Hegel's Confession Volume 1 Chapter 40

Xiao Li helplessly said, "Of course they are residents who just regularly come in and out. I did not pay much attention to it."

"Then look it up in the surveillance video if you cannot remember it. It will not be so difficult for you to find out the people who left the community after eight o'clock p.m. these two days," Xiao Teng said in a low voice, glancing at him.

Owing to the pressure, Xiao Li had to quickly check the surveillance video, and during this time, Xiao Teng and I intently watched the scenes showed on the screen. In the continuous patter of raindrops, there were still a lot of people who had come in and out of the community the night that Qiu Nan was killed.

According to the autopsy by the forensic doctor, the time of death for Qiu Nan and Wu Xiaolan was around eight o'clock p.m., so the murderer should have left the community after eight.

Almost half of an hour later, Xiao Teng suddenly asked Xiao Liao to pause the scene, and asked, "Who is that?"

There was a man who was wearing a thick raincoat showing on the screen. He lowered his head and slowly walked in the rainy night. He seemed to walk causally, which was different from the ones who hurried to go home or go outside. Nevertheless, I had already recognized the man was Dai Lichun.

Then I found that time was eight-twenty p.m. Xiao Li's voice rang in my ears, "He is the electrician for the community. He is so devoted to work that whenever we called him to fix the electric circuit, he would come here in a timely manner."

In the frozen scene, Dai Lichun was covered under the raincoat. He totally blended into the night without any light. "Was there a power outage that night? Did you call him to come over here?"

Xiao Li quickly nodded at my words without any hesitation, saying, "Yes, I called him. There was a sudden power outage in Uncle Ding's home, which was on the fifth floor of the third unit of Building No. 2. But there was no power outage in other homes in the same building. Uncle Ding is too old to explain the situation, so I called the electrician to go over there to check it out."

"And then? Do you know what was going on there?" Xiao Teng asked as he considered this meaningful insight.

Xiao Li shook his head and said, "Then I did not get any call, so I did not ask about it so much. Nonetheless, you can ask Uncle Ding about it if you want to know more about it."

Uncle Ding lived in Building No. 2, and Qiu Nan lived in Building No. 8. While thinking about it, I asked in a low voice, "When did you call the electrician and when did he come over here?"

This time, Xiao Li answered after he thought about it for dozens of seconds. "It was after than six p.m. He seemed to have arrived at six-thirty p.m. You can check it out in the surveillance video."

After watching the surveillance video, I found that Dai Lichun had come into the community at six-thirty p.m. It was dark and rainy at that time and he directly came into the community.

At last, we watched the surveillance video of the night that Wu Xiaolan was killed. We also saw that Dai Lichun came into the community around six-thirty p.m. and left around eight-thirty p.m. However, Xiao Li could not be sure if he had called the electrician that night, and Xiao Teng had to check it out on the landline call records.

After checking, we discovered that Xiao Li did not call the electrician that night, which made the electrician more suspicious. Why did he come to the community even thought Xiao Li had not called him? Plus, there were two hours left before he left the community, so what did he do during that time?

"But it does not mean anything; he often checks the electric circuit himself. I said before that he is very devoted to his work. Because the electric circuit sometimes malfunctions, which need regular checking, he comes over time to time." Xiao Li explained that he thought it was all because Dai Lichun was devoted to his work.

After we went out of the security room, we went to Uncle Ding's home. Uncle Ding was less than sixty years old, but it was inconvenient for him to walk because of a stroke. Fortunately, his wife, Aunt Ding was still healthy; otherwise, it would be quite worrying that these two old people were at home without their children around.

After knowing our intentions for being here, Aunt Ding was cooperative. She said that there was a sudden power outage in their home and she did not know the reason for it. She thought the power outage happened in the whole community, so she did not go out of her home. She directly called the security and asked him to call the electrician to come over and fix the electric circuit.

"The power was back on after about twenty minutes later. I was surprised and I went out of my home to look at it. I found the electrician was about to leave, and after questioning, I knew the power outage was owing to a trip of the circuit breaker. He suggested that there might be a place in the house with electricity, so it caused an automatic trip. He told me to carefully use electricity," Aunt Ding slowly said. She also told me that Dai Lichun was a nice person.

"Are you acquainted with the electrician?" I heuristically asked.

Aunt Ding shook her head and said, "No, I just feel pity for him. We once invited him to dinner when he was fixing the electric circuit, but he refused. Perhaps he was worried that his disfigurements would scare us."

I came to my senses at her words. "So you know that his face was burned?"

"Yes. At the beginning when he came to this community, he did not wear hats or masks. It was pitiful that he was so poor like this, but there were still some people who judged him and reported him. After that, he began to wear hats and masks so that n.o.body could see his face."

"So . . . you mean that he had left around six-forty p.m. and you did not know where he was going, right?" I changed the subject.

Aunt Ding nodded first, then shook her head. "He had left around six-forty p.m. and I did not know where he was going. Perhaps he went home since it was raining outside."

Xiao Teng muttered as he went out of Aunt Ding's home. "Dai Lichun was more and more suspicious. He had left around six-forty p.m., but left the community after eight p.m. This period was just the time the crime was committed, and no one can give him proof of absence."

I slowly nodded and said, "Yes. Let's go back to the security room. Since we know that Dai Lichun had been reported twice, we need to investigate who reported him and the effect this has had on Dai Lichun and what happened later."

"Do you suspect him? But it happened such a long time; why didn't he retaliate at that time rather than wait until now?" Xiao Teng thought that my guess was not correct.

My phone suddenly rang, which interrupted the words I was about to say, and I answered the phone as we strode to the security room. It was Chu Haoran who called. He went to investigate Dai Lichun's interpersonal relations.h.i.+p and life background.

He mainly checked his residence and wanted to find out about the weapon. Without realizing it, we had all focused on Dai Lichun. Although there were still some questions, there was no doubt that he was now the number one suspect.

Chu Haoran asked if I had any progress. After hearing my description, he said that I was heading in the right direction and I should continue the investigation. Unfortunately, he had found nothing valuable. Dai Lichun was so introverted and inferior that he had no friends.

Nevertheless, he still had his parents at home, but they were all in their sixties. They supported their family by scavenging sc.r.a.ps. Chu Haoran would go to Dai Lichun's home to check out his residence next.

I made him pay attention to safety and found that he could contact with me as long as he found clues. After ending the call, I began to think about Dai Lichun's personality: introverted, inferior, loneliness, no friends, and not good at communication.