El agente insensato

Capítulo 22

"Is that so? I don't think I've heard of it."

The driver turned to look at Wang Maoyuan: "I knew it. You're getting old, but you still need to keep up with the news. The Twin Saints Tomb incident caused quite a stir a while ago. How many TV stations and newspapers sent reporters here? Not to mention, my car alone has carried dozens of reporters."

Wang Maoyuan just chuckled.

"In our Baoshan area, there's a peak called Nantianmen, and on top of it is a temple called Shuangsheng Temple, which has a history of several hundred years. Inside, there are plaques enshrining the Great Sage Equaling Heaven and the Great Sage Reaching Heaven. These two brothers are from Shunchang," the driver said with a proud expression.

"Take this Three Rabbits image for example. It's also in the Twin Saints Temple. A while ago, British experts even came to study it. The image in the temple is exactly the same as the image on the Three Rabbits underwear brand logo. Yang Delin must have visited the Twin Saints Temple back then. He thought the image was magical and used it as the brand logo. But if we tell people now that the most magical Three Rabbits image in the Twin Saints Temple used to be the logo of an underwear brand, what kind of image would that be? It would be so damaging to our image."

I recalled my last interview in Shunchang. When Zhang Ting from the county's cultural bureau talked about the Three Rabbits painting, I felt he hadn't said enough. Now I understand. Turning my head, I noticed Liu Er's hand constantly gesturing on his thigh, I wondered what he was thinking. Seeing my attention, Liu Er smiled, stopped gesturing, and placed his hand comfortably on his lap.

"I've gone off on a tangent. I was young when the San Tu Factory changed its name, so I don't know much about it. I heard there was a conflict in the factory, and Yang Delin couldn't control it, so the county replaced him."

"But back then, the San Tu brand of underwear was so popular. They changed the brand name without even needing to change the manager. Did they still make underwear after that?"

"They stopped doing it later. I've thought about this issue too. Logically speaking, how much money did the San Tu factory make for the county every year back then? I heard... I heard..." The driver hesitated.

"What did you hear?"

"I've heard that something strange happens at that factory, but that's just hearsay."

"How exactly is it so strange?"

"I don't know the specifics, but I'm just thinking that the Three Rabbits image is something carved in the Twin Saints Temple, and it's been used so casually on clothes, even underwear, all kinds of panties and bras..."

Hehe, ghosts and gods are hard to say. If there really is a Great Sage Equal to Heaven, would he be happy?

“Well…” Wang Maoyuan smiled wryly, “That makes sense.”

"Are you looking for Yang Delin?" the driver asked.

"yes."

"Speaking of this factory, they changed its name and location. They moved six or seven years ago. It's hard to say how many people there would remember Yang Delin. But, as an old Shunchang resident, I do know which village he lives in." The driver turned and smiled at Wang Maoyuan.

This is about making business.

How far is it from here?

"It's about 30 or 40 kilometers. Taxis are cheap here, so it won't cost much. Don't worry, I won't take any longer routes for you."

"Okay, let's go then, but you'll have to take us to his house when we get to the village."

"No problem, you'll know once you get there. I won't charge you if his family isn't there. But don't blame me if Yang Delin isn't there."

"Okay, as long as we get to his house, I'll give you the fare whether he's there or not."

The driver stepped on the gas, and the car, which had been moving slowly, shot forward.

Wang Maoyuan turned around and smiled at us.

I gave him a thumbs-up. Fourteen minutes later, the car stopped in front of a two-story building.

“The Yang family lives right here,” the driver said. He had already gotten out of the car and asked several people in the village.

The fare was seventy-eight yuan, which was definitely worth it considering what I got out of him. I paid the fare before Wang Maoyuan could.

After we got out of the car, the driver waved to us and sped away. But his expression at the end was a little strange.

"Old Wang, you're really something," I said.

“In a small county like this, taxi drivers know best what to ask. But I didn’t expect him to bring us here directly.”

Liu Er had already rang the doorbell.

"Who is it?" came a woman's voice from inside.

"We're looking for Yang Delin."

"Who should I look for?"

"Yang Delin," I called out.

The door creaked open a crack, and a typical middle-aged, hardworking rural woman peeked out. She frowned, glared at us, and asked, "Who are you looking for?"

Was I wrong? I thought to myself, and said again, "We're looking for Yang Delin."

