As a well-known barrister in the Chinese community, Gu Lishi used his professional ability to one thousand percent and immediately entered the battle rhythm after accepting Li Mo's commission.
At around 7 o'clock in the evening, the person in charge of the hotel finally arrived belatedly and formally apologized to Expert Chen and compensated him with a generous sum of money.
"Mr. Gulish, this is your reward."
Li Mo wrote him a check with a smile, then picked up a cup of coffee and drank it slowly.
"Thank you Mr. Qin, I will accept it."
"You deserve this. We will continue to visit the market tomorrow. I hope you can cooperate with me better."
"Don't worry, if I can bring more Chinese antiques back to the country, that's what I should do. Where's Mr. Steven, why didn't you see him?"
"I asked him to take the stone sculpture to a professional for appraisal. I believe there will be good news soon. Mr. Gulishi, I will stay in the hotel tonight. All the expenses for these days will be charged to me. In There isn’t much delicious food in America, so we can only drink some coffee and some not-so-palatable pastries, let’s eat some together.”
"So I live in Chinatown and can eat whatever I want. Mr. Qin, there are actually a lot of antique shops in Chinatown. Although I don't understand antiques, I feel that every antique shop there has a good business."
"I will go shopping when I have time."
The next day, as soon as Li Mo finished washing up, there was someone knocking on the door outside. Li Mo opened the door and saw Steven walking in very excitedly and said, "Mr. Qin, the stone sculpture you found at the open-air market is a valuable work of art. It was created by the famous French sculptor Bodel. Early works. His works are very popular in the European and American markets, and every piece of work sold at auction has never sold for less than US$3 million."
Li Mo sat back on the sofa, poured a glass of warm water, took a few sips and said, "Is that the stone sculpture?"
"That's his early work. I've consulted professional appraisal experts. If that stone sculpture goes to auction, the price is expected to be around five million U.S. dollars. Mr. Qin, if you want to sell it, you can do your art The person in charge of commodity trading.”
Steven was very excited. The stone sculptures Li Mo found were already very valuable. He also found an oil painting yesterday. According to his experience, if the oil painting was made by a famous artist, the value might be many times higher than the stone sculpture. As long as he is willing to take action, his agency fee will not be low.
"I will take action, but not now. Today we have to continue visiting the market."
"OK."
Today, except for Expert Chen who stayed in the hotel to recuperate, everyone else went to work at the Boston Museum as normal. Li Mo and the others took a bus to Harrison Avenue, where they found several valuable treasures after just a short stroll at the open-air market there, so he was full of expectations for that place.
"Mr. Qin, there are so many tourists here today."
"When there are many people, you have the opportunity to find good things." Li Mo walked slowly, scanning the stalls one by one with strange eyes, stopping from time to time to ask the stall owner, and he enjoyed bargaining. There were four more people following today, and the bags each of them carried slowly bulged.
"Get everyone back to the car first."
After shopping for more than two hours, I found a lot of good things. I only came across three pieces of Chinese antiques. One was a clear rosewood pen sea, one was a pastel square bottle from the Republic of China, and one was a clear coral ring. The rest They were all foreign works of art. Even though he didn't understand them, they were sensitive to different eyesight, so he bought them all back.
"Mr. Qin, have a drink."
Steven handed over a bottle of freshly squeezed juice drink. Li Mo took it and took two sips, nodded and said, "I have already visited the antique area of the open-air market here. Is there anywhere else I can visit nearby?"
Steven pointed to a small alley diagonally opposite: "There is another alley over there, and there are street stalls there, but the people there are... similar to mobile stalls. Stall owners are mainly divided into two categories. One kind of people come from the surrounding rural areas, and the other kind are a little informal and sell some special things."
"Okay, let's go over and take a look."
There are not many tourists in the alley diagonally opposite, but there are indeed many street stalls. As for what Steven said
There was something special for sale, and Li Mo knew what it meant as soon as he saw it. In addition to the real mobile stalls, almost half of the stall owners are young women dressed very voluptuously.
As for the things sold at the stall, they are naturally related to women's products. The customers who come here are basically men, and the two parties have physical contact from time to time.
Li Mo turned to look at Steven, who smiled awkwardly and said, "The busiest place here is at night."
