A large block of masonry came hurtling down into the well, missing his left shoulder by the fraction of an inch. It landed on the back of the corpse with a thud. Quick as lightning, Ma Joong kicked his lantern over and, folding double, worked himself backwards into the niche. Putting his arms round his drawn-up legs and pressing his chin down on his knees, he just fitted into the hole.
Several pieces of masonry came plummeting down one after the other.
‘Stop that, you fool!’ he shouted. ‘Ah … my shoulder. Stop …’ He produced a series of agonized cries, followed by a loud howling that died out in low groans. More blocks of bricks came down, then a succession of mossy boulders. One bounced off the wall onto his left foot. With difficulty he suppressed a cry of pain. A few bricks fell into the well. Then everything was quiet again.
Ma Joong stayed in his cramped position as long as he could bear it, listening intently. When all remained quiet, he crept out of his shelter. Massaging his stiff legs, he stared up at the mouth of the well. When he was sure nothing was there, he retrieved his lantern and lit it.
Seng-san’s body was buried under a heap of stones several feet high.
‘We shall have quite a job delivering you of that burden later on, Seng-san,’ he muttered. ‘Right now, however, it’ll give me a start up to the mouth of the well. And then I’ll have a good look around for the well-wisher who dumped that load on you.’
Chapter 10
Judge Dee looked down intently on Seng-san’s headless body, which had been laid out on the trestle table in the mortuary. The judge was dressed in his nightrobe, his hair bound up with a piece of cloth. Ma Joong, his clothes mud-stained and torn, stood on the other side of the table, holding a large candlestick.
It was an hour after midnight. The Abbess had left as soon as the dinner was over. Afterwards the judge had played several games of dominoes with his three wives, then he had retired with his First Lady. In her bedroom they had drunk a few cups of tea, talking leisurely about their twenty years of married life, then they had gone to sleep. He had been awakened by the insistent knocking of the housemaster, who had informed the chambermaid in attendance that Ma Joong had arrived with an urgent message. Ma Joong had taken the judge to the mortuary at once, and reported on how he had made his discovery.
After a long silence, Judge Dee looked up.
‘So that’s why Seng-san’s head didn’t show the symptoms of strangulation,’ he remarked. ‘He was killed by a knife-thrust in his back. It was the other victim who was strangled. Have you any idea how your prospective murderer followed you, Ma Joong?’
‘Our headman, the stupid ass, failed to tell young Fang and the other constable about the second approach to the temple, from the rear. And I am just as stupid,’ he added bitterly, ‘for I ought to have looked behind the wall before going down into the well. There’s a gap in the wall, and from there the scoundrel must have been following my movements. He probably was in the main hall when I came in, for I think I heard the small back door by the altar table close; but of that I am not sure. While the constables were busy hauling the body up out of the well, I inspected the rear of the temple compound and found that there’s a path along the outside of the garden wall. The murderer must have walked along that path to the gap. He can’t have followed me through the garden, for then I would have spotted him. Of that I am absolutely sure.’
‘You also mentioned having seen a white shape.’
‘Well,’ Ma Joong said, a little self-consciously, ‘that must have been a trick of the moonlight after all, sir. Spooks don’t throw blocks of masonry about!’
Bending over the corpse, Judge Dee studied the intricate tattooing.
‘The back is badly bruised by the bricks your assailant threw down the well,’ he said. ‘Seng-san was evidently a very superstitious man, like most of his ilk. Below the tiger mask he had a pair of mandarin ducks tattooed, the symbol of constancy in love. Under the one he put his own name, under the other-Heavens, hold the light nearer, Ma Joong!’ The judge pointed at a smaller blue design that ran across the small of the back. ‘Look! That’s the profile of the deserted temple! Pity that the skin is torn by a brick. But I can still make out the four characters tattooed underneath: “much gold and much happiness”.’
Judge Dee righted himself.
‘Now we know why the murderer had to switch the corpses, Ma Joong! The motive of the crime was tattooed on Seng-san’s back! Seng-san was after gold hidden in the temple. And the murderer too.’