"Looking for him? What's your relationship with him?" The woman had no intention of opening the door wider.

This time, I can't just make up some relatives like I did with the driver before, otherwise Yang Delin will expose me as soon as he shows his face.

I was thinking of what to say when Wang Maoyuan took out his ID and handed it to me.

“We’re from Shanghai. I’m from the criminal investigation team. We’re here to find out some information from Yang Delin.”

I silently cheered in my heart. That straightforward approach left the other person with no way to refuse.

Once the criminal investigation team's sign is displayed, how many people can resist? Although there's some concern about alerting them, Wang Maoyuan must have thought this through carefully. Let's wait and see what he has to say, just like in the car earlier.

The woman glanced at the documents, handed them back to Wang Maoyuan, and frowned, saying, "Don't you know that Yang Delin died in a car accident last year?"

Dead?

I immediately understood the meaning behind the driver's strange expression at the end. When he got out of the car to ask for directions, someone must have told him that Yang Delin was dead. He was keeping it from us, afraid we would try to cheat him out of the fare.

"I'm his wife," the woman said, opening the door fully. "Let's talk inside." No wonder she'd been so guarded earlier. A husband dead for a year, and suddenly several men showing up at her door—wasn't that strange?

We sat down in the living room on the first floor, and the woman poured us tea. The furnishings in the house were like those of an ordinary, relatively well-off farming family; they weren't particularly luxurious.

“My husband had an accident on February 16th last year when he was driving to our new home in the city. He died on the way to the hospital. I kept saying that the village was fine, why did we have to move to the city? But he wouldn’t listen. He was just that stubborn, like an ox, no one could budge him.” A look of sorrow appeared on the woman’s face.

"What do you want with him?"

You know the Three Rabbits picture, right?

"Of course I know."

“A professional research institution has already studied this kind of image. The results show that looking at this image for a long time can have a negative impact on people’s emotions. Your husband used this image as a trademark for his underwear, and although more than 20 years have passed, we suspect that some users of the Three Rabbits brand underwear have been negatively affected. That’s why we sent me to investigate.”

"Oh, is that so?" The woman seemed a little flustered. "But Delin is dead."

"Don't worry, I'm just here to understand the situation and prevent this from happening again. I don't mean anything else. After all, this kind of underwear has been discontinued for a long time, and we won't bring up the past," Wang Maoyuan reassured her.

"Oh, oh," the woman murmured.

Do you know how Yang Delin came up with the idea of using this pattern for his underwear brand?

"He's loved this pattern since he was a child. He was chosen by the village to be the factory director, and he used this three-rabbit design because he's always liked it. He was absolutely obsessed with it. Later, when the three-rabbit underwear became popular, he said to me, 'Look, this design is truly amazing.'"

"So, Yang Delin knew about the magic of the Three Rabbits Painting a long time ago?"

"He thought it was something left behind by the gods, imbued with divine energy. He would always hold that precious stone and say, 'Look, this was drawn on by the gods with their fingers.'"

"What stone?" Wang Maoyuan frowned. This woman's words were incoherent.

"There was a large stone with a picture of three rabbits carved on it. He said it came from the Fairy Cave. I didn't know him at the time, so I don't know much about what happened."

"The Immortal Cave?" Unexpectedly, Yang Delin did not see the Three Rabbits picture in the Twin Saints Temple.

"It's the place now called Baxiandong (Eight Immortals Cave)."

"Eight Immortals Cave?" I remembered. "Is it under the cliff at Nantianmen, behind the waterfall? Aren't there eight caves there? Which one is it?"

"I don't know which one exactly, but it should be the deepest one."

"Do you know about the Eight Immortals Cave?" Wang Maoyuan asked me.

“I have interviewed about the Twin Saints Tomb. The Eight Immortals Cave and the Twin Saints Tomb are on the same mountain peak. It is said that there is a very deep cave, and no one has ever been able to reach the bottom.”

"Has Yang Delin ever been to the innermost part? What's there?" Wang Maoyuan asked the woman.

"I don't know if he went all the way in, but he said there were many stones carved with the image of three rabbits in the cave, and the deeper you went, the more there were. He used to love playing there when he was a child, but then there was an earthquake, and the passage in the cave was blocked. He remembered the image and figured out how to get a piece out of there. It was a really big piece, and I don't know how many of his younger brothers he got together to do it. Now you can't go into the cave anymore. After Yang Delin took out the stone, he broke the iron chain hanging down from the cliff. He said that the earthquake might have made the cave's owner unhappy, so he simply broke the iron chain so that no one would bother him anymore."

