Modern medical technology already made it possible to transplant most human organs, so the black-market organ trade persisted despite repeated crackdowns. But even the most ignorant person knew that a human brain could not be transplanted. At present, even the theoretical possibility did not exist.
Then why had this guy taken someone's brain? Removing a brain was a far more complicated operation than stealing a kidney, unless he had some peculiar fetish.
"What peculiar fetish?" Hu Xing asked curiously.
"Maybe he likes tofu pudding and thinks the stuff they sell isn't strong enough," Qingmu said offhandedly.
Hu Xing remembered the tofu pudding she had eaten that morning. Acid rose in her throat, and she nearly threw up.
"All right, Teacher Qingmu, stop joking," Shi Dazhuang said. "If you have a good idea, tell us."
"How long have you been questioning him?" Qingmu asked, looking at the dark circles under Shi Dazhuang's eyes.
Shi Dazhuang hemmed and hawed. "Ten, twenty, maybe thirty hours."
Qingmu understood and teased him. "So all that's left is torture?"
Shi Dazhuang jumped. "You can't go saying things like that, brother! We have rules. Who would dare torture anyone? Besides, we tailor our investigations to the individual. We take a humane approach, right, Little Hu?"
Hu Xing caught on. "Exactly! This man is a surgeon. He often spends a whole day standing at the operating table. This little stretch doesn't count as sleep-deprivation interrogation."
Qingmu nearly laughed. He shook his head and said, "Let me take a look."
"Sure. I'll go with you," Shi Dazhuang said.
Then Qingmu asked out of nowhere, "There's air conditioning in there, right?"
Then he told Hu Xing, "Officer Hu, watch for my signal and turn the air conditioning down to its lowest setting. Also, get me an ice pack."
"An ice pack?" Hu Xing was baffled, but she thought quickly. "Would an ice pop do?"
"As long as it hasn't melted."
Hu Xing frowned and pursed her lips, trying to guess what Qingmu intended. She kept feeling that this "expert" Professor Mei had recommended was not very reliable.
He isn't really a fraud, is he?
Zhao Pengcheng sat in the icy interrogation chair and heard the iron door open.
Another shift change?
This nonstop interrogation was indeed making him miserable. Without the endurance he had developed at the operating table, he really would not have lasted.
He heard the clack of leather shoes against the floor, along with a shuffling slap-slap.
Slippers?
Zhao Pengcheng struggled to raise his weary eyelids and saw the head of the criminal investigation unit, who had already interrogated him three times, enter with a fellow in a trench coat.
With the light behind the man, he could not make out his face, but the man was indeed... wearing slippers.
When did discipline at the police station get this lax?
Or are they trying to get my attention with this routine so I'll talk?
As though he had seen straight through the police's intentions, Zhao Pengcheng lowered his eyelids with a sneer and stopped looking at them.
Shi Dazhuang motioned for the officer conducting the interrogation to leave, then pulled out a chair, deliberately making plenty of noise, and sat down with a swagger. He was about to turn the lamp facing the suspect to its brightest setting when Qingmu stopped him.
"Turn off the light," Qingmu said.
"What?" Shi Dazhuang thought he had misheard.
Qingmu repeated, "Turn off the light."
Shi Dazhuang could only comply.
The light went out, and the interrogation room abruptly dimmed. Zhao Pengcheng, whose face had been under a bright light all this time, found it a little hard to adjust, but his body relaxed considerably.
A wave of weariness swept over him. He was sleepy. But he kept his nerves taut, speculating about how they would wake him and keep him from sleeping.
Bang on the table? Raise their voices? Or shine an even more powerful light on me?
He waited quietly. Then he heard the sound of slippers.
Slap, slap.
The sound reached him and began circling him.
Slap, slap.
Round and round.
Is that all? They think this will wear me down?
Ah, my eyelids are so heavy. I want to sleep! Whatever tricks you have, hurry up and use them. If you don't, I really will fall asleep!
Zhao Pengcheng laughed inwardly. This guy must be a complete idiot.
Surely he isn't some wizard here to hypnotize me?
Wait, hypnotize?
