Yang Qiuchi took the account book, but he was not in a hurry to look through it, and asked the shopkeeper Jiang: "Do you remember this incident when the Zhang family came to your pharmacy to buy arsenic?" ”

"Little remember." The ginger shopkeeper replied with a huff.

Yang Qiuchi was a little strange and asked, "Do you remember that so many people come to buy medicine every year?" ”

The shopkeeper Jiang said with a smiling face: "Then how can it." It's just that this arsenic trade is different from others, firstly, the government has requirements, and those who buy and sell arsenic must pay attention, and secondly, there are not many people who buy arsenic every year. Speaking of which, I glanced at Old Lady Yang and didn't say anything.

Old lady Yang snorted in her nose and didn't open her mouth.

Yang Qiuchi frowned: "What are you doing, it's spitting." ”

Shopkeeper Jiang was a little embarrassed, and he opened his mouth to say but was embarrassed to say it. Seeing that Yang Qiuchi's face was warm, he didn't dare to hide it anymore, took a step forward, leaned into Yang Qiuchi's ear, and said softly: "This Zhang family was the red card of Yingtianfu Qinglou in the early years, and the villain ran to Yingtianfu and saw her in Qinglou, so I know." ”

Although the voice was small, Old Lady Yang still heard it, and snorted again in her nose, with some displeasure on her face, but she didn't say anything.

Only then did Yang Qiuchi understand that it turned out that this second aunt was born in the Qinglou, and it was also a red card, and after the old lady Yang fell in love with her, he ransomed her and accepted her as a concubine. No wonder this Jiang shopkeeper knows each other, maybe he had a leg with her back then.

Yang Qiuchi picked up the account book and looked through it. The ledger is a bit old, and the cover is a little broken. The Jiang shopkeeper helped Yang Qiuchi turn to one of the pages, pointed to the line on it and said, "My lord, please take a look." ”

Yang Qiuchi looked at it and saw that the line read: "At noon on March 18, Yang Zhang's side room of Old Lady Yang in Yangjia Village bought arsenic two taels." ”

Yang Qiuchi's heart moved, two or two? The nurse Lu said that the second aunt Zhang only gave her one or two arsenic, so what about one or two?

Old lady Yang also came over to take a look, and sighed in some surprise.

Yang Qiuchi hurriedly asked, "Old lady, is there something wrong?" ”

"No, it's not," said Old Lady Yang, "your third aunt was hanged on March 20. It's only two days away, which is a bit of a coincidence. ”

Listening to Mrs. Yang say this, it is indeed a bit of a coincidence. Yang Qiuchi did not extract Guo's stomach contents for testing, nor did he have the conditions for such testing. It is uncertain whether Kwok has been given arsenic.

Zhang's purchase of arsenic was probably to poison Guo's, and when he came back, he thought that once he poisoned his third aunt Taiguo, he would definitely attract the attention and interference of the government, and he would soon suspect her, so he didn't poison her, but instead instructed his nurse Lu to strangle Guo's, and by the way, he gave this poison to Lu's and asked her to poison Shan'er to death slowly.

This is just Yang Qiuchi's speculation, as for what the reason is, he must pry open Zhang's mouth before finally knowing the answer.

Zhang's purchase of two taels of arsenic is relatively much, and it doesn't take so much to poison a person, but Zhang's definitely doesn't know how many doses are needed to poison a person, so he bought two taels.

In fact, the lethal amount of pure arsenic trioxide (pure arsenic) Chengren is only 0.1 to 0.2 grams, and the impure ones are of course higher, and the ancient arsenic is almost impure and contains impurities, so the lethal amount will definitely be higher than this standard.

Zhang's only gave the wet nurse Lu's one or two arsenic, so the remaining one or two is likely to be still in Zhang's room, why did she leave one or two and not give all to Lu's? This will have to be found out after prying her mouth open.

Yang Qiuchi analyzed his analysis and said that Song Tongzhi and Mrs. Yang were very likely. It was decided to immediately search Zhang's room.

Old lady Yang's wives and concubines all have their own small courtyards, and after the Zhang family was arrested, Yang Qiuchi ordered his guards to take the family to block the Zhang family's courtyard and not allow anyone to enter or leave.

