Chapter 19 Chapter 19 Thirteen Unspeakable Crimes
When Lin Xinghuo reached Gao Lao's house, he saw that inside the two-meter-high stone wall, there were five large brick and tile rooms with bright lights and shadows of people reflected on the window papers.
The door to the main room was tightly closed, and the sounds coming out were muffled and unreal. Instead, in the backyard, which was only a small acre in size, someone was crying, sobbing, and the sound was particularly frightening with the howling north wind.
Lin Xinghuo listened for a while. There were no fewer than ten men in the room. Some were feasting on the kang, some were rummaging through boxes and cabinets, two were surrounding a teenage girl at the stove, teasing her with obscene language. And a familiar voice smugly shouted, "Hurry up and cook two more hot dishes! Didn't your father say his eldest daughter is the most capable and will marry into a cadre in the provincial capital? How can she be so capable that she can't even cook a simple dish?"
"I'm telling you, if you keep crying and fooling around with me, I'll throw your two brothers into the yard too! Seeing you women looking so depressed makes me angry. Your father forced us to bleed and suffer, and all the money goes to you! You've been raised to be fat and plump, but you brothers don't even have wives..."
Dirty Beard was drinking and cursing at the girl on the stove in the outer room. There was a plate of greasy meat in front of his sable.
Lin Xinghuo quietly climbed to the backyard and understood what "in the tree yard" meant. There were two short and fat men tied under the ginkgo tree in the yard. Seeing that they were covered with half a finger of snow, Lin Xinghuo felt a little uneasy. He went closer and listened and found that they were indeed not breathing.
They were two elderly people, wearing only thin inner jackets. The woman's tears had frozen to ice, while the man's face was savage, roaring furiously before his death. Lin Xinghuo didn't look again, following the sobbing sound. He found the cellar entrance north of the vegetable jar—a plump middle-aged woman was hugging two young boys, sobbing. Someone rummaging in the cellar kicked her impatiently: "Cry, bird!"
"There are two whole slabs of pork, and all we eat are steamed buns made of white flour. Even the winter vegetables in the street restaurant are not as abundant as here!" The skinny young man viciously kicked the boy in the heart: "I said I did so many jobs, how come the profit is so little! Boss Gao is such a piece of shit, always crying poor, saying that the inspections are strict and it's only thanks to his connections that he can exchange some money and tickets... Pah!"
The woman rushed forward to block the boy and hugged the skinny monkey's legs. "Brother, we women really don't know what the boss did outside! He committed a sin and lost his life. Only orphans and widows are left at home. Please let us go!"
"Didn't that old man just point his finger at me and curse me? He's so stubborn, isn't he?" The skinny monkey pulled the older boy who was blocked behind his mother and said, "Diao Ye gave birth to a stupid grandson. Could it be Boss Gao's son?"
The skinny monkey's eyes looked back and forth at the woman. The woman shrank back and begged, "Brother, if you can just plead for us, I'll ask my father-in-law to give you the job at the station, okay?"
He really didn't like the job of picking up the train at the station, but he had done a lot of hard labor like making frozen popsicles before, and he knew that the old man outside was probably frozen: "It's too late! Your father has gone to reunite with his eldest son! Sister-in-law, we have something else to do..."
Lin Xinghuo couldn't bear to listen any longer. He broke off a small stone from the stone wall and launched it. The gust of wind it created extinguished the oil lamp, creating a shallow dent in the cellar's stone ceiling. It hit the skinny monkey right between the eyebrows and then rebounded to hit the woman's forehead. Without a word, the two men fell headfirst.
Without an adult to comfort them, the children's shrill cries suddenly became louder, piercing their eardrums. Lin Xinghuo fumbled out a wooden cylinder resembling a fire starter from the old days, shook it to produce a spark, and thrust it into the children's noses. The two boys fainted instantly. He lifted the children into their mother's arms and pulled down the straw curtain to cover them.
The caracal snorted, "You're so kind!"
