"P-Officer Baihe?"
In the dark cemetery, there was only the light of two flashlights. The gravekeeper kept bending down to pick up the flashlight and turned to look at the boy who made the same move as him.
A gust of night wind blew by, and there seemed to be a chill in the air.
It seemed that he was frightened by the boy's sudden move. The expression on the gravekeeper's face was quite panic at this moment. If it were not for the cover of darkness, he felt that he would be immediately exposed to the young police officer next to him, right?
The gravekeeper was lucky. Even so, the actual situation was actually pretty much what he thought.
After smelling the same unknown pungent odor on the gravekeeper's body as on Mr. Muraki's body at noon, the boy had roughly figured out the ins and outs of this case.
"No need for that, I can do it myself."
The gentle smile appeared on the boy's face again, but it was a pity that he couldn't see clearly in the dark night. With a little force, he took his flashlight from the tombkeeper's hand and stood up immediately.
Beside him, the tombkeeper also stood up, looking uneasy and nervous.
"H-I'm sorry, Officer Baihe, it's me, it's me..."
"It's just that I dropped my flashlight. Why are you so nervous all of a sudden?"
Without looking at him again, the boy patted the dust on the flashlight and said:
"You didn't throw away my flashlight, so what are you afraid of?"
"I, I'm just a little nervous. After all, you are the police, haha..." Forcing himself to calm down quickly, the tombkeeper laughed.
"Nervous? Why do you sound like you've committed some crime?"
After laughing, the boy turned on his flashlight and continued walking out of the cemetery. Behind him, the tombkeeper quickly followed, but as before, he deliberately kept a certain distance from the boy.
"You haven't broken any laws before, right?" The boy said in a normal tone, chatting with him casually.
"This, this is not the case!"
The tombkeeper quickly explained after hearing this. His tone that had finally calmed down now seemed a little flustered.
"Officer Baihe, don't think too much. I, I'm just a cemetery caretaker. Even if I want to break the law, there's no place to do it..."
"It sounds true, but...it hasn't been long since the war, especially during the war and the turbulent period of post-war reconstruction. There are often lawless people who take advantage of the police's inability to catch them. A criminal commits a crime and gets away with it.
There are countless unsolved cases from that period. In the past few years, I have been looking through such files stored in the Metropolitan Police Department, and I have solved many of them.
Some people always think that if they can hide for a while, they can hide for the rest of their lives. There are even some arrogant and ignorant fools who always think that they can deceive the police by just using two flawless tricks. They are really stupid...
As everyone knows, in the eyes of those who are truly determined and perseverant to investigate these things, their little tricks are nothing more than 'animals turning into deceit, only to increase their laughter'..."
Having said this, the boy suddenly turned to look at the tombkeeper beside him, got closer to him, and then raised his hand to pat his shoulder.
When he heard the boy's words that seemed to mean something, the gravekeeper was already frightened. He was not sure whether the boy had already investigated some key information, or whether he just happened to say it casually. .
And the boy's last tap made him tremble subconsciously.
"so……"
In the dark night, it seemed that he was completely unaware of the changes in the tombkeeper. The boy put his hand on his shoulder and smiled in a gentle tone:
"Mr. Gravekeeper, if you have done similar things before, it would be better to surrender to the police as soon as possible. This way you can at least get a lighter sentence, which is better than being found out by the police..."
"Police officer Baihe..."
"Just say it casually, just as a joke, don't take it too seriously."
At some point, both of them had already walked outside the cemetery, and the boy took back the hand on his shoulder.
"But I also mean it sincerely. If there are people in similar situations around you, please advise them to come over and surrender."
"Officer Baihe, I..."
After saying that, the boy turned around and left without waiting for the tombkeeper's reply.
"It's late at night, so be careful where you step, don't step into a hole and sprain your foot."
"..."
Early the next morning, the boy was not in a hurry to continue investigating the case. Instead, he went to a hospital in the city first.
He only heard that Keiko Hatoyama was hospitalized yesterday after he returned from the cemetery last night.
It is said that a medical team invited from abroad arrived and needed to treat Keiko Hatoyama for two days. Keiko Hatoyama was admitted directly to the hospital in order to receive diagnosis and treatment more conveniently.
This was not a very serious matter, but because the boy had been busy investigating the case yesterday, and Hatoyama Keiko did not want to affect the progress of the boy's investigation because of her own incident, so she did not take the initiative to tell him .
As for Karasuma, who knew about it, she simply understood the inner thoughts of Hatoyama Keiko, and she was too excited to investigate with the boy, so she forgot about it...
Therefore, early the next morning, the boy went to the hospital first.
He could have gone last night, but he came back late last night. Because he didn't want to disturb Keiko Hatoyama's rest, he waited until this morning.
"Xiao Qing, you left the case that needs to be investigated early in the morning and came to see your fiancée. This is not what a good and conscientious police officer should do..."
In the dedicated single ward, Hatoyama Keiko looked at Kaori sitting on the bed, put down the book she was half-reading, turned to look at the boy sitting beside the bed, and sighed softly.
"It's not time to go to work yet." The boy slowly peeled the apple in his hand and replied.
"You have to go to the police job when necessary. There are no fixed working hours." Hatoyama Keiko corrected.
"But no one in the Metropolitan Police Department is calling me over now, which means I can at least wait until the stipulated working hours before going."
The boy in turn defeated her, almost making Hatoyama Keiko angry.
That's right, as the grandson-in-law of the Hatoyama family, no one in the Police Department except Mr. Hatoyama dared to let the boy work overtime. Everything depended on his own volition.
Not to mention... the boy is not actually a real policeman at the moment, and there is no question of whether he can go to work or not.
"Glib tongue..."
"It's about knowing right from wrong."
As the boy spoke, he cut off a small piece of the apple with the fruit knife in his hand and handed it to Keiko Hatoyama.
"Hmph." Hatoyama Keiko opened her mouth and ate the small piece of apple without ceremony, and said:
"It's useless to talk to you. Let's talk about it. How was the investigation of yesterday's case? Is there anything you need my help with?"
(˙ー˙)
(End of chapter)
