He Yunqin’s expression instantly turned grim, staring fixedly at Wang Bide: “What do you mean Hongdou is missing?”
Too much had happened in too short a time; Wang Bide’s throat was noticeably hoarse: “It happened half an hour ago. At the time, Hongdou was with Yu Chongyi at the school looking for Gu Yun. When they passed the drill grounds, she disappeared. Yu Chongyi thought his sister had gone to the back alley, so he went to that wonton shop to ask the owner, only to learn his sister had never been there. He rushed back to look for Hongdou, and while searching, they stumbled upon the old classrooms by the back gate, where they accidentally discovered a corpse that had been strangled to death.”
He Yunqin had already been walking toward the school. Hearing this, his footsteps stopped abruptly, his heart seeming to be seized violently by someone’s grip, all the blood in his body freezing solid.
Seeing He Yunqin’s face suddenly drain of color, Wang Bide realized he’d misunderstood and hastily said: “That person isn’t Yu Hongdou. Speaking of it, the face looks somewhat familiar—I vaguely recall seeing them at your wedding—but because the person was hanged, the features are somewhat swollen and distorted, and with poor lighting I didn’t get a close look, so I couldn’t identify who it was. I did a rough examination just now; this person’s time of death shouldn’t exceed half an hour. The school has already called the police station, and they’ll arrive shortly. After Yu Chongyi and I discovered Hongdou was missing, we searched every corner near the back gate but found nothing else, except fresh automobile tire tracks by the back gate. I suspect Hongdou was taken away by this person in a car, because between the time the siblings separated and Yu Chongyi returning from the wonton shop in the back alley, there were a full five or six minutes—more than enough time for the murderer to get Hongdou out of the classroom and take her away by car.”
He Yunqin’s mind was in chaos, unable to calm himself enough to think: “So by the time you discovered Hongdou was missing, the car at the back gate had already driven off. You have no way to track that car, and you don’t even know who took Hongdou?”
Wang Bide’s face showed shame: “Just now Yu Chongyi already drove my car, following the direction the car went, chasing after it. But given how much time has passed, I don’t know if he’ll catch up. That’s exactly why I urgently need more people—I just called my detective agency, telling my newly hired assistants to hurry over and help.”
He Yunqin said hoarsely: “Didn’t anyone examine the tire tracks? You should at least know which company’s car it was.”
Wang Bide recalled the scene from earlier—fortunately the rain had already stopped, and aside from a few footprints near the entrance that had been badly disturbed, the rest of the traces remained clearly visible on the muddy ground.
Along the path from the classroom to the back gate, two sets of footprints overlapped in disarray, one shallow and one deep, continuing until they vanished beside the tire tracks under a tree. As for those tire tracks—
“It’s a car from the American Ford Company,” he said with certainty.
He Yunqin immediately went to the school’s gatehouse, handed money to the Sikh doorman on duty, picked up the receiver, and dialed. When the call connected, he said expressionlessly: “I need people to help find a Ford automobile. Starting from St. John’s as the center point, search out to five blocks in every direction—don’t miss a single corner. If there’s any news at all, call this number, 939, immediately. Besides that, I also need a car sent here—dispatch one to the back alley of St. John’s right away.”
After finishing the call, though he knew full well Hongdou was no longer at St. John’s, since this was where she’d gone missing, he still intended to re-examine the scene where she’d disappeared. It was only that his legs felt as if filled with lead, each step taken with great difficulty. If the murderer had wanted to kill Hongdou, he could have done it quietly right in the old classroom—there was no need to go through the trouble of taking her away by car. The back gate of St. John’s only led onto Fanzhang Road, and turning right from there led into Futai Street. Given Hongdou had gone missing half an hour ago, and calculating by the Ford’s driving speed, the search needed to extend at least five blocks out in every direction.
The moment He Yunqin arrived he’d already made a full set of arrangements, and Wang Bide secretly breathed a sigh of relief. Though he was unwilling to admit his abilities fell short of He Yunqin’s, ever since He Yunqin had appeared, it was as if he’d swallowed a reassuring pill—his entire train of thought had become considerably clearer.
Seeing He Yunqin heading back into the school, he hurried to catch up: “Since Gu Yun wasn’t in the old classroom, I took the liberty of calling the Gu residence just now, and learned that Gu Yun had gone home. Apparently, while she was reading in the large classroom in the Education Department earlier, she inexplicably fainted for a while. When she woke, it was already 7:30. Afterward she sat in a daze for a while, then made her own way home. This clearly shows she’d been ambushed by someone earlier, and combined with Hongdou’s disappearance, I suspect all of this was premeditated by the murderer.”
