Arriving at Fuhua Lane, He Yunqin and Hongdou went up to the second floor. Wang Bide was in the middle of recruiting an assistant, the hallway packed with young people waiting for interviews. A glance around showed they were all students — some drawn by genuine interest, others by the generous salary offered by Bide’s Detective Agency. Yet very few could actually pass the bridge card game test, and Wang Bide was suspicious by nature; the interviews had run from morning until evening, and only a handful had made it through the second round.
While Wang Bide was busy on his end, He Yunqin and Hongdou went straight into the study. Gu Yun sat at the desk meticulously organizing pages of documents. Seeing the two of them come in, she paused in surprise. “Oh, why are you two here? Well, this works out — I won’t need the family to send a car for me. I’ll ride home with you later.”
Hongdou laughed. “Do you come help Detective Wang as his assistant every Sunday?”
Gu Yun said earnestly, “Normally Detective Wang doesn’t tie me down — he only comes to me when he’s genuinely swamped. But on Sundays I need to come organize the files. Lately, because the Bide column has restarted, Detective Wang has taken on so many new cases that the case files are piling up like a mountain. I’ve been sorting since eight this morning and still haven’t finished. It just goes to show someone at my level can’t really handle such demanding work — I hope the new assistant he’s hiring today can start soon, so I won’t have to struggle like this.”
Hongdou was about to help her tidy up when she spotted a stack of photographs by Gu Yun’s hand. Her gaze fixed on them, and she hurriedly picked them up to look.
After greeting Gu Yun, He Yunqin had gone to stand by the bookshelf, searching for material on Shanghai’s “haunted houses.” Hearing Hongdou fall silent for a while, he turned to look, paused, then walked over behind her and took the photograph from her hand.
The photo showed an old Western-style house, shot facing the front gate. What made it notable was a line Wang Bide had written on the photo in tap water: No. 15 Chengfeng Road.
Both of them had excellent memories, and of course they recognized this as the address of the haunted house mentioned in the morning paper.
“Detective Wang took this case?” He Yunqin asked Gu Yun, slightly surprised.
Gu Yun pushed up her glasses. “Yes. A Western-medicine doctor surnamed Lin rented this house. There had been talk before that the house was haunted, but Dr. Lin didn’t believe such nonsense at all. After settling on the price, he prepaid a full year’s rent. Who would have thought that just one month after opening for business, the night-shift nurse died in the house. The clinic has since closed. Dr. Lin felt the whole thing was too strange, so he came to ask Detective Wang to help investigate.”
He Yunqin walked to the desk and picked up a sorted stack of pages. “Are these all the case files? Did Detective Wang go examine the scene at the house? What conclusion did he reach?”
Wang Bide happened to walk in just then. He’d been busy all afternoon, and his craving for a drink was already stirring. Too preoccupied to talk, he first pulled out his flask and took a swig, then pointed at the photo in He Yunqin’s hand and said, “The clinic’s proprietor is named Lin Yuwen, a doctor who studied in England. After the clinic opened, he hired three nurses in total. The victim was one of them — named Shi Chunli, twenty-five years old, a local, graduated from a mission-run nursing school. On the night it happened, it was her turn for night shift. All night, Dr. Lin received no house-call requests from her. The next morning, another nurse came to open the clinic and found Shi Chunli dead on the single bed in the break room. The autopsy results are in — Western medicine calls it sudden cardiac death. No other wounds were found on the body, and no clinic property was missing. The police investigated for a month and closed the case as death by natural causes.”
Hongdou flipped through the photographs Wang Bide had taken, one by one. “It sounds like the whole thing was an accident. Why would Dr. Lin ask the Detective to investigate?”
Gu Yun pulled out a photo and handed it to Hongdou. “This Western-style house is quite old — three floors in all, upstairs and down. The nurses’ night duty room is on the first floor; the upper floors are currently empty. A month before it happened, the nurses at the clinic had heard footsteps and a woman crying several times at night. This house has always had rumors of being ‘haunted.’ Frightened, the nurses told Dr. Lin about it. Dr. Lin thought someone was trying to break in and was just putting on a show to scare people off, so to catch the thief, he stayed overnight at the clinic himself. But nothing happened that night, and after that there were no more strange noises in the house at night. Who would have guessed that less than half a month later, the incident with Shi Chunli occurred.”
