Chapter Eighty-Eight: The Strange List

Wu Cheng'an gathered up his backpack and turned to Zhang Qinglin. They had only just parted not long ago, yet in Zhang Qinglin's eyes he already seemed like a completely different person than before, perhaps because he was no longer pretending to be Dashuang.

"Why did you suddenly come to Beijing?" Zhang Qinglin asked as he picked up the purple teapot, slowly poured two cups of Dragon Well tea, and took one for himself.

The two of them sat at a square table in a private room on the second floor of Sky and Clouds, Blue Heaven. Wu Cheng'an's gaze drifted to the large tea table outside the room, where Chi Tan was sprawled across the tabletop while waiting for Jiang Xinyue to dab medicine on his cheek with a cotton swab.

"For my second uncle."

"Your second uncle? What happened to him?" Zhang Qinglin asked.

"He died. The way he died was strange."

A flash of insight passed through Zhang Qinglin's eyes. He set down the purple teapot, walked to the door, and closed it.

Jiang Xinyue had just finished packing away the medicine box when she heard Aunt Zhou calling her from downstairs. She patted Chi Tan and told him to go down and help.

After Zhang Qinglin shut the door and turned back, he felt deeply surprised, though Wu Cheng'an's second uncle had nothing to do with him and had once stolen from his family, leaving him with a hatred to the bone. Still, hearing that a man had suddenly died was shocking.

"Do you know about the Ghost Claw?"

"I think I've heard of it. How did your second uncle die?" Zhang Qinglin asked as he picked up the purple teapot again and poured tea into the cups.

The name Ghost Claw stirred a faint impression in Zhang Qinglin's mind.

He remembered chatting with a secondhand antiquarian bookseller in Panjiayuan, who had once mentioned it. According to that stall owner, there had been a mysterious organization in ancient times that used a special method: they refined parasitic insects and set them onto weapons, or let them come into direct contact with a person's skin. Then a terrifying claw would begin to grow on the surface of the skin, growing darker and darker until it worked its way into the bone, devouring the organs from within. The victim would die in agony.

Wu Cheng'an said that after he brought his second uncle back to Siyue County, one day Hu Ren suddenly came calling. He had come especially to see Wu Daoyi, and the two of them talked in the room about something, though it did not sound like anything good.

Only when Hu Ren took from his bag an antique wrapped in oiled paper did Wu Cheng'an realize they were discussing the sale of cultural relics. But things were not quite as he had imagined.

Three days after Hu Ren left, an odd mark like a tattoo appeared on his uncle's chest. Slowly, the chest began to change into the shape of a claw. The skin festered into scabs, then broke open again, and that claw grew deeper and deeper. In the end his organs seemed to be gnawed apart by insects until the flesh rotted down to the bone. The whole process took only six or seven days, and his uncle went from a healthy living man to a heap of rotten flesh and bones.

When his uncle first discovered the pattern, he told Wu Cheng'an that the Ghost Claw was a man-eating parasitic insect, bred and refined by a mysterious organization in the Miao region.

His uncle's sudden collapse like that must have had something to do with the Shang-dynasty beast-face bronze goblet Hu Ren had shown him. If Hu Ren had not been involved, then he had come only to pry information out of Wu Cheng'an's uncle.

Before he died, his uncle said that Hu Ren had to be found, and that bronze goblet had to be buried in the ground. Someone needed to break the curse, and it could not be allowed to harm anyone else. That was his uncle's last wish. Though he had spent his whole life cursed by the world, he still hoped to leave behind a decent name after death.

Afterward, Wu Cheng'an buried his uncle according to the family's customs and went to Fang County to ask about Hu Ren. There he learned that Hu Ren had gone to Shaanxi, so Wu Cheng'an rushed there at once. By the time he reached Shaanxi, he learned Hu Ren had come to Beijing, and so he chased after him without a moment's delay.

But Beijing was too vast. The moment he arrived, he got lost. Thinking it over, he decided it would be best to find Zhang Qinglin first, since he was someone familiar. He remembered Zhang Qinglin once mentioning Uncle Jiang's teahouse, so after asking around for the location, he made his way there. He never expected that before he even got to meet the people he came for, he would run into a fight.

