The two quickly squatted on the ground, dejected. Chen Shi asked the hefty man what his name was, and he answered Ye XX. Chen Shi saw the bat tattoo on his neck and asked, "You wouldn’t be that Brother Bian, right?”

The hefty man said with a smile, "The brothers on the same path just gave me face by calling me Brother Bian[1]."

"What do you do?"

"Reporting to the government[2], we are absolutely serious people and collect debts for personal loan companies."

"Just collecting debts?"

"Just collecting debts!"

"Don’t lie to me. You think I don't know that you operate an underground casino?"

"Oh, that was long ago in the past. I’ve already turned over a new leaf. If you don’t believe me, you can ask my brothers.” Brother Bian smiled.

"How much does Sun Jun owe you?"

"Two, thirty... three, forty[3]... four, five hundred thousand or so."

"Exactly how much is it?!" Chen Shi berated him.

"Forty-six thousand, including interest! He’s been owning it for a long time. This kid has been in hiding and we haven’t been able to find him. It’s making my boss impatient.”

"Let me ask you something. Were you the one who chopped off Sun Jun's fingers?"

"Nothing like that happened. Nothing like that. How could we do that kind of thing?!" Brother Bian shook his head like a pellet drum.

Chen Shi gave Xu Xiaodong a glance. It was unclear what Xu Xiaodong got from that as he handed over a bottle of mineral water over. Chen Shi rolled his eyes. "Take this guy to another room!"

So, the thin man was picked up by Xu Xiaodong, and screamed as he was taken to the bathroom. Brother Bian’s expression looked as though this didn’t sit well with him, fearing that the younger brother would betray him. Chen Shi wasn’t in a hurry. He sat on the sofa and drank some water. He patiently waited and typed out a message to Xu Xiaodong, instructing him about what he should say when he came out.

Xu Xiaodong came out and clenched his fist. "Brother Chen, this youngster has been taken down."

Chen Shi looked at Brother Bian, who was already so anxious that he was full of sweat. Chen Shi said, "You’re really not going to say anything? You really think that we don't know anything? I’m asking now to give you a chance. When you get to the bureau, you won’t get this chance. Think about it!"

Brother Bian pinched his eyebrows as if he had a toothache, and under Chen Shi's cold eyes, he finally said, "I was the one who chopped them off..."

"Why?"

"He had been cheating. At that time, I was working in a casino. I found out that the boy had cheated a big boss out of hundreds of thousands. The big boss immediately wanted to kill him on the spot. I told him to calm down and that I would take care of him. So I just chopped two of his fingers off."

"If it was as you said, you had actually saved him?"

"I wouldn’t go as far as to say that." Brother Bian smiled.

"You’re still laughing? Listen, I don't care about any casino affairs. I don't care if you collect usury or gambling debts. I'm just investigating Sun Jun's affairs. If you cooperate well, I’ll let you go out of the door later!"

Brother Bian looked as though he was grasping at a life-saving straw, so he nodded desperately. "I’ll cooperate! I’ll definitely cooperate"

"Apart from chopping off his fingers, what else did you do to him?"

"Nothing!"

"Let me remind you. Did you tattoo a ‘dick’ on his forehead?"

"What ‘dick’[4]?"

"Male genitalia."

"Haha, so it’s a cock. You really know how to be eloquent. I know about that, but I didn't do it. It’s most likely that he offended others and was fixed up by them. That was too fucking funny. Way too creative. I laughed for a long while last time when I saw it."

"Don't go off on a tangent. Do you know who did it?"

"This kind of thing isn’t something glorious and he didn't tell me too."

Chen Shi took the wad of IOUs and asked Brother Bian to go through them and tell them who he recognized. Brother Bian looked at them one by one. "This Zhao XX is also a loan shark... I don’t know this one... This one seems to be a gambler."

When he saw Gu Daqiang's IOU, Brother Bian said, "This is one of Sun Jun's buddies. Sun Jun had deceived him."

"How do you know?"

"He told me. He once came over with a lot of money to gamble. I asked where the money had come from. He said that it was from an investment project. In fact, it was a leather bag company with which he deceived two well-off friends."

Brother Bian knew this in such detail that he may have participated in it himself, but Chen Shi didn’t pursue this. "When did this happen?"

"Six months ago!"

"Does Sun Jun have any enemies that wanted him killed?”

"They can’t be counted with the fingers of one hand!"

"Just tell us the ones that you know of."

