The first work of the imperial prison

The weather was gloomy, with dark clouds rolling in, and there seemed to be a wind blowing in the distance, with the fishy smell of water, pushing over little by little, pushing away the only white clouds, little by little, all dyed black.

looks like it's going to rain.

The gloomy weather made people feel depressed, as if they were facing a case now.

At the beginning of each murder case, it is very difficult, because the direction is not clear, and the ins and outs are unclear. If you go wrong, there will be no gain except waste of manpower and material resources. That's why public officials need to be more careful and precise.

Ye Baiting sat in front of the window, unaware of the rustling of leaves outside, the violent summer wind blowing with petals and dead leaves, across the window, over the corner, and concentrated on reading the news file in his hand without raising his head.

If there is no direction, just look for it, if there is no detail, just dig. There is no difficulty that cannot be overcome, just solve it one by one.

On this day, as usual, Qiu Yiqing and Shen Jiang continued to be busy outside, while Ye Baiting did not move. He was in Fusi, Beizhen, looking through the latest news on the table while sorting out and analyzing all possible new directions. Give feedback.

This sitting for a long time, I don't know when, it started to rain outside, the rain came with the wind, there was no thunder and lightning, at first it was pattering, and then it grew bigger, knocking on the blue tiles of the eaves, and puddles fell on the ground, the sky was dark It was so dark that people's faces could not be seen clearly from seven feet away, and the room was almost burning with lights.

Ye Baiting stopped looking at the file, and frowned slightly, it's raining, wouldn't it be more difficult for Qiu Yiqing and Shen Jiang to work...

He got up and walked out the door, wanting to see if the hall would be brighter due to its large space, because he really didn't want to hold a lamp in the daytime.

Although he lived in Qiu Xunqing's house for the past few months, paralyzed in the Liangshui Pavilion every day, and only came back to Beizhen Fusi when he encountered a case, in fact, this is the place he stayed the longest and is most used to. , went astray, but for some reason, he just went astray today, and only realized when his toes hit the veranda pillars, he didn't even look at the hall, and walked out the door directly.

Not only did the kick hurt his feet, but the rain also came in and poured his hands.

He paused, then immediately returned to the room, frowned, and wiped his hands with a towel.

"Boom--"

Lightning and white light flashed across the sky, and the long-awaited thunder finally came.

"Master—Master—"

There was a sound of faster and faster footsteps at the door like a drumbeat, and a soldier rushed over, his forehead was wet, he didn't know whether it was sweat or rain, he bowed his hands when he saw him, and said urgently and quickly: "Shen Qianhu sent someone to send word that the body was found—that Mrs. Shan is dead! The commander is still in the palace and cannot leave. He has already completed the on-site procedures and brought the body back. He will be there immediately!"

"He's dead?" Ye Baiting turned around abruptly.

Xiao Bing: "The word from Shen Qianhu is like this, saying that the young master should prepare as soon as possible."

Ye Baiting has already passed him, walked out the door, and went to Wu Zuo's room.

Soon, all preparations for the autopsy were ready, and Shen Jiang returned not long after.

This journey was in a hurry. Shen Jiang didn't bring an umbrella, but just put on a coir raincoat. In this kind of windy and rainy weather, he couldn't stop much. He was as wet as if he was fished out of the water. A foot of water.

"Grass! The body was found in the water. It was the pavilion at the scene of the banquet. Wasn't it built by the lake? The young master and the commander should have seen it when they entered the palace. There is a lake with Shan's body drenched in the rain. The commander and I were still doing other work, and suddenly found out that we were startled, and quickly picked it up. It was soaked in blisters and rain, and all traces on our bodies were washed clean, and even a little dirt on our clothes was gone. No, how to find this clue, how to investigate the case!"

He was very angry, it was really bad luck for his wife to handle this murder case!

Ye Baiting was very calm, directing people to move the body to the mortuary table, and did not forget to tell Shen Jiang: "Go and change your clothes first, and then come back to see my autopsy."

"Row!"

Shen Jiangsheng was afraid of missing something, so he went very fast, went to the classroom, didn't choose any style, quickly changed into dry clothes, kicked off his shoes, didn't wear socks, pulled a pair, wiped his hair casually, and came over— —

"Come on, young master, did you find anything?"

