Chapter 6

So the turning point came with their son's accident.

"Was it an accident, or deliberate? I asked him. He wouldn't answer... But he did once say he loved Xu Xiaofeng. He just couldn't, no matter what, love... that bastard's child."

"Perhaps... he was a devil then."

"But at the same time... he was her angel."

Xie Jintao couldn't help sighing.

Afterward, Zhang Mingxiang paid off the debts.

But how could he explain the insurance money to his wife?

Once a lie began, countless others were needed to conceal it.

So he forged the apartment contract and put her mind at rest for the time being.

On the surface, they could finally live a normal life.

But the present case began with her pathology report.

A month earlier, she had started having headaches and vomiting.

He took her for tests.

He didn't tell her the result.

Secretly, he researched the condition and consulted doctors. He learned that Beijing had specialists in that particular surgery.

That meant a great deal of money.

The specialist's surgery offered a higher success rate. If it went smoothly, the patient's survival rate could exceed 90 percent.

But recovery would be prolonged too. The disease was extremely prone to recurrence.

That meant more money.

Money Zhang Mingxiang couldn't earn, in either the short or the long term.

He must have thought about it for a long time.

And thought of the way he had solved his financial problem before.

This time, there was no other target at hand.

He could only find an innocent person: a homeless man with mental health problems.

Then fake his own death.

He must have known that, even if he remained physically alive, he would become a dead man in the eyes of the law.

Even so, he was willing to "die."

In exchange for money that could pay for her treatment and let her live.

But things hadn't gone so smoothly.

By this point, I thought I understood why he had tried to kill her.

He knew that without money, and without him, she couldn't go on.

And without her, he didn't want to live either.

So he had intended to kill her, then himself, and end everything.

Our unexpected arrival had spoiled his plan.

Xie Jintao admitted openly that, although he didn't approve of everything Zhang Mingxiang did, he still couldn't stop himself from helping.

At first, by reducing the interest on the debt.

More recently, by sheltering him and concealing his whereabouts.

After the crash, Zhang Mingxiang hadn't dared go home. He had hidden at Xie Jintao's.

That was why Jintao had been so nervous when I called.

Zhang Mingxiang had told him to contact their friends quickly and find out what I was investigating.

When he learned that a camera had recorded the person who called the insurer, he told Jintao to offer proof that he had been at work.

My judgment hadn't been wrong.

Someone had indeed been advising him.

By the time I arrived at the apartment, of course, Zhang Mingxiang had long since left.

Jintao knew he had broken the law. That was why he had asked me not to arrest him.

This was the whole truth.

It left my scalp prickling.

But...

"Why are you telling me all this? What do you want?"

Whether he spoke or not, Zhang Mingxiang's crimes were already extremely serious.

Murder and insurance fraud. Even surrender couldn't reduce the punishment very much.

"He came to me last night... Fuck, that idiot..."

Jintao swore, his eyes reddening.

"As soon as you went to see our friends last night, I heard... I... I told Mingxiang. Told him to run..."

I froze.

That meant Zhang Mingxiang knew I was coming?

Thinking back over the night, I suddenly realized something.

It wasn't that Zhao Jun and I had forced our way in and prevented the tragedy.

Zhang Mingxiang had abandoned the idea of killing her. Only then had he opened the door, rushed out, and knocked me down.

If he had really meant to kill her and himself, he had had plenty of time. Zhao Jun and I had no grounds to break in.

"But he didn't run. He came to me and said he'd nearly killed Xiaofeng... He said that would sever things completely. The police wouldn't suspect she knew about the insurance scam..."

"And more importantly, even if he was sentenced to death, she wouldn't keep thinking of him... The idiot..."

Before that night, I had indeed been convinced the couple were defrauding the insurer together.

He had used this to separate her from the case completely.

Stunned, I could only say, "He took it all... onto his own shoulders again."

So "killing Xu Xiaofeng" had been a performance.

One staged by Zhang Mingxiang.

Everything he had done was still his own crime. Murder. Insurance fraud. Terrible crimes.

I hated scum who could kill an utterly uninvolved homeless man for their own purposes.

Yet in that moment, for some reason, I couldn't hate him.

I felt only profound helplessness.

Jintao told me a few more things unrelated to the case.

But at least I now knew what he wanted.

Leaving the park, I made a call.

Xu Xiaofeng was still in hospital, but could walk normally.

Her injuries weren't serious.

Zhang Mingxiang must have held back.

She hadn't been discharged because she still had headaches.

Worried about possible aftereffects of oxygen deprivation, the doctors had kept her for further tests and observation.

Before long, she would learn she had a tumor in her brain.

What would she do then?

Back at the unit, I found Zhang Mingxiang.

Fortunately, there were still statements to complete and evidence for him to confirm. He hadn't yet been transferred to the detention center.

I took him out.

It was a serious breach of regulations.

None of my colleagues stopped me.

Not even Captain Xu.

They knew I had been the only one to persist with this investigation from beginning to end.

I wouldn't act recklessly.

Zhang Mingxiang faced murder, insurance fraud, and attempted murder. Although he had surrendered, the crimes were grave. He would very likely receive the death penalty.

Even if he wasn't executed, he might receive a suspended death sentence with restrictions on commutation.

And, just as he wanted, Xu Xiaofeng had cut all ties.

Barring anything unexpected, she would probably never visit him in prison.

So I took him to the hospital.

It was dusk.

Elsewhere, Xie Jintao brought Xu Xiaofeng downstairs.

They headed toward the garden beneath the inpatient building.

I stood with Zhang Mingxiang some distance away.

We hadn't brought them there to meet.

He didn't dare see her either.

The moment he spotted her in the distance, he shrank back, tense and apprehensive.

"Don't worry," I told him. "She doesn't know you're here."

Only then did he dare lift his head and gaze longingly after her.

Our only purpose was to let him look at her one last time.

And there really was light in his eyes as he watched her.

Not the light of sunset.

Something that was already there, within his eyes.

"Look a little longer," I said. "You won't see her again."

He said nothing. But his gaze was strangely ravenous.

As though he wanted to draw her into his eyes and keep her there.

"Have you thought about what happens to her afterward?" I asked. "What about her illness?"

Still no answer.

But tears spilled from the corners of his eyes.

The sunset happened to catch them too.

"Fuck, you're an idiot," I went on. "I'd like nothing better than to put you straight in prison."

Then I asked, "Didn't you know your best friend has sold his apartment?"

He turned sharply, staring at me in astonishment.

"He said the money he bought it with was dirty. Keeping it would only make him feel sick. Better to spend it treating your wife."

His face crumpled.

At last, he couldn't hold back. He clenched his teeth, but the sobs came anyway.

Great tears kept falling. He couldn't stop them.

"He said he's sorry. If he'd decided to help you like this from the start, perhaps none of it would have..."

I sighed. I couldn't finish.

Zhang Mingxiang still couldn't speak.

In the warm sunset, he watched the two distant figures with tenderness.

And kept crying.

Sobbing like a child.