Let Old Zhu see it?
Gu Zhengchen rose and bowed deeply to Li Yi, whose expression seemed laden with meaning. "Thank you, Magistrate."
Li Yi laughed heartily, slowly patted Gu Zhengchen on the shoulder three times, and left with a Reaping Scoop.
"Master, he's the county magistrate?"
Gu Cheng was dumbfounded.
Watching Li Yi walk away with short steps, Gu Zhengchen suddenly understood. His palm-leaf fan fell from his hand, and he slapped his forehead in bitter frustration. "Li Shanmei, you old fox!"
"Master..."
"Master, my foot! He took our Reaping Scoop without paying!"
"But he's the county magistrate."
"So what? What gives him the right to take our things for free? Damn it! Does the county office have any sheep-the sort we could walk off with?"
Gu Cheng nearly fainted...
Gu Qingqing brought over some mulberries, holding out her little hands stained purplish black. "Brother, try some."
Gu Zhengchen took the mulberries and ate a couple, a smile touching his lips.
Through the Reaping Scoop, Magistrate Li Yi had conveyed an unspoken message: Gu Zhengchen had been recommended to the imperial court.
As for the three pats on his shoulder before Li Yi left, those had not been an invitation to climb over the wall and visit him at midnight. They meant that, if things went smoothly, he had only three months left in Teng County.
Three months?
Gu Zhengchen looked at his sister, then at his mother picking mulberries in the distance. A trace of reluctance flickered in his eyes.
Under Great Ming's official regulations, local officials could bring their wives and servants when taking up a post, but not their parents or siblings.
If I leave, what will become of Mother and my sister?
At the county office.
Li Yi instructed Registrar Sun Ang to assemble the elders from across Teng County. He demonstrated the Reaping Scoop and ordered every locality to make them without delay and hurry to bring in the wheat harvest.
The elders dared not offend the county magistrate, so they agreed for appearance's sake. Upon returning, they reluctantly found people to make one or two Reaping Scoops to try. The result was that the smithies rang with clanging hammers all night long...
As dusk approached, Li Yi was just about to retire to the rear quarters when Chen Sanxiu, the head yamen runner, came rushing over, his face panicked. "Magistrate, bad news! There's been a murder!"
"A murder?"
Li Yi's expression grew grave. "Where? When did it happen?"
Chen Sanxiu hurriedly replied, "In the pond two hundred paces north of the government office. As for when, we don't know. Someone went swimming in the pond and discovered skeletal remains."
"Skeletal remains?"
Li Yi summoned his adviser, the deputy magistrate, and the coroner, then went to the pond with Chen Sanxiu and the other yamen runners.
The pond was not large, measuring only sixty paces around. The water was half a zhang deep at the edges, and only a zhang at its deepest point.
In the southeastern corner, a wooden boat was tied to a washing stone with a thumb-length hemp rope.
To the west of the pond stood Wang Fugui's white wall; to the east was the ancestral home of the Liu Yuanwai Family.
"Who found the remains?"
Li Yi asked sternly.
A bare-chested, still-dripping middle-aged man stepped forward and knelt. "Magistrate, this humble commoner is Zhou Er. The weather was so hot, I only wanted to take a bath..."
Li Yi's face darkened. "Get to the point!"
Zhou Er shuddered. "I dived underwater and found a body at the bottom of the pond, weighed down with stones..."
Li Yi frowned and looked at Head Runner Chen Sanxiu.
Chen Sanxiu understood and led men into the pond. Visibility underwater was poor, and it took nearly half an hour to clear the body before they could lift it out of the water and bring it ashore.
Torches were lit. Li Yi covered his nose and mouth with a handkerchief, enduring the foul stench.
The coroner stepped forward to examine it.
All the flesh on the body had rotted away. Several bones in the chest had been crushed, and the coarse cloth clothing was somewhat tattered.
The coroner kept turning over the remains and found a wooden tag at the neck. He washed it clean and handed it to Li Yi. "Magistrate, there are several fractures in this man's skull. He was likely bludgeoned to death before his body was sunk in the pond. It's difficult to determine when he died. It may have been several years ago."
"Gu Pei!"
Li Yi took the wooden tag. As he read the writing on it, his expression abruptly changed.
Adviser Yan Bin shuddered and stepped forward to look. Sure enough, the two characters on the wooden tag read "Gu Pei"!
Deputy Magistrate Jin Dache felt the name sounded familiar, but could not remember who it was.
Li Yi's Adam's apple bobbed. He looked gravely at Jin Dache. "In the First Year of Hongwu, the court sent its armies north and conscripted civilian laborers to transport grain and provisions. More than three thousand men from Teng County went north on corvée duty. After the army captured Dadu, three hundred stayed behind to serve, more than twenty-four hundred returned, and over two hundred died for various reasons. If I remember correctly, Gu Pei's name was among those two hundred dead!"
Jin Dache suddenly remembered. Gu Pei was none other than the father of Gu Zhengchen, Candidate Gu of Dayan Village!
"Wh-what on earth happened here?"
Jin Dache was horrified.
How could a dead man have returned alive, only to be beaten to death and sunk in this pond?!
Li Yi's face was grim as he ordered Jin Dache, "Take the body back to the office for a thorough examination! Also, have the chief clerk and registrar bring out the rosters of the corvée laborers who departed and returned that year. I'll examine them myself!"
Yan Bin drew close to Li Yi and said quietly, "Magistrate, if Gu Pei's name is on the Register of the Dead..."
Li Yi clenched his fists and said through gritted teeth, "Then someone deliberately added his name!"
"Not many people could tamper with those records."
Yan Bin reminded him.
Li Yi knew that only too well. Only a handful of people in the entire county office had access to those rosters. But that alone could not establish who had murdered Gu Pei. If the culprit insisted it had merely been an oversight, they would have no way to prove the crime.
"Someone must have seen Gu Pei, right here in this neighborhood!"
Li Yi looked around the pond and the surrounding streets.
Yan Bin was deeply troubled. "Five or six years have passed. Investigating this won't be easy. Besides, Teng County was unsettled in the First Year of Hongwu. There were plenty of roving bandits."
Li Yi snorted and pointed at the pond. "It couldn't have been roving bandits. Bandits kill and rob in a matter of moments. Why would they sink someone in a pond, and even find stones specifically to weigh him down? Whoever killed Gu Pei must have borne him a grudge! Head Runner, go and invite Gu Zhengchen here. Don't alarm Gu Shi."
Chen Sanxiu acknowledged the order and hurried away.
Holding a torch, Li Yi walked along the pond. He stopped, looked into the water, and asked, "You'd need a boat to sink a body in the middle of the pond, wouldn't you? Whose boat is this?"
Yan Bin immediately sent someone to inquire.
Before long, a yamen runner reported, "The wooden boat belongs to Wang Fugui's household."
"The Wang Family?"
Li Yi's gaze sharpened as he looked at Yan Bin.
Yan Bin glanced at the walls of the Wang Family's compound and told Li Yi quietly, "Magistrate, this is probably no coincidence."
Li Yi said nothing and continued walking. He entered a dilapidated alley, then suddenly stopped, took two steps backward, and held his torch up to the wall.
On the white wall was a lifelike drawing of a rabbit. Strangely, the rabbit wore an official's hat.
Yan Bin frowned. "Who would be so bold as to mock the authorities!"
Li Yi stared at the rabbit and pondered for a long time before saying, "A rabbit wearing a hat-that makes the character for 'injustice.' Perhaps someone saw something but dared not speak out, so they cried out against the injustice here!"
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