Lin Xinghuo shook her head. She was different from the caracal. The mark of the peaceful and stable era was engraved in her bones. Even if she knew that this was the wife and child of that vicious thief, she was unwilling to let people freeze to death in her hands.
The force of the stone was just right. Lin Xinghuo punched the skinny monkey twice on the bridge of his nose, waking him up immediately. "I ask you questions, and you answer them! If you hesitate, I'll stab you! If you shout, I'll stab you twice! How many people are there in your gang? Where are they all?"
The skinny monkey felt a sharp pain in his nose, and tears started streaming before he even opened his eyes. Blurredly, he saw that the person pulling his collar was the female villain who had stuck him against the car window that day. Just as he had turned over the female villain's words in his mind, he felt a chill on his arm.
He was stunned again and was hit on the left arm again.
Lin Xinghuo directly placed the fang dagger on the skinny monkey's neck and asked, "Are you sure you don't want to tell me?"
The skinny monkey's face was covered with tears and snot, and he howled, "Grandma—"
The despairing "puff puff" sound rang out again. If the wound hadn't hurt like salt being sprinkled on it, Skinny Monkey would have wanted to see what kind of knife the female star was holding in her hand. It could stab people more easily than tofu.
"I'll tell you, I'll tell you!" The skinny monkey trembled and spoke as fast as he could. The pain from biting his tongue was less than one percent of the pain he felt on his body.
Knowing that the thieves had arrived, Lin Xinghuo breathed a sigh of relief.
Putting his trembling right hand behind his back, Lin Xinghuo pressed the skinny monkey: "Is there anything else you haven't said? If I find out later--" He gestured with his fangs on the skinny monkey's thigh.
The skinny monkey looked down in horror, his voice cracking with sobs as he racked his brains to redeem himself from his crime. "Hu Zi said he'd have his minks lead the way once the snow stopped. They'd find you and kill your entire family and neighbors to lure the wild animals down the mountain! He'd even implicate the entire village! He said the village deserved it for raising a meddler like you! Auntie—Ah!"
Lin Xinghuo couldn't hold back his anger, and with a force of his left hand, the fang dagger directly penetrated the skinny monkey's thigh.
He hit the skinny monkey on the back of the neck and dragged him outside with one hand to provide some shelter for the unconscious mother and child.
The caracal swept Lin Xinghuo's cheek with its tail, licked its paw pads, and stretched out its sharp claws: "Twelve, half each?"
The caracal had been fuming for a long time when the thief, unprepared for the sudden shooting, injured a human and a fox cub right in front of it. If it hadn't been for the urgent need to save the fox, it would have slit the throats of those people right then and there.
"I'll do it, and you hold the fort for me." Lin Xinghuo took a deep breath.
When the people in the front hall heard the monkey's howl, one of them couldn't help but say, "You can eat anything! This monkey is so unrefined! I have to go and see!"
The one who was lingering in front of the stove said, "You pick it up! Why are you so eager to come over here?"
Dirty Beard didn't care at all: "Just don't lose it." He still had to interrogate the old woman later to prevent her from missing the treasure that Boss Gao had hidden somewhere else.
"Well, if it doesn't work, just go for it and invite the wolves. There are only a few people in this little ditch, so what's there to be afraid of?"
Dirty Beard slammed the table and said, "You pig brain! No matter how small Xiaohezigou is, it is a rich village next to the forest farm! If only one family dies, they will find a way to cover it up themselves, but if too many people die, the forest farm will have to intervene!" It's not like those villages in remote corners where news can only be spread after the snow melts in spring.
Dirty Beard had threatened to do something, but he was also thinking that if the place where that tough guy lived was difficult to clean up, he would have to do it once and for all and set a fire to burn away all traces. Normally, he was reluctant to set fires, mainly because the nearby mountains were densely forested and large fires would be difficult to control.
