Card Room

Chapter 72: Extremely Quick Train 5 – Death of Li Zhemin

Once they discovered that Li Zhemin was dead, the other three old men in the same room immediately started to scream.

The shrill screams alarmed the other passengers in the same carriage and the remaining eight elderly people of the tour group ran over.

The old lady who had dinner with Li Zhemin yesterday nervously touched his body. “Old Li, wake up, wake up!” The other two old ladies next to her wondered, “What’s going on?” “What’s wrong with Old Li?” “Oh my god, he isn’t waking up for so long. Surely he isn’t dead?”

Hearing the word ‘dead’, the elderly people were shocked and whispered to each other. Some even took a step forward and removed the quilt of the deceased to check the situation.

Yu Hanjiang stated, “Everyone, please go outside and don’t move the body!”

The train attendant’s face was extremely serious and his voice was as frightening as thunder. Yu Hanjiang’s sharp eyes swept through the crowd and they automatically took a step back with white faces. They left Room 2 and created a path for Yu Hanjiang.

Yu Hanjiang strode into Room 2 and quickly swept a glance over the scene of the crime.

The coats and caps of the four people in the tour group were hung from the hangers of the top and bottom bunks. The three beds 2B, 2C and 2D were slightly messy because the old people just got up. However, Li Zhemin’s 2A bed was extraordinarily neat.

Yu Hanjiang removed the quilt. Li Zhemin had changed into a set of plaid pyjamas and the clothes were neat. He obviously hadn’t fought with people nor were there any signs of struggle. He had been killed in his sleep and even at the moment of death, Li Zhemin was smiling like he was dreaming, his face extraordinarily quiet.

Most people over 60 years old slept very lightly and it was easy for them to wake up. There were some who found it hard to sleep in the middle of the night.

Room 2 had four elderly people and once one of them was awake, the risk of the murderer being found was very high. Apparently, the murderer knew these old people’s habits very known and confirmed that everyone fell asleep before moving.

It was reasonable to infer that it was easier for the three people staying in the same room as Li Zhemin to commit a crime. It was because they could always observe whether other and Li Zhemin was sleeping to ensure they wouldn’t be found.

Still, they couldn’t completely exclude the possibility of the elderly people in Rooms 1 and 3 from committing the crime. After all, they were colleagues for many years. They knew each other very well and often travelled together. They would be aware of who had insomnia, who was sleeping and who was snoring.

The tour guide Qin Shiyue was washing up. She heard the cries from inside the carriage, hurriedly washed her face with a towel, put it back in her washing bag and quickly ran back.

She saw that the door of Room 2 was surrounded by a group of people and nervously asked a familiar old lady, “Zhang Yi, what’s going on?” The old lady pointed to Room 2 and explained, “Old Li seems to be dead…”

Qin Shiyue’s expression changed and she quickly walked past. She found that the crew member of the 6th carriage was checking the situation of the deceased.

She came to the door and the other person just looked up.

His eyes were cold and sharp enough to pierce the bottom of people’s hearts. Qin Shiyue was startled by his cold eyes and took a deep breath to adjust her mood before asking in a quivering voice, “U-Uncle Li is really dead? What is going on here?”

The people around her shook their heads. “I don’t know.”

The bald old man suddenly said, “Is it a heart attack? I remember that Old Li was at risk of a heart attack!”

An old man next to him echoed. “Yes, Old Li has high blood pressure and had a heart disease for many years. His bed was originally on the upper bunk but he was worried his disease would strike in the middle of the night and he specifically changed beds with me.”

Another old man said, “He took his medicine on time every day and had surgery on his heart previously. It was said he got a stent!”

The three men who mentioned the heart disease were the old men who lived in Li Zhemin’s room.

Yu Hanjiang ignored their wild guesses and whispered, “Little Qin, can I trouble you to go to the 4th carriage and call the attendant there to come.”

Qin Shiyue nodded with a pale face and quickly headed to the 4th carriage.

Once she arrived at the 4th carriage, she came across Xiao Lou who was heading to this side. Qin Shiyue hurriedly wondered, “Hello, are you the attendant of the 4th carriage? The attendant of the 6th carriage asked you to come over!”

Xiao Lou nodded politely and strode to the 6th carriage.

The 6th carriage had so much activity in the early morning. There might be the dining carriage between them but Xiao Lou still heard the screams. The passengers of the 4th carriage also looked over curiously.

It must be a problem with Group Leader Yu’s carriage. Xiao Lou had immediately headed there only to encounter the guide.

Xiao Lou asked as he walked, “What’s going on?”

Qin Shiyue’s face was as white as paper. “Our group… there was an old man who suddenly died. My god, there was such a big accident. I’ll definitely be fired by the travel agency when I go back!”

