Conan's First Love is a Profiler

Chapter 164: Painting titled Left Bank of the Seine

Peanuts, cookies, almonds, dried cranberries, marshmallows, butter.

What will become when these are combined?

That’s right, it’s snowflake crisps.

Taking advantage of the opportunity that Yuanzi invited her to go to the art auction house together, she gave her these snowflake crisps as a return gift.

“Isn’t this expensive too?”

Xiaolan stopped in front of a colorful painting and asked Yuanzi about its price.

"Yes, at least this number." As he said that, Yuanzi stretched out two fingers.

"Two million?" Xiaolan guessed.

"It should be 20 million, right?"

Masumi Sera looked at the painting with a look of amazement.

"Two hundred million."

A male voice suddenly sounded behind them, and everyone quickly turned to look at him - he was wearing a suit and tie, with a business card pinned to his left chest, which read "Kenji Imashiro" and his position, the president of the auction house.

"Hello, Miss Sonoko."

Kenji Imajo stepped forward and said with a smile, "Thank you very much to the Suzuki family for providing such a precious work."

"You just said, 200 million?"

"Yes." Kenji Imajo nodded with a smile and said, "There are many such works at the auction. Do you want to bid for one?"

Xiaolan waved her hands quickly and said with a wry smile: "I'd better forget it."

At this time, a middle-aged man wearing black round sunglasses and a small goatee appeared outside the glass door.

"Mr. Kanegami!"

Kenji Imajo noticed him, walked over quickly, opened the door, and greeted him warmly, "You're here."

Jin Shang didn't say much, just nodded and responded softly.

"Who is that?" Sera Masumi asked in a low voice, inevitably a little curious.

"A well-known representative of Western painting style in Japan, Kaneaki Iwaaki."

Just as Qinghai Chuantang finished speaking, Jin Shang walked over and stood beside them.

To be precise, I was standing in front of the painting titled "Left Bank of the Seine".

Perhaps it is because of reluctance that I appear here.

Afterwards, under the leadership of Yuanzi, several people came to the auction venue.

"Next, we have the 102nd lot, Kaneaki Iwaaki's 'Left Bank of the Seine', which belongs to the Suzuki Foundation. All proceeds from the auction will be donated to poor children overseas. Thank you."

As soon as the auctioneer finished speaking, everyone applauded in tacit understanding.

"Starting price: 80 million yen."

Nearly half of the people in the venue raised their signs and started raising their prices.

When the price reached 90 million yen, a man in a striped jacket suddenly stood up and shouted, "Swindler!"

"What is Kaneki Iwaaki?"

As he walked, he shouted, "Why shoot that kind of liar's work!"

The uniformed security personnel immediately walked over, grabbed him, and tried to take him away by force.

The auctioneer scolded: "Please don't disturb the sacred auction scene."

"Holy shit! They are all blind!"

As he was being taken away, the man continued to shout.

Looking at this scene, Yuanzi said with some dissatisfaction: "Really, there are still people with such quality"

When the auction was over, when several people came out of the auction house, Xiaolan expressed her doubts.

"Before, he clearly cared so much about his work. But why didn't I see Mr. Kane at the auction?"

Before anyone could open their mouths to answer, several men rushed in.

"Oh no, call the police immediately."

"Yes!"

Yuanzi looked inside the door and felt a little strange: "What happened?"

"I'll go take a look. You guys go back first, Yuanzi."

"Sister Xiaotang, wait for me. I want to go too!"

"I am coming too!"

Looking at the backs of the three people leaving, Yuanzi couldn't help but hold his forehead and sigh: "That's good, the three detectives, there's no escape."

I don’t know if it was her illusion, but wherever a detective appeared, there would always be a murder, which was higher than the chance of drawing an SSR in a single time.

When the three men arrived, they saw Jin Shang lying on the ground with a large pool of red blood.

There were already quite a few onlookers around, and some of them showed fear and timidity on their faces.

The time of death is estimated to be 2 to 3 hours ago, that is, before the auction started.

"Ms. Tang, Conan, and Sera," Takagi said with a wry smile, helplessly, "It's such a coincidence that you all appear here together."

"It was Sister Sonoko who invited us here! She said that the Suzuki family happened to have some items for auction, so she brought us along to join in the fun." Conan explained with a smile.

At this time, a woman with long hair and a catfish bag ran over in panic.

Outside the cordon, after seeing the face of the man who jumped from the building, he showed a look of surprise and quickly went under the cordon.

Gao Mu reacted at this time: "Stop her!"

When Ye Jiusheng heard this, he hurriedly grabbed her, but the woman was still trying to break free.

"let me go!"

"Wait. Miss, who are you?"

"My name is Hojo, and I'm his agent."

When Takagi heard that it was someone related to the deceased, he prepared to take him to a quiet place for questioning.

"Officer Takagi!"

A police officer ran in, handed him a transparent bag with yellow paper inside, and explained: "This was found on the roof."

The B5-sized paper was filled with words, but they were a bit sloppy and it was unclear whether they were Japanese or something else.

