In just three hours, Rabe had smoked an entire box of cigarettes, and the house was filled with a choking smell.

Rabe pushed open the window to let in and asked, "I still have more than 80 photos, do you want to see them?" If you can still hold on. ”

"Look." Zhou Hexuan's eyes were full of bloodshots, his voice was hoarse, I don't know if he was choked or smoked by cigarettes.

Rabe took out many photos from the middle layer of the suitcase one after another, and handed them to Zhou Hexuan with the back side up, he didn't seem to want to see more pictures of the photos.

Zhou Hexuan first saw the text on the back of the photo, which was written in German: "More than a thousand more Chinese were driven there, taken outside the city, and executed with machine guns." Rabe. December 18th. ”

Zhou Hexuan endured the churning gastric juice and flipped to the front of the photo to carefully examine every detail. Then gently put it down, pick up the second photo and look at the front and back, the third, fourth, fifth...... More than 80 photos, Zhou Hexuan looked at them for an hour.

Rabe took out another stack of paper and said: "This is the original draft of the protest letter I wrote to the Japanese army headquarters, a total of 16 letters, and the investigation recorded more than 500 atrocities, each of which has a corresponding number. ”

Zhou Hexuan casually opened one of the drafts of the letters, which began with a condemnation of the Japanese troops in Nanjing and a demand that the Japanese military immediately stop such behavior. There is a series of cases, such as No. 36: Japanese soldiers snatched pigs and horses, many Japanese soldiers raped 17 women, two of them were raped to death, and there were many rapes and robberies in the Yinyang camp.

Zhou Hexuan put down the draft of the letter and said to Rabe: "Sir, I originally wanted to write a book to expose the Nanjing Massacre in the first person. But after reading the materials you brought, I don't think any literary genre can carry the weight of that sin. So, I want to put together all the information, including your diary, photos, and letters, as well as letters from other missionaries to the church and family. There is no need for a special literary form, just an objective record, an objective summary, and an objective presentation of facts in front of the eyes of the world. Some of the atrocities, recorded by other missionaries, may coincide with yours, and we need to check and verify them one by one. ”

"I agree, and I'll do my best to help you with this job," Rabe nodded solemnly, adding, "The most important piece of physical evidence is Father Maggie's video footage. The copy in my possession, although in the hands of the Gestapo, said that Mr. Magee would send the master disk back to the United States. ”

"I have contacted Father Maggie's family, but they have not received it yet. ”

Rabe speculated: "It may still be in the mail, and when I left Nanjing, he had already shot three reels of film and entrusted a friend to smuggle them to Shanghai for safekeeping." By the way, Mr. Magee also wrote more than 400 protests and reports to the Japanese command, which are also important written materials. ”

Zhou Hexuan thought for a while and asked, "Mr. Rabe, can you contact the friends who helped the refugees together?" I need their help. ”

"Of course," Rabe nodded, "Zhou, you are an upright man, and thanks to your help, we are not so embarrassed. ”

The so-called "Zhou Hexuan's help" refers to the 200,000 oceans he left to Xu Chuanyin.

Rabe and his friends formed the International Security Zone and was elected Chairman of the Zone. Xu Chuanyin was also invited to join the security zone and serve as a member of the security zone committee, and the two had mutual contact and cooperation, which is recorded in many places in "Rabe's Diary".

The international security zone is responsible for arranging food and lodging for more than 200,000 people, which costs a lot of money and food every day, and there are four main sources of funds: first, Rabe, Xu Chuanyin and others provide it privately; second, charitable donations; third, the national government appropriation; Fourth, the Japanese army allocated food.

The appropriations of the Nationalist Government came and went, the food provided by the Japanese army was always delayed, and the donations from charitable groups and individuals were a drop in the bucket, so the 200,000 oceans left by Zhou Hexuan were saved at a critical time.

The 200,000 oceans were originally reserved for Xu Chuanyin to help the old, weak, sick and disabled evacuate Nanjing. But at that time, it was difficult to find cars and horses in Nanjing, and tickets and ferry tickets were not easy to get, so Xu Chuanyin had nothing to do about it.

When Xu Chuanyin felt that the situation was not good, the 200,000 ocean bills could not be cashed, because of the impact of the war, all the banks in Nanjing were closed.

Until January, refugees in the International Security Zone were starving, many were freezing to death and starving, and Rabe and his friends were driven crazy. Finally, a missionary ventured to Shanghai, took the money from the money order, and transported food and medicine from Shanghai to the Nanjing Security Zone.