He Yunqin said not a word. By the time the two of them reached the row of classrooms by the back gate, every light had been turned on. Since the news hadn’t yet spread through the school, only a few school workers lingered outside the classroom, full of unease. Wang Bide’s reputation as a detective preceded him—he’d already dealt with these few people when the incident first occurred. The school workers, having no experience with crime scenes, weren’t sure whether they should stop them, and in that moment of hesitation, Wang Bide had already gone back into the classroom to examine the body closely.
He Yunqin, however, had no interest in the corpse for the moment. He went straight to the back alley. The road wasn’t wide, with shops lined up densely on either side selling all kinds of food. He forced himself to calm down, patiently asking at shop after shop. At a noodle shop, the owner, busy with his accounts, had no impression of anything, but as He Yunqin was asking his questions, a shop clerk wiping down tables happened to overhear and spoke up: “I remember—about half an hour ago, a car did pass by.”
He Yunqin asked: “What color was the car, what did the driver look like, do you remember the plate number?” The city already had several thousand automobiles, each numbered by the Shanghai Municipal Council’s Public Works Department.
The clerk set down her rag, wiped her hands on her apron, and walked closer for a look. Never having seen such a handsome, dignified man before, she couldn’t help but glance at him a few more times, only to find, for some reason, his face frighteningly pale, his eyes dark and inky black as ink. Hearing how urgent his question was, she thought carefully and recalled: “I didn’t notice the plate number, I just remember it was a black car. The driver, though—”
At the time the shop had been quiet, and she’d been sitting idle at the shop entrance. When the car passed by, she’d glanced at it out of boredom. The weather at present was nowhere near severely cold, yet the driver had wrapped his head and face tightly with a scarf and felt hat—she’d already found it strange, so she mentioned this, adding: “There was only him in the car. He should have been quite tall—I’ve often seen tall Western men driving that kind of car, and this person’s height wasn’t inferior to theirs.”
Just then a car horn sounded outside—it turned out someone had brought the car he’d requested. He Yunqin hurried out, dismissed the driver, and got into the driver’s seat himself, intending to drive along the street searching section by section. Just as he was about to start the car, Wang Bide came out from the school, got in, and said: “The murder weapon has been taken away. There’s a cigarette butt on the ground, a Changle brand. I suspect it’s the same person as the previous cases—though the method of killing this time was rather crude, just strangling the person outright. I’d guess Hongdou accidentally walked in on the murderer committing the crime, forcing him to abandon whatever plan he’d originally had. The police have arrived now, so I can’t continue examining the scene.”
Saying this, and noticing He Yunqin hadn’t spoken for a long while, he turned to look and saw He Yunqin taking a cigarette from his trouser pocket—yet several in a row all slipped and fell to the floor of the driver’s seat.
Since knowing He Yunqin, he’d never once seen him so utterly shattered, and couldn’t help but feel moved himself, saying gloomily by way of comfort: “Don’t panic, panicking won’t help. No news is good news. A person is hard to find, but that car can’t possibly disappear.”
He Yunqin tilted his head back, closed his eyes, and leaned against the seat back, all color drained from his face. He wiped his face, lowered his head to check his wristwatch—ten minutes had passed since the phone call. He hastily pushed open the car door: “I’m going to call 939. Captain Wang, go to the Gu residence. Before Gu Yun lost consciousness, she very likely came into contact with the murderer without realizing it. If properly guided, she might be able to recall some characteristic of the murderer.”
He got out here, found a telephone booth, and dialed the number. The voice on the other end said: “We were just about to go find you at St. John’s. We just found a Ford automobile on Fuyuan Road. No one was in the car, but there was a light red wool dress on the back seat. We checked the label—it’s from Dingxiang.”
He Yunqin fell silent for a moment. Because it had rained in the evening, Hongdou had felt cold and specially brought a coat before leaving—it was indeed a light red wool dress. At the time she’d been angry at him, laughing and scolding so vividly, as if he only needed to reach out a hand to touch her fresh, radiant face. Before receiving news, though the anguish and pain had been distinct, none of it had been as sharp as hearing this specific detail. In this instant, it was as though a sharp blade had been thrust straight into his chest, piercing all the way through—an agonizing pain.
His hands and feet had gone numb and cold, losing all sensation. Rain drizzled onto his face, feeling wooden and numb, no sensation at all. When he spoke again, his voice was so hoarse it was as though he’d swallowed a mouthful of coarse gravel, utterly unable to produce sound. After a long moment he managed with difficulty: “The murderer left the car—he can’t have taken her far on foot. Help search the surrounding area. I’ll be right there.”
Author’s Note: The author has exams coming up and needs to spend two hours each night studying, so there won’t be double updates these next few days. I’ll try to make it up on the weekend. Don’t worry, Hongdou will be found safe and sound very soon. When I said “tomorrow morning,” I meant tomorrow morning within the story—I didn’t expect people to nitpick over that. If I’d known, I wouldn’t have bothered with the spoiler.