Chapter 4

Back to Xiaohu's death.

If Zhou could theoretically be ruled out, the killer had to be the man in black in the third video, taken at six forty.

Those ten seconds were everything we knew about him.

But that created another problem.

If the man on screen was the killer, who had been behind the camera?

We investigated again and reviewed every clue, repeatedly.

For a long time, nothing changed.

We couldn't even identify someone worth investigating.

It was my first case after being transferred to Dayu Mountain.

And it had become an unsolved one.

Honestly, it hit me hard.

13

The next turning point came six months later.

Another email arrived in the provincial bureau's tips inbox.

The fourth connected to this case.

Unlike the others, it contained no video.

It was a letter.

When we read it, every mystery finally fell into place.

The case was closed.

But the truth left me shaken in a way I still haven't forgotten.

This was the letter:

“Hello, officers. I'm sorry for the trouble.

“My name is Ma Xiaohu. I sent all four emails in this case.

“I'm also the person who died.

“I scheduled the emails to reach you at different times.

“By the time you read this, I'll probably be dead.

“Perhaps you'll have solved the case.

“I won't be there to see it, of course. So I'll write as though you have.

“I killed myself.

“I did it to frame Zhou Gang.

“I framed him so that my father's case from a year ago would be reopened.

“As I write this, I'm terminally ill.

“Every day brings endless pain. Death has begun to seem like the only relief.

“But even if I died, I wanted it to mean something.

“In what little time I had left, I wanted to do something for my father.

“I grew up without a mother. Dad raised me on his own.

“He was a farmer with very little education.

“In the early years, he took whatever odd jobs he could find to support us.

“Then a fall broke his leg and left him disabled. He had to earn what he could digging for herbs on Dayu Mountain.

“Life was hard, but he always told me:

“'We may be poor, but we don't steal or rob anyone. That gives us backbone. It gives us dignity. No one has any reason to look down on us.'

“I never imagined that what he prized most—his backbone and his dignity—would be worth nothing in other people's eyes.

“In the end, he was branded a thief.

“A year ago, I got into university. I desperately needed tuition money.

“Dad told me not to worry. He'd gathered plenty of herbs over the past few months. Once he was paid, there'd be several thousand yuan.

“Many people in our village made their living as he did, heading into the mountains before dawn and coming back late.

“With transport so difficult, selling their herbs meant carrying them over the mountains to town.

“Because of his bad leg, Dad sold his harvest cheaply to Zhou Gang.

“He earned less, but it was much more convenient.

“Then Zhou began withholding payment.

“Months went by.

“Last August, when I was about to start university, Dad said he'd ask again for the money he was owed.

“I knew the chances of getting it were slim.

“So I suggested we take herbs from Zhou's storehouse and sell them ourselves.

“He hadn't paid for them anyway. What was wrong with taking back our own things?

“Dad gave me a fierce scolding.

“If someone refused to pay, he said, that was their wrongdoing.

“If we stole or robbed them, it became ours.

“He told me to live honestly, whatever happened.

“As for the money, I wasn't to worry. He'd talk to Zhou again.

“That was always Dad.

“It was August 25. My birthday.

“He went up the mountain early, as usual.

“Before leaving, he cooked a great pot of longevity noodles for us. We ate together so happily.

“I never imagined it would be our last meal.

“A whole day and night passed without his return.

“The following evening, the police came to tell me he was dead.

“He'd died below a slope that wasn't especially high or steep.

“The police told me he'd slipped and fallen.

“They placed his death at around six that evening.

“The investigation found that Zhou had been the last person to see him.

“But Zhou said they'd only met during the day.

“He claimed he'd caught Dad stealing from his storehouse and they'd argued.

“Then Dad had run off carrying a load of herbs. Zhou said he didn't know where he'd gone.

“He insisted he had nothing to do with Dad's death.

“Dad had died at about six.

“Zhou had an alibi from half past six until the next morning.

“Nearly twenty people could place him in town around six thirty.

“In theory, he'd had thirty minutes to get away after causing Dad's death.

“But there was no vehicle route down Dayu Mountain. In practice, he couldn't have killed Dad at six and walked forty kilometers to town by six thirty.

“The police couldn't connect him to the death because he hadn't had time to commit the crime.

“So Dad's death was ruled an accidental fall.

“And he was left branded a thief.

14

“I never believed he'd simply slipped.

“Still less did I believe he'd stolen Zhou's herbs.

“He'd scolded me for even suggesting it.

“How could he have done it himself?

“However poor and hard our life became, he always taught me to hold my head high and live honestly.

“His face was lined. He limped. He couldn't read a single word.

“But in my heart, he was a light.

“A light that drove back suffering and gave me the strength to live toward the sun.

“Now that light wasn't merely shrouded in mist.

“It had been thrown to the ground and trampled on.

“I couldn't accept that injustice. I had to clear his name.

“I was certain Zhou had been directly involved in his death.

“Accusing Dad of theft was just another way for Zhou to avoid paying the other gatherers what he owed them.

“I had to find a way to reopen the case.

“I began with the reason they'd given: he hadn't had time to commit the crime.

“At first, I suspected the alibi.

“I went to each of those twenty witnesses.

“Some were friendly with Zhou. Others had grudges against him.

“They all gave the same answer.

“He really had been in town at about six thirty.

“I couldn't think of any reason all those people would lie together for his sake.

“Eventually, I had to accept that they were telling the truth.

“Could Zhou actually travel from the mountain to town in thirty minutes?

“A shortcut, perhaps?

“One only he knew about?

“Could he have used it to create the gap that made the police decide he hadn't had time to do it?

“If such a route existed, I had to find it.

“I began spending my days and nights on Dayu Mountain.

“I searched from the place Dad had died all the way to Zhou's storehouse.

“One mountain. Then another.

“The result was despair.

“I couldn't find it.

“Dayu Mountain was too vast.

“Even if the route existed, perhaps only Zhou could reveal it.

“But why would he volunteer information that would convict him?

“Then, when I was already close to despair, worse news struck.

“I had late-stage stomach cancer.

“The doctor said I didn't have much time.

“Once again, fate felt impossibly unfair.

“I wasn't afraid of dying. I was afraid I wouldn't have enough time to clear Dad's name.

“Along with the despair came pain that tormented me every day.

“I began to think of death as an escape from both.

“But I wanted even that to count for something.

“So I designed this case.

“I wanted Zhou to become the prime suspect again.

“I wanted him to know what it felt like to be falsely accused.

“And I wanted the evidence to look as solid as I could make it.

“I wanted to leave him nowhere to turn, until he had to destroy his own old alibi.”