Chapter 23

Luo Wenzhou was just opening the door on his way in, pondering with his head down as he went. Only when he heard Tao Ran's words did he look up in surprise. "What's wrong now?"

Tao Ran didn't have attention to spare to wrangle over the cancer of heroism with "Captain China" Luo. Frowning, he said, "The tie Attorney Liu brought over has Zhang Donglai's fingerprints on it. The preliminary determination is that it matches the strangulation marks on the victim's neck. There are some small bloodstains on it—some skin broke on He Zhongyi's neck when he was strangled. Working overtime, the DNA test results can be ready by tomorrow morning at the earliest. The medical examiners say it's very likely that this is the murder weapon."

Luo Wenzhou listened silently. Then he looked up at the clock; it was close to midnight.

"Go after him," he said. "I figure Fei Du hasn't left, and if he has, it was only just now. We can catch up."

Fei Du in fact hadn't left.

After giving his statement, he'd gone to sit with Mother He again.

Perhaps it was because there was someone with her, and perhaps because the sight of the City Bureau all lit up in the middle of the night had given Mother He a bit of hope—her mood had steadied considerably. She could even voluntarily exchange a few words with Fei Du. "Before you came, I think I saw that man from this afternoon, that…what's his name?"

She meant Attorney Liu, but she couldn't remember what he did, stalled for a moment, found that the inside of her head was a ball of paste and simply passed over it. She asked, "Have they found new evidence?"

Mother He was sitting in a comfortable chair, but President Fei wasn't so comfortable. He had nowhere to put his legs, and this young master wasn't willing to ruin his image by curling up, so he could only sit twisted into an upright position to one side. His legs soon started to go numb, and he couldn't resist tapping on them. "Could be.—What are your plans once they've caught the killer? Will you go back home?"

Mother He's eyelids drooped. She didn't answer, only glanced at his hand tapping his leg and said, "You aren't with the police, right? It's very late. You should hurry home."

Aside from his numb legs, Fei Du in fact didn't feel tired at all. For young loiterers, this was when the nightlife was just getting started; it was the time he was most alert.

Unfortunately, there were no beauties around today; his only companion was a skinny, dried-up middle-aged woman. Despite that, Fei Du's treatment of great beauties and middle-aged women was indiscriminately good—from ten thousand flowers and grasses he had even cultivated some grades that didn't have a trace of lewdness to them.

"It's no problem. I'll stay with you a while," Fei Du told her. "My mother passed away when I was little. While she was alive, she was always taking medicine for her illness and couldn't go out and work. My father was busy with work and rarely came home. I was attending school then; my school was far from home, and I lived with a housekeeper near the school. I only came home once a week to see her."

Mother He looked Fei Du over somewhat bashfully. "Such a good-looking young fellow, your mother must have been crazy about you, looked forward to you coming home every day.—If a mother has no skills of her own, then the only thing she has left to look forward to every day is seeing her children."

After he heard this, Fei Du smiled at her without turning a hair. "Yeah."

He looked up and saw Luo Wenzhou and Tao Ran coming over, both their faces looking worn from working overtime. Tao Ran waved him over from a few steps away.

Fei Du unhurriedly walked over and smiled at Tao Ran, showing his teeth. "Ge, how did the date go?"

Fei Du's sense of propriety was comprehensive. He'd said he would change, so even his manner of address and body language changed completely; he'd said he would no longer make trouble, so he wasn't. He'd changed completely in an instant, becoming a close but properly-behaved brother.

"Don't mention it." Tao Ran waved his hand expressively and looked at the staring Mother He, indicating that Fei Du should go with them to one side. "Come over here for a moment. There are some things I need you to confirm."

"What's the matter?" Fei Du said languidly as he walked. "Have you finally realized that there's no future in being a policeman? I've always said that even the person selling youtiao in my company's building's dining hall gets paid more than your captain."

Stuck full of pins at every opportunity without even having made a sound, Captain Luo was so wronged that all he could feel was hunger. He ungraciously called over the officer on duty and gave him some money. "Go to the twenty-four hour shop and buy some youtiao."

Mother He craned her neck, watching Fei Du as he walked away. She was sitting in a corner. Her tears had dried, and a clear film had formed over her eyes, reflecting the cold city and the cold night.

Suddenly, her phone rang. It was a piece of trash that had been knocked off the market by the many types of smart phones long ago. The only function it had was receiving phone calls.

She shivered and answered in a flurry. "Hello?"

