NOVEL NEXT Chapter 65
Chapter 65 The Mysterious Cause of Death
Fu Xinjie said, “Chen Qiangjian went to a fancy club last night, which was his old haunts. The club waiter said he left late last night. The young man who parked his car said he drove a green Ferrari and left in that car too. Chen Qiangjian was drunk and took drugs. He shouldn’t have driven by himself. But the young lad said he had always liked the thrill.”
Long Xi thought of her parents who had been killed by the drunk driver and said sorrowly, “How can he enjoy himself that way? Does he think other people’s lives are so worthless?”
Fu Xinjie said, “How can a man like him care about other people’s lives? After he arrived at Chen’s villa, he washed and slept. The villa installed high-quality security and anti-theft system, and security guards thought he was sleeping in his own room because the screen showed that he had been sleeping in the room. But our professional computer technicians found out that the security system was hacked and modified last night. Therefore we can only watch the previous video. There was no yesterday’s record.”
Long Xi asked, “What about the school cameras? Do you get any pictures?”
Fu Xinjie replied, “We saw the surveillance tape. It showed that the front gate and back door of the school were locked all night, and there was no record of anyone going in or out. The two guards were also on duty all night, and they did not sleep even for a while. They said they didn’t see anyone going in or out. Based on these clues, we initially confirmed that the killer did not go up the mountain from the school side.”
Long Xi asked, “What was the exact time of his death?”
Fu Xinjie said, “According to the autopsy report, medical examiners thought he died between two o’clock and three o’clock last night. There were only a few fingerprints on his body, which proved to be the victim himself and a girl he met at the club. He had danced with the girl. The girl stayed at the club all night. She had a solid alibi.”
Long Xi questioned, “Did you discover any footprint there?”
Fu Xinjie answered, “There were two footprints, one was 42 yards, and the other was 43 yards. I preliminarily judge that one is tall and strong, about 1.75 meters, and weighs about 81 kilograms; the other is about 1.73 meters and weighs about 72 kilograms. The shoe size of the victim was 43 yards, but it isn’t incompatible with the footprint we discovered in the room. I think there are at least two murderers!”
Long Xi asked, “I saw the face of the body was dark purple. Were there any possibilities that he died from poison?”
Fu Xinjie replied, “No. If he died from poison, the body would also turn black. Moreover, after the autopsy, we found no trace of poison. The size of the victim’s heart was normal, and if the poison entered the body through the esophagus or respiratory tract, the heart would swell or tighten. We found some soporific ingredients remained in his stomach, but that’s not enough for killing someone.”
Long Xi inquired, “There were a lot of wounds on his body. Were there any possibilities that the poison was injected from the wound and entered the blood circulation?”
Fu Xinjie said, “That was impossible. If so, his heart would swell or tighten.”
Long Xi enquired, “What on earth was the reason for his death? Excessive loss of blood? Strangled?”
Fu Xinjie replied, “Although there were red marks on his neck, he was not strangled. He should have been hung up after his death. Also, though there were many wounds on his body, we didn’t find too much blood at the scene. This means that the place where the body was found is probably not the first scene of the murder. After the assay, the DNA of the eight blood words on the wall was compatible with the victim’s DNA. They were written by his blood.”
Long Xi asked, “What’s the cause of death?”
Fu Xinjie replied, “He died strangely since there was no air in his lungs.”
Long Xi questioned, “There was no air in his lungs? Did he suffocated or choked?”
Fu Xinjie replied, “The strange point was that his airways were smooth.”
Long Xi said, “If his airways were smooth, then he didn’t die from asphyxiation or choking.”
Fu Xinjie smiled and continued, “Little girl, you seem to know much about it! Are you going to be a policewoman when you grow up?”
Long Xi answered, “Nope. I never dream about that. I am just fond of reading detective reasoning novels. Excuse me, is there any loss to the property of the dead?”
Fu Xinjie said, “His wallet was in his pocket. There were many cards in it, but not much cash. His Wechat account had ￥22,327.3, which was bound to an ICBC card. We found his latest expenditure was on the day before yesterday. Chen Qiangjian bought a new sedan, a champagne Ferrari sports car. It is now in his garage which hasn’t been driven. His families said he preferred to pay by credit cards, Wechat pay, or Alipay than cash. That’s probably why there’s only a small amount of cash in his wallet.”
Long Xi asked again, “Is there anything else abnormal?”
After looking through the information in her mobile phone, Fu Xinjie answered, “Mr. Xu handed that bloodletter to the police. After assaying by the experienced handwriting experts from the police, we confirm that the handwriting and the picture of the little dog are from Xu Xian’er. Besides, the DNA of the blood on the bloodletter 99% matches with Xu Xian’er’s.”
Long Xi asked, “It means that the bloodletter is not counterfeit. Is it the same as the original one?”
Fu Xinjie said in a confessional tone, “I have compared those two bloodletters, and they are almost identical, except one punctuation. The previous one is a comma, while this letter is a period. The bloodletter that was found in the girls’ dormitory was burnt by myself, but before that, I took a photo of it.”
Long Xi sipped her lips and hesitated.
Fu Xinjie said, “I want to defend for myself. I didn’t do it for money. I have been determined to be a policeman since my childhood because I was saved by the police when I was a child. However, Liu Dazhi told me that if I did not compromise, then I could not continue my career. That was the reason why I compromised. I donated the money to the orphanage, which I regarded as an atonement. But my conscience is always uneasy and I have nightmares every night.”
Long Xi responded, “Every man makes errors. It’s not too late to correct. Madame Fu, your conscience is not gone, and I believe you will be a good policewoman in the future! If the bloodletter was real, Xu Xian’er was likely to write two copies of it, one in the dormitory, the other in her home. Could you please let me have a closer look at the body?”
Shaking her head, Fu Xinjie said, “Not anyone is qualified to enter the forensic section. Well, I took some pictures of the body, you can look at them carefully.”
After staring at the photos for a long time, Long Xi said to Fan Xiaolu who accompanied her all the time, “I probably know the reason for his death. It seems that I was wrong. Mr. Xu is highly suspected.”
“Why? Chen Qiangjian was so fat that it is tough for Mr. Xu to hang the body onto the big tree alone, not even to kill him,” said Fan Xiaolu. Just like Long Xi, Fan Xiaolu also felt sympathy for Mr. Xu, and he also didn’t expect Mr. Xu to be the murderer.
“Yes, it was tough to do it all by himself. So, I suspected that it was co-killing. Mr. Xu used his wisdom for his advantage is rich physical knowledge; while the other man should be stronger and used physical strength. Mr. Xu’s height is also about 1.73 meters, and his weight is about 72 kilograms.” Long Xi said.
“You mean that Mr. Xu used physical knowledge to kill him, right?” Mo Kun asked.