Chapter 351: Counting to Five

The desk couldn't fit a fourth thing.

Nine volumes of notes stood stacked at the corner. The first one was still wrapped in old newspaper, the paper edges brittle and curling up. She dragged the desk lamp to the left side, peeled up the plastic desk mat from the middle and shook it out, sending a layer of dust into the air, then laid it back down. It took two tries before she cleared a space wide enough to lay three sheets side by side.

March 13, 9:00 p.m.

Five printed pages spread in a row, first to fifth. She squared the four edges, then nudged the top sheet up half a finger's width so the page number stayed visible. The paper was new, cleanly cut; leaning close, she caught a faint metallic smell.

Then she took out her father's copy. The corners were frayed and fuzzy, and the words in the header were softer than the printed ones—the Song typeface had been photocopied too many times, a gray blur bleeding off the strokes. She placed it in the middle, lining up the left edges of all three against the wood-grain line on the desk mat.

The third item was the hardcover notebook, opened to the middle. The pages from the Baixi Village section were softer than the earlier ones, their edges curling page by page.

She started with the ID numbers.

The first batch was boxed in horizontal lines, one number per line, small and dense, the horizontal strokes hooked inward at the end. She read down line by line, stopping at one line in the middle: that number, compared digit by digit with the sample ID column on the photocopy, matched exactly. She lifted her hand, brought it back down, pressed twice before she could accept it as the same one. The miscalculated number in the footer was still there, crossed out and rewritten, with small characters added beside it. Last time she'd traced over it when copying; today her finger found it first, before her eyes even reached the ID number above.

In those lines of the first batch, there were words besides the numbers: the well behind the yard, the water jar by the stove, who carried the bucket over. He'd written all of it, cramped, spilling past the horizontal lines.

The second batch had one line near the end. The number from the lock opened on the 12th—that one matched the printed sample ID too. But before and after that line, there was nothing but the number—no well, no person, no date or time. She read that line left to right, then back right to left. On the page, only those few numerals stood, cold and alone.

By the time he'd gotten to the second batch, all he had left in his hand were numbers.

Then she looked at the conclusions.

The conclusion column on her father's copy: cadmium exceeded the standard. Page four of the printed copy: cadmium exceeded the standard, with a few more words, saying the same thing. The header was the same line: Jiangzhou Qingyuan Testing Center. Project: cadmium. The dates were both in spring—one faded, the other's first two digits blurred.

She held the two headers side by side to compare. On the photocopy, the horizontal strokes in that line were fuzzy at the edges; on the printout, the edges were knife-cut. The same sentence, separated by so many years, put onto paper by two different machines—one copied from the original sheet, one printed from a photograph. No one had ever seen the original in the photograph.

She laid both palms flat on the paper, pressed once, and pulled back. The lamp lit the paper, the white blazing.

Nine years ago, someone had waved her father's copy around and said the numbers on it were made up. Back then she'd only understood "made up," not "numbers." Her father spread the photocopies across the dining table and pointed at them page by page. The signature is mine, he said. The report wasn't written by me.

She'd been hearing that sentence for nine years. Tonight, three things sat on the desk. One of them she'd never seen before: the same center, the same project, the same conclusion—describing a different batch.

There was a sentence she wanted to say, already at the tip of her tongue: Both batches tested positive. She didn't say it. She was the only one in the room, and she never said things aloud just for herself.

The inner door made a sound. Zhi'an came out holding a cup and stood at the desk, glancing at the three sheets.

"Dad's stuff again."

"Yeah."

He set the cup by her hand and went back in, leaving the door not quite closed, a finger's width of light showing through. The scratch of pen on paper drifted out in bursts.

She pulled out her phone, scrolled to that name, stared at it for half a minute, then flipped it face down on the desk. That sentence—she was saving it. Until the 15th. Then she'd ask him to his face, not letting a single word slip.

At 9:40 p.m., she gathered the five sheets into her hand and flipped through them one by one.

"One, two, three, four, five."

Counting to five, underneath was the desk.

She lifted a corner of the five sheets and peeked beneath. The desk was clean. The second pass she didn't count sheets; she counted page numbers: those small numbers at the bottom of each page, from one to five, none missing, all connected. When she finished, she swept her eyes across them horizontally, shifted the five sheets half a finger's width apart, and checked the backs—blank, just backs.

She flipped back to page one. The bottom line of the first page was smaller than anywhere else: This report contains six pages in total (including one attachment). She'd read it twice on the screen on the 12th; today she read it a third time on paper.

At the end of page five, that line: Attachment: Sample Handover Form (photocopy).

There was no sixth page after it.

She held the first page up to the lamp, checking the light through it. No hidden patterns, no watermark. The white patch in the upper right corner was from scanning where the page hadn't been pressed flat—the printer had faithfully printed that too. The seal was black, not red. Printers don't read seals; they only read light and dark.

Her father's copy was different. That sheet had creases, three of them, running the full width of the page. The top one was worn white, nearly tearing through. She laid the two side by side again. One crease lay on paper, one crease lay in a photograph. She reached out and pressed her father's copy flat along the crease, running her fingertip over that white line twice.

