Chapter 435: 2:30 PM

At 2:08 PM, Lu Jibai paused on the last step outside the Intermediate Court.

The sun had shifted west, and half the steps now fell in the building's shadow. The ones that had been bleached pale by the morning sun now showed every pockmark in the stone, along with a few dried specks of mud.

He went in and put his bag through the security scanner. The man inside pointed at the desk. "Sign in."

The register lay open, still turned to that morning's page. Line after line of entries, and among them one that had been struck through with a single stroke—just a line drawn across it, not blacked out. The purpose column read: Trial Supervision Division.

He recognized the hand in that line. Heavy pressure, the last stroke dragging down.

"New entries go below," the guard said.

He wrote his name and affiliation on the next line. At the purpose column, he paused a moment, then wrote: Summoned for questioning.

The pen was tethered to the desk edge with a cord, the barrel still warm from someone else's grip. He finished and set it back. The cord snapped taut, then went slack.

The corridor's gray linoleum gleamed under the lights. The row of three connected seats by the window was empty. He sat at the window end, deliberately avoiding the seat by the door—the cushion there bulged in the middle, and the indent along one edge hadn't sprung back yet.

His briefcase rested on his knees, both hands pressing down on it. Inside, only one document holder: his ID card, his practice certificate. The three-page statement had been submitted in this building back on July 8th. The original stayed with the Procuratorate. He had no copy of the nine-page interview record—only the one in his head.

At 2:27, the inner door cracked open. A woman stepped out, glanced at the slip in her hand, then looked up.

"Lu Jibai?"

"Yes."

"Follow me."

The door at the end of the corridor bore a stainless steel placard: Interview Room. The room was small. Two chairs at one end of the long table, one at the other. The air conditioner's outside unit hummed by the window. On the table sat a computer, a printer, and in the corner, a paper cup of water, already poured, a thin film of condensation clouding its surface.

The middle of the long table was empty. The kraft paper evidence envelope that had sat there that morning was gone.

Judge Zhuo sat at the window end, shirtsleeves rolled up, glasses resting by his hand. He glanced up, said nothing, just tilted his chin toward the chair.

At 2:30, Lu Jibai set down his pen.

Identity check: name, affiliation, position. He slid his practice certificate across. Judge Zhuo flipped a page, looked, and pushed it back.

"Why are you here today. In what capacity."

"Witness."

"What's your relationship with Shen Qian."

"None. Nine years ago I was an intern at Hengzheng. The firm assigned me to the Baixi Village case."

"This case—were you counsel of record?"

"No."

"The petitioner is a lawyer at your firm."

"Yes."

"Who are you representing today."

"No one."

"Any conflict of interest."

"No."

Judge Zhuo wrote these answers in the left column of his notebook, then looked up. "What you stated at the Chengnan District Procuratorate—July 7th, nine pages. On July 8th you submitted a three-page statement at the Litigation Service Center here. Today, I'll be comparing what you say against both."

"It will match."

"Then speak. Where to begin—your choice."

"March. The second batch of samples."

"How many."

"Twelve. Two cardboard boxes, six each. Small plastic buckets inside, one sample per bucket."

"Who packed them."

"Me and one other person from the firm. Sealed as soon as they were packed—packing staples and tape."

"Did anything happen those two days."

"The morning of the 21st, moving the second box. One of the staples on the box flap caught my left index finger."

"Which hand."

He placed his left hand on the table. The scar beside the knuckle was pale, half an inch long, with a shallow diagonal line beside it.

The clerk glanced up, then lowered her head and typed.

"Where did the boxes stay overnight."

"The Village Committee. By the time we finished the last sample it was dark, so the firm had me pick them up the next morning."

"Who could access that room."

"I don't know. I wasn't the one locking or unlocking the door those times."

"Morning of the 21st—what time did you arrive."

"Around 7:50. I was the only one from the firm there."

"How did you notice something was wrong."

"I moved the heavier one first, carried it to the doorway. Came back for the second one—lifted it, and the box opening faced me. The tape was a fresh strip. The strip I'd put on the night before had its seam on the left, and when it was peeled off, it left a jagged edge still hanging there. The new strip's seam was on the right, pressed down over it, pinning the frayed edge underneath. The old staple holes were still there. New staples were driven in beside them, about a finger's width apart."

"You touched it."

"I felt it. All four sides, pressed down tight."

"Did you look inside the box."

"No. It was sealed."

"What did you think."

"That this box hadn't been in my hands the night before."

"Then what."

"Loaded it into the car. Left at 8:05, arrived at Qingyuan around ten."

"Who received the samples."

"The intake person. He was waiting at the door of the sample receiving room."

"Who signed the Sample Submission Form."

"I did. He signed for receipt."

"When you signed, did you say anything to him."

"No. He counted the buckets while I stood there. When he got to twelve, he looked up, and I said one thing."

"What did you say."

"All here."

Judge Zhuo pressed his pen into the paper at that line, then lifted it away.

"That was all."

"That was all."

"April."

"The afternoon the report came back to the firm, I saw that line: Discrepancy with initial test. No reason given below it."

"Did you ask anyone."

"I asked one question: who handled this one."

"Who didn't answer."

"I don't remember his name. I remember he didn't answer."

