Translator: Reina Editor: Killian
“What’s going on?”
Lu Xia’s excitement has not yet subsided: “We put too much attention on the content of the entries and the supernatural happenings. We should have looked at this record as a whole.”
Sun Zheng still did not understand.
“Don’t you find that the method used here is very similar to a famous detective novel?”
Sun Zheng broke away from Lu Xia’s hold. “What detective novel? I rarely read that genre.”
Lu Xia made a contemptuous expression and reluctantly said, “Looks like I’ll be wasting my saliva again. Have you read Agatha Christie’s “The Murder of Roger Ackroyd”? I have always liked her, and I can recite many plots without missing a word. Although “The Murder of Roger Ackroyd” is one of her early works, this method is quite classic…”
Sun Zheng frowned, signalling for him to skip the nonsense and get to the point.
Lu Xia had no choice but to skip the background introduction, and continued, “This Yan Yang, he deliberately worded this story in such a way to imply something to us. This entry itself, in short, is not very meaningful. He imitated Agatha’s storytelling in this way to reveal a lot of information to us.”
“A lot?”
“Yes, a lot. In this short story, he actually hinted a lot of things to us, and he even managed to hide them quite deeply.” Lu Xia’s tone held a trace of admiration.
He searched on the table for a long time, and finally found a ballpoint pen that still had ink. He turned the record to a blank page and began to write while explaining.
“Shall we start with ‘The Murder of Roger Ackroyd’? I’ll tell you a brief overview of the plot. I’ll skip the superfluous parts and discuss the case directly. In this story, ‘I’ am playing the role of Sheppard’s doctor. There was a call that mentioned Roger, the owner of a manor, had been killed. ‘I’ rushed to Roger’s house and broke open the door with the butler to find Sheppard’s body.” Lu Xia paused and made a mark on the page. “The housekeeper went to inform other people, while ‘I’ stayed behind and ‘did what was necessary’.
Seeing Sun Zheng frowning while listening, with a somewhat strange expression on his face, Lu Xia continued evenly. “At the crime scene, there were footprints of Roger’s son on the windowsill. Furthermore, the butler testified that he heard conversations in the room about an hour after ‘I’ left that day, so the murder case became one involving inheritance and there are several suspects…”
Sun Zheng seemed to be getting annoyed because Lu Xia hadn’t mentioned the main point yet. Lu Xia patted him to soothe his impatience, then passed the book with the points he wrote down to Sun Zheng. “Look.”
It read: phone calls, conversations, footprints on the windowsill, doctor’s alibi, housekeeper as witness
The key points in Yan Yang’s record were also written by Lu Xia below: the phone call, the ‘bang’, the footprints on the window sill, the doctor’s alibi, and Liu Qunfang as witness.
We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.
Vec Itfcu mbwqjgfv yfakffc atf akb jcv rjlv joafg j yfja. “P jugff atja atfgf jgf wjcs rlwlijglalfr yfakffc atf akb, yea cflatfg bo atfrf xfs fnfcar jgf gjgf. Pa kbeivc’a yf ragjcuf obg atfgf ab yf bnfgijqr.”
Oe Wlj ujnf tlw j qblcafv ibbx ktlmt rffwfv ab yf rjslcu atja tf xcfk bo Vec Itfcu’r qjgjcblv cjaegf, atfc tf mlgmifv akb ilcfr lc atf gfmbgv. “Tbe jgf gluta, P vlvc’a jrrbmljaf la atlr ojg ja olgra, yea atfgf jgf j ofk ragjcuf kbgvr lc Gg. Tjc’r gfmbgv atja gberfv ws rerqlmlbcr. Obbx—”
I stayed behind and did what was necessary.
Who was it that night? A person who can enter my office; a person who is familiar with my working hours; a person who wants to get close to me…
“Don’t you think it was superfluous for him to write these two sentences? And, I can tell you with certainty that the first sentence is the original sentence in ‘The Murder of Roger Ackroyd’, and the second sentence is an edited version of the original sentence from the book. This is a sentence Detective Poirot said when he solved the mystery—” Seeing the light of curiosity in Sun Zheng’s eyes, Lu Xia smiled and shook his head. “Let me first tell you how Poirot found the murderer.”
