Chapter 404: Chapter 54: Tem Bank!
(Extra for 6000 Monthly Tickets)_2 Chapter 404: Chapter 54: Tem Bank!
(Extra for 6000 Monthly Tickets)_2 Creak…
The long-unopened door emitted a heart-wrenching sound.
Sunlight slanted into the room, casting a perfect rectangle on the floor, where dust filled the bright spot, and darkness reigned beyond.
Chu Anqing fanned away the floating dust in front of her face and coughed lightly:
this dust seems like no one has cleaned here for a long time.”
After Xu Yun’s death, Ji Lin had come to China, which was already ten months ago.
Ji Lin definitely hadn’t visited in that time.
Therefore, the dust in this room must have accumulated for at least a year, no wonder pushing the door stirred up such a choking wind.
The two stepped into the room and immediately felt a sudden drop in temperature.
Lin Xian found the light switch near the entrance, and pressed it.
The dim room finally brightened.
The two found that the room really was empty, the walls bare.
If they had to mention any furniture…
it would likely be the thick, non-transparent black curtains that completely shielded out the sunlight.
“It’s like Ji Lin’s style,” Chu Anqing murmured.
The two continued to walk further inside.
The first floor was completely barren, a place not even a mouse would bother to dwell.
Lin Xian and Chu Anqing climbed the stairs to the second floor, and finally found the only thing in this house that could be considered a decoration, besides the curtains—
A painting hanging on the living room wall on the second floor:
“The Sorrowful Einstein”
Lin Xian gazed at the painting, which was just as unnerving as ever.
Einstein’s lifeless eyes were like black holes in the universe, seeming to drag everything in front of them into an unknown abyss.
Melancholy, sorrow, and despair spread across the great man’s face.
Coldness, oppression, and heaviness also weighed down on the hearts of all who looked upon it.
“Senior Lin Xian, is this painting a fake or a replica?”
Chu Anqing asked curiously.
At the beginning of the year, when she and Senior Lin Xian happened upon each other at the Donghai Exhibition Hall, they had visited the world touring painting exhibition together.
That exhibition had featured this painting.
Moreover, Senior Lin Xian had taken the time to explain to her the historical context behind this painting—
Einstein was melancholic because of the explosion of nuclear weapons, and he was fearful for having proposed the mass-energy equivalence formula.
He blamed himself for opening Pandora’s box, casting a shadow of destruction over the future of the human world.
really have a future?”
Einstein often questioned himself in his heart and passed away in a state of guilt, self-reproach, and fear.
“It should be genuine.
It is said that Henry Dawson painted more than one ‘The Sorrowful Einstein’, and each one hides a different code.”
While Lin Xian spoke, he turned on the ceiling lights in the living room on the second floor and approached the painting for a closer look.
he didn’t know whether it was true or false; it was, after all, second-hand information from Angelica.
However, Lin Xian did believe that, with Ji Lin’s resources, if there were indeed eight genuine versions of this not-so-famous painting, he could easily acquire one.
It would only be a matter of spending some money, something he indeed didn’t lack.
behind him stood Ji Xinshui, a world-class financial tycoon.
Where could the code be hidden?
Lin Xian carefully observed the details of the painting and compared them with the version he had seen at the Donghai Exhibition Hall…
He spotted a difference!
Lifting his finger, he pointed to the eyebrow above Einstein’s left eye socket on the painting:
“I don’t remember the other parts clearly, but I clearly remember the eyebrows over the left eye socket.
In the version of ‘The Sorrowful Einstein’ displayed at the Donghai Exhibition Hall, the paint here was indented, deeply sunken in.”
“At the time, I found it quite odd — what kind of peculiar painting technique was that?
As an art student, I instinctively felt it was incorrect to depict the densest part of the eyebrow in such a way…
I pondered for a long time, unsure of the profound intention.
However, the master is after all a master, and my meager skills surely have no right to question Henry Dawson; although he isn’t particularly famous among modern painters, he is nevertheless a master whose intentions must be deep, perhaps for a light and shadow effect or a side profile?
I wasn’t sure, only that it was impressively unfathomable.”
“But, look at this piece, also by Henry Dawson, ‘The Sorrowful Einstein’.
The left eyebrow here is perfectly normal.”
Lin Xian’s finger pressed directly upon the firm layer of paint, gesturing for Chu Anqing to come closer:
“Look, the paint for the eyebrow here is normally raised, which is the correct painting technique, very natural and three-dimensional.”
She had studied watercolor painting.
Although watercolor and oil paint differ, they still share some commonalities.
A mistake like a sunken eyebrow would never occur under the hand of a master.
Moreover, oil paint in itself is malleable, and such a sunken area could be easily fixed, which would be a trivial matter for Henry Dawson.
“So, Henry Dawson definitely did it on purpose.”
Chu Anqing said softly, then tilted her head and viewed Einstein’s nose from the side:
Senior Lin Xian, don’t you think the perspective of the nose is a bit strange from this angle?”