The three of us exchanged looks. It seemed that I’d stumbled upon a gold mine here.
“Does Xu Xiaohui’s death have anything to do with plastic surgery?” asked Wu Li in confusion. “But she’s such a natural beauty! Someone like her wouldn’t need plastic surgery, would she?”
“What’s the name of the plastic surgeon?” I asked.
“His name is Kong Hui,” Wu Li replied. “We met him at the reunion party. When we learned that he’s now a plastic surgeon with his own practice—lots of people were excited and wanted to get their face done with him. Actually, he gave me his business card too. Hold on, I’ll get it for you.”
Wu Li fumbled in her purse for the card and handed it to us. The card read “Aili Plastic Surgery—Dr. Kong Hui.” I recalled that the name of the clinic was one of the five clinics on Xiaotao’s list. This made Kong Hui much more suspicious now.
On one hand, I was excited to find a clue that led to the suspect so quickly, but on the other hand, it was so easy and straightforward that I couldn’t help but suspect that something was wrong.
“What is the relationship between Kong Hui and Xu Xiaohui like?” Xiaotao asked.
“Relationship?” Wu Li smiled. “Well, you see, when we were in high school, Kong Hui was really unpopular. He was short, dark-skinned, poor, and I even heard rumors about his father being a prisoner in a labor camp. But fast forward to the present and things are drastically different! He’s a very successful plastic surgeon, he drives an expensive BMW, and I think he had something done to his face too because he looks handsome now! That man ages like wine! I even joked with Xiaohui how she must’ve regretted rejecting him when he tried to woo her back then!”
“What did you say?” Xiaotao was stunned.
“Oh, it’s all ancient history now!” Wu Li sipped her coffee. “Back when we were in high school, Kong Hui would write dozens of love letters to Xiaohui. Once, on Valentine's Day, he stood in the middle of a circle of lit candles near our dorm and confessed his feelings to her. But it was past curfew then, and I don’t know who did it, but someone poured a basin of cold water on him from upstairs, and Kong Hui just stood there soaked to the bone! He never talked to Xiaohui ever since.”
“Did the two ever get back in touch with each other after the reunion party?” asked Xiaotao.
“I… I don’t know!” Wu Li’s tone suddenly changed. “Officer, you’re not suspecting Kong Hui to be responsible for Xiaohui’s death, are you?”
“Do you have anything to do with her death, then, Miss Wu?” Xiaotao shot back.
“No, absolutely not!” Wu Li denied vehemently. Her face had gotten pale. “I’m a good friend of hers! I’d never do anything to harm her!”
“Then stop making random guesses,” replied Xiaotao with a thin smile, “and do not spread any gossip about the case to anyone else, understood?”
Xiaotao wanted to intimidate her a bit just to prevent her from leaking any information about the case, but in fact it was clear to us that Wu Li was innocent and had nothing to do with Xiaohui’s death.
After we said goodbye to Wu Li, the four of us headed straight to Kong Hui’s plastic surgery clinic. When we asked for him at the front desk, we were informed that Dr. Kong was still performing surgery. We waited for half an hour, then a patient with bandages around her head was wheeled out of the operation room, and a man in a white lab coat walked out behind her.
“Nothing scares me more than plastic surgery!” cried Dali.
“Shut up, idiot!” hissed Xiaotao. She then went up to the man in white coat and said, “Are you Dr. Kong?”
The man nodded, then looked Xiaotao up and down. “Are you here for plastic surgery or liposuction?” he asked.
“Neither,” answered Xiaotao, showing him her badge. I observed his expressions closely and saw that his pupils shrank ever so slightly. This man could be very suspicious indeed.
Then Xiaotao asked him several questions in a row: Did he know a woman named Xu Xiaohui? Did they talk when they met at the reunion party on November third?
Kong Hui smiled. “I haven’t seen her in ten years. I met her at the party, of course, but we merely said a few words and that was it. It was just a small talk anyway.”
The man was calm, but his hands still betrayed him. As he answered the questions, the veins on his hand kept popping. This indicated accelerating blood flow which usually happened when one was in a state of distress.
“What was your schedule like from November 6th to November 13th?” Xiaotao asked again.
