Chapter 331 Go Help Old Comrades

What does it mean to be a collector like me?

Cui Laowu suddenly thought about it.

He didn't know what was going on. Why did Master Zhang and Teacher Bai suddenly turn enemies into friends and get close to him?

The atmosphere is also weird. Why are everyone looking at him with pity?

Someone who had the same question as him was Internet celebrity Li who was watching the live broadcast.

Because Li Wanghong couldn't see him in Zhang Yang's live broadcast room, he followed the live broadcast address sent by the barrage and chased Bai Hebo's live broadcast room, so he almost saw the whole process of the confrontation between Zhang Yang and Cui Laowu.

Why are you so talkative all of a sudden?

"What does this master picture mean?" Li Wanghong asked his assistant.

"He probably wants to tell this treasure friend that you are a fool and have been deceived, so I don't blame you."

The assistant accurately translated the meaning of Zhang Yang.

Li Wanghong nodded after hearing this, but suddenly felt a little worried:

"You said we sent out troublemakers. Isn't this the case?"

"How is that possible?" The assistant smiled, "We paid 50,000 for Master He. At this level, he is worth at most 500."

"That's right. The level of doing things at this level is more than 500, maybe 200. It's almost enough to give you a hard-earned fee."

Watching Zhang Yang send Cui Laowu to the patrolling police, Li Wanghong and his assistant quickly followed Zhang Yang back to his live broadcast room.

They are still waiting for Master He they invited to take action.

This wait lasted until six o'clock in the afternoon.

[Brothers, today’s live broadcast ends here, see you tomorrow]

[Brothers who haven’t paid attention, remember to pay attention. Tomorrow, at the same time, there will be the last event of the Jinmen Treasure Appraisal Conference. Let’s see you there]

"Is this the end?" After Li Wanghong clicked the following button, he turned to look at his assistant, "Are you sure you want to do it today?"

"Wait, brother, don't worry, I'll call again and ask."

"Don't go out and make phone calls. Just do it in front of me." Li Wanghong was a little irritated.

He came to see Master Zhang make a fool of himself, but ended up watching the treasure appraiser all afternoon.

He had this time to wash his feet, massage his feet, and pick his ears. Why couldn't he do that?

"Okay, okay, I'll call right away." The assistant didn't dare to delay and quickly dialed Master He's number.

"Hey, Master He, didn't you agree to take action this afternoon?"

"We're taking action." A vicissitudes of voice came from the other end of the phone.

"But why didn't we see it?"

"It's impossible. All the apprentices I sent were arrested by the police."

"Taken away by the police? You're not talking about the 500-yuan one, are you? A young man with an jade bracelet?" The assistant was suddenly a little scared.

The next second, Master He's words proved that the assistant's fear was justified.

"Yes, the police took them away for provoking trouble. Isn't that enough? I'll charge you 10,000 yuan and give you my life, okay?"

"What's ten thousand yuan?" Li Wanghong asked with a frown, "Isn't it fifty thousand yuan?"

"Well, Master He, we already know the matter. We will communicate with you later." The assistant hung up the phone in a hurry, then quickly stood up and stood aside, lowering his head and saying nothing.

"Where did the remaining 40,000 go?" Li Wanghong asked dissatisfiedly, "What the hell am I asking you? Why are you pretending to be dumb?"

"The remaining 40,000 yuan is... a confidentiality fee." The assistant replied bravely.

"Who keeps the secret? You? You ask me for salary, and you ask me for confidentiality fees? Are you telling me some bad joke?"

"You're not telling a joke." The assistant said in a rude voice, "Brother Qi, you don't want the media to know about the bad things you did, right?"

"So it's not a loss for me to keep this 40,000 yuan a secret."

These words made Li Wanghong calm down. The matter of scheming Zhang Yang was indeed different from what he had done before.

He was silent for a while and said in a slightly tired tone: "It doesn't matter if you are greedy, but you have to get things done, right? What do you think we should do now?"

"Don't worry, I'll take care of it. This Lao He is unreliable, so I can only go to Master Qiu, who has the best reputation in the Jinmen antique circle."

"Can you contact him now?"

"Okay, I'll call him now." The assistant knew that he had to win back the trust of his employer, so he worked very hard.

If I couldn't get through to Daegu, I called his company and his wife.

When I got to Mrs. Qiu, the phone finally got through, but it was a man's voice that answered the phone.

"Hello? Who is it?"

"Hello, are you Mr. Qiu Junchun from Daqiu?" the assistant said very politely, "I'm Xiao Zhou. We met at the antique exchange meeting in Qiongzhou years ago."

"Oh, you go find your ex-husband. He is in prison and can't be contacted."

"Prison? Brother Daegu is in prison? What is the crime? When can he come back?"

"Wait a minute, let me ask you...Honey, when will my ex-husband come back?"

The man on the other end of the phone left for a moment, then quickly came back with an answer.

"Daegu sells fake antiques. The first trial lasted six years. He refused to accept the verdict and has appealed. The results of the second trial will not be known until next year."

