Tang Dynasty detective

Chapter 203 Bamboo Forest Exploration
Just as Kang Xu was about to speak to stop Tao Youran, he heard a shrill cry in his ear.

Dongmei knelt on the ground and said in tears: "Master, you never understand Miss's thoughts. Miss has been locked up in this house since she was a child, and has never seen outsiders. Do you know how much Miss wants to go outside to see?" Mr. Zhang is a bit poor, but Miss really likes him, but what about you, Master? You hate the poor and love the rich, and you broke up the engagement, do you know how uncomfortable the Miss is? If it weren’t for the Master, you repeatedly forced the Miss to marry Lu Jitong That bastard, how could Miss think of elopement?"

"You...you!" Tao Youran's chest rose and fell violently, he panted desperately, and said angrily, "It's wrong, it's really wrong!"

"Mr. Tao, I think what Dongmei said is reasonable. Have you ever thought about why all this happened now? Don't tell me you have no responsibility for Miss Tao's death?" Kang Xu asked in a deep voice .

"My lord, what Dongmei said is correct, we have an unshirkable responsibility for Zhaoxue's death, woo woo woo~."

At some point, Mrs. Tao came to the main hall, and she cried: "Master, if you didn't dislike the poor and love the rich, and looked down on Zhang Hebi, would you have ended up in this situation? Zhaoxue has been steadfast since she was a child. It will never change, and it's not like you don't know this, but you just broke up the engagement and let her marry the Lu family. You forced Zhaoxue to death, and you gave me back my daughter, my daughter~ woo woo."

Mrs. Tao walked up to him, shook his shoulder desperately, and burst into tears.

Tao Youran's face turned pale in an instant, he slumped on the chair powerlessly, two lines of tears flowed from the corners of his eyes, his half-white hair instantly turned gray, as if he had aged a lot.

"I harmed Zhaoxue? Did I really harm Zhaoxue?" Tao Youran sat on the chair, letting tears flow down, muttering to himself, his words were not as aggressive as before, but full of regret.

Kang Xu couldn't bear it. It's a kind of sadness for a white-haired person to send a black-haired person. How could he add this crime to it?

"Mr. Tao, this officer... I have spoken harshly, and I hope you will forgive me. I will go to find the murderer right away, and give justice to Miss Tao, and justice to this bright world!"

After bowing to Tao Youran with a solemn expression, Kang Xu left Tao's mansion immediately.

After this incident, he believed that Tao Youran would not use punishment against Dongmei again.

Dongmei is not wrong, on the contrary, she is still a woman who values ​​love and righteousness. After Tao Youran figured it out, she will treat her kindly.

After leaving Tao Mansion, Kang Xu led his people straight to the bamboo forest in the southwest of the city.

According to Dongmei's confession, the location Tao Zhaoxue and Zhang Hebi agreed on is the Southwest Bamboo Forest, so this is likely to be the scene of the first crime.

About five or six miles west of the city, you can see a bamboo forest.

Kang Xu asked people to patrol the surroundings, strictly forbidding other people to approach, and then walked towards the bamboo forest alone.

The area of ​​this bamboo forest is about ten acres, and the bamboo forest is dense inside, making it difficult for pedestrians.

In front of the bamboo forest, there is an open space.

Kang Xu glanced around the entire bamboo forest, secretly guessing in his heart, if it was him, he would definitely choose to meet in the open space in front of the bamboo forest.

First of all, this bamboo forest is relatively hidden, and few people come here.

Secondly, since they agreed to elope, they naturally had to wait in a conspicuous place, and it was impossible to hide in the depths of the bamboo forest.

What's more, it was late at night, and the dense bamboo forest was like a maze, and it was difficult to tell the direction after entering. Anyone with a normal mind would not choose to meet in the bamboo forest, right?
Kang Xu went straight to the open space in front of the bamboo forest. Bamboo leaves were flying everywhere, and even a layer fell on the ground.

After pondering for a while, Kang Xu folded half of the bamboo and held it in his hand, and gently swept the bamboo leaves on the ground.

Some of these bamboo leaves are emerald green, as if they have just fallen off, but most of them are withered yellow.

Due to the lush vegetation around it, the ground under the bamboo forest cannot receive sunlight. Over time, the falling bamboo leaves begin to rot and become soft and muddy.

Kang Xu lightly swept the freshly fallen bamboo leaves on the surface, and carefully observed and searched inside.

After a while, he found some messy footprints among the rotten bamboo leaves that were as soft as mud.

These footprints were covered by the newly fallen bamboo leaves, so it was hard to be found. Kang Xu's heart moved, he took out the rice paper and charcoal pencils stored in the cloth bag, and compared them to draw the footprints.

He squatted in front of the footprints, meticulously measured the length, width and depth of the footprints, and noted them next to the pattern.

Then, go to the next footprint and draw the footprint in the same way.

After comparing the footprints, Kang Xu quickly discovered that the messy footprints here were actually two people.

Moreover, it is still a man and a woman.

Because, among these messy footsteps, some shoe prints are smaller and the tread marks are shallower, and it looks like a woman stepped on it.

The other part has larger footprints and relatively deep tread marks, obviously left by men.

These footprints are scattered all over the place, appearing to be rather messy, as if there had been conflicts.

And the woman's footprints are backwards, heading towards the bamboo forest behind her.