"I'll tell you some bad news too." Zhang Qinglin stood up and continued, "Hu Ren is already dead. I saw it with my own eyes. He died right in front of me."

That was indeed bad news for Wu Cheng'an. He frowned. "Then did you see that bronze goblet?"

"No. But he was a drug dealer. I was even wondering whether he was about to tell me my father's whereabouts that day. Who would have thought he would suddenly be killed?" Zhang Qinglin said, shaking his head.

"How could that be? From what I found out, Hu Ren came to Beijing carrying the bronze goblet. But if you say he was a drug dealer, that doesn't make much sense." Wu Cheng'an's eyes were full of doubt.

Zhang Qinglin said, "That's what the police said. I even saw them take a packet of drugs out of the travel bag next to him."

"Then who killed him? Was the murderer caught?"

"The murderer wasn't caught. I think this was definitely set up to target me. Someone left a card telling me to meet at a club, but from the look in Hu Ren's eyes that day, he clearly had something he wanted to say to me. Before he could even open his mouth, he was dead."

"Something about this is indeed suspicious. As far as I know, Hu Ren and my second uncle had no real connection. Why would he harm my uncle? And another thing: Hu Ren had once been to the ancient tomb at Liulianli, and nobody knows where the bronze goblet in his hands came from." Thoughtfully, Wu Cheng'an set his teacup down on the square table.

"Whatever the case, we still need to find that bronze goblet as soon as possible. No one knows how many people the curse on it could harm."

Wu Cheng'an roughly sketched the appearance of the bronze goblet, and Zhang Qinglin took it to look over. He said he would show it to Uncle Jiang and to Cheng Che's father, and maybe they would be able to help.

Just then, Chi Tan came rushing upstairs in a panic and shoved open the private-room door, shouting, "Brother Qinglin, come quick and take a look. Someone downstairs is causing trouble. Sister Xinyue can't hold them off much longer!"

Causing trouble?

For so many years, Sky and Clouds, Blue Heaven had not exactly been a top-tier teahouse on this street, but its service had always been respectable.

Whether it was the tea leaves or the cups, everything was of upper-middle quality, and every incoming and outgoing batch had been carefully inspected. That was one of the teahouse rules set by Uncle Jiang.

Under ordinary circumstances, no one could really find any flaw. If you did not like the item and had not yet left the teahouse with it, you could return it. But once you had been out of the teahouse for a day and came back saying you no longer wanted it, then it could no longer be handled by ordinary return-or-exchange rules. Any merchant would know that.

Just as Zhang Qinglin reached the stairwell, he heard a voice from downstairs saying, "I'm not talking to you. Get the person in charge here."

"Bring your boss out."

When Zhang Qinglin came downstairs, he saw that several people had already gathered around the counter at the front entrance on the first floor to watch the excitement. Outside the doorway, passersby were also craning their necks to look in from the street.

Jiang Xinyue stood in front of the counter with one arm resting on it. Beside her elbow sat an opened four-piece tea set.

Aunt Zhou was inside the counter, head lowered as she searched for something. In front of Jiang Xinyue stood two men. Neither looked like locals from Beijing. One of them, in a black leather jacket, was unshaven and shouting at Jiang Xinyue in a rough, aggressive voice.

Beside him stood another man with a scar between his eyebrows, looking equally unfriendly, his mouth curled in a contemptuous sneer.

Jiang Xinyue naturally could not stand men like that. Her expression was hard and dark as she pointed at the tea set on the counter and said, "I already told you I'm the one handling things here right now. I already gave you the solution just now. If you think it's acceptable, we'll take it back at half the original price, and I'll make up the rest out of my own wages. But you won't agree to that, and even if you go see our boss, it'll still be the same. We won't refund the full amount."

"Little lady, that's not how you talk," the man said.

"Who are you calling little lady? Don't call me that." Jiang Xinyue glared at him, her big eyes flashing with anger.

"Anyone can tell you don't know how to do business. Hurry up and call your boss out. It's not just this one tea set we bought! If you don't settle this today, don't expect this teahouse to stay open." The scar-faced man took a threatening step forward.

