Chapter 8 Old Man

The corridor on the third floor is different from other floors I have been to before. I wonder if it has been newly renovated. The originally splendid walls have been painted in bright red, which looks very eye-catching at first glance.

Not far away, we stopped in front of a door, which was also red. This makes me wonder about the taste of the owner of Hongfenglou. The beauty in cheongsam raised her hand and knocked on the door. She knocked on the door slowly and quickly, which should be a code that had been discussed in advance.

Someone opened the door. The person who opened the door was a bald man who looked very fierce. In October, he was only wearing a black vest and there were blue tattoos on his exposed arms.

From the first moment I saw the bald head, I felt that Du Xiaosheng beside me became vigilant, and my muscles tightened, always guarding against the bald head. The bald man glanced at us and nodded to the cheongsam beauty. The beauty in the cheongsam received the instruction, smiled at us again, said "Excuse me" and left in a hurry.

The bald man in the room looked at me a few more times and asked, "Is your surname Chen?"

I nodded, looked at him lightly, and said, "Yes."

The bald man was originally blocking the door, preventing me from seeing the scene inside the house. When he saw me nodding, he turned around and walked back, gesturing for us to go in. I raised my legs to follow, but an arm stopped me.

The person who stopped me was Du Xiaosheng. I glanced at him doubtfully. He caught my gaze, shook his head and said, "I'll go first."

I understand that he is afraid that there is something fishy behind the door. I have to say that he was a little too defensive, but Du Xiaosheng was thinking about me, so I really couldn't say anything.

The room was very spacious, equal to half a hall. There was a small wooden table in the center of the room. An old man with wrinkles on his face was sitting at the table, holding a bowl of tea in his hand. He was looking at the tea in his hand, not paying attention to our arrival. Half a reaction. The bald man stood behind the old man, leaving Du Xiaosheng and I awkwardly standing aside, neither standing nor sitting.

The room was silent. The old man would take a sip of tea from time to time, as if we didn't exist. Du Xiaosheng and I remained calm and had no intention of speaking. Even though I knew nothing about it, we still stared at the old man eagerly.

I don’t know if he was tired of playing, but the old man suddenly put down the tea bowl in his hand, raised his head and looked at me with a smile, as friendly as the grandpa next door. The old man's cheeks were covered with age spots, his hair was as white as snow, and only wrinkled skin remained on his body, like a zombie that had just emerged from the coffin. I felt uncomfortable for a while and quickly looked away.

The old man finally spoke: "Mr. Chen, don't be polite in my place, just sit down."

His tone was as if he was greeting an old friend he hadn't seen for a long time. I didn't want to just follow his words, so I didn't sit down and asked straight to the point: "Old sir, why did you call me here?"

The old man still smiled like a flower and said, "Don't worry. I know that Mr. Chen is already worried about that big thing."

I didn't understand what was going on, so the old man continued: "I once taught you that the prototype of this world is a maze that seems to intersect but has no relationship. Each of our lives is just a path in this maze. When this road is not connected to a certain exit, no matter how hard you work, you will eventually end up with it. Instead of dwelling on this matter, it is better to give up as soon as possible and move on to a more stable life. .For example, drink a cup of tea with me and talk about life." He glanced at the bald man next to him, understood it, picked up the teapot and poured me a cup of tea.

I frowned, my habit of getting angry came back. I don't know what this old man with white hair is doing. When you invited me here, you were not in a hurry to get down to business, but it seemed that you were deliberately playing tricks on me and destroying my aura. Since this was my first time meeting him and he was an old man, I suppressed my anger and said coldly: "What is what you said on the paper that I want?"

Hearing my words, the old man paused for a moment, then quickly returned to his smile and said two words lightly: "Mask."

I have masks on my hands, and more than one. From the old man's words, it is obvious that the ceramic masks in my hand are all fake. They are probably imitations of a precious mask. According to what he means, what I want may be the real mask. .

I asked him, "What exactly is that mask? Why do I need it?"

The old man didn't answer and stared at me with lifeless eyes. Those eyes were crystal clear and completely inconsistent with the old man's appearance. Instead, they looked like the eyes of a doll, which was extremely weird.

When I couldn't bear it anymore, the old man suddenly said: "Is your surname Chen?"

"Want me to bring you my ID card so you can take a look?" I replied angrily.

The old man seemed not to have heard and continued to ask: "So, where did you find this body?"

