The tower courtyard is suspicious

Late one night in March during the Guangxu year of the Qing Dynasty, a dog barked at the west end of Taiping Town, Kaizhou, in northern Henan. At this time, just after the second watch, the second watch drum had just sounded on the tower of the town's cross street, and suddenly there was a sound of the handover of swords from a compound in the west of Taiping Town, and then there was an urgent gong and an urgent shout: "The thief is coming, come and catch the thief." ”

When people got up from their beds and rushed to the scene, they found that the warehouse of the "Qin Ji Pharmacy" in Taiping Town had been robbed by a group of bandits, and the thieves had disappeared. In this robbery, the Qin family lost a large amount of silver and precious medicinal materials, and the eldest young master of the Qin family, Qin Tianxu, was killed by thieves, and an old man also died in this incident.

Qin Lanting, the old shopkeeper of the Qin family, was shocked when he heard the news, and hurriedly took the second young master Qin Tianyou and the third young master Qin Zhenxuan to the place of the accident. The warehouse of the Qin family pharmacy is located in a large compound at the west end of Taiping Town, which is very spacious, about five acres in size. There are eight halls inside, five each in the west wing and five in the east wing. There is a white pagoda in the middle of the courtyard, which was built by the ancestors of Qin Lanting in the Qianlong period, and the purpose of building the tower was to suppress the river demon. It turned out that less than 30 miles south of this Taiping town was the Yellow River, which often flooded in summer and autumn every year. From the Kangxi period to the Qianlong period, the Yellow River burst its embankment more than 20 times, and each time the embankment burst flooded a large area of fertile land north of the Yellow River. Taiping Town also suffered from it, and Qin Lanting's great-grandfather Qin Luzhen funded the construction of this white pagoda in order to suppress the river demon.

The Qin family's treasury has two inner and outer warehouses, the outer treasury is located in the three rooms on the east side of the hall, which stores some ordinary medicinal materials, and the inner treasury stores valuable medicinal materials and cash. This outer treasury is clear and known to everyone, but the inner treasury is a secret, only the four fathers and sons of the Qin family and an old husband know. The old husband is also the Qin family's own family, named Qin Futang, and he is Qin Lanting's uncle in terms of seniority.

The inner storehouse is located under the white tower, and the small wooden door on the east side of the white tower is pushed open to enter the white tower, and there is a hidden door on the wall inside the tower, which looks no different from the bricks on the tower from the outside, and can actually be pushed open by hand. After entering the interior door, there is a winding flight of steps. After about thirty steps, I came to a heavy iron door. When I opened the iron door and entered, it suddenly opened up, about the size of five rooms. Inside are stored cash silver and some valuable medicinal herbs, such as rhino horn, ginseng, fur seals, deer antler velvet and other medicinal herbs.

Qin Lanting and the two young masters came to the tower courtyard and found Qin Tianyi's body lying at the door outside the White Tower, and there was another corpse next to the corpse, which seemed to be a thief who had been killed. Qin Lanting fainted when he saw it, and it took a long time to recover his breath, and he couldn't help but caress the corpse and cry, and old tears flowed. Qin Tianyou and Qin Zhenxuan's tears also burst out of their eyes, and they couldn't cry. The eldest Qin Tianxu is loyal, very filial to his parents, and his brothers get along very harmoniously.

After crying for a long time, Qin Lanting stopped his grief and said to the two brothers: "Your brother is loyal and honest, he has always guarded the treasury for our family, and he has never made a mistake for more than 20 years. Today, how should people live in this catastrophe? Hey, people can't be resurrected after death, don't cry you two, let's go to the warehouse and have a look. ”

The two of them played the lantern, and as Qin Lanting entered the White Tower, they just walked a few steps and saw the body of the old man lying on the steps, and the pole and lantern in his hand also rolled to the side. The three of them became more and more sad when they saw it, the three generations of the old husband kept vigil in the Qin family, worked hard, worked hard, and was loyal to the Qin family, and now died tragically in this white tower, how could it not be sad?

The big iron door of the warehouse opened, and the three of them hurriedly entered the warehouse to check, only to see that the contents were almost looted. About 30,000 taels of silver were stolen, and a large number of precious medicinal materials were also lost.

Qin Xuanxuan, the third young master of the Qin family, was quite talented, and seeing this scene, he asked the second brother to help his old father go home to rest, while he himself stayed to check the scene.

Qin Yuxuan's word Hengzhi, the number Yeqiao, because of the third ranking, is known as Qin Sanbao. His ancestor was a family of traditional Chinese medicine, and his father Qin Lanting inherited the ancestral business and opened a pharmacy called "Hongjitang" in Taiping Town, also called "Qin Ji Pharmacy". Later, the pharmacy opened bigger and bigger, and finally opened the "Hongjitang" branch in Kaizhou County.

