Chapter 232: Organizing An Auction
Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
Li Du, who was almost ready to quote a price, was startled by the bald man’s sudden appearance. He asked, "And you are?"
After taking two deep breaths, the man gave him a beaming smile and said, "How are you, Mister Li? And Mister Fox, right? Let me introduce myself, I am the supervisor of this storage facility, David Richards."
Li Du nodded and said, "How are you, Mister Richards? May I know what’s the matter?"
Smiling, Richards said, "Yes, there’s something I need to trouble you with. Could you sell this Batpod back to our company?"
Frances hugged her arms and smiled. "Wow, looks like I’ve caused some trouble for myself. Did Chris contact you? To get you to buy back this Batpod?"
Richards gave her a wry smile. "No, it was Mr. Roven who called me. I made a huge mistake, d*mmit—I made a huge mistake!"
"Who is Mister Roven?" Li Du had no idea.
Frances explained, "Charles Roven’s a producer in Warner Brothers, and also the producer of this Batman movie—a Hollywood bigwig."
Richards hung his head and said, "Yes, it’s him. He told me off and warned me that if I lost this Batpod, then I’d also lose my job!"
Li Du said, "But you guys put the Batpod in this storage unit for auction, which means there was no intent to keep it, right?"
Richards, embarrassed, smiled. "No, no, it wasn’t that way."
Hans butted in, "There must be something wrong with your operations—this Batpod shouldn’t have appeared in this storage unit, right? There was no intent to sell the Batpod? At least not at such a low price, right?"
Richards said helplessly, "You’re right, Mister Fox. This Batpod should have been stored in storage unit 111 but we made a foolish error and put it in storage unit 11 instead."
This was a very common problem: the valuables in many storage units were placed there by careless owners, sometimes forgotten.
In America, storage was a way of life—not like in other countries where it was used for unwanted items.
Of course, the main use of storage was to store unused items, but there were many who would put their valuables in storage units.
Hence, when at auctions, treasure hunters frequently came across safes in storage units.
But this time, the storage staff of Warner Bros. had made a huge mistake to have put something so valuable in the wrong storage unit.
Usually, it would be fine to have misplaced an item, as long as someone tried to locate it afterward. In any case, there was a record of every valuable item before it went into storage.
Warner Bros. wanted to establish a new movie company and was preparing to film many new movies. Hence, they were clearing their storage in preparation. And under such circumstances, the Batpod had been sold by mistake.
As both parties had already signed the contract after the auction ended, everything in the storage belonged to the treasure hunter. If not for Frances making those calls to verify the identity of the vehicle, the storage owner would not have known that it had been sold.
Li Du looked at Richards sympathetically. "You guys shouldn’t have been so careless. But you have a chance to redeem yourself. If the price is right, I would be glad to sell the Batpod back to you."
Frances said, "Hey, isn’t there a first-come-first-served system to this? I was here first."
Li Du said, "Similarly, I’d be glad to sell it to you. But Madam, you heard how Mr. Richards needs this vehicle more."
Frances said, "You are really naïve. Do you really think that he’d lose his job because he lost a motorcycle prop?"
"He wouldn’t?"
Frances looked at Richard with a half-smile and asked, "What’s your surname, Mister?"
Richards coughed, "My name’s David Richards…"
"David is your Christian name, Richards is your middle name," Frances interrupted him. "I’m asking you for your surname."
Richards shrugged, "Alright, Roven. My full name is David Richards Roven."
Frances snapped her fingers,."See, he has the same surname as the famous producer— don’t you think that’s too much of a coincidence?"
Richards said defensively, "Madam, what do you mean by that? I got this job through my own hard work."
Frances said, "I’m not questioning how you got your job. I’m saying Charles Roven will not let you lose your job because of this, so it is meaningless for you to play the sympathy card here."
Richards had no response to that, and could only shrug. "You really are a powerful woman—I’ve heard that Frances McDormand’s very powerful."
Hans clapped his hands. "Hear me out. Both of you would like to get ahold of this Batpod, right?"
"I also want it!" a treasure hunter shouted from outside the storage unit.
"And me too, Big Fox, sell it to me!"
"If you sell it to me, I swear I’ll be your ally!"
Hans smiled. "I just checked on the Internet. At the beginning of the year, the distributor of the Batman movie had some publicity events, including an auction to sell movie props at a London prop shop.
"According to the news, two replicas of the Batpod were sold at the auction. One was sold for 79,611 US Dollars and the other for 106,148 US dollars. How about if we have an auction as well?"
Li Du gave him a thumbs up sign. This was a great move and would maximize their profit.
Frances laughed, "Cool, you’re a smart guy. Let’s do that."
Richards frowned. "Dammit, I haven’t got much of a budget."
The treasure hunters showed their middle fingers in displeasure:
"D*mn you, Big Fox, you sure know how to make money!"
"You even want to make money off us—so heartless of you!"
"Who can outbid Hollywood’s best actress?"
Hans chuckled, and after finding himself a white glove, said, "This is the most valuable, and had the best workmanship, out of all the replicas. So we will start from 106,148 dollars—no problem, right?"
He spoke as fast as an auctioneer, causing Li Du to whistle, "Nice!"
It was not clear why he did it, but York decided to participate—he raised his hand, shouting, "110,000 dollars!"
Frances smiled. "I’m an actor, and don’t know your rules. I’m just going to bid my maximum—300,000 dollars!"
Many treasure hunters were shocked and someone shouted, "This is not ‘not knowing’ the rules—this is destroying the rules!"
Richards, who was about to bid, blinked and then said despondently, "D*mn, how can this be? The production cost was only 10,000 dollars."
Frances said, "Then you can use your own money to go make a new one."
Richards smiled. "Alright, I shall withdraw from this auction."
The other treasure hunters also did not have the ability to bid; 300,000 dollars for a motorcycle?
Although it was Batman’s motorcycle, it was still a prop and not a real Batpod, so they were not able to bid such prices.
Hans was delighted and pointed at the actress, crying, "300,000 dollars, 300,000 dollars, 300,000 dollars a third time... This Batpod’s yours, Madam! Congratulations!"