Chapter 3 third chapter

After dinner, Uncle Keisuke came to Chizuru's house.Although Qianhe had already told him about the witnessing process last night, Uncle still wanted to hear it again. "The prisoner hasn't been caught yet, right?" Chizuru's mother asked when she greeted Uncle Keisuke at the entrance. "Unfortunately, we haven't caught it yet. Now we are investigating intensely." "If you haven't caught him yet, it will be troublesome. If the murderer knew that Qianzuru was a witness last night, he might attack her to keep her mouth shut. To prevent this from happening, he must be caught as soon as possible."

"Of course I know this. So after the temporary school suspension is over, we will arrange criminal police to protect her on the way to and from school." "The little girl's family is not yet married, and the police will follow her to protect her, which will affect her reputation. In order to end this kind of protection as soon as possible, you have to investigate hard." "I know this even if you don't tell me." Uncle Keisuke felt the pressure from his mother. At this moment the father spoke: "The most important thing now is to assist the police in their investigation and catch the murderer as soon as possible. This is also the safest thing for Chizuru. Keisuke, why don't you talk to Qianzuru in the living room?"

The uncle seemed relieved, and nodded to his father. After moving the small teapot and teacups to the living room with a plate, my uncle said, "This incident is really hard for you." "No, it doesn't matter to me. If uncle directs this investigation, it will definitely be resolved." "Qianzuru has also become able to talk." Uncle said with a smile, "I want to confirm with you about yesterday's witnessing process. First of all, Qianzuru, you noticed that the lights in the music classroom were on, and then from the gap in the curtain to the I was spying inside, right? Then I saw Mr. Kimizuka playing the piano. Then there seemed to be someone knocking on the door, Mr. Mr. Kimizuka suddenly stopped and went to open the door. The murderer entered the room. Did you see him at that time?"

"Well, when I looked in through the gap in the curtain, I could only see the piano and the right part of the door. The murderer stood on the left side of the door, so I couldn't see it." "Don't you see the hands or feet?" "I didn't see that either." Qianhe regretted it very much.If he could have seen the face of the murderer at that time, the case would have been solved long ago. "Mr. Junzuka said something to the murderer, what was his attitude at that time?" "It's just the way you usually talk." "Didn't you yell or feel scared?"

"No." "Then it means that the murderer should be someone known by Mr. Junzuka. If it was a thief who broke into the school, Mr. Mr. Mr. Mr. Mr. Mr. Mr. Mr. Mr. Mr. Mr. Mr. Mr. Mr. Mr. Mr. Junzuka was shot twice. According to the forensic doctor, the right He was shot once in the chest and the left chest. The one in the left chest passed through the heart, and it should be this shot that caused his death on the spot." The image of the teacher suddenly shaking and falling to the ground appeared in Qianhe's mind again.The sense of fear at that time was also awakened, and her body trembled slightly.

"After that, you saw the door opened and closed again. The murderer must have gone out. Chizuru, you subconsciously looked at the watch to confirm the time. It was 7:10. You go to the night duty room to find Hashizume Teacher, it is 7:14 to return there with him. The strange thing is that the door was locked during this time. That is to say, during the four minutes when Chizuru you went to the duty room and returned, the murderer locked the door Locked. The question is, how did he lock it?" Chizuru had noticed this before. "The doors and windows of the music classroom are locked. Those windows are designed to open horizontally, and the screw-type key can be inserted and turned at the overlapping part of the window frame to lock it. As for the door, the room can be opened by turning the handle, and the hallway Then use the key to open the door. Because the window key is screw-type, it is impossible to lock it from the outside. Therefore, the murderer must have locked the door with the key from the corridor."

"But the keys of all the classrooms, including those of the music classroom, are kept in the back room. Could it be that the prisoner stole the keys from the back room first, and then locked them?" "This is indeed the first possibility considered. But during the time Mr. Junzuka died, there was always a janitor in the back room, and it was impossible for outsiders to steal the key. According to the janitor, only the back office has the key to the music room. Even the headmaster doesn’t have the one in his office. At the headmaster’s place, there are only keys for the front entrance and the headmaster’s office. In addition, the keys in this school are all very complicated shapes, so it is very difficult to make spare keys. It is said that the principal is quite proud of this."

"The prisoner didn't steal the key. Couldn't the janitor be the murderer?" "But if the janitor is the murderer, why would he lock the music classroom? Isn't there no money in this place? Besides, at the time when Mr. Junzuka was killed, he had an alibi. Therefore, the janitor cannot be the murderer. That is to say, the key kept in the back room has not been used. "The next possibility considered is that Mr. Junzuka turned the handle from the room and locked the door after being shot. But this is also unlikely. Mr. Junzuka was shot twice at that time, and the second shot passed through the door. Heart, which resulted in his immediate death. So anyway, the possibility of locking from the interior is ruled out.

