Lei Mi - Profiler

"Oh, no reason," said Fang Mu, turning his attention to a photograph of the broken piece of pottery. "How about this?" he asked after a moment.

"That one's an even bigger headache. Nearly every crafts market in the city sells them. It's going to be very difficult to determine who bought it."

"What could it mean?" asked Fang Mu, staring at the ceiling and seemingly speaking to himself.

"Could the victim have broken it while struggling with her killer and then grabbed a piece in her hand?"

"No way," said Fang Mu, shaking his head. "I'm certain that the killer placed it in her hand after she was dead."

"How can you be so sure?"

"Don't you think it's a little big?" said Fang Mu, indicating the piece's size with his hands. "The killer murdered the victim, raped her, and then filmed her-no way in this whole series of events could he have failed to discover that she was holding this thing in her hand."

"You mean to say…" Tai Wei paused for a moment, and then slowly continued. "The killer placed this in her hand to communicate some kind of message?"

"That's right, but I don't know what exactly this message was supposed to be. Still, I think we can go about determining it in two ways. The first is through the object itself. The second is through the meaning expressed in this British artist Grayson Perry's work. For the latter we'll need to do some research, but as for the former…" Fang Mu trailed off. Then, speaking slowly as if deep in thought, he said, "I believe it has something to do with the identity of the victim. What characteristics does ceramic have?"

"Well, it's fairly hard, but also quite fragile."

"That's what I was thinking myself. I believe this can also refer to the female sex."

"Oh. How do you mean?"

"I'll answer that question in a moment, but first let's discuss the killer himself. I believe he's between twenty-five and thirty-five-year-old, possesses a certain amount of education and artistic taste, and lives fairly comfortably. In person he's clean-cut and urbane. And he suffers from a psychosexual disorder that stems from a history of sexual failure."

"On what basis?"

"First, there's the piece of pottery he placed in the victim's hand, which we tentatively believe represents femininity. In and of itself, this implies that the killer received a good education, and possesses a certain amount of artistic taste," he said. "Very often, this sort of person pays a lot attention to his appearance. Next, in committing the crime, the killer's behavior demonstrated the marks of sexual psychosis. For example torturing the victim; for example raping her corpse; for example filming her genitals. In general, raping the victim's corpse is often the mark of an individual unable to have normal sexual relations with women, and frequently one who has been refused or insulted sexually by women. This sort of person is also likely to possess a strong tendency toward sexual domination and sadism. So for such an individual, a dead woman is far better able to satisfy his need to control the female body than a live one. This is why I guessed that the broken pottery, by being hard and yet fragile, was meant to represent the female sex. It implies both refusal, as well as the fragility to collapse at the first blow. This is how the killer views womankind. Also, the return of the corpse to her parents' home probably also expressed this particular attitude. However…" He hesitated for a moment, "I have to admit to being far from confident in this analysis, because I cannot understand why the killer chose a seven-year-old girl. The majority of individuals with this sort of psychological makeup ordinarily select adult women for their victims, in order to better alleviate their feelings of frustration. But conquering a seven-year-old? I can't imagine that could have been all that satisfying for him."

"Maybe this was the killer's first time, so he intentionally selected an easy target? Or I guess it could all have just been by chance."

"Right now it's still unclear, so it would be best not to draw any conclusions," said Fang Mu, shaking his head. "On another note, the case files say that the source of the car is currently being investigated. Has there been any news?"

"Not yet. After speaking to the cab drivers working the morning of the crime, we turned up nothing, so at this point we're beginning to consider whether the killer might have rented a car or used his own."

"Oh." Fang Mu nodded as if lost in thought. "I think you might as well consider the possibility that someone friendly with the parents committed the crime."

"Why?"

"Because if this was a violent kidnapping, there would have to have been some kind of disturbance outside the school, and someone would have seen. Also, having grown up in that kind of household, the victim would surely have been instructed by her parents not to just wander off with strangers. And anyway, she might only have been seven-year-old, but this isn't like when we were young-someone wouldn't have been able to just lead her away with a piece of candy. Therefore, I think it's highly likely that this is a case where the perpetrator was familiar with the family. And after using this familiarity to get the little girl to drop her guard, he kidnapped her."

When Tai Wei was about to leave, Fang Mu asked him how things were progressing on the hospital murder case. Tai Wei hesitated for a moment, and then admitted that Fang Mu's suggested line of attack hadn't worked out. Fang Mu did not look disappointed in the least, but instead just frowned and stared out the window for some time.

"How about the seven-one case?" he said at last.

"I'm not entirely sure. As you know, that case is being handled by the State Enterprise and Nonprofit Institution Investigative Division, so I don't hear much about it, but I suspect they're as stumped as us." Seeing Fang Mu's frown grow deeper, he asked, "Why, what are you thinking?"

Fang Mu said nothing.

"Wait, are you thinking," Tai Wei hesitated for a moment, "that all these crimes were committed by one person?"

After a long time, Fang Mu slowly shook his head. A thin, bitter smile played across his lips. "I myself am finding it difficult to say what exactly I'm thinking," he said, meeting Tai Wei's eyes. "Rationally, this does not seem like the work of one person, because in all three crimes, the murder method, the victims, the characteristics of the crime scenes, and those of the killer's own psychology were much too different. Still, I can't shake the feeling that there's something connecting them." Noticing that Tai Wei was now following his every word with bated breath, Fang Mu smiled awkwardly and said, "However, this could all just be in my imagination. You shouldn't take it too seriously."

As Fang Mu was walking him out, Tai Wei seemed to suddenly think of something. "Did you ever read that letter Ma Kai wrote to you?" he asked.

Fang Mu hesitated for a moment before admitting the truth. "No. I burned it."

Tai Wei was extremely taken aback. "You burned it?" The way he saw it, that letter had been an almost ideal document for the study of criminal psychology, so for someone this interested in the field-not to mention this concerned with empirical research-to simply burn it up without even reading it was mindboggling. He was about to ask why when he saw that the words "Don't ask!" were practically scrawled across Fang Mu's face.

Jeez , thought Tai Wei, what was that saying again? Oh, yeah; geniuses are all crazy.

Dragging a broom and dustpan, cleaning woman Zhang Baohua climbed wearily to the fourth floor of the MultidisciplinaryBuilding. This was supposed to be Tian Cuixia's responsibility. Zhang Baohua didn't know how that old shrew had gotten so lucky, but after getting divorced, she had been able to marry the boss of a snack food wholesaling company. And then recently, after the wife of Pang Guangcai, one of the electricians from the maintenance department, was killed, police had come snooping around and discovered that he and Tian Cuixia had once had an affair. Even though she was proven to have had no part in the murder, she was obviously not going to stick around there any longer, so without even a word of warning, she quit. Since there already weren't enough cleaners to begin with, the maintenance department had had no choice but to temporarily assign the job of cleaning the MultidisciplinaryBuilding to Zhang Baohua. Her reward would be an extra 200 renminbi a month.