“Di di di, di di di, di di di.”
In the early morning, a disturbing ringing sound woke up Cai Yan, who had just fallen asleep.
He pried open his eyelids, which felt like they were glued shut, glanced at the time, then listened carefully. Suddenly, like a fish out of water, he shot up from the bed.
He ran out of his room in a few steps and saw his dad standing at the front door, studying the new electronic peephole he had installed. His dad even turned back to ask him:
“This thing starts ringing so early in the morning? How do you turn it off? Is it broken?”
“You don’t understand, get out of the way, don’t be a hindrance.” Cai Yan urgently pushed his dad aside.
Someone lingering outside the door for a long time at six in the morning, triggering the electronic peephole alarm—who else could it be but the person who left the dead cat last time!
Well, well, well. I wasn’t prepared last time and you got away with it. Now you’re getting bold, daring to come a second time. This is never-ending, isn’t it?
This time, I’ll make a vlog and make you famous!
He quickly grabbed the handheld camera from the corner, held it in his hand, then lunged forward and threw the door open!
“Let’s see if you dare to leave a dead cat at my door again—”
The camera was shoved in the face of a uniformed police officer.
Cai Yan: “?”
The police officer at the door glanced at the camera. “No need for that. We all wear body cams when we’re on duty now. If you need, I can keep it on the whole time.”
Cai Yan: “Uh… no need.”
The police officer was very pleasant. “It’s fine, leave it on, in case there are any disputes later. What’s this about a dead cat? Why didn’t you report it?”
“It’s nothing, just… a neighborhood dispute.” Cai Yan quickly found an excuse. “A small matter. The police are busy, I can handle it myself. I won’t trouble you.”
But Cai Hengmu interjected from behind. His dad always said the wrong thing at the wrong time.
“I was wondering why you’ve been acting so strange lately, even telling me to go out less and be careful. So someone’s been leaving dead cats at our door?” Cai Hengmu said. “Don’t listen to his nonsense. We have a great relationship with our neighbors; no one would come and leave a dead cat. It must be because he’s some UP and offended someone online, so they sent him a dead cat.”
“Oh? Old Cai, what’s your son’s ID?” the police officer asked.
Cai Yan wanted to cover Cai Hengmu’s mouth, but Cai Hengmu’s mouth was always so fast, never engaging his brain, no matter how many times he emphasized not to casually reveal his online ID…!
“His ID is cheap and easy to remember. It’s called Half a Cabbage.”
Cai Yan felt like he had died of embarrassment.
The police officers looked at him, their pleasant expressions turning a bit more serious. “You’re the one who did the analysis of the Tang Zhixue case online?”
“That’s me,” Cai Yan said with a straight face.
“Your video leaked too much content that shouldn’t have been leaked and caused a very bad influence. According to regulations, we need to criticize and educate you.”
Cai Yan had a basketful of retorts ready.
But the police officers changed their tone, and the seriousness on their faces melted like ice cream in the summer sun, the ice and water melting away, leaving only the sweet sugary residue on their pleasant, smiling faces.
Their gazes floated past him and landed behind him.
He heard these police officers say, “But we’re not here for that today. Someone else will talk to you about that later. Old Cai, coming to your door so early in the morning is to bring you some great news. Thanks to you, the Tang Zhixue case has been solved!”
The Tang Zhixue case was solved!
Cai Yan’s spirits suddenly lifted, but that momentary lift brought with it more strangeness.
Why did they say “thanks to you” to the old man?
Had this old man done anything these past few days? Wasn’t he just drinking tea, reading the newspaper, going for walks, and shooting the breeze?
Had the police found the wrong person? Even if they wanted to thank someone, it should be him… right?
Cai Yan woodenly turned his head and saw Cai Hengmu’s face plastered with a fake, polite expression. “I just did some insignificant little things. The credit for solving the case is all yours. A phone call would have been enough to notify me. There was no need to come all the way here. It’s too grand… Come in, come on in, have a seat. I’ll make you some tea.”