The group came to Zhang's courtyard and conducted a detailed search of Zhang's room, and after searching for a long time, they did not find it.

Yang Qiuchi was a little discouraged, could it be that he made a mistake in judgment? Or did Lu lie about it? No, there is no need for the Lu family to lie about this, just imagine, the poison Lu family gives more, and she uses less, but it can reduce her guilt, so she will not deliberately say that the poison given by the Zhang family is less, the Zhang family should give her only one or two, in addition, there is no indication that the shopkeeper Jiang of the pharmacy has made a false account.

In this way, if these two are not used, they should still be in Lu's room. But inside and out, where will she hide?

A couple of arsenic is too little, and there are too many places to hide. Yang Qiuchi looked at the messy room and frowned.

If it were me, where would I hide it? Yang Qiuchi envisioned. This place must not be something that ordinary people can accidentally turn over. The second aunt Tai Zhang's family has a personal maid ring and servants to clean, which should be a place where they are not easy to find when they clean. This place shouldn't be in a cabinet or a dresser, or any piece of furniture that anyone can climb through.

The remaining arsenic has not been useful for more than a year, so will it be thrown away?

No, she doesn't know the lethal amount of arsenic, and she won't throw it away rashly before Shan'er dies, what if it's not enough. Besides, no one had suspected that Shan'er was poisoned before, so she was not in danger of being exposed, and there was no need to destroy the incriminating evidence.

The furniture in the room has not been searched, and according to the speculation just now, it is unlikely that it will be placed in these places, nor will it be placed in other people's rooms, because if such an important thing is placed in other people's rooms, then I am afraid that I will not sleep peacefully. So, there are only two places left that can be stored, one in the sky and one in the ground.

Search the heavens first! Yang Qiuchi asked the servant to move the ladder and put it on the beam, Song Yun'er immediately guessed Yang Qiuchi's thoughts, and said happily: "Brother, I'll go up and search to see if the second aunt hid the arsenic on the beam." ”

"And inside the beams!"

"Hmm~!" Song Yun'er nodded. Like a tanuki, he quickly climbed up to the beams of the house, searched carefully little by little, and tapped his fingers from time to time to listen to the sounds.

For a long time, he went down the stairs with a disappointed face and shook his head.

If there are no beams, then only the ground remains.

Ground floor? It's hard to find such a small bit of arsenic wherever you bury it. However, there should still be logic to follow. The arsenic is a powder, and it is unlikely that it was wrapped in paper and buried directly in the ground, most likely in a small sealed iron box, and then buried in the ground.

Where would it be buried? The houses in the small courtyard where the second aunt lives are all bungalows, and the ground is paved with green bricks, which is very neat. Yang Qiuchi squatted on the ground, looking for the past brick by brick.

The entire room was almost searched for green bricks, but still nothing was found, only under the bed.

This is also the most likely place to be buried in the ground, because the servants do not go under the bed to clean it, although they have to clean.

Yang Qiuchi ordered the big bed to be moved away. It was a large carved sandalwood bed, which was very heavy, and seven or eight servants worked together to move it aside with great effort.

It didn't take much effort to find a few green bricks near the head of the bed. This place can be reached by squatting at the head of the bed, and it may be very large.

The gap between these green bricks is relatively large, but the fingers can't be inserted at all, the ancient green bricks are very thick, if you use a knife to pry in, because the green bricks are close together, so there is no way to pry them out.

There are several green bricks with relatively large gaps, and it is impossible to hide only a small bag of arsenic in such a large area, and it is likely that there are other things.

If something is buried here, how do you get it out? There must be a tool, and this tool can't be too far away yet.

Under the bed! Yang Qiuchi reacted immediately. He came to the head of the big sandalwood carved wooden bed, reached under the bed and groped for it, and suddenly, his hand stopped, his face was happy, and he slowly took out a handle clamp made of iron. Yang Qiuchi carefully observed the clip and nodded thoughtfully.

Yang Qiuchi came to the green brick with the handle clip, inserted the iron pieces on both sides into both sides of the green brick, grabbed the handle with one hand and lifted it up vigorously, and lifted the green brick out.