More like ghost paintings.

Hojo Ryoko came over and read out the contents on the paper.

"I have no talent for painting. I'm desperate. I want to leave this world in peace. This is how Jin wrote. This is definitely his handwriting!"

At this moment, Hojo Ryoko's expression suddenly became sad.

Qing Hai Chuantang took a peek at the contents of the paper, then looked at Gao Mu and said, "So, this is suicide?"

The suicide note was next to the railing on the rooftop. There were no signs of fighting around it. Coupled with the words "leave in a happy and peaceful way" written on the paper, it is easy for people to make the following association: Jin Shang crossed the railing himself, put the suicide note there, and then jumped down from the building.

“That’s what normal thinking is.”

Just when Takagi wanted to say something else, Hojo Ryoko suddenly fainted, and it seemed that she found it difficult to accept the news for a while.

Fortunately, Ye Jiusheng caught her in time.

"Go to the reception room. It's on the top floor."

After saying this, Kenji Imajo, together with Yokusho and Hojo Ryoko, went to the reception room on the top floor.

After resting for a while, Hojo Ryoko finally felt better.

She said weakly, "I'm sorry to trouble you."

"You're welcome."

Masumi Sera walked silently to the window, seemingly observing something.

"It's rare that he said he wanted to go to an auction. Although I felt it was inappropriate, I had work to do, so I let him go by himself." Hojo Ryoko touched her forehead and said with her head down.

Kenji Imajo looked at them and explained with a smile, "Ms. Hojo is not only a business partner, but also helps Kanegami a lot in private."

"Really?"

"We met in Paris." Hojo Ryoko was standing up and putting her hand down.

When Jin Shang was young, he studied in France.

"Left Bank of the Seine" was a work from that time.

"Has he been to Paris often lately?"

"No." Hojo Ryoko shook her head and smiled, "It seems that I don't have any happy memories in Paris, and it's been more than ten years."

After leaving the reception room, the three did not leave in a hurry, but borrowed the suicide note to take a look.

Gao Mu said that he has become accustomed to this kind of thing that does not comply with regulations.

The detective can solve the case and still get paid, isn't that great?

“Although it looks like B5 paper, strictly speaking, it is not.”

Conan began his own science class, explaining with a smile: "B5 has different sizes in different countries. For example, the B5 in Japan is 25.7x18.2cm, while the B5 in France is 25x17.6cm."

After borrowing a mobile phone from Qinghai Chuantang, I opened one of the software called "Ruler" and measured the width of the paper, which was exactly 17.6cm, the same as the French B5.

However, the length is 23cm.

"If you look closely, you can see traces of cuts on it." Conan handed the phone back to her.

If there is something written on the cut-off part, then the cut-off part may be the date.

On the surface, this suicide note was written by Jin Shang himself, but it is just the "Heiligenstadt suicide note".

Johann Beethoven famously wrote his suicide note in Heiligen, detailing his despair at his worsening ear disease.

But in fact, the suicide note was not shown to anyone, and the person did not commit suicide.

"Same goes for Mr. Kaneki."

Masumi Sera said: "He did lose faith in life and wrote a suicide note, but that should have happened during his time in Paris."

So, the paper used is from Paris.
The next day, the three of them came to pay a visit outside Jin Shang's studio.

After ringing the doorbell and waiting for a while, a small door on the side opened and a man in a brown vest came out.

Before they could explain their purpose, the man welcomed them in and asked in a somewhat cold tone, "What's the matter?"

He put his left hand in his trouser pocket and said in a dissatisfied tone: "Jin Shang is dead, what are you doing here?"

"Miss Tang!"

Just as Qinghai Chuantang was about to explain, a voice sounded from behind, and the three of them turned around and looked at her.

Hojo Ryoko explained: "He is my assistant, Aosaka."

"this way please."

She led the way, looking back from time to time and saying, "The police were here too, but they didn't find anything."

"Hey, do you come here often?"

Conan looked around curiously, with the innocence of a child.

"I don't come here very often. Jin Shang doesn't like others seeing him painting."

After going up to the second floor, Hojo Ryoko stopped in front of a wooden door, opened it, and introduced: "This is Kaneki's studio."

After entering the house, she opened the curtains, and the sunlight instantly sprinkled on the ground.

Perhaps because of certain stereotypes, many people believe that the studios of masters are rather messy.

However, Jin Shang's studio appears to be very neat and tidy.

After pulling open all the curtains, Hojo Ryoko said, "He doesn't care about the past, and doesn't care about the price. It was quite unexpected that he said he was going to the auction this time."

"Oh, right," Sera Masumi suddenly remembered something, "someone caused trouble at the venue yesterday."

"An Feng." She instantly put on an expression of disgust.

Conan blinked, looking very curious: "Mr. An Feng?"

"He's a painting dealer." Hojo Ryoko said unhappily, "Ever since we refused to sell him paintings, he has been against us. He's just a black fan."

(End of this chapter)