The Qin family had a prosperous business and naturally made a lot of money. Like other rich people, when they have money, they buy houses and land, and the 3,600 acres of land in Taiping Town are the Qin family's property. Although the Qin family was rich, they were willing to give and took out 600 acres of land as righteous fields. Yitian's income from the Qin family was not taken by the Qin family, and was mainly used for the repair of the town's school hall and the monthly salary of the teacher, as well as the expenses of the town's militia regimental training. In the year of the catastrophe, the Qin family always reduced or exempted the tenants from rent, and also released grain for disaster relief. Usually save the life and help the wounded, never talk about the price, the poor people often do not take a penny to see the sick, so they are well-known in the township and are quite appreciated by neighbors.

The second brother Qin Tianyou is over thirty years old and has no heirs. The old man Qin Lanting is very old and no longer takes care of the business of the pharmacy, but only sits in the pharmacy in Taiping Town for a morning on the third, sixth and ninth days of every month. Don't worry about other things anymore, raise flowers every day, tease birds, walk dogs, drink tea and live for the rest of the year. Originally, according to the order of the eldest and youngest, the eldest brother Tianxu should be in charge of the business, but he was excluded because he had no heirs. The second brother Qin Tianyou is honest, not good at words, has no quarrel with the world, and is willing to be a deputy for the third brother, so the actual shopkeeper of the "Qin Ji Pharmacy" is the third young master Qin Zhenxuan.

Because the ancestral secret knife wound medicine "Qin's Jinchuang Ointment" has miraculous effects, it is called a treasure; The "Gum Ginseng Health Pill" developed by his father was carefully restructured by him, integrated into the Tianshan Snow Lotus, and renamed "Bilian Gum Shen Dan". It is beneficial to nourish blood and qi and maintain health and fitness, so it is called Erbaoye; Another treasure is his poetry, Qin Yixuan is both talented and beautiful, loves to read, and likes Tang and Song poems, but he has repeatedly failed, and then he is discouraged, gives up his fame, and devotes himself to running an ancestral pharmacy. In his spare time, he recited poems all day long in the self-built "Yeqiao Xuan", and occasionally succeeded, so he recorded his poems into his poetry collection "Mr. Yeqiao's Collection". Because of its lofty artistic conception of poetry, the poem has the pastoral style of Wang Wei, and the words are close to Yan and a few poignant meanings, so it is famous in the township for a while, and the poems are widely spread, and they are also for the three treasures. In addition, he is the third in line, so he is called "Qin Sanbao".

Although Qin Zhenxuan passed the children's examination and only won the title of Xiucai, he repeatedly failed in the next four Zhengke township examinations, and finally made up his mind not to participate in the imperial examination. He inherited his father's business, made extensive contacts, was sociable, and inherited his father's legacy, demanding of himself, but generous to his friends, and not stingy.

Although the family has a lot of money, Qin Yixuan still maintains the legacy left by his ancestors, is diligent and thrifty, and focuses on farming and studying. Life is very simple, never wear clothes made of satin, a blue cloth shirt washed white, and some have patches. I don't pay attention to eating, and I never eat more than four dishes at home. He loves to eat chili peppers the most, every meal is indispensable, and the sauce nest in his hometown feels particularly fragrant when he drinks maize, and every meal is also indispensable. I also drink some wine, but I am not good at drinking, two or three taels at a time is enough. Except for smoking hookah, there are no other bad hobbies. But he is particularly particular about tea, and his favorite green tea is Maojian in Xinyang Shihe Port and Longjing in Meijiawu in Hangzhou before the Qingming Festival. Black tea: He only drinks "Wuyi black tea". He never put on a show, and often ate with the long-term workers, played chess, and lost squares. But he did not share his good tea with them easily, and only took it out and sipped a few bowls with them when the distinguished guests came to the door. He even went down to hoe and raise the field in person. Everyone often jokingly said of him: "With so much money, he doesn't eat well, he doesn't dress well, and he still works in the fields, what a 'big poor'." In this way, the nickname of "big poor" spread far and wide, and he didn't mind, but thought it was a compliment to him.

After sending off his father and second brother, Qin Yixuan began to check the scene seriously. He is a Langzhong, and his ancestors once worked as a servant in the Kaizhou Mansion, and he has made contributions to the trial of cases, so he has accumulated rich experience in handling cases. Qin Yixuan inherited the ancestral business, and this experience was naturally passed on to him. He is cool-headed, thoughtful, and reasoning, and has helped the government crack several major cases.

