When they arrived at the Luo residence, Luo Fuyou’s wife, Lady Yu, was truly startled to see Yun Xi. “A’Ting, what brings you here? Have you come looking for Shu’er?”

Though the Marquis of Loyalty and Valor’s household and the Luo household were related by marriage, the two families had grown distant since returning to Jinling.

Yun Xi said, “Aunt, you misunderstand. A’Ting comes today on official business.”

“Official business? What kind of business?”

“A case at the yamen — I’m not at liberty to say more just now. I beg Aunt to quickly summon cousin Shu’er and ask her to come with me to the yamen.”

Lady Yu had never been one with a steady head, and at these words her face went pale with fright. “Surely nothing has happened to my husband?”

Yun Xi shook her head. “This has nothing to do with Official Luo.”

“Well, that’s a relief, that’s a relief.” Lady Yu pressed a hand to her chest, and while ordering the servants to bring tea for the constables, led Yun Xi inside, saying with a smile, “You wouldn’t believe it — Shu’er has been so restless since she came home last night. It wasn’t until this morning that she finally asked me for a bowl of calming broth and went to lie down, though I don’t know if she’s actually asleep. I was going to wait until after lunch to wake her, if you hadn’t had urgent business — but here you are, over some case at the yamen.”

As she spoke, she pushed open the door to Luo Shu’s chamber and led Yun Xi inside.

Luo Shu, it turned out, was not asleep at all — she sat alone at the edge of the couch, lost in thought. Hearing the sound at the door, she looked up abruptly, and upon seeing Yun Xi, a flicker of panic crossed her eyes. “A— A’Ting, what are you doing here?”

Yun Xi said, “A case has come up at the yamen. Prefect Zhang has asked me to bring you in for questioning.”

Luo Shu shot to her feet, smoothing her skirts anxiously, and stammered, “A case? Al— alright, I’ll… I’ll come with you right away.”

As she followed Yun Xi to the door, she asked, “A’Ting, is it… is it about Susu, is she…”

The rest of the words seemed to lodge in her throat, and she could not force them out.

Yun Xi frowned slightly, glanced at her, and said, “This is a serious matter. I’m not at liberty to say. You’ll find out once we’re at the yamen.”

The Luo residence was quite far from the Capital Prefecture. By the time Yun Xi brought Luo Shu back to the yamen, Pei Lan, Fang Fulan, and the proprietor and errand boy from Huichun Hall were already waiting in the hall.

The moment Luo Shu saw the scene, she was thrown into complete panic. Before she could get a word out, two constables stepped forward and, without ceremony, clapped manacles on her wrists.

A head constable behind her shoved her forward; she stumbled two steps and dropped to her knees in the center of the hall.

Zhang Huailu struck the gavel block. “Accused Luo Shu, do you confess your guilt?”

Only now did Luo Shu realize something was terribly wrong. “Confess… confess to what?”

“To murder! Do you confess to murdering the second young miss of the Yao household, Yao Susu!”

At these words, Luo Shu’s eyes went wide with horror.

She seemed unable to process it, standing frozen for a long moment before looking first at Yun Xi, then at Pei Lan. “Susu — Susu is dead?”

Zhang Huailu gave a cold laugh. “How convincingly you play the innocent.”

He continued unhurriedly, “This official has already established the facts. You discovered young miss Yao secretly… ahem, meeting with General Pei, and out of jealousy, you murdered her. Isn’t that so!”

Luo Shu stared in shock, then, after a moment, shook her head in fear. “No — it wasn’t me.”

“Still denying it!” Zhang Huailu said sternly.

Then, softening his tone, “Let me ask you this — did you go to the Daoist temple yesterday?”

“I — I did.”

“According to Commandant Yun, you saw only young miss Yao alone outside the temple. What made you decide to follow her in and take a look? Simply because her manner seemed off?”

