◇ Chapter 39 (39) Stolen
The theft in the heavily guarded Shangshu Mansion, where guards took turns on duty, was an extremely incredible thing in itself, not to mention that Qinghe told him everything on the way back. There were no signs of break-in in other places. Only near the study were there unusual footprints and traces of a broken door.
Anywhere else is fine, but the study...
"We didn't catch him." Bo Kang said it affirmatively, raised his eyebrows and asked, "Didn't even see a shadow?"
Qing He lowered his head awkwardly and said nothing. Bo Kang sighed, suspecting that there was something wrong with his eyesight.
He was a guard who was selected by a man who had been a guard in Rongcheng for seven years and a guard in the imperial palace for three years. All his skills combined couldn't even catch a mere thief?
Qinghe followed behind and could hardly catch up with him. She could only frantically wink at the butler who came out to greet her, asking him to tell the people below that Lord Bai was angry.
Get ready to be scolded. If the study room, which is the most heavily guarded in the entire Shangshu Mansion, is robbed, you will at least be fined.
He quietly raised his head and stole a glance at Bo Kang's face, only to be startled. The man who had just been striding forward with a look of lawsuit suddenly stopped, his gloomy expression warming up, and finally a slow smile appeared on his face. "Baby, what are you doing here?"
Lianzhi stood outside the study door, head down, hands behind her back, twisting her skirt, looking uneasy. Seeing Bai Kang, he approached him with a wronged look: "Brother Kang, there's a thief in our house!"
He had already heard the details from Qinghe, so he didn't say anything at this moment. He just pulled Lianzhi towards the study. Lianzhi continued, "I'm injured!"
Bo Kang stopped immediately, turned around, squatted down, and looked at Lianzhi carefully: "You were hurt by him? Where? Is the injury serious?"
Lianzhi didn't have a chance to interrupt. She looked at his furrowed brows, wanting to speak but stopping herself. After asking, Bai Kang thought of something else: "Did you see that man's face?"
"No, I wasn't hurt..." Lianzhi didn't know how to start. Bai Kang's reaction was different from what he expected. He rubbed his eyes, feeling a little guilty. "I didn't see anything. I tripped and fell. The study was too messy and I lost my balance..."
Bai Kang didn't know whether to laugh or cry. Lianzhi was walking freely now, and seeing that he could still trot up, he thought he was probably fine. He led him into the study and asked him to sit on the small couch while he searched the desk and cabinets.
No. Luckily, no one is lost, and nothing important is lost... No.
On the floor lay many unsubmitted memorials and letters, scattered about in a chaotic mess. Beneath the cabinet, documents that hadn't been found yet were piled together, and several boxes were open, clearly having been touched.
It doesn't look like the way a thief rummages through things.
Although he had never been a thief, a thief would not rummage through things like this, looking in order, nor would he pile up useless things in the box together. It should be more messy.
More importantly, which thief would rummage through his boxes of books and waste paper? Did he think that he would use the waste paper as a cover to hide his gold, silver and treasures?
There are only two possibilities. The thief was after the documents, not the money. Or...
Bai Kang narrowed his eyes and looked at Lian Zhi, who was sitting on the couch, shaking her legs. Feeling his gaze, Lian Zhi turned her head to look at him. She was stunned for a moment, and then tears immediately flowed down her face, her eyes watering.
"Brother Kang, why are you looking at me like that?" Lianzhi wiped her eyes, her rims red. "Do you suspect that I'm rummaging through your study? How dare I? I wouldn't touch your things..."
Well, I haven't asked yet, but you confessed. Bo Kang has no way to deal with people who cry easily, not to mention that this person is Lianzhi, whom he likes very much: "Tell the truth, baby, I'm not angry."
Lianzhi lowered her fingers and looked at him secretly. Seeing that Bo Kang was calm, she said, "You usually leave the documents on the table. I want to help you restore them. Look!"
After saying this, he trotted over and took Bo Kang's hand, showing him the documents on the table that had been hidden by layers of books and restored to their original state. Bo Kang held his forehead with his hand, feeling that Lianzhi was mocking his slovenliness.
He swept the things on the table into the box, glanced around again, and said calmly, "So why did you lie to me that my house was robbed? Did you want me to come home early?"
"I'm not lying to you." Lianzhi shook her head. "What I translated is mine, and what a thief translated is a thief's."
All the servants in the house stood guard outside the door, not daring to breathe. Bo Kang gently took off Lianzhi's silk stockings and carefully examined her. He found that Lianzhi's feet were indeed scratched, and a red mark hung on her white jade ankle.
Lianzhi is the kind of person who can make a small illness a big one, and a small illness a small one. If this kind of scratch happens to someone else, it's not worth mentioning, but if it happens to him, he will definitely make a fuss about it.
Bai Kang also cooperated, drove Eunuch Wen away, and personally applied medicine to him. He was so serious that Lianzhi felt embarrassed: "It's just a minor injury."