The things placed on the mobile stalls in the alley were quite strange, and there were many things that Li Mo didn't even know what they were. But there are also many things that look a bit like Indian things. Unfortunately, they are all imitations, otherwise Li Mo would definitely steal them all.
While walking and looking, Li Mo suddenly stopped and squatted down to look at the things on the stall. The stall owner was a slovenly man in his fifties, with a full beard, messy hair, and the clothes he was wearing were torn. He was sitting cross-legged on the ground with a cushion under his buttocks. There were four empty beer cans beside him, and two more were unopened. As for the side dish, it was a box of fried chicken drumsticks, a little charcuterie and chili sauce.
"Can I have a look?"
Steven hurriedly translated, and after getting permission from the drunken boss, Li Mo lifted a three-color tomb beast from the ground.
This tomb-suppressing beast is about 80 centimeters high and 26 centimeters wide. There are double curved horns on the top of its head, its face is ferocious, its eyes are wide open, its mouth is wide open, and its fangs are exposed. The shoulders are decorated with wings, and the surfaces of the wings are decorated with negative lines. The body is in a squatting position and steps on the mountain-shaped base. The whole body is covered with green, white and brown glaze, and the glaze color is bright and moist.
Li Mo took a closer look and found that the tomb-suppressing beast was actually well preserved, with only a few minor bumps and no obvious major damage.
With a sweep of the strange pupils, a red halo was indeed transmitted from the body of the three-color tomb-suppressing beast. Think about it, such antiquities are funerary objects. In the United States, even if you want to fake it, you won't use such antiquities as prototypes.
Li Mo gently put down the three-color tomb-suppressing beast, and his eyes fell on a three-color pottery figurine, which was also an unearthed Tang Dynasty antiquities.
"Did they come out of the same tomb?"
Suspicion suddenly arose in my heart, how could this sloppy boss have three-color tomb beasts and three-color pottery figurines in his hands? Could it be that his ancestors also did those shameful things in China?
There was also porcelain on the stall. Li Mo picked up a blue and white cup and carefully identified it. It turned out to be an authentic blue and white cup from Wanli in the Ming Dynasty.
Yi Tong glanced at the other items. There were two pieces of Tang Sancai and seven pieces of Ming and Qing porcelain on this stall. A total of nine pieces turned out to be ancient relics. Damn it, Li Mo couldn't help but look up at the sloppy boss who was still eating fried chicken legs and asked: "How do you sell this cup?"
"Three hundred dollars." Steven translated seamlessly.
Li Mo also pointed out the Jiaqing pastel plate.
"Five hundred dollars, these are all five hundred dollars." Steven pointed to the tomb beast and the pottery figurines, "The boss said these two big things cost two thousand dollars each."
so cheap!
This slovenly American man's price was so low that Li Mo was embarrassed to bargain. And he was guessing that since this man could display nine genuine items, did he have more genuine items in his hands?
"Steven, ask him if he still has anything like this?"
After a few words of conversation, Steven said: "Mr. Qin, the boss said that he still has many in his hometown in the countryside. If you like it, he can sell them all to you at a cheaper price."
Seeing that Li Mo wanted to buy his things, the sloppy man quickly stood up and chattered a lot, feeling quite excited.
"Mr. Qin, he said the price is negotiable. But if you want to buy it, could you buy him a bottle of liquor first? He would be very grateful."
Turns out he was an alcoholic.
Li Mo glanced at Gu Lishi. They had lived in the United States for many years, so they naturally knew what good wines there were.
"Buy two bottles of good wine for this boss."
Gulishi nodded hurriedly. There were high-end wine shops on both sides of the street, and he quickly bought two bottles of foreign wine. The boss showed his black teeth happily. He quickly took a bottle, opened it, tilted his head and drank three big sips. Then he closed his eyes as if to feel the delicious taste of the wine.
"Steven, I bought all of these. If his house in the country is like this, I will buy them all too."
Steven translated immediately, and the sloppy man gave Li Mo a thumbs up, then nodded.
The security guard behind him took out 7,300 US dollars from his bag and handed it to him. His eyes were bright, and he took the money with both hands and counted them one by one.
"Steven, please communicate with him about when you can visit his home in the countryside. We will carefully move everything on the stall back to the car."