Kang Xu carefully followed the retreating footprints, and at the end of this narrow space, there was a cluster of tightly packed bamboos, like a screen made of bamboo.

The footprints became more messy here, Kang Xu carefully avoided the footprints on the ground, bent down to search around, and wanted to see if he could find any useful clues.

Bamboo leaves are constantly falling in the bamboo forest. If you don't pay attention, you will miss many clues.

Therefore, Kang Xu searched the ground very carefully, carefully checking everything from the fallen leaves on the ground to the surrounding bamboos.

However, what made him depressed was that there were no other clues to follow except for the footprints on the ground.

Kang Xu looked down at the footprints on the ground, trying to imagine the scene in his mind.

In a more conspicuous part of the open space, the woman's footprints are deep, as if standing there anxiously waiting, after standing for a long time, a small patch of disorganized woman's footprints formed.

In the bamboo forest not far from the woman's footprints, there is a row of relatively steady and powerful footprints leading directly to the woman's direction.

Judging from the situation at the scene, when the row of footprints reached the woman, the woman began to retreat step by step until she reached the densely growing bamboo forest behind her.

Kang Xu closed his eyes, thinking about the direction of those footprints in his mind for a moment, he opened his eyes suddenly, and walked straight to the bamboo forest.

The tightly packed bamboo forest seems to be a group of bamboos grown from a few sticky bamboo shoots, like a blooming lotus. Due to the passage of time, a lot of bamboo leaves have accumulated in the bamboo group.

Kang Xu walked up to the bamboo grove, and searched along the bamboo grove from bottom to top. When he found the middle, he found some obvious man-made chaos under the layers of bamboo leaves.

Few people come to this bamboo forest, and the bamboo leaves fall naturally, so they will naturally be superimposed layer by layer. Even if there is a wind blowing and blowing the upper bamboo leaves, the lower bamboo leaves should not be too messy.

Kang Xu picked up a bamboo leaf and looked at it. The bamboo leaf was yellow and damp, with a slight smell of decay. It was definitely not a newly fallen bamboo leaf.

From what he observed, the area in front of him had obvious man-made traces. These dead leaves seemed to be bamboo leaves that had been piled up all year round, but were turned up by someone.

"Could it be that there are some clues hidden here?" Kang Xu's heart moved, he hurriedly removed the dead leaves on the surface, and began to search carefully.

Unsurprisingly, he found a white silk scarf among the dead leaves.

This silk scarf is embroidered with a snow plum. After careful identification, it can be found that the shape of this plum resembles the word 'Tao' written in cursive script.

Holding the silk scarf, Kang Xu knew in his heart that it must be Tao Zhaoxue's silk scarf.

Judging from the situation at the scene, Tao Zhaoxue must have encountered some kind of danger at that time, so he took the opportunity to back away and buried the silk scarf in the pile of dead leaves tightly crowed in the bamboo forest.

"Tao Zhaoxue's mind is really delicate, and she can think of leaving clues when she is in danger." Kang Xu sighed in his heart.

Kang Xu held the silk scarf and quickly fell into deep thought.

Tao Zhaoxue came to the appointment, if the person she saw was Zhang Hebi, she would have no reason to be afraid.

After all, Zhang Hebi would not harm her at all.

However, if it wasn't for Zhang Hebi, who would the person who came to the appointment be?
Dongmei once said that no one else knew about the agreement between the two except them, so how did the person who made the appointment know the time and place they agreed on?

What is certain now is that Tao Zhaoxue has indeed been here, and a man has indeed been here. If you want to know whether Zhang Hebi has been here, you can just ask when you go back.

But Zhang Hebi attempted suicide, and now he doesn't know if he has woken up, which made the originally simple things complicated.

The key to the whole case is actually the agreement between the two parties.

If the person who came to the appointment was not Zhang Hebi, it was obvious that someone had taken advantage of their agreement and impersonated him to come to the appointment, then the person who came to the appointment was likely to be the murderer.

"There is no blood here, Tao Zhaoxue should have been taken away from this place." Thinking of this, Kang Xu immediately ordered everyone to look for footprints around the open space.

After seven or eight yamen servants took the order, they cleaned up the bamboo leaves on the ground according to the method Kang Xu said, and searched carefully.

"My lord, I found it. There are a series of footprints here." After a while, a yamen servant shouted.

Kang Xu hurriedly walked over. He looked at the set of footprints and frowned.

Those footprints were left by the mysterious man. Judging from the depth of the footprints, his body weight seemed to have increased a lot.

"It seems that Tao Zhaoxue was resisted by that person and left here." Kang Xu's thoughts turned, such a rude behavior, could it be that the person is a bandit?
Kang Xu followed the footprints forward, and after walking more than ten feet, the footprints suddenly disappeared.

"Where does the front lead to?" Kang Xu straightened up, looked ahead, and asked casually.

"My lord, eight miles ahead is Hetou Village." A yamen servant said with a bow.

"Hetou Village?" Kang Xu mused, "But the Hetou Village where Zhou Aliu lives?"

"Return to my lord, that's right."

Kang Xu narrowed his eyes, and said in a deep voice, "I order everyone to go to Hetou Village with me to investigate."

"Yes, my lord."

The yamen servant bowed to answer, and then summoned everyone to follow Kang Xu to Hetou Village.

(End of this chapter)