Xiao Lou whispered words of comfort. “Don’t worry, if it is murder then the responsibility isn’t with you. The travel agency will probably reconsider so I hope you can cooperate with our investigation.”

Qin Shiyue’s eyes bulged with disbelief. “M-Murder? Didn’t Uncle Li have a heart attack?”

Seeing this girl’s expression, Xiao Lou couldn’t help feeling sympathy. She was a just graduated university student who travelled with a group of elderly people. She was cautious the entire way and took due diligence, only for someone to suddenly die. This wasn’t an ordinary blow for her and perhaps she would be punished when she went back.

Xiao Lou told her, “It isn’t possible to draw any conclusions yet. Wait until we check before we can determine the cause of death. Little Qin, you should first sort out the information of the tour group, including the form they filled in when they signed up for the travel agency. We’ll find you later.”

Qin Shiyue looked complicated. “G-Good…”

Xiao Lou soon arrived at the 6th carriage and found a group of old people looking panicked around Room 2.

The family of four in Room 4 also heard the movements and popped out their heads. The three year old child who inhaled the raisin yesterday asked, “Mum, what’s wrong? Why are the grandparents there? Is there anything interesting? I want to see it too!”

The woman had heard the surrounding comments about a dead person and her expression changed. She immediately carried the child back. “No, don’t go out. Let’s stay in the room and watch cartoons, okay?”

In Room 5, a passenger had got off yesterday and Mo Jiaran changed over to sleep there.

The noise outside had woken her up and her anger was very serious. She opened the door with a dark expression and loudly called out, “What are you doing in the early morning that doesn’t let people sleep? Can’t you keep down the noise?”

An old lady told her, “Girl, someone died in Room 2…”

Mo Jiaran’s face suddenly paled and she tried to run to the 4th carriage like a frightened cat. Xiao Lou stopped her. “No one is allowed to leave.”

Mo Jiaran pointed to Room 2 in a trembling manner. “My god, there is a dead person over there! I don’t want to stay in the 6th carriage…”

Xiao Lou opened the door of Room 5 and smiled. “Go back in.”

Mo Jiaran’s face was white and she refused to cooperate.

Xiao Lou told her, “Don’t be afraid. It will be safer in your room.”

The faces of the other people became a big ugly at Xiao Lou’s words and Mo Jiaran reluctantly returned to her room.

Xiao Lou turned around and locked the door of the connecting carriages.

Yu Hanjiang heard his voice and tacitly called out from Room 2. “Carriage 6th is temporarily closed. Everyone, please return to your rooms. We need to investigate every passenger. Thank you for your cooperation.”

An old lady asked, “What do you need to investigate? Old Li obviously had a heart attack and died suddenly.”

Someone else spat out, “What can you find out? Are you planning to do an autopsy?”

Xiao Lou smiled. “Yes, we will do an autopsy.”

The old man was frightened.

Xiao Lou stated, “Everyone, please don’t panic and return to your room. The three people in Room 2, I will trouble you to wait in the corridor.”

He and Yu Hanjiang glanced at each other and nodded. They walked into Room 2 together, closed the door and isolated the room from outside gazes.

If there wasn’t a medical-related profession among the challengers, it would be impossible for them to judge the cause of Li Zhemin’s death. At this time, they should go to the 4th carriage and invite the doctor ‘NPC’ Jing Weiguang to come over.

Xiao Lou and Yu Hanjiang didn’t need Dr Jing’s help. Xiao Lou’s autopsy was more professional than Dr Jing.

Yu Hanjiang consciously stepped back and made space for Xiao Lou.

Xiao Lou put on a pair of clothes, leaned over to open the dead man’s clothing and examined the body.

Yu Hanjiang said, “The tour group just said that Li Zhemin’s heart wasn’t good and he had heart surgery.”

Xiao Lou immediately took off the deceased’s pants and indeed saw traces of the surgery on the thigh. He explained, “The stent placement surgery is generally used for coronary artery disease.”

He pointed to the traces on the thigh. “Group Leader Yu, look here, the victim’s right leg has a surgical scar. The doctor inserted the stent through the femoral artery’s vascular channel and into the heart’s blood vessels. This type of surgery was very common and have a high success rate. The implanted stent propped open the narrow blood vessels and the patient’s heart blood flow will return to normal.”

Xiao Lou examined the deceased’s face, pupils, muscles and skin, followed by the conclusion, “He didn’t die of a sudden heart attack. The body spots of patients who die of sudden heart disease are generally a dark purple-red. Due to the large number of organs in the body with congested tissue, rigor is too fast. There will also be significant scattered bleeding. Li Zhemin’s situation doesn’t match this.”

He carefully observed the details of the deceased’s nails, oral mucous membranes and other areas. “The possibility of poisoning isn’t very high.”

