Chapter 256: The Arrest Begins (2/2)
As soon as I reached out my hand, Dali knew to hand me the Autopsy Umbrella. With its application, I discovered many fingerprints on the body. ”The murderer handled the body very hastily which also suggests he’s not very good at this sort of thing,” I surmised. “The stake on the contraption was broken off so it must have been inserted very deeply.”
I asked Bingxin to lift the body and Dali was just about to lend her a hand but I closed the umbrella and quickly stopped him before he could move.
”Half of his body is heavier than I expected,” remarked Bingxin.
”The murderer is about your height and rather poor at manual labor,” I explained. “Transporting the body must have been difficult for him...”
”Song Yang-gege,” said Bingxin. “I just noticed laceration marks on the hipbone.”
I examined the hipbone and scanned my surroundings, immediately noticing an almost imperceptible trail left from dragging the body on the ground. ”The murderer tied a rope to the victim’s thigh and dragged the body all the way here!” I deduced. “There is something strange about that though. The body was openly discarded here without any form of concealment, but the rope was removed. Could the rope expose his hiding place?”
I had intended to walk along the trail to search for wheel marks, but I decided to investigate the body first.
I grabbed the dead man's bloody feet and meticulously examined each and every detail, then asked if anyone had a needle or something similar. Bingxin pulled a hairpin from her head which I straightened and inserted between the toenail and the nailbed, scraping out some tiny, crystal-clear particles.
Bingxin and Xiaotao leaned in to have a look at what it was.
”It's sand!” cried Bingxin.
”Sand from where?” I asked.
”I’m not sure,” Bingxin admitted. “In fact, I’m not quite clear about that either. I’m only aware that the shape of sand particles differ from place to place. They are pentagonal, square, and round shapes; the list goes on. This particular grain of sand has a round shape and should be river sand but I can't confirm the exact location.”
The officers took turns examining it, but only Wang Yuanchao had valuable information to offer. ”It's Chahe River sand,” he said flatly.
”That’s amazing!” exclaimed Dali. “You can even tell where it’s from with a mere glance!”
”The lower reaches of the Chahe River is the only sand collection point in Nanjiang City,” explained Wang Yuanchao. “Back when I was working narcotics, I swallowed a mouthful of sand when a criminal pinned me onto the banks of the Chahe River. The doctor eventually extracted nine grains of sand from my trachea so I remember this shape.”
”In other words, it’s sand used in building materials,” added Xiaotao.
”Did you find any wheel marks on the road?” I asked.
”Quite a few!” acknowledged Xiaotao.
I walked along the trail and came to a dirt road that was covered in wheel marks. After scrabbling around the ground for a while, I found sand of the same shape.
”The wheel marks are the same as those left by the car bombing!” yelled Xiaotao.
”Let’s investigate this lead,” I said elatedly. “He must be hiding in a messy rental unit under construction. There should be sand and ropes piled up at the scene. I doubt there’s a parking lot so the murderer’s car should be parked nearby. And the surrounding area has a bunch of food stalls.”
”How do you know there are a bunch of food stalls?” asked Xiaotao in wide-eyed shock. “Did you disect the victim’s intestines?”
”Just search along these parameters. I'll explain later,” I answered cryptically.
Xiaotao led the officers on a search at once but I stayed behind to help Bingxin with the body. After all, I couldn’t leave her to handle it all alone.
When the others had all left, the three of us returned to the corpse. To Dali’s surprise, I pulled out a stack of yellow joss paper from my pocket.
”Song Yang, are you actually going to burn joss paper for this heinous criminal?”
”He’s already dead,” I sighed. “This is something I must do no matter the person.”
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