Qin Yuxuan first checked the gate of the tower courtyard, and saw that the gate was open, and in front of the door was the street. This tower courtyard is located at the west end of the town, and there is a north-south highway about 100 steps to the west. This avenue leads to Kaizhou in the north and Kaifeng in the south.

Qin Yixuan carefully inspected the corpse of his eldest brother and found that the corpse was facing east and holding a sword in his hand. His left hand clutched his chest, and blood flowed from between his fingers and dripped. Qin Yanxuan took away his eldest brother's left hand and found that there was a sword wound on the chest of his left chest, which was about three inches wide. It doesn't seem to be a knife wound, it should have been stabbed by a sword and fell to the ground.

There was another corpse next to Qin Tianyi's corpse, a male, who was about forty years old, had a sword wound on his neck, and it seemed that he should have been killed by Qin Tianhe's sword. The man was dressed in gray cloth and held a large heavy iron knife in his hand. There is also a cigarette pouch pinned to his waist, and the tobacco pouch is hung with a tobacco cloth bag.

Qin Yuxuan took off the cigarette pouch pot and the tobacco leaf pouch together, and brought the cigarette pouch close to the lantern to take a closer look. It was found that the tobacco pouch pot was made of pure copper, and there were four small characters on the head of the tobacco pouch pot: Zhu Xiantongji. "Zhu Xiantong?" Qin Yanxuan thought in his heart, "Could it be that this person is from Zhu Xianzhen?" Or someone near Zhuxian Town? ”

He opened the tobacco pouch and pinched a pinch of tobacco leaves with his hand to look at it carefully, only to see that the tobacco leaves were golden in color and had a pure smell. He put the tobacco leaves into the tobacco pouch pot, put the tobacco pouch into the lantern, lit the cigarette, and took a deep breath, only to feel that this cigarette had a woody fragrance, fragrant and mellow, and it was definitely not local tobacco in Kaizhou.

Qin Yanxuan checked the shoes he was wearing again, they were self-made mille-feuille cloth shoes, and when he took off the cloth shoes, he saw that this person was wearing a pair of cloud socks on his feet. Cloud socks are socks worn by monks or Taoist priests, who have braided hair, are neither Taoist priests nor monks, and do not know why they wear a pair of cloud socks.

Qin Yanxuan walked into the White Pagoda with a lantern again, and the body of the old husband Qin Futang was lying on the steps. Qin Zhenxuan checked his wounds and saw that he had been stabbed seven times. Two stab wounds on the right leg, one on the arm, one on the shoulder, one in the waist, two in the back, one in the back, one in the heart, should be a fatal knife.

Qin Zhenxuan turned the old husband's body over, only to see that he seemed to be holding something in his hand. Qin Yixuan broke his hand and took out the thing and approached the lantern to check, it turned out to be a piece of topaz, and there was still half a red ribbon left on it. The ribbon is silky and soft, delicate and smooth, and at a glance it is not produced locally, nor is it Kaifeng's Bian embroidery, but seems to be produced in the southeast.

Qin Yuxuan took the piece of topaz in his hand and looked at it carefully, only to see that the jade was warm and crystal clear, as if it contained a pool of autumn water, surging slightly under the light. Qin Yixuan is very interested in jade, and knows that jade is divided into nephrite and jadeite. Most of the nephrite jade produced in China refers to the Hetian jade produced in Hotan County, Xinjiang, Xiuyan County, Liaoning, Dushan jade produced in Nanyang, Henan and turquoise jade produced in Yunxian County, Hubei. In addition to turquoise jade, the other three basically belong to nephrite, but Dushan jade in Henan has nephrite and jadeite. Hetian jade is divided into white jade, topaz, mutton fat jade, green jade, sugar jade and black jade; Xiuyu is divided into river mill jade, old jade, flower jade and jiayu; Dushan jade is divided into seven types: red jade, topaz, green jade, purple jade, white jade, black jade and green jade; Turquoise jade belongs to jadeite and is divided into light turquoise, yellow turquoise, turquoise, and blue-turquoise. In addition, Burmese jade also belongs to jadeite, which is generally hard and opaque.

Qin Yuxuan also has a piece of jade around his waist, which is the Dushan jade of Nanyang, Henan, which belongs to green jade, with a delicate texture, similar to jadeite, with a glass luster, also called "Dushan jade". And the piece of jade in his hand seems to be Xinjiang Hetian topaz, topaz is the treasure of Hetian jade, topaz is divided into dense wax yellow, maroon yellow, okra yellow, yellow flower yellow, egg yolk according to the color. Among them, maroon topaz is the best in the world, very rare, it is difficult for the general rich and noble to afford it, only the emperor and the princes and nobles can have it, so it is also called "imperial jade", which means the emperor of jade or the royal jade.

