It was already the morning of the next day when Herbert took the satellite and rushed to the south shore of Loch Ness in the Scottish Highlands.
This small town called Fort Augustus has only a few hundred households. A river passes through the town, and the other end of the river is connected to Loch Ness, where water monsters are rumored to exist.
Perhaps it is precisely because of this rumor that there are many tourists in this town. Wei Ran even saw a few Chinese aunts holding up silk scarves and taking photos with great interest at the river lock.
It was precisely when he set foot here that Wei Ran really understood that the joke about the British meeting and chatting about the weather was not an exaggeration. It was already mid-to-late June, but perhaps because of the dimensions, the temperature in this place was only 14 to 15 at most.
At the same time, there was a cool drizzle in the sky.
Not to mention, on the streets on both sides of the river, there were people wearing short-sleeved shorts, turtleneck sweaters, and even just wrapped in down jackets, which perfectly expressed the temperature index that each person felt about this place.
"Although I am French, I have to say that I hate the horrible weather here. In comparison, Volgograd is simply paradise."
Herbert complained very appropriately, "Even if there is really a water monster here, I don't want to live in such a ghost place. My knee joints are starting to hurt before I even get out of the car."
“Really not comfortable”
Wei Ran zipped up his jacket. In his opinion, this cold weather was the best time to sleep in bed. Even opening the curtains would be an unforgivable sin.
"Let us go quickly. I hope Mr. Charlotte has lit the fire."
Herbert paid the fare, turned up the collar of his windbreaker, pulled his suitcase, greeted Wei Ran and walked towards an old-looking house by the river.
The shape of this two-story house is not much different from the house that Wei Ran's studio shares with the travel agency next door. It's just shorter in length, only about thirty meters, but it's also more beautiful.
There are some sun umbrellas and solid wood tables and chairs in the space enclosed by the ship's anchor chain. A small patch of extra-flat lawn is separated by a walking path next to the river.
Although his English was as poor as a scumbag, he could still understand that more than half of the house, including the outdoor area enclosed by the anchor chain, was used to run a bar. The remaining half was used to run a bar.
, is a rather exquisite-looking souvenir shop.
Following Herbert into this store, the store of less than 40 square meters is filled with all kinds of silverware, from English tea sets and tableware to various styles of silver wine bottles, even candlesticks, and jewelry.
Boxes or some small pendants in the shape of the Loch Ness Monster, etc. are all dazzling.
And against the wall facing the door, there was a man who looked about forty years old and was concentrating on carving something on a piece of silver.
Herbert took off his windbreaker and hung it on the clothes rack at the door. After putting one of the suitcases against the wall, he asked the other party something in English, and the man pointed upstairs without raising his head.
"Let's go up. It seems that Mr. Charlotte is already waiting for us." Herbert said in German.
"Mr. Charlotte has been living here?" Wei Yan asked as he put down his suitcase and followed him as he walked upstairs on the creaking wooden stairs.
"Mr. Charlotte has been living here since his retirement."
Herbert explained with a smile, "He has two sons and one daughter. The younger daughter helps him run a jewelry shop in Edinburgh. The one downstairs is his eldest son who runs the souvenir shop. The bar next to it is his other one."
My son is running it."
"It seems that his life in his later years was pretty good," Wei Ran sighed with emotion, and at the same time, he couldn't help but think of his friends who would never be able to wait by the dry well.
“Of course not bad”
Herbert stopped and hammered his sore knees, then lowered his voice slightly and said, "He is also a famous British collector of ancient coins and a winemaker. Of course, he has always regarded himself as an explorer, although he
I have never left England much in my life."
"A theoretical explorer?" Wei Ran also asked in a lowered voice.
"You can think so." After saying this, Herbert blinked and continued to walk, leading Wei Ran to the second floor.
Compared to the first floor, which is less than 40 square meters in size and has a dazzling array of silver items that can withstand vampire attacks, the second floor is much more spacious. The living room alone is as big as the one downstairs.
In addition, various outdoor equipment can be found almost everywhere, even tables and chairs are foldable and portable models commonly used for outdoor camping.
But except for the large and exquisite outdoor wood stove next to the window, which is burning red charcoal and has obvious signs of use, many other items have not even had their labels removed, especially the neat wooden shelves in the corner.
Various kerosene gas lamps, gasoline stoves and other objects placed there all had an obvious layer of dust on them.