Zhang Qinglin lifted his chin and strode over, firmly pushing the scar-faced man's arm back to signal him to step aside.

Chi Tan and Wu Cheng'an followed him downstairs as well. Chi Tan hurried to Jiang Xinyue's side and quietly asked how things were going.

Jiang Xinyue tilted her head, gave Chi Tan a faint smile, and lightly ruffled his disheveled hair.

Zhang Qinglin stood in front of Jiang Xinyue, looked the two outsiders up and down, then clasped his hands behind his back and said to them, "You two don't look like locals. Whatever the matter is, tell me. I can think of a way to help you settle it."

"You're the boss?"

"Whether I am or not, what difference does it make? Isn't what you want simply to resolve the current problem? As long as it's taken care of, isn't that enough? Why insist on seeing the boss?" Zhang Qinglin glanced at the scar-faced man.

"Fine. If you're the one who makes the decisions, then we can talk." said the scar-faced man.

"Of course. Then please explain the situation again."

The scar-faced man turned slightly and gave the man in the leather jacket a look. The man in the leather jacket reached into the bag tucked under his arm, took out a receipt, and handed it over.

The scar-faced man took the receipt and held it up before Zhang Qinglin. It was a purchase invoice. Zhang Qinglin saw the teahouse's name written clearly in black and white: Sky and Clouds, Blue Heaven.

Several items were listed on it, and the quantities were not small either, about ten of each. They were all fairly expensive goods: teacups, four-piece tea sets, and two or three kinds of famous tea. The payee's name was Zhou Jie's, and the person responsible for confirmation was Zhang Qinglin.

The date was somewhat blurred, but it looked to be more than a month old.

Zhang Qinglin froze for a moment. He had no memory of this purchase receipt at all, yet when he looked at the signature, he could confirm it was indeed his own handwriting.

After glancing over it, he handed it to Jiang Xinyue so she could look too. Jiang Xinyue took it and examined it, shocked. She had clearly not expected such a large order. The receipt was indeed from their family teahouse.

"Among them, there are fifteen sets of Ru-ware tea cups. Ten of those fifteen sets have problems with the bottoms of the cups, and there is also a long scratch inside each one. They are simply unusable. The other goods also have issues. Either refund us in full, or replace the defective ones," the scar-faced man said.

As soon as Zhang Qinglin heard that, he immediately turned around to inspect the tea set on the counter. Jiang Xinyue also leaned over toward Zhang Qinglin and whispered, "I already checked it. This really is from our teahouse. There's even a mark I drew on the outside of the box. But I have no recollection of this receipt at all. Are they deliberately looking for trouble?"

Zhang Qinglin picked up a teacup, swept a sharp glance over the bottom, then lightly rubbed it with his finger. The cup indeed had a problem. Looking again at the scratch inside, he saw it was not something newly made; it stretched a good distance, all the way to the rim, and was extremely unsightly. This tea set style was sold on consignment by only their teahouse in Beijing, but Zhang Qinglin would never have overlooked such a thing in inspection. He shot a glance toward Aunt Zhou behind the counter.

Aunt Zhou also looked bewildered and at a loss. She picked up the ledgers they usually used for incoming and outgoing goods and flipped through several of them before finally finding a page to show Zhang Qinglin and Jiang Xinyue.

Looking at the lines in the notebook, Aunt Zhou said in surprise, "Xiaolin, this isn't my handwriting. Look."

Zhang Qinglin nodded and turned to the scar-faced man. "Sir, why don't we go upstairs and sit for a while, taste the pu'er tea we just got in, and talk this over slowly? I'll explain exactly how this can be handled."

Who would have thought the man would show him no face at all? The scar-faced man said angrily, "We still have things to do. We won't be drinking tea. Here's what we'll do: you come with us to see the goods. What can be returned, you return; what can be exchanged, you exchange. There's nothing else to discuss. If you agree, we'll leave now. If you don't... then don't expect your teahouse to do any decent business today."

When Zhang Qinglin saw that posture, he knew that if this matter was not settled today, they would probably smash the teahouse.