A Dish Best Served Cold (The Man In Rage) novel Chapter 207

"Dad, what are you doing?! How could you give him money? Although $200 isn't much, but giving him the money is as good as throwing it away," complained Su Qian.

Su Yuan-Shan replied, "It's not easy to survive in the city, especially someone with a poor background like him. He must have endured far more hardship and malice than we can imagine."

"It's not much to me anyway, so I'll help if I can. What's more, what if this youth really turns out to be a master appraiser? I'm just investing $200 to support him. It's no loss.”

Despite saying that, Su Yuan-Shan clearly didn't believe that this painting was the legendary work of Su Dong-Po.

After all, none of the people who could come here were fools. How could legendary work from a famous artist get displayed here for so long yet escape everyone's eyes?

Su Yuan-Shan had given Ye Fan the money purely out of sympathy.

Su Yuan-Shan's grandfather was from the countryside too. Seeing Ye Fan's predicament reminded him of how terribly hard his ancestors had to work in the city before finally gaining independence.

So Su Yuan-Shan helped Ye Fan this once out of pity.

"Here's $250. Can you give me a receipt?" Ye Fan handed the money to Yang He.

"Oh? Do you even want a receipt? You're just trying to delay things! Fine, I'll give you a receipt. Then there will be no way you can keep delaying things," Yang He assumed Ye Fan was afraid of the embarrassment and was trying to hold things up.

But he was clueless about Ye Fan's true intention.

"It's done. I've taken your money and issued you a receipt. The painting is yours. Now can we get President Gu to appraise it?" said Yang He impatiently.

Ye Fan nodded. "Of course we can.'

Ye Fan and Yang He walked over and asked Gu Long-En to appraise the painting.

All eyes were glued on them.

The sight of Ye Fan's confidence made everyone lose faith, especially Yang He himself. After what happened moments ago, he couldn't help but feel worried.

Could this really be a painting by the great writer from the Song Dynasty, Su Dong-Po?

If it was true, then Yang He would swim in regret for selling it off at merely $250!

Of course, everyone felt the likelihood of this happening was nearly zero.

After Old Master Gu studied it for a while, he shook his head somewhat disappointingly at Ye Fan, "Young man, I think you misjudged this painting this time."

"This painting is really a fake. In fact, it's a very badly done imitation and the strokes are poorly done. Its true value is probably about $100 to $200 and roughly the sum you paid for it. Of course, if you include the cost of its paper, that would set you back to almost $0," said Gu Long-En slowly.

This time, the crowd did not come to a conclusion as swiftly. They seemed to be waiting for Gu Long-En to confirm again.

And just as Ye Fan did previously, he smiled gently and said, "President Gu, please look carefully again."

"Hmm?”

Gu Long-En frowned. This time, he specially put his glasses on to look at it one more time.

This time, Yang He was the anxious one.

He was afraid that Gu Long-En might suddenly turn the tables on him again.

But fortunately, the same thing didn't happen twice.

"Young man, I'm afraid that you are going to be disappointed."

"This 'Withered Wood and Stone Painting' appeared in Christie's auction house in Hong Kong in 2018. It was sold for 410 million Hong Kong dollars and ended up in the hands of a Chinese rich man.”

"The original is already in the hands of a collector, so logically speaking, this piece here must be a fake! Moreover, the artwork is so unrefined, and the words don't look good at all, so it must be a forgery,” Gu Long-En's words were like a death sentence on this painting as he confirmed it to be a counterfeit.

In an instant, there was a commotion as everyone burst out laughing.

"I knew it!”