And next to the window, an old man who looked like he was sixty or seventy years old, wearing old-fashioned adventure clothes, desert boots, and a khaki helmet on his head, was sitting on a canvas chair and sucking on a pipe.
At his feet, there was also a Doberman pinscher that was obviously lacking in exercise and was as fat as an inflatable dachshund.
"This is Mr. Charlotte"
After Herbert said hello in English first, he introduced Wei Ran to the old gentleman who was in pretty good shape.
Due to the language barrier, Wei Ran could only shake hands with the other party, and muttered the phrase "Nestutumiteyo" that he learned in junior high school.
To Wei Ran's surprise, Mr. Charlotte, who was nearly 70 years old, could also hold back a seriously off-key "Ni Hao", which invisibly narrowed the distance between the two.
Under Herbert's translation, the two parties exchanged a few simple greetings, and then the topic turned to the so-called treasure.
After Herbert placed the oil drum in the suitcase on the aluminum folding table between the three of them, and took out the translated code and handed it to Charlotte, Wei Ran took it out from the backpack at his feet.
I got a file bag and put it on the oil drum.
Charlotte picked up the file bag curiously and opened it, and then saw the hand-drawn map sandwiched in Pell's code book.
After a brief moment of silence, Charlotte stood up in surprise, put the map in her pocket, and spoke very quickly while staring at Wei Ran with a pair of old eyes.
"Mr. Charlotte asked where this map came from." Herbert asked, suppressing his inner surprise.
"Found it with the code book," Weiran responded in German.
"Can you tell me who you got it from?" Herbert translated Charlotte's question.
Wei Ran shook his head pretending to be regretful, "The other party didn't want to reveal his identity."
After listening to Herbert's translation, Charlotte sighed, got up and walked to the writing desk not far away.
While Wei Ran and Herbert were puzzled, the old man took out a photo album from the drawer of his desk. He motioned to Herbert to put the oil drum aside first. Old Charlotte opened the photo album and found it in the middle.
A black and white photo taken by Wei Ran himself.
In this group photo, Per and Pierre each wear a birthday crown folded out of pornographic magazines. They, like Carlo, Harry, Panettone, Trento and others around them,
They were all holding a plate of pasta in one hand, various glasses of red wine in the other, and sitting under their buttocks was a wooden box originally used to hold ammunition.
Behind these people, there is the Italian CL39 truck on one side and a three-wheeled motorcycle on the other. At the corner, half of the outline of the well can be vaguely seen, as well as the endless desert in the distance.
"Carlo, Panettone, Trento, Pierre, Pelle,"
Charlotte pointed at the people in the photo and called their names one by one, then pointed at Harry with his head wrapped in gauze in the photo, and said in English that Wei Ran could understand, "My father, Harry,
Harry Burton".
Listening to Charlotte's rich and mellow Italian pronunciation when reading the first few names of Pell, Wei Ran hesitated for a moment, looked at the other person and asked in Italian, "Mr. Charlotte, do you know Italian?"
This sudden question made Herbert, who didn't understand at all, look confused. Charlotte, who was about to ask something, nodded in surprise and replied in proficient Italian, "I do know how to do it."
Italian was taught to me by my mother and is almost my second mother tongue. I always thought that in the Scottish Highlands, apart from the occasional Italian tourists, I would have no use for it.”
Before Wei Ran could say anything, the old man turned to look at the confused Herbert and said something in English. Then he saw Herbert standing up helplessly and reluctantly walking towards the passage.
Go to the stairs on the first floor.
It wasn't until the melodious sound of the souvenir shop's glass door and wind chimes hitting each other came from downstairs that Charlotte picked up the already closed photo album and said, "Young man, will you come to the study with me?"
"Herbert, he..."
"Let him go to the bar next door for a drink first, so as not to try to make money from me again." Charlotte joked in Italian, got up and walked towards a wooden door connected to the living room.
Hearing this, Wei Ran burst into laughter, stood up happily, followed the other person through the wooden door, and walked into a room where the walls and even the floor were filled with various books.
Putting down the photo album in her hand, Charlotte emptied a chair filled with books. After asking Wei Ran to sit down, he also sat on another chair across the desk.
"Okay Victor, let's talk about this treasure again now, shall we?"
While Charlotte was speaking, she opened the drawer and took out two clean glasses, then took out a box of ice cubes from the small refrigerator behind her, and finally took down a bottle of whiskey from the wine rack.
"Where do you want to start?" Wei Ran asked as he took the cup.
"How about starting with this map?" Charlotte asked as she poured herself a drink.
