Chapter 23 Section VII Guess

"Do you want to know the results of the meeting? Why don't you tell me first, did you get any new clues from your inquiry yesterday?" Deputy Director Issel glanced at the brown paper envelope in my hand . He probably thought it was a new development I had made on the "Romeo the Scythe" case-but he guessed wrong, it was just something I wrote last night and planned to send to the "Liberty Herald" during my lunch break Press release: Another copy, which I dropped in the mailbox at work in the morning—the one addressed to Libertarian.Judging from the style of the newspaper and the attitude towards accepting free manuscripts and news leads, the hope of the newspaper sent in the morning is obviously higher.

"? The attitude of the prisoners was very uncooperative, so nothing new happened." After hearing my answer, Deputy Director Iser seemed a little disappointed—but these slight disappointments were immediately replaced by the elation he tried to conceal: "What a pity? Well, it doesn't matter. You know, the butcher won't get away this time." "Oh? So, has the specific action plan been decided at yesterday's meeting?" In other words, it was decided not to report to the General Administration until the results of this case were achieved. "? That's right. Wenzel, it's a pity that you left the meeting in the middle of the meeting yesterday, and you didn't have time to hear about the 'perfect' plan! Well, Pummer proposed this plan shortly after you left. I And Keir, they proposed some amendments?"

I didn't show any curiosity or excitement-to be honest, I wasn't very interested in the project itself.I walked into the deputy director's office today just to make sure—anyway, Deputy Director Issel will always tell me about it after showing off. "Hey, you don't seem to be very curious! Detective Wenzel—but this is a good thing!" My reaction seemed to be expected by Deputy Director Issel. "We have decided to implement a second-level secrecy for this operation. Wenzel, you haven't been out of the police academy for too long. You should still remember what the definition of second-level secrecy is?"

This surprised me very much—during the conversation on Monday, I also mentioned the confidential content to him: his attitude at the time was still sneering, but he did not expect that it has been implemented in the plan now; moreover, I myself As the original proposer of this proposal, it has also become one of the targets of confidentiality. "Well, except for the planner and executor, the content is kept secret." "And you can only be regarded as a suggester? I'm sorry." Deputy Director Issel shrugged - he probably wasn't interested in continuing the conversation with me.

I also left the deputy director's office knowingly, and then returned to my seat bored. Handik was accidentally involved in a poll plan arranged by the General Directorate, and was recently forced to go to work with Peterfield; Oulu was temporarily notified to attend an agent training in Mel City last Friday——Ben Naturally, Yusheng on Tuesday gave up because of the absence of the owner: it doesn't matter, but, in this boring time, there are two important chat partners around, which is really annoying. Several people who are more familiar in the bureau, each has his own business - March is an important month for promotion, demotion, salary increase and award in each bureau: colleagues who are usually sloppy, have to Pretending to be busy—Hendik's evaluation of this false busyness is:

"Exchange the least amount of time for the greatest effect, and it's all about efficiency." But I have never been able to personally experience the feeling of "false busyness" - when we first entered the bureau last year, March had already passed; and this time this year, the report has been submitted, the action has been kept secret from me, and the news The matter of the manuscript has come to an end today? I am obviously doing nothing, and I only hope that the "Romeo the Scythe" case will be concluded as soon as possible, so that I can happily resign with my bonus check.

Hey, before I knew it, I was thinking about this case again. If I write everything about this case into a novel and serialize it in "Criminal Investigative Weekly" or "The Reasoner" magazine-then, there will definitely be enthusiasm for the serialization here. of readers asked me: "Why was Mr. Rügenmann not mentioned in the submitted report?" Ha, of course I don't forget to write - even a bad serial writer can't be so forgetful: well, how to say, I didn't think it would be good to hand in an overly complicated report at the beginning - thought Thinking that our purpose is to catch the "Shadow Killer" who is expected to wield a knife on the night of the full moon in a few days, there is no need to disclose too much information to Deputy Director Iser: enough to arrange actions, enough Just catch the murderer.

Moreover, those are basically just inferences, and there is no tangible evidence that can be written into the report (of course, the illegal evidence obtained from Mosman cannot be submitted)-in case the facts are completely different from this inference (we naturally The existence of "coincidence" cannot be completely denied—maybe Mr. Rügenmann pressed the button to request room service in a vague way, and Mr. Rhodes really chose the time when the incident happened to visit the gardener Raymond. Miss Lorena's elopement partner happened to be left-handed, and? Ha, this is of course possible), the error in the report may also be an excuse for the General Administration to reduce the amount of bonuses:

Now that the answer has been confirmed to be revealed in a few days, there is no need for me to submit uncertain things to increase my odds of winning the rent for the first half of next year. There is one question that can be answered but not answered: How did I crack Mr. Ruegenmann's perfect alibi? If the previous reasoning is correct, the answer is simple - it cannot be debunked. That is to say, Mr. Rügenmann, at least in the seven serial cases except Eliza - his alibi is impeccable. There is no apparent contradiction between this conclusion and the reasoning we have drawn—so long as we assume:

The first case was committed by Mr. Rügenmann, the rest by others. The "biggest contradiction" that had been bothering me before was instantly resolved. I am not making this assumption out of the blue—just because it occurred to me that, as a left-hander, Herr Rügenmann deliberately made the right-handed incision on Eliza's neck in my reasoning; The murderer is right-handed, so there is no need to bend his hand every time to make similar incisions in forensic identification. Naturally, we will immediately think that the murder weapon should be the same knife (if we think about it more carefully, we can also add such words as "the murderer is about the same height as Mr. Rügenmann" and "the strength of the murderer's natural swing of the knife and The technique is similar to the strength and technique of Mr. Rügenmann's deliberate swinging of the knife" and other additional conditions).

The common sense found in the "Swords and Swords" is the second basis for my assumption: Do you still remember that when Mr. Lugenmann and I were in the knife room of the villa, when Mr. Lugenmann wanted to put the handle back on the ebony knife holder, he failed to put the back of the knife into the clip several times? Go - even nearly slipped once. In this regard, Mr. Rügenmann shirks that he is "old and useless"-of course it is just an excuse. In fact, no one can put the ancient knife on the ebony knife holder at once: there is no difference between them. It doesn't match! According to "Sword and Sword Essentials", the frame of each Japanese sword is determined according to the blade length, blade curvature, blade back thickness (depending on the type, sometimes including the shape of the handle) and the center of gravity of the blade. Tailor-made - the matching knife holder is like the matching scabbard: it is easy to find the balance when placing the knife, and it fits perfectly (author's note: this is also strictly required by the technicians, because of the vibration caused by unstable placement It will also cause damage to expensive knives), and there will never be a situation of "nearly slipping" (correspondingly, the position of putting the scabbard is similar). Let's apply this assumption to the reasoning we made earlier, and it's easy to get Add the following details to that scene: After Mr. Rügenmann swung the knife, he immediately threw the knife into the Vysova River—of course, he had wiped off all fingerprints in advance to make "Karolina's mistress kidnapped and killed Ilize by mistake, hastily Abandon the knife and flee under the illusion of ". Of course, this is not the only way to discard the knife-Mr. Rügenmann can also throw the knife in any other possible place, or even sell the knife: and then a buyer had a whim and began to sell the knife in Liberty. Will City Tries "Passive Serial Killing" (Author's note: or according to the general saying, it is called "indiscriminate killing") and deeply involved in it. In any case, on the premise of affirming the previous reasoning, at least the following conclusions can be drawn: The knife that goes with the ebony knife holder is the murder weapon. If Mr. Rügenmann had not owed personal debts for organizing the funeral for his daughter, then the 4.5 million U.S. dollars he withdrew from his Swiss bank account on the 24th of the month when the crime occurred should be the money in the knife room. It was used by Nagura Masa (and the 1.7 million US dollars withdrawn before was probably used to meet the various additional expenses caused by the execution of his unfaithful wife). By analogy, we can easily understand why the place where the scabbard should be placed on the knife rest is vacant: This Muramasa's original scabbard, which was bought after the incident, can't be placed in that position at all-I'm afraid there is no balance point at all, so we have to store it somewhere else (according to the common problem of enthusiasts, probably always would not be willing to throw away).As for the scabbard of the original knife, it was probably thrown away when the knife was discarded. Here comes a new question: Why not ditch that ebony knife holder too? That's a good question, and without any known clues, I can only come up with a few possible hypotheses: Perhaps a unique way of honoring Eliza? Perhaps someone paid special attention to the knife holder when they visited, fearing that throwing it away would arouse suspicion? Maybe that knife holder has something special to the family itself? At that time, when I was pondering the inscription on the knife in the knife room, I didn't pay attention to the knife holder at all. Now that I think about it, it seems that there are a few hand-engraved English names on the side of the knife holder. Unfortunately, I didn't pay much attention at that time. Now I don't remember at all: maybe collectors usually engrave something like "This knife is a souvenir..." or "This knife is a gift..." on the knife holder-it seems that when Oulu I'll have to ask him when I get back from training. If the knife holder is inscribed "This knife was given to my beloved daughter Elise Hofer", then Mr. Rügenmann's reason for keeping it is obvious. Well, there is another question that I can't answer at the moment—I think, if you want to know the correct answer, you can only ask "Romeo the Scythe" himself: Why does the connection between the murder scene and the location