Ye Baiting looked down at the female corpse on the mortuary table.

Mrs. Shan, Han Ninghou's wife, is nearly fifty years old. Her body is intact. There are no scars, blood, or even bumps on her body. She is wearing a dark blue dress with dark embroidered orchid grass. The texture and style are very solemn. Combing a round bun, hairpin gold hairpin, no hair scattered, only a little sticking to the face at the sideburns, the makeup has been blurred and faded due to the water covering the face, and there is not much color.

"First of all, although she was found in the water, she was not drowned."

Ye Baiting stretched out her hand and pointed it to Shen Jiang: "There are no scattered bleeding points under the conjunctiva, no fungiform foam in the mouth and nose, no sediment, no movement of fingers to grasp the water plants or branches in the lake, and the nails are intact without damage... She Died by suffocation in water."

"Then someone dumped his body?" Shen Jiang narrowed his eyes, "It must not be suicide!"

"We'll have to take another look at this one, wait a minute."

"Then when did she die?"

Shen Jiang felt something was wrong when he saw it: "It's been three days since Xing Mingda's murder happened, and we haven't found this Mrs. Shan. It's summer and the weather is so hot. If she was at that time It’s dead, the corpse can’t be like this, it can’t be swollen and rotten, attracting flies everywhere?”

In the last case, the young master just said that the corpses that died in this weather, not to mention three days, would attract these things to lay eggs in less than half an hour!

"Good memory."

Ye Baiting looked at it and said, "Normally, it should be so."

But the fact is that the corpse is very fresh, without any sign of decay, and even the color of the corpse spots is very light, a slightly lighter red.

"Then she died today?" Shen Jiang rubbed his chin, thinking seriously, "Then where has she been hiding for the past three days? How could there be no news at all? The commander and the imperial guards searched for it, but they couldn't find it... ..."

Ye Baiting didn't speak, and was still looking down at the corpse: "The clothes she was wearing were the ones she wore when she entered the palace to meet the Empress Dowager on the day the crime happened."

"what?"

Shen Jiang glanced again, and then slapped his head fiercely: "Yes, although you and I haven't seen her, but the information file sent back by the commander has it, especially she has been missing, and the description of her characteristics is very good. To be clear, on the day of entering the palace, she wore a dark blue dress, embroidered with orchid grass, put on a bun, and had golden hairpins...they are exactly the same!"

"But these are the clothes she wore three days ago. There are several layers inside and outside, and they are still very heavy. Why don't you change them in the past three days? Don't worry about sweating..."

While talking, Shen Jiang put his nose in front of him and smelled it, but he didn't smell anything, and started cursing again: "Grass! Which animal is not doing human affairs, throwing its corpse into the lake, and it is soaked in water, except for the pool. You can't smell the fishy smell in it!"

Ye Baiting's eyes flickered slightly: "This corpse...is very interesting."

"What's so interesting?" Shen Jiang didn't know if it was raining or it was the room, Shen Jiang had goosebumps all over his body, "Young master, don't laugh like that, I'm a little scared..."

Ye Baiting smiled: "You said why Shan's body appeared in such a way today?"

"No, I don't know."

"We have to move fast."

"Hurry up? What do you mean?"

Shen Jiang didn't understand. The autopsy is very important. The sooner you can hurry, the more things you can discover, such as the time of death and the state of death. But now that the corpse is in front of you, there should be no need to rush. The commander didn't urge you, why is it so fast?

Ye Baiting looked at him: "Touch the dead body, isn't it a bit cold?"

"Of course it's cold." Shen Jiang pressed the back of his hand against the dead man's arm. "It's raining heavily outside. Even in summer, the rain is still cold. She's been soaking in the lake for so long. Of course, the body can't be warm."

Ye Baiting's jaw: "Remember the feeling of the temperature now, after I dissect it, I will feel the temperature inside."

Shen Jiang's hands stopped: "Do you still want to touch the inside?"

"Don't you dare?"

"How could you not dare, I am Lord Qianhu!"

Shen Jiang refused a little, but he didn't want to be underestimated by the young master, and wanted to solve the case, so he went to the side to wash his hands, picked up his sleeves early, and waited aside: "Come on!"

