Chapter 543: Seriously Ill Wife

Translator: Azza

Editor: Conspiracing

Lu Baoqiang scratched his head, "The two of them came to China to act as evil officers here. They weren’t liked here, nor were they respected in their own country. Tamura's friend once grabbed his collar and shouted at him, ‘Nandai konna mono iikai shinji masuka?!’"[1]

After all, he was an actor. He acted very convincingly and amused the police officers present. Chen Shi asked, "What does that mean?"

"It means, ‘Young fellow, why do you want to act in this kind of thing?!’"

"Lu Baoqiang, your Japanese isn’t bad. I asked you what Fujiwara had said yesterday. Why didn't you tell me then?"

"Actually, I don't understand Japanese at all. This is what Old Wang had told me."

"Old Wang? Call him over!"

After a while, Old Wang came. When he saw all the police in the room, his expression was a little flustered, but it was only for a moment. He immediately recovered his smile, "You’re looking for me?"

"I heard that your Japanese isn’t bad."

Old Wang waved his hands. "It's not good at all. I only know a few sentences. I learned them while filming.”

Chen Shi said to Lu Baoqiang. "Repeat the sentence from just now."

Lu Baoqiang said it again. "It took me so long to learn this sentence and I was taught by Old Wang. Bird language is really difficult to learn.”

Old Wang was slightly startled. He seemed to have understood who had “sold him out”. Chen Shi said, “I don’t believe that you can say such a complete sentence without any Japanese foundation. It seems that your Japanese isn’t too bad?”

"Ahem, I know a little bit. I learned it while chatting with Japanese actors. I had learned this sentence from Tamura. I just learned the pronunciation."

"What did Fujiwara say that day?"

"He said..." Old Wang recalled. "Tamura's family is in a difficult position, and his wife is sick."

Lu Baoqiang said, "Old Wang, I remember Fujiwara saying a lot that day!"

"You don't know this, but the Japanese are very verbose in their manner of speech. They can speak for half a day just saying one thing. Furthermore, my Japanese isn’t very good and I can only understand the gist of it.”

"Why didn't you say this yesterday? You only said this after an accident happened today!"

"What accident?" Old Wang suddenly seemed very nervous. At this time, Chen Shi deliberately talked about a flaw.

"It has nothing to do with the case. Answer my question."

Old Wang licked his lips. "Officer, you’ve seen how it is. We all despise the Japanese. If I said that I could understand Japanese, they’d laugh at me. I’ve been working as a featured extra for ten years. I can be regarded as the most senior among all the extras, so I have to pay attention to my image.”

"That’s a good reason!" Chen Shi nodded.

"It isn’t an excuse. It’s a fact."

Chen Shi looked around. "You two live here?"

"Yes, I share the rent with Baoqiang."

There was a bunk bed in the room with an iron frame. Chen Shi asked him who slept on the top bunk. Old Wang said that he slept on the top bunk himself.

This answer was a bit different from what Chen Shi had expected. He was just a little suspicious of Old Wang, but if Old Wang slept on the upper bunk, it wasn’t too easy for him to enter and exit the room.

"Okay, I've finished asking!"

Lin Qiupu gave Lu Baoqiang a lesson and everyone left while walking side by side. Lin Qiupu said, "I discovered a small detail in the morning. The deceased's clothes didn’t correspond to the ones they had used in the film. They were wearing the clothes of ordinary Japanese soldiers. Only the cap is an officer’s cap. In addition, cycle rickshaw tracks were found surrounding the scene. There are cycle rickshaws in the warehouse, one of which was used by the murderer to transport the corpses but it had been wiped clean."

"It seems that the murderer had originally just wanted to take a cycle rickshaw to transport the bodies. He accidentally discovered the costumes, so the idea came up."

Lin Qiupu looked around at the historical buildings. "Don't look at how big it is here. Many areas are closed at night. The streets in the residential area have people walking around and some shops have security cameras. There aren’t many places for the murderer to choose from when abandoning the corpses."

"Was anything discovered in the surveillance footage?"

"It's still under investigation. It’s been less than thirty hours since the case happened. How can it be so fast?!"

"Help me investigate the victims. Especially Tamura’s bank account and the bank accounts of these featured extras."

"What are you suspecting?"

"I suspect that Tamura was a scammer!" Chen Shi smiled.

On September 21st, at the case discussion meeting, Lin Qiupu revealed the new findings relating to the case. "Tamura’s bank account shows that his monthly income was nearly 40,000 yuan, and that he can save more than 30,000 after expenses were deducted. But every month, an extra 4,000 yuan was credited and converted to Japanese yen for remittance to a hospital in Japan... According to the information from Japan, his wife suffers from paraplegia and has been receiving treatment. The purpose of his work in China was to treat his wife."

"What is his wife’s situation?"

"Her name is..." Lin Qiupu glanced at the document in his hand, "Tamura Yukari. Twenty-four years old this year. She was injured because of a car accident seven years ago. Tamura was a graduate of a film university and his salary was barely enough to make ends meet. After his wife became bed-ridden, he came to China to work as an actor and doubled his income to meet his wife’s medical expenses."

"It seems that Tamura loved his wife very much, which was why he came to do a job where he’d be scolded by people.” Lin Dongxue said sentimentally.

Chen Shi sent a WeChat message to Tao Yueyue. "You were right. We’ll eat pizza tonight," and then said, "This extra four thousand yuan was probably the motive of the murderer. How much does it add up to?"

"This extra income has been coming in since 2015. Sometimes there would be more, but it was never less than 4,000, which adds up to over 200,000!"

The police present exclaimed at how persistent this "fooled" guy was. No wonder they’d be so ruthless.

Lin Qiupu added, "But as for those featured actors, their accounts weren’t abnormal."

"Is there a list?"

"I will give it to you later on."

Chen Shi leaned back in his chair and pondered over it. "I think that people who have known Tamura since 2015 are very suspicious. We’ll use the rule of elimination!"

𝗳𝚛𝚎𝚎𝘄𝕖𝕓𝕟𝕠𝚟𝚎𝕝.𝗰𝕠𝐦

After this round of elimination, there were only five people left. They had been acting together for many years. Among them was Old Wang.

From the sample brought back that day, the blood stains in the alley were Tamura's blood, proving that the murderer had indeed killed Tamura first before secretly hiding and observing at the entrance of the alley. There were blood stains of two people in the alley.

As for the vomit, they couldn’t detect the DNA because the sample was too small. However, the traces left on the scene should have been made by a shovel.

In addition, several footprints were found at the scene. The shoe size was 40, and no matching shoes were found among the featured extras.

Chen Shi was holding these documents in his hands. After thinking for a long time, he asked, "Lu Baoqiang was really drunk that day. Did he sleep in the dormitory? If so, he shouldn't know if Old Wang had gone out."

"You aren’t suspicious of Old Wang, are you...?" Lin Dongxue said, "Didn't the auntie from the kiosk downstairs say that she didn't see them go downstairs that night?"

"Is the auntie's testimony reliable? Let's go and check it out at night!"

Chen Shi took out his mobile phone and sent another WeChat message to Tao Yueyue. "Sorry, we’ll have to postpone the pizza to tomorrow!"

1. Why do you believe that something like this is ok?!