After the man on the other end of the phone said this, he suddenly let out a light sigh.

"That's not right. My ex-husband has been here for so long and you just called me. You are not a fish that slipped through the net, are you?"

"No, no, I am a law-abiding and good citizen. Brother Daegu and I just met by chance."

"Really? Anyway, you can take care of yourself. You said that you and your ex-husband met at an antique exchange meeting, right? Then you should pay more attention and be sure to avoid a person named Master Zhang. What he sent in was so cruel, dozens of people were sent in at once."

"Hey, are you still listening?"

"I'm...listening, brother, thank you." The assistant was so shocked that he couldn't speak. The hand holding the phone was shaking, and he pressed the hang-up button tremblingly.

Li Wanghong on the side even widened her eyes, and her breathing became heavier unconsciously.

"Brother Qi, let's now..."

"Stop taking revenge first." After Li Wanghong calmed down, he said with a serious face, "This kind of person either has a great background or has great luck. In short, he cannot be offended."

"Go back and check to see if, besides Jinlou, there are any other products for sale that will be appraised by Master Zhang. Please wait for a while. He may have already set his sights on us."

"We can't afford to offend him, but we can afford to hide and make a fortune in silence."

"Okay, I understand." The assistant nodded heavily. He knew that if Brother Qi went in, he would definitely not be able to escape.

Now he just wants to find someone to ask Master Zhang what treasures he usually appraises.

…

"Boss, a newbie who just joined the group asked me what kind of things you have identified, and how should I answer?" Sister Gao was scrolling through her phone while eating, not forgetting to keep an eye on the fan group.

"This may be a question asked by the people behind the team that Sister Gao asked in the afternoon." Xu Jie analyzed, "It is probably the boss's illegitimate meal, and I just want the boss to identify it for him."

"Is that so?"

It had been a long time since I had seen the illegitimate meal. Zhang Yang put down his chopsticks and told Sister Gao with his fingers which points to reply.

"Snuff bottles, this is a special category. Other teachers are too lazy to look at this. There are porcelain, jade, and metalware in it, but now they are all included in my miscellaneous group;"

"The second is bamboo, wood and tooth horns. I can see all four categories, but for wood Buddha statues, you can also find a teacher in the sculpture group;"

"Then there's classical furniture. There's nothing much to say about this. It overlaps with wood products;"

"Finally, there are stamps and coins. All kinds of ancient coins, banknotes, and stamps can be appraised."

As soon as Zhang Yang finished speaking, Xiao Chu's voice came from behind.

"Stamps? The stamps are here, Brother Yang, help take a look."

"Why did you come just now?"

Zhang Yang turned around and took the iron box from Xiao Chu's hand. The removed stamps should be placed in it.

"Forget it, I spent the whole morning cleaning Brother Qiao's warehouse and ventilating it until three o'clock in the afternoon." Xiao Chu said breathlessly, "I managed to collect a hundred stamps. Hurry up and pack your things and come over for dinner.”

"Okay, then you can eat first and I'll take my time."

In fact, Zhang Yang has never authenticated stamps. In 2023, this thing will almost fade out of the mainstream view of the antique circle.

Some auction houses even don't auction stamps at all.

Looking into the reason, it is because stamps are close to withdrawing from the stage of history. Young and wealthy people are playing NFT, and only old-school collectors are still interested in stamp collecting.

The palm-sized box that Xiao Chu handed over contained a hundred stamps. Fearing that some of them might be valuable, Zhang Yang didn't dare look at the dining table and silently walked to the coffee table nearby.

Unexpectedly, Chu Ziqiang also followed with his rice bowl.

"Can you please concentrate on eating?"

"No." Xiao Chu shook his head decisively, then reached out and pulled out a red stamp from the box, pointed at it and said, "Look at this for me first. Is it what you said about the mountains and rivers all over the country being red?"

"Are you thinking about shit...fuck?!"

Zhang Yang looked down and was dumbfounded.

Did he really find it?

The small stamp in front of you has an all-red map of China in the center, and someone is holding up a small red book underneath. Isn't it the "All the Mountains and Rivers Are Red" that was issued and withdrawn that year?

There is also a black postmark in the upper left corner of the stamp, which reads "Xiamen, Fujian, 1968.11.24".

"I can't accept it." Zhang Yang shook his head violently, hoping that everything in front of him was an illusion.

But contrary to expectations, Xiao Chu actually found stamps worth millions.

Seeing Zhang Yang's reaction, Chu Ziqiang knew that the thing had not escaped, and a proud smile appeared on his face.

"Okay, Brother Yang, you can take your time and read the rest. I'm going to eat first."

"Then when I see something good, I can keep it in my pocket." Zhang Yang said deliberately.

"It's okay, I like to get it myself. What I enjoy is the process of discovering the treasure, not the result." Xiao Chu returned to the table happily and greeted several other studio members present, "You can order whatever you want. Just now I picked up a one million stamp, I’ll treat you to it!”

"This is better than letting you pretend..." Zhang Yang shook his head enviously.

