Chapter 014: The Brother Who Hated His Sister

At my words, Yun Gao’s shoulders trembled; he seemed flustered and hastily begged me not to make baseless accusations. He addressed me as “Officer,” and I could tell he was anxious—whether genuinely or only pretending, I could not immediately discern.

Yun Gao still maintained his politeness, insisting that his goodwill toward his younger sister was sincere. He explained that she was rather mischievous and refused to return home, so he deliberately made things difficult for her out in the world, hoping she would come back and admit her faults. I hadn’t even asked yet, but Yun Gao took the initiative to explain.

Yun Gao recounted that when Yun Qing was at home, she constantly angered Mr. Li, the elderly patriarch. Mr. Li was old and suffered from heart disease; when he lost his temper, his face would flush and even his breathing grew labored. After Yun Qing left, Mr. Li either never mentioned her or, when he did, would curse her. But she was his own flesh and blood, after all.

Yun Gao said he could see that Mr. Li still cared deeply for his daughter, though he was too proud to admit it. At this, Yun Gao even smiled, remarking that the old man simply could not let go of his pride, and Yun Qing had inherited his stubborn temper—her departure lasted years.

During those years, neither father nor daughter yielded; Mr. Li never asked Yun Qing to return, and Yun Qing herself never came home. The only time she did was two years ago, during the New Year, when she secretly visited Mrs. Li. Unexpectedly, Mr. Li returned home early from a walk. Yun Gao said that at the time, Mr. Li said nothing, but the moment Yun Qing saw him, she left without a word or look back. In the early days after Yun Qing left, Yun Gao would secretly send her money, fearing she’d be unable to get by, but she never accepted it.

After being rejected several times, Yun Gao stopped sending money. As for arranging jobs for Yun Qing, that was actually Mr. Li’s idea. Though Mr. Li never spoke plainly, he would often hint to Yun Gao during conversations that he should help Yun Qing find work, lest she starve outside.

Yun Gao professed that he was more than willing to arrange jobs for his sister, and at first, he found her excellent positions. He even had a planning company approach Yun Qing with a high salary, but she refused.

Yun Gao discovered that Yun Qing would rather work in bars and nightclubs than accept the jobs he secretly arranged for her. Looking honest and forthright, Yun Gao told me he had been annoyed, but as she was his sister, he still hoped she would return home soon.

So, he pulled some strings with the nightclubs, bars, and hotels in the New Territories to have Yun Qing hired. In such places, a young woman was bound to face hardship and exhaustion—Yun Gao thought that if she suffered enough, she would willingly come home, at which point he could speak kindly to both Mr. Li and Yun Qing and resolve the matter.

He never told Mr. Li, for fear the old man would be unable to bear it and blame him.

Sighing, Yun Gao admitted that he never expected things to turn out as they had for Yun Qing. I listened to his account, a cold smile in my heart though my expression betrayed nothing. I asked Yun Gao if he truly believed Yun Qing was the murderer.

Outwardly, Yun Gao shook his head, but his words betrayed uncertainty. If his sister really had killed, he hoped she would face justice under the law and start anew. He said she had always had a sharp mind, but had used her intelligence in the wrong way.

Though Yun Gao never directly accused Yun Qing, his implication was clear to me. He suggested that Yun Qing, having misapplied her cleverness, might have deliberately killed someone, fabricated rumors of haunting, and then appeared as an exorcist herself to profit from the chaos.

I smiled, “But Mr. Yun, do you not also believe in spirits? Why not consider that Yun Qing, over the years, may have acquired some skills and is now ridding others of ghosts?”

Yun Gao shook his head immediately, claiming he knew his sister very well. She had spent these years working ceaselessly and had had no time to study Daoist arts. He added that Yun Qing had been sent to Sansong Monastery against her will and never truly studied, so it was impossible she would know how to drive out spirits.

“Do you know how to exorcise ghosts, Mr. Yun?” I asked.

He replied, “Officer, your memory seems a bit poor. I told you when you came to my house—except for the Daoist priests at Sansong Monastery, no one possesses such abilities. We secular disciples only learn methods for health and self-cultivation, nothing more.”

