Richard looked forward to Saturday. But Wednesday arrived first.
On this day, the head of the Department of Magical Economy of the Ministry of Magic had already arrived to see Gerald Rich, but at that moment Richard was busy with tutoring for the third year of secondary school.
A contract was signed with a representative of the wizarding governing body for the Ministry of Magic to lease a plot of land for ninety years, with the right to sublease. After this period, the tenants will pay directly to the owner, the Richs. Until then, the Ministry of Magic is obligated to pay Richard Rich or his heir ten Galleons per hectare per year, for a total of three thousand four hundred Galleons annually.
Gerald told Richard about all this after dinner.
"Dad, what is a galleon?" the boy asked.
"The galleon is the biggest 'thing' of British mages. It's supposedly gold. Mages have two other types of coins. The sickle is supposedly silver, with seventeen of them in a galleon. And the knut is a small copper coin, with twenty-nine of them in a sickle. Basically, it's a classic small-community thing-everything is done to make them different from ordinary people. Even with coins, mages have become quite perverse."
- Dad, why do you say "sort of"?
"Because, Richie, one Galleon is worth about five pounds. In fact, there's just enough gold in a Galleon and silver in a Sickle to make them worth about the same-which is to say, very little. Otherwise, wizards would be flocks of their currency to pawnshops."
"Five pounds, huh?" Richard quickly calculated the rent in his head. "Seventeen thousand pounds a year?!" He grimaced as if he'd eaten a lemon. "I spent that much on a week's stay in Tokyo."
"I had to make concessions," Gerald replied. "Think of it as a bribe for loyalty from the wizarding government."
"The Ministry of Magic will probably raise the sublease price two or three times," Richard muttered discontentedly.
"I have no doubt about it, son. They'll also probably build the farms themselves at rock-bottom prices and sell them to farmers on mortgages or long-term installments at prices several times higher than the cost price. As I understand it, the Ministry of Magic doesn't have many ways to fill its coffers: taxes on wizarding shopkeepers, excise duties, duties on magical goods, fines. And wizards need something to do after school. Some will become farmers, some will go work in a hospital for wizards, and what about the rest? To prevent crime, most wizards are placed with the Ministry of Magic, and they all need to be paid. So, the whole point of wizarding society in Britain is work for the sake of work.
- Just like in the army - as long as the soldier is busy with something, so that there is no free time for nonsense.
"Well observed, Richie. Incidentally, wizards' salaries are low, and despite all their efforts, the unemployment rate is quite high. The head of the Department of Magical Economy earns only two hundred and fifty Galleons a month."
"That's quite modest for a department head," Richard remarked. "Compared to that, my three thousand a year seems like a substantial sum. It's even a little more than a ministry bigwig's salary. But it's still not enough. Dad, did you find out from the wizard how much money can be converted into chips?"
"Of course, Richie. Currency exchange and storage is handled by the only wizarding bank in Britain, which belongs to..." Gerald chuckled meaningfully. "The goblins! They have a limit of a thousand pounds per month per wizard."
"Not much. You can't really do much with that kind of money... So, goblins, huh?"
- Goblins.
- Goblins?!
- Goblins!
"Dad, this is so weird! Where did these goblins even come from?"
"Good question, Richie," Gerald said, a wry smile creeping across his face. "I wondered the same thing. Luckily, the wizard was sociable. He told me that about six hundred years ago, short people from another world, where a global catastrophe had occurred, appeared in our world. They were of two races: goblins-aggressive savages who were quite skilled at blacksmithing; and house elves-powerful mages, but very trusting. The wizards enslaved the latter using cunning, and waged war against the goblins for a long time until they found a niche for them in the form of a bank, which they still own and run to this day.
"Hmm," the boy said skeptically. "There are aliens living among us, and we've never heard of them. But how wise is it to hand over control of our finances to aggressive aliens?"
"A pretty good move, if you ask me," said Rich senior.
Richard's face twisted into a grimace that betrayed a ton of skepticism.
"I see, son, you don't believe it. But I'll prove to you that it is so."
- Try it, dad.
"Look, son. We have a small group of aliens, and we need to deal with them. The most obvious solution is genocide. But apparently, the wizards didn't have the strength for that. The goblins tried to avoid ordinary people, because they would certainly have had the strength to destroy the strange freaks, especially since the Church was powerful at the time and could have launched another crusade."
- Let's say so.
Mr. Rich continued:
"For obvious reasons, the wizards didn't want to attract the attention of a power like the church. So they decided to manage on their own. And then someone's genius came up with the idea of finding a niche for the goblins that they wouldn't want to leave. From this perspective, the creation of a goblin bank seems entirely logical."
"I'm beginning to understand," Richard said, his skepticism gone. "So it turns out the goblins think they control the wizard economy. With their high profits, they've reined in their aggressive brethren. Yet they can't come out of hiding. Firstly, the wizards wouldn't let them, as that would violate the Statute of Secrecy. Secondly, they must understand perfectly well that they're influential financiers only among wizards, while in the mundane world they're nothing. Moreover, there are far more people now than in the Middle Ages. Ordinary people have far more developed weapons and methods of killing. And yet, humans remain as xenophobic as ever. So, at best, the goblins face the fate of guinea pigs in research labs; at worst, genocide. So they're not making a fuss. Therefore, it's highly likely that wizards trust the goblin bank."