Ji Yunshu glanced at Jing Rong before turning back and walked to the corpse and squatted. She spoke in a relaxed manner, “Under the victim’s nails, apart from Little Zhao’s skin, there are fragments of fabric. The fabric itself doesn’t appear to be of coarse material. Instead, it looks like it was made from silk. After observing this room, I have not found anything made out of silk. Besides, silk is a luxurious material and not something affordable to Little Zhao. When you look at the ligature mark on the victim, it does not look like it was caused by a rope. He must have been strangled by a silk cloth from the shape and delineate on the neck. The bruise is not evenly discolored. The victim must have struggled and grabbed onto the murder weapon which explains the silk under his nails.”
“Moreover, the ligature mark is slanting downward. The deceased is around 1.65 meters tall. This means that the murderer is certainly below that height and explains why the ligature is slanting downward. However, Little Zhao is around 1.70 meters tall.”
“According to the murder weapon and the murderer’s height, Little Zhao is unlikely to be the culprit.” Her eyes shone with wisdom and intelligence, and within that, confidence could be seen.
After everyone heard her explanation, the whole room fell into silence. They watched her with unbelievable eyes. ‘Where did this girl come from?’
Little Zhao twisted and struggled as he yelled his innocence, “Let me go! I told you I didn’t kill anyone!”
“Stay still!” The runners holding him didn’t have good tempers.
Ji Yunshu was about to get up when she discovered something at the corner of the deceased’s mouth. She immediately grabbed the handkerchief that she left next to the corpse and used it to pick up the thing in the corpse’s mouth.
‘A strand of hair!’
“The murderer is a woman?” muttered Ji Yunshu.
Although she muttered, people still heard her.
Constable Zhang asked, “A woman? How could it be? The victim is a man. How can he be killed by a woman shorter than him? Not to mention hanged to the ceiling beam?”
“There should be some logic behind it.”
Ji Yunshu got up and walked to Little Zhao. She then bluntly asked him, “Truthfully answer my questions. When you came in to steal, what did you do? Did you see anything? What was the situation of the victim at that time?”
“Hey!”
Bam!
Constable Zhang hit Little Zhao with the hilt of his blade and yelled at him, “Quickly talk!”
“I’ll talk! I’ll talk!” After suffering from some pain, he quickly tried to remember before he started to confess, “At that time, I came to deliver his meal. When I went in, I didn’t see him. Who would have known he was lying on the floor. When I checked, he was still breathing at that time. I-I thought he had only fainted, so when I saw the jade thumb ring on him, I became greedy. That’s why I dared to steal his ring. But who would have thought that he would suddenly wake up and grab my hands. At that time, I was terrified, so I pushed him and he fainted again. I took that opportunity to escape. It’s the truth! This is how it really happened! Other than that, I didn’t do anything else!”
“Are you certain that there was only him in the room at that time?”
“S-should be… I’m sure.”
“Something is amiss. Could it be that before you went inside, there was maybe already someone else? So, at that time, there should have been three people including the victim,” speculated Ji Yunshu.
Constable Zhang was astonished. “Three people?”
Ji Yunshu pointed at the table. “On this table, there are three cups of tea. Don’t tell me that you didn’t notice that when you came in? Why would there be three cups if there is only one person?”
‘That’s true when you look at it!’ Apart from Ji Yunshu, almost no one else took notice of this point.