‘I questioned a fellow down town tonight who said he thought that Seng-san was blackmailing someone, sir.’ Ma Joong outlined his theory about incriminating papers being hidden in the temple, and wound up: ‘In that case, “gold” would not refer to a hidden treasure but to the money Seng-san was hoping to extort from his victim.’
‘That’s a possibility we must certainly keep in mind. It’s a complicated case, Ma Joong! But at least we can eliminate the theory that a foreign barbarian was concerned in the murder. For we know now that Seng-san was killed by a knife-thrust in his back, and that the other man was strangled. To sever their heads after they were dead did not require any special skill in handling that Tartar axe.’ The judge thought for a while, then added: ‘Curious that the murderer didn’t throw the severed head of the other victim into the well too. There was only a bundle of clothes, you say?’
‘Yes sir. I put it over there, in the corner.’
‘Good. We shall take those clothes to my study. Lock this door behind you, Ma Joong.’
Their footsteps sounded hollowly in the deserted corridor of the chancery. While they were walking along the judge asked, ‘Who knows about your discovery of the body, Ma Joong? ‘
‘Nobody but Fang and the other constable, sir. I explained to them that no one in the tribunal must know about my find. We carried the body here wrapped up in a blanket, and I told the guards it was the remains of a vagabond we found in the woods.’
‘Very good. And the longer the murderer thinks he did indeed kill you the better. Tomorrow very early you and Fang had better cremate Seng-san’s body, together with his severed head. He apparently was a mean scoundrel, but he’s entitled to enter the other world a whole man.’
Once in his private office, Judge Dee sat down heavily in his arm chair. His lieutenant lit the candle on the desk from the one he was carrying and sat down too. ‘By the way, sir,’ he said, ‘when I entered the temple hall tonight, there was an awful smell there that reminded me of the stench of decay in the house of that dreadful woman Tala.’
‘I didn’t notice it when I was in the temple this afternoon. Must have been a dead bat; the place is swarming with them. Now that you mention the sorceress: when we were having dinner, the headman came to report that Tala has either left or gone into hiding, just as I feared. The constables searched the neighbourhood in vain. The people there were most co-operative, apparently they fear and hate her, and would be glad if we arrested the woman. You know how it is with those barbarians. As long as their sorcerers are successful, they venerate them like gods. But as soon as they fail, they show them no mercy. The Tartars there would like to kill Tala, if they dared. See whether there’s some hot tea left in the tea-basket, will you?’
While Ma Joong was pouring the tea, Judge Dee went on, ‘During dinner the Abbess told me that her maid is a flirtatious wench who makes up to the vagabonds that visit the temple. You might go there and make her talk a bit, Ma Joong. But don’t let the Abbess know, for she said she wanted to be there when the girl was questioned. But in the presence of the Abbess the girl won’t say a word, of course.’ He set his cup down and suppressed a yawn. ‘Well, let’s now have a look at those clothes.’
Ma Joong opened the bundle. He draped a neat blue jacket and a pair of trousers over the back of his chair, and felt the sleeves. Then he also went over the seams. ‘Not a thing, sir! The murderer took no chances.’
Judge Dee had been staring at the clothes, slowly tugging at his whiskers. Suddenly
he looked up. ‘You told me that Lee was looking for his assistant Yang who has disappeared. And the tailor told you that Yang associates with hoodlums and is a good-for-nothing. Ah-liu, on the other hand, informed us that Seng-san was working on some secret plan with a tall man, neatly dressed in blue, looking like a shop clerk. It’s a long shot, of course, but isn’t it possible that our unknown victim is no one else but that elusive painter’s assistant?’
‘Well,’ Ma Joong said slowly, ‘we might summon Lee Ko tomorrow and show him the corpse. Those painters have sharp eyes; he might recognize the shape of the hands, or the general stature and-‘
Judge Dee raised his hand. ‘No, I prefer to keep Lee out of this, as long as the matter of the ebony box hasn’t been clarified. Fill the basin on the wall table over there to the rim with clean water, Ma Joong!’
When his astonished lieutenant had done so, Judge Dee said, ‘Put it down here in front of me. Good. Now take that jacket and beat it with my ruler, over the basin!’
