The Bank Burglary Case (15)

Chapter 15

Yun Song should have returned to town. There was a body there, along with the young Liao couple.

Yun Song’s original plan had been to visit the village herself to scout the situation. A forensic doctor was supposed to come from the city, and she would definitely have headed back by then.

But now, she had found a lead and couldn’t easily leave. Meanwhile, back in town, once the forensic doctor arrived, the news would spread with the speed of local gossip. The family of the deceased, Tian Gui, would surely show up, and they might face a new set of troubles.

Tang Chao and Tong Jin were both newcomers who had graduated not long ago. She didn’t know if the two of them could handle it.

At that moment, the two in town were indeed facing trouble.

When the two of them had seen Yun Song off the previous morning, Yun Song had practically held their hands, giving them careful instructions.

“I’ve already applied for a forensic doctor from the county to perform the autopsy. They should arrive this afternoon. Tang Chao, you’ll be in charge of receiving them.”

“I’ve already written the Application for Detention Report for the Liao couple. When the forensic doctor arrives, give it to her so she can take it back to the city.”

Originally, Yun Song said she would be back in the afternoon, but she hadn’t returned.

Furthermore, the forensic doctor hadn’t arrived either. The county’s forensic doctor had gone to another province, and now the county was filing a report to have the city dispatch one.

That would take another day or two.

The forensic doctor’s absence was one thing, but the family of the deceased had arrived.

The parents of the deceased were in their sixties or seventies, experiencing the tragedy of the white-haired burying the black-haired¹.

“My son! How could you have the heart to leave us behind!”

“We were planning on you coming home for New Year’s this year so we could find you a wife.”

“Oh, Heavens! You are blind to let the white-haired bury the black-haired!”

The two elderly people cried heart-wrenchingly, and Tang Chao and Tong Jin couldn’t help but feel their own eyes grow red.

However, they soon ran into trouble.

The old couple had brought a coffin with them, intending to take the body away so he could be buried and rest in peace.

“Elders, here is the situation. Your son was murdered, so we cannot let you take him yet. Our forensic doctor will be here soon. You can only take him after the autopsy is finished,” Tong Jin said.

“What does that mean?”

“An autopsy means cutting the person open…” someone in the crowd of onlookers suddenly blurted out.

The two elderly people hadn’t understood at first, but upon hearing this, they immediately shook their heads.

“No! Absolutely not! We don’t agree to that.”

Tang Chao said, “Article 131 of the Criminal Procedure Law of the People’s Republic of China stipulates that public security organs—”

Before she could finish, the old lady’s gaze turned fierce. “I don’t care about your organs or whatever! If you cut my son open today, we’ll fight you to the death!”

The school teachers and the principal hurried to help hold them back, and they began to persuade the two elders. “An autopsy is necessary for the case. You don’t want your child’s killer to go free, do you?”

But the two elders felt they were all in league together. They argued, “In the plays I’ve seen, the officials find the killer without having to cut people open!”

“I don’t care! Whoever touches my son today, I’ll fight them to the death!”

Tong Jin: “…” It really didn’t need to go that far. They were police, not executioners.

Tong Jin remembered something from before.

She thought for a moment, stood on her tiptoes, and whispered in Tang Chao’s ear, “I have an idea. One of us stays here to watch them and make sure they don’t take the body, and the other goes to find the Old Lady for help.”

Whether it was the school teachers or the principal, to the elderly couple, they were all on the opposing side. The more they spoke, the more agitated the couple became.

“Who stays?” After Tang Chao spoke, she looked at Tong Jin’s build, then at her own.

“Go and come back quickly. I might not be able to hold out for long,” Tang Chao said.

Tong Jin nodded to show she understood and hurried to Old Lady Zhang’s house.

“Old Lady! Old Lady! There’s work for you!”

She knocked on the door, but no one opened it.

“Old Lady?” Was she not home?

Only then did Tong Jin remember that the people of Tonglin Town were a bit different from city folk. In the city, people would close the door even if they were home, but in Tonglin Town, people wouldn’t close the door if they were inside.

Since the door was closed now, she might not be home.

She was just about to leave when the neighboring door opened. The young Liao couple had been catching up on sleep at home and came to the door when they heard the knocking.

“Officer?”

“Why isn’t your neighbor, Old Lady Zhang, at home?”

“She should be. Her shoes are outside.” The Old Lady was very particular; she wore soft cloth shoes inside and rubber boots when she went out.

So, the couple went to knock on the door as well.

“Old Lady Zhang, the officer is looking for you.”

The door finally opened. The Old Lady’s eyes were red and swollen as if she had been crying.

The Old Lady said, “I’m getting old, I was sleeping and got a bit dazed.”

She let out a yawn, and it didn’t seem like anything was wrong. At her age, how could she have so much time to have a good cry?

Tong Jin didn’t have time to build rapport; her words were all about the money. “Old Lady, I have something I’d like to ask your help with. Five yuan.”