of the abandoned head pass through the Eleventh Branch? ? It is easy to think that such a choice represents some kind of hint.Referring to the Bernhardy/Kampel case, we see that imitation is only imitation after all—Teuid Street, Venice Street, and the Swiss Painter's Square are all in the same place as Theodor Street, that is, the murderer's hiding place. In a small section of the city’s Pratt district: From the point of view of automatic ticket machines, from Teodor Street to the above three locations, you only need to purchase short-distance tickets within five major stations (Among them, it is exactly five stops to Tuoyed Street, only three stops to Venice Street and two stops to Swiss Painter's Square) - this kind of money saving and convenience The behavior of first-time offenders can easily be used in investigative operations (Author's Note: In fact, for many serial murders that did exist in history (such as the famous "Jack the Ripper" case, Cleveland's "Headless Murderer" case and the "Italian grocery store chain" case in New Orleans, etc.) and arson cases, the police generally also consider the macroscopic connection between the scenes-this should be the most commonly used method), and then expose their hiding place the approximate location of the location. On the contrary, for the "Romeo the Scythe" case, the location of the fifteen satellites spanned the five districts of the city—objectively, due to the sequence and uniqueness of the choice of place names, the scene of the serial case hinted at the hiding place of the criminal Seriously weakened: Obviously the most important hint that "11th Police Station" was also given by the murderer. The police can't take advantage of the habitual investigation experience at all, but must fall into the map trap set by the murderer— — In other words, the murderer has completely taken the initiative. From this point of view, Bourne's imitation of the "Romeo the Scythe" case seems to be limited to the part on the traffic zoning map—the reason why the target of the connection line is the "distant mountain path" is probably as I said before: En didn't take Kanpur to the remote mountain trails, and set his goal there, but he made a solemn promise to his girlfriend to fulfill his wish—maybe Bourne has already planned it, and when he and the "Shadow Killer" cut off After throwing the same number of heads into the corresponding trash can, he would throw away the fire ax and choose a sunny day to fulfill his promise to go to the remote mountain trail with Kanpur. Sadly, this promise can never be realized "Eleventh Police Precinct"? What does this hint mean?Or, as Deputy Chief Pummer put it at the meeting, "an act of pure vengeance"—retaliation against our bureau?From this point of view, the murderer seemed to be a prisoner who had been arrested by this bureau. So how did the prisoner get hold of Mr. Rügenmann's knife?And how did you choose to start on the night of the full moon every year? "Cutting off the head" and "Night of the full moon in March" are hypothetical commonalities between the first case "by Mr. Rügenmann" and the rest of the cases "not by Mr. Rügenmann". Contact: From this point of view, it is easy to think that the murderer also appeared at the scene of the murder, and even witnessed the whole process of the case with his own eyes! One name immediately came to mind—Benda Blessing, the first eyewitness in the case. The first eyewitness is naturally the easiest to discover the murder weapon abandoned by the murderer at the scene—maybe Mr. Benda hid the knife found at the murder scene in advance, and after his suspicion was eliminated in a short time, because he witnessed the horrific murder The scene had a wonderful effect on his mind that had been damaged by some unknown things (such as the abuse he received in childhood), and finally made him unable to live on the night of the full moon every year. Why did the serial murderer who controlled himself aim at the Eleventh Bureau? - There is no evidence that my colleagues have inflicted any degree of psychological or physical harm on Mr. Benda during the interrogation eight years ago: but at the same time the possibility of such harm leading to retaliation cannot be denied . Ha, am I starting to think wildly too? I fired up a Marlboro and started looking for loopholes for speculation like this: The loopholes are quite obvious-the file information shows that Mr. Benda Blessing has no bad record in the case, and he is a typical good citizen.He has two small children and lives with his parents.His family lived at 17 Hector Street, a typical high-rise apartment building with night guards on the ground floor.Based on the distance between Hector Street and the White Swan Bridge, calculated at a jogging speed, he would have to get up at about 5:30 every day—if he had the habit of showering in the morning, he would have to take another quarter of an hour in the morning. We might as well use the case of "The Second Day of the Second Weekend" last year as a counter-evidence.In terms of time alone, it takes at least one hour and forty minutes by public transportation from Hector Street in Chimer District to Ophelia Street, which is very close to the main railway station, plus the transfer time (after midnight, The day bus has closed, so you can only take the night bus - there are very few trips of this type of bus, about every half an hour); because there is only one night bus N71 at Dedham Station (and the departure time is from 2 o'clock Afterwards, it turned out to be once an hour), which made the time for him to arrive at this station from the murder scene and then abandon his head to go home to be extended accordingly. According to the bus/night bus timetable in my hand, the exact time required is three hours four Twelve minutes—and that's not counting the jogging time from home to the bus stop. The body was found by the police at 2:30 in the morning, when the blood from Massahello's neck was still steaming - we can assume