Song Yun'er said in surprise: "Brother, you are so smart, how did you find out about this mechanism?" ”

This kind of small mechanism, if you look closely, you will find that Yang Qiuchi has no time to explain to her, he took out all the green bricks, and there is a small boxy box with a handle on it.

Yang Qiuchi took out the box and put it aside, the small box was not locked, it was hidden so hidden, naturally it didn't need to be locked.

When I opened it, everyone was stunned, it was full of gold, silver and jewelry, it seemed that the second aunt had prepared a lot of private money.

After removing these, a small bag wrapped in oiled paper was found at the bottom of the box. Yang Qiuchi was overjoyed in his heart, and slowly unfolded it carefully, and there was a small paper bag inside, and then opened it, and sure enough, it was a small packet of white and red powder inside! Ancient arsenic was almost impure, had impurities, and showed a reddish color in white.

Yang Qiuchi compared these powders with the small packet of arsenic found in Lu's room, the color and thickness of the powder were about the same, but unfortunately the chemical composition test could not be carried out, as long as it could be proved that the proportion of pure arsenic and impurity content and even the number of impurities in the two was the same, it could be determined whether the two were the same as the whole, so as to be able to prove that Lu's arsenic was given to her by Zhang from this small packet.

However, the current evidence is sufficient to conclude that Zhang instigated others to poison and murder.

Old lady Yang had a gloomy face and ordered Steward Pang to escort the Zhang family.

After a while, Zhang's escort arrived, and saw that the big bed was lifted, the few green bricks were taken out, the small cabinet where he put his private money was spread out, and the small bag of arsenic was unfolded and placed on the ground, and he couldn't help but tremble all over his body, and his face turned pale.

Song Tongzhi will ask the shopkeeper Jiang to turn over the registration on the account book to Zhang, and Zhang's sweat rained down and spread it on the ground.

Song Tongzhi sneered: "Criminal, the prisoner Zhang's family, people, people are all stolen, and there are people with evidence here, you, don't you confess?" ”

Zhang sat down on the ground and said, "I recruited it." The little master was poisoned by my wet nurse. Speaking of this, Zhang got up and knelt in front of Mrs. Yang, and kowtowed: "Master spare me, I was wrong, I was jealous that Sister Guo gave birth to a son and won your favor, I don't dare anymore." Please spare me, woowoo."

Speaking of this, the second aunt Zhang burst into tears.

Yang Qiuchi asked, "Why didn't you give all the arsenic to the nurse Lu?" ”

Zhang sobbed and said: "I heard that the shopkeeper Jiang said that if you use arsenic to poison mice, you can just pick a few nails with your little fingernails, so I think it is enough to poison a child, and half of it is enough, so I don't give it all." ”

It turns out that this is the case, of course, it is not enough to poison a small baby. This Zhang was still worried that the arsenic would not be enough in the future, so he didn't throw away the rest, which was really clever but was mistaken by cleverness, leaving this fatal evidence.

When her daughter Yang Aixiao saw that her mother had confessed, she also knelt on the ground with a sad face to plead for her mother.

Old Lady Yang had already beaten the Zhang family violently before, and most of this anger was gone, and she sighed: "If you know this, why bother in the first place?" You poisoned and murdered, and violated the king's law, how can I spare you? He turned his head to Song Tongzhi and said, "Lord Tongzhi, this slut will be handed over to you, you can deal with it as you want." ”

According to the "Da Ming Law", poisoning and killing is different from ordinary murder, and the sentencing reflects the principle of heaviness. "The death penalty used was beheading (in ancient times, beheading was heavier than hanging, which could leave the whole corpse). There is no distinction between completed and attempted poisoning and murder, and there is no distinction between master and slave.

Now, Song Tongzhi is more concerned about the murder of the third aunt who has not yet been solved, and asked: "Zhang, the third aunt Taiguo was also killed by you, right?" ”

When Zhang heard this, he hurriedly shook his head and denied: "No, it's really not!" I did buy arsenic to poison Sister Guo, but I haven't found a suitable opportunity to poison her, and on the third day after arsenic was about to buy it back, she became a nymphomaniac, and then hanged herself. After she died, I decided to poison the young master with arsenic. So I don't know who strangled Sister Guo to death. ”

"Dare to quibble, torture me!" Originally, it was inconvenient for Song Tongzhi to torture Mrs. Yang's aunt, but now that Mrs. Yang said so, Song Tongzhi had no worries and ordered to start torture to extract confessions.