“Nothing out of the ordinary,” he answered. “I travel from home to work in the morning and then back home again in the evening. What is this about, officer? What happened to Xu Xiaohui?”
Xiaotao was about to answer him, but I interrupted her, “She was in danger, but she was rescued and her conditions are stable now!”
“You mean she was hit by a car?” Kong Hui asked, his pupils dilated.
“Isn’t it obvious?” I asked.
Kong Hui’s expressions changed dramatically.
“No, it wasn’t, officer,” he said. “You were far from being clear, so how could I have known what happened to her?”
I kept looking straight into his eyes. It was a trick that I learned from Yuanchao. He taught me that guilty people or those who were trying to hide something would blink a lot. As I expected, Kong Hui didn’t dare to look straight at me.
“Well, she should be able to tell us exactly what happened when she wakes up,” I said.
I noticed beads of cold sweat on the sides of Kong Hui’s nose and on his forehead.
“Would you please let us into the operating room, Dr. Kong?” asked Xiaotao.
“I’m afraid not,” refused Kong Hui. “We just had an operation in there and it hasn’t been properly sterilized yet. I’m afraid it would be unsanitary for you to enter right now.”
“Oh, surely it’ll be fine, Dr. Kong,” answered Xiaotao. “This clinic doesn’t deal with infectious diseases after all.”
We entered the operating room and I asked Dali to get my Autopsy Umbrella from the car. The room’s walls were painted white and the lower half was tiled. There was a surgical table in the middle with a spotlight on top of it. There was a curtain around the surgical table too.
I closed the door, opened the window, and checked the whole room with my Autopsy Umbrella. The operation on the victim must’ve been long-drawn-out and complicated, so it had to have left some trace in the room. Yet, I found the room to be spotless with nothing particularly noteworthy at all.
“I don’t think this is the crime scene,” I said.
“That makes sense,” replied Xiaotao. “His clinic apparently receives quite a lot of patients. Kong Hui would not risk his business and commit the crime here. Besides, there are many staff members here. He could very easily be found out.”
At that point, all of us were pretty sure that Kong Hui was the murderer. It was just as Grandpa once said: the more complicated the murder method, the easier it was to find the murderer. Because of the horrifying way Xu Xiaohui died, it was much easier to narrow down the identity of the prime suspect. Had Kong Hui killed her with a more ‘common’ method, like stabbing or strangulation, we would’ve spent much more time running in circles trying to determine who could’ve done it.
“Are we going to bring him back to the police station?” Dali asked.
“Not yet,” Xiaotao answered. “We can’t just arrest anyone without strong evidence. Besides, it’s a better idea to lull him into a false sense of security for now.”
We decided to leave the clinic, but before that Xiaotao spoke to Kong Hui politely and made sure that he thought we didn’t suspect him at all. This was the usual modus operandi used by the police. The more they suspected someone, the more they tried to make that person feel safe.
Some murderers might be clever, some might be stupid, but there was always one common mentality among them—they always believed that they could escape with impunity.
Once we were outside the clinic, I looked back at the patients entering the building. They were all young and beautiful women.
“Why don’t you stay here, Dali?” I suggested. “You’ll have plenty of beautiful company while you observe Kong Hui’s movements. You can use the opportunity to practice your skills in picking up girls too!”
“Okay, sure!” he nodded eagerly.
The rest of us returned to the police station where one of Xiaotao’s officers had just brought in the farmer who delivered Xu Xiaohui to the slaughterhouse. We questioned him for a few minutes and found out that as he was driving to the slaughterhouse that morning, he found a pig on the side of the road, so he loaded it into the truck. At that time, he thought he was really lucky because it was like he’d just picked up an extra thousand yuan.
The man seemed to be an honest farmer. During the questioning, he often asked if there were any problems with his pigs and anxiously asked, “Did anyone get sick from eating pork, officers? How much do I have to pay in fines?”
“Don’t worry,” Xiaotao comforted him. “You can go now.”
At noon, Xiaotao ordered some takeaways for everyone and we ate lunch together at the police station. Just when we finished our meal, Dali returned. His eyes were all red and watery.
“What happened, Dali?” I asked with a laugh.
“This is all your fault, dude!” he snapped at me. “You and your bright idea about picking up girls! I got pepper spray in my eyes!”