Lei Mi - Profiler

Fang Mu shook his head. "I've never thought of becoming a policeman."

Bian Ping looked a little disappointed. "Eh, everyone has their own aspirations. However, if you did join the police, I believe you'd be fulfilling Professor Qiao's wishes." He stood up and patted Fang Mu on the shoulder. "Take it easy. If there's any news I'll contact you."

After leaving the dining hall, Fang Mu stood outside for a few minutes. At last he decided to head over to Professor Qiao's house.

Mrs. Qiao was the only person home. As soon as Fang My walked inside, he smelled the strong odor of some kind of traditional Chinese medicine.

"Are you sick, Mrs. Qiao?" he asked as he walked into the kitchen. A very small clay pot was on the stove, filled with a bubbling liquid and sending up steam.

" Aye , how could I not be sick?" she said as he came in.

In the few days since Fang Mu had last seen her, Mrs. Qiao had lost a lot of weight, and her hair was nearly all white.

"You came just in time; in a moment you can help me strain this medicine." She sighed. "I'm sorry there was no one here to greet you. Little Yu left to look for her father again. Now can I get you something to drink?"

Fang Mu hurriedly told her not to worry about it. Then after helping her to lie down on her bed, he rushed back into the kitchen, sieved the medicine into a bowl, and brought it back to her.

"How is everything going at school?" Mrs. Qiao asked after motioning for him to sit beside the bed.

"Well enough. Makeup classes have begun for criminology."

She sighed softly. "The thing my husband disliked most was delaying his students' education. So even though he wasn't around, I couldn't let them keep missing class. There was nothing we could do for the graduate students, but at least we could schedule makeup classes for the undergrads."

Fang Mu was silent for a moment. Then after summoning his courage, he asked, "Mrs. Qiao, Librarian Sun…also used to be one of Professor Qiao's students?"

"That's right. Let me think for a moment." She lightly massaged her temples. "He was part of the class of '91."

"Then why did he go work in the library rather than become a teacher?"

" Aye , that boy has been through a lot." Mrs. Qiao put the bowl of medicine down beside her. "At the time, Sun Pu was the most outstanding student in his class. Old Qiao is rarely the type to praise his students lightly, but back then he would often mention Sun Pu's name at home, and I could tell that he thought very highly of him. After Sun Pu graduated, Old Qiao recommended that the school hire him and arranged for Sun Pu to become his own teaching assistant. Sun Pu has always been driven to excel, and performed superbly in this position. Soon after, before he was even thirty, the school made an exception to their rules and promoted him to associate professor. At the time, Sun Pu was already quite well-known across the province as a very talented young man. Later, however… aye …" Mrs. Qiao shook her head and sighed.

"What happened later?" Fang Mu asked hurriedly.

"As you know, the law school sometimes helps the public security bureau work on cases," she continued. "At the time, Old Qiao had Sun Pu assist him in solving several. After they worked on a few together, Old Qiao decided to see how Sun Pu would do solving some on his own. Sun Pu seemed to have a special gift in this area, and he made expert work of several cases in a row. That's when all the honors and praise started rolling in. Sun Pu was still quite young back then, and he had some trouble keeping himself under control. In 1998, several cases of rape-and-murder occurred one after another on the outskirts of the city. At the time, Old Qiao was out of the country doing research, so the police asked Sun Pu to help them with their investigation. Using your guys' criminal profiling techniques, Sun Pu described the general characteristics of the killer. Soon after, the police arrested an individual who matched these characteristics closely. In the end, however, this person died without making a confession. Because the police had no other evidence, they needed this confession to make the case, but the suspect wouldn't own up. At the time this case was a very big deal and the higher-ups were all demanding that it be solved as soon as possible. The pressure on Sun Pu and the rest of the police was immense. I think this is what made young Sun Pu lose his head, because he soon incited the police to make the suspect confess by any means necessary."

She sighed. "In the end, the man was beaten so badly that he gave in and died. To make matters worse, the real killer was arrested a few days later. Many people were implicated in the killing. Some lost their jobs, others were sent to jail. One of the captains of the unit that was handling the crime, I believe his name was Zhao-something, was also transferred to the State Enterprise Investigative Division. Sun Pu was almost arrested himself, but because there wasn't enough evidence and Old Qiao pulled a lot of strings, he was finally let off. However, there was no chance of him returning to his old position. But because Old Qiao spoke strongly on his behalf to the university president, he was eventually given his job in the library."

So that's what happened , thought Fang Mu. Looking down, he saw the nearly cold bowl of medicine. Hurriedly, he handed it back to Mrs. Qiao. "Why have I never heard about this before?"

Frowning, she drank the rest of her medicine. When she was done, Fang Mu passed her a napkin, which she used to wipe the corners of her mouth. After taking a few deep breaths, she continued.

"You weren't here at the time, and besides, the school did everything it could to keep the incident under wraps. But to tell the truth, it made Old Qiao enormously upset. Ever since then, his temper has been much worse. Sun Pu has come by to see him a number of times, but Old Qiao has always just forced him to leave, even when he's brought gifts with him. And at home, this topic has become absolutely taboo." Mrs. Qiao patted the pillow beside her. "If Old Qiao were at home right now, there's no way I'd dare say any of this to you. Aye , for a long time after that, he made sure not to mention any of his students at home. But recently your name has been coming up a lot, and I can tell that out of all the students he's ever had, you and Sun Pu are the ones he's admired most. At first I considered recommending that you teach the criminology makeup classes, but later I decided that you're still too young. Besides, Sun Pu has been doing an excellent job these past few years, and in his evaluations he's received high marks in all areas. The school has even begun to consider rehiring him to a teaching post. Aye , I don't think even Sun Pu knows about that. On the surface, it might seem like Old Qiao has never been willing to forgive him, but all along he's secretly been doing everything he could to help him. If he hadn't suddenly gone missing, he was going to recommend that the school rehire Sun Pu to begin teaching next semester…"

Fang Mu was no longer paying attention to what she was saying. He knew there was someone he needed to talk to immediately.

"What did you just say?" cried Tai Wei, leaping up with a start from Fang Mu's bed. "The guy that works in the library? The one in the glasses?"

Fang Mu nodded.

"So this is why Old Zhao was transferred. No wonder the guy flies into a rage at the first mention of criminal profiling." Tai Wei frowned. "But he's such a gentle-looking guy. I guess you really can't judge a book by its cover."

"I never said he was definitely the killer. It's just that according to our analysis," Fang Mu said, "the killer was most likely someone who excelled at criminal profiling. And from the looks of things, the only people on campus who fit that description are me, Professor Qiao, and now Sun Pu."