I'd already written the 5,000 euro opening price. After thinking it over, I wrote down 35,000 euros, folded the form, and headed to the bid box.
The green bid boxes had white labels on the front with number ranges like 1-200 or 5600-5800; every 200 lots went into the same box. The boxes were lined up in a massive semicircle, like an ancient military "wing formation." Jade buyers wandered back and forth, searching for their lot numbers like scattered soldiers who'd lost their formation on the battlefield. I was one of them—after searching for a long time, I finally dropped my form for lot 81303 into the correct box.
The next day, bidding day arrived.
The emporium's bid opening was nothing like the drama of an auction. Instead, it was eerily quiet, almost frustratingly so.
Behind the podium, a wall-sized electronic screen scrolled through results in white text on black: "Lot Number | Item | Starting Price | Winning Bid | Bidder."
That was it—brutally simple. Round tables below were occupied by jewelry company representatives, all frantically staring at the screen, manually recording every public result in notebooks or on phones. Each line appeared, they wrote it down, occasionally discussing among themselves.
"Why are they recording every single one? They didn't bid on all of them, did they?" I asked Uncle Harvey.
"Simple—they need to understand competitors' movements and formulate strategies for tomorrow," Uncle Harvey replied in a hushed voice. "And these power plays don't just happen at the emporium."
"How so?"
"Let's say you and I are both jade dealers from the same region. If you win a lot of blue-water material at the emporium, then when you go back, you'll be releasing a lot of blue-water product, probably at competitive prices. That means blue-water becomes less profitable for me, right?"
"Oh! I get it—it's competitor surveillance!"
My outburst prompted Uncle Harvey to signal "quiet," reminding me to keep my voice down.
"So I'm a target of surveillance too," Uncle Harvey whispered even more softly. "Those bid forms I threw away—you were trying to stop me from fishing them out, right?"
"Right." I was still wondering what Uncle Harvey was really up to.
"And you think they'd be stupid enough to believe I actually bid those prices, then outbid me by one euro?"
"No. I wasn't expecting them to believe those were real bids."
"Then why bother throwing the forms away?"
"Because those lots had something in common," Uncle Harvey flashed his signature sly smile. "Every single one was a green-color material."
"And the ones I actually bought were all colorless texture materials."
"Brilliant!" I complimented him.
"Don't celebrate yet," Uncle Harvey kept his voice low. "We still have to win the bids for it to matter."
We stared at the screen for a long time. Finally, the results came through. First, the "near-top" lot 5959 sold for 130 million RMB—an astronomical figure. We watched all the way through and nothing exceeded it. 5959 was clearly the top lot of this session.
"The top lot is set," I told Uncle Harvey. "Incredible—over a hundred million."
Uncle Harvey said mildly, "Actually, that's not that high. Previous emporiums have had top lots worth a billion. Keep watching—I need to step out for a smoke."
I continued staring at the screen. Uncle Harvey's bids, ranging from the thousands to the tens of thousands, were all outbid. Every single one was taken by someone else. Only lot 64466, a white-rind open-cut stone from the Muna mine site, went to Uncle Harvey.
Then my bid—lot 81303. The winning bidder's name: MR. FEIZIKUN. That was me!
"I actually won!" I was overjoyed, pulling out my phone to snap a photo, feeling like a scholar who'd just passed the imperial exams.
But when I put my phone down, I saw Uncle Harvey's shocked face.
"Why did you bid so high?"
My heart sank. I checked the screen: price, 35,000 euros. Wasn't that right?
"You told me to add a 3!"
Uncle Harvey rubbed his forehead. "I told you to add 3,000."
"Oh my god!" I had an immediate meltdown. "I'm so sorry. I thought you meant the stone was really special."
35,000 euros—nearly 270,000 RMB—was absolutely not a trivial amount. If this were my own stone, I'd be crying right now! Even though it was Uncle Harvey's money, his target price had been 8,000 euros, and I'd bid over 30,000. I felt terrible.
Uncle Harvey saw my distress and said, "It's fine, don't worry. I actually really like this stone and genuinely wanted to win it. If you hadn't bid on my behalf, it might have been tailed, which would have been trouble. Besides, you bid 35,000—someone else might have bid 34,000. There's no telling. If I'd actually bid 8,000, I would have lost it. Sometimes you can't pick up bargains."
It sounded like he was making excuses for me. I sat in the hall, looking at the red, yellow, and green decorations, feeling like in the jade world, money didn't seem like money. In normal life, 10,000 was serious money, 100,000 was a lot. But for a piece of jade, it wasn't even a rounding error.
Here, figures in the millions, tens of millions, even hundreds of millions were thrown around. For a young man who just wanted to learn a carving craft and make a living—or at most pursue some artistic ideals—it was truly terrifying.
I didn't know what to say, so I just sat and waited while Uncle Harvey handled the paperwork.
Collecting the lot took Uncle Harvey a very long time—so long that I grew restless, pacing around until I was tired, then sitting back down, only to feel cold from the air conditioning.
When Uncle Harvey finally returned, he was carrying only one stone. Not two, just my single small piece.
"I had my other one shipped directly back to China," Uncle Harvey said. "Jade bought at the emporium has to go through official logistics to leave the country—it can't be taken out otherwise. If you want to carry it yourself, you need a certificate proving it was purchased at the emporium."
I was startled. "So you're not taking this one back either?"
"No. We're going to cut it right here and see if it's a winner!"
---
The road to the cutting factory was desolate. More of the same bleak landscape. Uncle Harvey made several calls arranging the cutting, then turned to me.
"I actually had my eye on this stone for a long time, but I couldn't bid on it myself—I'd have been followed."
