Chapter 3 — Listening to the Rain to Read Hearts

During those days, a creeping unease gripped everyone in the marketplace. The number of vendors setting up their stalls by nightfall dwindled by more than half. I too packed up my wares early, returning home long before dusk. Yet, upon reaching my lodging that evening, I discovered a brown kraft paper envelope resting before my threshold. Inside lay four photographs. Four dead souls. There was no return address. When I flipped the envelope over, a single line of ballpoint ink was scrawled across the back:

If you change your mind, come to the county Public Security Bureau and find me. — Shen.

I tucked the photographs away, sliding them deep beneath my pillow. Sleep evaded me the entire night. Not out of fear, but because the faces of those four women kept spinning endlessly through my mind. I did not know them, yet I recognized the expressions etched upon their features. Beneath the terror lingered something far heavier. A profound, bitter resentment. The following morning, I walked to the county Public Security Bureau. When the armed guard at the entrance barred my way, I stated simply that I was looking for Shen Zheng. He scanned me from head to toe. An eighteen-year-old girl with braided hair, wearing coarse cloth garments, the rubber soles of her canvas sneakers worn paper-thin.

What is your relationship with Deputy Captain Shen?

He asked me to come.

After a twenty-minute wait, Shen Zheng emerged. Upon seeing me, his expression remained entirely unchanged, yet his stride quickened by a couple of beats.

Step inside and we will talk.

The criminal investigation office on the second floor drifted with a haze of cigarette smoke. Four desks pushed together were piled high with case files. Shen Zheng shut the door behind us and pulled a chair over for me to sit.

Have you thought it through?

I have conditions.

Speak.

First, whatever I say may only be used as a reference for your thoughts, never as formal evidence.

Agreed.

Second, I will not show my face. No written depositions, no meetings with the victims families, no encounters with any suspects.

Acceptable.

Third...

I raised my eyes to look at him:

You must tell me why it had to be me.

He leaned back against the edge of the desk, striking a match to light a cigarette.

Because we have already exhausted every conventional method. Trace evidence, neighborhood inquiries, thorough background screenings—we have tried it all. The four crime scenes share not a single overlapping piece of physical evidence. Either the perpetrator is extraordinarily professional, or our initial direction was wrong from the very beginning.

So you decided to dabble in the occult.

I do not believe in the occult.

A speck of ash dropped onto his trouser leg, and he lowered his gaze to brush it away:

But I do believe in exhausting every single possibility.

I studied him in silence for a moment.

Bring me the records of the lives of those four people. As detailed as possible. Not the dry summaries written in police files. I need the photographs they took while alive, their personal handwriting, and the objects they once used.

A flicker of surprise crossed his eyes.

Are you no longer reading palms?

The living offer their palms to be read. The dead demand something entirely different.

Shen Zheng’s efficiency far surpassed my expectations. By the following afternoon, he arrived at my dwelling carrying a fabric tote bag. Inside were four brown paper bags, neatly labeled from zero-one to zero-four.

It is all here. Photographs from when they were alive, diaries, combs, and fountain pens they used daily.

I accepted the bags.

What did the families say?

I told them it was to assist with the investigation, that we needed to borrow them for a few days.

I pressed no further. He lingered outside the threshold, his gaze sweeping across the entirety of my room. Twelve square meters total: a single bed, a small table, a single chair, and a coal stove. In the corner sat a stack of ancient volumes alongside a set of bamboo divination sticks.

You live here entirely alone?

Yes.

How old are you?

Eighteen.

His brow twitched slightly.

When I come back to collect these items tomorrow, I will change your lock for you. A spring-loaded latch like this can be pried open with nothing more than a piece of thin steel wire.

I offered no false modesty in return. That very night, I emptied the four paper bags onto the table and examined each set of belongings one by one. The first victim, Li Fang, was twenty-two years old, a female textile factory worker. The handwriting within her diary was delicate and neat, mostly detailing the trivial occurrences of daily life. Today she worked overtime; the stewed potatoes in the cafeteria were disappointing; she had managed to save three hundred yuan and hoped to buy a new cotton-padded jacket. The second, Wang Lihe, was twenty-six, a self-employed vendor selling cassette tapes along the pedestrian walk in the county. The photograph showed an open, carefree woman with short hair, revealing a row of bright white teeth when she smiled. The third, Zhao Xiulan, was twenty-nine, an elementary school teacher. Her diary contained lengthy entries of lesson plans, occasionally interrupted by a stray sentence:

Today I dreamed of that person again.

The fourth, Chen Mei, was twenty-three, another textile worker. There was no diary, merely a half-used eyebrow pencil and a small pocket mirror. Four women. Varying ages, differing occupations, living in entirely separate neighborhoods. I picked up their possessions, watching and touching every single piece. Long ago, my grandmother had taught me a method she called listening to objects. Items kept in long-term use by a person inevitably absorb the imprints of their existence. Not spiritual energy in any mystical sense, but sheer habit. The pressure exerted when a person grips a pen, the frequency with which they comb their hair, the precise angle at which they gaze into a mirror—all of these leave subtle ghosts upon matter. I closed my eyes, running my fingertips over each artifact in turn. When I reached the third set, Zhao Xiulan’s diary, my hand halted. Turning to a page in the very middle, I found a passage underlined repeatedly:

He said I was the finest person he had ever met. But what good is goodness? He does not belong to me.

The sentence had been underscored three distinct times. I arranged the four diaries chronologically by the dates of their entries. And there, a crucial detail revealed itself to me.