Dirty Beard was certain Lin Xinghuo wasn't from the forest farm, otherwise he wouldn't have been unable to get on the train. He'd been hanging out on the line from the forest farm to the provincial capital since he was a kid. This old train, left behind by the old Jin family in the provincial capital, was the most convenient, allowing anyone with connections at the forest farm to squeeze on even if they couldn't buy a ticket. It was precisely because of his local knowledge that he was able to get a handle on Boss Gao's situation. Boss Gao's official home was in the county town, just outside the provincial capital, and he and his fellow workers simply called the women and children he kept there "sister-in-law" and "niece." Who could have known that Boss Gao's parents and children were hiding in plain sight in Xiaohezigou?
"Your father even created two names. He's a thief who acts like an undercover spy." Dirty Beard sneered at Boss Gao's eldest daughter, "My daughter, if you know where your father is hiding something, just tell us. Don't make your mother and brothers suffer."
The girl trembled for a long time and said in a hoarse voice, "Some are hidden in the half-collapsed cellar at the village entrance..."
Before he could finish his words, he was slapped by Dirty Beard: "Do you think I'm stupid? The brigade secretary's house is right next door! What? Are you trying to alert your uncle from the Gao family for help?"
Pointing outside, Dirty Beard sneered: "The wind is weak, do you really think you can't hear any noise from other houses? My girl, everyone knows that you people in Xiaohezigou are the most inhumane. Do you believe it? Tomorrow morning, the two sides of your village will have to fight for the things in your cellar. Just for this nice brick house, I won't let you make the decision." It would be better if everyone died.
Dirty Beard had no intention of letting this family go. Boss Gao was as cunning as a ghost, and if he hadn't been injured, he really wouldn't have been able to catch him.
"Hey, why is there no sound in the cellar?" said Ma Zi, a new recruit who was not yet brave enough.
The complacent Dirty Beard put down his wine cup and glanced around to find that there were only five brothers left in the room. He immediately became alert. He took out the homemade gun passed down by Boss Gao, leaned over to the crack of the door, and whispered, "Something's wrong! Push this girl out and try!"
Then he pointed at Ma Zi and said, "You haven't seen blood yet. Only when you get your hands on blood can you be considered a member of the gang. Go!"
Ma Zi opened the back door, trembling, and used Gao Lao Da's daughter to shield himself, calling softly: "Brother Monkey? Brother San'er?"
When he reached the entrance of the cellar, Ma Zi saw people lying all over the floor. He was so frightened that his crotch immediately became wet: "Who!"
Before he finished peeing, he was hit by the ice ball squeezed by Lin Xinghuo and rolled his eyes.
The dirty-bearded man who rushed out from behind trembled. He saw the shadow that flashed by clearly, and it seemed that the foot did not touch the ground: "Ghost!"
The other three howled like wolves, the largest one even biting his tongue through: "Humpback!"
Hunchback, that's her backpack! Lin Xinghuo jumped onto the wall, ignoring the man with the knife in front of him, and swung the dagger directly at the dirty beard. The crescent-shaped fangs spun in the air and returned to Lin Xinghuo's hand.
With a "bang", blood oozes out from Dirty Beard's wrist, and the heavy iron thing falls to the ground.
The remaining three stood back to back, waving their knives around.
People with this kind of skills are scarier than ghosts.
Dirtybeard whined and purred, calling for his sable.
In order not to give the enemy a chance to counterattack, Lin Xinghuo did not show favoritism and gave the remaining person a pair of semicircular "bracelets".
After knocking them all out one by one, Lin Xinghuo turned around and saw the caracal walking out of the house with a long sable in its mouth and a proud and confident step.
The caracal dropped the unconscious marten, jumped and kicked Dirty Beard's face, and the afterimages of its two claws danced and flew up.
"Hiss—" Lin Xinghuo couldn't help but take a breath when she saw that all the beard on Dirty Beard's face had been scratched off. The cat king always showed mercy when fighting with her.
The caracal gave him a haughty look: "Are you still asking?"
