Little Detective of the Tang Dynasty: What to do if you are beheaded at the beginning?

A week has passed since the Buddha head case.

Di Renjie was reading various documents carefully in the Dali Temple.

He noticed a detail.

From April 5th to April 10th, thirteen construction workers left Longmen Grottoes a little late.

Generally speaking, at 5 pm, the construction workers can go home after get off work.

After all, Longmen Grottoes is more than ten kilometers away from Luoyang City.

Youshi is usually the time when the sun sets, and it is also the time when ordinary people finish farming.

Logically, after a busy day, the construction workers should be eager to go home.

Di Renjie did not alarm the construction workers, but quietly followed behind to observe one day.

The carving work of Longmen Grottoes was restarted, and the daily busyness resumed.

"Hey, Fatty Di."

"?"

Di Renjie looked strangely into a cave and saw Song Zhen's wife Cui Mengzhu painting a mural on a wooden frame.

He looked down at his figure and thought, I am not fat, why do you call me that?

Cui Mengzhu realized that it was not polite to call me that and apologized quickly.

Di Renjie smiled helplessly. His job this time was mainly to observe the workers who came back late.

Now, it was almost the hour of You, and the Ministry of Works was about to get off work.

Di Renjie waited patiently for the hour of You to arrive. This time, he came and borrowed a set of work clothes from Minister Yan to make himself look integrated with everyone and not abrupt.

"A Guang, the hour of You is here, why don't you leave?"

A worker named A Guang shook his head and said, "A Zhong, you go first, I'll think about these words again."

A Zhong frowned and urged impatiently, "Why are you thinking about it? Just chisel it."

A Guang's hand brushed the paper on the ground, and he smiled.

"Such good words, such good articles, can't be ruined in my hands."

"It's just a statue inscription, I don't know who will read it."

A Guang smiled and shook his head: "Not necessarily, I just like these words, these articles."

"Maybe hundreds of years, a thousand years later, someone will really read it?"

"A Zhong, don't you think?"

"A Zhong?" A Guang looked back, and the worker next to him didn't know when he left. He lowered his head silently and continued to ponder the charm of these words. Every time he put down the chisel, he would think for a long time.

Di Renjie walked closer and looked up.

Indeed, the words on the stone tablet in the area where A Guang was responsible for carving were indeed more powerful than those of others.

He took the initiative to talk: "It's well carved."

A Guang stopped the work in his hands, he looked back with the awl and hammer.

He didn't know him.

A Guang wiped the dust on his forehead and smiled innocently: "Thank you."

After saying that, he continued to look down at the paper on the ground.

Di Renjie stood behind A Guang for a long time and finally left.

He should not be a suspect.

Before coming, Di Renjie had asked other people about their evaluation of A Guang.

Without exception, they all thought he was a fool.

A Guang was born in a peasant family. He had never been to school since he was a child and he could not write.

Strangely, with his dexterous hands, he could carve every word on the paper vividly.

......

Di Renjie walked around and found that there were ten workers in the Ministry of Works who were another A Guang.

Although their work was different from A Guang's, they either carved Buddha statues or painted murals, but like A Guang, they had a pure heart.

It was because of these great craftsmen that China left behind a great treasure of civilization.

Di Renjie crossed out eleven names and left the names of two workers in the Ministry of Works.

"Hu Zhenyi, Xue Zhong?"

According to Di Renjie's visit and investigation, he found that the whereabouts of these two people were indeed a bit strange.

Since the Buddha head was stolen, there has been no habit of staying overtime.

It's really a bit abnormal.

The next day, Di Renjie left the two alone.

He sat there quietly, looking at them without saying a word.

The two workers in the Ministry of Works were numbed by their scalps.

Hu Zhenyi wiped the cold sweat from his forehead and asked in a low voice: "I don't know what this young official wants us to do?"

Di Renjie took a sip of the tea cup slowly and said lightly: "No, you know."

"Do you want me to say it?"

The two were silent, but they kept their heads down.

The three people spent a long time in the Ministry of Works. Di Renjie's aura was very strong, which put great pressure on the two.

I don't know how long it took, but Xue Zhong couldn't hold on any longer.

He knelt down with a plop.

"Official, spare me! I know I was wrong."

Hu Zhenyi was stunned for a moment, and he looked at his companion in disbelief.

"A Zhong, what are you doing?"What are you doing?"

"My dear, it's all my fault that I helped the thieves steal the Buddha's head."

Di Renjie was stunned. No, you confessed so quickly?

Your psychological quality is too poor, isn't it?

He asked expressionlessly: "Tell me, why do you want to be in cahoots with evil?"

"Because, because I..."

Di Renjie suddenly slapped the table and shouted: "Tell the truth quickly."

Xue Zhong's body trembled, he was scared.

"Because I can't pay the money."

"Details!"

"At the end of March, the debt collectors came to my house to collect debts and took away all the valuables in my house. Even my wife was..."

"Why didn't you report it to the police?"

Xue Zhong smiled bitterly: "How dare I report it to the police?"

"Who are they?"

"From the underground gambling house in the city. I deserve to die! I shouldn't gamble! "While saying this, Xue Zhong kept slapping himself in the face.

Di Renjie had no sympathy, he just watched Xue Zhong's hypocritical confession.

"How much do you owe them?"

"Five, five hundred coins."

"You can't even pay back five hundred coins?" Di Renjie frowned. The salary of the workers in charge of excavating the Longmen Grottoes was not low, ten five hundred coins a month.

Where did his money go?

No need to think, it must have been used for gambling.

Gamblers never know how to turn back.

As for why Xue Zhong surrendered himself, it was probably to avoid gambling debts, because the court had issued a reward before, and he thought he could get the reward if he took the initiative to report the information.

Di Renjie did not interrupt him and let him continue.

"Then one day, a mysterious man found me."

"Wait? Mysterious man?"

"Yes, he was dressed in black and covered his face, and I couldn't see his appearance clearly."

"Okay, you continue. ”

“He gave me one guan on the spot and said he would give me another one after the job was done.”

After hearing this, Di Renjie stood up angrily.

“So, you took two guan and sold the Buddha head?”

Xue Zhong knelt down and kowtowed, crying, “Woo woo woo, I, I was also bewitched for a while. Spare me, spare me, spare me.”

Di Renjie took a deep breath and tried to calm his irritable mood.

“Then what?”

“Nothing happened. On the night of April 8th, at about 8 pm, I chiseled the Buddha head off by myself.”

“A rope was hung down from the top of the mountain, and I tied the Buddha head to it as required.”

“Then, I don’t know what happened next.”

“Then how did they pay you the one guan they promised after the job was done?”

“When I got home, I found a purse at the door.”

......