Qin Yuxuan played with this piece of jade repeatedly, and suddenly found that there seemed to be a faint flaw on the jade, so he quickly brought the jade closer to the lantern and squinted his eyes to watch. Under the light, I found that it was not a flaw, but four small words: Zhongshan Imperial Reward. The four small characters are seal scripts, weak mosquito feet, hook drawn, it is an iron wire seal, the handwriting is neat, containing strength, handsome and upright.

"Zhongshan Imperial Reward?" Qin Yixuan was secretly taken aback, "The imperial reward means something that the emperor appreciates, how could the emperor's jade fall here?" Which emperor is it? Haven't heard of the era name Zhongshan? And how can it be on a thief? So what does Zhongshan mean? This piece of jade is worth a lot of money, to say the least, it is worth 100,000 taels of silver. If a thief has such a valuable thing, he must be a very wealthy person, but why should he kill people for 30,000 pieces of silver? Qin Zhenxuan was puzzled.

Qin Zhenxuan summarized the clues he obtained: first, the cigarette pouch on the thief's body was made by Zhu Xianzhen, so this person may be from near Kaifeng; Second, the tobacco is definitely not the tobacco of Kaizhou or the north of Kaizhou, and it does not seem to be like the tobacco near Kaifeng. This has a contradiction with the origin of the cigarette pouch, in the end, is this person a person near Kaifeng? Do you chase down the tobacco pouch or follow the tobacco leaves? Third, the eldest brother Qin Tianhe was killed by a sword, the sword edge is not wide, it should be killed by someone who uses a small and light sword; Fourth, that piece of jade, which is also the most critical, how can it be a priceless piece of jade? It should have fallen unintentionally during the struggle or was grabbed and torn off by the old husband, and he didn't notice it in the chaos. So what kind of person is its owner? If you are so rich, why rob? It doesn't make sense; 5. There are about 30,000 taels of silver in the storehouse, and there are a lot of precious medicinal materials, and there are many things, and there must be many people coming, and there must be a carriage to load these goods, but why is there no carriage in the courtyard? There were no prints of the carriage even outside the gate, could it be that they were running on horseback or on their backs?

The bandits around Taiping Town have Li Er Mazi and Chen Da Fool, but these two bandits have a good relationship with the Qin family, and the Qin family sends a lot of silver to their locks every year, so they have been safe for many years, not only have they never touched the Qin family, but they have also sent people to help the Qin family when other bandits came to rob. If it weren't for them, could it be Liu Heiqi, a bandit from Shandong Guan County, northeast of Kaizhou? Liu Heiqi's name is very loud, but he has never met. It can't be him, all kinds of clues point to the south of Taiping Town, especially near Zhuxian Town, Kaifeng.

Another point is that although the thief succeeded in robbing the treasury, he lost the "Hetian topaz". Although the Qin family lost 30,000 taels of silver and a large number of valuable medicinal materials, most of the Qin family's silver was stored in the semicolon "Dashengyuan" in Kaifeng, Taigu Qianzhuang, Shanxi. In terms of value, this piece of "Hetian topaz" is more than twice the total value of the silver and medicinal materials that were robbed, and in this sense, the thief must have more than worth the loss.

Qin Yuxuan came to the room in the middle of the hall again, which was where the eldest brother Qin Tianxuan lived. There was no light in the house, Qin Yuxuan lit the candle, and saw that there was nothing unusual in the house. So Qin Yanxuan came to the room at the east end again, which was where the old husband Qin Futang lived.

I saw that the room was poorly furnished, with a bed, a table, and two chairs. There are four side dishes on the table, a plate of peanuts, a plate of pig's head meat, a plate of Kaifeng Tongzi chicken, and a plate of cooked beef. In addition, there was a jar of old wine on the table, Qin Yixuan took the jar and looked at it, and found that there was a label with the words "bamboo pole sake" on it. There are two cups and chopsticks on the table, and it is obvious that the two are drinking against each other, so who is this person who drinks with the old husband Qin Futang?

Qin Zhenxuan's eldest brother Qin Tianxu usually doesn't drink a drop of wine, but there is half a glass of wine left in the two cups, it is obvious that the person who drank with Qin Futang is not Qin Tianxuan, so who is this person? Is it someone you don't know or an acquaintance?

Drinking with someone you don't know in the middle of the night doesn't make sense at all, and the Qin family has a rule that no one is allowed to enter the "tower courtyard". The old husband Qin Futang has guarded the courtyard for the Qin family all his life, and it is impossible for him to make such a mistake, so this person must be an acquaintance. But who would drink with Qin Futang?