He wrote on the paper again: “The keys to Poirot’s discovery was firstly, the telephone, he found that the call was made from another city, and the person said that no one answered the call; secondly, the dictaphone Roger bought went missing. Why did it go missing? There must be some evidence in the dictaphone. That is to say, there was no one telling the doctor in the phone call that Roger had been killed. In fact the conversation with Roger which the housekeeper overheard was not a real conversation, but one which was recorded and replayed from the dictaphone, and the murderer retrieved the dictaphone left at the crime scene. At that time, Poirot said that sentence.”
Lu Xia raised his head, and ran a hand through his hair. “I’m sorry, I can’t remember the exact words, but the general meaning was: a person who has been to another city, a person who knows about this dictaphone… a person who was alone for a few minutes when the housekeeper notified others…This person was, in fact, ‘I’ — Dr. Sheppard.”
Sun Zheng’s eyes brightened, and he seemed to understand. “The murderer in this novel is actually ‘I’ myself, so Yan Yang deliberately wrote these two sentences in the hope that people who read this record can think of the novel ‘The Murder of Roger Ackroyd’?”
Lu Xia nodded. “This is the first hint he wanted to give us. Why did he use “The Murder of Roger Ackroyd” instead of other novels?”
Sun Zheng realised the main point. “Could it be that he wanted to imply that this whole incident in this record was actually orchestrated by himself?”
“Yes, that’s it. Now all we have to do is to match the two stories up with the character in the novel. ‘I’, the main character, would be matched with Dr. Yan himself, signifying that everything was orchestrated by himself. The role played by the child Gao Letian is the suspect in the novel who misled ‘us’. Liu Qunfang? She was the housekeeper who was sent away by Dr. Yan at that time. But, have you noticed that this entry is missing one of the most important keys?”
Sun Zheng was taken aback by the question, then tentatively replied, “Telephone?”
Lu Xia shook his head.
“Footprints?”
Lu Xia shook his head again, his knuckles still knocking on the table rhythmically.
“The dictaphone?”
Lu Xia shook his head with a smile. His hands had stopped moving, and he turned his head to hint to Sun Zheng, “All of these can be falsified in the record, but the most important link is one which cannot be falsified.”
Sun Zheng cupped his chin with one hand, thought hard for a while, then suddenly asked: “Is it the victim, the victim Roger?”
“Yes.” Lu Xia finally nodded his head, smiling slightly. “There was a victim in “The Murder of Roger Ackroyd” but there was no equivalent in this record. So the hidden thing in this entry is the person who disappeared.”
“The person who disappeared? What do you mean?”
“This entry is hinting to us that there is another party involved. He is unable to write about this party in the record, he is hiding this from the people who would see this record.”
“Hiding it from the hospital?”
“Perhaps. Moreover, the existence of this hidden person explains all other doubts.” Lu Xia’s expression gradually grew solemn. “Phone call? That could have been made by this person from Yan Yang’s office. Footprints? We have been misled from the start. These footprints can be easily falsified. It could be made by this person using a child’s shoes, or by them carrying a child up to the windowsill. And I suspect, this person… is my brother.”
“Your brother?”
“I can only think of one person who had a connection with Liu Qunfang, that child, and this doctor, and that is my brother. As he himself wrote in the record book, a person who can enter his office must be someone who is familiar with him, who can get his key, and a person who is familiar with his working hours must also be someone who is often with him. The person who wants to get close to him, maybe this too… In short, Yan Yang had tried his best to imply that there is no ghost in this story, only a figure, and behind him, there is no ghost either, but a person standing. And this person was with him all the time. ”
Lu Xia’s finger moved to a sentence in the record book.
Don’t talk about my back, there wasn’t even a ghost behind me!
“Wouldn’t the usual phrase we use be ‘don’t talk about my back, there wasn’t even half a human behind me’? Why did he specifically change the phrasing here? Why was his emphasis also not on the ghost on his back, but whatever was behind him?”
Sun Zheng looked at that sentence and thought to himself, you are thinking too much, don’t tell me that you’ll be saying that there is morse code in this record book next? But the words that he said were, “Well… Maybe…”
“Okay, so now we can try to make heads and tails of what happened that night.” Lu Xia did not notice Sun Zheng’s change in expression. “That night, the doctor received a call. This was actually a call from the person upstairs, and then he went upstairs with Liu Qunfang. They heard a ‘bang’ at the door. This sound is probably a complete imitation of Roger’s case, and likely came from a tape recorder. When they opened the door, the person was no longer there, and the footprints had already been falsified. Liu Qunfang could have known about it, or she might not have known about it, this doesn’t really matter either way. Yan Yang sent her away at that point in the record entry. Now, do you feel that when you take the story apart like this, it got boring and lacked suspense?”
