Who Stole My Pressure Cooker (3)

Chapter 23

Liao Shanchun’s nerves were wound tight. Even as she lay in bed, she remained terrified, her entire body trembling uncontrollably.

It wasn’t until the first light of dawn, when she heard her parents-in-law getting up, that she finally managed to close her eyes for a moment.

This brief nap lasted until past ten o’clock, by which time the sun was nearly shining directly into the room.

When she woke, Liao Shanchun looked at the hole in her bedsheet and let out a massive sigh of relief. She had been having a nightmare!

Thank goodness, it was just a dream.

She recalled the dream: she had dreamt of going to Changgui’s house to ask for her pressure cooker back, only to find that Changgui’s family had committed a murder and were dragging a corpse.

In the end, she, Changgui, and Changgui’s husband were all in the fields digging for eels together…

It really was a terrifying dream.

She woke up in a daze and walked out of the room, only to see her mother-in-law preparing to gut some eels.

Wait, eels!

In the basin next to her was a string of eels with their heads smashed in.

It wasn’t a dream!

A jolt went through her, and she snapped fully awake. That’s right! Last night she really had gone to Changgui’s house, and she really had seen them dragging a body.

The sun was shining brightly outside today, but even with the sunlight hitting her body, she couldn’t feel any warmth.

“What’s wrong with you? Did you run into a ghost while you were out digging for eels last night?” her mother-in-law asked.

Liao Shanchun waved her hand dismissively. She remembered that when she had asked for help last night, they hadn’t believed her. If she spoke up during the day, they certainly wouldn’t believe her either.

They might even spread it around as a joke until everyone knew, and then she would be finished.

That’s right!!!

Liao Shanchun quickly said to her mother-in-law, “Mom, I was just joking last night. Don’t tell anyone else. I don’t want it to affect my relationship with Changgui.”

The mother-in-law paused. This was a first. Her daughter-in-law had told more than a few tall tales in her life, but this was the first time she had said something so bizarre and then been afraid of others finding out.

The mother-in-law said, “I don’t usually like talking to people anyway.”

Liao Shanchun thought about it and realized that was true.

She thought she should also warn her eldest daughter… where was her eldest daughter?

Why hadn’t she seen her since waking up?

“Mom, where’s Dayan?”

“She went out early this morning. I don’t know where she’s off running wild.”

Children in the mountains naturally ran around everywhere to play; very few could stay cooped up at home.

Liao Shanchun’s heart thudded in her chest, and she rushed outside.

“Dayan!!!”

She ran past the pigsty and across the large flooded paddy field. Several people on the hillside spotted her.

“Dayan seems to have gone to town. She went with the people from the Village Party Secretary’s house.”

“Is something wrong? Why the rush?”

Liao Shanchun hurried toward the Village Party Secretary’s house. The Secretary’s elderly mother was sitting under the eaves, preparing vegetables.

“Did Dayan go to town with the Village Party Secretary?”

“Yes, what’s going on?” On market days, it was normal for children to go to town with adults.

Liao Shanchun breathed a sigh of relief. If she was with the Village Party Secretary, she should be fine.

Still feeling uneasy, she began walking toward town herself.

After crossing several hills, she soon spotted Dayan and a strange woman beside her.

Liao Shanchun could tell at a glance that the stranger was no ordinary person. Even from a distance, before she could see her face clearly, Liao Shanchun noticed how tall she was.

“Dayan!”

Dayan had been talking enthusiastically to the police auntie she had just met, but hearing her mother’s voice, she immediately waved. “Mom!”

“You scared me to death!” After what happened last night, waking up early this morning to find her daughter gone had been terrifying.

Liao Shanchun ran up to her daughter. Only then did she get a clear look at the stranger.

The woman was in her twenties or thirties, more than a head taller than her. She had calm, bright eyes that were currently fixed on her. It was a silent gaze, devoid of any malice, giving off a feeling like the moon on a clear night.

In the past, Liao Shanchun would have felt self-conscious meeting someone from the city, but at this moment, she felt no such thing.

The woman introduced herself. “Hello, I am Yun Song, an officer from the Jinguang Police Station of the South District Branch of the Pingcheng Public Security Bureau.”

Po… Police? This identity, combined with the woman’s calm gaze, her tall and upright posture, and her gentle tone, caused all the fear Liao Shanchun had been carrying to vanish in an instant.

Her daughter was so clever!

“My name is Liao Shanchun. You can just call me Shanchun.”

“Hello, Shanchun.” Yun Song had originally intended to return to the city this morning, but before she could leave, someone had called out to her, saying a young girl was looking for her.

She had gone out to find the girl breathless, saying her family’s pressure cooker was missing, and that while she and her mother were looking for it, they saw that someone had died.

Yun Song had quickly packed her things to come and see what was happening.

Liao Shanchun hadn’t expected her daughter to move so fast. She swallowed hard. Since the police were already here, there was no reason not to speak.

“I saw them with my own eyes, dragging a corpse out of the house.”

As she spoke, her eyes remained fixed on the officer. She was afraid the woman wouldn’t believe her, but also afraid the woman would show fear herself.

Yun Song asked, “Did you see clearly who the deceased was at the time?”

Liao Shanchun felt a weight lift from her heart. She said, “It was night, and his face was a bit mangled. I couldn’t see clearly.”