Judging from the fact that there were half glasses of wine left in the two wine glasses, it should be that the two of them heard the movement outside at that time, so they stopped drinking and ran out to check the situation. If the two of them had come after drinking the wine thief, then it would be impossible for both of them to have half a glass of wine left in their glasses. Even if one person is not strong enough to have half a glass of wine left, the other person will not have half a glass left at the same time. In addition, judging from the amount of alcohol they drank, they didn't drink much, the two of them probably drank a little more than a catty, the "bamboo pole sake" is relatively light, there is no problem for one person to drink a catty, and Qin Futang's wine is very large, and one person can drink this jar of wine.

Since the two of them heard the movement outside while drinking, they ran out to check, so why were Qin Tianxu and Qin Zhenxuan killed by the thief, but that person escaped by luck? Maybe he escaped because he was afraid and hidden? Still is......

Suddenly, a huge mystery appeared in Qin Xuanxuan's mind, if this person who drank with Qin Futang escaped by luck, then why didn't he appear after the town's militia and the masses rushed over? According to common sense, he should immediately report to the Qin family what happened last night, is he afraid that he can't tell clearly? Or are you too scared?

"Could it be that this drinker is the thief's guilt?" Qin Yixuan was shocked when he thought of this, he didn't dare to think about it, but the reality was in front of him, and he couldn't help but continue to think about it.

"Judging from the four dishes on the table, except for peanuts, the other three are meat dishes, and they are of high value, especially Kaifeng Tongzi chicken and cooked beef. According to common sense, these four dishes should not have been bought by Qin Futang, but by someone else. Because Qin Futang only has a total of five taels of silver per month, and these dishes are worth more than one tael. Qin Futang is a diligent and thrifty person all his life, and he is reluctant to buy such expensive wine and food during the Chinese New Year. Qin Yuxuan secretly thought, "Then who is the person here?" Why is it so generous? The bamboo pole sake is the famous wine of Zhuxian Town, a jar of one or two silver, and Kaifeng Tongzi chicken, both of which cannot be bought locally. As far as I know, Qin Futang doesn't seem to have such generous friends. So where did you buy the other three side dishes? Qin Yixuan tasted a piece of cooked beef, "This is the beef from the 'Liu Family Deli' in the middle of Taiping Town, ask who has bought cooked beef there tomorrow." ”

Qin Yixuan checked the room again, and suddenly found a wine gourd on the ground. Qin Yixuan knew that it was Qin Futang's wine gourd, which was usually hung on the wall behind the door. Qin Yixuan picked up the wine gourd and prepared to re-hang it on the nail on the wall, only to find that the nail was slanted. Qin Yanxuan took a closer look at the nails and found that there were some cloth threads on the nails. It was obvious that someone was in a hurry to go out, accidentally hit a nail in the wall, knocked the wine gourd to the ground, and at the same time his own clothes were torn. Due to the urgency of the situation, I didn't bother to pick up the wine gourd again.

Qin Yuxuan went to the tower again to look at the clothes on Qin Futang's body, and found no holes, so he deduced that the person whose clothes were torn must have come.

The next day, Qin Zhenxuan came to the "Liujia Deli", and the boss Liu Jinping said that yesterday the town was a day of the fair, and there were a lot of people who bought meat, and some knew it, but most of them didn't know it. Qin Zhenxuan asked him to think about the acquaintances in this town, who had bought beef and peanuts here. Liu Jinping listed five people at once, including Lu Qiulian, the housekeeper of the Lu family, Qin Xianpei, the housekeeper of the Qin family, and Erniuzi, an idle thief in the town, as well as Huzi, a young man from the "Duan's Silk Village", and Wang Ershun, a partner from the "Maojia Zhuangyuanhong" wine shop.

The Lu family and the Qin family are feuding, and it is impossible for Lu Qiulian and Qin Futang to drink. Qin Xianpei is the housekeeper of the Qin family, and he has a good relationship with Qin Futang, but he has been stewing fish for the old man last night, and he has no time to drink with Qin Futang at all. Er Niuzi is a scoundrel, and he is young, is it possible for Qin Futang to drink with him? The young man of "Duan's Silk Village" must have bought it for his shopkeeper Duan Tianqing, but it was impossible for him to drink with Qin Futang as Duan Tianqing. Then Mao Hongsheng, the boss of the "Mao Family Champion Red", will not drink as an old man in Qin Futang.

So who is this person? Could it be that an outside person was drinking with Qin Futang? Qin Yanxuan looked at the topaz in his hand, and suddenly his heart moved......