundamentals, and there would surely be speculators taking advantage to buy at the bottom, with stock prices slowly recovering. After a while, when they reached the East, she could go to the New York Stock Exchange to sell at higher prices, maximizing her wool-shearing for the capitalists.

“How is A’Fu?” She bit into the bread Su Minguan handed her, feeling there was too much orange marmalade, then sipped coffee. “You should still persuade him to quit and recover. Continuing like this doesn’t look good. If he can’t repay the boat fare, I’ll pay it.”

Su Minguan’s expression darkened slightly. Just as he was about to say something, suddenly the restaurant waiter approached with a broad smile. The clock on the wall chimed nine times.

“Chinese lady, there’s a Mr. Thomas Edison here, claiming to have an appointment with you.”

At Lin Yuchan’s insistence, Su Minguan still took her to the railway construction site once.

The torn-up tracks had been repaired and were expected to open for traffic tomorrow. Using her major shareholder status, Lin Yuchan successfully jumped the queue, securing connected seats for Chen Lanbin, Rong Hong, and dozens of students.

White supervisors reappeared at the work site, but they were different from before, no longer treating these small-statured Chinese like slaves. According to the strike agreement, the railway company had replaced the original supervisors and hired a new batch. These people, learning that the Chinese workers had organized to repel “Bloody Charlie’s” gang, regarded them with awe and curiosity, and relations were currently quite cordial.

To avoid exposing her “capitalist mole” identity, Lin Yuchan changed into the azure cloth jacket commonly worn by Chinatown women, covered her head with a scarf, carried a basket of vegetables, pretended to be a visiting family member, registered under a false name, and entered the work site gate.

The white supervisors were face-blind when it came to Chinese people and didn’t ask a single question.

Of course, Su Minguan didn’t let her approach the scene filled with black dust. Instead, in the workers’ rest hut, he had A’Xian wash his hands clean to make tea for her.

Posted on the crooked wooden door was the latest agreement signed between the company and workers:

First, the monthly salary increased to $32, with bonuses for the Chinese New Year;

Second, work hours were reduced to 10 hours for outdoor work, 8 hours for tunnel work, with further reductions during severe weather;

Third, detailed work injury compensation guidelines;

Fourth, improved housing conditions for Chinese workers, building wooden houses that could withstand wind and snow;

Fifth, allocating one train car to establish a Chinese store, regularly stocking goods from San Francisco Chinatown, selling Chinese food ingredients, shoes, hats, paper, tea leaves, etc., at cost price.

This was the result of Su Minguan leading the Chinese workers with guns in intense late-night negotiations. Mr. Stanford, having suffered a heavy blow at the banquet, being publicly betrayed by his shareholders and secretly stabbed by competitors, had to make huge concessions for the sake of face and to quickly resume work to receive government subsidies.

Although they didn’t achieve equal pay with white workers, they successfully shortened work hours and improved working and living conditions, and everyone was quite satisfied.

Lin Yuchan briefly asked about details. The struggle process differed somewhat from her “proletarian unity” vision, being more like the guild-style actions of Yason Shipyard. This was also the way of unity that overseas Chinese were more accustomed to.

The Chinese workers were jubilant, bare-chested, showing their lean ribs, carefully greeting her.

“Congratulations, sister!”

Lin Yuchan blushed. Well, everyone knew.

She toured the Chinese store. The shrewd capitalists, to save manpower, set up the store as self-service. Chinese workers freely took supplies, with someone coming weekly to restock and settle accounts. Debts were deducted from wages, so there was no fear of Chinese workers defaulting. It was somewhat like an early supermarket.

In one corner of the “supermarket,” about one square meter was set aside with a “Hongshun Hall” wooden plaque, surrounded by curling incense smoke. Various deity tablets originally erected in the wilderness finally had a roof to shelter them from wind and rain.

In the center of the small shrine sat a very formal ebony spirit tablet specially rush-ordered from Chinatown, with just a few characters: “Spirit Tablet of Chen A’Fu from Jiangmen,” with a black, withered pumpkin stem placed in front.

Sepsis was an incurable disease at this time. After the victory of the strike struggle, A’Fu let out his final breath and passed away that very night, becoming an ordinary member among the tens of thousands of Chinese buried on the far shore of the ocean.

At least his name remained.

The saying goes that bridge and road builders leave no corpses. Capitalists wouldn’t erect monuments for him, and the countless Americans riding trains wouldn’t know his name. Even his deeds of leading fellow workers in rising to resist would slowly be forgotten, overshadowed by more intense, more successful, and more organized struggles.

The spirit tablet was also carved with small characters “489,” Hongmen code indicating he was the first Dragon Head of the American branch Hongshun Hall. Su Minguan moved the tablet, placing it in the center, and lit a stick of incense.

Lin Yuchan felt melancholy and also offered incense to A’Fu.