Whispery static came over the phone, followed by a strange voice. "Did you see that lawyer? He took money to speak for those young masters, but he couldn't stand the condemnation of his conscience and came over there in the middle of the night to make a report. Now the police know for certain who the murderer is. They must be very busy now, right? Conclusive evidence is hard to cover up.—Are you willing to trust me now?"

Mother He's chapped lips trembled. Almost inaudibly, she said, "Who are you?"

"I'm the one helping you," the strange voice said. "Outside matters are too complicated. You don't understand anything about them. They're only being nice to you because they're afraid you'll go out and blab. The murderer has connections, so they don't dare to arrest him."

Mother He's eyes opened wide bit by bit.

The strange voice asked, "Are you ready?"

At the same time, Tao Ran brought Fei Du straight to his own office, fished out some close-up photographs and, cutting right to the chase, pointed at the striped silver-gray tie on them. "Have you ever seen this tie?"

Fei Du glanced at it. "It's a popular design. Everyone has one."

"Does Zhang Donglai have one?" said Tao Ran.

Fei Du froze, the joking smile mostly falling from his face. "What does that mean?"

Looking on, Luo Wenzhou found that this brat really was astute; too bad he didn't put it to use in the proper places. "Exactly what you think it does."

Fei Du hesitated, took the photographs and looked at them carefully for a while. "He does have one of this brand. If I recall correctly, it was a gift from Zhang Ting. You can see it doesn't fit Zhang Donglai's style, so he normally only wears it when he's playing around at his dad's company. One time someone else saw it and made fun of him for ages. Lao Zhang may be unreliable, but he does love Zhang Ting. He complains about it every day, but he still can't bear to throw it away.—What's wrong with this tie?"

"This tie was found in the crack between the seats of Zhang Donglai's car. It has his fingerprints. We suspect it's the murder weapon," Tao Ran said, lowering his voice. "Help us with a few things—on the night of May 20th at Chengguang Mansion, was Zhang Donglai wearing this tie?"

"He wasn't," said Fei Du. "That should show up on the security camera footage?"

Tao Ran then asked, "The twentieth was a working day. Could he have worn it during the day, then taken it off at night and put it in his car or his pocket?"

"I don't know about that." Fei Du frowned slightly, then, as if he'd thought of something, asked, "Are Zhang Donglai's fingerprints the only ones on the tie?"

Tao Ran's expression flickered slightly; that was enough for Fei Du to read the answer.

He stood in silence for a while, the smiling expression that seemed to have grown along with the corners of his eyes and the tips of his brows cooling. Then he slowly spoke. "Zhang Donglai can't be the killer. If his fingerprints are the only ones on the tie, it clearly shows that when the killer took that tie, whether he stole it or just picked it up, he was already planning to use it to implicate him."

His voice was leisurely, his tone no different from his usual one, but Tao Ran, bewildered, sensed his veiled temper.

Starting from the time Tao Ran had called him to ask for Zhang Donglai's alibi, Fei Du had displayed the indifference of an outsider. Even afterwards, when he'd twice accompanied Zhang Ting to the City Bureau, he was purely accompanying her, purely going through the motions, a mere drinking buddy through and through.

He hadn't gotten worked up trying to defend Zhang Donglai. He hadn't even asked of his own initiative what their investigation had turned up, whether Zhang Donglai had been entirely cleared of suspicion.

"I never expected you to get angry on Zhang Donglai's behalf. I thought…" Tao Ran was somewhat taken aback. He considered his wording. "I didn't think you were on such good terms with him? It looked at first like you weren't taking this so much to heart."

"I'm not angry. I just think that some people have been rather too thorough." Fei Du tilted his head and smiled at him, seeming warm and calm, then made a slip of the tongue: "Give me some coffee-flavored sesame oil to help me focus."

Tao Ran: "…"

The "not angry" President Fei's expression was frank; he had entirely failed to notice he'd said anything wrong.

When Fei Du, frowning, had drained a cup of instant coffee with an expression of deepest suffering, he let out a breath and spoke. "When you released Zhang Donglai, saying that there was insufficient evidence, you actually already had evidence showing he wasn't under suspicion. Is that right?"

Tao Ran froze.