Ning Ping said: I don't write down why it's missing. Master Qiu said: I only write down what I did.

She pulled open the drawer. The notebook was at the very bottom, under some old receipts. She put her hand on it but didn't open it—the first line on top she remembered, and it meant the same thing as the number she'd counted today. Her hand rested on the cover for a moment, then she pulled it back and pushed the drawer shut.

That year, when she went through her father's old case file, the main file's index had one column marked "attachment," with no paper behind it. Whether the missing page was this one, she didn't know.

She opened the notebook and wrote: March 12, hard drive export, five images, pages one through five.

Then: First page states six pages total. Sixth page: Sample Handover Form (photocopy), not exported with the files.

The pen tip stopped after that half sentence. She wanted to continue: Who has that page.

She lifted the pen. The half sentence stayed unwritten. She never wrote anything without a source—nobody taught her that; she'd bumped into it herself in this notebook several times. She left the lines below blank, started a new line, wrote "Still unknown," and below it one entry: Where the sixth page is. She read it over once, then set the pen down.

[Thud. Both reports say the standard was exceeded. One entered the file. One didn't.]

She stared at that line until she'd finished reading, then closed the notebook and pressed it flat.

March 14, 3:00 p.m., the lane entrance in the north part of town.

Two three-wheelers sat parked outside the courier hub, boxes stacked waist-high, the folding table wedged between the stacks. Cen Hong was sorting packages on the far side of the shelves, her blue cloth apron flecked with cardboard debris, the barcode scanner stuck halfway out of the apron pocket. The scanner beeped, and she answered from over there.

Auntie Wang sat at the folding table, still in her padded jacket, hands folded on her knees. She'd come by bus; the wind had left her face red.

"You read it." Auntie Wang said. "I can't read."

Cen Hong wiped her hands on her apron twice, walked over, sat down, and only then took the five sheets. She arranged them by page number first, as neat as if she were packing a shipment herself.

"Jiangzhou Qingyuan Testing Center." She read slowly, pressing each word down. "Re-test report. Sample name: Baixi Village well water, second sample."

Auntie Wang's hand shifted on her knee.

"Conclusion: Among the tested items, the cadmium detection result exceeds the limit set by the drinking water hygiene standard."

"What's that saying."

"It's saying the cadmium in this well is higher than the national limit." Shen Zhixia said. "This one page covers that one well, that one day."

"How much higher."

"There's a number on the table, printed next to the limit. If you want it converted to a multiple, I'll work out the figure and write it down for you."

Auntie Wang nodded, eyes still on the paper, even though she couldn't read a single word on it.

"Issuer." Cen Hong flipped to page five, paused, then read the name.

"Read it again."

"Cen Shouye."

"That's his name." Auntie Wang lifted her hand from her knee and pressed it once in the air. "He wrote this name for thirty years. Wore out who knows how many pens."

She put her hand back on her knee, pressing against the padded cotton pants.

"He wrote this. How come nobody ever came to ask him about it."

Shen Zhixia didn't answer too quickly. "I can't speak to that," she said. "All I know is this document never entered the case file before. Who asked whom back then, and what was asked—I don't have any paper on it."

Someone pushed through the door curtain to pick up a package, called out a number. Cen Hong got up to search the shelves, came back, sat down, and wiped her hands on her apron again.

"Then why didn't this document enter the file back then." Cen Hong asked.

"I don't know," she said. "That's also one of the entries in my 'still unknown' list."

"And the one above that entry—who stopped it from entering."

"I don't have a piece of paper that says that."

Cen Hong's jaw moved slightly. She didn't ask again.

"Can this be used." Auntie Wang asked.

"It's a scan," Shen Zhixia said. "The original isn't here, and neither is the seal on it. The appraisal office's opinion only states one thing: which drive this file came out of, and that it contains these five pages. Whether the report itself is genuine—they don't write about that."

"Then do you believe it."

"What I believe doesn't count," she said. "In court, what's recognized is the original."

Auntie Wang pushed the paper toward her.

"That missing page—where is it."

She opened her mouth.

"That page is the Sample Handover Form," she said. "Who delivered the sample, who received it—all of that should be written on it. Where it is now, I don't know."

Auntie Wang waited, letting her finish.

"That missing page—was it lost, or was it never submitted at all."

"Those are two different things." she said. "Which one it is, I haven't found out yet."

Auntie Wang pulled the pill bottle from her padded jacket pocket, shook two tablets into her palm, washed them down with the cold water by the door, and brushed the residue from her palm against the edge of her jacket.

"When you find out, tell me."

"I will."

Wind gusted in through the lane entrance, lifting a corner of the paper on the folding table. Cen Hong reached out and pressed it down twice until it lay flat again.

"You keep this," Auntie Wang said. "I've got the name memorized."

She stacked the five sheets by page number, slid them back into the plastic bag, and twisted the opening shut twice, tighter than when she'd arrived.