"Oh, ma'am, this is already the best price. If you are still not satisfied, maybe you can come back tomorrow during the day, when Father Oliver will be in the store, he may give you a better price... But it may be It's lower. Sage, I don't mean to disparage Dad, but he's really better at business than I am."
Seeing that Mrs. Frante was still hesitating, Jenkins could only say this. In fact, he didn't care much about whether the deal could be concluded, he was more curious about where Miss Yindi went just now.
What Jenkins said made Mrs. Frant, who was planning to leave, hesitate again. She stood in front of the counter and kept asking for a price increase, but Jenkins had no business pressure, so he insisted on the price of 23 pounds and 7 shillings.
In the end, Mrs. Frant could only take the jewelry and leave regretfully, looking like she wanted to try her luck at another antique shop.
After the middle-aged woman left, Jenkins did not immediately pick up the novel. After confirming that she would not come back, he immediately picked up the gloves that touched the jewelry just now, put them in front of his nose and sniffed them gently.
This action seemed a little perverted, but he just wanted to confirm his guess. Even after the jewelry had been cleaned, Jenkins could still smell the faint smell of earth.
More precisely, it was the smell of "funeral goods". Dad specifically talked about similar things. The funerary objects were sealed underground, and the wood and other funerary objects in the tomb would rot and produce odors. The smell is unique and difficult to get rid of unless it is treated with professional chemicals or covered with a stronger smell.
"Miss Yindi went out of the city today to rob the tomb?"
He guessed in his mind, but apart from the discovery of the dragon's ruins a while ago, he hadn't heard of any new ancient ruins near Nolan recently.
"Forget it, it's none of my business, don't think too much about it."
He shook his head, put away the things on the counter and started reading again. The cat strolled around and sniffed the gloves, then squinted its eyes, wondering what it was thinking.
There were a lot of guests tonight. Not long after Mrs. Grant left, another old gentleman pushed open the door of the store. He was wearing a very old-fashioned overcoat, but I'm afraid the price of that coat was not cheap. The old man seemed to be in good spirits. He was tall, almost as tall as Jenkins, and his body was slightly fat but normal.
The old man has a round face, age spots and wrinkles are very obvious on the rosy face, but the eyes are very lively, and there are not many wrinkles at the corners of the eyes. His head is mixed with black and white hair. According to his preliminary estimate based on his face, he should be over 50 years old, which can already be called a long life in this era.
Jenkins recognized it as the gifter at a glance, and then the somewhat familiar combination of light spots made him understand that this was the last stranger who sold dead leaves at Mr. Corpse's party yesterday. Emerging, not new players.
It was the first time Jenkins had encountered the participants of Mr. Corpse's party in the lives of ordinary people. But now is not a good time to discuss Mr. Corpse. Jenkins is more curious about the purpose of this old gentleman's arrival.
"Are you the master here?"
The visitor's voice was slow, but in a tone of voice Jenkins had only heard in a manner similar to that of some posturing aristocrat.
"No, this is Papa Oliver's shop, and I'm just his apprentice. Papa is away on errands, and I can be the master to handle some business."
He said very politely, and the guest nodded, and then came to the counter with a cane, and put a gold ring on the counter.
"Okay, please estimate."
Jenkins froze for a moment, this ring was exactly the same as the one that Miss Yindi showed just now. To be more precise, except for the details of the patterns, they are basically the same.
"They robbed the same tomb?"
Jenkins came to this conclusion, but after sniffing, he couldn't smell the funeral objects.
He nodded and took out tools to check, and then further confirmed that this ring was absolutely related to the three gold rings just now.
It's just that the visitor's ring needs to be updated, and it looks like it has been maintained frequently.
"It is indeed a good old thing. I can give you a price of 2 pounds. You see, this place is not pure gold."
Jenkins showed the surface of the ring under the magnifying glass to the old man. His original intention was to lower the price, but the old man didn't seem to care whether it was pure gold or not.
"Sure, £2."
With that said, the old man stretched out his hand to Jenkins. Jenkins looked at him suspiciously, after all, he rarely saw such a cheerful guest. But business still needs to be done. The real value of this ring is definitely not less than 10 pounds.
The old man came and went in a hurry, not even giving Jenkins a chance to ask about the origin of the ring. Jenkins took off his white gloves and directly rubbed the surface of the ring with his fingertips, but he still couldn't connect the old man just now with his neighbor, Mrs. Flatter.
After the old man left, Jenkins thought about it for a while, and then felt that this matter had nothing to do with him, so he picked up the novel and continued reading.
The story he was reading told of a horrific crime that took place in an antique shop late at night. The young apprentice, who has not been trained as a teacher, looks after the shop alone at night when his teacher is away on errands. When he welcomes several waves of customers and is complacent about the successful business, he is unaware of the robbers entering the shop from the backyard.
While the apprentice went to the toilet one time, the robber came to the front from the backyard and hid under the counter. When the apprentice came back, the robber dragged the apprentice into the counter and brutally injured him. After that, he pretended to be an apprentice to receive guests, killed those who visited at night one by one, and finally fled with a large amount of property before the owner of the antique shop returned.
This is a rare story that ends with the escape of the criminal, and there are no characters like policemen or detectives in the story. This means that the story almost recounts what happened that night in a crime documentary style.
So, it's actually a pretty bad story.
"interesting."
Jenkins muttered softly, stretched out his leg and kicked the counter, only to realize that the counter of Papa's Antique Store was solid, which was to cover up the rather large secret room below.
"Could it be such a coincidence?"
He closed the book with doubts, then opened his eyes of truth and turned his head to look at the backyard. Everything was normal there, except for the faint glow of the materials that Dad had hoarded.
"Meow~"
Seeing Jenkins looking around, the cat, which was lying on its stomach, also stood up and looked around. Jenkins smiled and stroked Chocolate's head. As if inspired, it made a more neutral cry.