I nodded and asked nothing further. Yun Gao nodded in farewell, turned, and left with Mr. Li. Chen Fan hurried over, asking if I had learned anything. I nodded; I was now more certain that Yun Gao was not as he seemed.

Chen Fan was shocked, “He’s the killer?”

Imitating Luo Feng, I gave Chen Fan a light tap on the back of the head. “Who told you that having ‘something wrong’ makes someone the murderer?”

What I meant by “something wrong” was the relationship between Yun Gao and Yun Qing. My conversation with Yun Gao was not idle—it was a test, and indeed, some clues emerged. On the surface, his words seemed reasonable, but there were glaring inconsistencies.

Yun Gao claimed to know Yun Qing well, even hinting that she might be the killer. That in itself was not suspicious—if he were a man of principle, perhaps he would sacrifice family for justice. But here’s the flaw: if Yun Gao truly understood Yun Qing, he would never have tried to send her money.

Yun Qing was fiercely proud and, except for Mrs. Li, wanted nothing to do with her family. She would never accept money from Yun Gao. If he knew her so well, he should have known that such an offer would be a blow to her dignity. Not only that, Yun Gao said he arranged for a planning company to offer Yun Qing a lucrative job—unless he did so deliberately, this makes little sense.

Yun Qing had no academic qualifications; no company would offer her a high-paying job, let alone seek her out. Yun Gao said Yun Qing was smart—this I don’t doubt—but Yun Gao is no fool himself. He had to know that Yun Qing would immediately realize he was behind the job offer.

So I quickly concluded: Yun Gao’s real motive for arranging work for Yun Qing in disreputable venues was not, as he claimed, to teach her a lesson so she’d come home, but rather to make her life difficult—because he resented his sister.

With Yun Qing’s temperament, no matter how much she suffered, she would never come home; otherwise, she wouldn’t have wandered for so many years. Yet, time and again, Yun Gao covertly got her jobs in such places. That was the greatest flaw in his tale.

I patted Chen Fan’s shoulder and told him the police now trusted him fully—he could easily use police resources to investigate. I asked him to look into whether there had ever been an irreconcilable grudge between Yun Qing and Yun Gao.

Even blood siblings can become bitter enemies.

Chen Fan was delighted; he’d never enjoyed such authority back in the capital. He set off at once, while I went to find Luo Feng. Luo Feng was a busy man, managing a large syndicate in the harbor district, but these days he’d been helping me constantly. He apologized, saying he might not be able to accompany me at all times going forward.

Still, Luo Feng assigned several men to assist me, instructing them to treat my words as his own. Then he vanished. I stayed at the hotel until evening, when Chen Fan finally returned with a report and some news, visibly pleased with himself.

It was his time to shine, and his efficiency had improved dramatically.

The report Chen Fan brought back was the forensic analysis of the tape and plastic pipe I’d recovered from the crime scene at the Ghost Restaurant. I immediately opened the report and read it.

The report stated that no fingerprints were found on the pipe or the tape. This alone made me one hundred percent certain that something was amiss with these objects.

If the tape and pipe had been used simply to repair damage, it would have been impossible for neither to bear even the faintest trace of fingerprints. Even a casual wrapping of tape would leave marks; clearly, this was not the work of a plumber. And it’s unlikely that an ordinary person fixing a pipe at home would wear gloves. Without gloves, fingerprints would inevitably remain—even if time eroded them, there would still be some traces for analysis.

Clearly, someone had deliberately ensured no fingerprints were left behind.

Other than that, there was nothing unusual about the tape; it was just ordinary black plastic tape. I focused on the analysis of the inside of the pipe. According to the report, nothing abnormal was found within, and even the amount of limescale was particularly low.

When I removed the pipe, I had specifically checked the pipes it connected to—those were quite dirty, but this piece was relatively clean. I had already suspected something, and the forensic report only confirmed my doubts.

“This segment of pipe was nine times out of ten a tool used by the murderer, either during or before and after the crime,” I deduced.

But Chen Fan quickly brought us back to the central puzzle: how could a short pipe be used to kill someone? And if the killer needed such a piece, why not bring one along instead of going to such trouble to use one from the rental property?