Chapter 49 Rope Murder Case (11) Mannequin

After listening to Sang Luo's analysis, Ma Shi Tu took a deep breath. A familiar feeling of seeing an old friend came over him, and his heart ached slightly.

He rubbed his sunken eye sockets and sighed, "Your analysis makes sense, but we currently lack strong evidence. If the murderer is really Hu Die, then to convict her, we must have a key piece of evidence, such as her bloodstains or fingerprints found at the scene."

Sang Luo was also very clear about this. She nodded and said, "Nothing like this was found at the scene, but maybe there are some somewhere else. Master, I think the murderer may have committed the crime more than once."

Ma Shi Tu immediately responded: "You mean the second case? But the second case is very strange. The method is obviously not done by the same murderer."

Sang Luo shook his head: "It's not the second case, but the zeroth case. In other words, it happened before the Lan Jianguo case. The murderer dared to kill people with a rope. He may have tried it somewhere in advance. We need to find the place where he simulated the crime and then look for clues there."

Ma Shi Tu suddenly understood. Perhaps because he had already determined the approximate scope of the suspects this time, he had become a little lax and had not even thought of this possibility.

"It's entirely possible!" Ma Shi Tu slammed the table and stood up. He originally wanted to find a breakthrough through interrogation, but Hu Die was totally uncooperative, and he didn't know how the interrogation of Hu Maoshan was going.

As they were talking, Yuan Xiaohu and Xie Ling'er walked into the room. Both of them were very tired. Seeing Ma Shi Tu's expectant eyes, Xie Ling'er shook her head. Yuan Xiaohu slapped the notebook on the table:

"Hu Maoshan is such a bastard. It's a waste of time to interrogate him! He said he didn't know anything when we asked him. He kept saying that he hurt his butt. He even insisted on taking off his pants in front of us. Isn't this just being a hooligan?"

Ma Shi Tu patted his shoulder and said, "Don't be angry. He is a person of low quality. Sang Luo has already thought of a new direction for us to investigate——"

As he spoke, Ma Shi Tu repeated Sang Luo's conjecture to everyone, and then made new work arrangements:

"There is still a lot of time this morning. Let's put our heads together and try to find the evidence left behind by the murderer when he simulated the crime!"

With new possibilities, everyone was full of enthusiasm again. Yuan Xiaohu first proposed a hypothesis. If he was the murderer, he would definitely find an alley very close to Suzhai Lane when simulating the crime, so that the length of the rope would be the same and the force in the middle of the rope would also be the same.

Ma Shi Tu affirmed his idea, and Yuan Xiaohu took action as soon as he said it. He went to the scene and measured the distance between the two electric poles, which was three meters, which means that the width of Suzhai Lane is about three meters.

Then the next task is to find an alley that is three meters wide and has corresponding columns (such as telephone poles and tree trunks) at both ends of the road.

Baiyun County is too big, so he and Xie Ling'er decide to search separately, with Yuan Xiaohu responsible for the east side of the city and Xie Ling'er responsible for the west side.

Sang Luo had another idea. She said to Ma Shi Tu, "If there really is a road that is highly similar to Suzhai Lane, and the murderer simulated the crime here, then who was responsible for driving the electric tricycle?"

Ma Shi Tu said: "It definitely wasn't a living person. It would be stupid to kill someone just to simulate the crime."

Sang Luo nodded: "Of course it wasn't a living person, but there must have been something on the driver's seat of the electric tricycle at that moment. After all, to test the lethality of the rope, the electric tricycle couldn't have crashed into the rope with nothing."

As Sang Luo spoke, he drew a diagram on the blackboard: "It should have been like this. There was an object on the driver's seat of the electric tricycle. The murderer started the electric tricycle and increased the speed to the maximum. Then he quickly dodged. The electric tricycle carrying the object drove towards the rope, and the rope cut the object. The murderer was very satisfied with this result, so he chose this plan when committing the crime."

"So, what is that object?" Ma Shi Tu pondered for a while while holding the water cup, "Could it be... pork?"

"Hu Maoshan happens to be a butcher, and he always has slices of pork at home. It's perfect to use pork to replace the human body!"

"No," Sang Luo questioned, "The pork after being slaughtered is soft and cannot stand upright unless someone holds it up. If it is a live pig, it will definitely make a shrill scream and attract other people's attention. The most important thing is--"

"Hu Maoshan treated the pork as if it were his lifeblood and would not allow anyone to get close to it. It would be difficult for Hu Die to do anything. And if she ruined a piece of pork, she would not be able to explain to her father when she returned."

"We need something that can be fixed on the seat and won't fall down easily," Ma Shi Tu thought for a moment, "then we need a sack. A full sack, solid and placed on the seat, will be perfect for testing. If the rope cuts the sack, the test will be considered a success."

Sang Luo rejected this idea again: "Although the sack is good, it cannot restore the height of a human being. The rope used by the murderer just cut into Lan Jianguo's neck, which means that the murderer must have studied the height of a person's neck when driving an electric tricycle."

"So you mean..." Ma Shi Tu was confused and didn't know what Sang Luo was up to.

"Mannequin!" Sang Luo said affirmatively. After much thought, she thought that this thing was most suitable for simulating crimes. It was the white plastic mannequin displayed in clothing stores. The joints could rotate, and it made no sound. The shape was similar to the height of a human body, and it could restore the height of a person after sitting down. It could also "sit" on the electric tricycle like a human.

Ma Shi Tu slapped his thigh and said, "What a perfect match! Let's go investigate and see if there have been any missing mannequins anywhere recently!"

The two of them went to the police's office to investigate, and they actually found something.

Xiao Deng told them that they received a report on the 1st of this month. The owner of a clothing store claimed that her store had been robbed. She forgot to close the window when she got off work the night before, and someone climbed in through the window and stole a male mannequin from her store. Since the mannequin was specially purchased from another place, she strongly requested the police to help her recover it.

"A day later, the mannequin was thrown outside her store again, but her neck was broken and her head was separated from her body. When the female boss saw the things returned, she went to the police station to request that the case be dropped. She said that the mannequin could still be used if it was taped up, so let it go. If she continued to investigate, she was afraid that the matter would become a big deal and lead to revenge from the thief.

Xiao Deng took out the documents from that time and said, "Since the parties involved have already requested to withdraw the case, we will not pursue the matter any further."

Sang Luo took the information, his heart pounding. The surface of the mannequin is smooth and it is easy to leave fingerprints. If it is properly preserved, the murderer's fingerprints may still be on it!