Lin Xinghuo thought for a moment and then said, "Ask."
When Dirty Beard was beaten awake, his eyes were so swollen that he couldn't open them. He was also a ruthless person, so he bit the tip of his tongue, spat out blood foam, and tried his best to see who had caught him.
But he only saw twelve logs standing in the front yard, and his brothers were tied to the stakes with their backs to him, not knowing whether they were dead or alive.
Dirty Beard then realized that he was also nailed to the wood, and he and his brothers were facing the old couple who had frozen to death under the ginkgo tree.
"Ming-ming——" Lin Xinghuo took advantage of the warmth in the house to feed the fox cubs some dried meat he brought with him, and then let them out to exercise for a while.
Dirty Beard swallowed his saliva. Now he was truly frightened: these logs were the coffins that Gao Laoda's parents had saved. They had been stacked in the front yard. Each log, as thick as a leg, stood upright on the frozen snow, staring strangely at Gao Laoda's wide-eyed eyes. And that vague, inhuman laughter...
As soon as Lin Xinghuo got behind him, Dirty Beard bit his tongue hard, spitting out blood: "I'll become a ghost even after I die——"
"..." Lin Xinghuo glanced at the account book in his hand under the light of the main hall, "Forget it! I won't ask anymore."
Dirty Beard's mouth stank of blood. Lin Xinghuo took a half step back in disgust and suddenly looked at the caracal and the fox cub: "I have to brush your teeth from now on."
The upright wood was to facilitate her questioning and search. There were too many thieves in this group. Lin Xinghuo didn't think much about it. It was much easier to lift the wood and pound it down than to turn over these smelly thieves, and it also allowed her to talk behind their backs.
This gang was incredibly vicious. Aside from the newly recruited pockmarked man, everyone else had their hands on more or less of a murder. The most vicious of all was Boss Gao, who had been buried alive by his own men. Lin Xinghuo flipped through this account book and diary and discovered that the story Grandma Wei had told about the eldest of the Xiaohezigou triplets suffocating to death by having beans stuffed into their nostrils wasn't the child's fault at all. Instead, the triplets were a nuisance to Boss Gao, so he took advantage of the adults' busy schedules...
Lin Xinghuo caressed each of the children, and the chill on her back subsided a little. She pulled the sled out of the woodshed. Xiaohezigou had electricity thanks to the forest farm's light, but even the woodshed at Gao Lao's house had a light bulb.
After locking Boss Gao's wife and children in the woodshed, Lin Xinghuo carried the money, bills, gold and silver antiques that Dirty Beard and his men had found onto the sled one by one, and finally piled Dirty Beard and his men up one by one.
Lin Xinghuo shook off the blood on his hands, grabbed a handful of snow and pressed it on Dirty Beard's wound: "Don't let it drip away."
The holes made by her fang dagger took a long time to clot blood. Fearing that the forestry security department could not control these people, Lin Xinghuo stabbed the limbs of each of the thieves one by one.
The snowflakes that had stopped for a while in the second half of the night started to fall again, and the whole sky and earth were covered in white.
Lin Xinghuo grabbed the sled rope and headed towards the forest farm a few miles away.
"Awoo!" Dahuang, who had sneaked in but couldn't jump into the stone wall of Mr. Gao's house, jumped out of the snow nest and excitedly rubbed Lin Xinghuo's hand.
Lin Xinghuo was afraid that the sled would be too heavy and would tire him out, but Da Huang was still unwilling to let go and bit the reins. Lin Xinghuo had no choice but to put the reins on him. Da Huang howled and broke into a run, pulling the sled with a squeaking sound.
"Hey!" Lin Xinghuo gritted his teeth and threw his dirty beard back up.
After only a few miles, Lin Xinghuo could not sit still on the sled. He had to jump down from time to time to pick up the thieves who had fallen. If the snow was not thick and soft, he would have thrown these people over several times.