"My third idea is that the murderer locks the door from the room first. Then he hides somewhere in the music classroom, and after Qianzuru and you guys open the door and find the body, they take the opportunity to sneak out." "But after we opened the door, Teacher Hashizume and the janitor turned around in the classroom, and there was no one there. And the legs of the desks in the music classroom can be seen. If you hide under the desk, you will be found. Moreover, inside the classroom There are no cupboards to hide in or anything like that." "It looks like this. Therefore, it is impossible for the murderer to hide somewhere in the music classroom."

Isn't this the so-called "secret room murder" in detective novels.Although it was not suitable, Chizuru couldn't help getting excited.Caston Leroux's "The Secret of the Yellow Room", Van Dyne's "Canary Murder Case" and "Dog Park Murder Case", Dixon Carr's and so on, a series of stories emerged in Qianhe's mind. A work that adopts the method of "secret room murder".Are the techniques in those novels applicable to this case? "It's like the so-called 'secret room murder' in Qianzuru's favorite mystery novel, right?"

Chizuru seemed to be taken aback by his uncle seeing through his thoughts. "—Uncle also knows that I like to read detective novels?" "Your mother is always complaining in front of me. She is a young girl, but she always borrows books with indecent names from the library. It really gives her a headache." Chizuru blushed. "—The name may be a bit strange, but the content is quite reasonable. Especially the series of works by Ellery Quinn..." Uncle looked at Chizuru's face with great interest and said, "Although it's not for you little girls. I watched it, but it's still quite interesting. From now on, women should not be bound by such words as 'what should a woman do', 'what a woman should do', it's better to do what she likes .Actually, when I said this to Qianzuru, I also wanted to hear your opinion as a lover of detective novels." Chizuru was overjoyed to hear the current policeman say this to him.But Mr. Junzuka passed away, and I'm still so happy, I'm really sorry.Chizuru warned himself. "In detective novels, there is a special way to lock the room from the outside without a key. For example, tie a thread to the doorknob inside, pass the thread through the gap between the door and the floor, and pull the thread from the outside. How about locking it?" "It's impossible! For sound insulation, the door of the music room is made without any gaps with the ground. Even if there is a gap similar to a cement gap, it will be filled when the door is closed. Therefore, it is impossible to extend the line out of the corridor. In addition, the door needs to be locked indoors with a doorknob, and a key must be inserted in the corridor to turn it, and the keyhole does not pass through the door. Obviously, it is impossible to extend the wire out of the corridor through the keyhole.” "Then, since the janitor has been staying in the back room, the prisoner should not be able to get the key to the music room. However, the prisoner can change the key in advance and lock it with the changed key!" "Even if the keys were changed, the janitor would know when they opened the door to the music room. Until then, the prisoner would have no chance to put the keys back!" "Well... that's true. Well, although this will not happen in detective novels—is there a secret passage to the music room? I heard that the music room is currently undergoing soundproofing work. Could it be done by then? What about the secret passage?" "The police also heard about the sound insulation project, and asked the unit in charge of the project if it was possible for this to happen. It's a pity that it was treated as a joke." "I see!" Chizuru was extremely frustrated. "Wait. Just now, the janitor said that Mr. Junzuka was not present when Mr. Junzuka died. Why was he not present?" "He said that from 7:00 to 7:90, Mr. Hashizume was chatting with Mr. Hashizume who came to pour tea in the back room. Didn't Chizuru say that when he saw the prisoner shooting Mr. Kimizuka and then fled, he looked at his watch and it showed 7:10 Is it divided? I think that no one can go from the back room to the music room in just one minute, shoot Mr. Kimizuka twice and then escape. Therefore, it is true that the janitor is not present. Similarly, Mr. Hashizume Same. Although it is possible that the two of them conspired to forge the alibi, in this way, the music room should not be locked. If it were locked, the janitor would be suspected, and the confession that the two of them were together would also be censored Suspected. From this point of view, the two of them are not accomplices." After listening to the explanation, Qianhe let out a long sigh of relief.After all, Chizuru has a good impression of the kind and kind school staff of Dojima, and the straightforward teacher Hashizume who treats life like a child. "If the two of them are not prisoners, then the prisoner must have come in from the outside. When Teacher Hashizume and I came to the music room from the corridor, we found a window in the corridor open. Could the prisoner have come in from there?" "That's right. The prisoner used a glass cutter to cut a hole in the window, reached in and turned the lock to open the window. Look, the cut glass fell all