Chapter 4 — The Code in the Tangerine Garden

Water does not spray up. It only made the ground tremble very slightly under Quan's palm.

He maintained his posture, looking at the cast iron valve cover. Mrs. Man retreated, and Thu used her phone to shine a light on the rusty lace rings. Lam placed the camera on a low tripod, pointing the lens down into the hole.

“If the pipe is still under pressure, don't turn it any further,” Quan said.

“I just opened it,” Thu replied.

"Partially open. Dad installed an anti-backflow valve. Water is pouring from the well."

Quan is a plant technician, not a plumber, but he grew up around the garden. He knows the noises the soil makes when roots are waterlogged, when pipes crack, when a tank is filling up. The vibration under the valve cover is like the sound of water running through a narrow vein.

He took a wrench from his tool bag and removed the small cover on the side. A jet of turbid water splashed onto my wrist, freezing cold. Quan immediately closed the valve. The water flow stopped, leaving a semi-circular trail of mud.

“There is real water,” Lam said.

“Everyone knows that,” Thu said. “The thing to know is where it goes.”

Quan used an iron rod to trace the pipe. The rod touched a hard object nearly two meters from the valve cover, then slid down a hollow slot. He marked the spot with a stone. The pipe circuit runs west, through two tangerine beds and stops at the packing house wall.

Mrs. Man looked after.

“Back in the day there was a tank underneath the packing house.”

“Why didn't you say anything?” Thu asked.

“Because we never asked about the background.”

Thu didn't like the answer, but she knew Mrs. Man didn't say it to annoy her. The packing house was built when she was a child. Father did not allow motor vehicles to pass through the southwest corner, always saying that the ground was weak. She used to think he was just afraid of breaking the tree.

Quan removed all the grass around the valve cover. Under the cast iron surface are three engraved grooves: a leaf-shaped groove, a water drop, and then a dashed circle.

“Order,” Lam said. “It's not just three types of marks.”

Thu opened the black cover book. On the pages where the watering schedule is recorded, the symbols always follow different sequences. Some pages are leaves – water, some pages are water – rings, some pages are rings – leaves. She photographed each page, numbering it by date.

“Maybe each sequence is an operation,” she said. “Open valve, change direction, lock.”

“If so, I would have left instructions in the trees,” Quan said.

“And the person who entered last night knows some of it.”

They opened the lid again, this time more slowly. Quan used arrows to draw possible directions of the pipeline on the ground. When he turned it to the water drop mark, a dull sound echoed underground. The patch of soil next to the wall collapsed, revealing a brown clay pipe.

Lam bent down. Inside the tube is clear water, less than an inch high. A small ceramic plate floats on the water. On the disc is a shape of six dots connected into an arc.

Thu used an iron hook to pull the disc up. The back has five numbers written in green enamel: 04–11–17–23–29.

"Date?" Quan asked.

“Or valve opening schedule.”

Mrs. Man wiped the mud off the plate. She looked at the number line for a long time and then said:

“Tangerine picking day.”

“Can you remember?”

"In the past, six houses were not watered at the same time. Each house had a day of picking to exchange water. The early ripe tangerine season received water first, the late ripening house received it later. Tan recorded the calendar that way."

Thu saw the symbols suddenly reconnect. Leaves can be trees or houses, drops of water can be watering rights, circles can be harvest days. But something is still missing. The number sequence does not have a month.

Quan removed a piece of rubber pipe on the west side. Inside is a yellow string with one piece tied at the end tin. On the piece of tin is engraved the letter "B".

"You said six houses. Is the letter symbol the household name?" Thu asked.

“It could be the name of the bed.”

Lam showed the camera screen to her. He projected the map segment in the gravure tube. Next to the six thin lines are six very light letters: B, M, T, H, N, and one blacked out letter.

“T is for Tan?” Thu asked.

"Or the Tran family. There are so many possibilities."

“The letter B is Mrs. Bay's house at the beginning of the ditch,” Mrs. Man said. "House M is Mr. Muoi's house. H is Hoa's house. N is Nam's house. The letter T could be the Tan family. The defaced word is Huy's house."

Quan turned. “Why should I apply it?”

Mrs. Man shook her head. “Tan does, she doesn't know.”

It took them all morning to open checkpoints along the pipeline. Some pipes were broken, but the main part was intact. Water from the old well enters an underground tank, then divides into six branches. Four branches have been filled in on land belonging to other houses. Two branches also go under An Loc garden and out to a low field behind.

If the cold storage draws water from the well, the remaining branches will lose pressure. That doesn't just affect tangerine trees. It affected the vegetable fields at the end of the ditch.

Thu thought of the sentence in the contract: "access to legal water sources for preservation activities." If the company buys the garden, they can call the pipeline a structure on their land. But if water rights belong to many households, the transfer will be more complicated.

“We need proof that the pipeline works,” she said.

“There's water down here,” Quan replied.

