Silent Testimony - Chapter 14

A heavy, satisfying downpour arrived at dawn, slightly relieving the summer heat. Li Hewei, awakened by her alarm clock, turned over and got out of bed. Wearing linen slippers, she moved to the window and pulled open the blackout curtain. Morning light streamed through the glass, instantly illuminating the dark bedroom. She squinted, adapting to the brightness for a few seconds, before turning to wash up.

After about ten minutes, Li Hewei opened her door, walked to the water dispenser to fill half a cup of water, and slowly finished it in small sips. The warm water hit her stomach, and she was completely awake. Her eyes unconsciously glanced toward Tao Ling’s room; she did not spot the familiar figure but heard sounds coming from the kitchen.

Li Hewei quickly walked over and saw Tao Ling at the counter, wearing an apron, skillfully flipping a pancake in the frying pan with her left hand. Li Hewei said, slightly annoyed, “How can you not stay idle even on the first day?”

A smile curved Tao Ling’s lips, and she continued her work: “Sister Wei, didn’t you say last night that I could use anything in the kitchen?”

“That doesn’t mean you have to wake up early to cook every day.”

Tao Ling was stunned for a moment, then replied: “I’m used to it. I used to get up at 6 a.m., so today I’ve already postponed it by forty minutes.” She had not slept this deeply in a long time; when she woke from her sound sleep, the sky was already showing the white belly of a fish (dawn).

“What time did you sleep?”

“Around 10 p.m. when I don’t have work.”

“An old person’s schedule,” Li Hewei muttered internally, standing behind Tao Ling, waiting to help.

“I saw milk, eggs, and flour in the fridge, so I made two pancakes.” Tao Ling carefully placed the perfectly intact pancakes onto a round platter nearby. “There are five in total. Yingqiu just went to wash up; we’ll eat together later.”

“Are they ready?”

“Yes, all ready.”

Li Hewei quickly picked up the porcelain platter: “I’ll take this.”

Tao Ling washed three pairs of chopsticks and three small plates, then washed the Sun Muscat grapes that Cheng Yingqiu had bought across the community yesterday evening, and carried them to the dining table outside.

“Wow, this is great happiness,” Cheng Yingqiu exclaimed, popping a grape into her mouth, her face immediately lighting up. “Tao Ling, we never used to cook. On weekdays, Sister resolves her meals at the cafeteria. I just grab a couple of steamed buns or some fried dough sticks and soy milk for breakfast, and eat at the cafeteria for lunch and dinner. We only improve our diet when we go home on weekends.”

“And of course, there’s takeout.”

“I’m glad you both like it.”

Li Hewei chewed the delicious pancake, slowly interjecting: “Even if you like it, you can’t cook for us every day. You should sleep in once in a while.”

Cheng Yingqiu chimed in: “Aiya, every now and then is enough for me to be satisfied.”

“Okay.” Tao Ling understood the hidden meaning in Li Hewei’s words, and her expression softened further.

After the meal, Cheng Yingqiu washed the dishes, and then they each went back to their rooms to change clothes before the three of them left together.

In the office, the morning briefing was over, and everyone was busy working with their heads down. Li Hewei was organizing documents when Qiu Wan knocked and entered, placing her phone on Li Hewei’s desk: “Captain Li, here are screenshots from the surveillance video. Take a look.”

“Send them to my WeChat.”

Li Hewei opened WeChat and received the images from the other party, her brow furrowing tighter and tighter. “Has this been digitally processed? Is this the best you can do?” Three screenshots were nearly mosaic-like, showing only the approximate outline of the suspect. How could they discern her face?

“Xiao Zhou is still processing the video. These are the clearest few so far.” Qiu Wan pointed to one of the images. “This is a screenshot from the tire repair shop’s footage. The suspect’s vehicle was speeding, and we captured five frames.”

“No, send me the video as well.” Li Hewei’s mind couldn’t form a clear picture; she needed more material.

“Hold on.” Qiu Wan turned and called a colleague in the Serious Crime Squad, asking them to send the video directly to Li Hewei.