Ye Baiting chose a scalpel, dropped it on the shoulder of the deceased, drew a Y shape as before, and performed the autopsy.

Shen Jiang leaned over: "Where are we looking now?"

"Of course it's the stomach," Ye Baiting said, "The contents of the stomach are still the most accurate basis for judging the time of death, and the others can come later."

"Oh……"

The knives and scissors cut through the human skin, and there was a crisp click sound, and then the intradermal fat, tissue layers, and muscles. The sound seemed to have a sense of hierarchy, each of which was different.

The room was quiet and cold, and Ye Baiting asked aloud, "Do you still remember the dishes served at the dinner that day?"

"of course I remember!"

Shen Jiang not only watched the young master's dissection of Xing Mingda's corpse last time, but also read the details of the dossier. On the banquet menu, he announced the name of the dish on the spot: "Stir-fried liver tip, stewed three delicacies, Buddha jumping over the wall, imperial concubine chicken, roast duck, deep-fried Deer tail, chrysanthemum pot... and wine, fruit wine for the female relatives, flavored with cherry, sweet-scented osmanthus wine for the emperor and Xing Mingda, during the Mid-Autumn Festival, when the young master autopsied Xing Mingda, didn't I just smell it? It smells like sweet-scented osmanthus!"

"Then you have to see clearly this time..."

While talking, Ye Baiting took out the stomach pouch, put it on the workbench next to it, and reminded Shen Jiang by the way: "It's time, you feel it inside, the temperature of the deceased."

As soon as Shen Jiang touched it, his eyes widened: "Huh, it's so cold, it's so cold that it's a bit icy!"

not right...

He quickly recalled: "If a person has just died, and the body is soaked in water, poured with rain, and quickly becomes cold, it must be from the outside to the inside, and the hands must be colder than the internal organs in the cavity. Why is it that the inside of the cavity is cooler than the outside skin?"

It's impossible for the rain to fall into her cavity first, and then run out!

"So I said, this corpse is very interesting."

While Ye Baiting was talking, he cut open the stomach of the deceased with a stroke of the scalpel.

Shen Jiang was surprised again: "This...this feeling, why is it the same as the previous corpse, Xing Mingda?"

It’s the names of the dishes he just reported. They are not bad at all. The shape, color, size... well, that’s the portion. The completeness is slightly worse than Xing Mingda’s. It’s a bit blurry, but most of them are I can see it!

"There is also the smell of this wine." Shen Jiang shrugged his nose, and it was very clear, "It's a little sour, isn't it just fruit wine, cherry flavor?"

Ye Baiting looked at him: "Do you still remember what I told you about the digestion time of food in the stomach?"

"Remember!"

Shen Jiang thought about it before and after, comparing the state of the clothes on the deceased: "...then this Shan Shi also died that day? He died not long after eating, at most an hour?"

Ye Baiting nodded: "Not bad."

That is to say, Shan's death and Xing Mingda are the front and rear feet. Not long after Xing Mingda died, she died. Because it was a corpse, not a living person, it was convenient to deal with. I don't know where it was hidden, so I kept looking for it. no?

"Isn't the murderer very busy?" Shen Jiang frowned, "In the palace, killing two people in a row, or under the noses of the nobles, how could they do so many things in such a short period of time? Really? Is it there? The palace people found out that Xing Mingda was coming soon, the emperor made a decisive decision, and directly ordered everyone not to move around, and the imperial guards sealed off and surrounded him. If the murderer was a person at the banquet, it would be impossible for him to leave..."

Ye Baiting lowered his eyes: "So the method of killing needs to be adjusted."

"The case of Xing Mingda, we have analyzed before, and we have already thought that it was too late to make a plan, and there is a risk. If this Shan Shi is also..."

Shen Jiang gasped. How powerful is this murderer? He can arrange so many things in a short period of time, and he can still be in order without being discovered?

Ye Baiting: "So the murderer left a loophole."

"Vulnerability?"

"Beizhen Fusi's ability to solve crimes, I'm an expert in autopsy," Ye Baiting said calmly, "I'm not boasting, probably everyone in the capital knows that since the murderer is smart, he should know that there are some things that cannot be hidden from my eyes. Time planning will be done more cautiously and realistically, but now I can only use this kind of rough cover-up method... I hope I won't find out."