The caracals and the fox cubs, on the other hand, were all very fond of him. Fox No. 2 and Fox No. 3 even jumped onto Da Huang, whimpering all the way, much to the envy of the wounded Fox No. 1.
By the time he arrived at the forest farm, Lin Xinghuo had already learned how to drive a sled.
The forest farm is a state-owned unit. Just look at the forest farm to see how powerful the security department is these days. They not only have pistols, rifles, and guns, but also bombs.
He Xiaohu was the most promising young man of Xiaohezigou. Not only had he joined the forest farm, he was also officially assigned to the security department. In the five years since he became a regular employee, he had handled numerous cases, both large and small, for the forest farm. Everyone praised this young man for his powerful boxing skills, accurate shooting skills, and steady, capable demeanor, making him the former section chief's most prized apprentice. He Xiaohu felt that his courage had been perfected, and nothing could shatter him.
When the door of the guard room at the main gate of the forest farm was knocked, He Xiaohu thought that the couple who had quarreled during the day were fighting again.
He adjusted his hat in the mirror, buttoned up his coat, and then opened the door to the guardhouse. "You stay here, I'll go."
Another colleague on duty rubbed his face, opened the record book to record the time, and said without looking up: "Okay! I'll write it down for you."
"Hum!" He Xiaohu was hit in the face by the snow and he woke up instantly. He went down the stairs and took a step, but suddenly he jumped up high in fright.
"Why are you still mooing like a cow?" The colleague opened the door with a smile.
He Xiaohu rushed back as fast as he could, pushed his colleague away, closed the door, took out his weapon and put it under the crack of the door to be on guard.
"What's going on!" The colleague quickly stepped back and squatted, using the thick wall as a cover.
He Xiaohu listened attentively for a while, then leaned over the curtain on the door to take a look, and panted as he turned on the headlights at the entrance of the forest farm.
These headlights were powerful and consumed a lot of electricity. They were only used briefly on National Day and Spring Festival, and rarely, even when the alarm was sounded. He Xiaohu turned on all six headlights at once, illuminating half of the mountain.
My colleague went to the window and took a look, and was also shocked. He saw about ten people neatly lined up at the bottom of the steps of the guardhouse!
There is also a sled facing the guardhouse.
He Xiaohu's heart was pounding. He said, "I'll go down and take a look. Watch my gestures and be ready to sound the alarm at any time!"
The colleague put his hand on the alarm bell and nervously watched He Xiaohu move down step by step.
He rushed up the stairs and found the man he had just stepped on. He found a blue notebook on his body, which looked like a railway worker's record book. He Xiaohu felt the man's pulse and found he was still alive. He breathed a sigh of relief and quickly grabbed the notebook.
He Xiaohu's expression became more and more solemn as he flipped through the pages in the light.
He pressed his palm down towards his colleague, and a shrill alarm sounded throughout the forest farm.
"Call the section chief! Ask him to notify the public security bureau immediately!" He Xiaohu shouted.
Without hesitation, the colleague picked up the phone and alerted the section chief, factory director, and secretary one by one before coming down with a gun in hand: "What's going on?"
He Xiaohu had already checked each of the thirteen men's carotid arteries, confirming they were all still alive. He pointed at the men and the sled, "This is part of the stolen goods from that vicious thief gang in the provincial capital who were never caught after the wiring was completed twice."
"Wow!" gasped the colleague. "Thirteen popsicles?"
"Still alive."
"Who is so capable?"
He Xiaohu shook his notebook. This wasn't just a half-frozen popsicle; it was thirteen indictments of crimes too numerous to list! These people deserved to be dragged off and shot.
The security chief arrived the fastest. An experienced veteran, he quickly understood the situation and said, "Move them to the guardhouse first, or they'll freeze to death. Don't worry about those talented individuals; don't waste their kindness. Those who gave these people the green light still have yet to clean up all the channels through which they sold their stolen goods, the people they harmed, and the people's property they embezzled."