Since there were still many things to discuss, the police officers didn’t stand on ceremony and came in.
Cai Hengmu boiled water and poured tea for everyone.
Cai Yan looked at the teacup placed in front of him. The clear yellow tea reflected his own sallow face.
He heard the police officer say:
“This old case is finally solved, and you played a major role in it. The chief’s intention is for us to go with you to visit Tang Zhixue’s mother, tell the old lady the good news, and then present you with a certificate of merit and take a group photo.”
“Huh? Solving the case is the police’s credit. What am I going there for? I’m not going.”
His dad’s voice, for once, said something self-aware.
“This is the bureau’s decision. What’s yours is yours, you can’t refuse.”
His dad fell silent. After a long while, he mumbled, “Let me think, let me think. I’ll go to the bathroom first. You guys continue drinking tea.”
Drink my ass!
Cai Yan couldn’t take it anymore. He shot his head up, shaking off the yellowed face in his mind, and asked the police with resentment and confusion, “What on earth did my dad do that you have to come all the way here to thank him?”
The police officers exchanged a look. “The things in your video, you learned them from Old Cai, right?”
Cai Yan felt guilty for a couple of seconds. “Part of it was. The other part I went to see for myself, and I summarized it on my own.”
The police officers sighed. “These old case details are crucial…”
The voices from the living room drifted in intermittently.
Cai Hengmu, acting furtively, went from the toilet to the balcony.
The keywords “go visit,” “present certificate of merit,” were all like biting snakes. As soon as they came out of the police officers’ mouths, they bit the previously composed Cai Hengmu and sent him to the balcony.
He paced around on the balcony and, out of habit, looked at the balcony next door.
He lifted his leg, wanting to climb over the balcony railing. He was old, he couldn’t make it. He had to move a stool, step on it to stand up. Once he was up, he wanted to jump, but looking at the height of the sixth floor, he felt it was dangerous. Then he went to pull the bedsheet hanging on the rack to tie around himself.
As he was tying it, before he could finish the simple protective measures, a familiar face popped out from the balcony next door.
Yuan Yue leaned on the balcony and gave him a helpless smile:
“Uncle Cai, with your old arms and legs, let’s not do anything dangerous. No more window jumping. Anyway, even if you jump, you won’t get away.”
In the end, Cai Hengmu still went, alone, slowly riding his beat-up little electric scooter.
The other police officers who were supposed to go with him were persuaded away with excuses of it being embarrassing and awkward.
The police officers discussed it and agreed. It was fine. Let Cai Hengmu go and inform her in the morning, and in the afternoon, they would make a formal visit to close the case and take some publicity photos.
Cai Yan, who had been standing by and listening to the whole thing, gritted his teeth and was about to follow, but after a few steps, he turned back and grabbed Yuan Yue’s clothes. He spoke rapidly, asking in a continuous stream, “Brother Yuan, what did my dad do? Why do you say he solved the case? You were clearly the one running around on the case!”
Yuan Yue: “The case is closed now, so it’s not a secret anymore. Uncle Cai will tell you later…”
“I don’t want to hear it from him,” Cai Yan interrupted Yuan Yue bluntly. “I want to hear it from you. He’s used to exaggerating. Who knows which of his words are true and which are false? Also, you said the case is solved. How exactly was it solved?”
Yuan Yue was silent for a short while.
The joy on his face subsided a little. He first looked ahead, then turned to Cai Yan, and spoke softly but seriously, “This case happened in 1994.”
“And?” Cai Yan didn’t understand why he was emphasizing this point.
“In 1994, many criminal investigation techniques were not well-developed. DNA testing, which is now commonplace, was just emerging even in the United States at that time. It was not popular and not mature, let alone in our country. So no one thought to search for and extract residual biological evidence at the crime scene to check for DNA.”
“Uncle Cai is someone who loves to read detective novels and follow foreign case news.”