Brother Bian recalled and listed a few people who had been deceived by Sun Jun. After listening to this, Chen Shi felt that Sun Jun deserved to die and wasn’t worthy of sympathy.

At this time, two police cars drove up outside. Chen Shi lifted Brother Bian up, and Brother Bian said in a panic, "Aiya, police officer, didn't you say that you wouldn't arrest me?"

"Did I say that? I just said that I’d let you out of this door!"

"Fuck! You tricked me!" Brother Bian shouted in disappointment.

In fact, as soon as Brother Bian started confessing everything, Chen Shi had sent a text message to Old Zhang. After handing the two over to Old Zhang, it seemed as though they had successfully completed their task. The clues provided by Brother Bian were enough for them to investigate for a while.

Chen Shi said to Xu Xiaodong, "Investigate Sun Jun’s scams tomorrow."

"Brother Chen, we don’t need to stay on guard here again tonight, right?"

"I don't have a place to sleep even if I go back now. I'm still going to stay here! You stay here with me."

"Ah? But I haven't showered in two days."

"I’ll invite you to take a shower. Let’s go!"

At 10:00 the next morning, Chen Shi went to the bureau. Instead of meeting Lin Qiupu, he went to the surveillance monitoring room and copied some surveillance footage. Then he went to Lin Dongxue's office, and took a look at the copy brought back from Ah Zhen’s housing district yesterday.

On the evening of September 25th, there was indeed a suspicious person entering Ah Zhen's housing district. Chen Shi carefully compared this person with the person who killed Ah Qiang. He leaned on a chair and crossed his arms in contemplation.

Lin Dongxue walked in and asked, "Why are you hiding here? Get to work!"

"Where is Liu Qin?"

"He’s with me! We have just arrested Ai Guowei who’s now in the interrogation room. Do you want to come over?"

"Ai Guowei isn’t the murderer. Just go through the standard procedures!”

"Ah? You’re not participating in the interrogation?"

"No, I need to go somewhere. I'll come back at noon to take you out for a meal. Bring Liu Qin. We’ll eat grilled fish."

Looking at Chen Shi's furrowed brows, it seemed that the truth was already on the verge of coming out. Lin Dongxue knew that he wouldn’t say anything no matter what she asked him at this point.

In the interrogation room, Ai Guowei confessed to injuring Teacher Li. He said that he had found Ah Zhen’s friend. After hearing the rumor, he believed that Teacher Li had hurt Ah Zhen and made her even more depressed, so he became impulsive and took some extreme actions.

Although Ai Guowei was filled with indignation facing the interrogator, Lin Dongxue could also tell from her experience that he was only an outsider in this case.

The interrogation continued until noon, and Ai Guowei was temporarily detained. Chen Shi only came back at 2:00 in the afternoon. Lin Dongxue complained, "Where did you go? I am famished."

"Sorry, let's go and eat!"

Chen Shi picked a restaurant that specialized in grilling fish that was killed on the spot and ordered a pot of spicy lychee grilled fish. The three of them ate happily. After spending time with each other last night, Lin Dongxue found that she had a lot of common topics to discuss with Liu Qin. The conversation at the table never died down.

After eating and drinking their fill, Chen Shi said, "Let’s go back to the bureau and get down to business!"

"What business?" Lin Dongxue blinked.

Chen Shi winked, "The suspect has been caught."

Liu Qin said excitedly, "Really? You guys are too efficient. I can sleep easy tonight."

"Liu Qin, who do you think that person is?" Chen Shi asked meaningfully.

"Letting me guess? Someone who might have been in love with Ah Zhen?"

Lin Dongxue suddenly noticed that outside the restaurant, Xu Xiaodong was lying in ambush with a group of police officers. Was the person Liu Qin? This was impossible. When Ah Qiang was killed, he was at the bureau and there was absolutely no time for him to commit the crime.

Chen Shi patted Liu Qin's shoulder, "Let's go and reveal the answer together!"

1. Means “bat” here, but the “Bian” Chen Shi mentioned earlier uses a different Chinese character even though the pinyin is the same.

2. What people sometimes call the police or people who uphold the law.

3. The reason why there’s “thirty” and “forty” present, is because you count Chinese numbers using groups of four zeroes rather than three. Hopefully this link can provide more insight. http://blog.tutorming.com/mandarin-chinese-learning-tips/count-with-numbers-in-mandarin-chinese

4. They both used Chinese characters that phonetically sound out “Dick” in English.