“My lord may not know this.” Luo Shu glanced at Pei Lan and said quietly, “Susu and I were close confidantes in our girlhood, very close indeed. I actually knew a little about her affair with… Brother Pei. She let it slip once, in private, that they met at that temple.”

Zhang Huailu nodded. “Then let me ask you this — your household is currently arranging your engagement to General Pei. Upon discovering him in a secret tryst with someone else — and with your own close friend, no less — did you not feel resentment in your heart?”

“…I did.”

“And so, did you resolve to be rid of her once and for all, and kill her?”

“No, no, I didn’t…” Luo Shu said in a panic. “Your honor, please understand — Susu and Brother Pei’s affair wasn’t something that started just recently. Even though I was upset when I discovered it, in my heart I had already braced myself for it. How could I have brought myself to harm her? Besides, I knew that if this became a public scandal, it would be impossible to contain, and no one would come out looking good — Brother Pei… he wouldn’t have wanted me anymore either.”

This account matched, almost word for word, what Yun Xi had already reported. It seemed credible.

Zhang Huailu said, “So you decided to let it go quietly, and returned with Commandant Yun to the medicine shop where Madam Fang was being treated?”

“Yes…”

“Madam Fang.”

Fang Fulan answered, “This commoner is here.”

“When the fourth young miss Luo returned to the shop, how was her mood and demeanor?”

Fang Fulan glanced at Luo Shu with some difficulty, then answered honestly, “Not good.”

“This commoner had just taken her medicine and was resting in the back room of the shop. When sister Shu’er… came back, she seemed unsettled. I had the servants wait in the front room and asked her what had happened at the temple.”

Zhang Huailu nodded, then turned to the shop proprietor, Mingcui, and Zhao Wu to confirm.

All three agreed.

Zhang Huailu said, “As I understand it, about an hour after the fourth young miss Luo returned to the shop, the second young miss of the Yao household came looking for her. Is that correct?”

Fang Fulan nodded.

“What hour was that?”

Fang Fulan said, “It was exactly the Xu hour.”

“How do you remember so precisely?”

“My lord may not know this, but this commoner is in poor health. Last night I had arranged with the shop’s herbalist woman to receive acupuncture exactly at the Xu hour. When the second young miss of the Yao household arrived, it was just as the herbalist was taking her needles into the back room.”

“This commoner knew about the matter at the temple, and when I saw sister Shu’er called away by young miss Yao, I was worried and wanted to go with her to see what was happening. But the acupuncture could not be delayed, so I had to let it be.”

Zhang Huailu then questioned Zhao Wu and the others. “You all witnessed this too.”

They all confirmed it, and the shop proprietor added, “At the time, this humble one saw the fourth young miss Luo and the second young miss Yao leaving, and thought it strange that two ladies of noble birth were going out with only a single maid accompanying them. Worried, I went over specially to invite them into the shop to talk. But the two young ladies seemed to have private matters to discuss, and sent me away. The second young miss Yao even said I was meddling in others’ affairs.”

Zhang Huailu gave an acknowledging “Mm,” then turned to Yao Susu’s personal maid, who had remained kneeling this whole time. “After the fourth young miss Luo and the second young miss Yao left the shop, where did they go?”

“Reporting to my lord, they didn’t go anywhere far. The street was very crowded at the time — the harvest dance procession was about to pass by — so the two young ladies, wanting to speak privately, found a pavilion by the Qinhuai River where there were fewer people.”

Zhang Huailu looked to Luo Shu.

Luo Shu confirmed. “Yes.”

Zhang Huailu said, “So when the second young miss Yao brought you to the pavilion, it was to ask you to voluntarily break off your engagement with General Pei — is that correct?”

Luo Shu nodded, and said with bitter, unwilling sorrow, “She said… that Brother Pei had never liked me from the start anyway, and that even if I… even if I married him, his heart would never truly be with me. He would take concubines, and might even, someday, if I displeased him, divorce me. Susu said that rather than suffer through all that later, I should just give Brother Pei up to her now…”

At this, everyone turned to look at Pei Lan.