“About a year or two later, he learned about DNA technology abroad and that it could be used to identify criminals.”
“You’re trying to say…” Cai Yan vaguely guessed what was coming next.
But it was impossible. How could it be possible?
Wasn’t this old coot just a braggart, someone who was always quick to speak but slow to act?
“In the following years, Uncle Cai traveled all over the country every year, based on the personal information recorded in the interrogation records of the suspects at that time. When he found them, he would look for opportunities to collect hair and saliva, for example, from liquor bottles they had drunk from or cigarettes they had smoked. When we reopened this case, I found biological evidence left by the suspect in the corner of a table at the crime scene. After comparing it with the suspect’s DNA that Uncle Cai had collected over the years, we finally confirmed the identity of the other murderer in the case.”
The DNA Yuan Yue gave to Hu Yuan was obtained this way, but DNA obtained in this manner cannot be used as court evidence. Later, Yuan Yue sent someone to Qian Shumao’s hometown to obtain the DNA of Qian Shumao’s parents through proper procedures to complete the evidence chain.
In addition, Cai Hengmu would regularly visit the hometowns of those he highly suspected every few years, secretly observing the parents of those suspects, looking for clues.
The work was tedious, and also simple.
22 years of time, 22 years of effort, were all condensed into these few short sentences.
“That’s impossible!” Cai Yan retorted. “I know him. He was just traveling. Every time he went on a trip, he would bring back all sorts of junk like jade, rocks, things that were clearly tourist traps.”
“Circumstantial evidence doesn’t just appear out of thin air,” Yuan Yue said with a chuckle. “But maybe… he was sightseeing and getting scammed while looking for evidence.”
“Even if he did do these things during his travels, even if—even if—” Cai Yan was inexplicably agitated. “Even if he worked so hard to collect evidence for so many years, he didn’t solve the case! You guys solved it! Without you, with his clumsy way of collecting evidence, he would never have solved this case!”
“He’s just a smelly old man, he’s just an ordinary person, and he’s stupid!”
The smile on Yuan Yue’s face faded.
But he didn’t refute. He even let out a soft “mm.”
This “mm” was directed at Cai Yan’s last sentence.
Cai Hengmu was an ordinary person.
The answer from Yuan Yue did not satisfy Cai Yan.
He left Yuan Yue, got in his own car, and chased after him.
On the way, countless thoughts raced through his mind, churning and steaming like boiling water. At first, he didn’t believe it, no matter what. But Yuan Yue wouldn’t lie, the police wouldn’t lie. This was real. The father he had always looked down on had done so much without him knowing…!
He was a smart person.
Smart people find it hard to deceive themselves in the face of ironclad evidence.
So in the end, he reluctantly, unwillingly admitted: maybe his dad wasn’t as bad as he thought. At least his dad was trying to make up for his past mistakes… at least his dad did indeed make a great contribution to solving this case.
22 years.
A long time, a very long time indeed.
Traveling north and south, it was certainly not easy.
Now, the case was finally solved. His dad’s persistence and hard work for 22 years had not been in vain.
Now, this old man had finally… finally become a hero.
The hero father he had hoped to see as a child.
The hero father was 22 years late, but he had returned.
The car arrived at the reed marsh. For some reason, even though he was driving a four-wheeled sedan, a car worth hundreds of thousands, it didn’t seem to be as fast as his dad’s little two-wheeled electric scooter. His dad was only five minutes ahead of him, but he hadn’t been able to catch up to that little scooter that should have been sent to a repair shop. It wasn’t until he reached the old house and the reed marsh that he saw the already-stopped scooter.
It was only six o’clock.
The sun was hiding behind the clouds, barely visible.
The old house, shrouded in the reed marsh, was also barely visible.
He quickly walked through the reeds and hurried to the front of the old house. He saw his father, and he also saw Tang Zhixue’s mother, Wang Caixia! He heard his father, with a hint of awkwardness, say to the old lady who was not fully awake and still sleepy-eyed in the early morning:
“Elder Sister Wang, I’ve come to tell you this time that your son’s case has been solved…”
This was a hero’s scene.