But next to him Luo Wenzhou nodded. "Right.—The DNA on those cigarette ends you sent over really was He Zhongyi's. We followed up on that lead and found that he'd gotten on a bus and left Chengguang Mansion to go somewhere else. He wasn't killed at the club. Zhang Donglai was still making merry in Chengguang Mansion at the time. His alibi is fairly solid. We didn't clarify this when we set him free because I had a feeling that the murderer was following this case closely. If we released Zhang Donglai so ambiguously, he would definitely have a next move. And sure enough, he delivered this tie to us."

"If he's someone who can closely follow the case and plant the murder weapon in Zhang Donglai's car without being suspected, then the murderer must be among those of us who came to pick up Zhang Donglai when he got out of the 'little dark room.' Aside from Zhang Ting and Attorney Liu, all those people also just happened to be at Chengguang Mansion that night." Fei Du stretched out his legs, half-leaning and half-sitting on Tao Ran's desk. "Among us, the one most concerned with the case, the most implicated, must be me. Am I under a lot of suspicion?"

"Not much," Luo Wenzhou answered without pausing to think. "Earlier you couldn't find north in the West District's heap of little alleys. The degree of difficulty involved in tossing a corpse there would be a little high for you."

Fei Du: "…"

Luo Wenzhou said, "That's enough, President Fei. I know you're 'both wealthy and virtuous' and can afford to eat youtiao. The silk banner's on its way. Stop throwing a tantrum and speak sensibly."

Tao Ran looked from one to the next. He was slightly appalled. He had no idea what had happened while he'd been away from his post for the time it took to have dinner.

Fei Du stared at Luo Wenzhou expressionlessly for a while; perhaps he was internally cutting him to pieces. He managed to maintain his bearing and said seriously, "Aside from me, the one who most clearly understands the circumstances of the case must be Attorney Liu. The whole affair of the tie may have been staged by him. But he never had any contact with Zhang Donglai before, and it would have been very hard for him to get ahold of Lao Zhang's tie to use as a murder weapon.—Attorney Liu reports directly to Zhang Ting, and Zhang Ting fits the above requirements better. Also, she came into close contact with the deceased He Zhongyi. You need to go investigate her alibi for that night."

He paused for a moment. "There's also a fourth person: Zhang Ting's boyfriend, Zhao Haochang. He's a fairly well-known legal advisor, specializing in mergers and acquisitions. He was the one who recommended Attorney Liu to Zhang Ting, and he came with her today. On the night of the murder, he was at Chengguang Mansion and left after the dinner party—"

"You're sure he left after the dinner party," said Luo Wenzhou.

The corners of Fei Du's lips twitched ambiguously. "What do you think? Would you participate in the 'midnight performances' in front of your future brother-in-law?"

Luo Wenzhou: "…"

Little whelp!

Fei Du said, "Can you tell me approximately where He Zhongyi went after he left the Chengguang Mansion?"

Tao Ran looked at Luo Wenzhou, saw Luo Wenzhou nod slightly, then said, "He got off the bus at Wenchang Intersection. After that we lost track of him."

Fei Du got a leather card case out of his pocket, flipped through it, and pulled out a business card:

Rongshun Law Firm (Yan City) Office

Zhao Haochang (Partner, 2nd Level)

Address: Third Floor, Jinlong Center, 103 Wenchang Street, Anping District, Yan City

Tao Ran stood up at once. "It's him!"

But Luo Wenzhou lightly scratched his chin, having a premonition that this matter wasn't necessarily going to be as simple as it seemed.

"Don't rush," he said. "We don't have enough evidence. He Zhongyi got off the bus at Wenchang Intersection, so a lawyer who works on Wenchang Street must be the murderer? There's no logical link there.—What else is there?"

"When He Zhongyi had just arrived in Yan City, a mysterious individual gave him 100,000 yuan," said Fei Du. "If that person was Zhao Haochang, then they obviously must have had some prior connection. Considering that He Zhongyi had left home for the first time to look for work, Zhao Haochang may have been to his hometown. Give He Zhongyi's mom his photograph and let her take a look."

Luo Wenzhou picked up his phone and dialed Lang Qiao. "Big Eyes, is He Zhongyi's mother still waiting for the results? If she hasn't gone to rest, ask her to come over to the office for a moment."

Lang Qiao gave an affirmative.

Fifteen minutes later, Luo Wenzhou had reviewed all the leads afresh and Lang Qiao still hadn't come with Mother He. He looked up, eyelid involuntarily twitching.

Just then, Lang Qiao ran in breathlessly. "Chief, He Zhongyi's mother isn't in the bureau. I don't know where she went!"