After the earlier round of questioning, Pei Lan had already been thoroughly humiliated, and now, hearing Luo Shu say this, he averted his eyes from everyone, utterly mortified.

Zhang Huailu said, “So it was precisely these words from the second young miss Yao that enraged you on the spot, and that’s why you quarreled with her — is that correct?”

Luo Shu knelt with her eyes lowered, saying nothing for a moment.

“Speak!” Zhang Huailu struck the gavel block. “If you don’t want others to know, don’t do the deed in the first place. Besides you, that maid was also there in the pavilion — do you think that just because you say nothing, this official knows nothing?”

Only then did Luo Shu answer. “…Yes.”

“As the two of you pushed and shoved each other, the second young miss Yao’s cat Snowball got frightened and ran off, and in her panic, she sent her personal maid to find it — is that correct?”

“…Yes.”

Zhang Huailu nodded, thinking to himself that it seemed the maid’s testimony was accurate after all — the killer of Yao Susu was likely not this maid.

Zhang Huailu said, “According to this maid, when she left, young miss Yao herself was also about to go look for Snowball, but it was you who grabbed hold of her and wouldn’t let go?”

“Why would you grab hold of her and not let go? Was it to catch her off guard, lure her somewhere isolated, and kill her?”

Luo Shu was silent for a long moment, then spoke in a low voice. “Though Susu and I were close, she always believed herself superior to me in every way — family background, appearance, everything — and deep down, she looked down on me.”

“She knew full well that I… that I had feelings for Brother Pei, and yet she often flaunted it in front of me, even showing me letters he wrote her from the frontier. I could bear all of that. But—”

Luo Shu raised her head, tears and hatred burning in her eyes. “But the reason she couldn’t marry Brother Pei in the first place was because she’d always behaved so recklessly! If she had shown the slightest restraint, she never would have become such a thorn in the old matriarch’s side after A’Ting and Brother Pei’s engagement was broken off! All of this was entirely her own doing — and now my family is arranging my engagement to Brother Pei, what right does she have to demand I give it up? What right does she have to say such things to me at all?!”

“Of course I hated her. So when Snowball ran off, I grabbed hold of her — I wanted to tell her plainly that as long as I lived, I would never give in to her wishes, never let her have what she wanted.”

“And then,” Zhang Huailu said, “you killed her.”

“I didn’t!” Luo Shu said. “After that, she left.”

“Left? Where did she go?”

“She saw she couldn’t talk sense into me, so she went to find Snowball. She also said that if I wouldn’t listen to reason today, then tomorrow she would have Brother Pei come speak to me himself, so I would finally give up hope.”

Zhang Huailu said, “If what you say is true, and the second young miss Yao only went to look for her cat afterward, then why did you appear so flustered when you came to court today? Commandant Yun tells me you seemed to already suspect something had happened to the second young miss Yao. If you did nothing wrong, why would you be so guilty-looking?”

“I was guilty — but not over Susu. Over Snowball.”

“Snowball?”

“Yes.” Luo Shu nodded, paused, then said, “The street was crowded and noisy during the festival. Snowball must have been frightened, but it hadn’t run far — on my way back to the shop, I found it huddled under the eaves of someone’s house.”

“I… at the time, I was so consumed with anger at Susu that I wanted revenge. I couldn’t do anything to her directly, but her cat — that, I could.”

“I didn’t dare harm it with my own hands. Seeing that the harvest dance procession had already reached South Zhuque Street, where the crowd was packed shoulder to shoulder, I carried Snowball there and set it down in the middle of the crowd, hoping… hoping it might get trampled to death, so that Susu would suffer a great deal of grief.”

At this admission—

Yun Xi, Cheng Chang, and Cheng Ye all frowned at the same moment.