While Ma Joong set to work, the judge drew the candle closer and looked intently at the dust descending into the water. After a while he raised his hand. ‘That’ll do. Now for the trousers!’ After Ma Joong had beaten those vigorously with the long wooden ruler, the judge said, ‘All right. Let’s see what we have got!’
He bent his head over the basin and examined the water closely. ‘Yes,’ he said with satisfaction as he righted himself. ‘It was indeed Yang! Look, those grey patches floating on the surface are common house dust. But do you see those very small particles that have sunk down to the bottom? Round the two on the right a diminutive red cloud is developing in the water, and there, where I point with my finger, you can see a yellow tinge, mixed with blue. Those are particles of powdered painter’s colours. Yang must have got them in his clothes when cleaning up the mess on the table in Lee’s atelier. We are making progress, Ma Joong!’
He rose and began to pace the floor. All his drowsiness had left him. Ma Joong tilted the water-basin with a happy grin. More small coloured clouds developed in the water.
The judge halted. Folding his arms in his sleeves he resumed, ‘Now that one long shot has gone home, Ma Joong, I’ll make another one. About the motive of the double murder. I don’t think the blackmail theory will hold, at least not in exactly the way you meant. If, however, we take the word “gold” tattooed on Seng-san’s back literally, it evidently refers to a hoard of gold hidden in the temple. Now Sergeant Hoong has studied all records relating to the temple’s history with painstaking care, but he failed to find even a hint at a treasure having been buried there in the course of its long history. And even if there had been a hidden treasure, the constables would have discovered it when the authorities had the temple vacated. Trust them to have interrogated the inmates, and to have gone over the grounds with a fine tooth comb!’
He sat down again.
‘My long shot is, Ma Joong, that they were after the gold of the Imperial Treasurer. Fifty heavy gold bars.’
‘But that theft dates from last year, sir!’
‘Precisely. However, the thief had to lie low for a long time, waiting till the authorities had given up looking for the gold. Suppose he only told his accomplices, or his principal, that he had hidden it somewhere in the temple, without disclosing exactly where? And that the thief died before they had retrieved the treasure? Then the others would be in a quandary. They would have to search the temple and the entire extensive grounds. Yang and Seng-san, separately or together, caught them at it. First they tried to blackmail them-that’s where your theory comes in, Ma Joong. But Yang and Seng-san had under-estimated their opponents, and were murdered.’
Ma Joong nodded eagerly. ‘I think you’ve hit the nail on the head, sir! You can pack fifty gold bars in many different ways: in a large square package, in a flat or oblong one, in several small parcels, and so on. That would explain why the searchers looked both under the floors of the cells and behind the wainscoting in the towers.’
‘Quite true. And the gold is still there, Ma Joong! For if the murderer or murderers or Yang and Seng-san had found it, then there would have been no sense in the switching of the corpses. They would have fled with the gold immediately after the murder; there would have been no need to prevent us from finding the tattooed clue. Nor would they have come back to the temple tonight, and tried to murder you. The gold is still in the temple somewhere, and we have to find it! We shall go to the temple tomorrow morning, Ma Joong. And now to bed!’
Chapter 11
The next morning at dawn, Ma Joong and the young constable called Fang burned Seng-san’s body and head in the brick oven behind the prison. Afterwards Ma Joong had breakfast with Sergeant Hoong in the guardroom, giving the sergeant a circumstantial account of his adventure on the preceding night. Then they went together to Judge Dee’s private office.
The judge briefly repeated his conclusions for the benefit of Sergeant Hoong. ‘So we have now a double task before us,’ he wound up. ‘To discover the hidden gold, and to catch the murderer. This morning we shall proceed to the deserted temple with-Yes, come in!’
The headman entered. After he had wished the judge a good morning he said, ‘The retired prefect, the honourable Mr Woo, wants to see Your Honour on an urgent matter. He is accompanied by Mr Lee Mai, the banker.’