I broke out in a cold sweat, and the doubts in my heart had gathered into one large mass. I am different from most people. Under the influence of my adoptive parents, I have maintained a vague attitude toward superstition since I was a child. When I was a child, I heard stories about vixens and yellow skins that shed their skin and change their bodies. Could it be that the Mr. Chen the old man was talking about was not me, but a fox or a weasel?

I suddenly remembered that from the sudden note to the conversation between the white-haired old man and me, he seemed to have always called me "Mr. Chen", but kept silent about my name. Thinking of this, I began to feel that I was not the person he was looking for.

While I was deep in thought, the old man sighed, turned to the bald head and said, "What's going on?"

The bald man's expression was not normal. When he heard the question, he immediately replied respectfully: "According to the news from below, Mr. Chen has indeed appeared in that area frequently recently." He paused, looked at me, and continued: " I was anxious to contact Mr. Chen, so I placed the imitation at the door of Xiangrui Real Estate. I didn’t expect that the person who picked it up was also named Chen. This is a subordinate who neglected his duty. Please punish me.”

After saying that, the bald man lowered his head, as if waiting for punishment from the white-haired old man. The old man waved his hand, with a slightly sullen look on his face, and said to us: "It turns out that we recognized the wrong person and had a misunderstanding. I'm really sorry. This bowl of tea will be regarded as Ye's apology. Please use it with ease." Pointing to the tea in front of us.

It turns out that this old man’s surname is Ye.

My doubts are still there. Since he could identify the wrong person, either I look very similar to the person they are looking for, or they have never seen another person named Chen. Another possibility is that the old man has seen the person named Chen, but he can't see it. Those two eyes looked very much like prosthetic eyes. If they were real eyes, judging from the age revealed by the old man's face, they would have been cloudy long ago and would never be as clear as this.

I don't have the habit of eating food from strangers, so I just stood there and didn't move. Du Xiaosheng put on a very unusual smile, picked up the tea bowl, and drank it in big gulps.

When the bald man saw that I didn't move, he scolded: "How dare you refuse Mr. Ye's tea? Do you know how many people in Beijing want to drink Mr. Ye's tea? Hurry up..."

"Quiet, quiet." Old Man Ye interrupted him with a soft voice. Seeing that Old Man Ye was angry, the bald man apologized repeatedly and did not dare to say anything more. Finally, he glared at me fiercely.

After Du Xiaosheng drank the tea, he wiped the tea stains from the corner of his mouth with the back of his hand and said to me: "Mr. Chen, you should try it too. This is Mengding Mountain tea, don't waste it."

I still felt something was wrong. Du Xiaosheng suddenly changed his serious face. He must be putting on a show to show the other party. I don't know if he really wanted me to drink tea. Old Man Ye said in an old voice: "Yes, young man knows the goods. This is indeed Mengding Mountain Tea. It was originally prepared for Mr. Chen, but I didn't expect it to be easier for you." After speaking, he sighed again and closed his eyes to rest. .

At this point, it would be disrespectful to refuse any more. When I saw Du Xiaosheng winking at me, I felt a sudden move, picked up the bowl, swallowed it in one gulp, put the tea bowl on the table, and said to Old Man Ye, "Can we go now?"

I didn't wait for the old man to speak, I raised my legs and was ready to leave. Unexpectedly, Old Man Ye shook his head, and I stood there awkwardly, not knowing whether to continue walking or put my legs down.

I glanced at Du Xiaosheng, and he was also full of doubts. He didn't know what medicine Old Man Ye was selling in his gourd.

Old Man Ye said: "Room 302 never receives strangers. Since you are able to come here, you must be doing things that normal people dare not do. What you two earn must be dead people's money."

I was shocked. Hearing what he meant, he must have guessed our profession. Although he didn't say it clearly, the scope given by Old Man Ye was already obvious. Apart from funeral parlors, tomb robbers and tomb builders, what else can be used to make money from the dead? But then I thought about it and realized that what he said about being destined but not destined was probably nonsense. He probably knows our profession because we often come into contact with dead bodies and have more or less the aura of death on our bodies. I once heard someone from the company say that the elderly who have recently passed away often have their feet in the world of yin and yang, and can distinguish the boundaries between the living and the dead, and can smell the smell of the dead. Old Man Ye is only over ninety years old, definitely not younger.

I said calmly: "Mr. Ye is well-informed, but there are some things that you can't talk about unless you become my client and experience it for yourself."