The bear child of the Red Chamber, Jia Cong

It is said that Qiu Liang's people found a secret passage under the ruined house, and the inside was huge.Qiu Liang stood in front of a large shelf, which was full of pottery jars.Qiu Liang said: "I just opened a few jars at will, and they are full of ashes." He waved his arm back, "From the screen wall outside, to the courtyard above, to here - it's full of ashes. Those The house is neat and tidy, like a prison cell."

Jia Cong glanced back: "Then...who are they locked up?"

Qiu Liang shook his head: "I don't know."

Jia Cong turned around: "Look at the meaning, these people must have been dead for many years. Mr. Qiu, can you ask the builders to come and guess how many years this house has been built? The Supreme Emperor went up to the mountain to hunt before he had time to take power... ...Um, Dongshou has gone. Could it be that this place was built by the late emperor?"

Qiu Liang said: "Yesterday, I asked the landlord to ask. He heard from an old man in Zuojinji that this house has been in existence for five or sixty years. I don't know who lived there. Only this old servant with a hunchback went out to buy some firewood, rice, oil and salt."

Jia Cong thought: "In addition to the old servant, there are so many dead men in the house. They consume a lot of firewood, rice, oil and salt, and excrete... I am afraid that the person who pours Yexiang will have to collect a lot of goods. Mr. Qiu, if this place is a prison , why is there no toilet? There are so many prisoners, the person who pours the toilet must be exhausted." Qiu Liang sounded reasonable, so he ordered people to pay more attention to toilets and toilets when checking carefully.

Jia Cong looked down at the old servant again: "This man has no beard."

"Ok?"

"Bi An is not something that ordinary people would carve to play with." Jia Cong said, "I usually squat in the Ministry of Criminal Justice or prisons. No matter how I look at it, I think it is a special beast for the Royal Judicial Department. I suspect that this place was built by the late emperor. Even... The first emperor, my father." He pouted at the hunchbacked old servant, "The emperor's most trustworthy person should be the eunuch."

Qiu Liang said: "But this person recognizes me."

Jia Cong looked at him: "You are always an important minister of the Shu Kingdom, so it's strange to recognize you."

Qiu Liang said: "If he has stayed here for decades and has never been to my yamen, how can he recognize me?" Jia Cong was taken aback.Qiu Liang's face sank like water, "I have been in Beijing for many years as the commander of the Wucheng army and horses, and many people have met me."

Jia Cong rubbed his chin: "Do you think...he came from the capital?"

Qiu Liang was not an airy old man, so he casually took two steps to the old servant's corpse and bent over to touch it - shocked: "It's really a eunuch!"

"Huh?!" Jia Cong clenched his fist, "I guessed it right! Does anyone recognize this eunuch? Send the portrait to Beijing to find someone to recognize it. Aren't there many eunuchs in the Forbidden City?"

Qiu Liang thought, "You can try it." He stood up and looked sideways at Jia Cong.Jia Cong blinked blankly.Qiu Liang sighed softly, "You kid is running around, it's good to know every household well."

Jia Cong pointed his nose proudly and said, "What an important resource sharing project! Except for me, others may not be able to do it." Qiu Liang shook his head.

In the next few days, Qiu Liang led his men to conduct a thorough search of the entire house; Jia Cong followed along to join in the fun.There are a total of seven or seven 49 rooms underground, of varying sizes.Except for those underground, the above ground are all ordinary household items.From top to bottom, there was never a single page.There were a total of 230 urns, all of which were filled with ashes; while Qiu Liang's people found another 260 ​​empty urns in a large debris room in the backyard.Jia Cong purposely held up a torch to look carefully at the walls of every room underground, and found several scratches in each room.

There are many quilts in the house, which are extremely chaotic.A few are on the bed, most are on the ground, and there are also folded quilts and mattresses on the ground.Checking the number, the dead soldiers, the hunchbacked old servant, and the two people who escaped pretending to be the corpses of Shu soldiers were exactly equal to the total number of quilts.However, except for the two old quilts, the rest are obviously the same set, even the face of the quilt is in the color of rich peony.Then someone found rich and noble peony quilts in the attic and combined with the quilts made by someone outside, there are a total of seventy quilts.

There are only thirteen toilets in the whole house, two old ones, one semi-old one, and ten new ones; there is no toilet.But the Yexiang collector said that the house is no more than two people's weight every day, and it has always been like this, and there is no sudden increase.

Jia Cong then returned to the yamen with Qiu Liang to sit and discuss.Qiu Liang glanced at Jia Cong: "You speak first."