‘Ex-prefect Woo? ‘ Judge Dee asked crossly. ‘Oh yes, I remember. Met him once or twice at official functions here. A very lean man, with a slight stoop? ‘ As the headman nodded, the judge went on: ‘Quite a dignified, elderly gentleman. He was a diligent and scrupulously honest official, but his career came to an untimely end through an unfortunate affair. His uncle went bankrupt and Woo insisted on paying all the debts, although he was not bound in law to do so, of course. It nearly ruined him, for, since the uncle died soon afterwards, Woo never got a single copper back. He tendered his resignation, left his native city and settled down here, because the standard of life is much lower here than in one of the larger cities, and there are fewer social obligations. Who is that other man? Lee Mai, you said?’
‘Yes, Your Honour. Mr Lee Mai owns a small gold- and silver-shop in the east quarter, and he conducts some banking business there also. He is a friend of the Honourable Woo.’
‘Lee Mai’s the brother of Lee Ko the painter, sir,’ Ma Joong put in.
Judge Dee rose with a sigh. ‘Well, go and receive our guests, Sergeant. Bring them to the reception hall. In the meantime I’ll change.’
Ma Joong helped the judge to don his official robe of green brocade. A retired prefect had to be received with the honours due to his rank. While putting on his winged cap, the judge said with a bleak smile, ‘Woo’s visit comes at a most inopportune moment, but as an experienced official he’ll at least state his case clearly and concisely!’
As the judge crossed the central courtyard with Ma Joong, he looked up at the sky. The heat was less oppressive than the day before; it promised to become a fairly cool day. They ascended the broad marble staircase that led up to the main entrance of the reception hall, built on a raised platform. Sergeant Hoong stood waiting for them between the red-lacquered pillars, and he led Judge Dee inside.
The two men seated at the tea table rose hurriedly when they saw the judge enter. The elder one came forward and made his bow. He had a long, sallow face adorned by a wispy goatee and a long grey moustache, and was clad in a long dark-blue gown with a flower pattern embroidered in gold thread; he wore a high square cap of black gauze with a green jade ornament in front. While the judge made the prescribed polite inquiries of the retired prefect, he covertly observed the tall, broad-shouldered man who stood behind him. He had a pale, round face with heavy-lidded eyes, a short jet-black moustache and a diminutive chin-beard. He wore the grey gown and small cap of a merchant.
The judge bade the prefect resume his seat. He himself sat down opposite the distinguished guest. The banker remained standing behind the prefect’s chair. Ma Joong and the sergeant sat down on low stools, so
mewhat apart.
After a clerk had served tea, Judge Dee settled back into his chair and asked, jovially, ‘Well, esteemed colleague, what can I do for you, so early in the morning?’
The old gentleman fixed him with a sombre stare. ‘I came to ask what news there is about my daughter, sir.’ Seeing Judge Dee’s uncomprehending expression, he added impatiently: ‘Since you issued that proclamation last night, you must have news about Jade.’
Judge Dee sat up. He poured his guest another cup of tea. ‘Before we continue this conversation, sir, may I ask why Mr Lee is accompanying you?’
‘Of course. One month before my daughter’s disappearance, I had promised her in marriage to Mr Lee. He has not married since, and therefore he has a right to know.’
‘I see.’ Judge Dee took a fan from his sleeve and began to fan himself. After some time, he said, ‘All of this happened last year, before my arrival here. Since my information is mainly based on hearsay, I would greatly appreciate it if you would tell me briefly the circumstances of your daughter’s disappearance. I failed to discover any concrete data in the archives here, you know.’
The old prefect frowned. Stroking his goatee with his thin hand he said, ‘Jade is my only child, by my first wife who died three years ago. She is a rather clever but very headstrong girl. When she was getting on for eighteen, I selected Mr Lee Mai here as her future husband. I may add that Mr Lee had been assisting me in some financial matters, and I have found him a straight and well-educated man. Also, we are natives of the same district up north. My daughter approved of my choice. Unfortunately, however, I had engaged as secretary a young student called Yang Mou-te. He is a local man, well-behaved, and he came with good introductions. Alas, my advancing years are evidently blurring my powers of judgement. Yang turned out to be a scoundrel. Behind my back he made advances to my daughter.’
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