False evidence

Chapter 185 Jiang Baohan

What Uncle Cheng did after he went out that night was quite disgraceful.

He first ran to a nearby house, and through the back window, he heard the elderly couple still awake, rambling on about what to do next.

Uncle Cheng was decisive. Remembering the old man in red's words, he didn't think twice and sneaked over the wall into the house, entering the kitchen.

Seeing a kettle sitting on the stove, he immediately poured two pills from a porcelain bottle and put them in.

The elderly couple probably got thirsty from talking all night, so they boiled water to drink.

They both fell asleep immediately after drinking the water.

Uncle Cheng pushed the two men to their feet, but they didn't wake up. He immediately began to ransack the house, burning everything that could be burned, including books and paintings, and setting fire to the kitchen stove.

Vases and other ornaments that cannot be burned and are not commonly seen in ordinary households were all thrown into the well in the yard.

After doing all this, he searched again to make sure there were no other 'eyesore' objects before leaving the house.

Then, they went straight to the clinic in the village.

At that time, the village clinic only had that short-haired man in a white coat.

Uncle Cheng knocked on the door, startling the man in the white coat. He saw it was him through the crack in the door and asked him warily what he wanted.

Uncle Cheng said directly, "Go home quickly! Something has happened at your home!"

The doctor in the white coat panicked as soon as he heard this, opened the door and hurriedly ran home.

Taking this opportunity, Uncle Cheng once again 'raided' the clinic.

The doctor in the white coat was the only doctor at the village clinic. Nowadays, he usually had to work night shifts as well, which was considered an emergency.

The clinic was like a second home to her, and it contained many of her personal belongings.

Uncle Cheng's 'sweep' was even more thorough this time; besides the medicines, he destroyed almost everything in the clinic using various methods.

The next day, the man in the white coat arrived at Uncle Cheng's house, about to start a fight, when chaos broke out outside.

The man in the white coat was stunned by the commotion for a moment before Uncle Cheng knocked him unconscious.

Immediately afterwards, Uncle Cheng took scissors and cut her originally neat hair into a complete mess.

The chaos in this rural area lasted for a period of time that was neither long nor short.

After the chaos subsided, the doctor in the white coat still went to the clinic every day to see patients, but his attitude was not as enthusiastic as before.

The contents of these three pages of letter have essentially come to an end.

But there is a line at the end that was clearly added later—"On a certain day of a certain month of a certain year, she and I finally got married."

……

"Did you understand?" Pidan asked me.

"Nonsense, anyone who understands that period of history will find the second half easy to understand."

As I spoke, I opened the envelope labeled 'Number Two'.

Both are three pages of letter paper, written horizontally with a fountain pen, and both are in Cheng Shu's handwriting, but the handwriting is much neater.

However, the contents of the three letters are of varying lengths, indicating that they were not written at the same time and are not coherent.

On the first page I looked at, the first line only had three words written on it—"Guardian snake".

There is also a saying about snakes in China.

I've heard my grandfather and the village elders say since I was a child that if you find a snake in your house or in front of or behind the house, you shouldn't kill it, because it's a guardian of the house, and injuring or killing it will ruin the family's fortune.

It is said that in the north, there are seventy-two wild immortals and five evil immortals.

Among them, fox, weasel, white willow, and fox spirits are often worshipped by some families as guardian deities.

The character '柳' in this context is also said to be '常', which refers to a snake.

Could the red snake that once lived on the roof beam and bit me have been the guardian spirit worshipped by the original owner of the house?
The first page of the letter contained only these contents. After reading it, Pidan said, "Uncle Cheng's two experiences when he was young are too strange to anyone. If it were me, after my life stabilized and conditions allowed, I would also want to find out the truth."

"Well, the internet wasn't popular back then, so he must have put in a lot of effort to find Si Manqing."

As I spoke, I turned to the second page.

This page also begins with three characters, but it's a person's name—Jiang Baohan.

This should also be information that Uncle Cheng found later.

This Jiang Baohan should be the original owner of this house.

They were just an ordinary family, but then someone reported them, saying that the Jiang family had been tomb raiders since their ancestors.

As a result, Jiang Baohan was arrested and imprisoned, and his whereabouts have been unknown ever since.

That's all for the first part.

The latter half, however, is quite messy.

It's not that Cheng Shu's account is chaotic, but it's clear that these are all materials about Jiang Baohan obtained from different sources.

When Uncle Cheng recounted these events, those who were of the same generation as Jiang Baohan, even if still alive, were already quite old, or even senile.

So the second half looks like a bunch of old men gathered together, each saying something in turn...

“Jiang Baohan, I remember he was the only son in three generations.”

"Jiang Baohan, is he still alive?"

"Jiang Baohan deserves to be thrown into jail! His ancestors have been digging up graves for generations. In the Qing Dynasty, that would have been a death sentence by a thousand cuts!"

……

I was so shocked by what I saw that my head was spinning.

I don't know what use Uncle Cheng has for recording all this.

Suddenly, Century Egg pointed to a line and said, "Look here."

I looked in the direction she was pointing, and that line read:
—I remember when I was little, we dug up two clay dolls from the mountains. Jiang Baohan saw them and snatched them away. He even kowtowed to the two clay dolls. I was too young to understand then, but now I know those two dolls were probably antiques. He was probably able to marry such a beautiful wife later on because he sold those two treasures for a high price…

I was initially both amused and exasperated, but when I inadvertently saw the next line, I felt a sudden, intense shock, as if I had been electrocuted.

"I remember, his wife's surname was Tong, wasn't it?"

Pidan asked me, "Speaking of clay dolls, I'm reminded of the one that Clay Figure Li sculpted for me. Was Jiang Baohan still a child then? How could he be kowtowing to a clay doll?"

My mind was in turmoil at this point. I skimmed through the third page, and it only made things worse.

I forced myself to calm down, thought for a moment, and tore out the last few lines from the third page.

Then he said to Pidan, "We can't figure this out just by thinking about it. Let's go back and ask Shen San and Lu Zelin for their opinions."

"Where is the third letter?"

I shook my head: "Didn't you see the piece I tore off?"

"I hadn't even seen it before you tore it up!"

"Alright... Now listen, you can take the first and second letters to discuss with Shen San and the others, but for the third letter... it's best not to open it for now."

Pidan nodded: "What's wrong? Why do you suddenly seem scared?"

Yes, I'm starting to feel a bit scared.

Because the second page of the second letter conveyed a message that seemed to confirm my previous thoughts.

Jiang Baohan was the original owner of this house, and he had a beautiful wife.

His beautiful wife, who was also the original owner of the house, was surnamed Tong!
(End of this chapter)