"That year—did anyone ever come to ask you about this."

"No. Not the firm, not the court, not the Procuratorate. No one in that case ever questioned me. I never signed any interview record. I never appeared in court."

"How do you know that for certain."

"Two years ago I borrowed that case file to review. I was checking the sample delivery section for my name."

"Was it there."

"No. Just a department seal."

Judge Zhuo set his pen in the middle of the notebook, folded his hands on the table, and studied him for a while.

"Your internship file at Hengzheng. Where is it."

"At Hengzheng."

"What's in it."

"Internship Agreement, Internship Log, Assessment Form. The log was kept day by day—who assigned the work, where I went."

"I'll request it through proper channels."

"Do it."

"If anything in that file contradicts what you've said today—"

"Then I'll answer according to whichever part doesn't match."

The clerk finished typing that, paused, then tapped out two more keystrokes.

"One more thing." Judge Zhuo pushed his glasses up. "You're a licensed attorney. Once today's record is sealed, people will come looking for you with it in hand. Your license, your firm, the cases you're handling—all of it sits behind this paper. Have you thought that through."

"I have."

"Thought it through, and you're still sitting here."

"I'm sitting here."

The outside unit by the window cycled off, then started up again.

"On July 7th, at the Procuratorate, you named two people." Judge Zhuo turned to a fresh page. "Their names are in that record. Today, I want to hear them again from you."

"All right."

He pulled his hands back from the table edge, set them on his knees, then placed them back on the table.

"The one who sent me was—"

The name came down, one syllable at a time. When it was done, he paused for breath before speaking the second.

"The one who received the samples was—"

Another name.

The keyboard clattered, rapid, urgent. For a moment, that was the only sound in the room.

Judge Zhuo listened, head tilted, and only spoke when the typing stopped. "I'll request the Procuratorate record to compare."

"Yes."

"Have you said these two names anywhere else."

"No."

"Written them anywhere."

"No. The paper is blank."

"Is there anything I haven't asked that you want to say."

He pressed his hand against his knee.

"Yes. When I signed the Sample Submission Form, I didn't look at the box."

Judge Zhuo raised his eyes.

"Put that in." Then, "Anything else."

"Nothing else."

At 3:50, the clerk pulled up the transcript and began reading from page one. Her voice was level, sentence by sentence, slowing at the numbers: twelve samples, 8:05, finger's width. When she reached "All here," she paused half a beat and looked up.

"Should anything be added here."

"Add one thing: he nodded."

"He nodded, or he said something."

"He just nodded."

The clerk added the phrase at the end of the line and pushed over the ink pad box. He pressed his right thumb down, lifted it—a fingerprint in the corner of the page, a ring of wet red around it. He wiped the excess onto the ink pad lid.

At page six, he raised his hand.

"This part—change it to my own words. What's written is 'I discovered the tape had been replaced.'"

"How do you want it changed."

"I didn't see anyone replace it. What I saw was that it wasn't the same seal I'd made the night before."

Judge Zhuo took the page, read it from top to bottom twice, then wrote in the margin, the characters cramped together. "Is this what you meant to say."

"Yes."

"Fingerprint. Page number stays."

The ink pad box came across the table again.

At 4:50, the clerk squared the pages of the transcript, tapped them twice, and pressed them against the table edge.

"Sign page by page. Signature, fingerprint, date."

"Today's date?"

"Today's."

He signed the first page. The horizontal strokes of his signature were flat and even, the final stroke curling back. Second page, third page. On the date of the third page, his pen slowed: July 20th. Fourth, fifth, sixth. The date on the seventh page came out smaller than the ones before. The remaining pages, one after another.

When he finished the last page, he capped the pen and placed it back exactly where it had lain on the desk.

Judge Zhuo gathered the transcript into a folder, stood, and pushed his chair back in. He made no comment on how the record read.

"We'll verify."

"I'll be at the firm."

"If they need to find you elsewhere, you'll have to answer."

"I'll answer."

He picked up the paper cup, drank half, and set it back down. The cup's base left a small damp ring on the desk.

"You drank the water," Judge Zhuo said.

"I drank it."

In the corridor, the floor split into two colors where the window light fell. The three connected seats by the window were still empty. Downstairs at the sign-in desk, he added a mark to his visit slip, and after the purpose column wrote: Completed. The guard asked if he'd met with the right person. He said yes.

The glass door swung open, and the heat rushed in. Shortly after 5:00, the sun had already dropped behind the building. The steps outside the Intermediate Court now lay entirely in shadow. The spots that had burned pale in the morning had darkened again.

At 5:10, he stopped at the base of the steps, took out his phone, and powered it on.

The screen lit. One unread message.

The Qinghe form—I've corrected it and left it on your desk.

The previous message was from the day before yesterday, about the same column on the form. This one carried no question mark, no follow-up.

He read the line twice, thumb hovering over the screen, then replied: Okay.

Sent.

He slipped the phone back into his pocket and pressed his palm against it through the fabric. Then he walked toward the bus stop.

The platform was quiet. The wind lifted the corner of a job posting taped beneath the sign, then let it fall. When the bus came, he boarded through the rear door and stood by the pole near the entrance, left hand on the rail, the scar facing out.

He didn't look at his phone again.