Jia Cong coughed: "Five hundred urns in the underground prison were purchased at one time. This figure was probably casually said by the people who made the decisions back then. The prisoners locked here are probably not going to be released, and they are all sentenced to life imprisonment. Each room has only A small bed, a table, a lamp, and the four treasures of the study. It can be seen that they are quite good to the prisoners, not like a pigsty with four or five people in each room. There are more than 200 jars containing ashes. To fifty. I think it should be like this. This prison is not tailor-made for a certain group of prisoners. room."

Qiu Liang thought for a while, and said, "I didn't expect these things. Well, it makes sense."

Jia Cong went on to say: "Prisoners were burnt to ashes and put them in jars after they died, but they did not leave their names. It is obvious that they are not ordinary prisoners. A total of 230 prisoners were imprisoned. After all died, the old eunuch guarding Knowing that there may not be any new prisoners in the future."

“How come you see?”

"He disposed of all the toilets used by the prisoners." Jia Cong said, "There is a custom among the people that the bedding of the dead will be burned for fear of being tainted with bad luck; it seems that the toilet has never been heard to accompany the owner, so it probably won't come. Prisoners should buy a new one and burn one after death." Qiu Liang nodded.Jia Cong added, "However, the eunuch is very diligent. Knowing that the cell below is empty, he still cleaned it up. Especially the ashes urns, which were wiped very clean on the outside. There are still unused ink sticks left in the cell The status of the prisoner should not be low, and he is a scholar." Qiu Liang nodded again. "There are traces scratched by knives on the blue bricks of the walls of each room. The prisoners must have managed to engrave the words. The guard eunuch carefully scraped off all of them. It can be seen that the prisoners want to leave some clues and give them to anyone. That's fine; and one of the eunuch's jobs is probably to keep any information about these prisoners never known."

Qiu Liang waited for a while, seeing that he was silent, he asked, "What else?"

Jia Cong spread his hands: "It's gone. It's hard for a smart woman to cook without rice. I don't even have a piece of paper. I can see that I'm pretty good."

Qiu Liang glanced at him: "How capable do I think you are?"

Jia Cong pouted: "I'm not a fast catcher..."

Qiu Liang said: "Didn't you see that those jars are not signed, but they are extremely fine?"

Jia Cong was at a loss: "Fine? Isn't it just an ordinary pottery jar? It's bare without even a pattern."

Qiu Liang said: "It's true that there are no patterns, but it is very delicate. Such a good jar shows that the master who made the jar put a lot of effort, how could it not be signed?"

Jia Cong stroked his chin: "Oh... So, the jar is custom-made? What about the lamp holder and inkstone?"

"People in the antique shop said that the inkstone is an early style, five or sixty years old, and there is no signature on it."

Jia Cong clapped his hands: "It's as old as the house."

"The lamp holder is from 40 to [-] years ago, and there is no inscription. However, there are inscriptions from two brush and ink workshops in Chengdu on the brushes and ink strips. They are not cheap, but they were made more than ten years ago."

"The inkstone is made of stone, and the lamp holder is made of copper, which are not easy to consume. Both of these and the urn are custom-made. The brush and ink strips are all consumables." Jia Cong thought, "This place must belong to the late emperor. Oh, it's not right. !"

"Oh?"

"Those dead men!" Jia Cong slammed the case, "So many dead men don't need to show respect? Why did the person who poured Ye Xiang say that there are only two people?"

Qiu Liang smiled and said, "Ten toilets are new."

Jia Cong thought for a long time: "These dead men are not here. There are only one old eunuch with a hunchback and another person here all the year round. Therefore, there are only two old toilets, and they each use one. They also prepared An idle toilet is only used when outsiders come. However, a few days ago, for some reason, a group of dead men came to live in this house. There are not many idle beds in the house, so the boss sleeps on the bed and the minions sleep on the ground. However, the guard eunuch is very cautious. Although he bought ten new toilets, he did not dare to let the person who poured Yexiang know. The toilets of the dead soldiers were all managed by themselves."

Qiu Liang nodded: "It should be so."

Jia Cong scratched his head again: "It seems that... about ten years ago, a group of prisoners were prepared to be taken in here. I never thought that those people would not come." He squinted at Qiu Liang, "Seventy bedding is not enough. How little. Which workshop made it? How did you buy it and how did you ship it?"

Qiu Liang said: "I haven't found out yet."

Jia Cong said twice: "About ten years...isn't it just the time when the first emperor was critically ill and the four generals disrupted the capital?" Qiu Liang said "Hmm".Jia Cong calculated, "This underground prison should have been built by the late emperor. The writing brush and ink note... more than ten years ago, it can be seen that the last batch of prisoners died more than ten years ago. The eunuchs guarding the prison are ready Ten new quilts, probably because he guessed that after the late emperor passed away and the Supreme Emperor took power, a group of new prisoners would be added here. Even if there were 49 prisoners, there would be no need for seventy quilts. Would someone be afraid of the cold? Build two beds. There is room for things to be prepared, so we know that this prison is not short of money. The eunuch guards recognize you, Mr. Qiu, which means that he has been to the capital in the early years. Wansheng boldly speculates: this kind of prison is the secret place of the Tian family, and there are no guards. Things are bound to not go away. Right."

