Moments later, Guan Zhenglin wiped away her tears. “Sometimes it’s better to voice the things in your mind, after all, I know I can trust you two. But let’s not dwell on that, it can’t be hurried. By the way, Wu Meng, why are we here?”
I stopped thinking about it. It was still unknown whether I’d meet Zhang Mingkun again, much less capture her. If there was indeed that option, it was a future me problem. For now, we needed to focus on this psychopath killer before he found more victims. With that in mind, I asked, “What would you do if you’re tasked to find a drop of water in the sea?”
Gu Chen groaned, “Stop with the riddles, just tell us.”
I raised my brow. “The easiest way is to ask the other drops of water about it. We cannot understand this psychopath’s worldview but it doesn’t mean the other psychopaths can’t. We might not be able to understand the messages left behind by the killer, but it doesn't mean that others won’t. In fact, the person we’re looking for might be in this building.”
To interview these patients won’t be easy. First we needed to confirm if the patient understood the killer’s messages and then confirm whether they would cooperate with us. Neither of them was easy to do.
For now, we could only visit the rooms one by one to see if anyone could help us. After several attempts, the result was less than satisfactory. When Guan Zhenglin approached the door and recited the message, most of them banged madly against the door, while those tied to the bed wiggled crazily. I started to question the validity of my action. Perhaps these patients lived in their own world; they couldn’t understand each other, much less a killer on the loose.
As we went upstairs, our shoes echoed in the quiet corridor. Guan Zhenglin said, “Looks like we’re going to return with no result. Perhaps these messages have nothing to do with the killer’s motive at all. He might have just written them down to throw us off.”
In any case, we continued our way up to the second floor. When I passed the room, I saw the woman was still lying in bed. She was so still, she looked more like a dead body than a living person. Gu Chen knocked on the door and looked through the window. The woman remained motionless.
We moved on. We discussed the messages among ourselves. When we passed a room, one of the patients suddenly shouted, “Devil, that’s the devil’s whispers.” We turned to the sound and saw a patient screaming and kneeling on the ground. He kept drawing crosses before his chest. We shared a look, this might be our breakthrough!
“What do you mean?!” I leaned close to the door before I could see the man on the ground. I noticed that the man was crying like he was in great pain. He said, “Come in and I’ll tell you.”
I reached my face closer to the gated window. At that moment, the man suddenly stood up and grabbed at me. The gaps between the iron-gated window was very small, but it didn’t deter the man. He somehow managed to squeeze his hand through. His wrist must have been broken from doing that. He held onto my collar and refused to let go. At that moment, the siren rang. Soon I heard footsteps, I knew people were coming. The man looked at me with eyes filled with sadness and fear. Then he suddenly let me go and walked around. He crawled to the deepest corner of the room and cowered there like a frightened child. I adjusted my collar while the chief nurse rushed over with the guards. He only slowed down when he saw that I was fine. “I already told you to be careful, didn’t I?”
I ignored the chief nurse and turned to the patient. I demanded, “What do you mean by what you said earlier? Explain yourself!” But the patient refused to respond anymore.
The chief nurse intervened, “You’re really treating the words of a mental patient seriously? I already told you they cannot be trusted. Stop wasting time here and go back out there to solve the case. Don’t come back here again with paranoia. You won’t get anything here, because everything here is illusive, they’re not real.” The chief nurse looked at me like how he’d look at his charge, “We live only in one world, but different people have different worldviews. Our world might be false and theirs might be real, who can really tell?”
I was not a philosophist and I didn’t have an answer to this question, because it could never be answered.
“We’ll leave after we’ve seen everyone. There’s still one person we haven’t met.” I said.
“Who?” The chief nurse frowned. He looked quite displeased.
I pointed upwards. “Of course, the one above, we haven’t even seen that studious senior scholar.”
The chief nurse said adamantly, “No, absolutely not. No one is meeting him. I’ve already told you, he’s too scary. He can look into people’s hearts, you’re naked before him. He can pierce through your heart to dig out your secret.”
I asked, “Sounds like you’ve experienced it yourself.”
The chief nurse shook his head. “I have not, because I know there are certain things in this world that are not to be attempted. Why do you think he’s locked here otherwise?”
I said, “But I have an instinct that I’ll be able to get some clues from this elder.” Since I had the warrant, the chief nurse could only persuade me but couldn’t stop me. Personally I only wished to meet this old man, to see how unique he was.
The chief nurse couldn’t persuade me otherwise so he added one last time outside the door, “Do not trust anything he says. Remember, he is a mental patient, not a scholar, or else he won’t be here.” Then the chief nurse knocked on the door. A heavy voice from inside said, “Come in.”
The chief nurse tapped me on my shoulders, signaling me to go in. I went in and closed the door behind me. The old man changed another pair of glasses to take a better look at me. “Why are you so nervous?” The elder pushed on his glasses and asked, “Am I that scary? You must have heard those rumors about me again. Sometimes I wonder why I am here. Why don’t you sit down and talk to me, perhaps we can figure this out together.”
I looked at him and pulled a chair over. “I’m not nervous.”
The elder shook his head. “No, you are. Human beings are funny creatures. They’re the only creatures who can’t tell what they’re really thinking. You might be able to fool yourself, but your subconscious can’t fool others. You bent over slightly when you closed the door and your fingers trembled. That proves that you’re indeed nervous.”
I looked at him and continued, “The moment I walk in, you assert your dominance, leading me into your rhythm. Whether I answer or not, you have control over the flow of the conversation. That cornered me into the passive role.”
The expression on the elder’s face didn’t change. “Interesting, are you a fellow student of psychology?”
I shook my head. “These are just rudimentary knowledge of psychology. An amateur psychologist could do what you did. I’m not here to listen to your lecture. You have many books on your bookshelf and most of them are related to criminology and psychology. I'm here to seek your help with a case.”
“Are you afraid?” The elder looked into my eyes. And I looked back at him. Behind the glasses, the eyes appeared to be able to look into people’s souls and the secret in my heart. “Let me see. I can see uncertainty and fear in your eyes, as well as weakness.” I kept my eyes on him.
The elder held his chin. “You’re afraid of something deep inside your heart. But what is that? Let me guess.” I shrugged.
The elder smiled, “I know what it is. You’re afraid of loneliness. The more insouciant you act, the more anxious you appear. Even though you have not done anything since you sat down, your pupils moved to take in the whole room.”
The elder looked around the room. “You know, the more one tries to hide something, the more it’ll be revealed. The greater one lacks something, the more one tries to preen about it, because they’re afraid that others might notice they’re lacking in that department.
“Won’t you agree, officer?” The elder smiled. “Now let me see, why are you so lonely? Why can’t you trust anyone? Why can’t you believe their words? Yes, this started when you were young. You were abandoned, you are an orphan, aren’t you?”
I still didn’t say anything.
“Ha ha.” The elder winked at me, “That’s why you’re most afraid of betrayal, you’re afraid of getting too close to another person. That’s why you prefer to do everything alone, you prefer to live and die quietly on your own. But why? Have you ever questioned why that is?
“Officer, look into yourself, you know the answer.”
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