Three days had passed since the first case involving Hu Hai. The citizens of Jinxi City had all sorts of bizarre speculations about the wealthy man’s death. Some said he had been kidnapped and murdered by pirates from the Eastern Sea, others claimed he was assassinated by a hired killer from a business rival, and still others said that Hu Hai had kept a mistress in a golden house and ended up being killed by his young lover. Rumors flew everywhere, creating widespread panic.
Huang Youdao was like someone whose backside was on fire—unable to sit still. He sought out Li Si two or three times a day. But aside from the physical evidence on the corpses and the later discoveries of lard and cheap rouge, there were still no further clues, which sent Huang Youdao back disappointed time after time.
Li Si and Bai Zhenzhu went again to the Hu and Liu residences to inquire, but Hu Hai’s wife had died long ago and Liu Feng’er had never married, so there were no reliable witnesses to question. On this day, Li Si and Bai Zhenzhu had just emerged from the Liu residence when Bai Zhenzhu caught sight of a man with a full face of bushy whiskers who was sticking his rear end in the air trying to climb over the wall into the Liu residence.
Bai Zhenzhu had a mind to tease this petty thief, so she deliberately shouted loudly, “Oh my! What a big, furry black rat! It’s even learned to climb over walls and into courtyards. Big Brother Li, come quickly and look at this black-furred rat!”
At Bai Zhenzhu’s shout, the bewhiskered man got so scared that he lost his grip and fell with a thud in a standard face-plant. It hurt so much that the bewhiskered man grimaced and bared his teeth. He glared at Bai Zhenzhu miserably and yelled, “Why are you shouting! That stinking bitch’s silver is partly mine too. Back then if it weren’t for me…”
The bewhiskered man suddenly caught sight of Li Si and said no more. He walked off grumbling and mumbling.
Bai Zhenzhu repeated what he had just said. Li Si thought to himself: The “stinking bitch” undoubtedly referred to Liu Feng’er. The silver being partly his—could it be that he knew Liu Feng’er’s secrets? Once this thought occurred to him, Li Si wanted to go find the man, but the bewhiskered figure had long since vanished without a trace.
After dinner, at the third quarter of the Hour of the Rooster, in the Fulai Inn where Li Si was temporarily staying, Bai Zhenzhu and Wu Wen were arguing endlessly over a plate of unsatisfactory Three-Yellow Chicken. Bai Zhenzhu said the shrimp wasn’t authentic, while Wu Wen claimed the chicken wasn’t soaked in enough oil. The two diners became more and more animated as they spoke. Li Si frowned. “How noisy! No one knows whether the food is good or bad better than the chef. Why don’t you two just go find a chef and ask!”
Bai Zhenzhu giggled. “Big Brother Li understands best. I’ll go grab a chef right now.”
Li Si suddenly stared intently at the Three-Yellow Chicken on the table, his eyes flashing with brilliant light. He said, “Three-Yellow Chicken, yes, Three-Yellow Chicken! Good, this Three-Yellow Chicken is excellent.”
“You think it tastes good?” Bai Zhenzhu pouted. “But I really don’t think it tastes good at all.”
“Whether it tastes good or not doesn’t matter. The key is that it’s a dish. The ones most familiar with dishes are chefs. A good chef can distinguish what seasoning a dish is missing, how many times it’s been through the fire and oil, and can even tell if the person cooking put their heart into it.” Li Si looked back at Bai Zhenzhu. “Think about who is most familiar with lard.”
Bai Zhenzhu’s distinct black-and-white eyes flashed with light. “Butchers!”
“Correct. Hehe, looks like I really will have to act like an unreasonable bandit this time. Wu Wen, tomorrow morning invite all the butchers in Jinxi City that you can find to the county yamen. I’m going to treat them to tea and conversation.”
“Yes.”
Wu Wen left, and Bai Zhenzhu returned to her room to sleep. Li Si closed the doors and windows. His eyes inadvertently glanced toward the street, and in the distance came a man with a face full of bushy whiskers—precisely that black-furred rat from outside Liu Feng’er’s residence. He craned his head around, constantly glancing behind him, then hastily disappeared into the deep alley behind Fulai Inn.
Li Si flew out the window and followed stealthily along the eaves. In a moment, Li Si discovered a second person. This person wore black robes from head to toe and was also closely pursuing the bewhiskered man ahead.
Li Si’s heart jumped in alarm. Who was this person—could it be the killer?!