Rough... cover-up?

Shen Jiang was in a hurry: "Master, you can see what's going on, so hurry up and say it!"

"No hurry, I need to see more clearly and more accurately." Ye Baiting returned to the corpse to look at the other organs of the deceased.

The room fell into silence for a while, and Shen Jiang could only continue to focus on the case itself: "The commander and the guards searched for three days, but they couldn't find it. Someone else threw the body. It happened to float on the lake. It was discovered by us...then where did it hide for the past three days? I can’t tell where it’s hidden, the weather is so hot, where can I hide it so it won’t rot?”

Ye Baiting kept his eyes on the corpse, and casually reminded: "So, in this weather, how can the corpse be placed to sleep without decomposing? What kind of environment and what can prevent the rot from happening?"

Shen Jiang stared blankly, a little uncertain: "...temperature? Ice?"

Ye Baiting had a childish face: "That's right, it's ice."

"People who die from drowning will have pale and wrinkled skin. Shan's corpse has similar characteristics. I was confused for a while at first, but I soon discovered that it is different. The characteristics of the skin of the deceased are not the same as those of drowning. Similarly, if you observe carefully, you can quickly see that the top of the sensitive part of the chest has shrunk, and some skin has 'goosebumps'... This is a characteristic that can only be caused by freezing."

"For people who died of freezing, the brain would be congested and edematous, and even the skull sutures would be ruptured. Of course, this did not appear on the body of the deceased, but for people who died of freezing, there would be maroon spots and bleeding under the gastric mucosa. I just dissected the stomach. Ministry, you should have seen—"

Shen Jiang nodded fiercely: "Yes, there is!"

He even walked over to the workbench and looked again just to be sure.

Ye Baiting added: "Besides, for people who freeze to death, the color of the body spots will be relatively lighter, and the internal organs will also change, for example, the blood in the lungs and left heart will be bright red, and the blood in the right heart will be dark red. The kidneys and other internal organs are congested..."

All of these can be seen on the corpse.

"Generally, if a living person freezes to death, the corpse will turn into a curly shape... This is why I didn't think about it at the first time, but what if the living person freezes to death, but is not a sober living person?"

Ye Baiting looked at Shen Jiang, and there was a glimmer of light in his eyes: "Last time when I punished Mingda's corpse, I had to provoke you so that you would let go of your nose and smell the smell in his stomach. After several careful identifications, I was sure it was sweet-scented osmanthus wine." , But just now, when I opened my appetizer, you immediately recognized it as fruit wine with a cherry flavor, why? The cherry flavor is stronger than the sweet-scented osmanthus flavor?"

Shen Jiang immediately shook his head: "That can't be, the sweet-scented osmanthus is definitely better than the intensity... I know the young master, is it because Mrs. Shan is drunk!"

If you drink too much, the smell of wine will naturally be stronger, and it can be smelled even more. If you are drunk, that is, a living person who is unconscious, if you are unknowingly put in a place with ice, maybe you don't need to spend much effort to attract people. She was able to go, and she was still sleepy and sleeping. When she fell asleep, she was slowly freezing to death... She didn't even know it!

Ye Baiting looked at Shen Jiang: "Nowadays, there is a lot of ice, and the only place that can freeze people to death is the ice room?"

"Yes," Shen Jiang nodded, with a serious expression on his face, "but the palace is different from the outside. The masters have to use ice. Every palace has its own ice cellar dug inside. Where is the place where Mrs. Shan froze to death? I'm afraid there will still be some I'm looking for..."

He squeezed his chin: "Could the murderer be worried that the commander would eventually find it, so he threw the body out in advance? He thought that today's almanac is good, so it's convenient for doing such a thing?"

"This man is very clever."

Ye Baiting's voice was slightly slow: "Maybe it's just a gamble. As long as I don't have so much experience in autopsy and I'm not that familiar with freezing to death, I will definitely be troubled by the state of the deceased. When did he die? Why didn't he rot? It can be regarded as a new death, thus going astray and delaying the process of solving the case."

Shen Jiang looked out of the window with complicated eyes: "So today's rain turned out to be the murderer? The sky is dark, the vision is blurred, it is convenient to throw the corpse, and it can also disguise the corpse as if it was drowned... just play with us!"