Sun Zheng nodded undeniably.
“But the information that’s useful to us comes from this point on. What do you think is the motivation for Dr. Yan to write this entry?”
“To leave a message, to hint information about your brother to someone who could possibly get their hands on this record book, while also hiding information from some other who can freely access this record book.”
“Indeed, I think so too, and besides… The Agatha Christie book set I have, was bought for me by my brother.”
“Do you think they were leaving this entry for you?” Sun Zheng pursed his lips and raised his brows at Lu Xia.
“That’s…” Lu Xia was uncertain. He glanced at Sun Zheng, and glumly rolled his eyes. “Why, are you saying that it’s impossible?”
“It’s too far-fetched!” Sun Zheng shot him a look.
“On the contrary, I think the possibility is quite high,” Lu Xia inclined his head and smiled sweetly. “Otherwise, how could Yan Yang be sure that the person who is reading the record book has read ‘The Murder of Roger Ackroyd’ before and can understand his hints? See, you didn’t pick up on these either when you first read this record, right?”
What are you acting cute for! Sun Zheng snorted and turned his head away. “What’s so good about those novels!”
Lu Xia suppressed his laughter and continued to analyse. “But this is only one of the reasons. If he just wanted to leave a record, there was no need for him to spend so much effort. Why would he orchestrate so many things, from the calls to the footprints, and even dragged in the whole nurse’s station?”
Sun Zheng thought about it. “Because he needed an excuse to write this record. If nothing strange happened and no one disappeared, then his record would be considered fabricated and torn out.”
“You’re right! But, there is another reason. This trio wanted to investigate something on the third floor, and so they deliberately created the illusion that the third floor is haunted so as to deter unnecessary people from going there at night, especially those night watchmen. Even if they heard something on the third floor, they wouldn’t dare to patrol carefully at night, and would just take a quick glance and leave.”
“I see now!” Sun Zheng sighed with emotion, then asked hesitantly, “But are you sure Yan Yang really wrote for that purpose? Could it also be that we misunderstood his intentions and read too deeply into his entry?”
Lu Xia shrugged and admitted the problem. “There’s a possibility. So, if we can verify the last clue in this record, then this means we are on the right track.”
“The last clue?” Sun Zheng was taken aback, and then he couldn’t help giving a bout of helpless laughter, “Isn’t this doctor Yan Yang’s record way too complicated?”
Lu Xia laughed along, but quickly returned to normal again, and said with a sigh, “I’m afraid this last clue has been taken away.”
“Huh?”
“I think Yan Yang must have left us some information about this hospital, and I speculate that this thing is either related to Liu Qunfang, or to that child, but…in Liu Qunfang’s box, there was only that letter and photo left. And as for that child…”
Lu Xia held Sun Zheng’s hand as he spoke, turning it over to reveal the black handprint.
“Could it be that he, too, entered the chasm later?” Sun Zheng shuddered.
Lu Xia sighed again. “For it to be this aggressive… Exactly what happened to that child? Is our investigation going to be broken here?”
reina: unfortunately neither Killian nor I have read ‘The Murder of Roger Ackroyd’ so heads-up that the quotes by Lu Xia will not be 100% accurate to Agatha Christie’s book. If anyone knows the phrasing of the actual quotes used, please feel free to leave a comment whenever such quotes appear 
Detective Poirot? Mr. Poirot? The very same Mr. Poirot from Murder on the Orient Express!?? I don’t know why I was so happy to get the Agatha Christie reference but here we are 😭
The Murder of Roger Ackroyd is going on my reading list!
Aaaahh i finally caught up with the recent updates~
Amazing novel and amazing translation! I just love me a good mystery with a hint of supernatural 🤭
Thank you so much for your work, I’ll be waiting for the next update~
ive read 7 books or so of hercule Poirot in it and i haven’t stumbled upon the murder of roger ackroyd yet. guess ill look it up.(≧▽≦)