So Li Si closely followed the bewhiskered man while keeping a tight watch on the person in black.
A sudden gust of wild wind arose in the deep alley, sweeping up leaves and stones. When Li Si leaped out of the wind circle, he was startled to discover that both people he had been tracking had disappeared. The deep alley had also split, transforming from one into three forked paths.
Opportunity knocks but once! Li Si had no time to think. He gambled on the uppermost fork and continued his pursuit. After chasing for the time it takes to drink two cups of tea without any sign of the bewhiskered man or the person in black, Li Si faintly sensed he had chased down the wrong path. Suddenly, from a corner of the deep alley came an exceptionally shrill cry. The cry was extremely brief, vanishing in an instant.
The situation was urgent. Li Si followed the sound and turned back, reselecting the lowest alley path at the three-way fork. After proceeding thus for a quarter of an hour, the alley path suddenly widened, revealing a desolate clearing about a zhang across.
Lying in the center of the clearing was a person—precisely the bewhiskered man he had lost track of.
The bewhiskered man’s eyes were wide like a leopard’s, his mouth gaping and spraying fresh blood. He had long since departed for the netherworld. Li Si sighed long with chagrin. Looking again at the bewhiskered man’s entire body: his lapels were completely torn, there was a large, faint strangulation mark on his front neck—his fatal injury. His hands were clenched in fists and hanging down. On his abdomen was still a blood hole the size of a basket, fresh blood flowing with residual warmth. The organs inside his belly had been kneaded into complete disarray. Li Si suppressed the rising bitterness and slightly turned the corpse sideways. Under the mottled moonlight, the exposed half of the body actually gleamed slightly, as if covered with grains of bright sand.
Li Si picked up a grain, tasted it at the corner of his mouth, and suddenly blurted out, “This is salt!”
The bewhiskered man’s chest and back were covered with crystalline grains of salt. At first glance, it looked as though he had grown a layer of white hair.
The clearing around was clean and empty, with no trace left by the person in black. Li Si knocked on the door of a household nearby to report to Huang Youdao, while he himself stayed guarding beside the corpse in the clearing.
At the end of the Hour of the Dog, Huang Youdao arrived in a dismal state. After briefly understanding the case, he had the corpse sent to the Black House.
Li Si carefully asked, “County Magistrate Huang, do you recognize the person who died so miserably this time?”
“Don’t recognize him, don’t recognize him.” Huang Youdao shook his head repeatedly. Constable Feng interjected from the side, “I seem to have seen this bewhiskered fellow in a gambling house, but I can’t quite remember clearly at the moment. Let me find someone to ask and then get back to you.”
Li Si nodded.
Bai Zhenzhu and Wu Wen also came upon hearing the news. Bai Zhenzhu recognized the bewhiskered man and said with a face full of surprise, “How can it be the black-furred rat! Isn’t he the one from outside the Liu residence…” Li Si made a sound of acknowledgment and signaled that Bai Zhenzhu didn’t need to continue.
“His front and back body completely coated with coarse salt grains—the killer really doesn’t treat people as human!” Wu Wen’s chest was full of agitation that couldn’t be released, and he could only clench his fists until they cracked.
“Lard, cheap rouge, and now coarse salt.” Li Si tilted his head slightly. “The feeling of being lost in fog.”
Constable Feng quickly investigated the deceased’s background clearly.
“The deceased is named Huang Gang, a native of Jinxi County. Huang Gang was a complete and utter gambler, and moreover the kind of despicable gambling scoundrel with no virtue or character. He owed money at every gambling house in Jinxi, lost all his ancestral property and still continued his rotten gambling. Two years ago, because he lost too much money, he fled to another place. This time he sneaked back, only to meet his end.” Constable Feng finished his report.
Li Si slowly nodded. “Huang Gang, a gambler.”
The night was frighteningly long. In a silent small room, he had just removed his black robes and lay bare-chested on a cold, hard wooden plank bed. His chest heaved violently, and his entire body still seemed to drift with a bloodstench that was difficult to eliminate. He tightly closed his eyes, then suddenly sat up from the darkness, swinging his fist to smash into the wooden plank, creating a black hole like a cut and dug-out blood hole…
He gripped his own hair, revealing fierceness and bewilderment in his eyes. “Why won’t you speak! If you won’t speak, then I’ll kill them all, hahaha!”
“Foster Father, I really am as you said—covered in fishy stench that can never be washed clean.”
The sounds gradually faded, and everything returned to the long black night.