Fortunately, the young master is smart, as expected the young master is the most powerful!No one else would have thought of ice!

"So," Ye Baiting turned to look at Shen Jiang, "You should also understand now?"

Shen Jiang felt that the young master's eyes were not quite right: "Ming, what do you understand?"

"A question about the last corpse."

"The last...Xing Mingda?"

"The heavy wound on Xing Mingda's left forehead, the uneven wound..."

Shen Jiang's heart skipped a beat: "It was also ice that caused his wound?"

Ye Baiting narrowed his eyes slightly, "That's right. The commander and you have checked the scene of the small banquet carefully, but they couldn't find any murder weapon, and the nearby stones don't match either. What if it's ice?"

"The pavilion is cool. It is not easy to use ice in the outside space like in the room, but there were frozen fresh fruits at the banquet that day. Under the fruit plate, there must be no crushed ice? If a certain amount of crushed ice is wrapped in a cloth towel, Can it be hard enough to hurt people, but the wounds left are still uneven?"

There is an explanation for the dried blood on the light apricot-colored veil, because the murderer used it to wrap ice cubes to attack the dead, and the blood was left on the veil, and the ice cubes were melting again, which caused the blurred edges. trace.

I just don't know why, the murderer didn't properly handle the veil, was it too short of time, too late, or he didn't hide it so well, was flown away by it, and still regrets his careless behavior to this day?

In short, except for what Xing Mingda was poisoned by, everything in front of him became clearer.

Shen Jiang hissed, it really is!Using ice... Thinking about it this way, everything is right!No wonder I have been unable to find a clue. It turned out that the ice was used, or this kind of oblique method. The ice may not be stained with blood. In the hot summer, if you throw it anywhere, it will immediately turn into water. You want to find a murder weapon. , it’s gone, how can I find it?

"Who did this? Who is so bold..."

"Then we'll have to work hard to find it."

I thought today's corpse was a big trouble, it was fished out of the water, and it rained heavily again, I was afraid that there were no traces, and there were not many things to be found. Who would have thought that it had passed under the young master's hands, not only could it be seen clearly, Solved a big problem, and by the way, even figured out how the last corpse was injured!

It was hard for Shen Jiang not to be full of confidence. He raised his chest and looked up, his eyes were sharp, and he almost slapped his chest: "Isn't it just to check the ice cellar in the palace, I'm afraid of shit! If something happens, I..."

After a pause, he took a step back quite conservatively: "There is something that the commander is taking care of!"

"……Um."

Ye Baiting lowered his head, carefully wrote down all the autopsy items, looked at the corpse again, and after confirming that there were no omissions, he began to return the organs and suture them.

Shen Jiang didn't leave immediately, and helped him: "This Mrs. Shan... is close to the Empress Dowager. Could it be that the murderer... is that?"

He pursed his lips and pointed east, the one who was always right sometimes.

"Not necessarily," Ye Baiting lowered her eyebrows, her fingers nimbly sewed the thread, "It's true, it's false, it's true, the rumors in the palace, as long as we don't find out the actual evidence, we can't believe it."

Shen Jiang's expression was serious: "That's right."

Ye Baiting: "What depends on is not who the deceased got close to, but who the murderer got close to, and which ice cellar is most convenient to use..."

"Understood!" Shen Jiang's eyes brightened slightly, so that he could find a thread!

Ye Baiting reminded again: "Remember, check quietly so that no one will notice."

"Huh? Why?"

"What we are facing this time is a very smart murderer." Ye Baiting neatly tied a knot on the skin of the corpse and completed the stitches. "The other party wants to stay in the dark and see what the guards in bright clothes are doing before thinking about what to do next." Behavioral steps, we have left everything out, wouldn’t it be convenient for the murderer?”

"It's better to turn the other party into a person who is kept in the dark and the information is not clear. Let's observe carefully and see who is wrong. Press and hold to check carefully. Maybe there will be surprises. When there is more evidence, we will directly pat the other party's face. Who dares to deny it?"

Shen Jiang chuckled, the young master is a bit mean, but that's how it should be!Their Jin Yiwei can play in any way, the bright way is skilled, the dark way has a lot of eyes, the murderer has done bad things and wants to run away, there is no way!