"welcome!"
As soon as the door was pushed open, the parrot couldn't wait to cry. The bookstore owner looked up sleepily, and wiped the drool from the corner of his mouth with his gray sleeve:
"Sorry, good afternoon, guest."
"Hello."
Jenkins looked around. The store was extremely crowded, and the distance between the bookshelves was extremely narrow, so he casually took out a thin old black book from the side, with "Old Times" written on the cover, which seemed to be A collection of poems by an unhappy poet.
"How much?"
Putting the old book on the counter, leaning on it, the sleeves of the coat pressed against the table by the arm. Glancing back, Chocolate was dashing across the road at breakneck speed, with Pop looking helpless across the street.
"This one... 11p."
The printing quality of this book is extremely poor, and due to poor storage, it has been eaten by moths and has some holes. In fact, it is almost like waste paper.
When he flipped through the poems inside, his thoughts became more firm.
"Wait a mininute."
Jenkins waved at the boss, walked quickly to the front of the store, opened the door and picked up the chocolate, and then walked back again.
"Sorry, how much did you say just now?"
"Eight pence."
He said vaguely, as if he hadn't woken up.
Take out the wallet from the side pocket of the coat, pretending to be counting:
"Your old books here are really expensive!"
"Miss a meal."
The boss muttered, and took out paper from under the counter to help him wrap it up.
"If you open a store in such a good location, you will be short of food? Huh? Why is the alley opposite blocked?"
At the same time as he asked this sentence, Jenkins suddenly realized that he had made such a big circle, and he was doing useless work at all.
"I'm not doing a secret investigation, can't I just ask?"
He made fun of himself.
"It was sealed up by a group of young people in the morning. I heard that the steam pipeline renovation of the city hall is going to be here. It is sealed up to facilitate construction."
Jenkins nodded, picked up the wrapped book, put it in his coat pocket, and turned to leave.
Pushing open the door of the second-hand bookstore, he looked aside subconsciously to check if there was a carriage passing by before he could walk through. When he looked up again, he was suddenly stunned because the old man across the street was gone.
Just two minutes ago, when Chocolate crossed the road, Pop was standing right in front of the new wall. The street is not very wide, and there can be no more than three carriages abreast, so if he wants to leave, shout Jenkins can hear.
With doubts, he quickly walked across the street and looked around, but he didn't see any pedestrians. He opened his eyes of reality and looked on both sides of the road, but he didn't notice the light spot representing the old man.
"strangeness… "
Scratching his hair, after all, in Jenkins' impression, Dad is definitely not the kind of person who would leave without saying a word.
"Chocolate, can you smell Papa?"
He hugged the cat and asked in a low voice, but Chocolate pawed his face directly, probably dissatisfied with Jenkins treating it as a dog.
I stood there for a while, but I didn't see my father come back. He raised his collar to cover his face, and confirmed that there was no one on the street for the time being, so he activated the ability of the cat's elegance, took a few steps to run up the low wall with his hands together, and then turned down again.
There was no one in the alley, only some household garbage was placed by the wall. In the middle of the alley, there is a tree that has lost all its leaves. The residents tied ropes to it, forming a spider web-like grid of clotheslines.
Due to the snow last night, today is also cloudy, so there are not many clothes on the clothesline.
The door closest to the parapet was the back door of the building facing the street, and there were some fresh food scraps in the trash can by the steps. But the black iron door was open, and there was no gatekeeper looking inside.
"Why are you so careless?"
Jenkins muttered something, and then walked to the address that Dad had mentioned.
The Stress family lives on the top floor of a small earth-red two-story building in the alley. This house is probably similar to an apartment building, but it is extremely simple. From a structural point of view, it is impossible for each individual house to have a washroom and toilet, and it is very likely that people in a building share one.
"Is there anyone there?"
Downstairs was a rusty grating door, and there was no bell or bell. After shouting a few times, there was no answer, and with a slight push, the door was pushed open.
"Why don't you close the door?"
He whispered, and looked up at the dilapidated small buildings around him, but he didn't see any residents.
At this moment, he finally realized that something was wrong.
Instead of going through the fence gate, he frowned and walked back to the main road from the other end of the alley with chocolates, seeing no one. After looking for a while at the empty carriage with no horse or driver on the street, he pushed open the door of the gold shop on the street.
Also no one, if Jenkins wanted to, he could have ransacked the place with chocolate right now.
"So, it's not that Dad is missing, but me?"
While thinking about it, he walked back to the alley, then climbed over the low wall on the same path, and walked towards the second-hand bookstore on the other side of the street.
During this process, he kept the [Eye of Reality] open, but he didn't see any suspicious light.
The shopkeeper was still in the shop, as sleepy as ever. The parrot welcomed Jenkins loudly again when he opened the door. Chocolate looked curiously at the human-speaking bird, touched his kitten paw on the stitch on Jenkins' shoulder, squinted his eyes and wondered Thinking about something.
"Welcome, guest."
The old man greeted Jenkins with a yawn, and tapped on the table with his fingers: "Is there a problem with that book? Sorry, this store does not accept returns."
"Tell me, what are you going to do?"
Jenkins stood at the door and asked, not daring to get too close this time. The owner of the second-hand bookstore has a dark aura, and a cautious great writer dare not take risks.
"I'm just a used book seller, what else can I do?"
He shrugged, "You walked into my store, picked out the books yourself, and paid the bill yourself. If you have any questions, you should ask yourself."
"Where is it outside?"
"Who knows?"
"If I pray to the righteous god now, what do you think will happen?"
"It's not going to happen, you can guess it? This is no longer the material world."
Jenkins took a breath and let it out slowly. He had tried to use the projection ceremony to contact Miss Miller of Loen just now, but it was useless at all, and he realized it at that time. Even so, being pointed out positively by the old bookstore owner still made his heart sink.