Li Hewei waited for her to finish the call, then asked, “How is the investigation into Yang Guang’s social circle progressing?”

“Ah, that man. He’s truly a master of time management,” Qiu Wan said, her voice full of disdain. “From a 48-year-old rich woman to a 23-year-old naive second-generation rich woman, five people all claim to be his girlfriend.”

“I took the statement of Yang Guang’s rich second-generation girlfriend via video last night. I know she is 158 centimeters tall and has been vacationing in Qianzhou for the past ten days or so. Zhou Lin is 168 centimeters tall, but her weight is less than 60 kilograms, and she also has an alibi.”

“As for the other three, they are scheduled to come to the police station today.”

“It looks like this will take another couple of days of work. Is Director Liu urging you?” Li Hewei knew Qiu Wan was under pressure, so she reached for her drawer, took out a White Rabbit creamy candy, and gave it to her. She had bought these at the convenience store entrance to the community this morning and shared a large portion with Tao Ling.

“Yes, he is. He grabbed me before clocking in and gave me five minutes of earnest advice.”

“Sigh, keep up the good work.”

Li Hewei received the video from the Serious Crime Squad colleague and pressed play.

Qiu Wan reminded her: “Scroll back, to about 12 minutes and 7 seconds.”

Li Hewei moved the mouse, staring intently at the screen. Before she could pause it, a blue Audi sped past.

Qiu Wan tore open the candy wrapper: “I told you, you can’t see anything clearly.”

Li Hewei scrolled the video back and forth, even adjusting the speed to 0.5x, but she could still only see a blur.

“I’ll call Xiao Zhou. You can observe while he processes the video.”

Qiu Wan dialed Xiao Zhou’s number in the Serious Crime Squad.

The other end: “Hello, Boss.”

“Where are you? Come to the Technical Squad office.”

“I’m at Yuan Hong Travel Agency. You arranged it this morning.”

“I forgot.” Qiu Wan had been sleep-deprived recently, so it was understandable she forgot things.

“Captain Qiu, I can try.” Tao Ling, who had been listening to their analysis from her desk and generally understood the case, walked up behind them.

Li Hewei was surprised: “You know how to use computers?”

Tao Ling nodded: “Yes, I know a bit.”

“Come quickly, sit down.”

Qiu Wan and Li Hewei vacated the seat.

Sitting at Li Hewei’s desk, Tao Ling first adjusted the video, increasing its resolution and bitrate.

“Why are you increasing the frame rate too?” Li Hewei knew a little about computers and understood that frame rate mainly affects video smoothness, with limited help for clarity improvement.

Tao Ling demonstrated: “If you adjust it to 60 frames per second, is it clearer?”

Li Hewei compared carefully and agreed: “Indeed.”

Tao Ling continued to optimize the video’s color and brightness. At the time of the incident, the sun was glaring, and the surveillance footage was overexposed. She adjusted the brightness and contrast to improve the lighting, then removed noise and applied moderate sharpening to the video.

Qiu Wan offered generous praise: “Xiao Tao, your technique is good, absolutely no worse than Xiao Zhou’s, and you even have Sister Wang’s flair. You were too humble just now.” Sister Wang was the Serious Crime Squad colleague who was on maternity leave.

Tao Ling modestly replied: “Sister Wang is the computer expert of the Serious Crime Squad. I still have a lot to learn from her.” She downloaded video processing software, adjusted the speed to the slowest, and played it frame by frame: “Sister Wei, Captain Qiu, I used the quick automatic screenshot mode. What do you think of these two images?”

“They’re better, but still not clear enough.” Li Hewei casually rested her right hand on Tao Ling’s left shoulder, gently massaging it once. “It’s very good already. I’ll combine this with the description from the convenience store lady and try to figure it out.”

She didn’t know that Tao Ling’s heart skipped a beat because of her sudden action. Before Tao Ling could dwell on it, Qiu Wan’s phone suddenly rang.

She answered the call, and the Serious Crime Squad colleague’s voice was urgent: “Boss, the rich woman is here.”