He Xiaohu and his colleagues tossed the men into the guardhouse like they were carrying sacks, pleading with their master, "The leader whose name is written on the leather is from Xiaohezigou. I'm requesting your permission to participate in this operation!" Boss Gao? Was that honest and simple Gao Dayou Boss Gao? Everyone in the village knew that Boss Gao was filial, working hard outside to support his family. He was skinny and dark, but he made his family plump and fair.
The section chief pondered for a moment, then nodded and said, "You will take half of the section staff to control the area first, and wait for the public security comrades to take over."
A colleague in the guard room shouted, "Section Chief, come and see!"
The head of the security department went in and saw blood pouring from the men's limbs. The old comrade peeled back some of their clothes to examine the wounds: "That's spot on!"
"What do you mean?"
"The tendons in the limbs are broken, making it impossible for the person to use strength, but the major blood vessels are not damaged, so no one will be fatal. The same goes for the wrists. The technique looks like the work of one person." Except for the wrist injuries, some of which are there and some are not, all the limbs have eight wounds. The wounds are small and deep, and the precision is frightening.
"We should dig some snow to patch their wounds, or they'll bleed to death here."
"This wound won't stop bleeding." He Xiaohu swallowed his saliva: "How cruel! What kind of cruel person is this?" He even lined up the people there in an orderly manner! He still felt scared when he thought about that scene.
At this time, Lin Xinghuo, who had already run several miles away, was being complained by the caracal: "You are so soft-hearted!" Why did you leave the sled behind?
Even Da Huang was howling as if he was cursing someone.
Lin Xinghuo noticed that the little fox cubs in the backpack were not quiet either, so he promised: "Let's make a sled when we get back!"
Pinching Da Huang's long, upward-turned mouth, Lin Xinghuo pushed it: "Go, go, go home!"
Dahuang rubbed his hands and refused to leave. Seeing that Lin Xinghuo was determined, he picked up a rabbit from the snow.
Lin Xinghuo waved his hand and pushed it again, and Dahuang walked away, looking back every few steps.
After brushing off the mud on his body, Lin Xinghuo jumped out of the half-collapsed cellar. Unexpectedly, what Gao Laoda's daughter said was actually true. Gao Laoda had hidden a box of small yellow croakers in this broken cellar very close to the brigade secretary's house.
Lin Xinghuo hadn't touched the stolen goods that Dirty Beard and his men had seized from Boss Gao's house. The money was fine, but the thick stack of bills even made her jealous. But who knew what marks might be on them, and Boss Gao's account books were fragmented. If someone saw a clue, it would be worthless.
There was no need to be afraid of the small yellow croaker. Lin Xinghuo put on leather gloves and squeezed them hard, and they became lumps.
The words "足赤", "寿" and "雪乡金" on the top were also gone - Lin Xinghuo guessed that this might be the gold hidden in the home of the famous local landlord and capitalist named Jin, which was embezzled by someone and then fell into the hands of the vicious Boss Gao.
Lin Xinghuo, guessing what Boss Gao was thinking, searched again along the Gao family's walls and the creek. Uncle Mao snorted coldly, sniffed the lingering scent of gold, and condescendingly pointed out a few places. Sure enough, he dug up three more bags of gold.
Lin Xinghuo picked up the old man, whose cold feet were rubbing against his thick tail, rubbed his head, and exclaimed sincerely, "How amazing! Raising a family man!"
The caracal's round, blunt ears stand tall, and a proud, purring sound comes from its throat.
"Hiss!" The sable, who was tied like a strip of cloth by the caracal under Lin Xinghuo's backpack, woke up and hissed in fear.
"Hey, are you awake?" Lin Xinghuo turned to look at the mink, "Let's go, we still have to deal with this little thing." The mink said that there were good things hidden in the mink's den.
The caracal, addicted to human praise, felt the soft hand leaving its head, and suddenly became furious and pounced on the sable.
The scratched sable hissed even louder.
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