Someone gently tugged her sleeve. The taciturn little A’Xian, with red-rimmed eyes, stuffed a roll of crumpled, dirty banknotes into her hands.

“Uncle A’Fu’s savings from these past years, thirty-six and a half dollars total. He said to return it all to you.”

From bailing out A’Xian to hiring doctors for A’Fu, buying medicine, purchasing hunting rifle ammunition for self-defense, photographing evidence, printing flyers… Lin Yuchan had paid for everything, spending over nine hundred dollars total.

Although A’Fu was reluctant to receive charity, with collective safety at stake, he had to accept it temporarily, but kept it in mind until his death.

He repaid what he could, not keeping a single cent for himself.

Lin Yuchan clutched that money, her heart heavy.

The other workers didn’t seem too sorrowful. Too many Chinese had died at work sites; suffering had long numbed their nerves. Everyone just clasped their hands when passing the spirit tablet, saying “Farewell, Brother A’Fu.”

Someone asked Su Minguan: “What about A’Fu’s funeral arrangements?”

With A’Fu dead, the Chinese worker group was leaderless. Although this halfway-parachuted Jin Lanhe hadn’t usurped A’Fu’s leadership and had even consciously accepted A’Fu’s command, when Su Minguan led everyone to repel the armed cowboys, he naturally confirmed his position as Dragon Head.

Su Minguan’s character meant he didn’t bother with “three refusals and three deferrals” – he only knew “if I can do it, I’ll step up.”

He thought for a moment and said, “Returning fallen leaves to their roots would be best. But trans-Pacific ships won’t carry Chinese corpses. I’ve inquired – when Chinese die in Chinatown, they can generally only be buried in nearby Black Christian cemeteries. But A’Fu died suddenly without time for baptism, and several Black cemeteries won’t accept him. So…”

Several Chinese workers looked toward distant hills.

Someone sighed: “Same as others. Stop where you fall, stay where you are. That’s all we can do.”

Lin Yuchan felt that wouldn’t do. Su Minguan certainly wouldn’t let his Hongshun Hall brother be casually buried on some hillside.

“Buy a plot of land. Make it a Chinese cemetery in the future. I’ll pay.” She suddenly said. “Don’t refuse yet. I’m holding thousands in railway company dividends – this money burns my hands, better to spend it clean. I’ll put up four thousand dollars first, donating it as membership fees to American Hongshun Hall. In the future, when everyone has an illness or a disaster, there will be support. When fighting with American masters, there will be backing. I depart tomorrow and can’t delay long – leave this money here first.”

Knowing Su Minguan had no ready cash, she actively transformed into a human ATM, speaking these words lightly.

Su Minguan looked at her with slight surprise but didn’t make petty refusals.

Instead, he quietly said thank you and asked everyone: “Is it enough? I’m not familiar with local land prices.”

The entire liquidated assets of the Guangdong Hongshun Hall, equivalent to 600,000 taels of silver in China Merchants Company stock, were all managed under her name. She was willing to advance this money, finding ways to handle it through dark accounts later.

The Chinese workers looked at each other and instinctively shook their heads.

“It’s probably enough, but… no, no good… too much, nobody can handle that much…”

Cook A’Xian suddenly raised his hand.

“I, I, I can! I manage cooking, have more free time, often go to the city, and understand accounts. Everyone can supervise – I absolutely won’t spend randomly!”

Su Minguan smiled and asked: “What’s the largest sum you’ve ever spent?”

A’Xian puffed out his chest: “Fifty silver dollars. Boat fare to the snakehead.”

“Good. You’re responsible for this. Everyone here is a witness. I must accompany Miss Lin eastward. When I return, I’ll come back to check the accounts. If you don’t do well, that’s fine – I won’t be harsh. But if there’s one cent unaccounted for…”

Su Minguan’s tone carried natural intimidation. A’Xian listened and went from elated to fearful, finally nodding with some awe.

“No, no, won’t happen. I’ll definitely… do it well.”

Su Minguan: “Have you ever burned incense?”

“Uncle A’Fu took me to burn some…”

“Good. Make a promise before the founding master’s spirit.”

A’Xian’s expression became solemn as he knelt before the tablet as instructed.

Lin Yuchan secretly pursed her lips, watching Su Minguan’s daily revival of tradition.

Among all the new and old Hongshun Hall brothers present, only he had never burned incense. But now no one would expose this.

Su Minguan didn’t even need to look to know this girl was laughing at him. Avoiding others, he quietly laughed: “You’re now a major shareholder of American Hongshun Hall. You could be Dragon Head too if you want – change the rules however you like.”

Lin Yuchan was very moved but declined. For leading a guild through gunfire, professional manager Su Minguan was more suitable. Providing money was the easiest part.

She glanced at the clock hanging on the gas lamp post – half an hour had passed.

“Family visit” time couldn’t be too long, or it would arouse suspicion.

She exchanged glances with Su Minguan and bid farewell to the Chinese workers.