over the floor!" "The doorknob of the music room, or the lock of the window where the prisoner came in, should there be fingerprints of the suspect?" "Oh, I'm getting more and more professional. It seems that Qianzuru's habit of reading detective novels can be quite useful sometimes." "Here, no one knows things like fingerprints." "The doorknob, the doorknob on the side of the corridor and the inside of the door have been wiped clean. On the doorknob on the side of the corridor, only Mr. Hashizume's fingerprints were found. I guess it was when he and Qianzuru opened the door of the music room. The lock on the window where the prisoner came in was also wiped clean. Chizuru peeked through the gap in the curtain and could only see the right side of the door, not the doorknob. Therefore, Chizuru could not see the prisoner wipe the doorknob when he escaped. what." Qianhe suddenly felt remorse, why did he miss the crucial point again? "Did you find the pistol that was the murder weapon?" "I haven't found this one yet. I searched the music room and the surrounding areas but found nothing. The prisoner probably took it away. — By the way, the prisoner took one more thing away!" "What is it?" "The watch of the dead!" "……watch?" "On Mr. Junzuka's body, there is one suspicious point - there is no watch. Mr. Junzuka is tanned, but there is a part of white near the wrist of his left hand. This must be because he usually wears a watch. Now, the watch is gone. We can only It is said that the prisoner took it away. Chizuru was in the gap between the curtains and could not see the part of the left elbow of Mr. Kimizuka who fell on the ground, so he could not see the prisoner taking off the watch from the teacher's left hand when he fled." Qianhe gritted his teeth with hatred, why did he miss the critical moment again and again? "Why do you think the prisoner did that?" The plot where the criminal takes the victim's watch is as good as it is in an Ellery Queen detective novel.In Quinn's work, the prisoner will take the victim's top hat and clothes.The biggest mystery is why the prisoner did that!Why the culprit took the victim's watch this time is like that mystery.Let Quinn write it, and it should be called "The Mystery of Japanese Watches". "The police guessed that the watch must be very expensive and have a theft value - for example, it is set with gemstones, or it has been worn by a famous person. If the prisoner is a watch collector, he should want that kind of thing." "However, I've seen Mr. Junzuka's watch in class before, and it's just an ordinary one. It's not inlaid with gemstones, and it doesn't look like an old antique with a history!" "Well, yes. Then, could it be that the victim is trying to blackmail the prisoner, and the bait for blackmail is hidden on the back of the watch cover?" "But, what can be hidden on the back of the watch cover? At most, it can hide some thin pieces of paper or something. —Wait, could the thin pieces of paper be stamps? Will Kimizuka-sensei put them on the back of the watch cover? Where are the expensive stamps hidden? The prisoner took the whole watch away if he wanted it." "Then why do you have to hide the stamps on the back of the watch cover? Shouldn't precious stamps be placed in an easy-to-reach place for viewing? Putting them on the back of the watch cover is enough to take them out!" "Well, that's true, too." At this time, there was a knock on the door.I heard the footsteps of my mother going out, as if she was going to pick someone up.Soon, my mother came to the living room, "Keisuke, someone came to see you. He said it was a secret room collector, and he looked like a gentleman. Is it the police?" "—Collector of the Chamber of Secrets!" The uncle was shocked. "—Understood. Bothering sister and brother-in-law, can you bring that person here?" "Uncle, excuse me first." As soon as Qianhe got up, his uncle said, "Okay, Qianhe is here! I think the Chamber of Secrets collectors also want to hear what Qianhe has to say." "Actually, who is the Chamber of Secrets collector?" "That is, whenever a 'secret room murder' occurs, there will always be mysterious figures of unknown origin who come to help solve the case." Chizuru's heart skipped a beat.Could it be that is the famous detective often seen in detective novels? "—Is there really such a person in reality?" "Uncle used to think it was the police who made a joke. But, look, it's true!" Following my mother, a man in his thirties came to the living room, making no footsteps like a cat.Qianhe took a breath inadvertently, because the man in front of him was a handsome man with a handsome face like an actor. "The two are Police Officer Muraki Keisuke of the Criminal Division of the Kyoto Prefectural Police Department, and his niece Chizuru. Thank you very much for the reception this time!" While speaking, he lowered his head deeply.At that moment, it was like being out of the world. "Where is it, we are also having a headache about this matter. I just want to hear your opinion, um, how should I say it?" "I would like to ask Police Officer Muraki to talk about the investigation status, and Qianzuru to talk about the scene witnessed last night, as well as Mr. Kimizuka's interpersonal relationship and so on." After listening to Uncle Keisuke and Chizuru calmly, the Chamber of Secrets collector immediately said, "I know the truth!"