Chapter 93: The Clue is the Footprint, Lu Qinglian's |
The good thing about this woman was that she was very polite.
"It's nothing," Zhang Shutong followed behind her, saying casually, "On the other hand, you got injured because of that pit, so this is only right."
The two entered the house. He boiled a kettle of water and had Lu Qinglian sit properly on the sofa while he went to the TV cabinet and pulled open the drawer.
If he remembered correctly... there should be some.
He squatted down and quickly rummaged out a certain item, tossing it backward:
"Catch."
Zhang Shutong turned his head and saw Lu Qinglian instinctively catch the small bottle with both hands. He added:
"Safflower oil. You know how to apply it, right? Just rub it on your foot—it promotes blood circulation and removes blood stasis."
Lu Qinglian nodded.
Of course, he himself wasn't in much better shape. Speaking of which, could safflower oil treat getting kicked?
Zhang Shutong pondered to himself. Should he rub some on his chest later?
Then he noticed Lu Qinglian unscrewing the cap and about to apply the oil directly to her foot after pouring just a bit, so he quickly stopped her:
"Wait."
"What's wrong?" She tilted her head.
What do you mean what's wrong?
Zhang Shutong thought.
"Who applies it directly? At least soak your foot in hot water first. Otherwise, what do you think I boiled the water for?"
Where did that mature, terrifying persona you had on the mountain go? Can you give people less to worry about?
He stood up and tested the kettle's surface temperature with his hand—just right, though slightly hot to the touch.
Zhang Shutong wasn't a particularly meticulous person. Too lazy to boil it completely and then gradually add cold water bit by bit, he simply brought out a footbath from the bathroom, poured the water in, and placed it in front of Lu Qinglian.
"Make do with this."
Lu Qinglian thanked him again.
"I thought with your skills being so impressive, you'd have applied this kind of thing plenty of times before." He opened his phone and scrolled through messages.
"Very rarely."
"Have you ever taken a medicinal bath, like the kind in martial arts novels?" Zhang Shutong wasn't sure if she'd read those kinds of books.
"There's no such thing." Lu Qinglian's tone was somewhat helpless.
Zhang Shutong noticed she seemed to be enjoying her current state, slightly narrowing those peach blossom eyes of hers.
Like when she ate something delicious—what she considered delicious, anyway—like Oreos, or sour apples, she would show this kind of expression.
"I just thought of something," Zhang Shutong said. "I used to think Gu Qiumian's murder was someone taking revenge, someone wanting to stop her father from developing the island—otherwise why specifically target her? But now it seems it's not that simple. Let's assume the person who's like you is the murderer—is there any other reason? You know what I mean—something more supernatural?"
"As far as I know, there isn't."
"How much do you know?"
"A bit more than you'd imagine."
"You're cuter when you're quietly soaking your feet without talking."
"You'd better not be so flippant."
Zhang Shutong was momentarily stumped.
He wasn't a smooth talker, but the other party was indeed quite serious. Some things really did need to be considered before saying them... Wait, was she really that serious?
"I just remembered—you've said several times before things like 'do you like me or not?' Isn't that being flippant?"
"Do you have a towel?"
Lu Qinglian asked instead.
"I'll get you some tissues."
Zhang Shutong won back a point, his mood improving.
Back to the main topic—since Lu Qinglian had ruled out one possibility, this question was left to him alone.
Judging from the results—the island's development had indeed stopped.
Judging from information eight years later—the police records also mentioned someone wanting to stop the island's development.
But Lu Qinglian also didn't know what the other party's background was. This was giving him a headache. Was there something else hidden?
Just then his phone rang. Zhang Shutong snapped back to attention—it was Qingyi calling:
"How did it go? Did she fall in?"
"It's a long story."
"Shutong, you didn't get caught and beaten up by her, did you?" Qingyi asked strangely.
"Uh... where are you all now?"
"That's also a long story. We played for a while longer and just came down from the mountain. Those two are waiting for their ride—Ruoping's dad will be here soon." Qingyi explained. "As for me... whoa, that's expensive, why is even Ice Dew two yuan? I'm buying water at the convenience store... I'm out now. I just asked that black-hearted auntie, and she said two students came down from the mountain not long ago, so I called to ask how things went on your end."
"Not bad, the misunderstanding is cleared up..." Zhang Shutong glanced at Lu Qinglian and found she was also looking at him expressionlessly. "I've recognized my mistakes."
The girl looked away and continued narrowing her eyes while soaking her feet, like a lazy cat.
