Apricot's Revenge by Ying Song

Author:Ying, Song [Ying, Song]
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
ISBN: 9781466873988
Publisher: St. Martin's Press
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

— 2 —

Nanyuan’s Ming Tien Café.

Nie Feng was seated in the same window booth as before. The same ponytailed waitress brought him a glass of water.

“What would you like, sir?” she asked with a big smile.

Nie took a look at the menu. “Japanese rice with braised eel. Make that two.”

When Xiaochuan arrived, the waitress was bringing up the eel dish in red lacquered trays filled with fine little plates of side dishes, so typical of Japanese cuisine. There was also a small bowl of miso soup with purple seaweed for each. It smelled wonderful, so they began eating right away, while Xiaochuan filled Nie in on the “death notice.”

“Identical to the one Hu Guohao got?”

“Yes. Another red tower mountain, according to Yao Li,” Xiaochuan said.

“Yes, I see that. The symbol does look like a red tower mountain. I hadn’t noticed that before.”

“Yao Li is an admirer of yours. She asked me to give you her best.”

“She did?” Nie asked jokingly.

Scratching his head, Xiaochuan smiled and changed the subject.

“Do you think that sheet of paper means something?”

“At the very least, it means that the same person killed Hu Guohao and Hong Yiming, and the pair of murders were meticulously planned and carried out. The killer is very smart.”

Xiaochuan was pleased that things were starting to become clear, even though there were still too many puzzles, too many questions.

“Also, the death notice was clearly meant to frighten the victims and make them feel like they were being hunted down. This fits the profile of revenge killings.”

“Revenge killings,” Xiaochuan repeated.

“Yes, but only if my analysis is correct.” Nie paused and, with a look at Xiaochuan, continued, “And if so, the key to cracking the case is to decipher the motive for revenge.”

“Decipher?”

“Yes. Not to find actual clues, but to figure out what the red tower mountain symbol and the string of numbers mean. Oh, and that strange wreath. They’re all there in front of our eyes, and we have to find out what message they were intended to convey, what secrets lay behind them. I’m pretty sure the victims knew before they died.”

“So how do we go about deciphering them?”

“I have to leave in three days, so I won’t be much help.”

“Will you still follow the case after you return to Sichuan?” Xiaochuan was obviously disappointed Nie had to leave.

“Of course,” Nie said. “I’ll follow up, so we’ll know what happened, and I have to write a story about it. So don’t forget to share any new information with me.”

“No problem.” Xiaochuan knew that Nie wanted an exclusive, a trait shared by every reporter worth his salt.

“Did you drive here?” Nie asked.

“I did.”

“Then come with me.”

“Where to?”

“You’ll see. You want to decipher the symbols, don’t you?”

They climbed into Xiaochuan’s blue-and-white patrol car and headed for Shennan Road. It wasn’t far, Nie told him, and they were there in no time—Shenzhen Book City. It was getting late, but the place was crowded with book buyers and browsers.

Xiaochuan parked behind the building and they rode

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