Case Files 013

Chapter 136: Dummy

The short hundred metres was like a marathon for Chief Zhou. When we returned home, Chief Zhou leaned against the bed and the frozen tears melted off. I knew it was impolite to ask Chief Zhou about Luo Sumei at a time like this but time didn't allow for pleasantries anymore. The killer was getting more out of control, if we didn't stop them soon, more tragedies would happen.

I summoned my courage to ask, "Chief Zhou, when did you last hear from Luo Sumei?"

Chief Zhou turned to me and said between sobs, "It was one week, or to be more precise, 9 days ago. We just had a fight and she blocked me from reaching her. I'm quite dense when it comes to relationships." Chief Zhou wiped away his tears. "Since she didn't want me to reach her, I decided to give her some time to calm down. But I never expected this to happen"

I nodded and asked, "Does Luo Sumei have the habit of wearing nail polish?" Chief Zhou looked at me while Guan Zhenglin and Gu Chen also glanced at me inquisitively. From their looks, I knew what they were trying to tell me. My question sounded quite interrogative. Guan Zhenglin glared at me, as if berating my lack of empathy but I couldn't eliminate anyone without proper investigation especially at a time like this. I had to figure out the possible suspects.

Chief Zhou naturally caught onto my intention too. He answered, "No, Xiao Mei was 30 this year, she never used those things when she was with me. So it never clicked in my head that those body parts could be hers"

Guan Zhenglin shook her head, "Even though I don't use much make-up, it's hard to escape the inundation of cosmetic commercials. When I was in school, my best friend used to bring me to do pedicures with her. From the nail polish I saw, the handiwork was quite professional. I believe Xiao Mei had been to a pedicurist to have them done."

Hearing that, I added, "Chief Zhou, when she left after the argument 9 days ago, was Xiao Mei wearing any nail polish?"

Chief Zhou answered firmly, "No, that I can be sure of. I would have noticed." In other words, Luo Sumei disappeared after she had a pedicure. If we could find out where she did her pedicure, we could narrow down further her time of disappearance. From there, we might also find witnesses who had seen her.

Then there was another question, why did Luo Sumei end up at First Drain Village? What was her connection to this village, if any?

I said, "Don't worry, Chief Zhou, we will find Xiao Mei's killer." At that moment, my phone rang. It was a message from Mary. "I've found the newspaper article for you. I'm still working on Luo Sumei."

The message was appended with a newspaper article, it was published many years ago. I finally had the chance to read the full extent of the article and got myself familiarized with the latter 12 killers reported. As I read through the article, my brows furrowed.

The methods of dismemberment used on Luo Sumei were featured in the article. Cutting off a victim's leg using a blunt blade, that was the mo of a butcher from US, the psychopath was dead; Training a dog to bite off the victim's arm, that happened in Russia, the killer was a hunter and was still on the run; the meat dumpling case happened in China, the killer was a restaurant worker, he had died in prison.

No wonder I would have come up with the criminal profile of a butcher. The killer modeled his method after another killer when they dismembered the body. But why would the killer employ so many different killing methods on the same body?

Currently I had 3 hypotheses.

One, the killer hated Luo Sumei a lot. The killer dismembered Luo Sumei when she was still alive. Only the craziest psychopath would enjoy such inhumane torment. If that was the case, the motive of the killer was pride. They wanted to use the police to announce to the world that they exist. It was like how you would gloat about scoring good marks in class. People had to know about their handiwork because they were proud of it. That would explain why the killer had messaged us about Luo Sumei.

Two, the killer hated Chief Zhou a lot. Oftentimes, the greatest pain we could deliver on someone was not to kill them, because death was a release. You wouldn't feel anything after you were dead. Only by being alive could you continue to be tortured. But only Chief Zhou would know if he had done anything to deserve a fate like this, if someone hated him so much that they would go to such lengths to harm him.

Three, the killer hated the police. They didn't have any history with Chief Zhou or Luo Sumei, she was targeted simply because she was the girlfriend of a cop. This kind of sociopathy appeared when one believed one was treated unfairly by the law enforcement. If that was the case, we should check the criminal background of all the villagers at First Drain Village. With that in mind, I sent a message to Mary to help me to do exactly that.

So far, these were the 3 most possible motives I could come up with. Regardless, the killer was already breaking at the seams.

If you were a killer, and you wanted us to know the identity of the victim, what would be the best choice? The answer was to show us the head of the victim. However, the killer did not do that but instead sent us a message through Luo Sumei's phone. There was nothing much we could do with this information. Mary could only triangulate the signal to a general location and we already knew the killer was from First Drain Village. So why did the killer choose this method instead of just showing us the head?

I shook my head and abandoned this thought for the moment. Now I needed to work on my second hypothesis, whether Chief Zhou had someone whom he had a huge beef with. When I shared my thoughts with him, Chief Zhou was silent for a long time. Then he said in a hoarse voice, "No, I don't think I have any enemies. You've been working with me, you know the kind of person I am. I normally don't get into arguments and conflicts, so I don't think I have any enemy that hates me that much."

Gu Chen chipped in, "How about the criminals you've arrested?"

Chief Zhou frowned and then said, "No, that's impossible too. Elm Town doesn't have any big cases, you know that. Most of the people I arrested are for street fighting and mugging, the worst is rape. I couldn't see anyone going this far just to take revenge for these petty crimes.

"After all, if they are caught, they will be given the death sentence." Chief Zhou sighed, "Would someone really risk their lives to take revenge for these past small offenses? This is too risky, I doubt anyone I've arrested would do something like this."

Then this hypothesis could be vetoed. The first and third hypotheses were harder to verify, I had to wait for Mary to come up with more information. And as fate would have it, Mary returned with news then and told me about Luo Sumei's movement before she disappeared.

Luo Sumei didn't disappear 9 days ago, the last witness who saw her was in the morning from 3 days ago, the day Luo Sumei was killed. The witness was a male pedicurist called Tony. Since it was just 3 days ago, when Mary called to enquire, Tony still had an impression of Luo Sumei. When Luo Sumei patronized them, it was snowing heavily and she was his only client. At the time, Tony even asked Luo Sumei why she had come for a pedicure in such weather.

Luo Sumei answered that it was because she was going to meet someone at noon. Seeing how giddy Luo Sumei was, Tony asked whether she had a date with her husband, and were they celebrating their anniversary.

Luo Sumei told Tony that she wasn't married yet, she was going to meet a dummy at noon. The dummy would give her 500000 RMB, so she planned to buy a house at Elm Town with that money. That was her lifelong dream. Tony was a good salesman so he pushed her to go for the full pedicure service. Luo Sumei accepted happily.

Mary sent Tony the picture of Luo Sumei's fingers and Tony confirmed that it was the nails he did for Luo Sumei that day. When Luo Sumei left his shop, it was about 11 am. And Luo Sumei died between 1 pm to around 3 pm.

Who did she meet? Why would that person give her 500000 RMB? Could that person be the killer? And what happened in that few short hours?