Living The Art Agony Chapter 9

After playing "Xiaoxiang Water Clouds", he extinguished the incense sticks that were still lingering in his heart. Outside the large French windows, the city was covered in the black cloak of night, like a magnificent universe spreading out before his eyes.

This is a condensed universe. The stars of lights shine and collide with each other in a dense arrangement, using the weak prosperity and bustle to cover up the coldness of darkness. The universe is also an enlarged city, where all the prosperity and bustle are infinitely diluted, revealing their original appearance.

He likes to quietly observe this city that changes its appearance day and night. Facing the skyline that gets taller every few months, he tries to feel the pulse of the city by following the ups and downs of the buildings. Seeing a city is as difficult as seeing people. They never show their truest selves, but always perform the right self in the right scene. In this way, it is more interesting to dilute everything in the universe. No one will question its prosperity and bustle, and it has always left people with only emptiness and mystery.

I haven't been watching Max for two days. I wonder what this guy is doing. In order to find Max, he hacked into the traffic monitoring system again a few days ago and found Max in Xiaolinzhuang on the South Fourth Ring Road. This guy just walked into a lamb rib hot pot restaurant.

Since Max escaped from prison, the police have been looking for him. However, with so many surveillance devices, the question is not whether they can find him, but how quickly they can find him. In order to control Max before the police, he had to race with the police. With almost the same equipment and efforts, the party that finds him first often has a bit of luck. And he was lucky to find an inconspicuous target in the surveillance of Xiaolinzhuang that day.

He had been looking at the screen for fifteen hours straight, and his eyes were stinging. But he was lucky enough to see Max, and he would never let this opportunity go. He didn't care about the discomfort in his eyes, put on loose clothes, a mask and a baseball cap, went downstairs, took a taxi, and rushed to the mutton spine hot pot restaurant.

The hot pot restaurant was not difficult to find. It was near the north entrance of Xiaolin Village and barely appeared in the corner of the surveillance camera. Perhaps this was why Max did not attract the attention of the police at the first time. After Max had eaten and drunk his fill, he followed him all the way and finally found the guy's hiding place.

The alley was cold and damp, and was covered with advertisements for infertility treatment and mahjong skills. The government had not yet installed the "Sky Eye" here. He took out the miniature camera he had prepared from his jacket pocket and fixed it in the crack of the brick wall of the bungalow fifteen meters away, with the lens facing the door of Max's temporary residence. A power bank connected to the camera was also embedded in the crack of the brick. After he finished these, he picked up some mud and sand on the spot and painted the wall a little.

Since then, he had to go and change the power bank regularly. But he didn't watch the surveillance every day, because after two days, he quickly got bored. Now the whole city is full of surveillance, and the cost of Max moving around is too high. Besides, it was still early for him to plan to kill Max, and it was boring to stare at a rusty and closed door every day.

But tonight, he felt bored again. Boring things change, but human boredom is eternal. The surveillance that bored him before now piqued his interest again. He turned on his computer and looked through the videos of the past few days.

Max doesn't go out often, but when he does, he buys two large bags of food and daily necessities. He obviously doesn't plan to go out again soon. It didn't take him too long from leaving empty-handed to returning with two full bags. It can be seen that he should be shopping in a small convenience supermarket run by a self-employed person within a few hundred meters. He doesn't need to walk far or wait in a long line to pay. This guy is a habitual offender and knows how to minimize the risk of being caught again. The smog that has been raging in Yudong City in recent years has also helped him a lot. The mask he never takes off does not make him stand out in the crowd.

Looking at Max on the screen, he couldn't help but laugh. This guy's figure is quite similar to his. If they are in the same group, he has a substitute.

The door was closed, and he continued to fast forward. Except for receiving a package at noon on the 10th, Max's door had never been opened.

Wait, express delivery? He is a murderer who just escaped from prison. He hopes that the whole world can't find him. It's impossible for him to buy online. So who would send him a package and know his exact phone number and address?

If you think about it carefully, there are actually many interesting things. For example, Max escaped from prison with nothing on him, so where did he get the key to open the door? Although it is impossible to rule out the possibility that he hid the key somewhere, it is also possible that someone has been waiting for him here. The act of receiving the express delivery itself shows that he is not alone. In addition, what is in the express box?

He wrote down these questions and continued reading on fast forward.