He realized he was still holding the camera. He raised it, trying to find an angle.
But there was no highlight; it was still early, the highlight was still hidden behind the clouds. There were no birds, flowers, or cheers.
On this ordinary morning, an ordinary old lady heard the news, was stunned for a moment, then took out a handkerchief and wiped her eyes.
Her handkerchief was so ordinary, her figure so common, even her old age was unremarkable. From any angle, this scene was so ordinary, so ordinary that it was far from exciting, far from thrilling, far from heroic.
He had just admitted that his father might be a hero, and then he saw that his father seemed to be the same father as before.
He suddenly thought of the glance Yuan Yue had given him, Yuan Yue’s soft “mm.”
He abruptly squatted down, hiding in the reeds, and fiercely pulled his own hair.
“I can do it too!”
He wanted to say this, but he knew he couldn’t.
He was willing to admit his father was a hero. Being surpassed by a hero was not shameful. But his father was just an ordinary person.
He would make mistakes; the case still needed others to help solve it.
He would be foolish; even when investigating a case, he would get scammed by tourist traps.
This ordinary person did ordinary things over and over again, and then, the extraordinary was accomplished in an ordinary way.
“Awake?” Huo Ranyin said.
“Don’t dare to wake up, don’t dare to wake up.”
“Hmm?”
“Don’t dare not to wake up, don’t dare not to wake up,” Ji Xun corrected himself. He let out a breath, pulled his hand back from the doorframe, and let Huo Ranyin in. “Captain Huo has a unique way of waking people up.”
“Your reaction is a bit disappointing,” Huo Ranyin said. “To be blunt, shouldn’t you be kissing me back right now?”
“Isn’t this about work?” Ji Xun was unperturbed. “For the sake of Captain Huo being willing to sacrifice his looks for work, I’ll tell you who that person I mentioned yesterday was—”
“Ji Xun,” Huo Ranyin interrupted him, “I don’t need you to tell me who that person is. I can guess myself.”
“Oh—” Ji Xun was a little annoyed by Huo Ranyin’s confidence.
He grunted inwardly and changed the subject.
“You just said Yuan Yue went to Yi’an County? It’s probably not just to report the good news to the guy who was giving him advice behind the scenes, right? Is he planning to bring that person over to meet with Xin Yongchu?”
Xin Yongchu had always thought he was the only one working on Tang Zhixue’s case. In his heart, he believed in the police, but he also held a grudge against them.
It was a grudge born of desperation.
That’s why he chose to poison the milk candy, on one hand to force the police’s hand, and on the other, not without a desire for revenge.
Bringing this person behind Yuan Yue over would help resolve Xin Yongchu’s inner conflict and could be considered giving him a slightly better answer.
“That’s for Captain Yuan to handle. I’m not curious about how he wants to handle it,” Huo Ranyin said with a cold expression. “Ji Xun, it’s not working hours right now.”
“Is that so? I thought Captain Huo wanted to work day and night, awake or asleep. I was just trying to satisfy you…”
“The first time we met, you weren’t this shy.”
“…”
“You were very direct back then,” Huo Ranyin commented.
“Is it so strange for a man to be direct about his desires?” Ji Xun said.
“What about now? Interest, feelings? It’s too early to talk about feelings; we’re not at that stage. It’s interest and danger, right?” He lowered his eyes and smiled. “You’re interested, you feel the danger.”
No matter when.
Whether at work or in private, Huo Ranyin was always this aggressive. Aggressiveness was probably the most essential part of Huo Ranyin’s personality, Ji Xun thought. He met Huo Ranyin’s gaze.
Huo Ranyin was at ease.
“Ji Xun, I’ve seduced you.”
__
Author’s note:
Ji Xun who works hard VS Huo Ranyin who doesn’t work hard.
Ji Xun: …Follows his heart.