"You really are..." Qingyi couldn't help but laugh. "This is the first time I've discovered there's a girl you're afraid of."
You'd be afraid too if you got kicked.
Zhang Shutong griped internally.
"Anyway, she's on our side now."
"Want to eat lunch together to celebrate?"
"Probably won't have time."
"Then the three of us will go eat."
"Sounds good. Contact me if anything comes up."
Zhang Shutong hung up.
"So you didn't hide it from them," Lu Qinglian finally said.
"Only from Qingyi. Ruoping would be too troublesome—you know, she considers you a close friend now. If she knew I dug a pit, she'd turn around and bury me in it. As for Du Kang, well, his situation is also..."
Zhang Shutong couldn't quite explain it. Better to leave it at that.
"Oh, that kid who likes me," Lu Qinglian thought for a moment.
Zhang Shutong's eyelid twitched:
"What do you mean 'kid'?"
At least you used to pretend and call him "Du Kang-tongxue."
"I call anyone who feels very immature a kid."
"Are you really sixteen?"
"Of course."
"Well, aren't you quite mature then."
"You're just too immature."
Zhang Shutong silently mourned for Du Kang in his heart as he watched Lu Qinglian dry her feet, then said:
"Actually, you could soak a bit longer. There's no rush."
"You still don't understand how urgent this matter is for me."
"What do you mean?"
"For you, it's about preventing your deskmate's death. There are other solutions to achieve that result."
Lu Qinglian lowered her eyes. She was quite frugal—not grabbing several tissues to wipe carelessly, but using only one at a time, until it was too wet to use anymore before pulling out another:
"But for me, assuming the content of your dream is real, if I don't take this opportunity to find the other person, it means there will always be another me on this island. I'm not interested in someone identical to myself—I even find it disgusting. Do you understand what I mean?"
"You're right." Zhang Shutong thought about it—that was indeed the case. He sighed again. "But it's not that I'm not anxious. I just don't have any more clues. We don't even know where to look for her. If there's still no progress, my idea is to take Gu Qiumian off the island to hide for a while."
"If that happens, I'll wait near the villa."
"We'll see when the time comes."
"Mm."
Zhang Shutong watched her apply the safflower oil. The pungent medicinal smell permeated the air. Her ankle had indeed swollen a bit, and because her skin was so pale, the reddish swelling was quite conspicuous.
This time Lu Qinglian had learned her lesson. She first carefully read the instructions on the back of the bottle, then mimicked the proper technique of gently massaging the swollen area—three circles counterclockwise, three circles clockwise, meticulously. Soon her foot took on a faint oily sheen.
Until:
"Please don't keep staring at my feet." She turned her face, frowning with slightly cold eyes.
"Oh, sorry..."
Zhang Shutong turned his head. He'd been spacing out just now and hadn't noticed until she mentioned it.
"Let me find you a pair of my old shoes. What size do you wear?"
"I measured last year. It should be twenty-three centimeters."
This answer left Zhang Shutong somewhat confused. What kind of strange unit of measurement was that? Wasn't it usually by size? Then he thought about it—she probably hadn't properly bought many pairs of shoes. There were still some places on the island that made shoes by hand. She'd probably had them custom-made. Of course it wasn't about sentiment—purely because it was cheap.
Zhang Shutong didn't know what else to say. In such thick snow, she'd actually gone out in a pair of cloth shoes. He himself wore hiking boots with waterproof material, bouncing around without any problems. Lu Qinglian's shoes must have gotten soaked long ago. From coming down the mountain to going to the Forbidden Zone and back home, she must have endured it the whole way.
"What are you imagining now?" Lu Qinglian said flatly. "My sneakers got wet last night, so I changed into a different pair today. That's all."
Zhang Shutong didn't respond. He just searched on his phone—her size was probably 36.
So Zhang Shutong had a pretty good idea now. He could find a pair from his first year of middle school. His mom had always kept his old shoes, though Zhang Shutong didn't know why. She always felt it was wasteful to throw them away, so she kept them in shoe boxes stacked on the balcony. Now they'd finally come in handy.
He also converted his own size using the formula—size 40, approximately 25 centimeters.
Twenty-five centimeters.
Wait.
Zhang Shutong suddenly stopped his movement of standing up, thinking of something.
He stared at Lu Qinglian's feet in a daze. She was sixteen this year. A sixteen-year-old girl's feet were smaller than his own, only about two centimeters shorter.
"Zhang Shutong, you really are..." Lu Qinglian sighed at him helplessly, then simply hooked the basin over with her toes to hide her feet behind it.