"I understand. That's why you had me look at it."
"Right. I knew it was good, but I wasn't sure how good. I trusted your judgment, and this way nobody was watching."
My head buzzed. "So you didn't even know for sure!?"
"I thought you had it in you, haha," Uncle Harvey said. "I just didn't expect you to bid so high."
Thinking about the 30,000-plus euros I might have cost us, I couldn't find a comfortable position in my seat, fidgeting left and right. I just wanted to get to the cutting factory in Mandalay as soon as possible.
The Myanmar cutting factory was livelier than the ones in Ruili, mainly because it was more labor-intensive. Rows of foot-powered machines were all occupied by Myanmar workers grinding cabochons. Here, pre-cut high-quality material was directly ground into jewelry-grade cabochons by these artisans. Foot-powered machines allowed for finer precision than electric ones, and the output was both cheap and excellent.
In the back were the large electric cutting machines—that was what we needed.
Up onto the machine. Water on. Cutting. Waiting. I sat in nervous anticipation while Uncle Harvey smiled and smoked beside me.
Finally, the stone split in two. At first glance, I exhaled in relief. The interior was as good as Uncle Harvey had predicted—the texture near the rind was poor, but overall it reached glutinous-ice grade. 35,000 euros was definitely coming back, and we should make a profit.
The Myanmar boss handed us two flashlights. I gave one to Uncle Harvey first, then turned mine on and aimed it at the raw stone from half a meter away.
The center of the stone appeared black under the flashlight!
How could it be black? We'd already reached glutinous-ice grade—why was the inside like this? If a piece of material wasn't very large, just barely enough for one or two bangles—and bangles were the most valuable product—then having a black spot right in the center would drastically reduce the chance of producing a bangle. If it truly couldn't yield one, the estimated value would drop to less than half.
I thought: We're done for. All that buildup, just to crash. A quick death would at least be swift—this slow torture was the worst.
"Uncle Harvey, what's going on with this black part inside? Why is it black?"
Uncle Harvey started laughing—not a natural laugh, but a forced "hahaha, hahaha, hahaha." It made my heart sink even further.
"Is this a crash? How much is it still worth?" I wanted a definitive answer.
Uncle Harvey suddenly stopped laughing. He looked at me, then at the stone, and said:
"Put your flashlight right up against it."
I hadn't looked closely yet. I leaned over, got close to the stone, and pressed my flashlight directly against the surface. The area that had appeared black now emitted a flawless fluorescence! The small dark patch in the center, under the intense direct light, seemed almost as if no material existed at all—yet there was something, like water, like mist, incredibly beautiful.
"This is glass-grade jade!" I exclaimed.
The Myanmar boss also saw it clearly now. He smiled, said something in Burmese, and shook Uncle Harvey's hand. Uncle Harvey, cigarette dangling from his mouth, peeled off several bills with great satisfaction—some for the cutting fee, and a few as a tip for the winning cut.
"But it looked black just a moment ago?"
"The black is correct," Uncle Harvey answered. "Strictly speaking, what you're seeing isn't black—it's because the texture is so fine that it absorbs light. Think about it: a slice of bread, viewed from the side, looks white. A pane of glass, viewed from the side, looks dark. Right?"
I didn't quite follow the analogy. Before I could respond, Uncle Harvey continued:
"Here—if you shine a strong flashlight through a slice of bread, what does the side look like?"
"The side lights up too."
"You can see the light, right?"
"But with glass?"
"The side still—"
"Exactly!" Uncle Harvey explained. "Because it's so transparent, there's no diffuse reflection. You can't see the light, so it appears dark."
"So it absorbed the light!"
"Correct. That small patch in the center absorbed all the light. From a distance with a flashlight, it looks dark—that's a sign of fine texture. Kid, you got lucky. Without that center patch, we wouldn't have made much. But with it, we've hit the jackpot!"
Before Uncle Harvey could finish, I was already planning how to spend the money. "How much is it worth?"
Uncle Harvey held up his hand, making an "8."
"80,000 euros? Doubled!"
"800,000 RMB."
"This lot is in your name—the stone belongs to you." Uncle Harvey patted my shoulder. "So I need to ask: are you willing to let me buy it back from you at cost plus a small margin?"
I was still dazed. Uncle Harvey kept talking: "Let's say 300,000. The capital of about 270,000 I've already fronted—the rest, I'll have the workshop transfer to you."
"I couldn't possibly accept your money," I blurted out.
But honestly, I very much wanted it. When I learned the stone had hit big, even the Myanmar sky seemed bluer and the sunshine more beautiful. A windfall born of both effort and luck—it was right there at my lips. How could I not want it?
"Hahaha!" Uncle Harvey laughed. "Don't stand on ceremony with me! I'll have it transferred to you. If you don't want to spend it, just treat me to dinner every day."
Uncle Harvey's approach filled me with respect. And his method was incredibly tactful.
He'd asked whether I was "willing to let him buy it back at a premium"—which made me feel respected.
Was he truly an honest jade merchant? Whether this stone was a win or a loss, you couldn't know without cutting it. He could have cut it himself, or simply taken it away—there were plenty of ways to keep me from learning the truth. After all, the capital was all his, and I'd even bid too high. Not giving me a single yuan would have been perfectly normal. Yet Uncle Harvey was still willing to pay me a finder's fee.
This was a true gentleman.
But looking back later, that conclusion proved premature. Of the two raw stones from this emporium, the small one let me earn over 30,000, and Uncle Harvey and I returned to Ruili in high spirits. But the other stone's story was neither so pleasant nor so aboveboard. To this day, that stone remains a sore point for Uncle Harvey. What happened? I'll tell you about that next time.