Bai Kang didn't listen to him, and didn't say much. He applied the medicine and left. Eunuch Wen then came out from the darkness, looked at Lianzhi's red cheeks, and asked in surprise, "Master, what's wrong with you?"
"I'm fine!" Lianzhi patted her face nonchalantly.
"Master, do we really have to hand this document over to them?" Eunuch Wen took out the memorial that Lianzhi had given him, which he had secretly taken from the study. "This is from the North Sea envoy to Bai Kang. If it gets leaked..."
"What's wrong?" Lianzhi gave a fake smile. "Don't you trust Arus very much? You even contacted him secretly. I asked you to pass it on to him, but you don't want to?"
Eunuch Wen knew that Lianzhi was angry with him, and he suddenly dared not breathe.
Lianzhi felt annoyed whenever this was mentioned. During the Wanshou Festival, many envoys from vassal states came to the capital to pay homage to the emperor. He had thought he would find secret letters from other vassal states in his study, but he didn't know whether Bo Kang had destroyed them or if they hadn't been left in the palace.
The Shangshu Mansion had been robbed, and his wife had been injured. Tracking down the thief had become the Shangshu Mansion's top priority. A cloud of gloom had been hanging over the mansion lately, but Bo Kang was somewhat relieved that his staff weren't just useless—a day later, he tracked down the thief.
"He's a man dressed in black, wearing a brown hat and a black veil over his face. He's nine feet tall..."
"After all that, this last sentence hits the nail on the head," Bo Kang interrupted him with a chuckle. "Such a rare tall man, but it took you a whole day to find him? Couldn't you tell yesterday that he was nine feet tall?"
The captain of the guards felt a little embarrassed. Fortunately, Bo Kang didn't say anything else. He raised his chin to the people around him and said, "Draw it."
The scribe beside him immediately picked up his pen. The captain of the guards immediately spoke, describing the man's appearance. Oddly enough, a man nine feet tall was indeed rare. Only Lord Bai was that tall among them; the others were envoys from the North Sea Territory.
He should have been extremely conspicuous in a crowd, let alone sneaking into the mansion. But they didn't see him. It was only after a private investigation yesterday that they confirmed that this person was suspicious and looked like a thief.
Bai Kang lowered his eyes, watching the scribe painting closely. Although the scribe was only an eighth-rank official, he was a rare talent, with superb painting skills, and he had painted portraits for many foreign envoys.
As the eyes were finished and the calligrapher put down his pen, Bo Kang sat up straight, staring intently at the eyes of the person on the paper. He didn't need to draw the nose and mouth anymore, he could already confirm the person's identity -
The day before yesterday, in the alley, he was beaten.
"A person from Mobei?" The clerk beside him asked curiously.
Bo Kang subconsciously asked back: "How do you know?"
"I guessed." The clerk he addressed as important scratched his head awkwardly. "A few years ago, the King of Longxi returned to the capital. The servants around him looked a bit like this man. Perhaps they have the characteristics of someone from Mobei."
"You kid, you have a really good memory." Bai Kang patted him with a smile, his movements gradually slowing down.
Do they look a bit similar, or are they the same person?
Three days had passed since the thief was caught. Apart from the initial portrait and the traces found, the man seemed to have disappeared from the face of the earth, and there was no news of him anymore.
Bai Kang checked the documents he had lost, but they were nothing important. He thought that the man from Mobei didn't know the Central Plains characters, so he didn't find anything useful.
The wound on his shoulder ached again. The rainy summer had relieved the intense heat, but the dampness was exacerbating the pain in Bai Kang's old injuries. Unlike Lianzhi, he wasn't one to complain about pain. He used to have Qinghe apply the plaster, but now, afraid Lianzhi would find out, he just endured it.
Only when the pain was unbearable would he apply a plaster, and considering that Lianzhi might find the smell unpleasant, he would peel it off before going to bed. Otherwise, Lianzhi would not let him hold her.
Just as he was struggling to apply the plaster to his right arm, the door suddenly opened and the young man came running in like a bird, pouncing on Bai Kang. The smell in the room was too strong. Lian Zhi sniffed twice and his expression changed instantly. "What's that smell? Brother Kang, what did you put on?"
After saying that, he lifted up Bo Kang's collar and saw that his injury was more serious, the wound had not yet healed completely, there was a hideous scar, and new flesh had grown on his shoulder.
Beneath this, there were old scars of varying sizes. Many were shallow scars from practicing martial arts, while others were marks from being beaten.
Bai Kang held his breath. Fortunately, Lianzhi didn't ask about his new injuries. Instead, she pointed at his back and asked, "What's going on?"
Those? Bo Kang was stunned for a moment before realizing that he was talking about the scars on his back from being whipped.
It was an old injury he had when he was a royal guard and was punished by Chen Fenglian.
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