At 1:30 a.m. on the 12th, the iron door of Max's residence opened again. Max, wearing a mask and carrying a thin black bag on his shoulder, lifted a battery-powered vehicle with both hands and crossed the threshold. At the same time, he looked around vigilantly, which made him look even more sneaky in the early hours of the morning.

Although there were no surveillance cameras in this dilapidated village in the city, it did not prevent him from quickly locating Max at an exit. Qi could only exit from three exits, and there were few pedestrians at this time, so Qi's sudden appearance was particularly conspicuous.

Max rode north for about 20 minutes. When he saw where this guy parked his car, he frowned. Provincial Museum? What was this guy going to do?

He had cracked the provincial museum's surveillance long ago. Max quickly found the best place to climb over the wall, threw the black bag on his shoulder into the courtyard, then climbed in with familiarity, took the black bag, and walked into the basement with his head held high, taking the shortest route, as if he was very familiar with the place.

The way this guy entered the Provincial Museum was exactly the same as the way he did that day when he put up the blood painting, he thought in surprise.

Max took out a bunch of keys from his pocket and opened the three doors of the storage room one after another.

There is a key! Could it be... that courier?

There was no one on duty from 11pm to 7am. Max quickly walked to a row of safes, opened one of them without hesitation, took out the scroll inside, then opened the black bag he brought with him and stuffed a scroll of the same length into it. After that, Max left with the scroll he had taken out, climbed over the wall, rode on an electric bike, crossed the bridge, entered a surveillance blind spot not far away, and disappeared into an old residential building. He did not come out for a long time.

He quickly turned the surveillance camera back to Max's hiding place at the small wooden stake and found that the guy came back empty-handed at 8:30 a.m. on the 12th. It seemed that the things had been successfully sold.

This also shows that the painting stolen from the Provincial Museum was most likely transferred in that old community. He went back to analyze the surveillance cameras at several exits of the community and saw Max riding a bicycle out of the community at 7 o'clock, with nothing on his body or on his bicycle. So there are only two possibilities for the whereabouts of the painting: one is that it was given to someone living in the community; the other is that it was given to someone in the community, and that person also left the community at some point, and they just chose this blind spot in the surveillance to transfer the stolen goods.

If it was the first possibility, since there was no surveillance in this community, no matter how hard he tried, it would be fruitless. But if the person who contacted Max also left the community at some point, there would be hope of finding clues.

His original purpose was simple, which was to keep an eye on Max and make sure his prey didn't run away before the hunting date. But Max's unexpected action aroused his interest, and at the same time, he couldn't help but worry. He was a person who loved paintings, and he absolutely couldn't accept the real things in the museum being replaced. He also understood that the provincial museum had a large collection, and if it wasn't a national treasure, it would never be kept in a safe. Which painting could it be?

The matter of national treasures is a big deal, and anxiety arises naturally.

He began to study the surveillance cameras at several exits of the community where the scroll was switched. Max left the community at 7 o'clock. The 12th was a weekend, and before 7 o'clock, there were only aunties and uncles carrying vegetable baskets out to buy vegetables. Between 7 and 8 o'clock, several suspicious people came out of the community one after another. The so-called suspicious people are those who brought out bags that were big enough to hold the scroll. He did not check the suspicious people in the order they left the community, but first checked the ones that made him feel the most suspicious within the unit time period. If there was no one, he would continue to check for the next hour.

The person who attracted him the most appeared at 7:28. He looked about 40 years old, wearing a navy blue sweater. He didn't wrap himself up too tightly, and his gestures were quite natural. He was pushing a black suitcase about 30 inches long, and looked like he was going on a long journey. For a scroll of painting, the suitcase was a bit exaggerated. But he always felt that this person gave him an uncomfortable feeling. He was used to following his own feelings.

His feeling was right. The middle-aged man pushing the suitcase was not going to the train station or the airport. The taxi stopped in front of a high-end villa area. When the man walked into the villa area and knocked on the door of a three-story villa, he was shocked but also realized: there was a 90% probability that he was following the right person.

This is Hu Qiuzhi's residence.

Anyone in the art circle of Yudong City knows where Hu Qiuzhi lives. Professor Hu never hides his wealth from the outside world. As a collector, he owns many top-notch antiques, calligraphy and paintings, most of which are hidden in this small building. He is not afraid of thieves, and has long spread the word through the media that there are surveillance cameras everywhere in his home.

