Owen Sutton had a pet hamster when he was in elementary school, so he knew how to tell the gender of these little creatures. He gently massaged the area between the little squirrel’s hind legs for a while, and a tiny penis popped out. Seeing this, Owen Sutton laughed and said, “Alright, let’s give you a new name. You’re a boy, so you’ll be called Xiao Ming!”

He let go of the little squirrel and was just about to train the little guy to respond to its name when a car horn sounded outside the window.

The sound was a bit shrill, startling the little squirrel, which darted back into its maple tree nest through the window.

Owen Sutton knew it was Auerbach who had arrived. Sure enough, after a moment, the old man’s dignified face appeared.

Auerbach’s hometown was right here in Farewell Town. He was already retired and had moved back to live in the small town. However, if anyone in the area needed legal help, he would provide it for free, so everyone who knew him respected him greatly.

In North America, lawyers’ fees are very high, and ordinary families can’t afford them. That stuff in Hollywood movies where people say, “I won’t say a word until my personal lawyer arrives,” is all nonsense.

Owen Sutton took out all those paintings. Auerbach was clearly prepared; he opened his laptop, which contained a series of Van Gogh’s works, including high-definition photos of all eleven surviving “Sunflowers.”

“Where did you find these paintings?” Auerbach asked as he flipped through them.

Owen Sutton pointed above his head and said, “In the attic. My family has a tradition of hiding treasures in the attic, so yesterday I thought, maybe my great-granduncle left something up there? Luckily, I found these paintings.”

Auerbach looked at a few landscape sketches and nodded, saying, “This Mr. Pinayang’s skills are excellent. Although I haven’t really heard of him, I think he must be a great artist.”

Owen Sutton wasn’t in the mood to discuss Pinayang’s identity. He carefully opened the Sunflowers painting and handed it to Auerbach, who pushed the laptop toward him and said, “You take a look yourself.”

Leaving it at that, Auerbach continued to immerse himself in Pinayang’s paintings, examining each one very carefully.

Owen Sutton scrolled the mouse, and high-definition photos of “Sunflowers” appeared one after another. After just a glance, he became frustrated, because among these photos, there was one exactly the same as the painting in his hand. The note beside the photo said this painting was discovered in 1900 and is now housed in the British Museum.

“Damn, no way, is my painting a fake?” Owen Sutton became dejected.

Just like that, the excitement Owen Sutton had felt all night melted away like snow in the sun.

He tossed the painting toward Auerbach, who dodged and carefully caught it, saying, “Kid, be careful. If you damage this painting, I bet you’ll be so regretful you’ll want to kill yourself today!”

“They’re all Pinayang’s paintings, how valuable could they be?” Owen Sutton said weakly.

Auerbach laughed and shook his head. “No, young man, this one is not!”

Owen Sutton was surprised. He was sure he’d checked yesterday and all thirty paintings were by Pinayang. But he knew Auerbach was steady and wouldn’t speak without reason, so he went over to take a look.

The painting in Auerbach’s hands was about a meter long and half a meter wide. Owen Sutton couldn’t quite make out what it depicted—just a human figure outlined with a bunch of lines. At the top of the paper was a line of scrawled letters: Femme-au-Tambourin.

Seeing this painting, Owen Sutton remembered that there were four or five paintings in the batch that were in an abstract style he couldn’t understand at all. To him, they had no beauty, so he’d just glanced at them and tossed them aside.

“This painting is valuable?” Owen Sutton’s eyes lit up.

Auerbach smiled slightly and pointed to a line of small letters in the lower right corner. “If this name is real, then it should be very valuable.”

Owen Sutton was skeptical. He looked at the lower right corner of the painting and saw a string of over a hundred letters. He exclaimed, “God, don’t tell me all these letters are someone’s name? Is he African? A fellow countryman of NBA star Dikembe Mutombo?”

Auerbach shook his head and gently stroked the paper. “This is Spanish. The painting’s name is ‘Woman with a Tambourine,’ and the words below are indeed a person’s name: Pablo Diego José Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno María de los Remedios Cipriano de la Santísima Trinidad Ruiz Picasso!”

When he heard the last word, Owen Sutton couldn’t help but gasp. Picasso’s name—everyone on Earth knows it! And what is Picasso best known for painting? Everyone on Earth knows that too: abstract art!

But with the fake Van Gogh “Sunflowers” as a lesson, Owen Sutton was much more cautious and asked doubtfully, “You don’t think this painting is genuine, do you?”

Auerbach nodded slowly and said gravely, “Unless I’m mistaken, this painting is indeed authentic. As for the reason, I’ll have an old friend of mine explain it to you. He’s an authority in this field!”

Chapter 0008 Entering the Sea