"Wait, I think I know where to find her!"
His heart suddenly lurched, thinking this was bad.
Zhang Shutong quickly found Teacher Song's number and dialed it.
At the same time, what surfaced in his mind was the footprint he'd seen at the entrance to the mountain road earlier today.
At that time, he hadn't had a clear concept of shoe sizes. That footprint had been smaller than his own, but he'd originally thought it was probably size 38 or 39. Foot length correlated with height. He was already tall among his peers, and their generation was generally taller. Now it was 2012—many people in their thirties and forties were all shorter than him.
But just now when he went to look for shoes, he suddenly realized that a difference of two centimeters in foot length could mean a difference of four whole shoe sizes!
So how big was that footprint, approximately?
Probably only around size 35 or 36.
So was the footprint he saw back then really from the auto repair shop owner?
This discovery made Zhang Shutong stand up. Lu Qinglian also realized something was wrong. He watched her quickly put on her wet shoes and socks. The safflower oil hadn't yet penetrated her skin, and her socks were also stained red, but she paid no mind and stood up, looking ready to move at any moment:
"What's wrong?"
"I saw a line of footprints today, right at the entrance where you all picked me up..." Before Zhang Shutong could finish explaining, the call connected and he simply put it on speaker.
"Hello hello, Shutong, how are things on your end?"
Zhang Shutong hurriedly asked if Teacher Song had known the auto repair shop owner before, and what the man's height was.
"A little shorter than me, around 178 centimeters?"
Zhang Shutong's heart sank:
"Then Teacher, what shoe size do you wear?"
"43?"
In that case, didn't it mean the other person's shoe size would be at least over 40?
So that footprint wasn't from the auto repair shop owner at all. From beginning to end, it was from someone else...
Someone else had also gone near the villa today!
Where was she now?
Zhang Shutong felt a chill. He quickly explained the whole story to Teacher Song, who was also stunned:
"Really? I even went to the courtyard this morning to smoke a couple cigarettes and didn't see anyone. According to what you're saying, it's a woman?"
Then came the sound of getting up from the sofa:
"Then you guys wait—I'll go outside and check right now..."
"It's best not to." Lu Qinglian suddenly spoke up, her tone grave.
"Uh... Qinglian?" Teacher Song was stunned again. "Wait, did I hear wrong? I thought I just heard Qinglian's voice. Kid, where exactly are you? Are you two together?"
"It's a long story, I'll explain later." Zhang Shutong just said. He quickly changed into his shoes. "You and Gu Qiumian shouldn't leave the villa for now. We're heading over there right away. Remember, don't go out looking. That person is very likely the murderer."
At critical moments, he wouldn't beat around the bush. If some misunderstanding led to Teacher Song not believing him and taking risks, that would be trouble.
"Wait wait wait, what murderer? What do you mean you two are heading over right now? You've completely confused me."
"Anyway, the other person is very dangerous." Zhang Shutong just emphasized. "We'll talk when we meet. Lu Qinglian and I are on our way to the villa now."
"The problem is, even if it really is dangerous, you two aren't safe either?"
Zhang Shutong simply held the phone toward Lu Qinglian. The girl immediately spoke:
"With me here, he won't come to harm."
"What do you mean..."
"It means..."
Zhang Shutong no longer had time to listen to their explanations. He immediately went to the balcony to find old shoes and randomly grabbed an unopened pair of socks. When he returned to the living room, she had already hung up.
"Done explaining?"
"Mm."
"Then change shoes first. Don't push yourself."
Zhang Shutong frowned, calculating the time in his mind. From here to the bus stop, then to the mountain road—it would take at least half an hour, and that was without considering the two factors of Lu Qinglian walking slowly and waiting for the bus. The time would only stretch longer.
He originally hadn't expected things to be this tight, thinking a trip to the villa could be earlier or later, it didn't matter. But now he wasn't sure where the figure from the Forbidden Zone was. If they'd just gone for a stroll this morning, that would be fine, but if the other party had gone back...
Zhang Shutong felt goosebumps rising.
All he could do was warn Teacher Song not to open the door easily, then get there as fast as possible.
But the problem lay precisely in this "as fast as possible."
Zhang Shutong flipped through his contacts.
Mom was probably already on the boat by now.
He thought about it and could only ask for different backup.
So Zhang Shutong directly dialed Ruoping's number.
"What now?"
"Need a favor." Zhang Shutong pushed open the security door. "I need to trouble your dad to come pick me up."