Wang Bide rose from the sofa. “I’ve been to examine the scene several times. There were no suspicious traces at either the front door or the back garden. The second and third floors are entirely empty — only in the innermost study on the second floor did I find a pair of footprints, roughly size 39, impossible to tell if male or female. I asked Dr. Lin about it, and he said when he first viewed the house, it had been cleaned by someone, and there were no footprints in the study then. After he rented it, all business was conducted on the first floor, and the second floor was kept mostly sealed off — so I suspect those footprints are recent. It’s a shame Shi Chunli’s death shows no sign of external force, or else those footprints alone would be grounds to demand the French Concession police reopen the investigation.”
He Yunqin flipped through the stack for a while and indeed found a photo of a footprint. Hongdou leaned in curiously alongside He Yunqin’s hand. “Why did this house get the reputation of being haunted in the first place? Did someone die here before too?”
He Yunqin said, “Ten years ago, an American missionary came to Shanghai and, for some unknown reason, hanged himself in this house. Half a year later, a Japanese tenant poisoned himself to death in the house as well. Ever since then, the house has had rumors of being haunted.”
Hongdou glanced quietly at He Yunqin. He seemed to have quite deep knowledge of these old Shanghai buildings — she remembered once at the New Asia Tea House, he had given a talk titled “A Report on Mysterious Incidents in Shanghai Architecture.” Was the effort he put into researching these buildings really, as he claimed, just a passing whim, or did he have some other purpose? This morning, the moment he heard Chen Baidie was selling her house, he’d taken an interest; after dinner he’d specially come to Wang Bide’s to ask about this haunted house where the nurse had died an unnatural death, and when it came to the origins of the haunting, he knew it in remarkable detail. However she looked at it, something seemed off.
He Yunqin had clearly noticed Hongdou’s probing gaze but pretended not to. Hongdou pouted, displeased. Though He Yunqin had introduced her to some of his friends, there were still many things he kept from her — and she suspected that even if she pressed him, he would simply change the subject with something else.
He Yunqin said to Wang Bide, “Since last month, Bai Haili has been secretly visiting Chen Baidie’s residence. Because of all the scrutiny, the two haven’t dared to associate openly. Have you seen the ad recently about Chen Baidie selling her house? I have other matters to attend to right now — Detective Wang, if you have the time, please help me look into this.”
This reminded Wang Bide, and his expression turned graver than ever before. “I was just about to bring this up with you. Last time, at the theater assassination attempt on Wu Ruhai of Nanjing, we were busy dealing with the Bai Fengfei matter and had no way of knowing what happened outside the theater. But my assistant told me that when Wu Ruhai was being escorted to his car, Bai Haili was right there attending to him too. Lately Bai Haili has been frequently visiting the hospital where Wu Ruhai is recuperating in Shanghai, currying favor. This man’s intentions are crooked — if he manages to attach himself to Wu Ruhai, it would be greatly disadvantageous for us.”
He Yunqin nodded, sneering coldly. “A clown jumping about on a stage. Not worth mentioning.”
Hongdou recalled the scene earlier at Tongfu Lane — He Yunqin had seemed to already have a clear grasp of Bai Haili’s movements, and clearly held no regard for him at all.
Gu Yun said scornfully, “The rumors outside grow more alarming by the day. Wu Ruhai’s position has become increasingly clear since coming to Shanghai. A traitor like that deserves to be killed by anyone — I only regret that whoever attempted to assassinate him last time failed.”
He Yunqin changed the subject. “It’s getting late. Hongdou has school tomorrow. Detective Wang, I’ll take these files home to study carefully and bring them back to you tomorrow.”
Wang Bide said, “Take them. I have no leads anyway.”
The three of them then took their leave. On the way, Gu Yun said to Hongdou, “Classmate Wang, who was in our play with us, had to rush back to Wuxi because her mother is ill. The male lead’s role is now empty. The drama club approached Qin Xuekai, but no matter what, he refuses to perform. So for the remaining three shows, we have to find someone else on short notice. Did Mei Lizhen and the others tell you about this?”
Hongdou was one of the female leads, and with the school drama troupe suddenly needing to replace the male lead, there was no way it wouldn’t involve her.
Hongdou’s thoughts were still lingering on He Yunqin; she replied absently, “They told me. Mei Lizhen and the others have been busy the last couple of days finding a suitable person. Later, someone mentioned a distant relative studying at Shanghai University, saying he’d be very fitting. He’s the eldest grandson of President Yu of Shanghai University, named Yu Rui — a sophomore, quite presentable in appearance, genuinely interested in Western drama himself, and often performs at school. When he heard Mei Lizhen and the others’ proposal, he happily accepted the invitation and will come to school tomorrow to rehearse.”
He Yunqin knew Hongdou had been performing in a school play lately, but being too busy, he hadn’t personally gone to the church hall to watch. Hearing the words “quite presentable in appearance,” he rested his arm on the car window and rubbed his chin.