After hearing this, the three employees put down their bowls and chopsticks and gathered next to Zhang Yang to watch the fun.

"Boss, would you like to introduce it to us?"

"Yeah, yeah, I haven't even used stamps."

"I can't introduce them. There are so many types of stamps that I can't finish them all in one night." Zhang Yang concentrated on selecting the stamps in the box and stacked them in the corner of the box in order from high to low value.

Of course, those stamps that are not valuable at all will not be released.

The ones that are worthy of his attention are at least stamps with "certain collection value" in the item information.

"This is...the Nie Er commemorative stamp from 1982?"

The main content of the stamp is Nie Er's black and white portrait + red music score, with a complete black postmark stamped in the center.

But from the perspective of stamp collection, age identification is no longer difficult. The important thing is to have a correct understanding of its value.

Know what is valuable and what is cheap.

Zhang Yang noticed that this stamp is "highly collectible", which is the same evaluation as "All the Mountains and Rivers Are Red".

"I've seen this Nie Er stamp." Xu Jie, who was watching the show, shook his head and said, "I heard someone say when I was a kid that hundreds of thousands of stamps were issued that year, and you couldn't get them even if you had no connection."

"No shit, you can't get more than 100,000 pieces?" Sister Gao didn't quite believe this statement.

"The actual circulation is obviously more than 10 million. Xu Jie, you probably confused it with some other stamps." Zhang Yang looked at the results he found and explained, "There are only a few brand-new stamps like this." It’s ten yuan a piece, and the whole page is only a few hundred yuan…”

As he talked, he himself was confused. So why is this stamp so valuable?

Is there any hidden mystery?

Zhang Yang held the commemorative stamp in his hand, looked over it over and over, and finally discovered what was special about it.

There are no traces of glue on the back of the stamp, indicating that it has not been used.

But there is clearly a black postmark in the center of it.

Then it can only be a [cancelled stamp], that is, a stamp that has been stamped by the post office before issuance.

"Chu Ziqiang, did you find this stamp from inside the envelope? I see no traces of glue on the back."

"There are a few like this, please help me see if they are worth anything." Chu Ziqiang was already concentrating on eating at this moment, not even bothering to raise his head.

Zhang Yang thought for a while and placed the stamp on the top of "The country's mountains and rivers are red".

A single unused canceled stamp like this with a complete postmark on the stamp should be very rare, otherwise it would not be worthy of the evaluation of "highly collectible".

"Boss, aren't these Mei Lanfang commemorative stamps valuable?" Xu Jie picked up a used stamp and asked Zhang Yang in order to have a sense of participation.

Zhang Yang took a look and shook his head: "Just search it, it shouldn't be more than 10,000."

"It seems to be about a thousand."

"That's it. The transaction price you searched online is one thousand, but the actual price should have dropped to 600 to 700. The price of stamps has dropped drastically now."

"Aren't these twelve zodiac animals valuable?" Sister Gao also asked.

"You can search online for yourself. I don't think it's worth anything."

Zhang Yang's tone of reply was a little helpless, but as everyone knew, the three employees were actually waiting for his words.

They have long wanted to study it themselves.

Moreover, the three of them all had some thoughts in mind, hoping to find a truly valuable stamp among the stamps that Zhang Yang thought were worthless, which would prove that the boss was blind.

This mentality is similar to searching for treasure in the antique market.

Hard work paid off, and Tang Qiyun relied on her eyesight to be the first to find a potentially valuable stamp.

"Senior, this is the wrong version of stamps. I read on the Internet that it is worth ten or twenty thousand."

"Let me take a look?" Zhang Yang took over a Cai Lun commemorative stamp that Xiao Tang found, and sure enough he found an obvious printing error on it.

Cai Lun was born after AD, but this stamp is incorrectly marked as "BC".

After checking the auction records, it turned out that this wrong version of stamps had already sold for a high price of 22,500 in the early years.

At the same time, it is one of the misprinted stamps that is more recognized by the market.

Zhang Yang gave Xiao Tang a thumbs up. Although the wrong stamps were not as valuable as the wrong coins, there was no doubt about their scarcity.

And the mistake was so subtle that even he himself missed it.

Then, Zhang Yang returned the Cai Lun commemorative stamp to its rightful place - at the top of the stack of valuable stamps.

Just enough to be a 20,000 goalkeeper.

After sorting out this box of stamps, only seven out of a hundred were found to be valuable.

Most of them are in the range of more than ten yuan to one or two hundred yuan.

"Thank you, Brother Yang." Xiao Chu excitedly took the box that Zhang Yang had packed and handed him a key. "There are tens of thousands of letters left there. Are you interested in taking a look?"

"No, I have business to do after get off work tomorrow." Zhang Yang declined politely.

The captain of the Tianjin Public Security Bureau in charge of cultural relics crime is a comrade with Captain Liu of Linhai. Through his connections, he asked him to help look at some stolen goods tomorrow.

It is said that he encountered a cunning tomb robber. There is no clue to the case, so he can only find Zhang Yang.