At the end of the year, the streets of Shanghai are cold and bleak, and the branches and leaves of the sycamore trees, which are the pride of the French Concession, are withering, and the golden dead leaves are sprinkled on the sidewalks, and they dance their own foxtrots in the breeze.

A Rolls-Royce armoured patrol car, which belonged to the International Chamber of Commerce of the Ministry of Industry, was quietly parked in front of the Bubbling ell (Boiling Spring) Cemetery opposite the Jing'an Temple. On the open mount on the roof of the car was a Vickers water-cooled machine gun, and the linen belt had been filled with 7.7 mm bullets, which looked golden in the winter sun.

"A pack of red tin packets (Ruby Queen)." Zhang Degui threw a few copper plates into the wooden plate of the cigarette stall, and after taking the cigarettes he wanted to buy, he also took a bag of matches.

Zhang Degui opened the tin foil of the cigarette, neatly shook out a cigarette roll, first put it under his nose and smelled it, then skillfully solidified the tobacco on the back of his hand, and then held it in his mouth.

"If you sell it, close the stall, don't come out in the second half of the day." As he spoke, Zhang Degui put his hardwood baton under his armpit, put his hands together and lit a cigarette.

The stall was a thin girl, wearing a blue floral cotton jacket, looking no more than eleven or twelve years old, this should have been the age of reading and literacy full of dreams, but at that time, children from poor families often shouldered the burden of life very early, competing with adults for jobs in order to make ends meet.

Zhang Degui knew this girl, to be precise, he knew this girl's grandfather, the real owner of this mobile cigarette stall. The old man is very honest, he never defaults on the monthly license fee and the monthly regulation money (protection fee) of the patrolmen, and often asks the patrolmen to buy cigarettes on credit, so the patrols of the nearby segments take good care of him. The old man has been sick for the past few days, because it takes a lot of money to see a doctor, so he asked his granddaughter to come out for him and continue to sell cigarettes. The patrols saw that the old man was good in the past, and the girls' families were really pitiful, so they took care of a lot of business in the cigarette stalls in the past two days.

The girl didn't talk to Zhang Degui, but just looked at the young patrol with timid eyes.

"Okay, I'll assume that you know." Zhang Degui was a little embarrassed to look at, he hung the baton on the belt loop around his waist, and threw the match back to the cigarette stand.

"What time is it? How can the Gmy Gang come back? (What time is it?) Why haven't those bastards come yet? Watching Zhang Degui approach, his companion, who was leaning on the fender of the armored car, complained loudly. The one who spoke had three folded lines on his arms in his uniform, and he was a rare "Sha Zhan" (sergeant) inspector in the Chinese patrol of the Ministry of Industry.

In the past, most of the sergeant inspectors who served in the patrol room of the Ministry of Industry Bureau were Sikh Indians. After the outbreak of war in Europe, a number of Indian patrols in the Public Concession were attracted by the high salaries and benefits to join the Sikh infantry battalions of the British army, which were being recruited in the expatriate circles of Shanghai. Because the high-level officials of the patrol house generally did not trust the Japanese patrol, the job gaps left by the Indian patrol were all filled by the western patrol and the Chinese patrol.

In late May 40, the Sikh infantry battalion boarded a ship from Shanghai to Europe to support the resistance of the British mainland, but the transport ship carrying the troops was attacked by a German ocean-going submarine off the coast of South Africa, and in the end, only four Dutch crew members escaped with the help of the rest of the ship, either drowning or dying in the mouth of a great white shark, a local South African specialty.

It is absurd that, since these men were recruited by the army on an ad hoc basis, the list of personnel had not yet been filed with the War Office in London, and the personnel documents carried by the troops were sunk to the bottom of the sea with the transport ship, and in the end there was no detailed and reliable list of the killed. In the aftermath, many Indian families claimed that their relatives were on that boat and asked for pensions from the British government, but they could not produce any official written documents to prove it.

To be honest, some of these people were indeed relatives of the dead, but many of them wanted to take advantage of the opportunity to deceive the British government, because the government could not identify them, so they simply refused all such requests. The British Army only issued death notices and pensions to the families of those registered in the army files, and the rest of the people were treated as missing civilians, because these people had resigned before joining the army, and they were not even hired by the British to patrol them.

"There's still half an hour, it's early." Zhang Degui took a cigarette from the cigarette case and handed it over.

"That, and half an hour? The wind is too cold to be frozen. (Damn, it's going to be half an hour, and the wind is blowing people to freeze.) The Inspector took the cigarette and pulled a steel-shelled lighter out of his pocket.

This is talking nonsense with his eyes open, the weather is not so cold today, and there is still a big sun shining, but who made the other party's official rank one level higher than himself, Zhang Degui could only nod his head and smile in agreement.

While the two patrolmen were smoking cigarettes and chatting, a terrible siren suddenly sounded in the distance, and it sounded like the sound was still moving rapidly, and it was getting closer and closer to them.

"Scattering cubes is hula? (Where is the fire?) The Inspector looked up and looked east along Bubbling ell road.

"Doesn't sound like a firetruck." Zhang Degui walked off the road and looked curiously.

After just a dozen seconds, the two of them saw the source of the alarm, a "Red Maria" belonging to the patrol room of the Ministry of Industry Bureau, rushed through the intersection of Hart Road and Jing'an Temple Road with a piercing alarm, and almost hit a Johnson & Johnson taxi that was parked at the intersection waiting for a red light.

Zhang Degui really heard it right, this is indeed not a fire truck.

"What's going on?" Zhang Degui asked in surprise.

"Book that, Nongmen's Nest, how can the nest know, it seems that the matter of Sagdu must have been measured, Nong waited for the separation, and the nest helped the top to be the ground house Meng Yesang. (, you ask me, how do I know, it looks like something big must be wrong, you wait here, I'll call the upper side and ask.) Then the inspector cursed and ran towards the security booth in front of the cemetery, where there was a telephone that could talk to the arrester.

"God, it looks like something really happened." Zhang Degui agreed with the inspector very much, because he found that the "Red Maria" was not alone, and there was a long convoy behind her.

Immediately following Red Maria across the intersection was an identical Rolls-Royce armored car beside him, with the flag of the International Merchant Corps on the hood at the front. At present, there are only six armored vehicles of this type at the disposal of the Ministry of Industry, and during the conflict half a month ago, these vehicles were very active, although they were traveling back and forth from beginning to end, and they did little to no avail.

Rolls-Royce was followed by a blue-grey painted four-wheeled convertible with a white SS lightning logo painted on the doors and a black SS flag waving in the wind on the small flagpole on the right side of the front of the car.

"Xiao Zhang, it's really like a book! (Xiao Zhang, something really happened!) At this time, the inspector shouted loudly and ran towards Sun Binggen. When he hurried to the side of the road, a Renault armored car with a French flag roared and rushed in front of the inspector.

"Book that, how can you be the law pot Ning A is here, and the grid machine is going to make trouble? (Damn, why are the French here too, it's hilarious.) The Inspector shook his head and sighed.

PS: Thank you for your support, I haven't bought a new computer yet, this chapter is with an ipad code, there is only one chapter today, I hope you understand.

I owe twenty chapters before and after, how to repay the debt, it depends on the state of the author, and this period of time is obviously outbreaking.