"Yes."
At first, Qin Siyang wondered who had done it.
Then he thought again.
Wait, that wasn't right.
She went missing last night. Only a dozen or so hours had passed, so why had Olof rushed over already?
"Inspector Olof, I heard the police don't open a missing-person case until forty-eight hours have passed."
"That's right, so I'm only here to gather information."
Qin Siyang snorted. "The police must really have nothing better to do. Li Jingwen has only been missing for a dozen hours, and you're already here questioning me. Who knows? She might turn up while you're talking to me."
Qin Siyang sat in the principal's chair. "Inspector Olof, you can't give this case special treatment and take such an interest just because Li Jingwen is my classmate. You're making me wonder whether this counts as abusing your authority for personal gain."
"I know police regulations better than you do, Qin Siyang, so you needn't concern yourself with that. I just want to ask where you were between seven and seven thirty last night."
"I was on the bus."
"How did you answer so quickly?"
"Obviously, I left the Education Bureau just before seven. Where else could I have been between seven and seven thirty if not on the bus?"
"You went to the Education Bureau?"
"Zhou Xing, the director of the education division, thought so highly of me that he insisted on giving me his special admission slot. We had dinner at the Good Fortune Restaurant, then went to the Education Bureau, where he submitted my recommendation for special admission right in front of me."
Olof's brow furrowed deeply at that.
Zhou Xing again.
Things weren't unfolding as he had expected.
Olof had visited Qin Siyang's classroom and learned from his classmates that Li Jingwen and Qin