"Having water is not enough. It must be proven that it is for common use, has a history, and has witnesses."

“Are you going to take the whole village to court?”

“I intend not to let Huy's contract replace the truth.”

At noon, baby Na came to the garden with her mother. The girl was wearing a yellow backpack and holding a pencil box in her hand. He looked at the piece of porcelain plate, then looked at the notebook.

“Miss Thu, these three symbols look like the pictures in grandpa's notebook.”

“Do you know how to read symbols?”

"No. But grandpa let me play in the packing room. He said if you see leaves, look for a tree with green fruit. If you see a drop of water, look for a place to hear a gurgling sound. The circle is a place not to step on."

Quan frowned. “Why didn't you tell me?”

“Grandpa said dad often drops tools.”

Quan was about to get angry when Na laughed. The tense atmosphere eased a bit.

Na took out a drawing notebook from her backpack. On the first page are many symbols that children have drawn themselves, with a date under each image. The child said his grandfather used to let him label boxes of tangerines. Each label has a different color, corresponding to when it was picked.

The letter shows the date on the notebook. There are five dates that match the sequence of numbers on the disc. The sixth day is marked with a large dot, without a number.

“Who taught this seal?” Thu asked.

"Grandpa. You said that place doesn't belong to one person."

Mrs. Man turned away.

In the evening, Quan took Na into the house. Thu and Lam stayed to check the underground tank. Lam discovered a different-colored brick at the bottom of the pit, with a six-part circle engraved on the brick. He used a screwdriver to pry it up, and underneath was a piece of oilcloth wrapped with three old photos.

The first photo shows six people standing by a ditch, much younger. Father Thu stood in the middle, one hand on the iron valve. Young Huy stood at the edge of the photo, behind him was a man who looked like him. The second photo shows a piece of paper with six signatures. The third photo was torn in half, leaving only the first line: "Use and protection agreement..."

Thu looked at Lam. “Did you know dad took these pictures?”

"Not yet."

“So why did dad tell you not to film? last?"

Lam clasped his hands around the camera. “I don't know.”

At that moment, a metallic knock sounded from the direction of the old well.

They came running. The well cover is shaking. There was no one nearby, only a red string tied to the crank. On the ground there is a wet piece of paper, scribbled in black ink:

“The last day is not on the calendar.”

Thu picked up the piece of paper. Water from the well dripped onto her hand, cold and smelling of iron.

Quan held Thu's wrist, signaling not to bend down. He took a small stone and dropped it into the well. The stone hit the water after two beats, then there was a soft sound of metal hitting the wall. The object below is not a person; it is flowing with the current.

“Can you pump all the water out?” Lam asked.

“No. If you pull out the wrong way, the well wall may collapse.”

Mrs. Man took a long rope from the warehouse and tied it to a hook. She said her father used to use this method to pick up leaves to cover the net, but this time the end of the rope had to be wrapped with a piece of cloth to avoid scratching the object underneath. The army lowered the rope very slowly. The hook slid through the water, hit the wall of the well, and then got stuck on a soft object.

When pulled up, it was a dark blue cloth bag. The bag is heavy because it absorbs water. The letter was uncorked, inside there was a copper key, two white pebbles and a piece of cloth with the date written on it. No paper.

“Someone dropped it so we would think it had something important,” Lam said.

“The key may be important,” Quan replied.

On the key is engraved an unclosed circle, like a symbol on a tree. Mrs. Man realized that it used to belong to the old tank lock, but the tank was partially filled when the packing house expanded. She pointed to the southwest corner.

They walked around the floor. At the foot of the wall, there is a discolored brick. Quan tried knocking, the sound was hollow. The key does not fit into any visible lock, but the key head has a small groove that fits into the gap between two bricks.

Lam gently pried. A wooden lid popped open, revealing a small ceramic tube containing a piece of paper drier than the others. Thu used tweezers to take it out. On the paper are six letters, arranged in a circle, the letter L being the outermost.

"Mrs. Luu," Mai wasn't there, but Mrs. Man said that name as if she had waited too long.

Thu looked at the caption below the text circle. Just read: "people without land still have the key."

Quan turned towards the well. “So the person who just dropped the bag knows where the key is.”

“Or they get the key from the tank first,” Lam said.

A sound rang out outside the fence. Huy ran north, and Quan closed the well cover. Thu hugged the piece of paper to her chest. She no longer thought her father was setting up a puzzle. He built many layers of doors because he knew someone would destroy the first layer.

Thu called Mai and asked about Mrs. Luu's key. Mai said her mother used to wear a silver ring, not a key. When lost, the ring is lost.

“Maybe someone else found it,” Mai said.

“Dung has a scar on his wrist,” Lam reminded.

Thu looked at the wet cloth bag. A silver thread was stuck in the button, the same color as the ring in my father's video.

Before they could put everything together, the strong wind caused the back gate to hit the pillar. Someone removed the steel wire.

In the darkness under the well cover, something moved.