The middle-aged man left the residential area where he handed over the stolen goods and went straight to find a person in the calligraphy and painting circle, and the head of the expert group of the Provincial Museum. What this means is obvious. Moreover, with Hu Qiuzhi's relationship with the Provincial Museum, the key and password in Max's hands might have been provided by Hu Qiuzhi. And how could a gangster like Max be so familiar with the Provincial Museum, a place of high culture? Perhaps Hu Qiuzhi also provided a map and security details in the museum? Thinking of this, he was almost certain that the scroll was in the black suitcase.

When he was hacking the surveillance camera at Hu Qiuzhi's house, he was reluctant to continue. He learned painting many years ago because he naively believed that people in the art world were simple and clean. As a top painter in China, Hu Qiuzhi had no reason to do such a thing.

But why did these people, who were supposed to be the cleanest, become the dirtiest group? Compared to the dirt itself, he hated the process of exposing the dirt himself even more.

However, enduring the pain and moving towards even deeper pain is a certain explanation of life and also his destiny.

The middle-aged man opened the black suitcase in front of Hu Qiuzhi. Hu Qiuzhi took out the scroll and carefully unfolded it on the drawing table.

"Autumn Clearing in a Fishing Village"!

He couldn't believe his eyes. Wasn't this painting on display at the Provincial Museum? How could it be... But based on the time when the painting was stolen and the series of security measures taken by the Provincial Museum, it should be an authentic painting. And if it is an authentic painting, then the one in the museum's exhibition hall must be a fake one that Max had arranged! Thinking of this, his head buzzed, and he almost forgot that he had only wanted to keep an eye on Max.

But the scandal that shocked him was far from over.

Hu Qiuzhi looked at "Fishing Village in Autumn" and nodded. "Yes, yes, it's the original." He just admired it, raised his head, and said to the middle-aged man with an expression that said, "Okay, I will give it to Mr. Zhao in person later. Thank you for your hard work."

After hearing this, the middle-aged man nodded tactfully and pushed the empty suitcase out.

Who is Mr. Zhao? This question suddenly popped into his mind.

Obviously, the matter is not simple. Max passed the stolen painting to Hu Qiuzhi through the middle-aged man, which made him think that Hu Qiuzhi, as a painting fanatic, cherished the painting and hired a thief to steal the painting. However, the conversation just now proved that Hu Qiuzhi was just a person in charge of transferring the painting.

Since the surname Zhao has the word "Zong" after it, he is most likely a businessman. With Hu Qiuzhi's social status, those who can deal with him are not small bosses; and those who can use him as a tool like this, I dare not imagine their background.

After hesitating for a long time, he made up his mind that since he had hacked into Hu Qiu's home surveillance, he had to uncover the truth even if he had to dig up his ancestral grave.

But just as he was about to check all the surveillance footage from Hu's house, Hu Qiuzhi did something that shocked him. He walked to the rosewood antique shelf, squatted down, opened a cabinet at the bottom, and took out a scroll. He placed the scroll and "Autumn Clearing at Fishing Village" side by side on the drawing table and unfolded them.

Another painting of "Autumn Clearing in a Fishing Village"!

He couldn't help but stood up in front of the computer screen, and the mouse in his hand fell to the ground, and a No. 5 battery jumped out.

Professor Hu was seen standing in front of the two paintings, looking at the left one and then the right one. After a while, he nodded with satisfaction and called Mr. Zhao to say that there was no problem with the paintings.

He sat in front of the computer, the tide of his heart surging and rushing towards the endless skyline in despair, looking for a reef to hit and vent. He rubbed his tired eyes and looked through the surveillance footage of Hu Qiuzhi's home for several days.

He learned from a phone call Hu Qiuzhi made in the living room two days ago that Mr. Zhao was Zhao Kangmei, a tycoon in the pharmaceutical industry and the former richest man in Qin Province. And his son was Zhao Chang, the boyfriend of Grace whom he had just killed.

The painting "Fishing Village in Autumn" fell into the hands of thieves, and there were also undercurrents among the thieves. It's a pity that this famous painting will be restored to its rightful place?

Max took the risk of showing up, and he would be arrested by the police sooner or later. In this way, his plan to kill Max himself would fail. He had to race with the police.

A lot of things to think about.

At 3:30 in the morning of the 16th, he suffered from insomnia.