A glimmer of clarity flashed through Zhao Pengcheng's mind, and fear welled up.
Ah, I can't sleep!
He tried to open his eyes. But why were his eyelids so heavy?
Slap, slap.
Why won't that damned sound stop?
Slap, slap.
The world sank into nothingness.
Slap, slap.
Qingmu walked around Zhao Pengcheng a few times, then gestured toward the surveillance camera and mirror.
A cold draft came from the air conditioner overhead and circulated through the cramped space. The temperature inside the room and the books abruptly dropped, bringing a distinct chill.
A little later, Hu Xing pushed the door open and placed a box of ice cream bars on the interrogation table.
Qingmu opened it and saw that the lovely policewoman had actually bought one of every flavor. A whole box, with no two alike.
Smiling, he picked a mung bean one, then pushed the box toward Shi Dazhuang, gesturing for him to choose one he liked too.
They're actually eating them!
In the surveillance room, Hu Xing stared wide-eyed as the two grown men took big bites of ice cream in the dim interrogation room, while the man being questioned had actually fallen asleep in his chair.
This is too unreal! Is this really happening in a criminal investigation unit?
Shi Dazhuang had his doubts too.
He was willing to trust Qingmu, and trusted even more that the renowned Professor Mei would not send him a charlatan, but eating ice cream in the interrogation room was still a little hard to swallow.
"Shh!" Qingmu gestured to stop Shi Dazhuang from speaking and indicated that he should wait a little longer.
Just as Shi Dazhuang was growing impatient, Qingmu stood up, slowly paced over to the sleeping Zhao Pengcheng, and lowered his head to study his face.
The light was dim, and Hu Xing could not see clearly through the glass outside, but her intuition told her there must be some detail she could not afford to miss. She hurried to check the surveillance feed and zoomed in until only the suspect's face remained on the computer screen.
She saw that although Zhao Pengcheng's eyes were closed, his eyeballs were moving rapidly.
Qingmu seemed to be confirming something. Then he went back for another ice pop. Without removing the wrapper, he walked behind the interrogation chair and tucked it against Zhao Pengcheng's lower back.
Zhao Pengcheng woke up. The cold had woken him.
It's so cold here! Especially my waist and back. It's like lying on an iceberg.
He opened his eyes groggily and discovered that he was lying stark naked in a bathtub.
Ice cubes floated in the bathwater, chilling him to the bone.
Startled, he immediately reached for the soap dish beside him.
He did not know why he was doing this either. It was as though he were following a prearranged script.
There was a mobile phone in the soap dish.
He turned to look at the bathroom mirror.
A line had been written on the mirror in lipstick:
Your kidneys will give out sooner or later anyway. Better to give one to someone more useful. Call 120. You'd better not stand up before the doctors arrive.
Fear took hold of his body more thoroughly than the cold.
His hand trembling, he reached into the icy water and felt along his buttocks toward his back.
At the left side of his lower back, he felt a raised ridge about twenty centimeters long. His instincts as a doctor told him it was an incision that had been roughly stitched up.
Someone had taken his kidney!
He picked up the phone and dialed 110. After thinking it over, he decided that was not right and dialed 120 instead. Then he thought again and still felt it was not right.
He did not know why calling either 110 or 120 was wrong. He simply felt that he must not call, so he sat there in a daze, holding the phone.
Just then, he saw the bathroom door open, and a strange man walked in.
The man had handsome, refined features, yet his hair was a bird's nest. He wore an old dark gray trench coat and a very out-of-place pair of bell-bottoms, their legs cut short and so ragged that the seams had come apart. With both hands in his trouser pockets and his back slightly hunched, he walked lazily, as though he had just woken up. The slippers on his feet went "slap, slap," like a hypnotic magic flute.
"Caw, caw..."
Zhao Pengcheng heard a crow fly past the bathroom window, then fly back with another "caw, caw" and settle on the windowsill.
He knew crows were carrion eaters and could smell the dead. That was also why folk belief held that crows were ill omens.
Am I dying? he wondered.
"You won't die. You've just lost a kidney," the strange man at the door said.