Rabe asked curiously: "Zhou, did you know in advance that the Japanese army would carry out a massacre in Nanjing?" Listening to Dr. Xu Chuanyin's narration, it seems that you have been prepared for a long time. ”

"Guess," Zhou Hexuan smiled bitterly, "What if you can predict?" It's not useless yet. ”

"No, it's useful," Rabe said, shaking his head, "and the money you left behind helped the refugees through the most difficult times." If it weren't for the 200,000 oceans to buy food and medicine, many people would have died, not killed by the Japanese army, but frozen to death, starved to death and died of disease. Because of your help, at least tens of thousands of refugees have been able to save their lives. ”

Zhou Hexuan laughed rarely: "If I had known, I should have kept more money." ”

Rabe lamented: "Unfortunately, in February, the security zone was forced to close. At that time, the Japanese promised not to massacre civilians again, but I knew that they would not be able to keep their promise, and the atrocities in Nanjing would continue. Although the safe zone was closed, many of my friends were still maintaining the camps, and I couldn't wait to leave Nanjing. I am not running away, I want to rush back to Germany as soon as possible and ask the Führer, Mr. Hitler, to intervene. Who knows, I didn't wait for the Führer's summons, only the Gestapo. ”

"Don't blame yourself," Zhou Hexuan comforted, "Mr. Rabe, you have done a good job. You and your friends have saved the lives of 250,000 Chinese people, and you are all living bodhisattvas in the hearts of the Chinese. ”

In the next two months, Chen Guangfu and others finally persuaded Roosevelt to start negotiations with the Morgan consortium on commercial loans. Stimson, the Pritz Brothers, Hu Shih, Zhang Pengchun, and others also successfully set up the "Committee on the Non-Participation of the United States in Japanese Aggression," setting off an even more fierce wave of anti-Japanese aid to China in various parts of the United States -- in this situation, although several major American conglomerates are still friendly with Japan, public opinion has rapidly turned to China.

At the end of the Battle of Songhu last year, 82 percent of Americans opposed mediation in the Sino-Japanese war, and 70 percent of Americans demanded the withdrawal of US personnel and troops in China.

In just the past year, the situation has finally gradually changed due to the continuous propaganda of Chinese such as Hu Shi and Zhang Pengchun in the United States, the efforts of American academics and churches, and the promotion of some capitalists whose interests have been damaged.

Opinion polls just conducted show that although the majority of Americans do not want to get involved in the war, they agree to sanction Japan by diplomatic and economic means and support the Chinese people in the war of resistance through material means. At this time, more than 30% of Americans expressed support for the abolition of the US-Japan trade agreement, and in another year, this figure will reach 81%.

The idea of ordinary Americans is simple, that is, the United States cannot enter the war, it is terrible to fight. But the Japanese are beasts and have bombed our warships, so they should provide material support to China.

What Zhou Hexuan wanted to do was to speed up this progress and expose the Nanjing Massacre in exchange for further support from the American people.

With Rabe's help, Zhou Hexuan collected first-hand information much faster. After all, Rabe was the former chairman of the International Security Zone and had ties to most of the refugee camps and charities in Nanjing. Rabe sent a telegram, Ms. Weitling sent all her diaries, and four of Father Maggie's images arrived in the United States.

At this moment, Zhou Hexuan has 18 diaries, 4 reels of film roll, 681 photos, 1,328 letters of various kinds, and 66 protest letters and investigation reports.

The information is so complete that it has more records than the Tokyo Trial and subsequent investigations, and only the narrative testimonies of Holocaust survivors are missing.

Zhou Hexuan, Yu Peichen and Rabe jointly listed a total of 829 cases of robbery, rape and massacre, and the number of victims in these cases alone is as high as more than 50,000.

Yu Peichen couldn't hold it at first, she only lasted for half a month, and she kept having nightmares, and woke up screaming in her dreams several times.

Zhou Hexuan is actually not much better, the text description is a little bearable, but the video and photo materials are too shocking. No wonder Ms. Weitling would commit suicide, no wonder Ms. Zhang Chunru would commit suicide, these extreme evils of human nature can drive normal people crazy.

When all the information was sorted out, Zhou Hexuan did not immediately start writing a book, but ran to the cinema and Broadway theater for several days in a row, picking out the comedy genre to relieve his mental pressure.

Although it is very out of place, I still have to say that Zhou Hexuan slept with Yu Peichen.

One night, Yu Peichen woke up from a nightmare, ran into Zhou Hexuan's room in the dark, frantically picked his clothes and said, "I want to vent, I want to vent, you hurry up!" ”

The two of them snapped for half the night, completely transformed into wild beasts, so tired that they could think of nothing, do nothing, and sleep until the next afternoon.

From then on, they did things during the day and at night. In October, she finally got her life, and Yu Peichen became pregnant......