This time, Song Tongzhi has brought back the arresters from Guangde County, took out the torture tools used to interrogate female prisoners, and put them on the joints of Zhang's slender ten fingers.

Yang Qiuchi didn't stop it, he wanted to see if what Zhang said was the truth, and now Zhang flatly denied that she instructed the nurse Lu to strangle the third aunt Tai Guo. Is what Zhang said true? Yang Qiuchi was also confused.

If it is said that Zhang took advantage of the opportunity of the third aunt Tai Guo's nymphomaniac, he instructed the nurse Lu to strangle Guo to death. Since there is a big difference between the traces of strangulation and hanging, and since ancient times, there has been a relatively deep understanding of these two methods of killing, and a little more experienced and serious post-mortem can be found, and it is very likely to be exposed.

And once it is revealed, since there are only two nurses and little maids in the room, the second aunt Tai Zhang will soon be burned.

Therefore, if the Zhang family wants to kill the third aunt Tai Guo, it is very risky to use this method. Since she had bought poison and was ready to poison it, they lived in the same big yard, and there were too many opportunities for poisoning, as long as she was patient, she would always find it.

However, there is a greater risk of poisoning, that is, poisoning someone to death, it is likely to be found to be murder, in which case, the government will intervene, and there will be endless fear of being discovered. And pretending to hang himself, once it succeeds, then no one will check.

Therefore, it is difficult to guarantee that the second aunt Tai Zhang will not use this risky method. What's more, as long as the death of the third aunt is said to be more terrifying and associated with ghosts and evils, it will be easier to pass the test, and once it passes, everything will be fine. Therefore, it is inevitable that she will not take this risky move.

The second aunt proposed that the third aunt was too caught by an evil demon, and asked the mage to exorcise the ghost and find a piece of yin land to bury, which is probably the intention.

After thinking about it, Yang Qiuchi was still not sure. So just sit on the sidelines and see if there is any breakthrough.

It seems that today is the suffering of the Zhang family, who was beaten by Mrs. Yang and was pinched by his fingers. However, thinking about how vicious she instructed her nurse Lu Shi to poison the child, I don't think she has anything to be pitied.

Although Zhang was born in a Qinglou, after all, he has been pampered in Mrs. Yang's house for almost 20 years, how can this kind of torture be resisted. Besides, she had already admitted that she had poisoned the child, which was already a capital crime, so why should she suffer like this, and her will to resist would soon collapse, so in a moment, Zhang screamed and made a vow.

After the sentence was relaxed, Luo Xiancheng ordered someone to record a confession for Zhang, and Zhang admitted that she instructed her nurse Lu to strangle her to death when her third aunt Tai Guo was unconscious, and pretended to hang herself.

Taking advantage of the victory, he brought the nurse Lu Shi and tortured him to extract a confession.

Lu Shi began to deny it, Song Tongzhi told her to poison and kill, according to the law to behead, Lu Shi admitted this case or not, it was inevitable to die, Lu Shi's spirit was completely defeated, plus I heard that the second aunt had already confessed, and the torture on the body, the severe pain was unbearable, and in a moment I screamed and confessed.

After recording the confessions of the two, the case was solved, Song Tongzhi and others were very happy, and even praised Yang Qiuchi for solving the case like a god. But Yang Qiuchi just smiled and didn't say anything. Song Tongzhi was a little strange, Yang Qiuchi didn't seem to be very happy, as if he had a lot on his mind.

Yang Qiuchi has something on his mind, he has no bottom in his heart, although there is no problem in the case of poisoning Shan'er, everyone has obtained stolen goods, and the two also voluntarily confessed, but the case of the third aunt hanging herself, Yang Qiuchi watched coldly, and felt that it was likely that she was tortured to confess and torture into a confession, and the real murderer was likely to be at large.

Although Yang Qiuchi himself was not sure, he did not have any clues to overturn the case.

However, this kind of time is often the time when the murderer is the most relaxed, and the murderer will think that he is safe, and it is often easy to show his feet. Therefore, Yang Qiuchi is not in a hurry. He waited for the moment when the willows would dawn.

(To be continued)