Yun Song said, “Has anyone in the village gone missing recently?”

Liao Shanchun found a single thread to pull from the tangled mess of her thoughts.

That’s right, who was the dead person?

“Let me think.”

First of all, it was definitely a man. His face was basically ruined, so she couldn’t tell who it was.

But it had to be someone from the village. The couple wouldn’t go out and kill a stranger and then drag them back to their own house.

But lately, she hadn’t heard of anyone in the village going missing.

It was strange. If a person suddenly vanished… their family would surely be worried.

Wait!

Liao Shanchun suddenly remembered that there actually was one person in the village whose disappearance wouldn’t be taken seriously by anyone.

“There is someone in the village who hasn’t been seen for a while, and yet no one thinks anything is wrong.”

“Who?”

“Sun Er.”

“Who is that?”

That was a long story.

Every village has one or two bad seeds, people who never do an honest day’s work, spending their time stealing and causing trouble. They have foul tempers, and one look at them tells you that sooner or later, they are going to end up dead.

Their village was no exception, and the Sun family’s second son was exactly that kind of rotten apple.

“Sun Er has had sticky fingers since he was a child, always stealing things from others. When he got a bit older, he started stealing money from his parents to go mess around in town for a few days, only coming back when he ran out of cash.”

“His parents sent him to the neighboring town to apprentice as a carpenter. As it turned out, while he was out on a job at someone’s house with his master, he stole money from the client. Craftsmen value their reputation above all else; his master was so furious he nearly beat him to death and sent him packing immediately.”

“When he got back, he lied and said his master looked down on him. Since they had paid the apprenticeship fee, his parents went to cause trouble for the master.”

“The master was so angry he came to the village to curse them out. The whole family was humiliated.”

“After that incident, his parents gave up on him and stopped caring what happened to their son.”

And… and Liao Shanchun remembered people in the village saying that besides his petty thievery, Sun Er was also a lecher. He had once been beaten for peeping on someone while they were bathing.

Liao Shanchun had dealt with him personally. Her impression was that he was incredibly crude in both action and speech. Once, she had been hanging laundry in the back alley when he passed by and started saying filthy things.

She ignored him, but he only grew more emboldened until she threw a basin of water at him to make him leave.

It really made one want to kill him.

Thinking about it now, it really could be him.

This… this…

Liao Shanchun felt that people were different after all. If the dead person had been anyone else, she would definitely think there was something wrong with the couple. How could they kill someone?

But if the dead person was Sun Er…

Then Sun Er must have done something to drive Changgui’s family to kill him.

That was the weight of Sun Er’s reputation over the years.

Liao Shanchun looked at the police officers beside her, and her heart suddenly filled with panic.

It was over. Had they accidentally done a bad thing while trying to be helpful?

Liao Shanchun’s perspective shifted instantly. If Sun Er really was dead, would Changgui’s family have to pay for the life of a person like that with their own?

Liao Shanchun was born in the 70s, and her understanding was that a life must be paid for with a life. She had heard many such stories when she was young – that if you killed someone, you would eventually face a firing squad¹. In the stories she heard back then, it didn’t matter if you were a mother-in-law or a husband; if you killed someone, you got the bullet.

On the other side of the village, Changgui and her husband had already returned with the pesticide.

On their ordinary dining table now sat two bottles of pesticide. In front of Changgui’s husband lay a primary school writing notebook, and he held a pencil in his hand.

“It was us…” The knowledge they had gained in the past from literacy classes was finally being put to use.

“How do you write the word ‘kill’?”

“Three dots of water on the left, and the word for ‘few’ on the right².”

Changgui’s husband wrote it down, but it looked strange.

“Doesn’t look right.”

“It’s close enough. We’re not writing a book.”

“It was us who kilt³ Sun Er. We will pay the Sun famly with our lives.”

This matter certainly couldn’t be hidden forever. Both of them were honest, hardworking people. During this time, looking at the rotting corpse every day and having nightmares every night, they hadn’t had a single moment of peace.

Regardless of whether Liao Shanchun discovered it, the couple had already decided on this outcome.

It was just that a bullet was too painful. They didn’t want to go to the city to face a firing squad.

So, they bought pesticide.

Outside the door, there was a knock.

“Is Changgui home?”

It was Liao Shanchun’s mother-in-law.

The Old Lady held a small wicker tray containing eggplants and chili peppers.

“The eggplants at home are growing well, so I thought I’d bring some over to you.” The Old Lady spoke as she walked inside.

“This… no need, no need.”

The husband hurriedly hid the notebook. They couldn’t let anyone see it.

“Why be so polite with me?” The Old Lady quickly set the eggplants on the table. “It’s not like it’s anything expensive. I passed by your vegetable plot a couple of days ago and saw your crops were all gone, and we just happen to have extra. Take them.”

After the Old Lady finished speaking, she walked out with her tray, giving them no chance to return the vegetables.

Once she had walked a distance away, she looked down at the pesticide she had stolen.

Could what her daughter-in-law said actually be true?

These pesticide bottles were clearly brand new, but it was October⁴. Where would anyone have a use for pesticide right now?

Thus, when Changgui’s family finished their meal of braised pork and prepared to drink the pesticide… where was the pesticide?

Translator’s Notes