that he was killed at 2 o'clock, and Mr. Benda It took four hours to get home from the scene. In other words, Mr. Benda can't get home until six o'clock - which contradicts his daily waking time for running. Of course, he can use many other tricks—for example, instead of taking the N71 night train, he can run about one kilometer from Daldeham Station to the main railway station, which can save an hour and a half: although it is difficult to guarantee that he will not be suspected by the patrolling police . In any case, it is almost unconvincing to choose last year's case as a counterexample—seven years have passed since 1984, maybe Mr. Benda has long since lost the habit of morning exercises?Insisting on morning jogging for twelve years, in my opinion, is not so easy to do. Then, another loophole is quite convincing-in a family of six, it is almost impossible to hide any secrets alone, and it will take up to eight years.Think about it, when parents clean up the room, when the wife sorts out the old goods, when the children play hide-and-seek, if they find a blood-stained Toyo sword, will they turn a blind eye? Even if he did—for example, he said that he bought such a knife as a collection, and wiped the blade dry after each crime: Then, the doorman downstairs in his apartment saw him two or two times in the middle of the night. Wouldn't you be suspicious if you went out with a tennis bag on your back or something wrapped in a newspaper?Moreover, if he swung the knife in a raincoat every time to avoid blood stains on his body, then what would he do with this blood-stained raincoat? He might burn it, wash it, bury it—anyway, the police never found anything like that. As for the doorman, he can pretend that he likes to watch midnight shows, and when everyone else in the house is asleep, he will go downstairs and push to buy cigarettes (the TV is best set to automatically turn off after 90 minutes, his If the wife accidentally wakes up and finds him missing, she can also excuse it to buy cigarettes: housewives don’t talk about such trivial things, and it’s not easy to arouse people’s suspicion)—of course the knife has been hidden outside in advance.After finishing his errands, he went back outside the apartment building and spied on the night doorman from a hidden corner: when he went to the toilet or deserted, he had the opportunity to sneak into the stairwell. Don't worry about the sound of the key being opened—Mr. Benda could have said he locked the door at night.When you go out, you only need to tape the latch (so that the door cannot be closed), and then use a small piece of folded newspaper to plug the door against the door frame, so that it will not be accidentally blown open by the wind—— This way, it won't be discovered by a family member who gets up at night to go to the bathroom. This little trick, wait until he gets up "on time" for morning exercises that day, and then deal with it by the way. He didn't even have to dodge the guards.He can use the key to the apartment door to sneak out through the fire door in the basement storage room. Seems like it's real, doesn't it?Obviously, Mr. Benda Blessing is unlikely to be the murderer—the above statement itself contains too many assumptions, but there is no evidence at all.As long as any part of the above assumptions that have been advanced step by step can be proved to be untenable, then the saying "Benda Blessing is 'Romeo the Scythe'" will also fall apart. In fact, the name "Benda Blessing" above can be replaced by anyone who is slightly or even completely unrelated to the case - as long as the assumption is far-fetched, anyone can be "Romeo the Scythe": even me . Please believe that when I give this seemingly irrelevant example, it is not that I am bored to the point where I can only play fantasy reasoning-I just want to illustrate that "Romeo the Scythe" is most likely single and lives in a In an apartment building with no night security (or have your own house).He may have been near the murder scene on the day of the 1984 incident, may not know the original owner of the knife, and has an inseparable connection (or hatred) with the 11th Police Station. In addition, he is likely to have a strong interest in astronomy-certainly not many astronomy enthusiasts have been interested in the satellites of Uranus since 1984.In 1986, many people joined the ranks of astronomy enthusiasts because of the media hype about Voyager 2.Although today, this craze has long receded, but due to the vigorous publicity of TV and other media, a little knowledge related to Uranus satellites has now become advanced common sense-but these common senses today were at least for astronomy enthusiasts in 1984 expertise unique to researchers and astronomers. He may have an amateur-level telescope at home, as well as a stack of old astronomy magazines-he may also be completely unfamiliar with the works of Shakespeare or Alexander Pope, just like I didn't know why Venus was called Avo Lodite (Author's Note: This is the Greek translation name, Babylonian is Ishtar), because it is the brightest among the nine planets. He is familiar with the city's traffic zoning map: we can assume that he often takes public transportation - he may not have a car of his own, so we can slightly rule out the possibility that he owns a bungalow of his own. He must be very concerned about current affairs - this can be seen from the police case of Derek.He might subscribe to the Liberty Herald; or he might just read the newspaper from the reading column at his workplace: that fits perfectly for a single male with no one to help prepare breakfast. I tentatively define him as a single, male office worker with mediocre performance and few opportunities for advancement; he loves astronomy, cares about current affairs, doesn't have a car of his own, and lives in a cheap apartment with no night guard. I admit that what I have summed up is very much like my own sketches. I'm glad I didn't include those conjectures in that report.