"That's the theory."

Jia Cong blinked: "The former emperor abdicated and became the Supreme Emperor. Now that the Supreme Emperor ascends the throne, Mr. Qiu, are you an official in the capital?"

Qiu Liang's eyes moved: "Yes."

Jia Cong rested his cheeks and said, "Could it be that time when the guarding eunuch went to the capital? This prison was originally intended to be handed down by the late emperor to Prince Yizhong after his own death, but suddenly he wanted to pass it on to another son." Qiu Liang nodded slightly.Jia Cong was silent for a while and then said, "Um...about when did Master Qiu and the King of Shu become friends?"

Qiu Liang frowned: "What do you mean?"

"There are so many officials big and small in the capital, and the Wucheng Bingmasi is not some great yamen, how could he recognize you by chance?"

Qiu Liang smiled: "If the world is not divided and the old man loses with the king of Shu, the emperor will have to kill me all over the house, and I will not be sent to prison."

"It's true." Jia Cong shook his head, "Your Jingtian Hou Mansion is not a house that the emperor can't touch. Oh, there is no one in the world that the emperor can't touch! Who is this sneaky prison prepared for? ? Wouldn’t it be cheaper to be imprisoned in the Imperial Prison blatantly? Shu is so far away from the capital.”

The two sat opposite each other and stared at each other, unable to guess.Qiu Liang tidied up the paperwork for the meeting, and went to answer the King of Shu and his son first.Jia Cong claimed that he came from the age of information explosion, only if he couldn't do it, he couldn't imagine it, so he sat in the yamen with his hair in a daze, guessing all kinds of possibilities.Thinking of Qiu Liang's return from Shu Palace, he still didn't think about it.

After listening to Qiu Liang's investigation and his conjecture, the king of Shu and the prince were also very surprised.The king of Shu couldn't guess who could be imprisoned in this underground prison at all, but the son guessed why Mr. Namei led Jia Cong there, and who put the dagger and letter in the crack of his door.Anyway, everyone is confused now, so Qiu Liang sent Jia Cong to go back and rest first, and think about it tomorrow.

Jia Cong went back to Jia's horse shop listlessly, and reported everything that happened during the day to the third grandmother.Then I asked Mr. Mei if he had any news.Chen Ruijin shook his head: "No. Liu Feng asked someone to check that dim sum shop. Although it is a time-honored brand in Chengdu, it only had a new dim sum chef half a month ago. However, the dim sum chef got an urgent letter from home a few days ago, and his mother He is seriously ill and hastened to go back."

Jia Cong rolled his eyes: "It turns out that Dim Sum itself is setting me up."

Chen Ruijin pondered: "Obviously that house was built by the late emperor. What firearms did those dead men use? Do you know the model?"

"I know, I recognized it at a glance." Jia Cong said, "It's not a new model, it's a front-loading gun, the Diao Chan Six." Because Taiwan's military industry is under the control of the female minister Wu Xiaoxi, the guns are named after her. .She then named the firearm after the beauty and the serial number.

Chen Ruijin said: "Where is the code?"

Jia Cong was stunned: "Code? Oops! I forgot about the code!" All the firearms sold by Red Bones have codes.If you find the code, you can find out when this batch of firearms was sold and who the buyer was.Others don't know where the code is typed, but Jia Cong knows it.Chen Ruijin pursed his lips and stared at him for a long time, Jia Cong raised his hands, "I'll find an excuse to see the evidence tomorrow."

Chen Ruijin sighed: "Sister Lin specifically told me before leaving the island that you are clear when you think about things, but you are often confused when you do things."

Jia Cong rubbed the back of his head and said with a flattering smile, "Mistakes, mistakes! Be careful next time, be careful!"

Chen Ruijin shook his head and said, "One of the two men who escaped pretending to be corpses of soldiers from the Shu army must be the bald and skinny old man. Tomorrow you can tell which house belongs to him, and then look for traces in that house. This man Be an important boss."

Jia Cong thought for a while: "I'm not good at this, even if I look carefully, I may not be able to find much clues. I think... call Dong Yu and his father to help."

Chen Ruijin also thought about it for a while: "That's good. He is very capable, and after all he is better than others." She smiled lightly, "Since I have imprisoned more than 200 people, there must be someone who is smart and can leave traces behind the guards and eunuchs. place."