Balu immediately called two of the workers here, and brought hoes and shovels to open the coffin and conduct an autopsy. At this time, many villagers still came to watch the fun, even people from nearby villages. Balu asked the house to

The servants separated the onlookers and kept them at least three hundred steps away, so that they could not interfere with Master Qiu's investigation.

Qiu Wuhen first asked Wu Zuo to open the coffin and carry out the coffin inside.

After digging it out, I found that the coffin underneath had begun to rot. After all, it had been buried in the soil for thirty years. Moreover, there was a lot of rain in this mountainous area. When the water soaked in, the wood was relatively easy to rot.

Fortunately, the coffin was made of relatively good wood at that time, but after the coffin lid was pried open, there was a stench. A corpse in the coffin had completely turned into bones, and the color of the bones was old, indicating that it had been in the coffin for many years.

There were also some clothes, quilts and simple ceramics and ironware inside. Balu explained that these were buried with the old lady. After all, the old lady died suddenly and was a foreigner. Her father gave her some good things to be buried with her.

Lest she become resentful and come out to harm others.

Perhaps these things buried with her comforted her, and nothing happened for thirty years. Unexpectedly, something happened after her new inspection came, killing a cook. It was unclear whether there were others below.

.

Qiu Wuhen asked Wu Zuo to lay a piece of oilcloth paper next to the coffin, then took out the entire body bones and placed them on the oilcloth paper. After checking, the bones were all intact, and he put his hands on the palm bones of the deceased to get the bone age.

She is actually eighty-eight years old. Oh my gosh, this old lady has actually lived to be eighty-eight years old. This is the age when she died, not the age she is now. Because after a person dies, the bones stop growing and move from the pelvis to the bone.

It was judged that it was indeed a female corpse.

Qiu Wuhen put his hand directly on the skull, and the skull was immediately scanned and imaged. Qiu Wuhen said to the medicine gourd: "Please help me restore the skull portrait."

Then the muscles, skin, and hair around the skull gradually came to life, and it turned out to be a gray-haired old woman. Her face was wrinkled like a bun, and her eyes were narrowed into slits and slightly opened.

The mouth and teeth have basically fallen out, which is also reflected on the skull.

Qiu Wuhen took a hair from the old lady's hair, held the root of her hair with his fingers, and immediately extracted the old lady's DNA test results.

Unfortunately, the entire corpse has turned into bones, so there is no way to extract her fingerprints. However, DNA may be more effective than fingerprints.

Judging from the combination, there are indeed traces of a broken skull on the neck, confirming that the old lady did hang herself to death.

After Qiu Wuhen finished the inspection, he asked Wu Zuo to put the old lady's bones back into the coffin and set the coffin. Qiu Wuhen burned a few sticks of incense and some paper money in front of the coffin, prayed silently, and then

Asked Balu: "By the way, where are the bodies of the inspector, official and cook who died?"

"The bones that were inspected have been transported back to the county government and given to their families to send back to their hometown for burial. The official was from the county town. After his family learned that his death was caused by a local evil spirit, they refused to take the body.

So he was buried in our village. The place at the entrance of the village is used by some people who have no money to buy a cemetery. It is what you Han people call random hills. But I still set up a monument for him. After all, he also died in our village.

, he had a good relationship with me, and he died at my house by chance."

"Well, please take me there. I want to open the coffin and conduct an autopsy."

Balu was surprised and said: "He has been dead for more than thirty years, and he stabbed himself to death. Why do we need an autopsy?"

"Because he was scared to death by the old lady's ghost, then I want to find evidence. This old lady has threatened the lives of our inspection department. If we don't solve this problem, we will be finished. So find out.

The truth of the matter is a top priority, and all clues must not be let go."

"Okay, then I'll take you there."

Balu took Qiu Wuhen and the others to a tombstone at the entrance of the village. There were dozens of tombs, large and small, scattered on the slope. He found the coffin, and sure enough, the name of the official and the year of his death were written on the tombstone.

day.

After Wu Zuo dug up the tomb, the coffin also began to decay. When he opened the lid of the coffin, the bones inside also turned into white bones. However, there were no burial objects in the coffin, only a white bone and a set of clothes. The clothes were still official robes.

The official was a low-ranking official, and no one cared about it. Wu Zuo also took out the bones and placed them next to him. Qiu Wuhen inspected the bones, and his eyes lit up because there was actually a stick inserted across the skull.

Silver chopsticks.

Qiu Wuhen remained calm and said to Balu: "Is this the silver chopstick you mentioned that he stabbed himself to death?"

"Yes."

"These are the silver chopsticks your family uses when eating, right?"

"Yes."

Qiu Wuhen nodded and took a closer look at the silver chopsticks, which made his heart skip a beat. Because he found that there were faint bloody fingerprints on the silver chopsticks. It was obvious that the chopsticks were pierced through the ears and passed through from the opposite side. The blood flowed smoothly.