It wasn’t a heart attack or poisoning. There weren’t any stab wounds or impact wounds. LI Zhemin’s death was simply unknown. It was like the old man died naturally in his sleep.

Yu Hanjiang frowned slightly. “Can you speculate on the cause of death?”

Xiao Lou was silent for a moment as he carefully observed the deceased’s navel area and upper arms. “Group Leader Yu, he has many needle marks.”

Yu Hanjiang was slightly stunned. “Did he take drugs?”

Xiao Lou shook his head. “It might be left by injecting medicine.” He opened the door and asked the three men standing there. “Did Li Zhemin have any medical history besides heart disease? For example… diabetes?”

The three people glanced at each other before one of them suddenly exclaimed. “I think so! He had high blood pressure, high blood lipids and high blood sugar. Old Li previously mentioned that all three are so high that he has to eat vegetarian food or something.”

Xiao Lou glanced at Yu Hanjiang. “Search Li Zhemin’s luggage.”

Yu Hanjiang nodded and took Li Zhemin’s bag from the luggage rack. It contained several magazines and some medicine.

Old Li was like a medicine seller. There were a dozen bottles of medicine in the bag. Yu Hanjiang didn’t know what these medicine were and poured them on the bed for Xiao Lou to see.

Xiao Lou examined them from the side while introducing them to Group Leader Yu, “This bottle is antihypertensive medicine. These two bottles are used to soften the blood vessels. This is for diastolic blood vessels and this is a gastric mucosa protection agent.”

Xiao Lou explained the functions of the medicine and the surrounding elderly people were stunned.

An old man exclaimed with shock, “Are the current train attendants so strong? You know medicine?”

Xiao Lou didn’t explain and whispered to Yu Hanjiang, “There is no insulin.”

Yu Hanjiang closed the door and shut out the curious old people outside.

“Patients with diabetes must carry insulin with them when travelling for long periods of time and take it at a certain time every day to control their blood sugar,” Xiao Lou stated.

He looked back at the medicine on the bed. “Li Zhemin’s bag has many messy medicines like antihypertensive drugs. He must take them every day. However, the most important insulin isn’t in his bag. This is absolutely unreasonable.”

Yu Hanjiang didn’t know enough about medicine and couldn’t help asking, “Did the murderer steal it? Can insulin kill people?”

Xiao Lou nodded. “Originally, insulin is life-saving medicine. This can solve many diabetic problems and can lower blood sugar. However, if the insulin injection is excessive, the body will have sugar metabolism problems. Blood sugar is consumed and falls to a very low number. The brain tissue will suffer irreversible damage, resulting in a coma, fainting and unknowingly dying in their sleep.”

Yu Hanjiang’s expression sank.

In this way, Li Zhemin’s death was clearly related to an insulin overdose.

Fortunately, Xiao Lou was professional enough to quickly determine the cause of death. The several injection marks around the navel and upper arms indicated that Li Zhemin used long-term injections of insulin to control blood sugar levels. Yet his backpack was missing insulin. Li Zhemin died peacefully in his sleep without any signs of death. He must’ve been injected with a large amount of insulin, dropping his blood sugar to the limit.

Yu Hanjiang couldn’t help thinking that efficiency was really high with a forensic doctor. It took less than half an hour to determine the cause of death.

He looked at Xiao Lou with admiration. “Since the murderer injected Li Zhemin with a lot of insulin, it is likely that the insulin LI Zhemin carried has been used up. In order to avoid the perception that something is wrong, the best thing to do is to dispose of the insulin bottles and syringes.”

The insulin dose that could be carried was limited and the murderer would have to inject it all in one breath to kill Li Zhemin. If his insulin was suddenly empty then a search of the luggage would certainly raise suspicions. Group Leader Yu’s speculation was reasonable. The killer must’ve disposed of the crime tools.

Xiao Lou suggested, “Shall we search the trash cans?”

Yu Hanjiang nodded.

The two people walked to the door together and opened the bin at the end of the carriage. They quickly searched through the strange smell of food.

The entire garbage bin was searched and no traces of the bottles and syringes were found.

Xiao Lou whispered, “Did the murderer throw them away on other carriages? However, if they happened to bump into people going to the toilet in the middle of the night, traces would be left behind.”

Yu Hanjiang frowned. “The murderer is so cautious and shouldn’t rush to an unfamiliar carriage to throw away the garbage.”

Suddenly, he found a meal box. The meal box was tightly sealed and on the surface, the person throwing it into the bin was very hygienic. The cover was tight and prevented any soup from spilling out.

Then when Yu Hanjiang opened the box, Xiao Lou was surprised to find—

There was a syringe in the box as well as several drained insulin bottles.

The two men glanced at each other. They had completed the post-mortem examination and inquired about the medical history.

The next step was to find the killer!