Silent Reading 默读 [BL Novel by Priest]

Chapter 101 to 110

CHAPTER 101 - Verhovensky 11

"Xia Xiaonan? I just had a look at her. She still hadn't woken up." The criminal police officer responsible for keeping watch at the hospital had just eaten dinner and was walking unhurriedly towards the inpatient department. "What's wrong, boss? Didn't you say we were going to wait a few days for the child's psychological state to stabilize before questioning her?"

The sharp sound of car horns came over the phone. Luo Wenzhou quickly said, "Xia Xiaonan isn't an eyewitness, she's one of the suspects. Get your eyes on her!"

"Huh? Who? You're saying Xia Xiaonan is..."

As he pushed open the door of the hospital room, the policeman's voice abruptly came to a halt.

Luo Wenzhou's heart sank.

"Boss, Xia Xiaonan is gone!"

Luo Wenzhou stamped on the gas pedal.

"Xia Xiaonan is a local. Her father was called Xia Fei. He had lung cancer and couldn't go out and get regular work. He made a bit of money working snack counters. He died a few years ago. Her mother spent all her time looking after a sick person and a household full of children and the elderly. She must have been rather depressed and taken things badly. She died jumping off a building." Fei Du had his phone on speaker. Tao Ran's voice came over the line. "All the appraisals this girl has ever gotten have basically been 'sensible' and 'introverted,' and her grades have always been very consistent. One of those students who goes to class even when she's sick and wears her uniform when she's on vacation. For children like that, studying and attending a good university is the only way to change their fate."

"Does her family have any involvement with the 327 case or Lu Guosheng?"

"No, they're just ordinary common people. Aside from being rather tragic, there's nothing special about her family. The last three generations haven't been near Lotus Mountain. They don't even have relatives around there. I have no idea how she could know Lu Guosheng, or what kind of grievance she could have against Feng Bin that would make her want him murdered and dismembered."

Luo Wenzhou finished dispatching his troops and hung up his phone, turning to Fei Du. "You mentioned schoolyard bullying. Is it possible that Feng Bin was bullying her, so she wanted to use every possible means to get revenge?"

"Have you had a handwriting analysis performed on Feng Bin's letter? If you're sure that the letter was written by him, then I don't think that's it. That letter doesn't like the tone of a victimizer," Fei Du said. "Anyway, wasn't Xia Xiaonan scared out of her wits? If she set this up, then her acting is too good."

Perhaps out of the habit of being a boss, Fei Du had a profound understanding of structuring his words in a way superiors would like—he very rarely brought up messy suppositions to upset others' trains of thoughts. He would give his conclusion if he had one; if he didn't have a conclusion, he could present a clear analysis of the course of his conjectures. It was very straightforward.

Luo Wenzhou looked at him in the rearview mirror, then said to Tao Ran, "Contact their homeroom teacher. Then there's the other runaway students. Get in touch with their guardians and arrange for permission to talk to them.—We're almost at the hospital."

"All right," Tao Ran agreed. Then, somewhat hesitantly, he asked Fei Du, "What do you mean by the tone of a victimizer?"

His body language very relaxed, Fei Du leaned back in the passenger's seat, the passing lights now bright, now dim on his face. An irrepressible fragrance of chestnuts wafted off the closely-woven fibers of his wool coat.