Bai was waiting in the courier yard when Yan arrived. A guild manager stood over a ledger with a complaint slip in his hand. Two other couriers had stopped nearby, pretending to sort their bags while they listened.
“Bai Jiu,” the manager said, “you’ve been diverting reject stock without permission. Your route may be removed.”
Bai’s face hardened. “The packets were marked for disposal.”
“Huo Jue says you sold goods that belonged to the guild.”
Yan looked at the slip. The ink was fresh. “Can we compare the complaint with the return tags and the delivery book?”
The manager turned to him. “This is a courier matter.”
“Then the book should settle it.” Yan pointed to Bai’s open ledger. “It records what came in, what was rejected, and what he carried away.”
Bai set the book on the counter. “I’ll show the entries. But if this is a rule, I want the rule in writing.”
The manager flipped through the pages. He stopped on the return-tag entries and checked the batch numbers against the complaint. Each packet Bai had carried was marked for disposal or return. The unknown jar was listed separately, with a note that it had not been offered or sold.
“You need a storehouse record for every transfer,” the manager said. “A courier cannot sell stock merely because it was rejected.”
“Then why was I allowed to take these packets?” Bai asked. “The clerk gave me the return tags and told me to keep the copies.”
“Those tags record a return. They do not authorize resale.”
“Which policy says so?”
The manager tapped the complaint. “The new procedure applies to all reject stock.”
Yan read the date. “This was issued yesterday.”
“It was announced yesterday.”
“After Huo filed the complaint?”
The manager paused. Huo Jue entered through the gate at that moment, carrying a narrow receipt. “I filed because Bai has been selling stock that came from my route. He should lose his position.”
Bai closed his book halfway. “You said the bundle was yours because you bought it legally. What did you buy?”
Huo held up the receipt. It named a return cart but did not identify a batch. “A jar and several packets.”
“Was the jar tagged?” Yan asked.
Huo’s jaw tightened. “It was sealed.”
“That isn’t a batch tag,” the manager said. He examined the receipt. “The container is unknown stock. If you still have it, it must be quarantined until the source is identified.”
“It’s at my stall,” Huo said. “I’ll bring it after market close.”
“Bring it now. The quarantine shelf is open.” The manager wrote the hold instruction on the complaint slip and gave Huo a copy. “No one is asking you to surrender the other sealed packets. The jar has no tag and needs an inventory search.”
Huo took the slip. He looked as if he wanted to argue, but the two couriers at the side counter had started reading the posted route rules. He left through the gate to fetch the jar.
Huo returned with the cloudy container wrapped in cloth. Tao was called from the storehouse desk to examine the old glass and assign a temporary tag. No one opened it. The manager signed the hold record, and Huo watched Tao lock it in the quarantine shelf. It was his jar to reclaim if the source could be established; until then, it could not be sold as a known product.
Huo looked at the manager, then at Bai. “You’re changing the rule because he has a better book.”
“I’m applying the rule I announced,” the manager said. “It must apply to every courier and seller, including you.”
Bai pulled his ledger fully open. “Then show the entire route book, not only my transactions. If every courier needs a storehouse transfer for each reject, I want the procedure applied to all of us.”
The manager glanced at the listening couriers. “That is the policy.”
“Put it on the board, with the same return tag and transfer steps for all routes.” Bai tapped the written complaint. “I’ll follow it if the other couriers do too.”
One of the nearby workers set down his sack. “I take rejected jars back to the south store. I’ve never been asked for a separate transfer slip.”
Another courier nodded. “Neither have I.”
The manager rubbed his forehead. “Then the policy was not clearly posted. I’ll have the transfer record added to the board and apply it from today. Bai, your current route entries are valid under the procedure in effect when you took the stock. You may keep the route.”
He wrote an initialed note in the margin and stamped Bai’s route sheet. The complaint remained in the file, but the suspension was removed. Huo was ordered to bring the unknown jar to the quarantine shelf and wait for an inventory search. He left with the receipt clenched between his fingers.
The manager pinned the new instructions to the yard board. It required a return tag, a transfer slip, and a route-book entry. The same forms would be used by every courier. The two workers who had spoken stepped closer to read it.
Bai turned his stamped sheet toward Yan. “I was ready to quit rather than let him dictate every coin.”
“I would have bought your remaining stock,” Yan said. “I would not have bought the route.”
Bai laughed. “You would be a terrible employer.”
“I know.”
They walked toward the market lane for fried dumplings. Bai counted out the cost of the food himself. “The route is mine. The stock is mine when the tags say it is. I can do business without pretending every clerk is fair.”
“Now the rule is posted.”
“For today. If it changes again, I’ll ask for the book.”
At the gate, the two other couriers approached Bai. One asked if he could show them how he kept return tags with the batch entries. Bai opened the book and demonstrated the columns without hiding his prices. Yan stood by while the other courier copied the procedure into his own ledger.
“You’ve turned a complaint into a small class,” Yan said.
“I turned it into fewer arguments next week.” Bai gave each courier a page number where the new policy had been recorded. “That’s different.”
The manager initialed the posted route policy in front of the others. The couriers signed that they had read it. Bai tucked his restored route sheet into the back cover of the book. He kept the same route, the same fee arrangement, and the responsibility for his own customers. The new procedure gave them all a way to prove what they carried.
One courier asked Bai to check a return tag from the south store. Its batch number had been smudged, and he had written a different number in his book. Bai compared the transfer slip with the packet and noticed the last two digits had been reversed in the copy. He corrected his entry with a single line, then asked the courier to sign the change.
“If we both initial it, nobody has to guess which number is right,” Bai said.
The courier nodded and signed. The manager watched, then added the same correction method to the bottom of the posted procedure. The two couriers copied the new line into their own books. Bai’s ledger had become an example, but it stayed his own record; he did not hand the book over or let anyone rewrite the original pages.
They shared a pot of tea before leaving the yard. Bai dunked one dumpling in it by mistake and ate it anyway.
“Your tea is worse than the pill powder,” Yan said.
“Then don’t buy it from me.”
“I don’t buy tea from you.”
“Exactly. Your judgment is sound.”
They left the yard with the complaint settled and the rules posted where every courier could read them. Bai had lost no route and gained no special favor. The book stayed with him, open to the procedure that applied to all.