The silver chopsticks seeped out, so the hands holding the silver chopsticks were stained with blood, and bloody fingerprints were shed on the silver chopsticks.

Although these fingerprints have faded a lot over the past thirty years, they are still vaguely visible. If Qiu Wuhen did not have a medicinal gourd to extract fingerprints, it would still be difficult to extract such old fingerprints. But now this technical

The difficulty no longer existed for him. He lightly touched the bloody fingerprint with his finger and immediately extracted the fingerprint in his mind, and it was bright. In other words, this fingerprint had identification value and could

carry out the same identification.

Looking at Balu, a thought flashed through his mind. Could it be that Balu was lying? Did he actually kill this official?

Qiu Wuhen said to Balu: "Master Balu, can you pick up a stone for me? It needs to be smooth."

Balu didn't know why Qiu Wuhen had to let him do it? Because there were stones of different sizes on the ground beside his feet, and he could get them by leaning over. Maybe Qiu Wuhen was studying the case and didn't want to interrupt his thinking.

Without thinking, Balu leaned over and picked up a pebble from the ground and handed it to him.

Qiu Wuhen took the pebble, covered his hand with Balu's fingerprints left on the stone, and immediately extracted the fingerprint. At the same time, he compared it with the blood fingerprints on the silver chopsticks in his mind, which made Qiu Wuhen feel

Unexpected, but relieved. Because the fingerprints are different, could it be another hand?

Qiu Wuhen threw the stone down and said, "Please bring me a big stone. I want it to be this big."

Qiu Wuhen made a gesture about the size of a washbasin, forcing him to use his left and right hands to reach the stage. Balu didn't understand even more, but he still didn't ask. He leaned over and picked up a pebble the size of a stool from the ground, using both hands.

He held it and handed it to Qiu Wuhen. Qiu Wuhen took it with both hands and covered his fingers. He immediately extracted the fingerprints of both hands and compared them in his mind, but neither of his hands matched.

This proves that the bloody fingerprints on the silver chopsticks were indeed not left by Balu.

He placed the big stone on the ground and sat on it as a stool. "I suddenly felt very tired and wanted to sit for a while. Balu, sir, please sit down too."

Only then did Balu understand that the other party was asking him to bring a stool to sit on, and he couldn't help but feel a little funny. He sat down on a pebble next to him, thinking that if you want to sit down, it would be great if you just sit on the stone. Why should I give it to you?

By moving here, are you really starting to show off your official airs?

Qiu Wuhen said: "This official, do you still have the things he used during his lifetime?"

Balu said: "Yes, it's in the coffin."

Qiu Wuhen was stunned for a moment, then looked up and saw that there was nothing inside the coffin.

"It should be in that pile of clothes."

There was a pile of clothes in the corner of the coffin, which should have been used by the deceased, and there were only a few pieces. But Qiu Wuhen didn't check just now, so he personally took away the clothes one by one, and sure enough, several pieces of clothes were placed under the two clothes.

All the utensils, including the bowls, chopsticks, wine glasses, pens and inks he used during his lifetime, were all placed in the coffin, but they were hidden by his clothes. Qiu Wuhen felt a shiver in his heart, wondering if fingerprints could be extracted from them?

He carefully took out everything and covered it with his palms, but no fingerprints were found. After all, the fingerprints on it were thirty years old, and if they were ordinary fingerprints, they would generally be impossible to leave behind.

, unless it is some dyed fingerprints that are not easy to fade, such as ink.

Suddenly he had a flash of inspiration and asked Balu: "By the way, did this official cover his fingerprints with his palm on the document? Please recall it carefully."

Balu thought for a while and suddenly said: "There should be, he especially likes to eat bamboo rats, which are our kind of rats that specialize in eating bamboo. They are quite big, as big as a kitten. After the meat is dried,

It tastes very good. It is a favorite food of every family in our butchery. He also liked it very much after he came, and said that he should do as the Romans do! He bought a lot of bamboo rat meat and wanted to take it back, but he didn't have much money.

.Because the money was used to buy wine and other things, he owed many villagers money for bamboo rat meat, so he issued an IOU, and his fingerprints were stamped on the IOU."

"Later, after he died, more than a dozen villagers to whom he owed money approached the inspection department. The inspection department said that it was his personal matter and he was not responsible for it. It was indeed true. It was not what the inspection department wanted, but what he wanted personally.

We couldn't ask the inspection department to pay. My dad said forget it and let us pay for him, so we paid him all the money he owed and got all the IOUs back. All the IOUs should be recorded.

Yes, it’s still put up, so it probably hasn’t been burned.”

Qiu Wuhen was overjoyed: "This means that all the IOUs he issued are in your hands? Can you help me find them? I want to use them."

"Okay, just go to my house now and I'll ask the accountant to find it for you."
Chapter completed!