"Where's the stone? Let me see," Wang Maoyuan said.

“The stone is gone.” The woman’s eyes reddened. “Yang Delin was trying to move his precious stone to his new home when he got into a car accident on the way. He’s dead, and the stone flew onto the road. I didn’t have the heart to move it back. But I do know where the stone is now.”

"Is it the Twin Saints Temple?" I suddenly asked.

"You know about this?" The woman looked at me with surprise.

“I heard from people at the county cultural bureau that the big stone in Shuangsheng Temple was picked up from the side of the county road last year. I guessed it from what you said.”

“Yes, that’s the one. Let it lie in the Temple of the Two Saints,” the woman sighed.

"A tour guide even told me that the picture of the three rabbits on that rock was drawn by the Monkey King with his finger. I never imagined that it was something Yang Delin had been hiding all along." I was reminded of the nonsense that Tang Sanzang had told me back then.

"Yang Delin has kept it hidden for decades. Maybe it really was drawn by Sun Wukong. Who knows?" the woman said.

“The marks on that stone really do look like they were drawn with a finger,” I said to Wang Maoyuan with a smile.

Wang Maoyuan didn't show any surprise. I think he didn't take it to heart at all. Perhaps in his mind, it was just that the carving was more detailed.

"So, Yang Delin never went into the cave again after that?"

"The earthquake blocked the cave, and the iron chains broke, so we couldn't go in even if we wanted to. He likes to ponder the Three Rabbits picture when he has nothing to do, sometimes he looks at it for an hour, he's really addicted."

"Because it's addictive, the lingerie is also called 'Three Rabbits,' and they even used the image?"

"Yes. I still remember how carefully he was taking the rubbing off the stone, afraid of damaging it."

Wang Maoyuan looked at us. He had originally thought there might be something fishy about using the three rabbits design to make underwear, but now it seemed so simple.

"But why did the San Tu brand underwear suddenly stop after two years?" Wang Maoyuan continued to ask.

"It's all because of those people at the factory," the woman said bitterly.

"What kind of trouble are those people at the factory causing?"

“They…” The woman looked slightly confused, hesitant, as if what she wanted to say was something that even she found difficult to say.

Wang Maoyuan put on a stern face: "Although I'm just here to understand the situation, the premise is that you must answer honestly and tell me everything you know. You can't hide anything from the public security authorities!"

Wang Maoyuan emphasized the four words "public security organs".

"I'm not trying to hide anything." Hearing the mention of the police, the woman became somewhat flustered. "It's just that things were indeed a bit strange at the factory back then."

"It's okay, as long as you tell the truth."

"When the factory was small at first, nothing much happened. But then sales suddenly took off, and the number of female workers in the factory increased from a few dozen to a couple hundred, and then to five or six hundred. The wages in the surrounding area are very low, and most of the female workers were at home during the off-season. They were just doing nothing anyway, and they were very satisfied with six or seven yuan a month, so everyone wanted to come to the factory. At its peak, there were more than a thousand female workers. With so many people, things started to get a little strange in the factory. I often went to the factory, and there..." The woman paused and took a deep breath.

"Logically speaking, these are all women from the fields, many of whom are neighbors and know each other, so it's perfectly normal for them to chat while working. But in reality, in the workshop of thousands of square meters, all you can hear is the whirring of sewing machines. New female workers might chat sometimes, but after a while, they become like the veteran workers, just focused on making clothes and not talking at all. The atmosphere is so quiet it's frightening."

The most common effect of the Three Rabbits painting is to calm people down, and when many people are together, emotions can be contagious, so I can understand the quiet atmosphere in the Three Rabbits factory workshop. However, as someone directly involved, one might not feel it while in the factory, but after leaving the atmosphere, it feels strange in retrospect. And for others who happen to visit the workshop, it feels even more peculiar. "Originally, the factory was relatively quiet, and the workers didn't think much of it. But gradually, some women became less talkative at home, and their husbands became unhappy. Even worse, some couples, some couples..." The woman hesitated, unsure how to continue.

"Is there disharmony in your sex life?" Wang Maoyuan asked.

"Yes, how did you know?"