Snowball was just a cat, harmless to anyone — what had it done to deserve such cruelty?

But thinking it over carefully, Cheng Chang realized it did line up — he had indeed found Yun Xi right as the harvest dance procession reached South Zhuque Street. The two of them had just pushed their way out of the crowd when they heard Snowball crying out by the roadside.

The timing matched as well.

Yao Susu had gone to the medicine shop to find Luo Shu at the exact Xu hour, and the quarrel between them had happened around the end of the Xu hour.

From the end of the Xu hour to the start of the Hai hour was, at the shortest, the time for a cup of tea, and at the longest, about fifteen minutes.

If Snowball had run off at the end of the Xu hour, and Luo Shu found it and carried it to the most crowded part of South Zhuque Street, that would take roughly fifteen minutes.

And fifteen minutes later, at the start of the Hai hour, Cheng Chang had found Snowball by the street.

Zhang Huailu asked Cheng Chang, “When the third young master found Snowball, did you see the fourth young miss Luo anywhere nearby?”

Cheng Chang thought for a moment, then shook his head. “No. The street was packed with people at the time — without searching carefully, it would have been hard to make out anyone I knew.”

Even with Yun Xi, he had searched for quite a while before finding her.

Zhang Huailu then asked Yun Xi, “Did Commandant Yun see the second young miss Luo either?”

Yun Xi recalled the events of that night — Cheng Chang carefully shielding her as they made their way out of the crowd. In that moment, she’d had no attention to spare for looking around; she’d nearly forgotten about searching for the scarred man entirely.

“I didn’t see her either.”

Zhang Huailu said to Luo Shu, “In that case, there is no one to confirm whether what you say is true or false.”

In other words, no one could verify where Luo Shu had actually been between the end of the Xu hour and the start of the Hai hour.

Whether she had spent that time harming a cat, or had used the cat as an excuse while she murdered Yao Susu.

At this point, Pei Lan could not help but speak up. “Prefect Zhang, last night bandits were causing trouble in every street and alley of Jinling. Could… could Su— no, could the second young miss Yao have been killed by bandits?”

Zhang Huailu said, “General Pei may not be aware — last night’s bandits were primarily interested in plunder, and injuries to people were rare, let alone killings. Moreover, when the second young miss Yao was found this morning, her valuable gold and silver jewelry was all still on her person, and her clothing was nearly undisturbed — this does not look like the work of bandits. Furthermore, the timing does not match. The second young miss Yao went missing at the end of the Xu hour, the start of the Hai hour, while the bandit disturbance did not break out until after the middle of the Hai hour.”

In truth, Zhang Huailu did suspect Pei Lan as well, and had wanted to question him too. But for one thing, when Pei Lan first arrived at the court, he had brought along two generals who had been with him the previous night, both of whom confirmed that after the Xu hour, he had been attending the Emperor beneath the Zhuque Terrace.

Of course, there remained one possibility — that Yao Susu had pestered Pei Lan relentlessly, and he had hired someone to kill her.

But without evidence, Zhang Huailu dared not speculate recklessly. And besides, Pei Lan was a third-rank general — if he truly were a suspect, it was beyond the authority of a mere prefect of the Capital Prefecture to interrogate him; the case would have to be transferred to the Court of Judicial Review.

Just then, the yamen’s coroner suddenly arrived to report. “Reporting to Prefect Zhang, this humble servant has determined the cause of the second young miss Yao’s death.”

“There is no swelling on the body. She was strangled with a silk ribbon while still alive, and afterward pushed into the water.”

“The time of death was between the end of the Xu hour and the middle of the Hai hour.”

“And furthermore, this humble one found, lodged between the second young miss Yao’s teeth, a woman’s earring bead.”

Luo Shu turned to look at the earring bead. She froze for a moment, then her face went white.

She shook her head in terror, stammering, “It wasn’t me — it truly wasn’t me…”