Tong Jin wasn’t particularly short on money, so she didn’t mind that today was another day of paying out of pocket to work.

The Old Lady had been in low spirits, but upon hearing this, she immediately perked up. She hurried to change her shoes and asked, “What is it?”

She was eager to get to work.

Tong Jin said, “Regarding the deceased person found earlier, we need to perform an autopsy to determine the cause and time of death. But the deceased’s parents have arrived and want to take him back for burial. They’re threatening to fight us to the death.”

Walking beside Tong Jin, the Old Lady sighed and said, “The white-haired burying the black-haired. How pitiful.”

Tong Jin said, “Yes, so we don’t have a better way. We wanted to ask for your help. You’re a local and you’ve seen a lot; you’ll surely have a better way to handle this.”

Just like the last time they went to rescue the elderly, those two old people hadn’t trusted the three police officers at all and needed a local acquaintance to help testify.

Compared to the police, or the teachers and principal who were helping the police, these two parents who had lost their child would certainly place more trust in Old Lady Zhang, who was also a local elder.

The old lady nodded. On the way there, Tong Jin explained the situation. After hearing that the deceased was a suspect in the bank burglary case, the old lady sighed and said, “Sigh, other people’s sons are so filial.”

Tong Jin uttered a confused sound. She couldn’t figure out which part of her long explanation – which included stealing copper wire from a brick factory, robbing a bank, and being dumped in a manure pit – could possibly lead this elderly woman to the conclusion of “filial.”

“You see, other people’s sons know to steal things from the outside,” the old lady whispered.

Tong Jin didn’t catch what she said; they had already reached the makeshift shed.

Tang Chao was quite tall, but he was currently being backed into a corner by two elderly people who were two heads shorter than him.

Tong Jin hurried over to help, while the old lady blended into the crowd. She was thin and short, but she possessed a level of determination that far surpassed the other onlookers who were just there for the spectacle.

Quickly, she reached the parents and spoke up: “Where is the justice in parents not being allowed to see their own son’s body? At the very least, you should let them see their child!”

Tong Jin didn’t understand why the woman was doing this, but she chose to trust her.

So, she said, “Let the two elderly parents go inside and take a look first.”

Because her words carried weight, the others gave Old Lady Zhang some face and stopped trying to push their way in.

The two parents were allowed inside, and Old Lady Zhang followed them.

Tang Chao stood guard outside the shed while Tong Jin went in with them.

Once inside, seeing their son’s body bloated from being submerged, the two parents began to wail again. There is no grief quite like a parent burying their child.

Old Lady Zhang started crying along with them, and she was crying even louder.

“We are crying for our son, what are you crying for?”

The old lady’s crying was becoming a major distraction.

“I feel so bad for you,” the old lady said, her voice choking up as tears fell. “Such a filial son, gone just like that. Just thinking about it breaks my heart.”

Even Tong Jin, standing nearby, was moved by her performance. It was impossible to tell that this old woman was a helper she had personally invited.

“Such a good boy, how could he just leave his parents behind like this!”

Old Lady Zhang grew more distressed as she spoke, showing genuine, heartfelt sorrow. “Your son was truly filial. He worked hard to earn money and treated you well, unlike my own son. How could such a good child from your family be gone just like that?”

The elderly couple had been immersed in pure grief, but hearing these words, they began to feel a flicker of resentment toward their son, though they didn’t voice it.

If their son had been a bit more filial, if he had listened to them and settled down to get married and have children in Yulan Town, how could this have happened?

If he had been more filial, if he hadn’t gone out drinking with those hoodlums and had come home to visit more often, how could he have left them to mourn him in their old age?

Unaware of their internal shift, Old Lady Zhang continued to grieve, wiping her eyes. “Such a good boy would never rob a bank. I bet someone else robbed the bank and he saw them, so they murdered him. Poor child! Now that he’s dead, people are still saying he robbed the bank, even though he didn’t get a single cent. I wonder how well the person who actually stole the money is living right now!”

The two parents thought about this and began to hate the person who had robbed the bank.

Old Lady Zhang continued, “The bank might even think the boy did it. Now that the money can’t be found, they might demand you pay it back. Those banks aren’t good people. If they decide your son gave all the money to you, what will you do then?”

“We didn’t get a single cent! How can they do that?”

Listening from the side, Tong Jin finally realized how formidable the older generation was when it came to navigating human nature and social dynamics. Even if the police had thought of these arguments, they could never achieve the same effect as this old lady.

Furthermore, the police couldn’t say such things. After all, Tian Gui was almost certainly the one who robbed the bank. If they said these things and the truth came out later, they wouldn’t be able to face the parents. But Old Lady Zhang could say whatever she wanted; she wasn’t a police officer and didn’t have to answer to anyone.

At that moment, Old Lady Zhang turned her head toward Tong Jin and said, “Officer, you have to help them.”

Tong Jin: “…”

In an instant, she had been transformed from a villain into a good comrade of the people.

Translator’s Notes