Qiu Wan assigned two other colleagues to take the statement of the rich woman, Ms. Sun, while she and Li Hewei observed the details of the conversation via surveillance.

“Looks like there are no issues.” Li Hewei focused on the woman’s micro-expressions but found no clues.

“Hmm, from July 16 last year until the 23rd of last month, Sun Luying transferred a total of 2.89 million yuan to Yang Guang. They genuinely had no emotional disputes. After he went out of contact, she even went to the travel agency’s vice president to inquire about Yang Guang’s whereabouts.”

Li Hewei was puzzled: “Why didn’t she choose to call the police?”

Qiu Wan pulled up Sun Luying’s chat history with Yang Guang: “Look, they were in contact every day before the police discovered the body. Sun Luying only contacted the travel agency last night when she couldn’t reach the deceased, and the travel agency informed her of Yang Guang’s death first.”

“The killer is not only meticulous but also quite bold. I guess she wanted to stall for time, but didn’t expect the body to be recovered so quickly.”

Li Hewei asked her: “What about Yang Guang’s other two girlfriends?”

“Those two can mostly be ruled out as suspects. One was studying out of town from the 20th to the 30th, and the other was hospitalized with pneumonia. Neither was present.” Ten minutes earlier, Qiu Wan had successively received evidence from them.

“So, out of his five girlfriends, four have an alibi?”

“Yes. Zhou Lin accompanied Yang Guang’s mother back to her hometown, and relatives and friends can testify.” Qiu Wan rubbed her temple with her thumb, a headache starting. “Yang Guang’s last contact should be the killer, but that mobile number is not registered under a real name.”

Following all the clues, Li Hewei asked her: “What about the swimming pools?”

“We have forty-four public swimming pools. I have already sent people to collect water samples. We still need to get permission from the owners for the pools in the villa areas.”

“For the villa areas, Sister He and I will go with a team.” Li Hewei speculated, “Surveillance cameras are installed everywhere now, so the possibility of the killer acting in a public pool is small.”

Qiu Wan decided: “Should we go to Sun Luying’s villa first? Her house has a private pool.” At this point, all clues were dead ends, and they could only pin their hopes on the water sample testing—just in case they got lucky.

“Good.” Li Hewei bypassed the Serious Crime Squad interrogation room, took the elevator up to the third floor, and quickly walked back to the office, raising her hand to knock on the door. “Sister He, Xiao Meng, Xiao Wu, you all come with me to Huicui Villa in the southern suburbs to collect water from the swimming pool.”

He Ying closed the folder in her hand: “I’ll get ready.”

“Where is Tao Ling?” Li Hewei wanted Tao Ling to go with her to the villa area so they could split up later and save time.

He Ying replied: “She’s in the lab, saying there’s a problem she hasn’t been able to solve.”

“Okay, I’ll go find her.” Li Hewei turned and left. After two or three steps, she pushed the door open. She approached the lab bench and quietly asked Tao Ling, who was using a microscope to observe a slide, “What are you doing?”

Tao Ling turned her head and replied: “Sister Wei, a plant-like substance was detected in the deceased’s nasopharynx.” She looked back, adjusted the magnification of the microscope, and frowned slightly. “It seems to be a petal, but because it was soaked in water for too long, I can’t immediately identify what kind of flower it is.”

“Let me see.”

Tao Ling stood up and stepped back half a step. Li Hewei put on gloves and a mask, sat down, held the arm of the microscope with her right hand, and leaned in.

“No, I can’t tell.”

“I have already sent the sample to a botanical science expert and am waiting for her reply.”

“Okay, let’s leave it at that for now.” Li Hewei took off her gloves and mask, threw them in the trash can, and turned to ask her, “Do you have any other work right now?”

Tao Ling blinked and shook her head: “No.”

“Let’s go. Change your clothes and come with me to the southern suburbs,” Li Hewei said as she walked. “You are a forensic examiner. You shouldn’t just be able to perform autopsies; you should also visit crime scenes more often, be adept at noticing surrounding details, which might help you solve problems.”

“Alright.” Tao Ling quickly took two steps to follow closely behind her.